A Sweet Unrest

Slam Poetry

A few weeks ago, Melissa over at Writing Forward opened up a whole new world for me with her post about slam poetry. I'd never heard any before, except that bit Mike Myers does at the beginning of So I Married An Axe-Murderer. She provided a lot of links to different performances and I'm having fun going through them.

So far, my favorite of her favorites is Taylor Mali. He is incredible- both his poetry and his performance of it. I really love this one called Giving Good Voice, which is about the joy and importance of having stories read to you and, in case you have children, it's a little naughty so it's not for them!

And I know I have a few teachers among my readers- Taylor Mali was a teacher and you guys may want to check out his What Teachers Make. It's awesome.

Taylor Mali's MySpace

Melissa mentions several other slam artists too, so I hope you'll check it out.

I've been thinking that slam has to be related to rap somehow. Anyway, I get that same rush from it- the intense thrill of a fast-paced verbal free fall- so I'll leave you with one of my own favorite clips of Mos Def freestyling.

Tomorrow I'll Buy Myself A Dress

One of my other interests, besides books and music, is clothes. I never write about it here and I don't know why, because fashion and music absolutely go together. Fashion and poetry, I don't know- except weren't Lord Byron and Baudelaire known as dandies?

Anyway, over the past few years I've grown disenchanted with fashion magazines as they've focused more and more on celebrities and status bags and less on clothes. But when one door closes, a window opens somewhere else and for me that would be all the fashion blogs. And I think I like them even better than the magazines because it is so inspiring to see how real people with budgetary constraints and ordinary lives put themselves together. And I love that I can see how people from all over the world are doing this.

One of my favorite style blogs is Leah's. It's called Style for the Stay at Home Mom but it's really for anyone interested in nice clothes you can actually live in. Leah is a one-woman crusade against the Juicy tracksuit and the Ed Harvey t-shirt, but she also writes about art, books, poetry, music, and whatever else is on her mind. She's spirited, smart, funny and warm I always look forward to her posts. She was also very supportive of me when I first started blogging, a kindness I will never forget, and now she has tagged me for a Premio award, which is so, so sweet. Typepad and I are locking horns over how the little graphic can be displayed so hopefully I'll get that worked out. But the most lovely thing about it is that now my job is to talk about seven of my favorite blogs, so here we go:

I love Bookgirl's Nightstand- how could I not? Iliana reads and reviews lots and lots of books, takes pretty pictures, and makes amazing book art.

Copenhagen Cycle Chic is another favorite. Gorgeous happy people in great clothes riding bikes around one of my favorite cities in the world.

Lost In Your Inbox- I'm new to this blog but totally addicted. Marcy talks about music and life, not always in that order. She knows about so many bands, which is really impressive because she also has three children and seems to know where they are at all times too. She's definitely an inspiration.

All Eyes and Ears- Dane posts a picture and song to go with it. Gorgeous simplicity.

So Much Silence- Another great music blog. Kevin is into a really wide range of music and posts about bands like Frightened Rabbit and Calexico while still managing to keep tabs on Q-Tip's every move.

I write about him all the time, but I have to repeat it here: I love The Vinyl Villain. I also love his German musical twin, Dirk from Sexy Loser. Between the two of them, they must own every single recording from the last 30 years worth having. They both take requests too!

Pretending Life is Like A Song- It was there and then it was gone. Then I ran into Adam at the Contrast Podcast but still no blog. Now it's back and that makes me happy.

And finally, Melissa at Writing Forward is another favorite. More about that in my next post.

Mmm, that might be more that seven, but I hope it's OK. I think the best thing about this was that it inspired me to finally get my links list in order so thank you again Leah!!

Contrast Podcast- Days of the Week

Tuesdays are much more exciting now that I've found the Contrast Podcast. This week's episode considers all the days of the week- download or listen here.

I wasn't able to make a picture for this one as I've been completely wrapped up in a project for my little boy. Back on schedule next week!

A Little Yeats

Yesterday's New York Times had a nice article on the Yeats exhibit at the National Library of Ireland. The website for the exhibit is stunning, to my mind a very fine example of how technology can be used to both preserve yet make accessible all these lovely rare documents and notebooks that most people would otherwise never get to see.

I've only read two Yeats poems so far, The Lake Isle of Innisfree and When You Are Old. He's on the list though, one of the first I want to read once I've gotten through the Romantics. I have read his book Mythologies and there is some beautiful writing in there as well.

Photo Friday

I am so very, very, very excited. Only 48 more sleeps!

The Prelude: Book Two

On to Book Two then- Wordsworth and his boyhood pursuits and how important nature was to him growing up. He describes an adventure with some friends, after which they dropped off 'the minstrel of our troop' on a small island (let's hope he lived there)...

And rowed off gently while he blew his flute
Alone upon the rock, oh then the calm
And dead still water lay upon my mind
Even with a weight of pleasure, and the sky,
Never before so beautiful, sank down
Into my heart and held me like a dream.

Gorgeous. And I absolutely have to stop and talk about a song here because of that phrase, weight of pleasure. I'd heard it before:

If I care enough I will break your heart
Under the weight of pleasure

Different kinds of pleasure, I guess. Any Chris Whitley song is going to have an erotic element that I just don't see so far in Wordsworth. Wordsworth found inspiration and transcendence in nature. Whitley found it... elsewhere. But the need to transcend- I see it everywhere. That's what it's all about.

mp3: Chris Whitley - Vertical Desert

On the album Rocket House, buy here or on iTunes.

Goodbye, Fake Steve

I've linked to this before but I thought I'd print it here. I've been crazy about a blog called The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs. A while back Forbes journalist Daniel Lyons started it up- he uses the persona of Apple's Steve Jobs to comment on business, politics, entertainment and modern life in general. And every once in a while he wrote a little poetry. At first no one knew who was actually writing the blog and then it came out. I find him really funny.

Well, this kind of thing can't go on forever and Fake Steve announced last week that he is walking away from the keyboard. In appreciation of all the enjoyment I've gotten from his blog, I'd like to share my favorite poem, Eric Schmidt's Serenity Prayer. For those who don't know, Eric Schmidt is the grown-up brought in to run Google when they wanted to go public (more here).

Eric Schmidt's Serenity Prayer

Dear Lord,
You have blessed me with many gifts
including a two hundred billion dollar market cap
and a search monopoly that gushes cash
like nothing in the history of the planet.
For these things, Lord,
and for allowing me to beautify the world
by splattering glorious text ads on every available surface,
I give you thanks and praise.
But now, Lord, your humble servant seeks your assistance.
My stock, though still widly overpriced, has dropped
by nearly one hundred dollars.
My followers, fully vested, grow restless,
and begin to seek a new promised land.
Though free delicious cuisine
from every corner of the globe
is available to them twenty-four hours a day,
like sweet manna from heaven,
still they hunger for more.
Though we offer haircuts and laundry
and saunas and massages
and a roller coaster and bumper cars and a skee ball arcade;
though each drone need work only four days
a week and may devote one-fifth of his or her time
to personal interests, such as designing time machines
and rocket ships that can fly to Mars
or just totally fucking off,
still, these spoiled, bratty, greedy little pricks
keep leaving for Facebook.
Damn them, Lord!
Smite them down!
Send a plague upon Zuckerberg!
Something that itches and burns!
But seriously.
Lord, I need your help.
Give me patience.
And kindness.
And courage.
Help me to put up with Larry's bullshit
and Sergey's smug, condescending tone.
Help me tolerate their Legos and jumbo jets and cockamamie ideas,
like this crazy campus that looks
so much like a friggin kindergarten
that you half expect to see Barney
leaping out from behind the bronze T-Rex
or riding on the replica of Burt Rutan's spaceship
or having his photo taken with Meng.
Dear Lord, how did I get here?
And how can I get out?
You know as well as I do
that I have no idea how to manage this place.
No one does.
You know that our
ridiculous profit margins
have masked our many mistakes
and inefficiencies. You know
this madness cannot go on forever.
You know what time bombs
lie buried in our income statement.
Lord, I come to you now
in most humble supplication
to ask this favor:
Let your servants succeed
at something other than search.
VaporPhone (tm), social networking,
desktop apps, herbal supplements --
frankly, Lord, I don't care.
Just make it happen.
Speak to me, Lord.
I'm listening.
I'm all ears.
Of course, if this be not your will,
I will accept your decision.
But I swear if that's the case
I am so friggin out of here
it's not even funny.
Seriously, Lord.
One year, tops.
Then I'm gone.
That is all.
Amen.

The original post is here.

Namaste', Fake Steve.

Contrast Podcast- Threats and Promises

Promise me you'll listen to this week's episode of the Contrast Podcast. Or else.

Glittering Idly in the Moon

I loved this image from Book One. Young Wordsworth sneaks out one night and steals a skiff:

...It was an act of stealth
And troubled pleasure, nor without the voice
Of mountain echoes did my boat move on,
Leaving behind her still on either side
Small circles glittering idly in the moon
Until they melted all into one track
Of sparkling light.

Here's to troubled pleasure and secret midnight adventure!

The Prelude: Book One, Take Two

I am hell-bent, not on compromise, but on making sense of Wordsworth. 104 degrees and a head full of steam. Or something. Here it goes.

I started rereading The Prelude and, as usual, things aren't quite as grim as they appeared last week. I do understand some of it, maybe even a lot of it. It wasn't so hard to read through this time either so maybe I am also getting used to the language.

He starts out leaving the city behind him (so many good songs start out that way but I have to focus on this right now), he is happy to be back in nature, feels breezes both literal and creative, lets us know he's been stuck a while and is now happy to ramble freely but will soon want to apply himself to something. He starts talking about some of his frustrations with himself, his writing, and as I read this passage (lines 228-271) I wondered, how did it not grab me the first time through? Especially this:

Far better never to have heard the name
Of zeal and just ambition, than to live
Thus baffled by a mind that every hour
Turns recreant to her task, takes heart again,
Then feels immediately some hollow thought
Hang like an interdict upon her hopes.
This is my lot; for either I still find
Some imperfection in the chosen theme,
Or see of absolute accomplishment
Much wanting- so much wanting in my mind
That I recoil and droop, and seek repose
In indolence from vain perplexity,
Unprofitably travelling towards the grave
Like a false steward who has much received
And renders nothing back.
(Lines 257-271)

Unprofitably travelling towards the grave? I get that feeling.

It's only after all this that he goes into the Was it for this and the beautiful descriptions of what nature meant to him as a boy that filled my head the first time around.