Intentions
There must be a bone caught
between my heart and spine.
If only I could cough it up,
like this place for which I did not ask,
but this splintered ivory lodges,
rigid, crippling love.
Shall I take a fork
and knife,
cut it out, eat it, so it
dissolves within a dark, caustic
acid? Like I wish I could with
hapless man words
tossed with as much meaning as
a horseshoe that circles and clanks about my heart .
I prefer to hurl myself, alone, over unstable ledges, or wait for
those ledges to buckle beneath
me. At least I’d be falling within
my own logic, no bone piercing, male
trickery, that extended hand
which when gripped
disappears into thin air.
* Author of the novel When the Ugly Comes, Carmen Eichman earned her Masters Degree in Creative Writing & Literature from Kansas State University and is now an Assistant Professor of English and Honors Chair, living in North Carolina. Eichman’s poetry has appeared in A Little Poetry, All Things Girl, The Argotist Online, Subtle Tea, Invisible Ink, The Dan River Review, Borderline, Thick with Conviction, and Contemporary American Voices to name a few. She is currently at work on her fourth novel and third collection of poetry.
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Thursday, November 12
Carmen Eichman wants to fall within her own logic
by
Charles Christian
on Thu 12 Nov 2009 05:41 PM GMT
Wednesday, November 11
Jim Murdoch thinks the truth can be ugly
by
Charles Christian
on Wed 11 Nov 2009 04:52 PM GMT
Ugly Truths
"What is it, Granda? Is it a toad?" "I’m not sure, dear. My eyesight isn’t what it was. We’ll need to get closer. " "It’s very ugly." "Oh, I see what it is." "What? What is it?" "A truth." "What’s a truth?" "Goodness, me. I thought they were extinct." "What’s a truth, Granda, and why does it have to be so ugly?" "Oh, truths were all ugly, dear. Most of them anyway. Some of them were quite gruesome in fact. That’s why they started eradicating them before you were born. I wonder how this one managed to hang on so long." "What’s eradi…?" "People started getting rid of them." "Should I squash it? Can I squash it, Granda?" "Wait! Wait. Hold your horses. Let's get a good look at it. I want to see what kind it is. There were lots of different kinds of truth. It might be something new altogether. A new strain." "Well, I don’t like it." "No, not many people did, my dear. Lies were much more colourful, adaptable and interesting. And there were so many of them." "Granda! What are you doing?" "Oh, nothing. I just thought I’d dig it up and take it home. See what it grows into." "You mean it’ll get bigger?" "Yes, and probably uglier. The biggest truths were really hideous. People could hardly bear to look at them." "Ugh, Granda. I’ll be ill if I have to look at that much longer." "Well, some truths can make you feel like you’re ill when you’re not really ill." "Why would anyone want to feel ill?" "It’s a kind of protection." "I don’t understand." "Well, imagine every time you had to go out in the rain you felt a little poorly. You’d never go out in the rain would you?" "No. But I have an umbrella. You can see through it." "Well, that’s good, too. But if you didn’t have the umbrella what would happen if you went out in the rain?" "I’d get wet. But if I felt poorly, Mummy would make me a bed on the couch." "That’s the idea. So you see why truths used to be a good idea." "I think so. So why did people get rid of them?" "Why? Oh, I suppose they all bought umbrellas. We should get going. Your mother’ll be wondering where we are." "She’ll shout at you if you try and bring that thing into the house. That’s what she does to me." "Ah, out of the mouths of babes and sucklings…" "I'm not a baby. I'm six." "Of course you are, dear. Of course you are." * Jim Murdoch is a Scottish writer living just outside Glasgow. His second novel Stranger than Fiction was published in August. www.jimmurdoch.co.uk Tuesday, November 10
Do poets still starve in their garrets - Part II
by
Charles Christian
on Tue 10 Nov 2009 11:53 AM GMT
Our posting over the weekend – showing the cafe sign at Aldeburgh inviting poets to share a bowl of soup (here's the photo again in case you missed it) and prompting us to ask whether poets still starve in their garrets
 has prompted regular IS&T contributor Charlotte Ghost to submit this suggested menu – enjoy...  Monday, November 9
Postcards from Aldeburgh
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 09 Nov 2009 07:06 PM GMT
Here are a few more pictures from Aldeburgh... the first picture shows the queue at one of the town's two main fish & chip shops – this one tends to get the bigger festival crowds although the locals say the other chippie farther up the High Street is better. This picture was taken at around 1:00pm on Sunday afternoon.
 Alternatively, you can visit another festival institution – the Cragg Sisters Tea Rooms (incidentally that is not a real cat in the window).  Here's a view from the Town Steps towards the shore – and yes the sea really was that colour – it may have been shadows cast by the clouds (as distinct from a current of warm water flowing out of the nearby Sizewell nuclear power station).  And finally, forget what people say about Maggi Hambling's 2003 sculpture Scallop (raised to commemorate local cultural hero Benjamin Britten – the lines "I hear those voices that will not be drowned" comes from his opera Peter Grimes) being the most important piece of public art in Aldeburgh, this is without doubt the most popular statue. 
Larry Kimmel has been visiting the home of the brave
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 09 Nov 2009 09:08 AM GMT
Regular IS&T contributor Larry Kimmel has sent along two prose/flash pieces. Both are true anecdotes. He explains "I grew up in rural southwestern Pennsylvania, where there was a time lag of a good 25 years, and so I've a lot of early 20th century Americana to draw on. I'm not sure if you'd be interested in this sort of material for IS&T, but here they are. The first – Home of the Brave – is sort of Appalachian in nature (we lived on the outer edge of that culture, just a hop-skip-and-a-jump from West Virginia), and both are family stories. The second one, a tale my dad told of about himself."
Home Of The Brave For three days Grandma’s best milker frothed at the mouth, then died—clearly poisoned. A year later, old Mike Kovitch, with a skin full, said: “It a shame about that cow, someday I tell you Mister Mahler,” and so we knew what we already knew, and Grandpa spoke true when he told us a desire to see justice done would only result in something else dying or burning down, and all Grandma had said to old Mama Kovitch was: “Those aren’t your cherries to pick,” it being Grandma’s one cherry tree and she counting on the crop for preserves, and old Mama Kovitch had gone off mumbling: “Me think this free country,” no different than any other time. ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ Rattlesnake Three on the path ahead of him stepped over it unawares, and he, likewise thinking it a stick, was stepping over it when it stirred—sliddered off the path into a clump of brush near at hand. They, not wanting it on the farm, took up sticks and beat the brush (one from each of the four directions), till out it came streaking straight for him, who always ended this tale palpitating his shirt with pinched fingers—miming the fear—saying: " ... and I'll tell you, I was one scared young fellah that day—What?—O, we got'em okay. I came down on 'im good 'n' hard. He didnt last long after that, you betcha."
Normal service is resumed
by
Charles Christian
on Mon 09 Nov 2009 08:52 AM GMT
We're back from the Aldeburgh Poetry Festival and back to our normal publishing schedule of one new piece of poetry or prose everyday – although we will also be posting up some final reports, pix and video clips from Aldeburgh.
Sunday, November 8
And so we say goodbye to Aldeburgh for another year...
by
Charles Christian
on Sun 08 Nov 2009 06:47 PM GMT
 And so the sun sets on Aldeburgh for another year and we say goodbye to the Festival until 2010. Among the sessions I caught this Sunday was the Fantasy Festival looking at all the poets who had been approached to attend the festival, since it started in 1989 but who – for a variety of reasons – never made the trip. Aided and abetted by some rare video and audio footage, Naomi Jaffa, Michael Laskey and Dean Parkin filled in some of the gaps. Although ill-health and frailty (in some instances followed by death) and a fear of flying/dislike of travel were the most frequent explanations, we did also have such classics as: the poet who seriously believed he already performed at Aldeburgh once and didn't want to come again – he had but that had been for the entirely separate Aldeburgh Music Festival. The poet who was frightened his ex-wife would hunt him down there. And the poet whose backstage rider included copious supplies of a white powder normally inhaled up the nose. But, at least we now know the author of the line "If I were a voting man, I'd vote for you" – its from Days of Pie & Coffee by James Tate, another American poet who looks like he'll never make it to Suffolk.  However, my favourite event of the day was the last of the Close Readings (sponsored by Ink Sweat & Tears – hey, that's us, hooray) when Roger Robinson gave his analysis of Robert Hayden's poem Those Winter Sundays. Without doubt this must have been one of the most energetic and enthusiastic readings Aldeburgh has ever seen, a veritable masterclass that ran for double its length and concluded with Roger fielding questions from the audience like the most popular creative writer tutor in town. I've now ordered all his books.
Sunday morning at the Aldeburgh Festival
by
Charles Christian
on Sun 08 Nov 2009 12:19 PM GMT
 A lot to catch up with as I continue to juggle an over-ambitiously packed timetable with erratic online access and chronic constipation, so here we go... The good news is that both Annie Freud and Roger Robinson gave stunning performances during Saturday's Emerging Voices session. But then there were two sessions where the audience vibe was definitely split between the love them and hate them camps. Geoffrey Hill gave a bravura performance of his latest writings – all previously unpublished and never-before read in public work. He also revealed himself to have a pawky sense of humour and the ability to control the audience in a way many younger performers can only dream of. (More about performance techniques in a later posting.) But... was he being serious or most-Modern ironic with his introductions, which included explanations of various rhyme schemes of the "this is written in an ABBA pentameter" variety. Talking to audience members afterwards, there was a distinct split between those who thought they had just seen a reading by the most important English poet today and 'WTF'. Hill, incidentally, revealed himself to be a movie fan and believes he cuts his poems, rather like film editors working on a movie in the cutting room. And then there was Albert Goldbarth, whose poem about Stephen Hawking read in a cockney accent of the Dick van Dyke in Mary Poppins variety caused a collective jaw dropping that measured on the Richter Scale in Southwold and probably caused a security panic at Sizewell B. We're still pondering that performance. Other nuggets: Jo Shapcott, a last minute substitute player in one of Saturday's readings, remarked that one of the challenges for all poets is 'latent inhibition' – the self-censoring process whereby part of your brain says "you can't say that" when you try to move outside your own comfort zone or belief system – in her case writing about fur in anything but a negative light when she is a lifelong opponent of the fur trade. Late night saw the Open Mic session with 30 performers in just over an hour – there was no nakedness this year – and we even had Penny Shuttle reading her poem about postal filth. At this point I wimped out for the night but the stalwarts were still going strong in the bar at 3:00am – all of which made the turnout of nearly 200 people for a session at 9:00am on the Sunday morning, show true dedication to the cause of poetry. This was the much anticipated discussion on the female poem by Jo Shapcott, Maureen Duffy, Annie Freud and Pascale Petit – and follows in the wake of the now famous letter of complaint earlier this year by a number of poets about the apparent gender bias in the reviews in Poetry Review magazine. This was another parson's nose session that didn't deliver the killer blows that might have been hoped. Was it preaching to the converted? Some people thought so. Did it mean you can't win if you are a man – you're either a chauvinist or patronising – as some male poets subsequently commented? There was definitely agreement that many male poets have a different voice to female poets – and that female poets are requenty 'more emotionally open' than men. However Maureen Duffy made the point that it was bizarre that we were still raking over a debate that started with Aphra Behn in the 17th Century and which still results in a situation where the liberal Guardian newspaper almost exclusively has male poets reviewing male poets, female poets reviewing female poets and ethnic poets reviewing ethnic poets. As Annie Freud concluded, the poetry establishment still has a problem with women poets writing things "women shouldn't say". This debate looks like running and running – but hopefully this session has helped light the blue touchpaper. The (woman) poet I was sitting next to certainly left the Jubilee Hall feeling inspired "That's it," she said "from now on I'll just write what I want to write – and not what I think editors will publish or won't unsettle the men in my writing groups..." Still to come... more reports, more pictures and some video clips.
Beer related submissions please
by
Charles Christian
on Sun 08 Nov 2009 10:00 AM GMT
For reasons that will become apparent later, Ink Sweat & Tears would like to receive some beer related poetry or prose submissions (actually we're happy to receive some beer as well, but that's another story). Send them to the usual address but also include the word beer in the subject line – thank you CC
Saturday, November 7
John Hegley at Aldeburgh - not poetry but poetrees...
by
Charles Christian
on Sat 07 Nov 2009 01:37 PM GMT
Yes, the cafes in Aldeburgh have put on some special offers for poets – no stereotypes about starving in their garrets here then. Meanwhile John Hegley gave his second performance of the Festival on Saturday morning, giving his leftfield perspective on his journey from Luton and beyond. In contrast with one of the discussions earlier this morning – looking at whether love and death are 'the only true subjects' for poetry – Hegley takes the view that "the everyday is as important as love and death" and that poems about potatoes, dogs and spectacles are just as valid. Hegley said he got into poetry "because he liked the way words and language can fly and be potent". Howevr he went on to add that "its not just about poetry – its about poetrees... there are lots of different fruit on the poetree – some are easily accessible, some are very hard to understand and reach." |
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