A week and a day

I am not yet prepared to do my stint at the Decatur Book Festival, but I shall be. The schedule is up, and I will be on at 2:30 pm at Java Monkey a week from Saturday. For some reason, I keep thinking it will turn out something like the Monty Python sketch in which a man who believes he is Trotsky pulls out a feather boa in the middle of a rousing speech and goes into a French cabaret number.

Good thing I wrote several poems this weekend

I will be reading my poetry at the Decatur Book Festival at the local authors stage (Java Monkey) for 15 minutes some time between 2pm and 4pm on Saturday, August 30, 2008. I am pleased and honored to have been invited to perform.

Unfortunately, I have concluded that it would not be appropriate to wear my 60's stewardess outfit on this occasion and will be dressed less suggestively.

And, here is another poem I wrote this weekend:

WE'LL HAVE A WAR WE NEVER FIGHT

We'll journey far
into the night

We'll track a star
we never sight

We'll often say "Bu-bu-bu-buh?"
and always answer "So what, huh?"

We'll never have a glorious "Wha?"
and never give a flying fuh
.
.
.

Sonnet No. 36, or “That Guy Who Was at the Cocktail Party”

Sonnet No. 36, or “That Guy Who Was at the Cocktail Party”

There were some charming pieces I once wrote
And posted to a famous magazine.
And then one day arrived a little note.
It said my work was not the best they’d seen.

Now to be honest, that is not quite so:
I was rejected, though I don’t know how.
And that I was, somehow, I’m sure I know.
It bugs me now and then, but mostly now.

I write these twiddling trifles all the time-
Everyone ignores me, yes, I know.
It’s not just tedious of me to rhyme,
Iambic pentameter bores them so.

‘Twas good enough when Shakespeare wrote this way,
I know that he, too, suffered in his day.

and now . . .

This is just to say,
I wish I didn't know

he wasn't really talking about plums.

I'm no Lorax, but I do love trees

I have revised the poem about trees, and I could not be more pleased with how it came out.

Here is the link.

In light of yet another re-reading of American Gods

A lovely novel by Neil Gaiman. It behooves us all to enjoy this story from The Onion.

Say hey, Mr. Senator Kennedy, sir -

Right. This is an outburst of the kind of thinking and feeling that I normally endeavor to save for therapy appointments or venting to friends.

Senator Ted Kennedy had a big seizure and was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. This catches my attention, even though I am doing my best to ignore as many Senators as possible at least until after the '08 presidential election. I have a malignant brain tumor myself, diagnosed after I had a big seizure. Sen. Kennedy and I have some other stuff in common - disrupted legal careers, excellent government health insurance, we're both alright for rich white people. He is way richer and far more powerful. I am younger, healthier and better looking.

I have a much better brain tumor than he does though - operable (near-full resection in 2001), right temporal. That it is on the right side means that post surgery I have a little more trouble finding my car again after I have parked it, and don't always recognize that I have met someone before. My language is fine. I still have my words. They implied I had 5 or so years to live when I was diagnosed at 29 yrs old, and these days (at 36 yrs old) I am thinking I have a decent shot at making it to 45 with a reasonable number of marbles intact. The scientific literature I have perused describes my kind of glioma as "indolent" (albeit capable of speeding up at some point).

Sen. Kennedy is old and has some other health problems. His tumor is in the left side (words) and seems like it might be pretty aggressive. That is all bad news. The article I linked said maybe 3 years survival for him, but didn't really go into his possible loss of function. It might be very bad and difficult, and all the treatments attack the rest of your body along with the cancer. That really sucks for him and his family.

So what is my problem? I don't hate Sen. Kennedy. I like him fine. I like his Irish whiskey nose and general legislative bad-assery, to the extent that I know anything about politics. I am not glad he has a malignant brain tumor. Nobody should be glad about anybody having a malignant brain tumor.

My problem is I am angry about some bullshit. The bullshit in that article and in all the other articles I read that reminds me of how angry I am about my own tumor. The bullshit in the articles that is pissing me off right now is the "He's a fighter" bullshit. I have a brain tumor - listen to me - SHUT UP. SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP.

Now listen:

Cancer doesn't care if you are a fighter. Your family cares - it helps keep their hopes up. Your doctors care - it helps them face you honestly and be good doctors to you. So, there are good reasons to be a fighter and it will probably make the whole process easier for many people.

BUT. I'll say it again, louder: CANCER DOESN'T CARE IF YOU ARE A FIGHTER.

I thought one time I wanted to learn how to fly a plane. My dad had done that for a while, until all the kids were born and he decided that being able to pay the mortgage and giving up a potentially fatal hobby were both good things. He sat me down and said I could only go for flying lessons if I understood that the plane was just a hunk of metal. It doesn't feel, it doesn't love me, it doesn't want to fly. It is matter with mass. Gravity works on it. A plane is a hunk of machinery that wants to fall out of the sky. Flying a plane is just keeping it from falling.

I eventually decided against lessons. And, cancer is cancer. It is not a demon or a bad mood or an enemy that shall be defeated with the right attitude and plucky can-do spirit.

Anyway. I am pissed off by all of those quotes in the articles about Sen. Kennedy's brain tumor about how he is a fighter. So - "Yeah cancer cancer, but he's a fighter, so everything is cool"? Or - "Let's start pretending he's already dead and he died with his boots on. Go us!"? Or, "He will survive this because I want him to and he deserves to live more than other people do!" To heck with those guys, except his son, who does have a right to say that - just like my Mom has a right to say it about me.

And for that matter - by all means, pray. Baptists, Methodists, Buddhists, Mennonites, Hindus, Catholics, Jews, and Presbyterians have all prayed for me at various stages of treatment and I have lasted a surprisingly long time in surprisingly good shape. I try to let everyone know that I appreciate their support and am keeping up a good attitude. That I am FIGHTING. It makes the people I care about feel better, but the way people outside the real personal situation of cancer talk about it sometimes just pisses the hell out of me.

This is just the luck of the draw. For all I know it is the Marlboro Reds that have been holding that sucker at bay all these years.

Real life v. Fake life

I have been doing things in the real world. Many of my activities in the real world are part of a policy initiative. The policy at stake is "improve poetry and creative endeavors." The related strategic initiative is "get out more and interact with poets and creative people." Sadly enough for my blog - a different subset of the same policy initiative - I have hardly done any actual writing since beginning this strategic initiative. So, no energetic time at home in the evening making charts of news stories and no oul-AP-o.

In the meantime, here is an entertaining quote from Ezra Pound, from a paragraph dismissing the relevance of the real identity of Andreas Divus Justinopolitanus, a translator of the Odyssey into Latin (Parisiis, In officina Christiani Wecheli, MDXXXVIII).

... I am myself known as Signore Sterlina to James Joyce's children, while the phonetic translation of my name into the Japanese tongue is so indecorous that I am seriously advised not to use it, lest it do me harm in Nippon. (Rendered back ad verbum into our maternal speech it gives for its meaning, 'This picture of a phallus costs ten yen.' There is no surety in shifting personal names from one idiom to another.)

(from the essay "Translators of Greek: Early Translators of Homer" printed in Literary Essays of Ezra Pound, edited and with an introduction by T.S. Eliot)

An Interruption in Weekly Service

There is no oul-AP-o yet this week. I was tired last night. And The Producers was on. I expect to get another installment posted later this week.

Hey! Another Oul-AP-o

.

See the last entry for more of an explanation of this process. The only difference with these is that this time I was watching Big Trouble in Little China and Bizarre Foods because CSI reruns weren't on. Here is your mixed up news:

Apr 8th, 2008 | LOS ANGELES -- A man who says he worked as a bodyguard called off research into and surveillance of traumatic brain injuries in exchange for $213 million. Documents released Tuesday gave details about the hushed phone calls that triggered the raid - he averages 13.5 points and nine rebounds. "It has caused losses in the millions economically ... and ultimately it has deprived western New York of vibrant economic growth," said FBI Special Agent-in-Charge L. Bennett.

Apr 8th, 2008 | BOGOTA, Colombia – France voted Tuesday to expand Iomega Corp. with girls spiritually married to much older men as soon as they reached puberty and boys groomed to perpetuate the cycle. A 16-year veteran was obtained earlier this season. The president of the group was among those charged with extortion and racketeering after a five-year investigation. In court papers, the plaintiff claimed breach of oral contract and violation of four California labor codes, in addition to fraud and infliction of emotional distress.

Apr 8th, 2008 | WASHINGTON – The U.S. House of Representatives said Tuesday it would acquire sexual abuse because of a right hip contusion. Some of the crimes were aided by its access to state motor vehicle records. In an unrelated development, it has sued actress Lindsay Lohan and her company, claiming it is owed more than $55,000 in unpaid wages. French President Nicolas Sarkozy's office said he is "deeply disappointed."

Apr 8th, 2008 | BOSTON -- Data storage provider EMC Corp. is rife with Memphis Grizzlies (members of a National Basketball Association team based in Memphis Tenn.) attacking non-union workers and their families. Calls to EMC Corp.’s publicist were not immediately returned. The Grizzlies insist, as they have since 2005, that the government de-militarize two counties. Senator Chris Dodd said "we are another step closer to ensuring that every baby born in the United States will be tested for a full panel of genetic and metabolic disorders."

Apr 8th, 2008 | ELDORADO, Texas -- A polygamist compound with hundreds of children sat out Tuesday night against a decade of attacks, but was not paid for its services. The Foreign Ministry said late Tuesday that there was no longer any reason to keep the mission. The polygamist compound supports Health Resources Service Administration grants to fund state projects to improve access to rehabilitation. A representative said this should not have any material impact on its full-year earnings.

Apr 8th, 2008 | MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- Phoenix Suns center Shaquille O'Neal was arrested and charged with two weeks of 24-hour personal security and 17 weeks of evening duty to treat and possibly free an ailing hostage. Similar legislation was already approved by the Senate, and the Senate is expected to act soon to send it to President Bush for his signature. A San Diego-based storage company had rejected that offer earlier this year, calling it inferior to a proposed all-stock transaction. Church lawyer Patrick Peranteau did not immediately return a phone message seeking comment Tuesday.

Apr 8th, 2008 | BUFFALO, N.Y. -- A dozen leaders and members of a construction union say they are owed $4000 a week for a humanitarian mission that affects some 1.5 million Americans every year and has come to be the signature wound of the war in Iraq. This expands their offerings targeting small businesses and consumers. Authorities completed a search of the gleaming 80-foot-high temple, a cheese-making plant, a cement plant, a school, a doctor's office and housing units and said that they took a knee to the hip in their 105-98 loss against Dallas on Sunday.