Poetry News:

1. — New site: Postal poetry —
2. — City Lights: 50 years on the cutting edge of publishing —
3. — Half of his sonnets and songs were written during his travels which he regarded as a form of exile, an alternative to prison in Lisbon, imposed on him by cruel fate —
4. — Revisiting Coney Island of the Mind —
5. — How Seamus Heaney defines Ireland’s 1972 troubles with a portrait of a drunken seaman blown up in a pub [mp3] —
6. — faculty readings from the last two West Chester conferences are online: 2007 and 2008 —
7. — Joe Milford’s internet radio show feat. Ron Silliman [mp3] —
8. — Seeking poems that explore the twisted world of David Lynch’s Blue Velvet for The Private Press’s next chapbook anthology. Deadline 31 December 2008 —
9. — Is music just “auditory cheesecake” or can it provide deep insights into the workings of the brain and the evolution of language —
10. — Trying to explain this to younger/newer poets and those outside of the poetry community is frustrating [True -- 7.03% of regular readers of this blog bought my book, using my feed subscriber stats & # of Lulu orders to calculate... it's probably even less than 7%, because the calculation assumes that all the orders came from RSS feed subscribers, which is probably doubtful.] —
11. — Eileen Tabios & the Poetry Economics: A Moronic Oxymoron —

A bit of confession Wednesday — lately I’ve been posting here as a way to demonstrate to myself that I am doing better, healthwise, than I am — I think. Self-psyche-out. But I need to quit it until I get this cardiovascular / autonomic nervous system weirdness figured out. I am totally exhausted! From what?! All I’m doing is sleeping and eating really, and my PT routines. I’m getting fat too. I have an exam Friday. I’ll be back when I get some energy.

Poetry News:

1. — What the neoconservative editor of the New York Times Book Review won’t be asked about when he speaks to political fantasists this evening —
2. — She’s left the tarot cards and psychic-speak behind in favor of straight-to-the-gut protest poetry as fierce and passionate as anything released by June Jordan or Nikki Giovanni —
3. — Why The Writers Must Win —
4. — In itself, it is an aftermath, an explanation of myself to myself —
5. — Tennessee Poet Laureate Margaret Britton Vaughn will be awarded the Germantown Arts Alliance Medal for Literary Arts at the Arts —
6. — WILL you kindly permit me to reply to Mr. Shaemas O’Sheel’s remarks in THE NEW YORK TIMES REVIEW OF BOOKS of my new volume, “The Poet, The Pool, and the Fairies,” and his recommendation that American poets should seriously consider the study of Celtic poets, Yeats, Fiona, Macleod, Nora Hopper, Moira O’Neill —
7. — Bogalusa celebrates Komunyaka —
8. — Too Much Spam? Turn it Into Poetry and Hang it on Your Wall —

I guess Madison Cawein is the Kentucky poet who allegedly got ripped off (?) was the inspiration of (?) got borrowed from (?) re: The Wasteland.

Excellent interview with David Lynch.