Thanks to Judith Taylor and Patty Seyburn of POOL Poetry for including four of my poems in Issue 14, along with work by Rusty Morrison, Matthew Thorburn, Peter Cooley, Molly Brodak, and more!
About twelve years ago, a friend of mine introduced me to POOL and said he thought it was one of the hottest new journals following the best writing, and I've wanted to place work in it ever since. And today's the day! Yay!
Showing posts with label Rusty Morrison. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rusty Morrison. Show all posts
Tuesday, September 8, 2015
Monday, May 28, 2012
Reading Style
Most of my life I have been basically a serial reader; that is, I have read books one at a time, one after another.
Then I had kids and I became a simultaneous reader. Stealing moments here and there left me less time to read, so I would start various books and leave them in various locations, in reach when I could manage a moment. Still, I only read one of each kind of book at a time: one fiction, one non-fiction, and one poetry book, usually.
I still do this, except that recently I have started reading multiple poetry books at once. Instead of reading 5 to 15 pages of poetry from one poet in a single sitting, I now tend to read 5 or so poems each from 2 or 3 poets. This is a new strategy for me, and here's how it developed.
I was reading Rusty Morrison's Whethering, and I was admiring her technical virtuosity, the line breaks, the repetitions, and I wanted to let the techniques sink in, so I studied the poems and wanted to think on them rather than plowing ahead to the next set of poems. So I picked up Alicia Suskin Ostriker's The Book of Life to read in the meantime. And it was so intense that I didn't want to lose the emotionality of it by reading it too fast.
As it happens, I've been reading Karen An-hwei Lee's Phyla of Joy for over a month now, prior even to beginning the Morrison book, and I've been reading that one so slowly because Lee and I have so many of the same shared obscure obsessions (selenographia, blindness, invisible blue lines, celadon) that I get overwhelmed by that and have to put the book down.
And then I wanted to read something whimsical because of the weight of all the other books, so I picked up Carol Guess's Doll Studies: Forensics, which wouldn't seem to be whimsical when you consider that her poems are all based on dioramas of crimes scenes as portrayed using dolls by artist Frances Glessner Lee, and then photographed and researched by Corinne May Botz. It's Guess's word choice that constantly surprises me and gives this deeply disturbing book its whimsical quality. There isn't a poem in here that doesn't surprise me with word choice or imagery.
And reading these books concurrently is really working for me in a way I hadn't known it would. The aesthetics of the different poets bouncing around in my mind at once is giving me new ways to appreciate each artist's work, and new ways to see their work and my own.
(And for completeness, let me just add that in non-fiction, I'm just finishing up Bill Bryson's Mother Tongue, and for fiction I'm reading Nathan Englander's The Ministry of Special Cases.)
Then I had kids and I became a simultaneous reader. Stealing moments here and there left me less time to read, so I would start various books and leave them in various locations, in reach when I could manage a moment. Still, I only read one of each kind of book at a time: one fiction, one non-fiction, and one poetry book, usually.
I still do this, except that recently I have started reading multiple poetry books at once. Instead of reading 5 to 15 pages of poetry from one poet in a single sitting, I now tend to read 5 or so poems each from 2 or 3 poets. This is a new strategy for me, and here's how it developed.
I was reading Rusty Morrison's Whethering, and I was admiring her technical virtuosity, the line breaks, the repetitions, and I wanted to let the techniques sink in, so I studied the poems and wanted to think on them rather than plowing ahead to the next set of poems. So I picked up Alicia Suskin Ostriker's The Book of Life to read in the meantime. And it was so intense that I didn't want to lose the emotionality of it by reading it too fast.
As it happens, I've been reading Karen An-hwei Lee's Phyla of Joy for over a month now, prior even to beginning the Morrison book, and I've been reading that one so slowly because Lee and I have so many of the same shared obscure obsessions (selenographia, blindness, invisible blue lines, celadon) that I get overwhelmed by that and have to put the book down.
And then I wanted to read something whimsical because of the weight of all the other books, so I picked up Carol Guess's Doll Studies: Forensics, which wouldn't seem to be whimsical when you consider that her poems are all based on dioramas of crimes scenes as portrayed using dolls by artist Frances Glessner Lee, and then photographed and researched by Corinne May Botz. It's Guess's word choice that constantly surprises me and gives this deeply disturbing book its whimsical quality. There isn't a poem in here that doesn't surprise me with word choice or imagery.
And reading these books concurrently is really working for me in a way I hadn't known it would. The aesthetics of the different poets bouncing around in my mind at once is giving me new ways to appreciate each artist's work, and new ways to see their work and my own.
(And for completeness, let me just add that in non-fiction, I'm just finishing up Bill Bryson's Mother Tongue, and for fiction I'm reading Nathan Englander's The Ministry of Special Cases.)
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
Books for the Holidays
Did you get any poetry books for Christmas? If so, which are you most looking forward to reading?
I got a nice stack of poetry books from my husband and from my parents (yay and thank you!). Among them, a few that I am particularly excited to read are:
A Point Is That Which Has No Part by Liz Waldner. This won the Iowa Poetry Prize and the James McLaughlin Prize about a decade ago, and I've been wanting it ever since. It's title refers to a definition from Euclid's Geometry, which is what immediately drew my attention. I bought another book by Waldner in the meantime, but somehow I had never gotten this one. So excited to have it, I started reading it on Christmas afternoon. The University of Iowa actually offers the entire text online here.
Paul Guest's My Index of Slightly Horrifying Knowledge is also a book I've been wanting to read, and now can. Guest writes about his paralysis since a bicycle accident at age 12. As our family copes with devastating health issues, I find myself drawn more and more to Guest's poetry about struggles with the physical, written with poignancy, wit, and a realistic edge.
the true keeps calm biding its story by Rusty Morrison is probably the book I was coveting most this Christmas season, as I am in the throes of a poetry crush on Morrison, but didn't have this volume. But I've blogged about Morrison before...
So how about you? Did you get any particularly coveted books this holiday season?
I got a nice stack of poetry books from my husband and from my parents (yay and thank you!). Among them, a few that I am particularly excited to read are:
A Point Is That Which Has No Part by Liz Waldner. This won the Iowa Poetry Prize and the James McLaughlin Prize about a decade ago, and I've been wanting it ever since. It's title refers to a definition from Euclid's Geometry, which is what immediately drew my attention. I bought another book by Waldner in the meantime, but somehow I had never gotten this one. So excited to have it, I started reading it on Christmas afternoon. The University of Iowa actually offers the entire text online here.
Paul Guest's My Index of Slightly Horrifying Knowledge is also a book I've been wanting to read, and now can. Guest writes about his paralysis since a bicycle accident at age 12. As our family copes with devastating health issues, I find myself drawn more and more to Guest's poetry about struggles with the physical, written with poignancy, wit, and a realistic edge.
the true keeps calm biding its story by Rusty Morrison is probably the book I was coveting most this Christmas season, as I am in the throes of a poetry crush on Morrison, but didn't have this volume. But I've blogged about Morrison before...
So how about you? Did you get any particularly coveted books this holiday season?
Sunday, October 2, 2011
What You Invent When You're Rusty
It's no secret I have a poetry crush on Rusty Morrison. If you'd like to get familiar with her work, here's the link to a short 10-minute reading she gave at the Babylon Salon. Or maybe you already adore her poems as much as I do. Then you will enjoy these selections she presents from Necessities and Inventions, as well as her new work about illness. (If you cope with chronic illness, may I especially recommend you finish the entire video?)
I actually found this originally at P&W's column, A Writer's Advice, but the link to the video kept crashing. Still, I have to give credit where credit's due. And you could still read the column if you clicked here. Also, the link might not crash on you, giving some credence to my sense of technological paranoia.
(Finally, a second silly title for this blog could be What You Need When You're Rusty. Ya think?)
I actually found this originally at P&W's column, A Writer's Advice, but the link to the video kept crashing. Still, I have to give credit where credit's due. And you could still read the column if you clicked here. Also, the link might not crash on you, giving some credence to my sense of technological paranoia.
(Finally, a second silly title for this blog could be What You Need When You're Rusty. Ya think?)
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