Bud Bloom has invented a neato button that will take you to “any one of 554 sites that publish poetry.”

The button is over in the sidebar. “Verse Libromancy.” Click! You know you want to.

So, Steve and I have given the new CBS show “Jericho” a shot. I don’t like it. He seems to like it. The real geekery, however, is that there’s a couple of scenes with Morse code. Steve, the amateur radio operator, had to decode. Luckily, or unluckily as the case may be, we have TiVo, so he could repeatedly rewind to hear it.

“… and want…”

*tuning radio*

“… code delta code delta 2 minute warning u…”

—– cut to another scene—–

“… score remains scoreless…”

Yes, he decoded the score, or lack thereof, to a football game.

Woo.

Ever get a poem just sorta stuck in your head, where everything you’re writing is struggling to break free from some sort of poetic taffy? This poem of mine from earlier this year seems to be trying to crush all newcomers like a felled tree. A felled yarrow?

Sprung

The yarrow died. He said the yarrow died
last year when I was too strung out on grief
to pace the yard. I couldn’t bear the fat
cartwheeling clouds, the soil like fudge, the shit
of too damned many birds. In winter, death
is like an earthquake. It’s not if but when.
But June’s no time to die, too many flies
will gather friends and dot like berry seeds
along your face. This spring, he touched my wrist,
told me the yarrow died when you were dying,
told me its skeleton in brittle grey
was still footing the yard. I pulled it out.

I learned today that one of Steve’s favorite authors (and one of mine as well), Dick Francis, just put out a new book. The rumor had been that Francis had retired after the death of his wife, who was at least his researcher, and possibly more of a cowriter. It’s a fourth book in the Sid Halley series, and I’m just deelighted. Look at me. Deeeeelighted. The first three have been rereleased as a single paperback, plus the new book, and Steve’s birthday is shaping up nicely. Woo!

From a nonpoetry board, someone looking for a poem:

I wrote down (or so I thought) the name of the author. Zbigniew Herbert. And the name of the poem (or so I thought). ‘Prologue’.

Searching Herbert’s collected works, and the works of Czeslaw Milosz (the only other poet I know in any depth) have turned up nothing.

Then later:

I have it written on a small piece of paper stuck inside my pencil box. I can date the piece of paper to around 8 – 10 years ago, by my handwriting and the type of paper.

Given the timing, I’m assuming I either picked it up from an anthology, periodical or English language radio. Less likely: my clumsy translation from Russian (which I do speak) or Polish (which I don’t, but not knowing a language never stopped me yet.)

Can anyone help?

I need something to wake me up. Preferably something that doesn’t involve pain, so no whacking my toes with a hammer, you smart alecks.

I’ve been trying to motivate myself a little more toward getting some poetry sent out for publication. I find that I feel a little more in tune with the poetry world when I’m engaging with it in a purely self-oriented way.

But there are so many journals, and I don’t understand how anyone picks what to send where, or whether to send where. I’m confused. And sleepy. And I see that hammer, sneakypants.

Well, confiscated is more like it. But still. It is gone. And in its new home, it is being used for coffee, which is an abomination unto my palate.

The smell of coffee, on the other hand, is just delightful. How can something smell so good and taste like the ass end of a mule?

When someone posts a link to what they claim is the WORST SONG IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD! why do I immediately go listen? And why do I post the link here? And why do I have the suspicion some of you will listen, too?

Well, for those who will, go here. Click on the sharktiger thing. Don’t come whining to me when your ears fall offen your head.

If Joseph Conrad were here, he’d chuck Heart of Darkness into a fire. Musical taste, he dead.

Creeped out or creeped in, your choice.

Go to 99rooms.

I have the honor of having some poems up at The Adroitly Placed Word.

I want to give a shout out to Didi Menendez whose dedication to the miPOradio got me more involved with recording poems, which gave me special interest in John Vick’s project. And my involvement with miPo has brought it to John, which makes everything very circular in the best possible way. Didi and John are both delightful to work with.

Now go! Listen! Shoo!