brookfield zoo and poetry

so i visited brookfield zoo and got to see the great bear wilderness. the reason i bring this up for i posted a while ago about the poetry instillation exhibit that is there. i finally got to see it and it was amazing.  the poems were picked perfectly for the different parts of the zoo they were in. and i just thought i would share the photos of the different poems that were there. sorry some of them are hard to read.

the rose shank

the rose metaphor is used all the time in high poetry. and i saw this and knew i just had to share it with everyone. hehe

quarter of a century

yesterday was my 25th birthday. i had a great day. i worked (which was no fun) but then i went to the blackhawks game that night which was great. they won in a shoot out and two of my favorite players scored; kane and toews. so over all it was a great birthday.

every day i get an email from the new york times with the days headlines. and yesterday one of the headlines was called this: light out, huck, they still want to civilize you. and it was written by michiko kukutani. the article was about how alan gribben, a professor of english at auburn university, at montgomery, alabama, has produced a new edition of mark twain’s novel, huckleberry finn, that replaces the word “nigger” with "slave".  Never mind that attaching the epithet slave to the character Jim — who has run away in a bid for freedom — effectively labels him as property, as the very thing he is trying to escape.


Nigger, which appears in the book more than 200 times, was a common racial epithet in the antebellum South, used by Twain as part of his characters’ vernacular speech and as a reflection of mid-19th-century social attitudes along the Mississippi River.


Haven’t we learned by now that removing books from the curriculum just deprives children of exposure to classic works of literature? Worse, it relieves teachers of the fundamental responsibility of putting such books in context — of helping students understand that “Huckleberry Finn” actually stands as a powerful indictment of slavery (with Nigger Jim its most noble character), of using its contested language as an opportunity to explore the painful complexities of race relations in this country. To censor or redact books on school reading lists is a form of denial: shutting the door on harsh historical realities — whitewashing them or pretending they do not exist.


Mr. Gribben’s effort to update “Huckleberry Finn” (published in an edition with “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” by NewSouth Books), ratifies the narcissistic contemporary belief that art should be inoffensive and accessible; that books, plays and poetry from other times and places should somehow be made to conform to today’s democratic ideals. It’s like the politically correct efforts in the ’80s to exile great authors like Conrad and Melville from the canon because their work does not feature enough women or projects colonialist attitudes.


Efforts to sanitize classic literature have a long, undistinguished history. Everything from Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” to Roald Dahl’s “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” have been challenged or have suffered at the hands of uptight editors. There have even been purified versions of the Bible (all that sex and violence!). Sometimes the urge to expurgate (if not outright ban) comes from the right, evangelicals and conservatives, worried about blasphemy, profane language and sexual innuendo. Fundamentalist groups, for instance, have tried to have dictionaries banned because of definitions offered for words like hot, tail, ball and nuts.


In other cases the drive to sanitize comes from the left, eager to impose its own multicultural, feminist worldviews and worried about offending religious or ethnic groups. Michael Radford’s 2004 film version of “The Merchant of Venice” (starring Al Pacino) revised the play to elide potentially offensive material, serving up a nicer, more sympathetic Shylock and blunting tough questions about anti-Semitism. More absurdly, a British theater company in 2002 changed the title of its production of “The Hunchback of Notre Dame” to "the bellringer of notre dame."


Ballantine Books published an expurgated version of “Fahrenheit 451,” Ray Bradbury’s celebrated sci-fi classic about book banning, in which words like “hell” and “abortion” were deleted; it was reportedly 13 years before Mr. Bradbury became aware of the changes and demanded that the original version be restored.


Whether it comes from conservatives or liberals, there is a patronizing Big Brother aspect to these literary fumigations. We, the censors, need to protect you, the naïve, delicate reader. We, the editors, need to police writers (even those from other eras), who might have penned something that might be offensive to someone sometime. 

dancing in the snow

today is the first real big snow fall of the year so i thought i would share a poem that was inspired by the snow.


Dancing in the snow
With my soul all a glow
Hand and hand with the ghost
Of the person i love most

tom waits book

Singer Tom Waits is to make his publishing debut next year with a book that combines his poetry with images of the homeless, according to the Guardian newspaper.
Hard Ground is described as a portrait of homelessness, combining Waits's words with images of people who "live on the hard ground."

This is the publishing debut for Waits, the eccentric troubadour who, after 40 years, dozens of film appearances and about 20 albums, has noticeably avoided committing himself to print. He remarked in a 1975 interview that poetry is "a very dangerous word."

"I don't like the stigma that comes with being called a poet," he said. "So I call what I'm doing an improvisational adventure or an inebriational travelogue."

Hard Ground is modelled on the 1941 classic, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, which combined James Agee's poetry and Walker Evans's photographs of Depression-era farmers.

Although this is Waits's first collaboration with O'Brien, the photographer has frequently taken pictures of the singer. He also shot the cover of Waits's recent album, Glitter and Doom Live.

Hard Ground is to be published by University of Texas in March 2011.

-Edmonton Journal, November 28, 2010

happy thanksgiving!

happy thanksgiving everyone! hope you have a good day. here is a good thanksgiving day poem.

Save Room
By Joanna Fuchs

As meals go, Thanksgiving dinner
Is always a feast--a five star winner.
Here comes the salad, dressed just right,
The golden brown turkey--a savory delight;

The stuffing now, and then the gravy,
The jello mold, all wiggly and wavy.
Take some cranberry sauce and candied yams;
Is there room for fresh made rolls and jams?

More dishes tempt me; ah, but I
Must save some room for pumpkin pie!

2010 national book award winners

the fiction winner is: lord of misrule by jaimy gordon.
the non fiction winner is: just kids by patti smith
the poetry winner is: lighthead by terrance hayes
the young peoples literature winner is: mockingbird by kathryn erskine

congrats to all the winners!

happy halloween!

since today is halloween, i thought i would post the great edgar allan poe's the raven. it's such a great poem. and i think it fits perfectly with halloween. hope everyone got lots of candy and had a spooky day.

the raven

liu xiaobo - day break

so i was reading some of liu xiaobo's poetry and i came across this poem and just wanted to share it. i love the last stanza. one of the best i've ever read.

Daybreak
for Xia

over the tall ashen wall, between
the sound of vegetables being chopped
daybreak’s bound, severed,
dissipated by a paralysis of spirit

what is the difference
between the light and the darkness
that seems to surface through my eyes’
apertures, from my seat of rust
I can’t tell if it’s the glint of chains
in the cell, or the god of nature
behind the wall
daily dissidence
makes the arrogant
sun stunned to no end

daybreak a vast emptiness
you in a far place
with nights of love stored away

6. 30. 1997

john milton is really just a dirty old man

dr jennifer batt, an english lecturer at the university of oxford, was somewhat surprised when she came across a filthy, innuendo-laden rhyme "by milton" while reading a forgotten, early 18th-century poetic anthology; the oxford and cambridge miscellany. it cannot be proved for sure if the poem is by milton but the poem is introduced in the volume as An Extempore Upon a Faggot, by Milton.

the rather smutty ditty reads: "Have you not in a Chimney seen / A Faggot which is moist and green / How coyly it receives the Heat / And at both ends do's weep and sweat? / So fares it with a tender Maid / When first upon her Back she's laid / But like dry Wood th' experienced Dame / Cracks and rejoices in the Flame."

the coarse, and frankly misogynistic verse likens a young woman to a faggot, a bunch of damp sticks, which, when cast upon the fire, produces moisture "at both ends", like (according to the poem) a weeping virgin when sexually aroused. by contrast, the more sexually experienced woman is more like dry wood, which becomes joyfully enflamed when put on the fire.

it is all rather a long way from the lofty, christian sentiments of milton's great epic, Paradise Lost.

poetry postcard 13

seeing how it's september now, i assume this is the last postcard with poetry on it i will be getting. it was very cool to get the postcards and i loved reading everyone's poetry. this last poem is called: trees.

we have seen the trees roots like long legs
stretched out above ground ocopus like,
we remember the times as children at night
outside our windows the trees did a hula dance
then a wild frug, winding down swaying
waltz like. trees do these dances at night
sometimes by moonlight, but after we sleep,
after we cleep they uproot themselves
cautiously, disturning the eath so little,
moles are blamed for any piles of dirt,
they dance away on their root tips
embracing limbs with other trees,
they know their dances well, and
they choose their partners carefully.
the chestnut on the corner loves a maple,
she is big leaf maple and rebuff him.
sometimes at night a slight rumbly noise
may awaken you, it's the trees running home,
occasionally they stop in place and retend
it's where they grew, they are so nonchalant,
oh yes, there were nights they liked to frighten you,
wave their limbs and look like monsters,
you thought it was the wind that made them so,
but really they're great actors, fortunately
during the day they stay in their places, espically
in summer on bright days when their shade is needed.

poetry postcard 12

the latest poem does not have a title.

in a heavenly field trimmed
and rimmed in gold,
st bartholomeu slunes(?) in
a reddish light -- his halo
burning through the muscle
and corpuscle(?). bartholomeu's
tendons stretch along his
arm and the sinew holds
each finger around his
shin, clutched in his
own fist. helt aloft in glassy(?),

poetry postcard 11

the latest poem is called: the loss of one more link. the writer notes on the postcard that the poem was composed from bits and pieces of emails sent after joan's passing.

in the early hours of a march morning,
during a peaceful and painless sleep,
in the presence of those who dearly love her,
aunt joan passed away.

it is hard to accept that she is gone.
she was such a lady,
so welcmoing and fun to be with,
a breath of fresh air, yet also
worldly and sophisticated!
we would look forward to her visits,
prepare everything just right:
now there is a void within our lives,
the loss of one more link
to mumsie and my old world relatives.

and so, by way of homage and remembering,
i gaze upon an artifact from the past:
a black-and-white photograph of
a wartime wedding dinner, with a young joan,
smiling, an intense groom, janusz,
and all four sisters, alas, now dwindling fast.

words of support and consolation come:
joan is with her sisters, sympathetic company,
no longer suffering. thus we continue living
with the greatest of sorrows,
badly shocked and shaken.

how are things with you, janusz,
during these days of grief and sadness,
stabilized and getting better?
our thoughts and prayers are with you now,
to restore strength, more suitable conditions.
we send you these comforting words,
our love, beautiful flowers,
wishing you peace and mending:
better days will come, please be assured.

postcard poetry 10

the newest poem is called: misplaced

i have lost
many things
libarary books,
phone numbers,
christmas present i remember buying.

my mother, teasing,
says i'd lose my head
if it were not welded
to my neck by
spinal column, muscle, and sinew.

poetry postcard 9

the latest poem on my postcard of poetry is called: some call this home.

foot hills rising out of morning
fog - expanse of fileds lined
by roads heading straight to padilla bay - i can tell
how long you lived here by
which way your head turns
traveling south, how the "l"
in padilla curls off your tongue
and how the pace of your heart
slows here, close to the rim.

postcard poetry 8

there is no title for the poem on this postcard.

oh, i ain't got manners,
and i ain't got talent,
but i know what it's like
to chase that rabbit,
so when the dogs are weighed
and the band starts up the hurry
my money's on the six
and i ain't go no worries.

postcard poetry 7

the most recent postcard poem was titled: steptoe bute, idaho

so what is it
that makes the grainlands
so fruitful,
the spilt blood of 100 dragons
or the sloswed(?) wine of the wealthy
as they viewed from the top
an they own?
or could it be as simple
as the sun rising with the uneat(?),
each reflecting the owner
back to itself?

postcard poetry 6

there's no title for the newest postcard of poetry i have gotten.

her pennies
have wheat
you can eat
his crickets
have legs
that play mozart
your ears
have corn
so sweet
my body into(?) child
comes
to hearts.

postcard poetry 5

the newest postcard with poetry has titled it's poem: Mt. Rainier

we leave the
chores
hardness
grief
behind
and travel to the
glacier covered
mountain that
reassures us.

poetry postcards 4

yesterday i got another postcard of poetry in the mail. this one is called: Ziggy Stardust

fall alseep to
rain
awake to
rain
a memory of her
intimacies, mattress
chat and
david bowie lyrics.