Poetry Hut Blog
John Donne

Poetry News:

1. — Susan Howe whispers the netherworld [mp3] —
2. — Violet de Cristoforo, 90; California haiku poet survived WWII internment camps —
3. — This poem is as sexy as a soft-porn script —
4. — This very special baseball program of SELECTED SHORTS includes stories, memoirs, and poems that celebrate the national game [mp3] —
5. — how the structure of language reveals things about the mechanics of our minds —
6. — The words that time forgot —

Clever crows are caught on camera

Poetry News:

1. — Poetry as Right-Hemispheric Language —
2. — “There certainly isn”™t enough genuine talent for us to take notice” —
3. — Poet John Donne was a compulsive conceit practitioner —
4. — The correspondence started after Schillaci submitted poems for publication in a now-defunct University of New Hampshire literary magazine —
5. — This remarkable true story is recounted in a new book, The Zookeeper’s Wife, by naturalist, poet and essayist Diane Ackerman —
6. — The war against Hitler was barely a year old before newspapers began asking: Where are the war poets? —
7. — Call for submissions on the literary grotesque - the monstrous, the unusual, the abnormal —
8. — a lot was taken from the single Graham lines I listed —
9. — Artists often think of their creations as brain-children, plucked from the air. But perhaps a work of art is closer to actual offspring. —
10. — I am sad but he had a good life I guess. —
11. — Muslim cleric demands Taslima be driven out sighgh —

I may work in a grim cubicle but at least it is not orange. I wonder what the suicide rate was for folks who worked in those? By 10:02am everything would be vibrating and spots would be floating in front of the monochrome CRT displays.

In 1973, basically the population of the entire lower-peninsula of Michigan was poisoned with Polybrominated biphenyls (PBBs). Sadly there isn’t much in Wikipedia about this. It was a chemical-based disaster in which cows were fed tainted feed — “Firemaster” flame-retardant accidentally got shipped with a cattle feed supplement called “Nutrimaster.” A dairy farmer, Frederic Halbert, (who fortunately had an MS in Chemical Engineering) tried to get the state to realize um, something is wrong with the feed, & they didn’t really listen to him at first. But he didn’t give up, thank gawd. But in the meantime everyone was drinking the milk, etc. Once the magnitude of everything became clear, Michigan asked the Federal Government to help out — $$$ — & it refused. Hard to believe, nowadays. I don’t know whatever happened with that.

I’m reading a book about it, Bitter Harvest, out of print 0-8028-7039-2. My Uncle’s dairy farm was quarantined I think? I’ll have to ask my dad; perhaps that is my imagination. But it was one of those haunting childhood things for me — thousands of bloated, frozen, hoove-up-dead-cows-in-the-snow on TV, alongside images of Vietnam …

… and so began my distrust of the government hahahaha. What’s that, Senator Clinton? The government intricately involved with my healthcare? No. No thank you. hahahaha.

There are thousands of PBB cows, chickens, etc buried in a big clay-lined pit in Kalkaska, Michigan and in Mio, Michigan. And PBBs all over the place. But people are working on it and maybe poetry is helping them a little bit?

Poetry News:

1. Does poetry still matter? —
2. But in the early 20th century, a critical revolution led by T.S. Eliot helped to put Donne at the center of the English canon —
3. Virginia Tech’s Professor of Hate —
4. At the tender age of 15, Franz Wright sent one of his poems to his father —
5. In fine form —
6. Duck-billed platitudes —

My brother Jason has a sculpture “A Few Iron Posts of Observation” at the Usdan Gallery at Bennington College until May 4th as part of the show Multiples.

Poetry News:

1. Defection probe over poet Auden —
2. UNM English Emeritus Professor Frumkin Dies —
3. Uncovering Ezra Pound’s roots —
4. The Cat’s 50! —
5. Shuson a poet married to his muse —
6. Jagged rhythms —

March 3, 2007 total lunar eclipse & Viewer’s Guide: Total Lunar Eclipse Saturday Evening

Google Trends for “poetry” and Google Trends for “poet” and Google Trends for “musician”