Quick now, here, now, always—

I really liked this piece about TS Eliot by Jeanette Winterson.

So when people say that poetry is merely a luxury for the educated middle classes, or that it shouldn't be read much at school because it is irrelevant, or any of the strange and stupid things that are said about poetry and its place in our lives, I suspect that the people doing the saying have had things pretty easy. A tough life needs a tough language - and that is what poetry is. That is what literature offers - a language powerful enough to say how it is.

Let's not confuse this with realism. The power does not lie directly with the choice of subject or its social relevance - if it did, then everything not about our own contemporary situation would be academic to us, and all the art of the past would be a mental museum. Art lasts because it gives us a language for our inner reality, and that is not a private hieroglyph; it is a connection across time to all those others who have suffered and failed, found happiness, lost it, faced death, ruin, struggled, survived, known the night-hours of inconsolable pain.

Also, couldn't agree more with Cathy Park Hong of Harriet Blog about serious unproductivity during the days (weeks, months) leading up to the election.

Gray Saturday

It's a quiet, gray day here. Although I hear City College's marching band playing, it looks like rain. John has already gone downtown to work on a reshoot and won't be back until maybe 5:00. Greta is patiently waiting for me to finish with this post and take her for a walk. (Would be good idea to get out there before the rain starts.)

The house is a bit worse for wear -- everything stopped this week as we obsessed over the election. Now, change will come in Washington, but I still better wash the kitchen floor!

In the office, I have papers spread all over the floor. I'm going through my big wicker picnic basket full of old poems, printouts, old versions of my manuscript. I don't really know what I'm looking for.

One Day

After all this time. One day.

Three More Days

I am obsessed. I can't think of anything else except the election -- even though John and I already voted today. We stood in the rain and we voted early. For Obama, of course. Is there any doubt? And against California Proposition 8 and against Proposition 4. Talk about the audacity of hope. If President Obama can accomplish even a small fraction of what this country needs, it will be wonderful. It will be a start.

The thing is: I had been obsessed with my manuscript, how close it's come so many times, the totally specious reasons for which it has been rejected, the less worthy books that have been published… But this election, this campaign has really made me understand how trivial my concerns about the manuscript are in comparison -- in comparison with the bigger cause that has involved us.

It's Saturday night and it's raining. I've been soaked twice today. John is out finishing some prints he owes people. I've had a large glass of red wine, so forgive me. The wine: free, Argentinean, "tannat," 2005 vintage. John is a photographer -- you know, if he shoots it, we drink it.

So, we're going to win, aren't we? In 1968, when I graduated high school, I was named "most idealistic." But even I could not have imagined the possibility of a win on Tuesday. Not just a win -- a landslide.

Please.

This ain't no fooling around…

This ain't no party, this ain't no disco, it's work I'm posting from -- but I don't want to come down yet from the high of last night's concert -- David Byrne at Davies Hall in San Francisco. (And speaking of high, though we weren't partaking, it seems that Davies Hall ushers are not quite used to doing liquor-and-other-assorted-other-stuff searches, because, well, let's just say that this was not your typical Symphony crowd). But it was an awesome concert -- the new stuff ("Everything That Happens Will Happen Today" music by Brian Eno, lyrics by Byrne) and the old Talking Heads stuff.

We had good seats -- second tier, but right in front with a clear view to the stage. And the acoustics were terrific. Byrne, his backup band, backup singers, and three athletic quirky dancers were all wearing white. The show was as good as the music. There were two encores, standing ovations, and at the end of the second encore, Byrne invited the "San Francisco Marching Band" -- maybe they were leftover from the Love Parade the last week? -- to come to the stage and then the Byrne band joined them (that's what this picture captures, though it doesn't really capture anything, but you can see the excitement) for the finale of "Burning Down the House."

Roses on a rainy day

It rained last night here. First rain since, what, April? I lay in bed trying to figure out what the noise was.

Not much news in this corner lately, but I'm embarrassed by the dearth of posts in this blog. I hardly know what the point is, but anyway, today I'll post. It gives me the opportunity to show off my beautiful roses. They've opened out since Thursday, and their colors are the whole spectrum of apricot, from pink and creamy to nearly orange to hints of brown, like a sunset in a flower. This picture doesn't do any justice -- but there's only one photographer in this family and right now, he's still asleep.

We didn't do much for our anniversary (32!), but then we're going out on Monday to hear David Byrne and Brian Eno at Symphony Hall, and that was a bit of a splurge, so that will be enough. Besides, there was all that other entertainment on Thursday. (But I'm telling you, I'm going to bite my fingernails entirely off before this election's over.)

And I'm already biting them for other reasons. But I wasn't going to get into that again, until/when/if.

Dream job

New Pages has posted the following announcement
ZYZZYVA Seeks a New Editor
In the Editor's Note of the most recent ZYZZYVA, Howard Junker announces his intent to retire from the magazine, which is now seeking his successor, someone who "will have to be different, will have to take a new direction, because the times have changed." The informal job description Junker gives draws upon a response he once gave to a Paris Review Questionnaire about "the key ingredients needed to keep a literary magazine afloat." Junker writes: "Taking its editor George Plimpton as my model, I declared: An independent income is the basic flotation device. Having the office in the editor's basement reduces rent and the editor's commute. Also helpful because, even if the budget remains modest, attracting money is key: good looks, charm, guts, a thick skin, a sense of humor, a good work ethic, luck, and the ability to spot and nurture talent." Sound like anybody you know? If so, Junker closes his editorial: "If you have someone in mind, please let me know.

Ah yes, that would be cool. But an independent income? Uh, no.

In other news: nice party at work today for two people who just became citizens and also for one who was getting married. He had lived 15 years with his boyfriend and they are getting married this weekend. Very cool celebration -- about a dozen pizzas, three cakes, ice cream, champagne. I work in a cool place.