Sunday, September 28, 2008

The Paradigm's Shimmy, if not Shift



It all goes much faster after having done it before and working in a back yard is far better than beings squeezed in a cave between a wall, car and motorcycle.  Getting the cables off the ground and into their proper places is definitely easier.  Parts come this week including--a new stator plate and the throttle cable adjuster, and as usual the work will come down to the details in the fine tuning.  



By the by, if you happen to live in Upstate New York, my cousin Jess is looking to open a Vespa shop and she could use your help, if you want to click over to VoteForVespa.com.  

I tend to get a pretty decent amount of writing down when I'm working on the Vespa.  When I'm focused and working on anything that involves my hands.  Max has some ideas about the education systems in this country, and it gets me thinking:  in the post-M.F.A. (and M.A.) time, it seems I could either bury myself in the adjunct system making peanuts to teach comp, or use all I've learned about poems and continue to develop raw skills and gain some new ones I didn't have before, maybe move into other professions.  At some point in the education, they seem to have suckered us into thinking that if you're going to be a writer, the only way you can making a living is by being a teacher.  One job offered me two classes per semester, Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday, plus a half-hour of office hours per student per week, plus a required 10 hours per month attendance at campus events all for 19K in a one year appointment.  Another job would've given me $2,100 per class per semester.  Situations like that might be great for some people, but for me, I'd be contacting myself into an extended poetic dry-spell, as well as dependable poverty.  

I don't have any classes this semester for the first time in years.  No workshop, no thesis credits, office hours or prep-time.  Having not landed a full-time tenure-track gig, I'm under nobody's gun to produce and publish except for my own; and with that comes a freedom that is unexpected, yet also kind of obvious.  Plus, I've written more in the last 6 weeks than I did in an entire semester at school.  Have probably read a little more too.  But I was writing and reading before the school.  Though the intention was forgotten for a while, I didn't go to school for a professional degree; I was there to learn more about the craft.  Maybe one day I'll go back, but in the meantime, there's a lot to learn that isn't in the desk copies.  

Seems silly to not give you a poem after all of that.  From Tom Thompson's the Pitch

The Benches

In this mountain air we achieve
without benefit of any actual mountains,
you can train your body
according to the exacting principles
of your own distinctive pleasure--
she says--if that's what you want
here on this cold stone bench
wet with November's outtakes.  


Monday, September 22, 2008

Davenport's on Verse Daily

Check him out!

Christina Davis has a new gig and that's pretty great. 

Stay tuned for the Vespa's resurrection.  It's coming.

  

Wednesday, September 17, 2008

I'll Be There



And maybe here too:


Thursday, September 11, 2008

Pull My Daisy

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Labors of the Days




Sometimes you just have to break into your own place.  Avoid if possible, but embrace if necessary.  

Onwardly, The M[a]c Gary is a big papa.  There are cigars and cocktails to be had at an event to be determined.  (Congrats, brother!)

Davenport--also a father, thought not just recently--has a new chapbook out.  No need to order it as you can simply click and read.  Point and shoot.  Hit/run.  If you were dying to drop some dough, you can attempt to hunt for Murder on Gasoline Lake, also by the fatherly Steve Davenport.

I can't submit until the Fall of 2011, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't get some work over to Ninth Letter.  See if they have any t-shirts left in your size.  Send photos of the Patriots preseason c/0 Matt Minicucci, bike parts to Lillian Bertram.


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