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I wrote this at work

Saturday, June 30, 2007

And then my senior in time worked but not in rank read it suspiciously. It’s okay, though, because at the time my job was to stand in readiness to tear tickets.

“Every time I see one of these high production value commercials put on by the otherwise unheard-of Foundation for a Better Life advertising civic virtue and, as far as I can tell, nothing else, I am reminded I need to research the Foundation and revise my understanding of capitalist democracy (democratic republic). Thinking about it now, I am surprised it does not address a divisive issue like the Colorado Springs “Abortion Is Murder. Signed, God” billboards. The Foundation does not appear to be promoting a political, religious, or secular agenda- just broad, inoffensive traits like caring, or maybe patience. How about that.”

After he read it, my co-worker dismissed my naive curiosity, telling me that people will advertise anything. He himself would advertise littering, he testified, if he wouldn’t get in trouble. So, that thing happened. I told my parents this about the Foundation, and after hearing that they appeared to be completely non-profit, my father told us that they were in it to make money. Cynical ass.

“I tore a middle-aged woman’s ticket just now and told her to go to theater 7 on the right. She walked a few steps down the hall, paused, and, dreamlike, hesitant, told her friends that she had never been to a theater on the right before.

I have. It’s a good time.”

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trying to write a poem

Sunday, December 24, 2006

I have spent a long time now trying to write a poem, and it has matured into either self-pity or worse, prose. Poetry is supposed to be about how words are used, not about what words are used for- that’s more what prose is about. Poetry is form over content. I don’t want to go as far as to say that content is completely unimportant in poetry, but it should be less about thoughts and more about words. I thought I couldn’t write personal poetry because this would happen- it would become about the message- and think now I was right. I mean, I could write out what I want to say and then poetry-ify it, but that would be miserable and anti-poetic. That would reduce poetry to a sort of fancy prose, and not its own thing.

But master poets do poeticize about important personal things. So, how does that fit in? Well, maybe they’re just so masterful they can suppress the content, important as it is, in favor of the form. Alternatively, maybe I’m just more repressed than most.

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Search terms used to find this site

Saturday, December 16, 2006

Sorry I couldn’t deliver, person who searched for “screwdriver in girls ass”. You are amazing, because you hopefully visited my site even though it is not within the first 856 hits of a Google search, and after those 856 hits, Google informed you that the other 130,000 hits were omitted because Google thought they were redundant.

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Protected: maybe you won’t like this

Friday, December 15, 2006

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Meditations at Lagunitas | Robert Hass

Friday, December 15, 2006

All the new thinking is about loss.
In this it resembles all the old thinking.
The idea, for example, that each particular erases
the luminous clarity of a general idea. That the clown-
faced woodpecker probing the dead sculpted trunk
of that black birch is, by his presence,
some tragic falling off from a first world
of undivided light. Or the other notion that,
because there is in this world no one thing
to which the bramble of blackberry corresponds,
a word is elegy to what it signifies.
We talked about it late last night and in the voice
of my friend, there was a thin wire of grief, a tone
almost querulous. After a while I understood that,
talking this way, everything dissolves: justice,
pine, hair, woman, you and I. There was a woman
I made love to and I remembered how, holding
her small shoulders in my hands sometimes,
I felt a violent wonder at her presence
like a thirst for salt, for my childhood river
with its island willows, silly music from the pleasure boat,
muddy places where we caught the little orange-silver fish
called pumpkinseed. It hardly had to do with her.
Longing, we say, because desire is full
of endless distances. I must have been the same to her.
But I remember so much, the way her hands dismantled bread,
the thing her father said that hurt her, what
she dreamed. There are moments when the body is as numinous
as words, days that are the good flesh continuing.
Such tenderness, those afternoons and evenings,
saying blackberry, blackberry, blackberry.

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BONDJAMESBOND

Friday, November 24, 2006

Before the release, the princes of the Bond James Bond franchise announced their intentions to rebirth Bond. Among other things, the technological pornography was to be toned down in order to draw a larger, more family-friendly audience. Also on the agenda were less fantastic action sequences, but the unspoken changes are far more interesting. They have made James Bond more modern in two ways: economically and morally.

First, it seems the reason James Bond can suffer to have fewer gadgets is because he has discovered the amazing utility of cell phones, just as cell phone companies have discovered his. Cell phones are so prevalent as to occasionally allow a character to make completely gratuitous calls that develop neither the plot nor the characters. James’ missions often revolve around retrieving cell phones, which often reveal valuable clues. Familiarity with text messaging pays big dividends in this movie to the extent that whenever a character needs to supply an important, non-numeric password, he is presented with a cell phone keypad where a qwerty keyboard would have been perfectly appropriate. Much of James’ success in Casino Royale can be attributed to his ability to use up to two cell phones at once- oh, hold on- I should take this call. This cell phone call.

Second, the cinematic James as we knew him has been castrated. To modern audiences, he may have appeared too masculine to be fully civilized: every other character was to be preyed on at his convenience, and also the women. Before Casino Royale, he remains un-repremanded and the whole thing is presented as all in good fun. In Casino Royale, however, James’ behavior is condemned. He is revealed to be the victim of his poorly chosen profession: he can no longer love or trust, and this is the reason he treats others so lightly. Our heroine rescues him (love conquers all) and domesticates him. But she is not long for this world, and we are to understand that James will revert to his antiheroic ways only because he has been so terribly hurt.

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Gears of War Review, Wii Review, XBox 360 Review, PS3 Review

Friday, November 17, 2006

I have heard that Gears of War feartures a ‘chainsaw bayonet’ for the ‘assault rifle’. Some people may think that this is a cool thing, but they are more wrong than a witch’s titty. No thing is as cool as the sword gun available to the players - not the characters - of the PlayBox PowerStation console. This is not a gun with a sword attachment or even a sword with a gun attachment, but instead a gun that shoots swords. This, along with the gun sword (and I think we all know what that shoots) to be wielded by the player’s off-hand, is the reason the PlayBox outmatches the rest of the new consoles available this holiday season. Unfortunately, they will be very hard to find until mid-2007.

Hot hell! Holy damn! Ima git me some hits! Should a player enter “xbox 360 gears of war review”, Google will bestow a player with three and a half million options - and this page a-one-a them!

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A JOKE in SIX LINES

Thursday, November 16, 2006

Years ago, Alan and I happened to overhear a wonderful girl innocently ask about an aroma she detected. This is a poem in her honor.

A hallway standing girl inhaled inhales
That hungry ask, “Kapow!” And also ask,
“Oh Snap! A smell that chicken pot pie smells!
What could it be I hallway standing smell?”
Well girl, as you are outside kitchen ask,
I think it’s pretty clear that it’s just chicken pot pie.

Advanced litarary techniques used in this poem include adjectiving a pro-verb, using contemporary slang, and having a punchline.

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What I Did Today

Thursday, November 16, 2006

Prologue: What I Did Last Night

Last night I watched sitcoms and supernatural dramas on broadcast television with my brother. I recognized the actress from the movie Brick, which reminded me that if everyone doesn’t watch contemporary film noir set in suburban high schools, the terrorists have won the battle over popular movies. Well, not on my watch. Karl needed this movie, intravenously if possible. The horrible laugh tracks of popular television strengthed my resolve.

Chapter 1

I was only temporarily discouraged by the following setback. I announced to my father this afternoon my intentions of renting the movie and watching it later that evening. He cautioned me that the household battle over television watching and computer using rights had arrived at an unstable agreement. Karl was permitted to use the computer on weekdays provided he finish his homework and maintain his grades. Well and good, I thought: not wishing to offend but instead to accomadate, I decided that I would make sure homework was finished. But this turned out not to be the wrinkle my father meant to allude to; or, this turned out not to be the wrinkle to which my father meant to allude, if you prefer your phrasing grammatic and unattractive. He meant to allude te the allowance of weekday computer use but but disallowance of weekday television use. I quickly promised to put the movie off until the weekend so that no feathers, his or Karl’s, might be ruffled. Presumably unaware of the irony, my father rejoined that while he himself liked this plan just fine, there was just no pleasing some people.

Chapter 2

I walked Bella to Blockbuster. Along the way I saw some dark, low storm clouds completely obscure the twin peaks. The sun shone and the wind blew. I thought of Taru because of its geoghraphical situation and because the typical Colorado weather reminded me of walking to Alan’s house or David’s house.

At Blockbuster I asked first for films, and not movies, by Tarkovsky and Bergman. Of course they had none: I had only asked to satisfy elitism. However, it gave the movie girl the perfect opportunity to pitch Blockbuster online, because surely the Blockbuster mothership would have my esoteric titles and all new customers get a free two week trial period! She presented me with a coupon ostensibly needed to unlock my free account. It isn’t. Its size, shape, bright colors and resistence to being managably folded betray its true purpose of being seen.

They did have Brick. I paid for it with coins, and not the larger, more valuable ones. No one carries $4.07 with them in change without having planned on a powerful gesture of insensitivity for the convenience of the money-taker, but as I was short $.26 (well, less than that, but the girl would not recieve my myriad pennies) and as she was willing to supply the deficit, it was not so powerful as one might have liked.

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A grasping Brazilian/Greasy pavilion

Saturday, November 11, 2006

Dear Alan,

Yesterday after I came home I announced my intention to visit the store. What for? Deodorant, toothbrush, toothpaste, floss, and nose hair scissors- all the things that I am too important to have bothered to travel with. Oh, and a pen, I remembered. I was advised by my father that, quote, there were a grillion pens in the house. I imagined that a ‘grillion’ was slang for ‘a grimey million’, and thus informed, redoubled my efforts to secure a clean one.

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Theirs Is A Polite Language

Sunday, October 1, 2006

This gem was taped, with small, manually achieved pieces of tape, on to the postcard that Alan sent to me from Japan. I reproduce it here for your cultural enlightenment.

“THIS ITEM IS DESTINED FOR YOUR COUNTRY !!

The sender’s and addressee’s addresses are in opposite position.

It would be greatly appreciated if you could deliver it to the addressee. Thank you.”

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This is an interview

Sunday, October 1, 2006

That I found online of Alan. It is ostensibly a plug for the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor Language Department. However, one suspects that the Department could have chosen a person whose qualified praise is slightly less scrupulous.

“Studying Japanese is important to me…I guess because I started it in high school. Initially it was an arbitrary decision, but once I became interested in it I wanted to continue (studying it) and I have since decided that I want to study in Japan next year and so it’s become important for that reason (too). I’ve since found out about a lot of programs such as the JET program Japan, English Teacher Exchange program, which provide jobs for people who study and know Japanese and English speakers to teach abroad. I decided to continue with it (studying Japanese) partially for that reason.”

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Mural of Flavor

Monday, September 18, 2006

Oh salt-free mural of flavor, grace my pork chops with your low sodium health. I’m looking to gaze into a mural of flavor- more than gaze, dive- dive into a torrent of flavor, a gushing current wherein I’m not altogether in command, not altogether comfortable, so swept away by the ubiquitous pressure of surprising oral color. I’m so happy to give myself up to you, salt-free orgasm, you scintillating effluvence of roseate luxury. I’m a flavor whore: use me, mural, service my wet taste buds, titillate, tease, and, finally satisfy me- but responsibly: without salt. Such a higher joy is the joy of salt free comestibles than the vulgar joy of uncouth sodium.

Paradife Loft

Where once we joyful lived the rare empyreal air ensconced among, blissful for that which we slept within, so many spacious square feet.

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I need to change my attitude

Monday, September 11, 2006

I’ve come away from these Pascal and Descartes seminars not enriched by their wisdom, or amused by their novel or beautiful thoughts, but convinced that their philosophies only insufficiently describe the world or my experience. I am reminded of my experience that all the essays I could write, however scrupulously, will be rendered inadequate by a casual treatment by a tutor.

How upsetting. I have a natural, or at least strong, penchant for skepticism. I came here convinced that truth was unattainable. In light of this, I decided to no longer voice or seek out difficulties but look for and suggest solutions. I changed my goal to appreciating not truth, but compelling and interesting ‘ways of understanding’ and beauty. Now, though, it seems that qualifying like this doesn’t circumvent the above problem. Which is, pretty much, that there are problems and difficulties.

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I wrote a great poem about Maggie

Thursday, August 17, 2006

Well Maggie, let me tell you that although
You butter far more butter onto bread
Than I would ever dream of buttering,
And even though you wrap up onto hips
More belts (a number truly fabulous
As it suggests some cautionary tale)
Than I would ever dream of wrapping up,
I guess you’re still a pretty alright girl.
A praying mantis waits for us. Love, me.

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I wrote a great poem about Felicia

Friday, August 4, 2006

Last night I had a vivid kissing dream.
Of course it was. I only mention it
Because I needed two more syllables;
Just one more stubborn trochee. Anyhow,
I squirmed for kissing you, Felicia, you.
You are, no doubt, both flattered and aroused
To hear how you have wormed your curly self
(To sex this up, I here refer to pubes)
Into my sleepy bed, my mouth, and this,
An ode and exercise in unrhymed verse.

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Excerpt from letter to Alan

Sunday, July 23, 2006

Dear Alan,

Salutations, cracker. I’m a-sitting (a-sittin’, really), in mah damn old apartment living room and have a purpose to write on a letter to you. I’m eating some left over lentils for dinner at this, the hour of five. I’ve meant to cook up some bread so’s I can wrap the dough around the lentil - and also left0ver risotto - but the kitchen’s a holy hell mess what with my successful dinner party las’ nacht. I have five kiddos over, and I cooked for them some spaetzle and goulasch. They were very excited to see me use the spaetzle schwob - an instrument resemblin’ a giant garlic press - to press the egg and flour batter directly into a whole mess-a boiling water whereupon it was cooked straightaways.

I am sorry to hear about the monotony of your job but heartened to hear that you’re spending so much quality time with Dan. Phuong’s datin’ on him these days, and she told me in an IM that she felt so comfortable with him and liked him very much. Sounds like Dan is some kind of good guy these days and that makes me miss him and feel tenderly towards him. I’ve been sprending some real quality time with Brian- we go on walks and have great conversations.

What movies have you been a watchin wit Dan? I been watching “The Passion of Anna” by Ingmar Bergman and “8 1/2″ by Fellini. They are both geniuses. I watch a Bergman movie and think very much that cinema is as good a place as literature and music to find beauty. Fuck, man. I remember bloggin’ a long time ago ’bout how mine Pater had denied me some movie rental but that was ok ’cause “I wouldn’t give up butter for movies”- a reference to some wartime slogan encouragin givin up butta fo guns. Kendar commented, all-sayin that on the contrarizzle, she’d give up a who’ lot fo some good moovis. Well, she had that raight. Movies are some mad profound shit.

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Excerpt from letter to grandmother

Monday, July 10, 2006

I haven’t exercised in so long- months, years (?)- and it feels so good. I am in no kind of shape, naturally, but still I feel blissful. I will try to do so more often- not primarily for the long-term, abstract health benefits or even the beauty it may or may not bestow on me, but for the immediate gratification, which is both a bodily high and an emotional release. I feel so powerful, so benevolent! I feel loved and loving.

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S G

Friday, July 7, 2006

The combination lock on my school mailbox is unique: it has two dials, the one on the left bearing the letters A through M, and the one on the right bearing the letters N through Z. To open the lock, you must dial a particular letter on the left and a particular letter on the right. Here’s the interesting part: coming home just now, I took out my apartment key, stuck it in the normal lock my door sports, and found myself reciting the two letters of my mailbox lock. And it’s happened before, when I’ve opened my gym lock, a conventional dial-three-numbers combination lock. As I’m twisting it to the first number, I’ll hum the first letter, and so on. Stimulus generalization, babe!

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L T C

Thursday, July 6, 2006

I saw The Last Temptation of Christ last night. It made me want to have long hair again. Like Jesus. They called me Jesus when I had long hair on high school swim team. As for the movie, I was dissapointed. I can’t put my finger on why. Part of it was because I knew the plot beforehand and so was expecting it. Certainly the last temptation was the most interesting part. Why did he move from woman to woman, for instance? Was God killing them off as a sign? Why did Saul and his disciples have conflicting views about what ended up happening? And also “There is only one woman”? Hmmm. The acting didn’t seem that great. M-maybe I’m being a snob? All I can say is, I wasn’t moved.

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