Ithink I’ll go to the youth slam tonight.
Then I think I’ll do something else.
Monthly Archives: June 2006
jim’s neighborhood
He hates his dreams,
not because they are horrible
but because they are exotic.
He sees his dreams as creatures
from endangered species
who can’t be killed
because the punishment for hunting them
far outweighs the reward.
He wants to let the gate to the dream pasture
stand open all night so the wolves can get in.
He tries to lure out the dreams
by placing salt licks under
his tight-closed eyes so that the dreams may be
drawn into the open and driven away.
He builds a blind, sets traps,
and one night snares one still alive.
He offers the yowling dream upon
a smoking altar.
He wakes up and wonders
if even that was a dream.
He asks his neighbors next morning
if they heard
strange howls
last night.
He is amused when they shun him,
turning away
with blood still fresh on their own hands.
jim’s mythology
the gargoyles in notre dame’s niches
were put there to keep away demons.
the church of santa maria formosa in venice
has a monster’s face over the side entry.
dragons bring luck
in china and japan.
in my sleep i kill dragons.
i keep gargoyles in my garden as curiosities,
bring out the monster mask
once a year, and then only in the dark.
i am pretending when i say
i do not understand
why i will have to
die someday.
Good news: Internet access has returned to the Vortex.
Bad news: They replaced a bunch of stuff but there’s one old line in the basement they can’t get at. Probable failure looms in the future…
Query, revised
I’m going to be writing an article for Gotpoetry.com regarding the whole perpetual discussion of whether or not it’s a good idea to post your work online for fear of plagiarism, loss of copyright and money, inability to publish, etc.
My thinking on this issue has evolved to the point of deciding that I no longer care about these issues in regard to my own work — I’m content to let the work be out there and seen by more people than worrying about whether or not I’m losing out on potential royalties or whether someone’s taking credit for my work. I’ve pretty much decided not to copyright my work in the future at all.
But I’m interested in your points of view. Thoughts?
ETA:
geminipoet pointed me to the Creative Commons site for more info on something that works very nicely for the type of thing I’m talking about. I was familiar with Creative Commons, but not with the details of how it worked.
Anyone else out there using this?
who was that in the shadows?
my memories
screw me out of peace
more often than not.
they bring me back to such odd times.
every morning reminds me
of childhood cocoa at night.
every night reminds me
of warm college beers in the morning,
but i never recall much of anything at noontime
and that’s likely for the best. it’s a merciless hour.
anything that comes up then could be immediately fatal,
unlike the slow toxins of dark and dawn,
and if i died in the light of day
i would be forgotten at once.
noontime creates
such small shadows.
no, give me the dark hour memories,
bastard children unwanted but accepted
strictly because they’re so obscure. waking memory
is so hard to endure
because there
is so little
shade there
to shelter in.
Notice: booking Gotpoetry Live!
I’m looking for features for August and September right now, if anyone’s interested in hooking up for one. Pay is 50 bucks and all the merch you can sell in a really nice all-ages cafe in a beautiful section of Providence.
I’ve got a couple of people I’m waiting to hear from right now, so you’ll need to be a little flexible, but the current openings are:
August 1, 8, 15, 22
September 5, 19
Those are Tuesday nights, by the way. Hit me up, tell me where I can see/hear your work, and we’ll talk.
If you’ve talked to me recently and we’ve still not set a date, you get priority.
Asylum fun
— Great feature by ted_badger last night. Love some of the newer stuff, especially the multi-part piece.
— Old face from the past showed up: Deb Powers. She’s planning to get down here more in the future…
— Ralph’s: silly insanity as usual.
More later. Still no internet access at the house, so I’m at the Hut.
last night
Well, let’s see.
I didn’t sleep much Thursday night after sleeping through a headache for several hours, then got up early yesterday, cleaned up a bunch of old correspondence, showered, ate breakfast, pressed my suit, went to Boston, had four great interviews, came back to Framingham, stopped at the old workplace to see folks, went out for drinks, stood people to a couple of rounds, went out for dinner, stood people to more drinks, drove to Worcester, hit the Hut, hung out a bit, went to Ralph’s, drank some more with a bunch of people, was loud and crazy, went home, ate some more, talked on the phone, lay down, couldn’t sleep (this after 6-8 Maker’s Marks), got up and wrote crap, dozed off around 4, woke up at 9, tossed and turned, dozed off, and just woke up again feeling just fine.
Went to the shelf to get my meds and realized I had forgotten to take any of them yesterday. First time in ages.
Ah, mania. How I love and curse thee at once. You break my bank account, show me a good time, and leave me terrified at the end.
(Yeah, I know. I shouldn’t have been driving like that. Trust me, I’m pissed at myself. No lectures, k?)
The Plunge
I have a job interview today for a position in Boston. The position involves managing a nationwide construction company’s college intern/recent graduate site manager training program, pays very well, is an employee owned firm, and includes partial subsidization of travel. I could take the train in every day if I desired. There’s some travel involved, although not much as their offices are based in Boston, Providence, and NYC. I’d be spending a decent chunk of time in NYC, which pleases me.
I hate the idea of moving back into corporate life, but I’m tired of trying to make this consulting business work. I need some stimulus from outside the world of poetry. I never wanted to be a fulltime poet, as I think I’d end up writing mostly about poetry that way.
Wish me luck.
The new Zero Point Zero column is up!
The Zero Point Zero Regular Column!
It’s better than poetry!
also: i’m headed here tonight — if you can make it, c’mon down:
A Reading & Book Signing
At the Uxbridge Public Library
Catholic (Surviving Abuse & Other Dead End Roads)
The Poems
By Skip Shea
Thursday, June 15
6:30 to 8 PM
“Catholic: Surviving Abuse and Other Dead End Roads” is a collection of poetry performed in the stage production of the same name, a one-man theatrical memoir by Skip Shea. The show has been performed at the Bowery Poetry Club in New York and weekly in February at Jimmy Tingle’s OFF BROADWAY Theater in Somerville.
The collection of poems traces a life of tragedy, from enduring sexual abuse at the hands of priests at St. Mary’s Parish in the Diocese of Worcester, Mass., to the death of his sixteen-year-old daughter Shawna. A life filled with substance abuse, mental illness and suicide attempts, Shea’s poetry takes us through despair to find hope and healing.
The Uxbridge Public Library is located at 15 North Main Street (across the Street fron the Town Common) in Uxbridge.
(508) 278-8624
“Catholic: Surviving Abuse and Other Dead End Roads” is published by Katherine James Books.
The Friends of the Library will be serving light refreshments and there will be a brief question and answer period at the end of the reading.
For questions please email director@uxbridgelibrary.org
Two Sides
He looks out the window.
“What a beautiful day,”
he thinks —
“first the full sun, then
the full moon.”
A cat’s demanding love in the neighbor’s yard.
He would be too, except the woman in his bed
is sound asleep and he won’t wake her. Instead
he’ll take his love from the sound of breathing
that is not his own, and from seeing
her hip under the sheet,
so like that white moon. The sun’s
hours away yet, but its time is coming
and he can wait for it, certain of this:
that there are two sides to every day.
Poetry Update
Gotpoetry Live was excellent tonight — a double feature showcasing two very different styles in honor of Pridefest RI.
J*me rocked his usual stuff — the great Janis Joplin poem, and a relatively new one about his time in Turkey, among others — while Zilla McCue kept us snickering with her stories of “whore-pumps” and the joys of being “homo-riffic.” Packed house and a great open contributed to the atmosphere.
If you’re local and you haven’t made it yet, get down here. If you’re touring, let me know and maybe we can set you up.
That is all for now…
Two points of interest:
Tonight at Gotpoetry Live, Reflections Cafe, 8 Governor Street in Providence, we help celebrate RI Pridefest with a double feature of Zilla McCue and J*me. Bring yourself down! Show starts at 7:30, signup for the open is around 7.
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I think I can officially declare the Online School course dead. No one signed up.
A quick note addressed to all of you who said, here or in e-mail or in person, that you were going to sign up and didn’t: I don’t care that you didn’t, but I care deeply that you told me one thing and then never told me otherwise when you changed your mind.
It makes it hard to plan. When you’re only filling 6 slots and it’s the first time out for the course, to think you’ve got even a couple of slots already full makes a difference in how you plan and market and hustle.
All I’m doing these days is hustling for work. I have to budget my time among all the activities. When you think something’s at least somewhat under control, you tend to slack off and not follow up enough. Bad on my part, I know; human nature, I guess.
Anyway…so much for that experiment. I think I’m not made for this independent life. I’ve got a job opportunity in Boston right now, and I think I’m going to go for it.
Well, I think I’ll keep the hair…
so I think the tattoo is even more a necessity now.
Body modification occasionally feels like the best way forward.
I recall that when Roger Bonair-Agard cut his dreads, I saw him at a show we were doing in NYC and asked him why. He said that the hair “locked up a lot of energy” he felt he needed to release. I understood it implicitly.
So I’m keeping the long hair, will probably grow it longer, and I definitely am on the hunt for the next tat.
Dark Matter 