A Quick Note...

If you haven't seen it yet, I have a "guest blogger" article on Robert Brewer's Poetic Asides blog - it's entitled "7 Reasons Why You Should Be in a Writing Group". Check it out here.

Parental Bragging and a Festival Photo

My son Chris, a sociology professor at Hofstra U. and Academic Director of the Center for Suburban Studies there, was interviewed today on "Soundcheck", a program on New York's public radio station WYNC. He and host John Schaefer discuss Arcade Fire's album The Suburbs, which just won a Grammy for Album of the Year. You can listen to the broadcast here:

And here is a photo of me with Jane Hirshfield and my awesome workshop group at the Palm Beach Poetry Festival. (I'm in the back row with the cap, and Jane is on my right.)

Palm Beach Poetry Fetival

I am the worst blogger - every time I promise to make this a regular habit and post weekly, or biweekly, or whatever, I backslide again. Well, at least now I have a good reason for a post. I had the pleasure of attending the 7th Annual Palm Beach Poetry Festival in Delray Beach, Florida from January 17 to 23, and it was without a doubt the best conference I've attended yet. The list of "all-stars" was mind-boggling: Jane Hirshfield, Thomas Lux, Heather McHugh, C.D. Wright, Stuart Dischell, Ellen Bryant Voigt, Vijay Seshadri, and Alan Shapiro, plus performance poets Taylor Mali and D. Blair, and a special poetry-with-jazz performance by former US Poet Laureate Robert Pinsky. The schedule included morning workshops, afternoon craft talks, evening readings by the above-mentioned "faculty". Wednesday evening featured a gala dinner and Robert Pinsky's reading, and Saturday was an evening performance-poetry event with Blair and Mali, plus DJ dancing and drinks.

I had the great fortune of getting into Jane Hirshfield's workshop, and it was a wonderful experience. She worked with about a dozen of us all week, which included five all-morning sessions and a brief one-on-one conference with each participant. I was a bit anxious beforehand, not so much about meeting and working with Jane, but with the level of skill of the other participants. Would I feel like a hack in their midst? But no, despite the fact that they were an extremely talented bunch, I felt like a peer and an equal. We started each day sharing a favorite poem by another poet, then had a writing "experiment", as Jane called it, after which we shared our results with the group. Then we critiqued each others' poems submitted for the workshop. It was a productive and rewarding week. Jane is a wise, warm and gracious lady - and one hell of a poet. She even went out to dinner with all of us on Saturday evening.

There were also readings on two afternoons by the workshop participants. I read a poem I wrote in workshop, "Suitcase", which got a good response. I also re-connected with my old poetry friend Lorraine Stanchich, who has been involved with the festival before and was asked to be Mr. Pinsky's assistant. I got to meet him afterward too - really nice guy. And of course, on top of all of this, the weather was in the 70's and 80's almost the whole week - a wonderful if brief departure from winter in New Jersey. Now I have to return to the "real world". Sigh....

Big Poetry News and Best Music of the Year

I am psyched! I applied to attend the Palm Beach Poetry Festival this coming January in Delray Beach, Florida, a great annual conference that features some of the country's premier poets who run intensive workshops throughout the week, as well as special events, panel discussions and readings. I just found out the other day that I've been accepted into the conference, and I will be workshopping with one of my favorite poets, Jane Hirshfield. Also leading workshops there will be Thomas Lux, Heather McHugh, C.D. Wright, Alan Shapiro, Stuart Dischell, Ellen Bryant Voigt, and Vijay Shesadri. There will also be featured readers like Robert Pinsky and performance poet Taylor Mali. I'll be staying and hanging out with my wife's relatives there, too. It should be a great week!

I've been doing Robert Brewer's "Poem-a-Day Chapbook Challenge" again this year - a poem a day throughout the month of November, with the intent to create a chapbook manuscript at the end. I don't know if I have a unified chapbook theme at this point, but at least I'll have a few good poems coming out of it. I'm almost two days behind at this point, though, as I haven't written a poem yesterday or today so far. I feel like a slacker for not writing a poem in two days - how about that?

I was featured poet at Poetry in the Round at Barnes and Noble last Monday. It was a small audience, and my friend Kelly Fineman stepped in for regular host Barney Oldfield, who was under the weather. The highlight of the evening for me, however, was my friend Bill, who attended and read a poem he had written about his experience with cancer treatment in the last year. He said he hadn't written poetry in decades until he was inspired by another cancer survivor who attended one of these readings last year. I think it may be the first time he ever read one of his poems in public, and he did fine.

We also had a very successful reading in our Quick and Dirty Poets series, featuring Teresa Leo, last night. The little coffee shop where we meet, The Daily Grind, was standing room only, and the place was full of great poetry by Teresa and others

Music: I submitted my final lists of best 10 albums and songs of 2010 to WXPN this week, and I'm looking forward to their countdown at the end of the year. I have to say though, that this was a rich year for music, and cutting my lists down to a top 10 was a real chore, but here are my choices:

Top Ten Albums:

1. Arcade Fire – The Suburbs
2. The Hold Steady – Heaven is Whenever
3. The National – High Violet
4. Beach House – Teen Dream
5. Frightened Rabbit – The Winter of Mixed Drinks
6. Bettye LaVette – Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook
7. Drive-By Truckers – The Big To-Do
8. Black Keys – Brothers
9. Sufjan Stevens – The Age of Adz and All Delighted People EP
10. Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers - Mojo

Honorable Mentions:
Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings: I Learned the Hard Way
Josh Ritter - So Runs the World Away
Alejandro Escovedo - Street Songs of Love
Yeasayer - Odd Blood
Spoon - Transference
The New Pornographers - Together
Bruce Springsteen - The Promise
Jimi Hendrix - Valleys of Neptune
Herbie Hancock - The Imagine Project
Ray La Montagne - God Willin' and the Creek Don't Rise
Natalie Merchant - Leave Your Sleep
Field Music - Field Music (Measure)
Vampire Weekend - Contra


Top Ten songs:

1. I Should Have Known It – Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers
2. Measure – Field Music
3. Working This Job – Drive-by Truckers
4. Anchor – Alejandro Escovedo
5. Bloodbuzz Ohio – The National
6. Sprawl II – Arcade Fire
7. I Walked – Sufjan Stevens
8. Too Afraid to Love You – The Black Keys
9. Haul Me Up – Richard Thompson
10. Burn It Down – Los Lobos

Honorable Mention:
Laredo - Band of Horses
Zebra - Beach House
Cousins - Vampire Weekend
American Slang - The Gaslight Anthem
Repo Man - Ray LaMontagne
The Mystery Zone - Spoon
Swim Until You Can't See Land - Frightened Rabbit
Angel Dance - Robert Plant
Your Hands (Together) - New Pornographers
The Weekenders - The Hold Steady

Poem of the Month:

Here's one of the two poems published in the current issue of the online journal Tilt-a-Whirl:

Poe Boy Blues


Well, I woke up this mornin’,
there was a raven in my bed.
I woke up this mornin’,
there was a raven in my bed.
If I didn’t know better,
I’d swear that I was dead.

When I went downstairs,
I heard a thumpin’ under the floor.
Yeah, when I went downstairs,
I swear I heard thumpin’ in the floor.
It sounded like a beatin’ heart,
so I ran right out the door.

I’m pinin’ for my Annie,
I’m pinin’ for Annabelle Lee,
Yeah, I’m pinin’ for little Annie,
and pinin’ for sweet Annabelle Lee.
I’m a morbid Victorian lover,
wallowin’ in my misery.

Well, I got them Poe Boy Blues,
my face’s a perpetual frown,
Yes, I got the Poe Boy Blues,
my face’s a perpetual frown.
I ain’t felt so sad and lonely
since that Usher house fell down.

If the booze and drugs don’t get me,
It’ll be a broken heart for sure.
Yeah, if them booze and drugs don’t get me,
That ol’ broken heart will for sure.
I’m a Poe boy, baby,
and I’ll be happy Nevermore.

Mad Poets, Whale Sounds, Baseball Letdown, Trivia, and the National Book Award

I can't believe that October is almost over! This autumn has flown by, helped along by a wedding, our international student, a yard sale, a handful of poetry readings, a 9th grader who's already involved in the band, orchestra and school play; and an exciting but ultimately disappointing baseball season. Seems like I have a lot to talk about this time:

Poetry: The reading at Big Blue Marble in Philly last month went well - even though I got my dates mixed up and showed up a day early! A small but appreciate group attended, and I ended up selling two chapbooks, but I spent all my proceeds at the supermarket on the way home. (Who says poetry doesn’t bring home the bacon?)

Last week we had our Quick and Dirty Poets reading at Daily Grind in Mt. Holly, featuring Tony Gruenwald, a great New Jersey poet and co-editor of Edison Literary Review. I also read as a contributor to the new issue of Mad Poets Review – their annual book party, at the Delaware County Science Museum, is always a fun event, with lots of excellent local poets and goodies too. This new issue almost didn’t get off the ground due to loss of funding, but hats off to Eileen D’Angelo and company for persevering and getting another fine issue of MPR out to the world!
I’ll be reading later this week at Croft Farm in Cherry Hill, then on November 15 at Barnes and Noble in Marlton, and finally on December 12 in South Brunswick. (I’ll get paid for that one!)
Publication-wise, the only news since last time is that my poem, “Taking It All Back”, is featured on Nic Sebastian’s website Whale Sound. Nic has a lovely British-accented speaking voice, and she did a fine job on my poem.

Although returning to Peter Murphy’s Cape May festival again this winter was very tempting, I decided to apply instead for the Palm Beach Poetry Festival this coming January. It’s a week-long conference in Delray Beach, Florida, featuring some poetic heavy hitters like Robert Pinsky, Jane Hirshfield, Dean Young, Thomas Lux, Heather McHugh, and C.D.Wright. I’m applying for a workshop, with Hirshfield and Young as my first and second choices respectively. I won’t know till mid-November if I’m accepted, but if I go I’ll be able to stay with my wife’s relatives who live right in Delray Beach.

In other poetry news, I was very happy to hear that three of the five nominees for this year’s National Book Award in poetry are poets I’ve met: Terrance Hayes and James Richardson, whose workshops I have taken, and Kathleen Graber, who has been involved (along with Richardson) in the Cape May festival, and whom we Quick and Dirty Poets featured at one of our readings a few years ago. Congratulations, all!

Baseball: Woe is me – my Phillies didn’t make it to the World Series this year. The Giants beat them in six games to take the NL pennant and go on to play the Texas Rangers. I was super-bummed till the next day, then I started to wax philosophical. The Phillies had another great year, winning more games than any other team in baseball, despite being decimated by injuries most of the season. The starting pitching has never been better, with the lineup of Halladay, Oswalt and Hamels. Halladay pitched a perfect game (the 20th in MLB history and only the second Phillie pitcher to do it) and then pitched a no-hitter in Game 1 of the divisional playoffs (only the second postseason no-hitter in history and only about the fifth time a pitcher has thrown two no-hitters in one season). He should be a shoo-in for the Cy Young Award – the Giant’s Tim Lincecum is his only competition. The downside is that offensively, the Phillies were streaky at best. They rode an incredible hot streak from September into the playoffs, but then had trouble doing anything with the bat. Even when they swept the Reds in three games for the Eastern Division title, it was by virtue of two stellar pitching performances by Halladay and Hamels, and a game the Reds threw away on errors and sloppy playing. The Giants just outplayed the Phillies, getting all the key hits that seemed to elude our boys, and their pitching was at least as good as ours. Ryan Howard got a hit here and there, but not a single homer, or even an RBI, in the post-season. So no World Series for the Phils this year, but on the other hand, the Yankees won’t be making a repeat appearance either.

Miscellaneous: If you haven’t checked out the website Sporcle, do so now, especially if you are a trivia buff. There are thousands of quizzes, mostly created by registered members like myself, and if your quiz is popular and highly rated enough, it gets “published” on the site by the administrators, which gives it a much higher profile and lots more action. I just had my first one published this week: it’s called “Different Actors, Same Role”, and as of last night it had over 39,000 hits. My screen name is bruceN, if you want to check out my other quizzes, too.

Music: It’s been a great year for music, at least the music I listen to. I got the eagerly-awaited new album from Sufjan Stevens, The Age of Adz, and it’s pretty good stuff, though not the classic that his album Illinois was. It’s a bit more “noisy” with electronics and such, but still worth a listen. “I Walked” will be the breakout song from this album.
His EP from earlier this year, All Delighted People (really the length of a full album) is also worthwhile. Other new albums that have recently caught my ear:

Herbie Hancock: The Imagine Project
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers: Mojo
Trombone Shorty: Backatown
Richard Thompson: Dream Attic
Ray LaMontagne: God Willin’ and the Creek Don’t Rise

Poem of the Month: I wrote this one at last winter’s Poetry and Prose Getaway in Cape May for James Richardson’s workshop, as I anticipated my son’s upcoming nuptials. It appears in the new issue of Mad Poet’s Review:


Hoofing

Of the 58 things I need to do before I die,
Number 6 is to dance at your wedding.
Yes, me – the guy who once asked for a Virginia Reel
at my school dance, because we learned it in Gym,
and it was the only dance I knew. I’ll stumble and sway
with your mother and your bride through a slow dance,
but later I'll need at least three beers to lubricate
my creaky joints and my reserve, and a full dervish
on the dance floor, a Brownian movement of bodies,
where I’ll slip between Uncle Jack,
who lumbers like a grizzly bear; Aunt Lois
and her date, who’ve inexplicably slid into a tango;
and the flower girl, who randomly jumps up and down,
parachuting her petticoats. I’ll be a hoofer for you –
that is, I’ll dance like an animal without toes.
I won’t do that damned Chicken Dance,
but I will bounce and celebrate to Kool & the Gang,
or any of those obligatory songs, as this ecstatic mob
thrums along with abandon, in a rented hall,
under a clear, rosy evening sky, where somewhere,
your grandmother does the tarantella.

Wedding Bells III

More images from the wedding:

Wedding Bells II

Here's a slide-show video of my son and daughter-in-law's wedding done by their photographer, Ted Nghiem. I never would have thought that Modest Mouse's "Float On" would make a good wedding album soundtrack, but for this one it's surprisingly effective. Also, the video really captures the joy and fun that were Jer and Gen's wedding.

Jeremy and Genevieve from Ted Nghiem on Vimeo.