WEEKEND UPDATE: The long weekend is over and it went out on a high note. First, Voices Carry 2 was a big success! The Carter Center rotunda was full (about 100 people) and the poets - Jon Goode, Beth Gylys, Eric Nelson, Sharan Strange, Dan Veach, Cecilia Woloch and host Kodac Harrison - were all fantastic! My thanks to all of them for participating. Poetry Atlanta is definitely planning to host Voices Carry 3 in 2006.
On Saturday night, while I should have been home getting ready for Voices Carry, I was tempted out to the release party for Verb, a new audio literary magazine. The event was held at The Seen Gallery in Oakhurst, which is a great space. The guest list was impressive, headed up by Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler. I actually wound up missing him and most of the other readers because I was outside talking with other poets. We had no idea the readings had started because they kept taking breaks between every reader, not to mention there was nowhere to sit in the gallery...literally. They had not set up any chairs, so most folks wandered outside to the patio tables or into the restaurant next door. These are minor complaints. Verb itself is a great idea and the majority of the poems and stories are superb. They even got James Dickey...and he's dead.
Dr. Madelyn Hatter was a hit, once again, at Java Monkey Speaks last night. It was a spirited evening of poetry in general, and Madelyn was icing on the cake...and the cherry. You know you've got an audience in your corner when they are oohing and ahhing and murmuring when the poem is finished. Safe journey back to Baton Rouge, Dr. M. See you again soon!
So, FEMA head motherfucker Michael Brown resigned today. And while I should be happy about that (and I am), I'm furious that Dubya didn't fire him two weeks ago when all those people were dying in New Orleans. I guess after saying, "Brownie, you're doin' a heckuva job," firing him would have made him look...ahem...stupid. Apparently the only thing Brownie was good for was raising money for his old pal Dubya. Time magazine had already found Brownie had doctored his resume, so the writing was on the wall and somebody was eventually going to have to take the fall. Of course, while we could breathe a small sigh of relief that Brownie is gone, now we have to contend with his replacement, David Paulison. Remember him? He's the moron who suggested in 2003 that everyone stock up on duct tape and plastic in case of a biological attack against America. Oh, brother...the cronyism and stupidity never ends with this administration.
Today, I started getting emails from folks about this Blackwater mercenary group now patroling in New Orleans. These private military types are being used in Iraq and now they are being allowed - fully armed and without any oversight - into the streets of a major American city? What the fuck is happening to this country? It's like we've fallen into some alternate universe.
Okay, so here's the poem I mentioned. It's a little dated now that Brownie has gone, but you'll get the idea. It borrows liberally from Led Zeppelin, Theresa Davis and Public Enemy, not to mention America's own Marie Antoinette...former first lady Barbara Bush.
Drowned World
Up on the roof tops…drip, drip, drip
this is the sound of tears and blood
spilling out into the eddy
of stagnant water just beneath our feet.
If it keeps on rainin’ levees goin’ to break…
And when it does, the power vacuum
will pull you down faster than the tide,
the chosen leader raising more money
to line his pockets in sunny San Diego,
his second in command hip deep
in tranquil streams, fly fishing in Wyoming,
and their go-to-girl, dazzled by the lights of Broadway…
who are you, Condi coos, to question my purchase
of Ferragammo shoes…
And Brownie, toppled from his Arabian steed,
new assholes ripped along his backside,
courtesy of Katie Couric and Paula Zahn.
But there’s salve for those wounds,
he’s doin’ a good job, and he’s back
in the saddle, showing his boss the cancelled check,
all that money raised to keep the power in power.
And that bug-eyed bitch that begat
the motherfucker who claims to hold the power,
strolling through the Astrodome,
the embodiment of bourgeois,
she’d let them eat cake, but then they might linger…
What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary,
is they all want to stay in Texas.
And so many of the people in the arena here,
you know, were underprivileged anyway
so this is working very well for them.
Perhaps she could be forgiven,
dealing with a brain-damaged son,
who reads My Pet Goat
while planes fly into buildings,
and improves his chip shot while
the world drowns.
Look in the mirror,
we are the new public enemy,
and we will be left to drown and starve
if the power has anything to do with it,
the white trash, crackers, and niggers,
the old, frail and infirm,
sucking up resources, not George’s problem,
they didn’t vote for him…twice.
We must rewrite the song:
George Bush was a hero to some,
but he was just a motherfucker to me…
fight the power, fight the powers that be…
On Saturday night, while I should have been home getting ready for Voices Carry, I was tempted out to the release party for Verb, a new audio literary magazine. The event was held at The Seen Gallery in Oakhurst, which is a great space. The guest list was impressive, headed up by Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler. I actually wound up missing him and most of the other readers because I was outside talking with other poets. We had no idea the readings had started because they kept taking breaks between every reader, not to mention there was nowhere to sit in the gallery...literally. They had not set up any chairs, so most folks wandered outside to the patio tables or into the restaurant next door. These are minor complaints. Verb itself is a great idea and the majority of the poems and stories are superb. They even got James Dickey...and he's dead.
Dr. Madelyn Hatter was a hit, once again, at Java Monkey Speaks last night. It was a spirited evening of poetry in general, and Madelyn was icing on the cake...and the cherry. You know you've got an audience in your corner when they are oohing and ahhing and murmuring when the poem is finished. Safe journey back to Baton Rouge, Dr. M. See you again soon!
So, FEMA head motherfucker Michael Brown resigned today. And while I should be happy about that (and I am), I'm furious that Dubya didn't fire him two weeks ago when all those people were dying in New Orleans. I guess after saying, "Brownie, you're doin' a heckuva job," firing him would have made him look...ahem...stupid. Apparently the only thing Brownie was good for was raising money for his old pal Dubya. Time magazine had already found Brownie had doctored his resume, so the writing was on the wall and somebody was eventually going to have to take the fall. Of course, while we could breathe a small sigh of relief that Brownie is gone, now we have to contend with his replacement, David Paulison. Remember him? He's the moron who suggested in 2003 that everyone stock up on duct tape and plastic in case of a biological attack against America. Oh, brother...the cronyism and stupidity never ends with this administration.
Today, I started getting emails from folks about this Blackwater mercenary group now patroling in New Orleans. These private military types are being used in Iraq and now they are being allowed - fully armed and without any oversight - into the streets of a major American city? What the fuck is happening to this country? It's like we've fallen into some alternate universe.
Okay, so here's the poem I mentioned. It's a little dated now that Brownie has gone, but you'll get the idea. It borrows liberally from Led Zeppelin, Theresa Davis and Public Enemy, not to mention America's own Marie Antoinette...former first lady Barbara Bush.
Drowned World
Up on the roof tops…drip, drip, drip
this is the sound of tears and blood
spilling out into the eddy
of stagnant water just beneath our feet.
If it keeps on rainin’ levees goin’ to break…
And when it does, the power vacuum
will pull you down faster than the tide,
the chosen leader raising more money
to line his pockets in sunny San Diego,
his second in command hip deep
in tranquil streams, fly fishing in Wyoming,
and their go-to-girl, dazzled by the lights of Broadway…
who are you, Condi coos, to question my purchase
of Ferragammo shoes…
And Brownie, toppled from his Arabian steed,
new assholes ripped along his backside,
courtesy of Katie Couric and Paula Zahn.
But there’s salve for those wounds,
he’s doin’ a good job, and he’s back
in the saddle, showing his boss the cancelled check,
all that money raised to keep the power in power.
And that bug-eyed bitch that begat
the motherfucker who claims to hold the power,
strolling through the Astrodome,
the embodiment of bourgeois,
she’d let them eat cake, but then they might linger…
What I'm hearing, which is sort of scary,
is they all want to stay in Texas.
And so many of the people in the arena here,
you know, were underprivileged anyway
so this is working very well for them.
Perhaps she could be forgiven,
dealing with a brain-damaged son,
who reads My Pet Goat
while planes fly into buildings,
and improves his chip shot while
the world drowns.
Look in the mirror,
we are the new public enemy,
and we will be left to drown and starve
if the power has anything to do with it,
the white trash, crackers, and niggers,
the old, frail and infirm,
sucking up resources, not George’s problem,
they didn’t vote for him…twice.
We must rewrite the song:
George Bush was a hero to some,
but he was just a motherfucker to me…
fight the power, fight the powers that be…
Comments
GAV
Impeachment Proceedings could be only a breath away...
And did you see on the news the other night that most of metro Los Angeles went dark when ONE cable was cut by a worker? One cable. The terrorists are taking notes I'm sure. America's resources are stretched thin, the economy is going back into the toilet (not that it was ever out of the bowl) and our leadership is non-existant. It would be death blow to the country if terrorists strike before the end of the year.