the future of poetry / poetry of the future

Yesterday, as part of my college's poetry festival, I went to a panel with the above title. The last month or so has been a huge time of research for me--I've been thinking so much about where the creative universe will be headed after the huge meteor crash of postmodernism, and just how the art world will be recovering from the huge shock of it all. This research (unfortunately scanty for now, because although scads of critics have declared the end of postmodernism, almost no one has taken the time to define what will succeed it) will be culminating in a grand critical essay on my part, to be undertaken before my graduation from Sarah Lawrence. Logically, this panel seemed right up my alley, and I was expecting to leave it optimistic about the state of art, rather than entirely discouraged. But the panel, which consisted of the poets Vanessa Place, Christian Bök, K. Silem Mohammed, and Doug Kearney, was largely more concerned with poetry as yet another "conceptual" field.

Although it wasn't what I expected, and although I came out of the panel more frustrated than enlivened, I was still provided with a better view of my opposition's standpoint, and, to be fair, Doug Kearney and K. Silem Mohammed challenged the views of their peers in a very satisfying way for me. And, through the festival, I've been offered some wonderful opportunities to see incredibly talented poets--both established and students--so I certainly cannot complain simply because some of them do not believe as I do.

Also: new successful recipe, adapted from one I found on the Sunset magazine website:

cream of lettuce soup with spring salsa:

for the soup:

sautée two finely chopped leeks in butter (or olive oil, for vegans) until soft. add roughly two heads of lettuce, (we used one head of butter lettuce, one of romaine, and a good helping of watercress) finely chopped, and 1 quart of vegetable broth, and bring to a boil. once boiled, reduce to a simmer for several minutes until lettuce is soft. add salt, pepper, juice of 1/2 lemon, and a sprinkling of nutmeg, and whir it in the blender until smooth. add 1/2 cup of half and half (or rice milk, for vegan recipe), and heat to temp without boiling.

for the salsa:

combine 1 cup fresh green peas and 1/2 a fennel bulb, chopped to pea-sized with a handful of fresh chopped basil. dress lightly with a vinaigrette of lemon juice, garlic, salt, white wine vinegar, and olive oil. serve but the spoonful in top of the soup, or on the side. serve whole meal with garlic toast.

This made a wonderfully light, flavourful meal, and would be a great way to use up lettuce that's gone wilty (but not slimy) in the crisper. It would also be great served cold, or with grilled cheese sandwiches. We used rice milk instead of the half and half the recipe calls for (one of our guests is lactose-intolerant) which worked out just fine, although for those of you who are neither vegan not lactose-intolerant, half and half (or, let's be honest, heavy cream) would be incomparable.

I have one more reading to attend today, as the festival dies down, as well as old projects to finish up, and new ones to begin. I'm going to be beginning a new series of interviews here on ye olde blogge, the first of which should be up within the next two weeks--the series will be called "artistic synergies" and will be made up of interviews with artistic couples that feed off each other's talents and ambitions to further their own arts. More later!

I know that I am, indeed, awful at this whole diligence thing. I must make this resolution right now: Once a week, at least, I promise to post here, even if it's just a few words. I feel I am becoming careless.

This morning , I awoke to this splendor:




Unfortunately, the lovely snow affected a late opening on campus this morning, which means that my new philosophy class was cancelled; while this class already met once on Tuesday, today was the second portion about which I am rather curious--the class is an integrated Chinese philosophy/movement class, and we have yet to meet for the movement aspect.

As the daylight grows longer and longer each week, I find myself once again in a terrible poetry slump. It seems that every January it hits me like this--So beautiful, so inspiring, and yet I am without inspiration.

Off to conference now, but more in the next week, I PROMISE!

A Happy Birthday Blog

This is a blog to celebrate a whole array of birthdays from these past ten days:

Happy birthday, Charlie! (April 19)
Happy birthday, M. Benjamin, my dove! (April 26)
Happy birthday TK! (April 27)
Happy birthday Carly! (April 29)

And for good measure:

Happy birthday, Kevin! (May 5)

I must admit that my blogging has been at a minimum lately due in part to the semester coming to a close very very soon (two weeks left after this one!) and partly due to my starting a new job in Manhattan, which has kept me scooting back and forth on the train every minute of rest I am allowed. Next weekend, though, is the event that this blog has been leading up to for several weeks now: Jónsi in concert! My sweetheart and I are going to see his show at Terminal 5 on May 8, and be sure that there will be an excited blog entry the next morning.

In addition, he and I are in the process of printing our limited-edition, twenty-copy chapbook, möbius strip, or (filaments) caught in growth, "filaments" for short. It contains four poems by him, and three by myself, including my semester-long, five-part project, "möbius strip". In addition to the limited edition (which we are mostly only gifting to family and friends), we are also printing conventional chapbooks, which will be available through either of us at the end of the semester. Please let either of us know if you are interested!

Well, onto the next phase of my day: class and muchmuchmuch writing of my conference paper...

Artistic Synergy

Since doing so much listening to Jónsi's Go, I must admit that it has been all I could do to not to think about that album night and day. I've gone back and rediscovered Riceboy Sleeps, his and his boyfriend Alex's ambient album of last summer, and I've been looking at photos and reviews. There's a wonderful interview with the two of them here, and this may be my new favourite image of them together:

(That's Jónsi on the left, upside down, and Alex on the right with his eyes closed. I found this photo here)

I just can't help but think of the beautiful artistic synergy that must happen in their peaceful household. They relate to each other with such a sweet, playful, quiet respect and affection. The art they create (in music, in visuals, in food, even) shows the clear marks of deep love and companionship. Oh, if all couples were so well-suited to each other as they are!

On this note, I announce a collaborative project even dearer to my own heart. By the end of this semester, my own partner in art and I shall be self-publishing some of our own creative works. There will be chapbook which will compile most of the poems that both he and I have written this semester (title and details pending) and, the best part, we are planning a limited-release edition of twenty copies or so, in larger-format binding, individually silk-screened in our own writing, with illustrations and individualized covers. We are very excited to begin this, our very first creative collaboration in the two years we've been together. I hope to keep this bog updated with the details as they become more clear, and as they flesh out on paper.

I cannot end this post with anything more than "hooray for love! hooray for art!"

Dust

I woke up this morning to the most beautiful, peaceful snowfall I've ever seen.







(P.S. these are the adorable boots M. Benjamin gave me for our anniversary...)
There's something so centering and peace-making about a walk in the snow, as one of my favourite bloggers, Margie Oomen, is perfectly aware. Hopefully all of my readers back home in California will be able to experience this great peace second hand through these photographs...

I'm off to a conference with my professor and don, but expect a new piece on my poetry blog later on today, if all works out according to plan...

The Trees Speak Riddles

Just wanted to let all my faithful readers (ahem) out there know that I've begun a new blog. Frustration with all of the disgustingly sparkly animated ads on my Livejournal account has persuaded me to post all my poetry on a Blogger site. The site is called "The Trees Speak Riddles" and you can reach it through my profile or by clicking the link. Hope it works out for the better. All my final draughts are posted there, and I hope to keep it fairly reasonably updated. Enjoy!

And the Dreaded Conference Weeks Begin...

Stopped in for a quick lunch between conferences and its coziness on this blustery day felt worthy of a picture:


This is some organic butternut quash soup from my cute little local health food store, a slice of thick wheat bread, and some chunked-up provolone. Those are my cute little s&p shakers there on my laptop.

Almost done with my poetry conference project, a series of poems on quiet things called Tree Songs and a Second Winter, a title I'm raw-ther happy with at this point. All the poetry I've written this semester has finally been put up on my stubborn Livejournal, so please take a gander? Tree Songs isn't up yet, but expect it sometime next week.

Well, must be off to work on my History of Photography conference paper. Twenty pages, due next Friday. Eep. Prayers, zats (and ducks, if Amina is reading this) are all welcome, if anyone has any to spare!