Review of AWE in Bitch magazine and hallway leg of The Tiny Tour is up!

Thanks to the editors of Bitch and the brilliance that is Julia Bloch, there is a new review of AWE in the magazine's current issue. Check it out!

Here is what you will see at first when you check it out (but reversed*):



*By the way, if anyone out there knows how to reverse images in iPhoto, please let me know. I really really need that information, especially for the future.

Also, check out www.birdinsnow.com for the hallway leg of The Tiny Tour up there today.

Kate Bush - Babooshka

ABBA - Fernando

Pat Benatar- We Belong

Frank's new book is out!!!

Frank Sherlock's New Orleans collaboration with Brett Evans is hot off the press from Lavender Ink!

Buy it now!!!

Flo Rida ft Timbaland - Elevator (Official Video)

Commodores - Sail On

Breaks my heart every damn time

Commodores - Night Shift

One of the best love songs ever written

oh shit

oh shit (said in a different way)

Interview with The Great One

I fucking love Stevie Nicks and here is a great interview with her: Stevie Nicks interview

Back To Ohio

Break My Stride - MATTHEW WILDER

Check out Weird Deer today

I am reading a poem on Weird Deer today: Weird Deer

"Smooth Criminal" Michael Jackson

As He Came Into The Window
It Was The Sound Of A Crescendo
He Came Into Her Apartment
He Left The Bloodstains On The Carpet
She Ran Underneath The Table
He Could See She Was Unable
So She Ran Into The Bedroom
She Was Struck Down, It Was Her Doom

Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK
Are You OK, Annie
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK
Are You OK, Annie
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK, Annie?
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You Ok, Are You Ok, Annie?

(Annie Are You OK?)
(Will You Tell Us That You're OK?)
(There's A Sign In The Window)
(That He Struck You - A Crescendo Annie)
(He Came Into Your Apartment)
(He Left The Bloodstains On The Carpet)
(Then You Ran Into The Bedroom)
(You Were Struck Down)
(It Was Your Doom)

Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK Annie?
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK Annie?
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK Annie?
You've Been Hit By
You've Been Hit By - A Smooth Criminal

So They Came Into The Outway
It Was Sunday - What A Black Day
Mouth To Mouth Resus - Citation
Sounding Heartbeats - Intimidations

Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK Annie?
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK Annie?
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK?
Are You OK Annie?
Annie Are You OK?
So, Annie Are You OK
Are You OK Annie?

(Annie Are You OK?)
(Will You Tell Us That You're OK?)
(There's A Sign In The Window)
(That He Struck You - A Crescendo Annie)
(He Came Into Your Apartment)
(He Left The Bloodstains On The Carpet)
(Then You Ran Into The Bedroom)
(You Were Struck Down)
(It Was Your Doom)

(Annie Are You OK?)
(So, Annie Are You OK?)
(Are You OK Annie?)
(You've Been Hit By)
(You've Been Struck By -
A Smooth Criminal)

Okay, I Want Everybody To Clear The Area Right Now!

Aaow!
(Annie Are You OK?)
I Don't Know!
(Will You Tell Us, That You're OK?)
I Don't Know!
(There's A Sign In The Window)
I Don't Know!
(That He Struck You - A Crescendo Annie)
I Don't Know!
(He Came Into Your Apartment)
I Don't Know!
(Left Bloodstains On The Carpet)
I Don't Know Why Baby!
(Then You Ran Into The Bedroom)
I Don't Know!
(You Were Struck Down)
(It Was Your Doom - Annie!)
(Annie Are You OK?)
Dad Gone It - Baby!
(Will You Tell Us, That You're OK?)
Dad Gone It - Baby!
(There's A Sign In The Window)
Dad Gone It - Baby!
(That He Struck You - A Crescendo Annie)
Hoo! Hoo!
(He Came Into Your Apartment)
Dad Gone It!
(Left Bloodstains On The Carpet)
Hoo! Hoo! Hoo!
(Then You Ran Into The Bedroom)
Dad Gone It!
(You Were Struck Down)
(It Was Your Doom-Annie!)
Aaow!!!

Janet Jackson- FEEDBACK [ Official Full Length Video ]!!!!!!

This is amazing

Oh my God this is amazing: Article

Björk - Isobel

Joanna Newsom, "Sadie"

Fire escape leg of The Tiny Tour is up tonight!

Hello! The fire escape leg of The Tiny Tour is up now on www.birdinsnow.com

Do you like hats? I know you do.

Ladies and gentlemen, do you like ladies' hats? I love the idea of having big, floppy decorated hats for every occasion and wish I had more than the very small collection I do have (it used to be bigger but I lost some in some moves). Anyway, I am a little tight on funds right now, but if I wasn't I would head on over to

Lucy's hat shop
on 1118 Pine St. in Philadelphia!

The owner there, Lucy, (Lucy is her middle name actually), is just delightful and she will help you find a hat for any special or ordinary occasion. She must have 100 or so hats in there at any given time. You want some leopard hats? Yeah, you got it! You want magenta hats with rhinestones? You got it there! You want an acid yellow hat with black trim that will cut into your spleen every time you look at it? Yeah, there is one there right now!

Does this sound like an ad to you? Yep, it is! This is my ad for Lucy's hat shop. It is beautiful, Lucy is beautiful, and most importantly, the hats are beautiful. She also carries lucite jewelry, other antique jewelry, and some old and glamorous coats. Go there! Please!

My new page on PennSound

I have a new page on PennSound and it contains a recording of a reading I did last year and my most recent reading with Matthew Rohrer. Check it out: DL's new page on PennSound.

Bob Dylan - Simple Twist of Fate (1975)

Beautiful Bob Dylan, sweet Jewish Gemini like my father

When are people going to stop putting their heads up their asses?

I am taking a Young Adult Fiction class and I recently found out that Where's Waldo? is one of the 100 most banned school books. Are you kidding me? Where's Waldo??!?

Seriously, what is the world coming to? I like Waldo and I think he is acceptable for any age. He's cute and he teaches kids to hunt. Let's get real, book banners.

Tina Turner - We Don't Need Another Hero

"We are the children
The last generation
We are the ones they left behind
And i wonder when we are ever gonna change it
Living under the fear till nothing else remains"

Some things to say

I have three things to report:

1. I love Pilates. When my Pilates teacher tells me to imagine there is a bag of sand in my pelvis, that is all the aesthetic training I will ever need. It is a blessing to be able to move.

2. I love this woman's website: Bits and Bobbins. Whenever I am sad, looking at her amazing creations and suggestions makes me realize that every day is new. My love for it sometimes also makes me remember this creepy guy on a New Jersey train who asked me if I had majored in textiles. I didn't, but sometimes I wish I had. When I am 60, I am going to start a clothing line. I figure it will take me that long to save enough money and finish all my already started but unfinished projects.

3. I love my friend Camilla Schofield's drawings. Not only is she a kick-your-ass-good historical scholar, but she is a really wonderful artist. I think she is in the middle of a one-doodle-a-day project and here are some of my favorites:

Andrews Sisters - Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy

Kate Bush - This Woman's Work

Kate Hall's new chapbook is out

Kate Hall's new chapbook, Suspended, is out from Greenboathouse Books (I love that press's name) and I can't imagine it is anything but brilliant. Kate Hall is a fabulous poet.

Here is where you can buy Kate Hall's chapbook.

Devendra Banhart Interview

Kate Bush - Lily

Well I said
"Lily, Oh Lily I don't feel safe
I feel that life has blown a great big hole
Through me"
And she said
"Child, you must protect yourself
I'll show you how with fire"

Eyes - Rogue Wave

Bracelets

I remember one Fall in Northampton I helped this very bubbly man put on a Sylvia Plath day on her birthday. I think he does it every year and I am very glad if he still indeed does, but I only helped out one year. It was great. During the day, scholars talked about her poems, singers sang songs they wrote about her, people who had met her once gave long accounts of her––all of it was amazing. Not a lot of people came the year I helped, which is probably my fault cause I was supposed to do most of the publicity. Still, I sat in the paltry audience and swooned at the magnitude of the whole thing. Some of you out there might not like Sylvia Plath, but I am fanatic about her. She is, and always will be, my hands-down favorite poet. We as a poetry society haven't even begun to realize what a genius she was.

Anyway, one of the speakers told a story about how she was in a workshop with Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton. Someone from the audience (not me) asked her to describe what it was like to be near them––what they looked like and dressed like and so forth. The woman (I wish I could remember her name) said that Sylvia Plath was very neat and proper and energetic and driven and that Anne Sexton was kind of ethereal and quiet, except for her ringing bracelets. She told us how Anne Sexton had these long arms full of bracelets that would ring and jangle as she spoke and moved her papers around and that it was enchanting. And as she told the story, in my mind, I saw this large person––larger in her grace than she could ever be––full of bracelets that rang like bells. It was around this time of my life that I started collecting bracelets.

I have quite a collection now and I just bought a small glass case to house them and so here they are in the below picture. I think collections are important. Someday, I would like to have a collective collection website for people to put up their collections up on it for everyone to see, but it might be some time before I get a chance to undertake such a project. If anyone out there starts one, let me know!

Here are some of my bracelets:

Madonna - Buenos Aires

Help animals just by putzing away on the internet!

Today, my wonderful friend Michael let me know about something really important. Supposedly, the Animal Rescue organization is having some trouble getting people to go to their site and this is not good. The way they have it set up, they need people to click a button on their site and when you do, their advertisers pay a certain percentage relative to the amount of clicks. (I think this is a cool set-up actually.) So basically, when you click the button, you are giving money to help feed abused, neglected, and abandoned animals. One of the saddest things in the world is to a see an animal that has been domesticated beyond its will a long time ago be left for dead. We cannot forget our animals.

Here is the link to click Animal Rescue Site.

Click on the big purple button that says: "Click Here to Give--it's free." Once you have done so, you will have given an animal .6 bowls of food.

I have clicked about twenty times already. My arm is tired. Please help.

I don't think this is good

I actually think it is so sad that Edwards is out.

He was a candidate that I really grew to like once I understood how in line his views were with my own. You could tell in the last debate, however, that he had lost a little of his rhetorical fire, probably just under the stress of the whole thing and the sad fact that his wife is so sick. It must be really hard to bring it, day in and day out. He had wonderful healthcare and education (especially higher education) plans and I hope whoever eventually becomes the candidate will pay attention to some of his proposed policies and implement them.

I'm sorry that this race was so brutal, John Edwards, and I hope you won't drop out of politics entirely cause we still need you. This selection from the Bible, I mean from Tender Buttons, is for you:



Cloudiness what is cloudiness, is it a lining, is it a roll, is it melting.


A recital, what is a recital, it is an organ and use does not strengthen valor, it soothes medicine.

A transfer, a large transfer, a little transfer, some transfer, clouds and tracks do transfer, a transfer is not neglected.

Beauty School Drop Out

I die every time I see him pop her bubble.

Belinda Carlisle - I Get Weak

You know you've got a hold over me
You know you've got me where I want to be

Dolly Parton - Better get to livin

Madonna - True Blue

Let's go, Hillary! You're gonna win this thing.

There is a problem

There is a problem in our schools and it is in our approach. It is only going to get worse. We need to change this.

Rama Lama Ding Dong

Roisin Murphy - Ramalama Bang Bang

Fleetwood Mac - Don't stop (thinking about tomorrow) LIVE!

Prodigy-Girls

Go Hillary! Don't stop til you get to the top!!

Groove Armada - Superstylin

Foreigner - I wanna know what love is

"Through the clouds I see love shine.
It keeps me warm as life grows colder."

Kate Bush - The Red Shoes (Extended)

I love you, Kate Bush.

This is the polarizing rhetoric of this millennium

The end is near every one thousand years until we revise our definitions of time.

Philip Glass - Sesame Street (extended cut)

This is love.

Sesame Street - How Crayons Are Made

plastic injection machine

plastic injection moulding - stampaggio plastica con robot

Trial Animation Injection Moulding

NERD-She wants to move

"This is your part, girl."

Go, go, Hillary!

The Quinz loves Samuel Beckett

Check out this video: Quinz’s Book Corner



Add to My Profile | More Videos

Blythe in the Wonderland!

プチブライス バードソングデュエット Petite Blythe- Bird Song Duet

Stevie Nicks - Stand Back

"No man called my name, no man came"

These dancers really mean it.

I love this

I love this a lot:

Photos of Dolores Castellano by Greg Fuchs

The Monkees - Sweet Young Thing

Bob Dylan - Isis (Live 1975)

"The snow was outrageous"

The Shining (the best scene)

There is nothing new in the world now either.

Strawberry Shortcake

She-Ra opening

Rainbow Brite Opening

Jem Opening

THE FACES music video (2005)

I am so sick of irony. I am glad some people still make unironic things.

I really like when Weird Al Yankovic gives him some balloons.

More Dewey love (my love doth never end)

Dewey loves the new, as do I:

"The 'magic' of poetry--and pregnant experience has poetic quality--is precisely the revelation of meaning in the old effected by its presentation of the new. It radiates the light that never was on sea or land but that is henceforth an abiding illumination of objects."

(from his essay "Experience, Nature and Art" in Art and Education (1954))

You should love the new, too.

What form does the new take, you ask? Life. Life is the form it takes. With its "abiding illumination of objects."

The White Stripes - Hotel Yorba

"If I'm the man that you love the most, you could say 'I do' at least."

John Dewey's Art as Experience

I am pretty much whole hog in love with John Dewey and I am really not afraid to say so. I have been reading his book Art as Experience (1934) and it is basically one of the best things ever written. (But he rambles, you say. Sure, he does, but doesn't everyone?). In Chapter 1, "The Live Creature," he writes of a somatic connection to art that is possible when the conceptual and spiritual are not flattened over each other, but instead are wholly aware of their dependence of the body. That's right, people--the body. That's where the whole thing happens. He writes:

the trouble with existing theories [of art] is that they start from a ready-made compartmentalization, or from a conception of art that "spiritualizes" it out of connection with the objects of concrete experience. The alternative, however, to such spiritualization is not a degrading and Philistinish materialization of works of fine art, but a conception that discloses the way in which these works idealize qualities found in common experience. Were works of art placed in a directly human context in popular esteem, they would have a much wider appeal than they can have when pigeon-hole theories of art win general acceptance. A conception of fine art that sets out from its connection with discovered qualities of ordinary experience will be able to indicate the factors and forces that favor the normal development of common human activities into matters of artistic value.

I can't help but think that this idea is in every Dolly Parton song.

(I am in love with her too, but that is an older, deeper love.)

And I can't help but think that this is in Kierkegaard's Fear and Trembling too--that faith means a surrender to the power of the body and its aliveness. Art that has this faith is never not alive, even when it should be dead given its past context.

Anyway, I think that you should read Art as Experience by Dewey if you never have. Maybe you will get an old copy, like the one I found in the library, with futura font. Futura font just makes every reading experience feel like you are a glamorous 1960s secretary, reading the great works on her lunch break. That's not a bad way to feel either. Most of those women were the great artists of our time.

Dean Martin - Young At Heart

Have fun in Italy, my dear sweet Laura!

You want some good news?

All I have to say, is yes!!! Look at why the world can be right:

What's right

What is also right, although this isn't news

Shea Butter

When Laura came over smiling yesterday, saying "I have a present for you!" I was confused as I didn't see an iPhone or some grapes in her hand (since those are two things I always want). I was still confused as she brought out of her bag what looked to be a tub of rancid hummus (is that possible?). I was PISSED when she opened the tub of rancid hummus and tried to smear it all over my hands. "It's Shea Butter," she said, "It's a cure-all." All I could say at first was, "What the hell is that?" Then I grumpily put it on my hands, face, hair, and dog's head as she instructed.

I didn't believe that Shea Butter was a cure-all until I tried it. But in just a few hours after applying it, my skin and hair have never been so soft and healthy. You really should try it. Winter is fast approaching. It is already here really. You might not have a giant live grizzly bear to keep your warm during these cold months (who does these days, really?), but for a few dollars you can have a pound of Shea Butter. Not everyone out there cares about having soft and healthy skin and hair, but I think you do. This is not a commercial. This is me telling the world that I was wrong and me trying to make it right. Laura, I was wrong and you were right (like always). I was wrong, but now I am right. Softly right, which is the best kind.

Listen, just buy some Shea Butter already.

If I can't make it to the grocery store today, I might try to eat it. I doubt it could be bad for the digestive system.

Sally

Last night, Eric Baus and Ish Klein read in the closet leg of my Tiny Tour. They were both wonderful, of course, and their poems were meant to go together. Eric's poems were just as brilliant as they were when I first read them six years ago. And Ish continues to amaze me with her poems and puppets and movies and I am just so lucky to know her and to live in the same city as her. She made a new puppet named Sally and brought her to the reading. I had seen Sally in pictures, but seeing Sally in person filled me with immense love, as I have a thing for animal puppets. In the middle of the Question and Answer section of the reading, Ish actually gave Sally to me. I was speechless and still am.

Here is Sally:



I am hoping that in the future Ish will want Sally to be in a movie of hers and that I can do Sally's voice.

Here is a video of Ish reading her poems that will probably blow your mind. It is from the Action AIDS Benefit event back in November that CA Conrad organized. That whole event was amazing and my only regret is that I didn't tape record the whole thing. Here is Ish:

Cyndi Lauper - All Through The Night (Solid Gold)

Alan Davies and Frank Sherlock are reading in Boston

I don't live in Boston anymore, but if I did, you would find me at this reading (see below announcement by John Mulrooney and Michael Carr). If you go, you will have a chance to buy Frank Sherlock's new Katalanché chapbook, Over Here.

_____________________________________________________________________________________

Come One, Come All to P&S on the Road, Alan Davies and Frank Sherlock kick off the holiday season at Pierre Menard Downstairs at Lame Duck Books, 12 Arrow St. Cambridge MA

SATURDAY December 8th, 2007 7 P.M.

Please note this holiday treat is Saturday not Sunday, Lame Duck not Plough

ALAN DAVIES is the author of many books of poetry, including Name (This), Signage (Roof), Candor (O Books) and Rave (Roof), as well as an untitled collaboration with photographer Mark Winterford published by Zasterle. He has written many critical articles and book reviews, and has lectured here and abroad. He was twice a recipient of Canada Council Grants for the Arts. His big book called Life is forthcoming from O Books. He is at work on a lifelong project consisting of individual books, a couple of which have been published as chap books.

FRANK SHERLOCK is the author of Wounds in an Imaginary Nature Show (Night Flag Books), Spring Diet of Flowers at Night (Mooncalf Press), ISO (furniture press) and 13 (Ixnay Press). Forthcoming chapbook publications include Daybook of Perversities & Main Events (Cy Gist Press), Over Here (Katalanché Press) and a collaborative poem with Brett Evans, entitled Ready-to-Eat Individual. He is alive in Philadelphia.

Casiotone for the Painfully Alone,

Bedroom readings, Tiny Tour

Hello! There are some new videos from the bedroom leg of The Tiny Tour up on www.birdinsnow.com. There are readings by Noelle Kocot and I and a dance performance by Rebecca Ketchum and Nathan Kosla. Check it out if you like watching things.

Scrabulous

There was once a time when EB could beat me at Scrabulous. After about 40 games with others and the computer (for training purposes), I have now beaten EB at Scrabulous (timed, no less). This blog entry is a public document that shows the final thing that EB could hold over my head as being superior has now dissolved with my victory. Eat these words and weep, EB! Weep for my domination!

Hey Mama- KanYe West (Live)

Stevie Nicks - I Can' Wait

Animal Collective - Leaf House

People sometimes call forms of contemporary art "child-like," but that is not what they mean (or what I hope they don't mean, but cannot find any other word for). Watch this video and hopefully you can see the difference between child-like and horror, between real life and the sublime.

"I got seven pictures of Buddha
The prophets on my tongue
Eleven angels of mercy
Sighing over that black hole in the sun
My heart's dark but it's rising
I'm pulling all the faith I can see
From that black hole on the horizon
I hear your voice calling me

Let it rain
Let it rain
Let it rain
Let it rain
Let it rain
Let it rain
Let it rain"

--Bruce Springsteen, "Mary's Place"

Van Morrison - Cyprus Avenue

Whenever I listen to Van Morrison, it just reminds me so much of Nick Moudry and his poems. The spirits and the genius are the same, both based on the power of repetition.

Bathroom leg of The Tiny Tour

If you enjoy watching videos of poetry readings, check out www.birdinsnow.com today. The Bathroom leg of The Tiny Tour is up there, featuring readings by Stan Mir, CAConrad, Laura Solomon, and me.

Nellie McKay

Dirty Dancing UK - Julia and James First Dance

British people really know how to dance.

The Clash-Complete Control

Better

Kristin and I ran for 8 miles today. It is hard for me to believe that I used to run twice that much everyday when I was 18. And even though it is hard for me to remember my name right now, it is nice also to remember that running sometimes makes me fall in love with being alive.

Earlier this weekend, I went to Boston to read at the New England Institute of Art and most specifically to sit in David Blair's Creative Writing class. I used to teach at that school and although I have only the fondest memories of all my own students, I can't help but think that right now there are some awfully nice ones around there. They drew me pictures:



That was drawn during my reading and is the Elephant Jesus in my "Dear friend" poem. And then this wonderful girl drew this one during class:



Also, other cool things happened this weekend or over this past week. Charlie Wright from Wave Books was interviewed on the PBS NewsHour.

Travis Nichols had a brilliant piece published in Poets & Writers this month on John Ashbery. I don't think you can read it online, so that means you better buy the magazine.

Also, even though I have had her CD for over a year and have loved lots of her songs on it, today I got some really kind feelings towards Regina Spektor's song "Better." Some people never feel anything at all.

Cyndi Lauper - True Colors (original video)

Still one of the best songs ever written.

Sylvia Plath's birthday

Happy Birthday, Sylvia Plath!

Jeff Mangum - Two Headed Boy part II - Live at Jittery Joe's

"God is a place where some holy spectacle lies"

JOURNEY

Sunshowers by M.I.A.

MC Lyte - Lyte As A Rock (Video Version)

Bright Eyes - At The Bottom Of Everything

Fred Claus

If you don't see Fred Claus when it comes out (11/29), you are crazy:

www.fredclaus.net

I'll be there!

Al Gore wins Nobel Peace Prize

Al Gore, please run for President!

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/13/world/13nobel.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin

missy elliott - we run this

We didn't start the fire - Billy Joel