Matthea Harvey is Lovely

Matthea Harvey has a new poem in Tin House. I love Matthea's work. She’s lovely and doesn’t feel shy about using the word lovely. Once, I was her lowly, star-eyed, copy-cat black t-shirt wearing student a year and a half ago. Without her, I wouldn’t even have written poems like “Water Jealousy,” found here.

So, I've posted her poem below from Tin House (Issue 24, Summer 2005). Buy it. Now. And both of her books. You can also view the original version here.

Implications for Modern Life (poem)

The ham flowers have veins and are rimmed in rind, each petal a little
meat sunset. I deny all connection with the ham flowers, the
barge floating by loaded with lard, the white flagstones like platelets
in the blood-red road. I’ll put the calves in coats so the ravens can’t
gore them, bandage up the cut gate &; when the wind rustles its
muscles, I’ll gather the seeds and burn them. But then I see a horse
lying on the side of the road and think You are sleeping, You are sleeping,
I will make you be sleeping. But if I didn’t make the ham flowers, how can
I make him get up? I made the ham flowers. Get up, dear animal.
Here is your pasture flecked with pink, your oily river, your bleeding
barn. Decide what to look at and how. If you lower your lashes,
the blood looks like mud. If you stay, I will find you fresh hay.


"Implications for Modern Life"
Matthea Harvey
Tin House, Summer 2005

2005 Pebble Lake Review Poetry & Fiction Contest Announcement

Thanks to the participation of our entrants, the 2005 Pebble Lake Review Poetry & Fiction Contest was a tremendous success, with hundreds of entries from the United States and abroad. We are pleased to announce this year’s winners and finalists:

FIRST PRIZE

Alan Elyshevitz of East Norriton, PA, fiction, "Tribes"
Patricia S. Hohl of Framingham, MA, poetry, "Verisimilitude"

HONORABLE MENTION

Carol Gilbertson of Decorah, IA, poetry, "Jury Duty"
Mary MacGowan of Madison, NJ, poetry, "A Pedicurist Bowing Before A Goddess"
Aaron Pell of New York, NY, fiction, "Getting Involved"


FINALISTS

Robert L. Brimm, poem, "Hard Times"
Sheldon Flory, poem, "Maine, 1963: Total Eclipse"
Carol Gilbertson, poem, "Setting Out"
Lois Lewandowski, fiction, "The River Man"
Dzvinia Orlowsky, poem, "Losing My Hair"
Michell Ross, fiction, "Ventriloquy"
Judith Skillman, poem, "Salt"
Joris Soeding, poem, "The Pope and Rendition Without a Count"

The notices have been sent out and the print version is slated for early September. The online version will be up in late August. For more information, email me.

Movies & The UPS Man

Run, don't walk to see "Happy Endings" at your nearest cinema. Oh My God this film is so fucked-up and gorgeous. My husband and I went to see it earlier this week (Sunday, to be exact) and I loved the movie so much I wanted to lick it or something similiar to have it swimming around inside my body, although in a non-parasitic sort of way.

I saw "Me and You and Everyone We Know" with E. last night and it was. . .odd. I'm not even sure I would recommend seeing it, except maybe for the funniest line I've ever heard was in this movie: "Fuck children!"

I have plans to see (and you should, too): "Last Days," "November," and "March of the Penguins" (for the absolutely cuteness factor).

In other news, the UPS guy delivered the print edition of the Summer 2005 issue of Pebble Lake Review, so I will be sending those out to contributors, subscribers, NewPages, Verse Daily, Poetry Daily, and the like. Want one? See the website for info.

I haven't written anything new, lately. It seems that I have a few days a month (like a week) where I write in a manic frenzy. I feel it bubbling up, so hopefully I will have new material, soon.

Blurb

Here is the blurb the lovely Dzvinia Orlowsky wrote for my forthcoming chapbook, Light Under Skin (Finishing Line Press, 2006).

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There’s a deep lyricism in these poems that combine both alien and familiar worlds, luring us to inquire which is more “real”: the cavernous, black half-smiles of earth of St. Goddard Pass, a mother uncovered in her pink smell, a dollhouse in the state of revolt where we learn there’s nothing to own but ourselves. Even our heads will come off. Auchter’s startling ability to relocate her readers through a complex matrix of loss and renewal, the body’s unfinished paradise, redefines more conventional notions of boundaries. Fault-lines flare luminous; afternoon thunderheads pass like moods. Elegant and spare, this collection is written from a heart which is anything but…the challenge that Auchter distinctively undertakes and masters.

Dzvinia Orlowsky
7/16/05

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I'm all a-shiver and so grateful.

Want

Since I am slightly OCD, I've been making lists: lists of poem subjects, lists of poem titles, lists of literary magazines to read, lists of lists. I've been quite busy this summer and the lists are getting a little out of control. I think it's time to really sit down and write from those lists and really get something worthwhile out. I'm happy with the few poems I've done this summer: "Cocktail Hour," "Dragonfly on Blue Agave," "Lung" (still in revision), and a few others (including the one below). I'm especially greatful for my dear friend, E., for all of your crazy(albeit amazing) inspiration.

We are still judging the fiction for the 2005 Pebble Lake Review Poetry & Fiction Contest, but we have made our final decisions on the poetry prize recipient and the honorable mentions. Aren't you dying to know? Huh? Huh? Well, check back in August for updates!

Anyway, I do appreciate all of the comments so far on this blog. Oh! I almost forgot: I received the coolest email yesterday from a guy who translated my poem "Catching a Sunset" (the oldest poem ever, but okay). Isn't that wild? I will try and post both versions, soon. In the meantime, here is a poem:

Want

for E.R.


Want (verb) 1. To be needy or destitute: As in, Eddy wants his lover to pick up the phone and return her voice to him, her laugh like a fist of nickels, wants her like the dime he pockets on the street. He says her skin smells like cooking. I imagine: baking vanilla, a sifting of flour, sugar, extracts. He wants to say smell is everything, the coconut lotion she uses after her baths, the red smell of her legs after they slept in the sun. 2. To have or feel need: He is not in want of her absence. He has too much of this: empty corner chair, the lipstick in the drawer, bottle of perfume. He does not want for her to marry the surgeon in New York, for her to mention this arrangement, or the dress waiting in Pakistan. He wants to tape a note to her door, wants to drive past her house, check for lights, check the mailbox, check the rooms for shadows, bend of bodies at the glass. 3. To be necessary or needed: He wants her over for dinner, wants her fork to cross his plate, touch his teeth. He is in want of her mouth to find his, in want of their hands to occupy the same instant as though the want of one body detects the want of the other. He tells me I want her like this: hair in my fingers, my mouth, I want all of her. I want to explain that her body is not a meal. I want to say meet me in five minutes, I will bring you a bottle of wine. I want this to be enough. 4. To desire to come, go, or be: Eddy wants his lover naked, wants to bring a cigarette to her mouth. He wants to move toward the pale blossoms of her nipples, touch the scar on her knee. He wants to leave himself, the dreams of her body inside her husband’s, or her turned from him, brushing her hair. I want him like this: telephone at my ear, my slow circles of smoke rising like desire.

New Poem

I've been working on a new poem for a while (below). I've been sort of blocked about it because of a certain situation I found myself in. Anyway, I think it's either (a) done or (b) headed in the right direction. I would love comments and suggestions. NOTE: Francois, you are not allowed to comment! ;-)

Hope everyone is well and if you are coming to my party next weekend, bring liquor!


Cocktail Hour


You arrived in gestures—dusk-lit stare, shuffle
of shoes on sidewalk, doorbell buzz. I took
your bottle of wine, your girlfriend’s hello.

The party was on the back porch. There was
barely enough light for a shadow— your hand
lifted merlot to your mouth and your lips

reddened. Your girlfriend’s rhinestone brooch
caught against your cologne. Each empty glass
you set down, she filled, walked away,

her green skirt swishing her long legs.
When she returned, she lifted her glass, gazed
at us through her lipstick. I brushed my shoulder

with yours, tossed a laugh in your direction, or
a sigh, leaned my head back against the window.
The night heaped between us. I stood in starlight

while you smoked against the moon. I watched
her rock her hip to your hip, how you danced
to the skitter of dry summer leaves, the cross-

current of voices. Earlier, you followed me into
the kitchen with a tray of canapés, empty bottles.
Your girlfriend sat outside—dark hair, gin lips,

tapped her heel, lit a cigarette while you cut fruit
on the counter. I wondered if she saw us, our shadow-
slung bodies leaned in like that, my sugar-dabbed

mouth like a glass rim, the vermouth you let me taste,
or how I slid my finger around your wrist, my hair
to your cheek, and licked lime juice from your skin.

Graduation vs. Claudia Rankine. . hey that rhymes (sort of)

My original plan: to graduate in Dec. from UH with my honors thesis in poetry. No. Big. Deal. After the Bucknell Seminar, who can't conquer the world? (OK, enough ego). The thing is, Claudia (who Lacy and Todd both refer to as "The Goddess") will not be able to work with me until the spring. At UH, most of their esteemed poetry staff only works in the Spring, except for Mark Doty and a few others, but everyone is so busy in the fall, that pinning one down is impossible. At J. Kastely's suggestion, I contacted Robert Phillips, but to no avail. So, it's July and I am not any closer to getting an advisor and this makes me want to sit on the floor next to the edge of the bathtub and pull my hair out ( or something similar).

I am taking a course on Sylvia Plath & Ted Hughes in the fall and could write a 40 page thesis on that, but ugh. . .really don't want to. Not that I'm not interested in the material, it's just that having the class and then working day and night on the thesis with the same topic would drive me to an oven.

So, I'm thinking about just waiting until the Spring to work on my poetry thesis with Claudia (or Nick Flynn, who I love more than my couch). I can't decide. . .

I want to graduate and move on with the next phase in my life. Mary Ruefle told me that she thinks I'm "chomping at the bit" to get on with my writing career and everything that comes next. Yeah, pretty much.

Any advice from my beloved peanut gallery?


Things I can't stop looking at, or a quick wish list of items and magazines I covet:

Unpleasant Event Schedule: Daniel Nester, you are delightful. Thank you for your email and I am going to send work. Soon--I promise!

McSweeney's: This poem by Shanna Compton is amazing. Partake. Quickly. Now.

Sunspinner: This is a beautiful online literary journal. Read Ron Mohring's interview.

The Canary: this literary journal gives LIT and Jubilat a run for their money. (But we still love them, don't we?)

One Good Bumblebee: Katey Nicosia's amazing little online shop. I bought the kitty zip pouch and the circle tote. So sad that the rooster pouch sold out! This site is named after the James Tate poem, "Head of a White Woman Winking." Cool schtuff.

CROWD Magazine: I'm so jealous, it hurts.

ALLOY: How cute is this sequin print skirt?

Graywolf Press: Nick Flynn, Matthea Harvey, Claudia Rankine, Tony Hoagland. . who could ask for more?

Swimming the Witch: I want this book!


OK. . .I think that's enough wants for now. I'm still decisionless. Any ideas would be helpful.

Happy 4th!

Odd Link

Every once in a while, I check the webstats for Pebble Lake Review to see how many actual visits we get a month (currently 2,000 or so) and where people are linking to us from, besides search engines. I just checked the stats page and there was a link from an ordinary looking blog and I was like "Hmmm. . .who is blogging PLR?" I clicked on the page and lo and behold, it was a site called "See Her Squirt". Ewww!!! You can only imagine the photos that popped up on the screen and so forth. OH MY GOD.

Anyway, how PLR wound up being linked to a porn site is beyond me. If you have any ideas, post them here.

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I saw "The Machinist" with Jeff tonight. So crazy and deranged, but worth a rent. Amazing how Christian Bale anorexicized himself for this role and then buffed up for Batman.

Heaven is a Discotheque

See the wanton Bucknell Younger Poets Here:

http://stadlerpoets.blogspot.com/