pantoum of pants

concrete tree, a wrought-iron bench.
tailored suits for tailored people.
a tensed car / frieze / a crashway.
Autonomous Rex the techno-dino.

tailored suits for tailored people.
such-and-sucks about the sky.
Autonomous Reg the techno-vag.
unstable substances board your horse.

such and sucks about the clouds.
mindless pseudopolitical mumble.
unstable substances bored me hoarse.
try this Cheesequake before it tries you.

mindless pseudoanalytical jumble.
concrete tree, a wrought-iron Bens.
unexpected gift is creepy kindness.
a sensed bear / freeze / a cashway.

Children writing backwards

My friend Leigha's little daughter Sydnee writes in mirror-image. Thought I'd look into it. Here's something I found online at the URL above:

Five-Year-Old Writes Backwards
Pediatrics Expert Advice from Shari Nethersole, M.D.

Question: My five-year-old granddaughter, when trying her skills at writing, usually starts on the right side of the paper rather that the left. About half of the time she mixes her Bs and Ds and makes her S backwards. She has been in a structured day care and is getting ready for kindergarten this fall. Any need for concern, especially about dyslexia?

Answer: There is no need for concern if your granddaughter is otherwise well. It is completely normal for children to write "backwards" at this age. In addition to letter and number reversals, some children will truly write in mirror image: going from right to left with all the letters reversed. There is nothing wrong with this. The brain does not completely form the concept of left and right until somewhere between ages five and eight. This means that almost all children will have persistent reversals when they first start writing.


meop rof eendyS

t'nod eb eulb
t'nod og srekcarc
s'ti yako fi er'uoy a elttil sdrawkcab

sgniht teg ssel erup sa uoy worg dlo
od ew lla trats sdrawrof, neht og
sdrawkcab nehw er'ew dlot?

Last Christmas was an ugly hat

Christmas last year was a bit of a bummer. A couple months before, I finally broke up with my ridiculous ex-boyfriend. The apartment I had found for us to rent (on my own, since he was too scared to search for a place in case it was run by a slumlord), turned out to be run by a slumlord named Bertram Okeke. The boyfriend left before the mice did. Both were extremely difficult to get rid of.

My aunt Ellen, a strong lady who I hadn't seen in years, came busting in to rescue me from my depression. I went to live at my cousin Sandra's, a nice place in the armpit of Calgary. 2 hours to work each way, to my job scrubbing suites at the swanky seniors' community, but at least I'd get some reading done if I wasn't too tired. That was it. It was going to be the end of my boyfriend days - each man had been worse than the one before. And this is coming from a girl who smoked various things, drank, wrote terrible lyric poetry on a daily basis AND insisted on reading it to them. Yep, I was no catch, but catchier than the boys I ended up with. If I was a pothead, they had to be dealers. If I drank a couple times a week, they had to be alcoholics prone to DUI. If I wrote bad poetry, they wrote worse and often set it to music. Then there was fraud, theft, gambling, pawning, gambling, pawning some more, paranoia (this last one had me under surveillance, sure I'd cheat on him like his ex did), insane roadrage and the usual cheating. I didn't participate in these, was only implicated their results.

Emotionally screwy, I have never been good at turning off the emotions and staying protectively cynical no matter how badly my love life has gone.

Last Christmas time, in the sensory lonely of one completely unused to being alone, I believed I had made a connection with someone who perpetually impressed and delighted me. In short, I had a crush on him. We went out once and I thought it had gone well. In retrospect, it went horribly: nervous, I insisted on paying, drank too much, chain smoked, and when I got a call from an old guy friend on my cell, I thought it would be fun to let them talk to one another rather than saying sorry, I'm busy. Then he gave me a lift back to the armpit of Calgary and I hugged him awkwardly. A night out like that, how can a guy not call you back? Yep, I should have known better than to hope. I had acted like a total slob.

Meanwhile, the owner of the company I worked for, having made so much money from the exploitation of rich seniors, gave each employee a $100 gift card to spend at a particular mall. By that time I had done most of my Christmas shopping, but I felt like spending the card money on family and friends. Sick as a dog, I was hopped up on Benelyn and echinacea by the time I arrived through the big glass doors. Bought some things for Granny, some accessories for my thrift store Company Christmas Party dress, then thought it would be amusing to buy something from my impressive delightful friend who happened to work there, the one who hadn't called me for the couple weeks since we went out. (Never mind that he'd considered it a 'non-date', for one thing..). Anyway, I couldn't find anything whatsoever in the mall that I thought he would like. I ended up getting him a moronic card and an ugly hat. If you squinted your brain it made a kind of sense. I'm blaming Benelyn and echinacea. To make matters worse, his sister kindly suggested I give her the gift so that she could sneak it under the family Christmas tree. So here I was, this horrible chain-smoking chain-drinking bad poetry girl who lives in the armpit of Calgary and works in an ol' folks home, in a way crashing my friend's family Christmas with my terribly chosen gift. Way to go.

Needless to say he didn't reply to my embarrassed, apologetic phone call either. I've never felt so low in my life. Maybe it was partly because without someone else around being much more ridiculous than I was, I was forced to reckon with my own ridiculousness. That's my Margaret Lawrence analysis. It all still makes me cringe with embarrassment when I think about it.

**

Christmas time is here again and I'm in a significantly different position. This past January, an old friend came to visit from Winnipeg. We spoke about our lives since I had lived in Winnipeg. Suddenly he declared that he wanted to keep all the assholes away from me. It was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to me. In February 06, I went to visit him on his birthday and he asked me to marry him. A few days later, with a duffle bag of clothes and his guitar, he got on the bus and came back to Calgary with me. A straight-edge vegetarian with no bad habits to speak of, a strong moral centre, and an admirable artistic output, Gareth has been a clear departure from what my life had been from about 1999 when my parents moved from Ottawa and I'd decided to stay there on my own, and 2005, the culmination of those 6 years of escalating unhappiness. We now have our own place in Sunnyside, and while we're not exactly thriving financially, we both have decent full time jobs and plans for the future. He doesn't care how ridiculous I am - either I've managed to tone it down, or he doesn't mind. I'm laying off the bodily pollutants (except for occasional celebration),and concentrating on what I can accomplish rather than lamenting about what I can't. I'm not as paranoid anymore that all the educated writers think I'm lame. I'm fairly convinced by now that even people I admire are lame in their own way.

But for some reason, it being Christmas and all, I can't help but think of that goddam ugly hat. For an equally unknown reason, the closer it's getting to Christmas, the more I find myself reliving last year's embarrassment, feeling inexplicably sad, and continuing to care about what the person in possession of that ugly hat (if he wasn't smart enough to burn or regift it) thinks of me. In a way he was the last person to see me giving in to every possible lapse of willpower before Gareth found me all crumpled up and picked me up and dusted me off. It's like if I could redeem myself in the eyes of this person, I could be sure I've really evolved. I could relax and be happy and not act like a nervous little bird. But it so happens that the few times I've relapsed back into fungirl mode, you've been around. Not for any related reason, just by chance.

So I've just got to pull myself together and not be such a sensitive twit. But I'd just like to say, you still impress and delight me. Having once thought I could be one to make you feel less alone - and now being one who is herself less alone thanks to another - I hope that you find someone who would pick you up and dust you off if you crumple. Because it really can be better than being alone when you're with the right person. Love isn't so bad after all. Nowhere near as ugly as that goddam hat, and as fun to give as it is to receive.

Biased Calgary Bylaw Passes: Reaction

Thanks again to everyone at CHAI for their hard work, for taking up an issue that meant a lot to me, and for allowing me, an inexperienced activist, to join you. Thank you also to the wonderful support we had from Calgarians, whether from agencies, NGOs, concerned Calgarians or those most affected by the Bylaw. We will continue to collect the remainder of the petitions we have not received, and we will look into our options.

As a recap, our position was that a great deal of the bylaw targets the homeless. Parts about loitering, loitering and obstructing, putting feet up on a bench, and urinating on public property make it illegal to huddle, panhandle, sleep outside, and obey the body’s natural functions when no public restrooms are provided. The steep fines for these activities are not affordable to anyone living on the street, and they will be put in jail for up to six months instead. We felt that the City must build more shelters and provide more affordable housing before considering passing such a bylaw, since those on the street haven’t been any other choice but to commit those offences that are now, as of yesterday evening, illegal. Considering the fallout of the economic boom has brought a great deal more poverty to Calgary, and with it a crisis for those who can’t find shelters beds or a place they can afford to live, we felt that the timing of this bylaw was indeed in very poor taste. We begged the City to have a conscience and not pass the bylaw.

City Council finally got around to Public Behaviour Bylaw #54M2006 at about 8:00 p.m. at their meeting last night. There were several Land Use applications to consider that took up a great deal of time, and though they had taken supper and other breaks, Council was visibly tired since they had convened at 1:00 p.m. Alderman Joe Ceci, the chief voice at Council against the Bylaw, attempted to put through an item of Urgent Business. This Urgent Business was to have the principles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, as laid out by the Fair Calgary Policy accepted by Council on November 13, be applied to the Bylaw.

Council rejected the Urgent Business in a vote, and then voted to make the Bylaw final. They went from a 7-11 split in favour of the Public Behaviour Bylaw at the second reading, to a 7-7 tie last night. Still, the bylaw went through. Close as it was, I'm sure if the media had faithfully reported all the inclusions of the bylaw sooner instead of repeating over and over again the parts about spitting, fighting, and carrying a knife, we could have been up at arms fast enough to effect an outcome in our favour. From now on, we will certainly be keeping a closer watch over the Council’s minutes on the City of Calgary website and not relying on the media to relay information.
The majority of Calgarians we spoke to realized the bias of the bylaw once they were made fully aware of its contents and applications.

After the Bylaw went through, Alderman Farrow put forth a 'motion arising' that passed easily. It was ‘to ensure that Law Enforcement refer to the Fair Calgary Policy when implementing the Bylaw’. This helps, but unfortunately it is not a real solution, since there is no active enforcement of the Policy by Council over Law Enforcement. Everything is still left up to Officer Discretion. This frightens me: given the biases average citizens have towards the less fortunate, police who have had unhappy dealings with homeless people in the past will certainly have strong prejudices and may see the bylaw as a method of exercising those prejudices or even getting revenge. If the extremely prejudiced officer I spoke to on Sunday night serves as an example of a certain faction of the Calgary Police Service, and he probably does, we have much to worry about. One wonders if the Policy will even find its way, physically, into the hands of individual officers.

It was a long day for Council; again, they were visibly drained and bored. The only reason not to subject the Bylaw to the provisions of the Fair Calgary Policy was Council’s unwillingness to go through the whole process again from the beginning, after so many attempts were made at amendments in the past by those Aldermen who were on side with CHAI. Had that Urgent Business of Ceci’s gone through, the Bylaw would have been tabled, re-written according to Fair Calgary principles, and subject again to 3 readings and attempts at amendments.

It should be noted for those who couldn’t be present that Alderman McIvor stood up 3 times to say sarcastically that he ‘Admired his fellow Alderman’s tenacity’. Then he said that he thought ‘Calgarians don’t care about Fair Calgary policies or Bylaws; they just don’t want to step in someone else’s defecation’. Personally I think that McIvor ought to give Calgarians more credit. I think Calgarians might get the credit they deserve from McIvor once they eventually get him out of Council, or at least let him know that in fact they do care what Councils plans are for average citizens – in particular, they care when they realize that human rights are to be violated right here in Calgary.

Alderman Ceci responded that his colleague gave him too much credit as a conniver; that really, it was not a sneaky move, but instead, he just cared about the repercussions that Bylaw would have.

I’m so upset that the bylaw passed. We did the best we could on such short notice after the 2nd reading in terms of the petition and protest, and tried to emphasize that what we had managed, given the short notice, was only the tip of the iceberg – an indication that once eyes were opened to the ramifications of the bylaw, Calgarians did indeed care – but we could have done much more. Again, if I hadn’t relied on the media to tell me about all of the aspects of the bylaw, the true nature of it and implications of it could have been brought to the attention of more Calgarians while there was still time to stand up at Council and object to it.

Misinformation and corruption won the day yesterday. But beginning today we will watch Council like hawks, so that tomorrow we’ll be much more prepared for the City’s next discriminating move towards denying citizens of low or non-existent income their basic human rights. Instead of funding shelters, they take away their buildings. Instead of building more shelters, they sign away big parcels of land for development as rich gated communities at the very same meeting in which they pass a bylaw that will jail those who have nowhere to go.

As members of the crowd cried at yesterday’s protest, Shame! It is a shame the bylaw passed, it is a shameful move by the City to pass it, much of our news media should be ashamed of themselves for concentrating mainly on innocuous parts of the bylaw and thereby misrepresenting it, I am ashamed that we could not do more to stop it. But I am not ashamed of trying to stop it, and proud as hell of all those who tried too. It is easy to give up hope in a super conservative city that citizens of conscience will ever influence a corrupt Council, but if we do we'll never get anywhere.

Meanwhile, we at CHAI will certainly be doing our homework to find out if there is anything to be done at this stage, now that the bylaw has passed. It could even involve a human rights lawyer. Please stay tuned and join us if you can. See www.housingaction.ca

Statement about Calgary's Public Behaviour Bylaw 54M2006

Statement

Those who accept the Public Behaviour Bylaw clearly don't understand the ramifications of it. The media has been concentrating on the innocuous aspects that we can all agree on: don't spit, don't fight, don't carry a knife.

The truth is, the parts of the bylaw about loitering and obstructing, putting feet up on a bench or public structure, and urinating or defecating in public are designed to put the homeless in jail. When you look closer, you see that they make it illegal to huddle, panhandle, sleep outside, and use the bathroom when no public washrooms are provided. The fines carried for these items ($300-$10,000) would be impossible for those less fortunate to pay; instead, they would face a jail sentence of up to six months.

In a time of extreme crisis, when there are not enough shelters or affordable housing and not enough being done by the City to provide these necessities, it is reprehensible and without conscience for City Council to decide that the solution to these problems is to create a bylaw that effectively gets rid of the homeless by putting them in jail.

As citizens, we can do much better for the poor in our community than to allow the City to do this to them. We must put a stop to it, and demand that the City move more quickly to provide more shelters andmore affordable housing in this time of crisis. With our petition and our protest on Monday November 20th, we will make our voices heard.

Laurie Fuhr
November 17 2006

David Helwig responds

Response to an email I sent him to an address on the Porcupine's Quill website. Couldn't find the book online by cover description, so I emailed to ask what the white hardcover book with the binoculars on it was that I saw at the Borden Friendship Club. Posted with permission.

To: lauriefuhr@yahoo.ca
Subject: Unread books
Date: Thu, 19 Oct 2006 22:35:46 -0300

Hi Laurie,

The book is called Catchpenny Poems. I think that physically it's one of the most beautiful Oberon ever published. The poems in it won the CBC poetry award for 1983, and the book was published in that year.

I have only two copies, and one of them is the one my parents had, which I reclaimed after they died. Still like the poems.

Sure I'd love to read in Calgary sometime. I don't think I've ever read in Alberta, though I remember being in Calgary publicizing a novel and finding the city was empty after seven o'clock. Somebody told me they'd just used it for the set of a Superman movie. That was maybe not quite before you were born, but a while back.

Odd to think of those books sitting there in the cold waiting for someone to discover them. But they sure aren't going to let some uppity chick run away with them.


Cheers,


David


From: jgdh@pei.sympatico.ca
To: "Laurie Fuhr"
Subject: Re: Unred boks
Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2006 16:07:36 -0300

Laurie,

Answers to questions:

Sure, post the letter if you want. Not much to it.

In the Eighties I was published for a while by Viking Penguin. They are a big outfit that can afford to send writers for long distances to do publicity--which was what I was doing in Calgary when I went for a walk down dark and entirely empty streets between skyscrapers. Then I saw a weird light approaching--an empty streetcar. Passed by and vanished into the movies.

New stuff? I have a novel called Saltsea supposed to be out soon from Biblioasis and next fall PQ is doing a novella called Smuggling Donkeys.

I have lots of unpublished poems, but they might be a bit old-fashioned for your magazine.

You didn't ask, but you can find my website at davidhelwig.com.


Stay uppity and ornery.

Cheers,

David

Canadian Literary Archives of the Borden Friendship Club

On October 7, my cousin Jenny got married in Saskatchewan to a cop with a silly nickname, who supposedly laughs when you say the word Jaguar if you believe the best man speech. Already I know more about Aaron than I do about Jenny, my extremely quiet cousin who is a maternity nurse. Maybe when you hear other people screaming all day (mothers, babies, doctors), you don't feel the need to fill the air with much noise yourself later.

Jenny's reception was held at the Borden Legion. The room where the meals were served was the Borden Friendship Club, which included an organ I couldn't help but dip around with after wine, especially since my Dad was enthusiastic (a sloppy rendition of Neil Young's Like a Hurricane is about the only organ thing I could come up with).

Later, Gareth and I were hanging out after he had become rather silly, and he grew increasingly alarmed about the interest I was taking in the library (a single bookcase) of the Borden Friendship Club. There, spines uncracked, utterly untouched by the passage of time (or people's hands for that matter), were a number of old rare poetry books. I'm not a used book expert like my friend David Collins, but here was a pristine first edition of Milton Acorn's Jackpine Sonnets, and one of a really bizarre early Don McKay book (Brick Books edition) called Lependu, which I'd never come across. They were all stamped 'Courtesy of the Canada Council'. There was a hardcover poetry book by David Helwig with binoculars on the cover, which I can't seem to figure out the name of (I've actually emailed poor David about it, will let you know what he says if he's still at that address) and an early Lorna Crozier. There was a lot more I didn't even get at good look at.

My gears were turning, so I found one of the people involved with the Friendship Club who was volunteering and asked if I could take a couple of the books for a donation to the Club, since it seemed no one ever read them. She agreed, saying she thought the Club would be much more pleased with the donation than with the books. If anyone had concerns, I told her, they could call me at the number on my cheque.

A few days later, the phone rang - a Saskatchewan number that wasn't my grandmother's. Uh oh. "This is Shirley Williams, treasurer of the Borden Friendship Club," she said in a strong, well-aged small town Saskatchewan accent (and there is such an accent, really). "We had a meeting and the fellows would like you to return their books as soon as possible." I apologized and said that the woman I had spoken to had thought it was okay. "The woman you talked with did not have the authority to give you those books," Shirley told me matter of factly. "Well, I really thought you wouldn't mind, considering the books had obviously never been read." "It's the principle of the thing," said Shirley. "We will not be treated like a shopping mall." Ouch! I felt like a horrible shoplifter.

I told Shirley she could keep the donation cheque, and that now that I know they like poetry, I would send some additional books along with those two I had taken for donation.


Whatever extra books I send, I know they'll be preserved for all time on the shelves of the Borden Friendship Club, as secure as the National Archives or moreso, since no one will likely ever touch them again.

If anyone should like to donate books to the Borden Friendship Club, here is their address:

Borden Friendship Club
c/o Shirley Williams
Box 96
Borden, SK S0K 0N0

I think it would be really amusing if they suddenly received an influx of poetry book donations from elsewhere in the country. :)


p.s. Geist has the 'Tirade by Way of Introduction' by Milton Acorn from his Jackpine Sonnets on the site linked above.

Calgary MultiArts Variety Show #2 - March 24 07

The first one went so well, we have to do it again. Some things you do right you still do twice. :)
Thank you to everyone who was involved the first time.

#2 is Saturday, March 24 2007, 7 p.m. at The Soda.

Confirmed participants are The Russian Artist Factory, The Pine Tarts, Kessler Tidal, Sheri-D Wilson, Juanita Brandt, Naomi Burkhart, Aaron Leaney, Anita Athavale, Moe Clark, Chantal Vitalis, the return of Swallow a Bicycle Productions with another mind-altering theatre experience and more short films.

If you might be interested in performing or volunteering, please don't hesitate to get in touch even this early.


Thanks,

Laurie

Laurie & Gareth's Wedding !

...will be Saturday, May 26, 2007. Time & place you'll know if you're a guest. It's sweet. Pretty traditional, followed by a brunch picnic in the park, but the *other* reception that evening will be a rock n' roll show open to the public - with Calgary and Winnipeg bands!

Yeah, I know, marriage, eek, everyone does it. Hmm. Well I guess I do to. It's completely amazing and shocking when someone says to you, "I want to spend the rest of my life with you." Enough to change a jaded and cynical mind...

Press Release Update

Please note additions: Light City Fiction (band), Shone Abet (spoken word poet), Barb Maier (short film) ; and subtractions: Sheri-D Wilson (cancelled with regrets due to prior engagement)

Advance Tickets available for purchase at 2 vendors! See below.

PRESS RELEASE

The Calgary MultiArts Variety Show is an exciting new event featuring short sets by local musicians, poets, filmmakers and actors, followed by 3 local bands!

Bands: Ghostkeeper and Light City Fiction with The Jagatha Christies;

Musicians: Aaron Booth, Danielle French, Spencer Davis (The Incandescence), Phaedrus Gatherman, and the pantymelters (duo feat. Gareth Williams);

Poets: Shone Abet, Carmen Derkson (filling Station), Fred Holliss (Single Onion), Kirk Ramdath (Calgary SLAM Team),, Jocelyn Grosse & James Dangerous (music & poetry), and Colin Martin (NoD Magazine);

Play by Charles Netto’s Swallow a Bicycle Productions;

Short Films by Garth Whelan and Barb Maier.


MC’s: Mark Hopkins and Laurie Fuhr.


Don’t miss this Celebration of Calgary’s Imagination!

Saturday, September 23, The Soda Lounge, 211 – 12 Ave SW. Doors at 6:30 p.m., event at 7:00 p.m. Tickets: $10 at the door, $8 in advance at Megatunes and Pages Books on Kensington. More info: 999-2566 or visit www.myspace.com/calgarymultiarts

For more information or to arrange an interview, please contact Laurie Fuhr at 999-2566 or lauriefuhr@yahoo.ca

Calgary MultiArts Variety Show, Sept 23 - The Soda

the bill so far... still somewhat in progress! have a look - exciting stuff!

PRESS RELEASE

The Calgary MultiArts Variety Show is an exciting new event featuring short 5-10 min sets by local musicians, poets, filmmakers and actors, followed by 3 local bands: Children of the Great Northern Muskeg (featuring Shane Ghostkeeper) with The Jagatha Christies and the pantymelters.

Musicians: Aaron Booth (Spreepark), Naomi Burkhart (jazz), Spencer Davis (The Incandescence), Trevor Tchir (guest – Edmonton) ;

Poets: Sheri-D Wilson (CISWF), Carmen Derkson (filling Station), Kirk Ramdrath (Calgary SLAM Team), Jocelyn Grosse & James Dangerous (music & poetry), Colin Martin (NoD) and K.L. McKay (SPIRE, guest – Edmonton) ;

Play by Charles Netto & Friends ;

Short Films by Garth Whelan and Barb Maier.

Even more talent TBA!

MC’s: Mark Hopkins and Laurie Fuhr.


Don’t miss this celebration of Calgary’s vibrant imagination!
Saturday, September 23, The Soda Lounge, 211 – 12 Ave SW. Doors at 6:30 p.m., event at 7:00 p.m. Tickets: $10 at the door, $8 in advance at Megatunes. More info: 999-2566 or visit www.myspace.com/calgarymultiarts

For more information or to arrange and interview, please contact Laurie Fuhr at 999-2566 or lauriefuhr@yahoo.ca

the pantymelters

www.myspace.com/thepantymelters

extra-ephemeral ephemera: black slacks blog poem for Christian Bok's 40th

poem 1-8 for Christian Bok

1 the slack in his lips knows he’s crazy*

2 black all day in the heat for your party



3 black the all slack day in in his the lip
heat knows for he’s your crazy party

4 the black slack all in day in lip the
knows heat he’s for crazy your party



5 black the the black all slack slack all
day in in day in in his lip the the lip
knows heat heat knows he’s for for he’s
crazy his your your crazy party party

6 the black black the slack all all slack in
day day in in in lip his the the knows lip
heat heat he’s knows for for crazy he’s
your your party crazy party



note:
3 is a treatment of 2 and 1, resp.
4 is a treatment of 1 and 2, resp.
5 is a treatment of 3 and 4, resp.
6 is a treatment of 4 and 3, resp.
7 is a treatment of 6 and 5, resp.
8 is a treatment of 5 and 6, resp.


*after dropping off sound gear at Tubby Dog for the party to head to Marda Loop to see an apartment (which was crap by the way), a guy on the bus bench barks, "Have you been TOLD today?" and started rambling unintelligibly through the dis-intelligibility device of his thick moustache.

2 April Reviews: Riley, Begamundre

Light as Lightness, then Neon
The second pair of books in Frontenac’s eclectic Quartet 2006

Guiding us through countries including India, Canada, Bali, marriage and folklore, Ven Begamudre redefines what we think of as the boundaries of place in The Lightness Which is Our World, Seen From Afar.

Cross-cultural echoes resonate and meld for Begamundre with the ease and contemplative grace of ripples meeting halfway across a pond. Continents experience new Pangaea – France, Switzerland and Mumbai made neighbours by the common thread of Begamundre’s interpretative tour. In 2: Kanton Bern, from the Itineraries section, the poet observes:

“...I become aware
the Swiss keep dogs
the way they keep time – moving,
mechanical, leashed.
I’m baffled by myself.”

Yet, as in Paul Bowles’ The Sheltering Sky, one who is more traveler than tourist is also too familiar with the universality of sadness, and cannot go unaffected by it. In 5: In Florence, at the Pension Pitti Palace, Its Final Season, Begamundre observes:

“I don’t want to become a bore:
I feel I care too much.”

Exotic creatures are made mystical by their unlikely abilities to poke furred or feathered heads into seemingly normal human circumstances, flagging our attention towards unusual and transcendent aspects of human relationships. The activities of parakeets, crocodiles, cobras and people are equally fantastic. From 9: Ombaththu, a poem in the opening sequence:

“Is this how she saw him, resenting
her need? He urges the cobra towards him. He thinks, When it leaves to rejoin its kind, I will warn it of the sun.”

In the third section, Tourist Quota, Begamundre takes us off the edges of mapped India to visit the statue of Lord Bahubali in Shravan Belgola. Begamundre juxtapositions Canada:

“On the map of
Saskatchewan linger places that barely exist.”

Begamundre weaves bright threads of experience into the rich tapestry of his verse, dyed berry and rust by the organic colour palate only available to one who has actually been there. A fantastic debut.


* * *

To make an impact, the singer-songwriter of a rock band must use all she’s got. Ali Riley, formerly of Sacred Heart of Elvis injects this principle into poetry’s bluest vein with Tear Down, her second collection from Frontenac House.
Tear Down chooses narrative tactics and assumes conversational tones to connect with her audience on a comfortable, personal level – before gleefully tearing them up how only a good ol’ fashioned rockabilly show usually can.
Personal-made-political insights into gender differences share binding with reminiscences of gritty glory days at The National Hotel:

“all these ghosts will haunt the coming condos
as sure as the bones of ancestors
still taunt the covered wagons”

Razed into four strong sections of poems, “My Sister, Guard Your Veil: 7 Easy Pieces” contains opening poem For Each Man-Eater a Lady Killer, getting down to the grit of beginnings:

“a tough rose
blooms anyway
steeped in Jericho sand

I painted bat wings on my eyes
I crushed He-man spine
I kicked at the sky”

So begin the adventures of Undelicate Woman, an action figure in her own right. Next, Riley re-invents modern female archetypes in prose poetry: Snow White, Courteney Love and Saint Teresa all have it coming. Section two, The Boyfriend Sutras: 108 Performances also shows no mercy:

“don’t talk to me about Revolution
the pine-scented Che that hangs
from your rear-view mirror
can’t camouflage the smell of cold feet”
- from A Honey Mistake

The Dwelling Places includes The National Hotel and other pieces reminiscing little-documented underground history and its unprotected historic sites. House of Chango, Limbo Pad, Symptom Hall, a place called The Murder House as well as dreamscapes join these eclectic real estate listings.
The final, title section examines the tenants of such places and symptoms of the way we live, or lived. From Unspeakable:

“the video years made us brittle
rewound and rewatched
til the mention of what we feel
sounds dead”

Referencing such unlikely bedfellows as Kafka and Patti Smith, Zarathustra and Godspeed You Black Emperor, St. John and The Silver Jews, Ali Riley, reliable trafficker of the sweet unexpected, is a writer who will not be pinned down – nor her art jabbed through with common expectation to hang in the canon’s glass case. These are poems alive and pulsing as desire.

new poem 26/04/06

verbs of Sam

she plays the Zantax of video games
phones co-worker’s braincancer via cellphone
rides train like Business Class
next to Guy with Bag of Cans for a Briefcase

lobbyist for legroom
leggiest for lob groom
(a nice man who bowls too hard

sits on nestegg of debt like Yoga Ball
votes CP thinks NDP has N.O. party (on her birthday
adds flax
faxes lads
acts lax with Dad, lack-of-tax-wad sad

knows discrepancies provide for crepancies, knows she likes crepes
speaks Gilmour Girls Frenglished with Buffyisms
makes miso sake eso hake with riso



I eat her leftover leftovers,
wear her second-hand me downs,
rent a no room in her condo



we bond over shared dead Grandma and visions of Coleco
over the inability to explain just how the cigarette caught the oxygen tank on fire
or the addictive power of Mousetrap, Smurfs, BC’s Quest for Tires

we bond over but
sit under on cathair upholstered furnishings
on toilet only I’ve ever cleaned
on fabric softened by her pilfered Bounce sheets
on tongues rather than biting

(them, comma, each other)


but yes, we’ll always have Burger Time,
always Donkey Kong,
always Zaxxon

Personal notes: focus versus wide scatter

- have given notice at the seniors community. While the 2 hour commute gives me tons of time to read and hear the vast numbers of CDs I've been compulsively borrowing from the library, the commutes, plus the job, have worn me right the f*** out. My most long-term employment after Ottawa years of crap jobs and busking, and a whole year in one spot, hey, had to happen sometime. Will miss all of the lovely seniors though, especially the 4 Margarets, 4 Marys, 3 Jeans, and 2 Helens.

- have given up horrible relationships, smoking of any kind, all but ceremonial booze, and all but weekend coffee. Eating healthy for quite awhile now, I've lost my appetite for crap, and doing what you know you ought to seems to bleed over to other parts of your life. Living honestly, I suppose it could be called.

- long lost friend Gareth, a musician in Winnipeg, spontaneously touched down in Calgary a few weeks ago and visited for four intense days of surrealist walks and music. He was 17 and I was 19 when I saw him last; quite the thing to see, both of us now all growed up. Inspired to songs, indie rock/folk/country all, writing new ones in spare moments, and should finally get to record a wee demo in Winnipeg as I'm visiting between jobs. Haven't been back since leaving in 01, will be nice to see those poets again. Gareth is moving here to be my new roommate! Currently living at my cousin Sandra's condo in S.E. Calgary. With three of us there, we'll actually get Internet hooked, so I can catch up on all the blogs and essays you've been writing. (Currently only get on in short bursts at work)

- my next job is with a non-profit organization out of a big leisure centre closer to where I live, and includes a free membership. Hoping to get back into skating, early mornings before work, providing hockey players still don't like to get up that early. Also want to run in charity marathons, my new boss is a runner and can point me in the right direction. Housekeeping has buffed me up considerable.

So, finally after years of struggling: a decent job, a place to live sans crackheads or incorrigible stoners where I can actually relax, a clean bod and no ill-suited suitor. A slight sense of being settled, after umpteen moves about the country. When you're busy trying to survive, it's damn hard to get enough breath for much else. Hard work to do now and amends to make in my neglected writing life - starting immediately.

Peter F.Yacht Club Calgary submissions call

Peter F. Yacht Club, a small press poetry magazine out of Ottawa (various editors), would like to invite submissions for a Calgary-focused issue. The issue will be edited by myself, Laurie Fuhr, a former member of the writing group the magazine sprang from. Deadline for this submissions call is March 3. Please direct innovative poetry submissions on any topic to:

lauriefuhr@yahoo.ca

or by snail mail if necessary:

Peter F. Yacht Club Sails to Calgary
#15-220 Erin Mount Crescent
Calgary, AB T2B 2B2

Please feel free to circulate this call. Thank you.

Notes from the (Volunteering) Underground: Mutton Busting

Notes from the (Volunteering) Underground: Mutton Busting Performance Festival, Calgary

A wacky and wonderful time was had by all at the Epcor Centre Saturday, where a new space was christened in the name of Bubonic Tourists-initiate: Motel. A smallish room that somehow gets bigger and bigger the more people you fit into it, it hosted physical theatre troupe RED2BLUE's Faire (1+1) Tu, a trance-inducing smorgasborg of lighted umbrellas, suitcases converted to mirrors and record players, and a love story both in shadow puppetry and person. A mobile of books became a library, a coloured-light disco ball, the night sky; a screen projected an artful film of the credits. This is theatre?

Next came local songwriter/playwright/multitasker extrodinaire, Ethan Cole, playing oddly chosen covers that worked so well in acoustic style it took awhile to recognize even the most popular (or least popular) of his choices: Beach Boys, Depeche Mode and (*gasp*) Milli Vanilli!

Mike Angus was a clear departure, all the way down the Yellowhead in fact as he played songs from his beautiful, nostalgic acoustic CD, The Yellowhead Diaries. This mystery man's CD notes won't tell you how to get your hands on the next album he puts out; one just has to keep one's ear to the ground to hear the train comin' in from Winnipeg.

Later, one of the RED2BLUE narrators lost his black suit for a flame pink cowboy shirt, taking up DJ duties for the Motel launch party while Mutton Busters sipped Warthog and cider and danced like maniac theatre students - this wasn't my usual literary crowd of calm hipsters happening, we're talking people dressed like animals and a naked Bubonic curator, in Equus head, chasing (or being chased by) a naked woman in loincloth and teased-up Blondie. Whoa! This is theatre? And in Calgary, too? Ought to have known these sorts of things were going on somewhere... it all felt oddly natural, dancing like an idiot with a couple of animations artists there in the Motel - was it my high school drama improv days calling me back, or the beer on tap?

Am now very excited about the High Performance Rodeo and it's affiliate festival, Mutton Busting, seeing that the curators of each, Michael Green and Eric Moschopedis respectively, have eclectic and phenomenal taste in performers! Next weekend I'll be taking in The Rheostatics, local bands Summerlad and Woodpigeon, and indie icon Calvin Johnson (when I'm not actually manning the door or doing something otherwise useful, that is :) )

Check out www.bubonictourist.ca and/or www.oyr.org for info before it's too late. Mutton Busting runs from Jan 3-14 and the High Performance Rodeo happens from Jan 3-29. Volunteers are also welcome to apply!

a small gift this day (year 5)

(A New Year's sendout from Gil McElroy to his lit friends - with permission to blog! L.)

Sure Points & Lubricants
for rob mclennan


Irony, be
a giant. Offer me
no more
of the mill. I'll
overlook the
drawer (so
mellow &
straight) &
the gaudy childhood,
too.

I'll
sing (from right
to left) the wit
of impossible
songs, mimicking the style
of Mancini himself (at
the core), or maybe
Bacharach,
beyond high school. Ah,
those were handsome times,
of sure points
& lubricants.

Much gasps.

To pall,
likely.


- Gil McElroy

Irving Layton 1912 - 2006

This, forwarded yesterday by rob mclennan to his email list:

I just got an email from Ottawa poet Seymour Mayne that Montreal poetIrving Layton passed away today, two months shy of his 94th birthday. Information on Layton can be found
at:

http://www.library.utoronto.ca/canpoetry/layton/
http://www.irvinglayton.com/
http://www.ucalgary.ca/UofC/faculties/HUM/ENGL/canada/poet/i_layton.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irving_Layton
http://www.cbc.ca/lifeandtimes/layton.html
http://www.umanitoba.ca/cm/vol2/no26/layton.html

rob

Please Help Oni - Here's Why / How!

from an email I received, forwarded by rob mclennan:

On December 20th Ottawa poet "Oni the Haitian Sensation" was in a serious car accident involving a commercial snow clearing vehicule in the City of Ottawa. Oni and her three young children were hit from behind and the car was damaged beyond repair. The police officer dealing with Oni's case told her that the driver of the snow clearing vehicule was under investigation and will be charged. All occupants suffered from whiplash, Oni suffered a concussion, and continues to suffer from chronic pain.

Oni is an internationally recognized artist who has given much to Ottawa. She tells us that she and her children are in need of help from the community, and can be contacted at (780) 247-9285.

resolve

this year to colour-coordinate
your Christmas tree ornaments

is the better replace
before a hair-blower fire

this year to subvert the tactics
of charitable organizations

is the grocery in-door slam
trying to out

this year to commit to avoiding
ridiculousness

is the keep teeth shut
and gone into hiding

this year to snowblow
all 3 cm at 8 am

is the overwater houseplants
til black-thumb

is the put together Ikea bookshelf
not inside-out

is the to this year
this to year is the

the this is to year
year the this to is

A Comment on Comments --

To those who have attempted so far to post comments: sorry! While I want to read comments, I don't necessarily want to post them (just to keep things simple for the casual browser). When moderating, Blogger only gives me the option of posting or rejecting a comment, but not replying to it. If you would like a reply from me please include your email address in your comment. Thank you to those who have commented so far.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! My resolutions: Time to quit smoking all smokeables and go into hibernation for a period of intense reading and profuse writing. (Except when I have to come out to work, eat, pee, forage for berries, and volunteer at Mark Hopkins' Mutton Busting performance art fest here in Calgary). May your 2006 inspire art and awe.