Ardor, Fortunately

Psyche Revived by Cupid's Kiss by Antonio Canova

Here's to the spirit that all it takes is one well-timed, courageous kiss. 

A full month spent determining an enhanced voice to put to words on sound.

Not looking for options. Not disguising one for one other.  

The last chrysalis shucked. A cool, sunlit breeze. Momentum.

Hello, October

And thank you for your arrival, not a minute too soon. September, that month-of-limbo, no longer summer, not quite fall, has meandered away, hands in pockets, shuffling its tapped shoes -- and with it, all the fits and starts and pfffts! of half-done and half-embarked-upon projects. 

Clean slate. My favorite month. Birthday month. Halloween. Candy. Time to dust off the free weights and lift. Time to write the book reviews I've committed my hand to for some presses. Time, naturally, to draft new poems, revise others. Time to wash the outside screens and open a few windows. Time, I've decided, is the one thing of absolute value on earth. As you'd suspect, it doesn't run with any type of currency. It appears to prefer a catch-as-catch-can posture. Fine. It's never too late to learn to adjust. What did that good dog teach me? Yes, to be glad. And if I couldn't be glad, then to be indifferent -- but without having an attitude about the indifference. In my house, we say, "I'll have a BLT" -- be like Taz.

There's a coolness in the air and the pecans are brand spanking new, doing their green-before-brown thing. I'm glad about that.

Deluge By Any Other Name

The rain hurtled down sideways yesterday. I had concerns that last night's poetry reading might be cancelled, or worse, no audience members show up, or worse yet, the poets themselves unable to get to the venue. As most folks know, it hardly ever rains in the Phoenix-area desert. I was forced to utilize something called an "umbrella" to get from my home to the car, and subsequently, from the parking lot to the bookstore. Do you know that getting into a car when it's pouring rain came back to me "just like that"? As I opened the car door I remembered --  ooh, I have to use this contraption like a shell over my head, and bend it ever-so-slowly downward as I back in to the driver's seat. It's funny how those maneuvers you don't even remember you've forgotten come back to you.

At the bookstore, three of us were in the seating area in front of the small stage where the poets would read. We're long friends, and laughed together wondering if we'd end up reading to each other for the night's festivities. Pinna Joseph, my dear friend, and Changing Hands' Marketing Director was the essence of calm. Dave was busy reading a poem of William Pitt Root's, from his marvelous new book Strange Angels. It was 6:45PM and the reading was set to commence at 7. Yikes.

It would've been humorous: large capacity, rows and rows of chairs, just us four, but we were so desirous for Pamela Uschuk and Bill (yes, he did insist I call him that) Pitt Root to arrive, safe and sound, in such unfixed, tumultuous weather. Suffice to say, by 7 they'd arrived, with Melissa Pritchard, and by 7:15, in just fifteen simple minutes, they were about to read to, somehow, a packed house. The weather had broken; the crowd had gathered. I felt like the happiest woman in the audience, to be surrounded by good friends, and a duo of exemplary poets. Our little group sat in the front row, so I didn't twist around to snap a photo of the audience, but it was full and enthusiastic, and we were not disappointed.

Pinna Joseph and Dave Chorlton

Pamela Uschuk

 Pamela read selections from her books of poetry, and a memoir she is currently writing. From her American Book Award collection, Crazy Love, she sweetly read a poem I'd requested, "The Horseman of the Crass and Vulnerable Word." Her poetry is truthful and mindful and penetrating. It's simply a joy to watch a master craftswoman at work. To speak of her reading from her memoir would set me to tears to tell you -- her survival and triumph over ovarian cancer, and the roadway she and Bill were obliged to walk down is something indescribable. I await the publication of her memoir, impatiently. She imparts faith in poetry, in travails of the temporal, and the overcoming of them with grace. Honored. Honored to have met her.

William Pitt Root

 These days one can find so many articles, or essays, or commentaries from the world of the literary arts written by 20- or 30-something's that are rife with a kind of disgust or downright maliciousness for the process of writing great work, and, significantly, maintaining humility in the formula of being a writer. I wish it were compulsory for younger poets and writers, including university students in the written arts, to immerse themselves in the works of contemporary adult poets like Pamela Uschuk and William Pitt Root. These younger writers would learn a thing or two about decorum and good form, evenly, for the act of writing itself and the act of presenting oneself in coat of decency. It would constitute a great measure in informing the rest of the world outside of the written arts just who we are who actually perform the business, the craft and the art of it. And we would no longer have to be embarrassed by the contingency of snide-casters and naysayers. If only they'd learn from someone like William Pitt Root. His reading was majestic, yet fully embracing. I highly recommend you pick up the virtuoso volumes of poetry he's written. 

These people are remarkable. They are our best role models.

Speaking of role models, I've heard of a superhero who doesn't much care for the limelight, but will help anyone, absolutely anyone, out of a jam in a heartbeat. He comes from a faraway planet called We'd Like To Remain Anonymous, But Our Hearts Are Huge. Shrewdly, I've captured his musings for you. Thankfully, The Los Angeles Review partook of the telling of them. And, hopefully, you will pre-order their Fall 2013 issue here.

Please support this fine literary journal, and the poets and writers in this issue, by purchasing a year's subscription. You can share it with family and loved ones, neighbors and friends, when you've finished reading it. The written word needs all the help it can get. Particularly to you folks who are not in the literary arts, please do pick up a copy. You'll most likely find yourself enjoying the experience of reading excellent work by writers who've worked hard to hone their craft, and who would be thoroughly appreciative to you for supporting their efforts. You might also find yourself tapped on the shoulder by an unassuming superhero.

And so it rained last night. And the dust of the desert washed away and everything was bright green, and shiny, and I felt so happy. Umbrella: like riding a bicycle. 

It's the things that are ingrained that remind you who you are.  

Witnesses Report Superhero Seen Flying Over Main Street!

Just in time for summer’s end – two new “SUPER DAN COMICS QUESTION BOX SERIES” poems in the gorgeous new issue of THE MAIN STREET RAG. Volume 18, Number 3, Summer 2013. This issue is so cool it has an outer and inner front cover, both poignant and engaging, particularly as played off one another. 

Find out how a mere mortal can make a superhero speechless AND stupefied, simultaneously, all on the basis of a gingerly-placed, albeit spectacular, sofa. 

Then find out how a superhero can kick a mere mortal’s ass in the “just do it” department.

Martha Schulzinger’s take: “I really enjoyed SUPER DAN COMICS QUESTION BOX SERIES #24. A lot. I've read it a couple of times and I feel I can identify with Super Dan on that quite a lot. SDC #40 is very inspiring. As I read it, I feel Super Dan is inspiring us to take action, action we may not want to take. It's hard work, but we can do it.” 

In some circles, “SDC #40” is affectionately referred to as The Closer.

Thrilled to be pagewise side-by-side with the gifted poet and critic Bill Christophersen, in addition to a bevy of first-rate poets, including Roy Bentley and John Guzlowski.

Many thanks to publisher/editor M. Scott Douglass for his astute, dedicated and guiding care in constructing this special summer issue as well as the full body of fiction, poetry, interviews and artwork constituting The Main Street Rag Magazine and Publishing Company since 1997. 

Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art

I’m so honored to share that I have been commissioned by the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art to create poetry in conjunction with the Museum’s superb fall exhibitions, Narrow Road to the Interior: contemporary Japanese artists, and, Julianne Swartz: How Deep Is Your. 

SMoCA’s gala event, “ART OUT LOUD: POETRY IN THE GALLERIES,” will be held Thursday evening, December 5, at 7PM. 

It will be an outstanding celebration of poetry and art and everyone is invited to attend! I am very excited to participate in this wonderful occasion.

SEPTEMBER 21, 2013 -

JANUARY 12, 2014

NARROW ROAD TO THE INTERIOR CONTEMPORARY JAPANESE ARTISTS
Narrow Road to the Interior, takes readers on a pilgrimage—both worldly and immaterial. The artists in this exhibition also evoke the idea of earthly and spiritual passage in paintings, sculptures, photographs and installations using elemental materials such as wood, paper, ash, minerals and ink.

OCTOBER 12, 2013 - 

JANUARY 26, 2014 
JULIANNE SWARTZ: HOW DEEP IS YOUR

Acclaimed for her unique blend of high and low-tech materials, artist Julianne Swartz often makes the ephemeral presence of the viewer fundamental to her work. Her art quietly celebrates contradictions and dichotomies that invite us to slow down and sharpen our senses.

I’ll be participating in this event with a few other poets whose names I don’t know yet. As soon as I do, I’ll certainly post them here on the blog. In November, my fellow poets and I will be attending a private introductory tour with the Museum’s Associate Curator in order to become acquainted with the exhibitions and to select the particular artworks on which we will be basing our poems. So thrilling!

Save the Date! Please come join in the festivities. 

Thursday, December, 5, 2013.  7PM.

Projects and Projections

Night-Blooming Cereus just before opening, which will take place in the dark of coming night.

This is the time of year when southern Arizona is the hottest and almost the most miserable. The most miserable will be in August, when the schizophrenic monsoon season, and by that I mean a pittance of rains but with dragon-breathing winds, settles upon us like a goose-down comforter over a 400 degree oven. August is when the nights don’t cool off and you’re lucky if the temps lower to 100 degrees. There’s no help then, at least until the end of October. We become, collectively, The Truffle People. Indoors by day, timidly emerging our foreheads by night.

But here the heat is. I once wrote a poem called “Desert Bird” which has in it a line “…shade the sustainer…,” and every year that line proves true. And yet, every year, I’m astonished that these trees and foliage and cacti hold up against such relentless, tyrannical heat. Usually, summer in southern Arizona means, Take a break, slow down, those of you unlucky not to have a cabin up north, which I don’t, just slow the heck down. Well, not this summer. No slowing in sight. Some shiny projects are in the offing, one involving the creating of spanking-new coruscating poetry for an event I’m overjoyed to have been invited to participate in. I feel like a racehorse at the gate, snorting and stomping and fidgeting, ears attuned to any and every possible influence for material. I want to shuck this saddle and rider, and run, run with this.

And then there are poems to finish for my next collection. I’m seeing semblances emerging, not only from a superhero series of poems, but others too, that squawk with harmony and prongs and girdles. So much to do. As always though, albeit more infrequently now (thank goodness), there’s the nonchalant rejection note, lately from the oh-so-famous journal I have sent to at least ten times. What follows from that? Nagging self-doubt. Which leads to a run-away night.

Last night’s run-away was over to a high-school-packed auditorium to see Neil Gaiman read from his newest book, The Ocean at The End of the Lane. Over 1,300 people attended. Gaiman read Chapter II, which referred to a cow and milk, and then he read a children’s tale, which involved many references to milk, and then he took questions. In my opinion, this man is thirsty for a mug of milk. Oh, and because we were allowed three signatures from him, I’m suspecting last night alone he signed his name 3,900 times. If I were him I’d have a professional hand masseuse traveling along in that giant RV parked in the high school lot.

A very dedicated Gaiman crowd outside

     

        A very dedicated crowd inside

Gaiman signed the July/August Poets&Writers cover for me, which has his photo on it, and he looks just like Bob Dylan’s brother. Then he signed an interior page, kindly, and wrote, “Way to go, Cyn!,” his black marker pointing down to the notice of my winning of the 2012 Red Hen Press Poetry Prize for "Super Dan Comics Question Box Series # 18". That was sweet. Did he have to do that? No. He could’ve knocked his signature number down to 3,899. In his book, his inscription simply said “Dream.” My one question to him was rhetorical: “Do you know how fortunate you are to have an audience of this magnitude?” He nodded, and still I saw a sliver of suspicion. I am, and possibly will always be, freighted with this type of line-of-questioning from law. It can’t be unlearned, no matter how hard we in the field try. Then it was time to hunt down “But the Gentleman to my Right,” who typically couldn’t care less about the whole dang thing and was eating a chili dog from one of the food trucks outside. 

                   

A few days before, I'd seen the great comedian Brian Regan at Stand Up Live. He was, as usual, stunning, in the ways he constructs his routines and sketches. This is a photo of not him, but the stage he was about to enter:

And then there's, oh this. Again, not something. Not law, the standard type of work I'm used to, but this, which is more heart-wrenching. Funny, for old comics to make you misty-eyed and wistful. Just another portion of real work for the hot summer. And, if they ask you if comics are a funny business, just tell them Cynthia sent you and it's a long row to hoe.

 

Two Night-Blooming Cereus, full bloom after having fallen, and risen, again.

If they ask, and they might, all of it is worth it.

O Bisbee, Sweet Bisbee, Part II

Some shots from my poetry reading at The Oliver House in Bisbee.

That long instrument, a didgeridoo, heralded the beginning of the event. We had a packed house, and I was fortunate enough to present for a genuine poetry-loving audience. It was a uniquely memorable night. The people of Bisbee were enourmously kind and big-hearted. I’ll want to return again very soon. If you’re looking for me in the crowd, I’m way in the back on the left, just in front of the open window. Working hard to get those sweet 50-degree nighttime Bisbee breezes.

After reading from JUDGE SPENCER, I asked the crowd if they wanted to hear new work. Happily, they did, and that is what is cradled under my left arm. This shot is a reminder to me to forever remember not to wear floral prints when giving a reading. My excuse is: but I was told this was a community of ex-hippies! Am I off the hook if I just say: it's a tunic! 

A quick pictorial of my lovely time in Bisbee --

Every trip needs one inexplicable shot.

       

O Bisbee, Sweet Bisbee, Part I

Bisbee

Bisbee Blue Turquoise

I traveled down to Bisbee, AZ to give a poetry reading. I'd pulled together my line-up from THE DAY JUDGE SPENCER LEARNED THE POWER OF METAPHOR and I'd brought brand new poems from my new collection-in-progress to read for a crowd I couldn't quite put a finger on. Since I didn't know what to expect, I was leaving the line-up "open and impulsive." Bisbee is one tough "heard-it-all" crowd, so at the last minute I decided to come on with some of the strong sex-and-et cetera stuff. Bisbee is also a classic, old mining town founded in 1880 to quarry gold, silver and copper. While mining for copper, miners stumbled upon this gorgeous mineral, azurite,

Azurite

which happens to resemble the deep-blue turquoise they discovered there as well. The turquoise was so stunning in the depth of its "blueness" it developed its own moniker: Bisbee Blue. Yes, I admit I've been smitten by it. Okay, so I'm having a ring made.

Last year I read for the Phoenix Poetry Series with a very kind, unique and distinctive poet, Chris Dietz. He and I decided we'd assemble a reading in his hometown down in Bisbee, not only to promote my book, but to invite musicians and other poets to participate in the event, making it a mini-festival, all to be held at the historic Oliver House, rumored to be haunted. The Oliver House had originally been a mining house for mine workers. Very badly, I wanted to see a vision of a ghost, but I guess I'll have to reach for that one on my next trip there. Not even a rattling of chains, darn it. Because Bisbee is famous for being a town full of artistic types from potters to poets to painters, I had a feeling this was going to be a wild ride. And boy, was it ever. 

But first, there deserves to be discussion of Chris and his wife, Tami. I didn't know these people, really. I'd met them for a couple of hours at a poetry gig in Phoenix half a year ago. I'm a lone wolf and I like to think I'm proud to be one. But it's lonely being a lone wolf, and don't let anyone tell you different. Chris and Tami generously and lovingly opened their home and hearts to me. Chris had prepared a tremendous delicious platter of seasoned chicken and rice, and Tami was pulling brain-reelingly aromatic spearmint from the front yard for me to take back home. Tami and I found a private moment for a toast to our new friendship, and wow, that vodka! From Poland, it had a piece of the long grass that the bison feed on inside the bottle. The sweetest vodka I've ever had the pleasure of tasting. And one shot will knock you off your feet.

Chris calls himself an ex-hippie. Their home is stuffed with every book you can think of. It's quite possible I have only one book out of every five they own. Chris has known all the beat poets, some having stayed in the very bedroom I slept in. Lawrence Ferlinghetti slept in that room. Gregory Corso slept there as well; he shot his heroin up in Chris and Tami's living room before he could make himself presentable for his reading. And then he downed a fifth of whiskey. That bedroom is like sleeping in Lincoln's bedroom at the White House, except the Dietz bedroom is exclusively poets' territory. I was honored.

I fell in love with Chris and Tami. I know we'll be friends for life. I have no way of thanking them for their tremendous kindness toward me and "But the Gentleman to my Right" except to offer my home, and my best efforts in friendship and loyalty in return. They are gentle and spirited, and opinionated and brave. They are tender and inquisitive and genuine. If you look out their kitchen window, to the right, you can see where Naco, Arizona ends and Rio Sonora Mexico begins. You can see Mexico from their kitchen. People in Bisbee don't lock their doors when they leave their homes. I love them.

Chris Dietz

Tami Dietz

***O Bisbee, Sweet Bisbee, Part II will reveal a packed Oliver House of Bisbee-ites, various photos of weird offbeat singularly Bisbee-type historic building stuff, secret culverts, one person in a gas mask, local poetic legends, a few remarks about "first" experiences for this poet, the dog, Flo, chewing on some kind of underclothing, didgeridoos, and a photo like this: 

Note that the "We Also Honor" various credit cards placard is riddled with shotgun pellet holes. Despite that, for me, it's all about the pig. The pig rules.

Stay tuned for Part II.***

Please Mr. Lion

I've been asked by a great number of people about influences I've encountered in the making of my poetry. Some influences never get old. Yes: as usual, thank you, Ray, thank you.

Knock Kneed, My Eye

Let me just say, for the record, that I am not allowed to say anything about "But the Gentleman to my Right" except that, apparently, in the photograph below, there is a left shoulder and partial head of him. He doubles as a celestial superhero so he cannot be photographed in full. It is against the universal rules. I can tell you, if you're in the Phoenix metropolitan area, and just outside downtown Phoenix, here's the place to go for seafood, brought in fresh every single day, very reasonably priced, been here at the same location since circa 1947, 1947 I said, when 2 big pieces of delicious, delicately fried fish and chips were 40 cents, ha, ha, 40 cents for a plate, the ambiance is somewhat lacking but the food is knock kneed delicious, sincerely, and notice, please, I did not photograph plates of food, as is the internet custom, I give you the restaurant  Knock Kneed Lobster and, interestingly, it has a subterfuge sub-story to it that I am at liberty to divulge:

Single Ladies, yes, single ladies of the Phoenix metro area: if you are looking to "connect" with an honest, smart, dependable, decent, kind, knowledgeable, rock of a man [or on infrequent occasion, a superhero, but don't bet your life on that one because they are very difficult to come by], why don't you take my advice and go to this restaurant between the hours of 11:00 a.m. and 1:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. Free advice. Free advice. Thank me later.

Look: they have seashells hanging from the ceiling!