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Jason Crane Posts

The sonnet in all (or at least many of) its forms

Sina Queyras, poet and blogger at Harriet, the Poetry Foundation blog, wrote an interesting post on the modern sonnet. In it, she mentions this erasure poem by Jen Bervin, from her book Nets:

When I have seen by Time’s fell hand defaced
The rich proud cost of outworn buried age;
When sometime lofty towers I see down-razed,
And brass eternal slave to mortal rage;
When I have seen the hungry ocean gain
Advantage on the kingdom of the shore,
And the firm soil win of the watery main,
Increasing store with loss and loss with store;
When I have seen such interchange of state,
Or state itself confounded to decay;
Ruin hath taught me thus to ruminate
That Time will come and take my love away.
This thought is as a death which cannot choose
But weep to have that which it fears to lose.

Wow. You can find out more at jenbervin.com, and here’s a link to Bervin’s book:

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POEM: Blackout

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Blackout

during the war he rode the English trains
asking strangers to wake him at his stop
they never did, and he’d find himself lost
in the blacked-out countryside
worried that the Brits would find him
and think he was a German spy
“They’d shoot ya,” he told me
holding on to the bar in the subway
and leaning against his wife
“My Ro,” he called her
they’d just been to the opera
to see Atilla, and now here he was navigating
the depths of this city, trying to
find the next connection and looking for help
to yet another stranger on a train
I grasped his hand as I led his Ro and him
to the shuttle for Grand Central
this time all the lights were on,
and no shots were fired

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POEM: Eating Godzilla

Listen to this poem using the player above. The music is by a friend who prefers not to be named. The laughter is by Bernie and John.

Eating Godzilla

for some reason, we started with the tail
you’d think that would be the toughest part
but after we’d sliced away the scales
the flesh was surprisingly tender
and no, it didn’t like taste like chicken
well, maybe a little
but it also had that metallic
just-out-of-the-microwave aftertaste
probably from the lingering effects of the radiation
Kazuhiro had insisted on serving side dishes
despite our obvious inability to finish
the great green lizard in one sitting
so we’d sautéed Mothra in a sesame sauce
and served him (her? it?) in lovely
sculpted bowls that fit perfectly in the hand
I’d suggested also eating Raymond Burr
just for old times’ sake
but by this time he was more fat than meat
and who can be bothered to pare all that away
just for a few grizzled bits of TV lawyer?
anyway, after the tail was finished we
cracked open Godzilla’s skull to get at
what we thought would be
the salty brain encased within
imagine our surprise, then, when
the skull turned out to contain
thousands of Pez candies
in a variety of fruity colors
Iwai-kun suggested handing them out to the children
who’d naturally gathered ’round us
for a look at the sundered source
of their nightmares
you should have seen the smiles
on their faces as he
reached his hands into the skull
and drew forth the rainbow
of sugary delights
he tossed the Pez out like Mardi Gras beads
and the kids scrummaged for them, squealing

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POEM: Tea Ceremony Hurts Yours Legs

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Tea Ceremony Hurts Yours Legs

at 17, I studied the ancient art of tea ceremony
with my final host-mother
and a teacher who seemed middle-aged
but may have been just slightly older than I am now
I’m not sure about the sensei,
but one thing I do know is
tea ceremony hurts your legs
the insidious thing is that you
don’t even notice it at first
you’re too focused on
placing the bowl just so
the ladle along the crook
between your thumb and index finger
the sugary snacks on a piece
of pristine rice paper
floating above the tatami floor
after a while, it feels like
you yourself are suspended
above the floor, just slightly
is this enlightenment?
did I, at 17, achieve satori?
wait till my parents hear about this!
and it’s then, as you leap up
to spread the word
that you realize your mistake
and pitch face-down onto the mat
spilling your carefully whipped green foam
and crushing the delicate wooden ladle

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POEM: Where In The World Is Weldon Kees?

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On July 19, 1955, poet Weldon Kees’ car was found on the Golden Gate Bridge with the keys still in the ignition. Shortly before, he’d told a friend that he wanted to move to Mexico to start a new life.

Where In The World Is Weldon Kees?

“It is still not known whether he killed himself or went to Mexico.”
— from a Poetry Foundation podcast about Kees

Or maybe both
perhaps all suicides go to Mexico
sit invisibly in the zocalo
and listen to the mariachi band
if unbaptized babies
are shunted off to limbo
and a beef jerky
can get you purgatory
why couldn’t a leap from the Golden Gate
land you in Guadalajara?

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POEM: Aomori

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Aomori

standing on the cliffs of Aomori
is like standing at the end of the world
one more step and you can take
a refreshing swim in the bay
if you survive the drop, that is
squint your eyes and it feels like flying
pine trees level with the top of your head
and the waves continuing their
thousand-year attack on the rocks below
I kept better notes than this
but they were lost in a flood
nothing so grand as the sea
winning that final victory
it was just that our washing machine
overflowed and submerged the basement
who would have thought
after a thousand years
it would be a load of laundry
that would finally conquer
the cliffs of Aomori?

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Review: While We’ve Still Got Feet by David Budbill

David Budbill isn’t a hermit or a recluse or a misanthrope, although he chose four decades ago to move to a mountain and write poems and play the flute. The thing is, unlike the image that immediately conjures, Budbill still seems gregarious and connected and invested in friends and family. Oh, and he moved to the mountain with his wife.

While We’ve Still Got Feet (Copper Canyon Press, 2005) is a joyous collection of poems informed by the work of Chinese and Japanese recluse-poets and by Budbill’s own distilled observations. The poems are clear and often arresting, filled with wry humor and a refreshing matter-of-factness.

Budbill, who also publishes the overtly political and progressive e-newsletter The Judevine Mountain Emailite, sprinkles the occasional political commentary into his poetry. Of course, looked at from another perspective, his entire existence is a political act and a commentary on the system of consumption and greed that has grown up here on the same soil that provides the foundation for Budbill’s mountain home. Here is one example of Budbill’s combination of humor and insight:

***

It’s Now or Never

Eat, drink, and be merry, for
tomorrow you will surely die.

Get together with your friends.
Enjoy the pleasures of the flesh.

I’m pretty sure this is all we get.
I can’t be absolutely certain, but

of all the people I have known who
have passed over to the other side

not one has sent back any news.

***

At its heart, Budbill’s poetry is a clear expression of his vision of life, a vision to which he has remained true despite what I can only imagine are temptations to move back where things are “easier.” Budill is no recluse, no hermit — but he is a striking example of having the courage of one’s convictions, and the kindness to share those convictions with others.

Highly recommended.

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Review: Map of the Folded World by John Gallaher

In the realm of wrong answers, someone
always has the radio on.

— from “I Will Sing the Monster to Sleep, & He Will Need Me”

I’ve been watching the middle seasons of Stargate SG-1 again. If you’ve never seen the show, the premise is that there are Stargates that allow instant travel between planets. You step into one on your world and step out into some completely other landscape.

To get around the problem of having to invent new languages for every race of alien encountered, the producers cut the knot this way: They explained that a particular race of evil aliens had captured many humans from earth and sprinkled them throughout the galaxy to use as slaves. So most of the folks you encounter are human. And most of them speak English, albeit with some interesting variations in dialect. And no, that last bit doesn’t make any sense, but it sure is easier than having to learn Klingon.

Which brings me to John Gallaher’s Map of the Folded World (University of Akron Press, 2009). Gallaher has managed to create a language all his own using English words. Reading his poems, I felt like I’d arrived on some other world where the linguistic building blocks were familiar, but the physics of assembling them was completely different, surprising, otherworldly.

Map of the Folded World gathers momentum as it goes, and traveling through it I was quickly swept up into Gallaher’s deft use of language, not really needing to know what something meant so much as to hear how Gallaher had opened up the possibilities of the words by putting them next to one another in surprising ways:

I don’t feel it’s helpful to quote sections of his poems (although I started the interview with my favorite line from the book) because his poems are so dependent on being whole. To remove any piece for study under the microscope would be to miss the point. Gallaher is sculpting, constructing, imagining, transporting the words. Similarly, although I’m sure these poems would be captivating individually, Map of the Folded World is a book. It is held together by the strength of Gallaher’s imagination and by the cascading wash of the language. By the time I reached the end, I felt almost as though I could speak the language; as though I could understand what some of the natives were saying, and maybe even try to carry on a rudimentary conversation of my own.

I love clear, narrative poetry. For me, this is not that. What it is, instead, is something equally valuable and maybe more rare — a transformative experience that comes about through nothing but the careful placement of word blocks on a landscape of Gallaher’s own devising.

Highly recommended.

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POEM: Tsurumigawa

Listen to this poem using the player above.

Tsurumigawa photo by Ivan Kurniawan
Tsurumigawa photo by Ivan Kurniawan

Tsurumigawa

ironically, we lived along the See Crane River
it sliced through the rice fields
that were just steps from the busy road

Tokyo and Yokohama and Kawasaki
are joined like an urban Cerberus
between them, hidden bits of unexpected farmland

bent old women in worn rubber boots
knotted bandanas around their heads
slop through the wet paddies

reaching crumpled fingers into waving rice
and plucking out the o-kome
the flesh of their people

in Ichigao, our town,
the women could have walked
a mile along the river

and treated themselves
to McDonald’s french fries
or the Colonel’s secret recipe

of herbs and spices
a bloodless invasion
leaving no cloud in its wake

I don’t think we ever actually
saw a crane on the river
that bore the bird’s name

like Oak Glen or Forest Heights
the name is simply a reminder
of what’s been taken away

gold flecks in green tea
gold plastic across the street
from the train station

and the Colonel standing there
arms outstretched, smiling
beckoning the cranes to fly to him

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Three observations: Thumbs up, Fats & Kassav’

Good morning! Here are three things I’ve been thinking about this morning:

1. Has the “thumbs up” gesture completely replaced the “OK” gesture?
OR

2. Fats Domino turns 82 today. Huzzah!

3. The album Kassav’ au Zenith is, to my ear, one of the greatest live records ever made. If this album doesn’t dispel your blues, nothing will. But don’t take my word for it. Check it out for yourself:

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POEM: Enclosures

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Enclosures

huddled under the umbrella
nestled in the sleeping bag
crouched beneath the spreading elm
encased behind the windshield

while the rain pounds
the hailstones plummet
the wind circles ’round
looking for a crack in the siding

it’s not an aversion to the elements
it’s the thrill of being protected
the joy at not being forced
into anything you don’t desire

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POEM: Gerry & Lenny

Listen to the poem by pressing the play button above.

Gerry & Lenny

have the same vocal tic
an explosion of air from the nose
with the tongue in the back of the throat

each time it sounds like laughter,
a commentary on their own speech
then back or not back to the matter at hand

“I’m waiting for a Jew to turn Catholic!
Can you imagine a Jew submitting
to the goddamned pope? Jesus Christ!”

Like Lenny, Gerry stops in the middle —
in mitn drinen, they would say —
to tell stories and to follow tangents

Like Gerry, Lenny draws water from
a desert oasis and pours that water
into molds of his own design

“The Catholic Church has given the pope
permission to become a nun.
Just on Fridays, though.”

Gerry was born in Pittsburgh:
grew up with bituminous in his mouth,
ate the ash-gray snow

Lenny was born in Mineola:
within weeks, Sally was back on stage
and Lenny drifted from house to house

Gerry has been a poet laureate
and has won awards and prizes
and taught at prestigious universities

Lenny died on the bathroom floor,
syringe near his arm,
camera lens in his face

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