The Confessional

Chicago (60637)

2009-09-02T17:39:00.000-07:00

Then you see an innocuous door and a few steps down
and you think, this looks small and rather
less than you expected.

But again and again the rooms unfold
and you walk deeper and deeper into

book heaven.

Like Roaches

2009-04-13T20:28:00.000-07:00

The moment you flick the light switch,

the way they scurry from sight

is not art, nor the sound

of them skittering. You have begun

to understand.

Not even the painting

of the lit room, empty. Art is this:

to look at it, the room painted

the moment after

the lifting of the black

and still be able to feel

the roaches there.

University of Chicago

2009-02-19T13:37:00.001-08:00

I visited the University of Chicago over the weekend. What can I say? The neighborhood is awesome, the school is beautiful, and the program is extremely impressive. Hyde Park is much less intimidating than downtown, and there is so much diversity. There are awesome bookstores, and the whole feel of the place is very intellectual.

The bottom line is financing. If I can figure out the money situation, I'll probably be living in Chicago next year; if I can't, I won't. Despite that, I cannot say enough about my experiences with the University to this point. It's definitely on a whole other level. I would be extremely honored to study there.

There Was a Little Magpie

2009-02-18T20:02:00.000-08:00

after Joan Miro

nothing is important

your tiny heart

stitching itself to the sky,

planets like a girl's fingerprints

children singing about

the sorrow of winglessness,

a heavy secret never to be told

nothing was more important

you became the first

small thing with blood

to love your own face in the mirror

flight

the way you named yourself

Will the Real False Prophet Please Stand Up?

2009-02-14T10:20:00.000-08:00

Image from a Borders bookstore's CHILDREN'S SECTION.

On the "Stimulus"

2009-02-13T13:03:00.000-08:00

“There is plenty to complain about for everyone, and perhaps that’s the sign of a good compromise. Regardless of party, we all cast our votes with one hand and crossed our fingers with the other.”
~ U.S. Rep. Emanuel Cleaver (D)

"No one believes more firmly than Comrade Napoleon that all animals are equal. He would be only too happy to let you make your decisions for yourselves. But sometimes you might make the wrong decisions, comrades, and then where should we be?"
- George Orwell, Animal Farm, Ch. 5

"No question now, what had happened to the faces of the pigs. The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."
- George Orwell, Animal Farm, Ch. 10

"I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just, that His justice cannot sleep forever."
~Thomas Jefferson

Wordplay

2009-02-10T18:49:00.001-08:00

The reading by Michael Dumanis tonight reminded me of this (he talked about the importance of wordplay...cue Bahamadia).

Dear God It Is Me Calling

2009-02-08T20:13:00.000-08:00

after Carla D’Aguanno

Drawn to false sheen, you were

captured by wrongness, couldn’t

look up from the lie.

No little girl wears a dress

into a hayloft, not unless she wants

it torn. What could she want there,

anyway?

Unless it is forbidden,

a pitchfork is boring, those walls

too shiny to be real.

Why pray here, except to beg

for grace?

The Fugue

2009-02-07T21:16:00.001-08:00

after Wassily Kandinsky

As excited as you are

by burgundy, it cannot make up

for the lack of noise

nothing makes you so angry

the world brushing against

your sensitive parts

as if your bedroom needed

another genocide

to order things

water ruined by rust,

a sip of delirium,

and you wake up coming

It’s midnight Friday

The Seroquel is gone

Nude Woman on her Back with Legs Apart

2009-02-06T14:26:00.001-08:00

after Auguste Rodin

I am a woman's mouth, painted shut.

There is movement in the corner,

your muttered words full

of the weight of night.

This has nothing to do with me.

A person, oddly, remembers

hay motes in sunlight , her little sister’s

eyes like a chemical burn,

drab non sequiturs of purity.

I won’t say I, but a woman,

any woman, can feel you looking,

instinctively knows the stroke

of the brush that halves her.

2009-02-01T18:25:00.000-08:00

Charmi Keranen, beloved den mother, is in the Winter issue of Blossombones!

Christina's World

2009-01-21T17:10:00.001-08:00

after Andrew Wyeth

A picture of a house

hangs in the house in the picture

of a house on a hill

and so on, each girl afraid to turn her back

the yearling hung in the corn crib, gutted,

dead eyes wide, front hooves scraping

the slatted floor

the man with his blood-smudged cheek

she thinks of following that rutted lane

as if she could walk out of the world

and not step right back into

that house

Life Story

2009-01-29T17:33:00.001-08:00

after Nadia Beltei

It is written

all over you, the memory

of pride, the perfect

sapling straightness

of your youth.

The later desperate bend

into the wind.

And didn't you weep yourself

free of leaves?

Too late, you realize

it could have been avoided,

this slow, painful shaping

toward the light,

if you had only

taught yourself

to bow.

Maelstrom

2009-01-20T21:15:00.000-08:00

after Salvador Dali

Ticked
_____and skittered, ticked
and skittered, trick-
_____________ery of minutes in the midnight hour

The room moves
_______a mind unstitching itself

Something tries to walk up
______where skull meets vertebrae,

________maddening as rats scrabbling in walls
____________and you

______and you follow the voices, try
to nail them down and

the night like violin wire, strung tight
__________________________across the eye

It is times like these, when the music
_____won’t stop, you dream
________________________in sepia

2009-01-20T17:02:00.000-08:00

Tangled Garden

2009-01-19T13:21:00.000-08:00

after J.E.H. MacDonald

This garden is a frenzy

of whispers, half-wild, creatures

like voices moving between the weeds

A murmur of nasturtiums

If sunflowers crumbling

calms you, their brittle veins

needling your skin –

what of that? Dust is, finally, silent.

You begin to grow this way, the living

fed by dead things, husk and fragrance

borne on the same wind.

And that window? If there was

a girl, she’s gone now.

Recession? What Recession?

2009-01-19T08:55:00.000-08:00

Cost of actual swearing in of new president..............$1.24 million

Cost of huge party............................................$170 million (partially funded by bailout money)

The audacity of hope.........................................Priceless

IUSB CRIME ALERT - VERY IMPORTANT

2009-01-15T16:37:00.000-08:00

The IU South Bend Police Department has received reports of possible sightings on campus of the above individual who is a predatory sex offender. Rickey Allen Robbins was released from custody in Oregon on December 10, 2008 after serving time for sex-related crimes. He immediately fled parole supervision. Robbins, who has family in the Union City, Indiana, area has been responsible for burglary and sexual offenses on college campuses across the country. Most of his crimes have been committed on college campuses. He also has a history of posing as a college professor to gain access to campus areas. If you see this individual, you should immediately contact IU South Bend Police Department at 520-4239 or call 9-1-1. His description and picture are below:

Age: 57
Height: 5'9"
Weight: 190
Eyes: Brown
Hair: Brown/Gray
Scars: Abdomen, Back, Chest

My addition: Spread this news, ladies; tell everybody you know. And be careful when on campus. Walk together with a friend if you have to go anywhere isolated, and when on campus after dark. Guys, please be just as careful, and be willing to walk a lady to her car or across campus if necessary.

Accepted

2009-01-13T15:28:00.000-08:00

I have been accepted to the University of Chicago School of Social Service Administration's M.S.W. program! Financial information is still forthcoming.

The Meaning Of Christmas

2008-12-24T17:02:00.000-08:00

God bless you all.

Meet the new boss...

2008-12-23T17:45:00.000-08:00

...same as the old boss.

The Cemetery of Forgotten Books

2008-12-19T10:16:00.000-08:00

"Without further ado I left the place, finding my route by the marks I had made on the way in. As I walked in the dark through the tunnels and tunnels of books, I could not help being overcome by a sense of sadness. I couldn't help thinking that if I, by pure chance, had found a whole universe in a single unknown book, buried in that endless necropolis, tens of thousands more would remain unexplored, forgotten forever. I felt myself surrounded by millions of abandoned pages, by worlds and souls without an owner sinking in an ocean of darkness, while the world that throbbed outside the library seemed to be losing its memory, day after day, unknowingly, feeling all the wiser the more it forgot."

from "The Shadow of the Wind" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Portrait of the Blocked Poet as a Bad Child

2008-12-17T18:44:00.000-08:00

By God, if it’s the last thing you do, you will sit

at that table until you finish

writing a poem.

Sex Vs. The Web

2008-12-16T14:42:00.000-08:00

Nearly 50 percent of women would rather go without sex than the internet for two weeks, according to a recent survey.

My question is: who were the half that chose to go without the web?

My Dream Job

2007-11-05T17:47:00.000-08:00

Not to mention, one of the few things I will be qualified to do upon finishing college.