Larry and Friends by larry goodell

Larry and Friends #1

from Hal Johnsonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Truck larry goodell was guest editor for month of July 2016

a duende free for all production 2017 http://www.larrygoodell.com/

2017 all rights revert to authors

Hello and Love to All Hal Johnson asked me and here I am for the month of July in 2016 and you might call this LARRY AND FRIENDS since I just emailed for poems and any comment about "what you're up to" and most people sent in poems. To me this is further revelation that increasingly all poetry is local. Traditionally way back there were national entities of poetry, national poets even, but now there are entities within the national poetry reading and publishing confabs in pockets entities just about everywhere. The populace of poets growing all around broken up into localities of us bards, bardic yawps everyplace. The locality I live and breathe in is Placitas Albuquerque Las Cruces Santa Fe Taos El Paso mainly but more often it's just plain ole Albuquerque-Placitas for me. The Facebook and email/website reaches are constantly extending and over time dear friends are in their own localities wherever increasingly. So the poets here are some of the poets informed by the longstanding living locality plus the reachings out as everyone experiences, that growth â&#x20AC;&#x201C; online, Facebook, music and "document" sites. So welcome to all and thank you for sending poems and news and as long as my time allows (constantly being demanded on) please continue to send on here if you are indeed in some way a friend, a true acquaintance, surely you're welcome and I'll do my best. larrynewmex@gmail.com For information about me it is embarrassingly all too available with more coming as I continue my project HEAR making much of my poetry work finally available. http://www.larrygoodell.com/ And I can't help but recommend my 3 new books from Beatlick Press. And thank you, Hal. -lg

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Truck/July 2016 I was so pleased with the generous response when I asked friends for poems I decided to cut and paste what was sent to me in July and put the poems in this format to be more easily accessed and Hal said go ahead I may do another round of friends’ poems as time trippingly speeds by. love to all and thanks for sending me your notes your poems. larry spring 2017

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Contents of July Truck 2016 Hello and Love to All . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -1Truck/July 2016 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -2Rudolfo Anaya . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -6Margaret Randall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -8Alan Casline . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -10Zachary Kluckman. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -12Bruce Holsapple. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -14Matthew Conley. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -16Judy Grahn . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -18Don McIver . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -20Laurie Macrae . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -22John Macker. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -24Geoffrey Young . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -26Miriam Sagan. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -28Katrina K Guarascio. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -30Mitch Rayes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -32Georgia Santa Maria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -34Anne MacNaughton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -36Jules Nyquist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -37Donald Levering . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -38D.R. Wagner. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -40Jim Fish. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -42Michael Boughn. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -44Jennifer Bartlett . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -46Brendan Douthit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -49Joe Bottone. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -50Anne Valley-Fox. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -52Latif William Harris . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -55Joseph Somoza and Jill Somoza . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -62Jerome Rothenberg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -65Bill Nevins . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -69Mary Oishi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -72Gloria Frym . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -74John Roche . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -76Deborah Coy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -80Sidekick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -80Jonathan Penton . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -82James Burbank . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -85Mark Weber . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -88John Tritica . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -90A Page for Satyrs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . -92-3-

Rudolfo Anaya Years ago Rudy and Patricia Anaya, along with David Johnson, Tony Mares, Jim Fisher and others, launched the Rio Grande Writer's Association* which boosted poetry and all creative writing across the state and the SW . . . Voices of the Rio Grande came out of its first conference and it remains the groundbreaking anthology for us in these parts . . . thank you, Rudy . . . and thanks for sending this . . .

Rudy Anaya * https://larrygoodell.wordpress.com/2013/08/06/rio-grande-writers-associ ation-1976-1991/ 6/19/16 Hi, Larry, good to hear from you. Yes you may use my poem in TRUCK . . . . New, just out, my new novel, THE SORROWS OF YOUNG ALFONSO, reviewed by David Steinberg in [The Albuquerque] Journal. . . . Keep well my friend, Rudy. . . Keep well my friend, Rudy Here is Davidâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s review: https://www.abqjournal.com/797869/fact-amp-fiction.html

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The Pulse of Life It was the twelfth of June another hot and humid Florida night. In Orlando young people gathered at the Pulse Club, enjoying camaraderie, the dance floor pulsating with life, dancers moving to syncopated music, Latin rhythms, good will embraces, laughter, friendships, plans for tomorrow, flashing smiles releasing stress in silent motions. Then the pulse of life ended. A man on fire came from a dark, twisted place, methodically spraying death, massacring our LGBT dancers who fell like cut flowers. Pulses died in 49 bloodied wrists, blood pressures plunged to zero, juices of life that would never flow into the future stained the sad dance floor. Shock spread across the country, across the world, enough grief to last many lifetimes. Lost lives cannot be replaced. Orlando pulled together, offering condolences and help. From here we sent flor y canto, oraciones, flowers and poems, prayers. Left bereaved on this senseless plain, we wondered who killed the Golden Rule, Love Your Neighbor. We mourn our fallen comrades, our gay sisters and brothers, and after grieving we march to tear down the barricades of hate, bigotry, prejudices. We march to tear down walls that separate. ÂŠ2016 Rudolfo Anaya

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Margaret Randall I cannot speak for the gun I cannot speak for the gun doing its ugly job in George Zimmerman’s overeager hands. I cannot speak for those eighteen ounces easily concealed in any pocket. Easy to guess what George’s intention was, too easy to imagine the terror in Trayvon’s eyes, the grief his mother holds four years beyond her loss. The Law never found Zimmerman guilty or condemned his crime. And Martin could not know his death would bring a nation into the streets or that hundreds of other black youth would have to die, gunned down by white policemen or self-styled protectors of an order that runs by exception in this country where Law protects the men who write it, works for white, fails for black, rich or poor, genders that matter or don’t. Now George Zimmerman auctions the gun that murdered Trayvon Martin. He’s asking $5,000, promises some of the money will go to fight Black Lives Matter because, simply put, they don’t matter to him. Will this gun’s new home -6-

turn its barrel around or lure another trigger finger in wait? I cannot speak for the gun or the men who love caressing its fever. My job is finding the words that describe the weaponâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s threat exactly. Margaret Randall Dear Larry: Here's a new unpublished poem for you. About Naropa, I'm about to go up to Boulder to teach in week 3 of Naropa University's Summer Writing Program (SWP). I've been doing this almost every year for the past decade. It's always thrilling: long days and hard work with serious students, plus the thrill of hearing the other visiting poets and writers read and lecture. Naropa . . . Started by ChĂśgyam Trugpa Rinpoche and Allen Ginsberg, Anne Waldman took it over after their deaths, and her special gift for imbuing it with energy and creative exuberance permeates every part of the experience. I hear there are still openings for those interested in attending Week 3 (beginning June 26th) and Week 4 (beginning July 3rd). Week 3 features Tisa Bryant, Julie Carr, Corrine Fitzpatrick, Colin Frazer, Gloria Frym, Renee Gladman, Laird Hunt, Steven Taylor, Danielle Vogel and myself, with special guest Richard Tuttle. Week 4 features Charles Alexander, Junior Burke, CA Conrad, Christian Hawkey, Valentina Desideri, Thomas Sayers, Ellis and Janice Lowe, Thurston Moore, Eileen Myles, Julie Ezelle Patton, Paul Van Curen, TC Tolbert, and Anne Waldman . . . . I'll be there, teaching and learning . . . Love, Margaret.

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Alan Casline Larry, here is a poem . . . . Best, Alan Casline (note: Alan lives in Albany, NY) SARDINE (FOR WORKSHOP) sardines swimming small old salty says â&#x20AC;&#x153;sardines pure with no one to bait a hook that little" we plant the spirit of something smaller the mesh of the spirit of something smaller a little like love the sardines squeeze their spirits for us spirits shaped like toothpaste spirits pushed out under pressure they are swimming with garbage to protect all beings gather poets from our axletree broken wagon poets spilled on low-lying ground we stop on the swale just beyond us at sea the rainbow out over the emerald sea swimming little taste for fish only vague how they, how they come back again a few left alone -8-

beauty sardines with the beauty of swimming

"Sardine poem from August 4, 2009 reconfigured from Persian translation by machine â&#x20AC;&#x201D; " Alan Casline (December 12, 2013) Poets on the trail of "The Burning Springs" *(in NY) - photo from

Casline's FB photos. (thanks.) Alan Casline is second from the right. The gentleman on the right (unusual for him) is our friend John Roche . . .

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Zachary Kluckman The Buoyancy of Potbellied Boys A sobering thought. Water is stronger than I, for all my thick-shouldered girth. Frog stroke. Kick back to move forward. The same philosophy our mother taught for self-defense. Kick back. Swim, little fish, trust the current. Avoid every hand with its hook. This is survival. Practice. Young, I punched myself in the face. Hard enough to crack bone. Prepared the taste of blood in my mouth. No surprise when the older boys came to the fight. Choked myself to discover how long I could hold my breath, in case I should find myself short of air, victim of violence or old age. Asked my friend’s father, the Marine, to bind me with the best knots he knew. Broke loose, under 2 minutes to freedom. You never understood this fear of captivity, this need to prepare for every violence and ready defense. To kick back. A sobering thought. Water is stronger than prayer. Quicker to take you to god. I would have learned to swim, If our teacher had not let you drown. Had not stared so hard at our father’s thin body, she missed your move to the deep end. You live there now, though I pulled you from the water. Sister, the water was stronger. Pulled thrashing with fear from the bottom, I never took another lesson. I pretend my fight for the surface made me a swimmer. A devout minnow, silver-finned like mother, with praise for the river. Pretend the fist to the face, the blood in the knuckle, made me a man. A sobering thought. A man’s past can drown him as readily as water. Past 40, my knees are not as strong as your memory. Your face under water. But my children have never seen the mirror I carry near rivers, to remind myself of the sky. Never seen the fight inside of their father. The pillow I hold over my face to test my breath. A sobering thought. My need to defend them from the fear, as fierce as their need to swim. Blood, once more, the reason I jumped in the water. Zachary Kluckman

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"Zachary Kluckman, the National Poetry Awards 2015 Slam Organizer of the Year and 2014 Slam Artist of the Year, is a Scholastic Art & Writing Awards Gold Medal Poetry Teacher and a founding organizer of the 100 Thousand Poets for Change program. The 2015 Slam of Enchantment Grand Slam Champion, Kluckman has appeared multiple times at the National And Individual World Poetry slams, as well as regional competitions, and has toured the nation performing and facilitating poetry workshops. He serves as Spoken Word Editor for the Pedestal magazine and has authored three poetry collections." We probably are brothers in the "sunlight of the spirit." larry -11-

Bruce Holsapple Hi Larry, What I've been up to, besides no good: I just submitted the page proofs and index for The Birth of the Imagination: William Carlos Williams on Form to UNM Press. The book is due out in November (2016). I'm reading a lot on the sublime, Longinus, Kant and Burke, and on the Enlightenment. The sublime, they believed, contains an element of terror, e.g. fear of God. And I am attempting lately to restain the porch, but every time I'm begun painting the rain moves in. Cheers, Bruce

Fear of God A hullabaloo outside a squall moving in the winds howl over the roof growl about the corners bawl, yowl I am so mortified melancholy mad Is anyone not struggling? Write out the grievances: crushed sore shabby harassed Why did I get smacked so bad grumble, grumble the various toxins available, rattlesnake, black widow weird dirt orange trick tiger leg flicker stifled child the felony tip glow a match lit, sulfur tang red clandestine decay -12-

Why ask people to read such garbage Light a candle, will you, Jack? Because it produces in them an unholy dread & it is sort of delightful Okay, I had no ulterior purpose but to write & confess, it breaks the fixation the reportorial, What I thought was What I believe she did What I feel besides broken hearted a relief to be rid of yourself curl into a black cloud, rain can almost rumble rumble hear the storm clouds below you mean above I mean above & below I mean I always carry raincoats when I travel you never know when someone special might knock Well, you could step outside & get banged as easily Okay, but still you never know what pivotal event fatal interview, you probably should straighten your tie, pull aright this could be the moment youâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re taken aside for questioning Has your humor dried with age? Yes, dried out, cracked Bruce Holsapple Comment from Laurie Macrae: Wonderful poem. Review of Wayward Shadow and info about Bruce's many Audio Recordings of Poets! http://outlawpoetry.com/2013/10/23/bruce-holsapple-wayward-shadow-la -alameda-press/ -13-

Matthew Conley “That tattoo” That temporary tattoo is permanently too That tat so you: -flat -unnatural blue That tat it's true, I have my own bone zoo Matthew Conley I’m humming through a tiny airport at near 90 mph watching the smoke from the Dog’s Headfire off to the northeast news kiosk. Wait that can’t be right. Maybe: I’m sleeping behind the wheel somewhere outside of Albuquerque, Arizona, once called Tucson, New Mexico in another life. Yeah that’s it: I’m steering a Subaru bed using a round pillow while a big orange snooze button keeps kinking the horizon ahead. My “Teacher’s Summer” is turning into a year-long sabbatical in this transitional place called the southwestern United States. My desert home is just another stop on the road trip, but this time I’m leaving my library behind me like an ant: follow the chemical trail hint of divorce and social isolation. For a decade I’ve been at the University of Arizona working with international students (the last5 years) at the lowest acceptable (for American institutions of higher something) English proficiency levels and it has been wonderful as in “full of wonder.” Having conversations with young people from China & Saudi Arabia & Kazakhstan & Angola & Mongolia is usually the exact day I want to have on planet Earth. Occasionally attending workshops led by cutting-edge experts working on problems I “solved” (hahaha) 3 years ago in the classroom. But when I spoke up my speak up didn’t use the big words like their talk down. Yet. -14-

And as much as America has been on fire this Summer of 2016, I have let my amicable end-of-relationship proceedings be that much smaller in my mind. Life invites me to stress so to make room I take brooms to my me. “Gone awaaaaay” are meat & alcohol. “Here to staaaaay” aredaily yoga & herbal tea. Preach a little & practice more. Now my last June in Tucson is behind me. That is something indeed. Once the Sonoran sets me free I’ll 2nd Master’s Degree, this time in Education. Another U.S. school, probably mid-Atlantic, a graying mid-90s Legacy wagon parked outside. Power to the People This Summer “) -MjC * Matthew Conley was born in Walt Whitman’s hometown but prefers a tighter line. Most recently, a poem of his appears in The Sonoran Desert: A Literary Field Guide (University of Arizona Press, 2016).

some people you just love in the rebel of light - lg -15-

Judy Grahn From old friend and former Placitas resident (a time ago) Judy Grahn. And please see http://judygrahn.org/. Hi Larry, I spent a lot of time this month crying over the police murders of innocent black people, as well as the murders of Dallas police. Also reeling from the RNC misogyny expressed toward Hillary Clinton, and my guess is some of that wrath is infused with racist hysteria. News for me personallyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;finishing up another collection of poems for Red Hen Press due out next year, and working on stories that chase after spirit in nature, ways nature reaches out to us and we use her creatures to make meanings. Very happy that two friends from high school! came to visit me for my birthday. A 60 plus year friendship, amazing. Recently someone asked me why I write poetry given that it doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t make any money and takes so much effort. I know the answer: because it saves my life (really) and also keeps me curious and optimistic. Love to you and Lenore, please keep on singing your song. Judy Grahn, Ph.D. Poet, Writer, Professor at Large

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Here's a collage of images and a couple poems from ye olde Oriental Blue Streak in 1968, a mimeographed poetry magazine from duende press. "The Centipede's Poem" and "In Larry's Room" are 2 of the poems she generously contributed. Thank you, Judy. The top left photo is by Lynda Koolish from Crossing Cards. The top med photo was taken in Placitas where she was living . . . . book covers from books Judy sent me . . .

Max Finstein and others, loved Judy's poems in this one-shot issue of Oriental Blue Streak . . . love, larry

"The walls of the closet are guarded by the dogs of terror, and the inside of the closet is a house of mirrors." - Judy Grahn

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Don McIver Conspiracy Somewhere in the Rio Grande gorge, cottonwoods conspired with Russian Olives pulled as much water out of the river before it merges with the Red. Those pesky humans dumped chemicals, mine tailings, nitrate laden water, agricultural runoff and top soil in their river. They stopped it. The trees conspired to change the flow of the river, stored it up in new lakes, had a highway of deer teamsters carry the water down to the cottonwoods and Russian Olives in small quantities and bottles and not let anyone else have it. Somewhere in the depths of Elephant Butte, bass conspired with trout. They tired of Jet Skis, tow boats, water skiers and tubers, top water lures and crank bait, casual swimmers, three day weekend barbeques, and drunks. The fish nibbled toes, dragged innocent children down to the depths, stuffed and mounted them on water made walls. Somewhere in the Rio Grande Bosque, cranes conspired with ducks. They turned on dogs, horseback riders, and joggers. The cranes ignored the grain that BLM rangers left behind, posted memos and trail signs, organized field trips, and erected educational walks for viewing:

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bureaucrats, bird watchers, tourists, and the elderly. Somewhere in El Paso, Texas and New Mexico water managers conspired to take more of the Rio water away from human farmers, pueblo communities, and the desert. If the courts can mediate a settlement, Albuquerque can sprawl even more; El Paso can grow even larger; and the natural communities and habitats that depend on the Rio can fend for themselves. Deeds are written; titles notarized for water, a naturally occurring chemical compound.

Don McIver

"Resting after bagging Mt. Wheeler (New Mexico's tallest peak)."

Don is a former member of the ABQ slam team, a host/producer of KUNMâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Spoken Word Hour, the author of The Noisy Pen, and editor of A Bigger Boat: The Unlikely Success of the Albuquerque Poetry Slam Scene. Heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s performed all over the United States, produced, curated, and hosted poetry events big and small including the 2005 National Poetry Slam, and been published in numerous magazines and anthologies. He's a teacher by trade at Central NewMexico Community College, where he also manages the tutoring center. For more information on Don, please visit his writing blog, Confessions a Human Nerve Ending http://donmciver.blogspot.com/

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Laurie Macrae Laurie "grew up in Albuquerque, spent six formative years in the Bay Area during the sixties, and returned to New Mexico in 1969. She has been an activist all her life and a poet, periodically, since her teens, when she was mentored by Tuli Kupferberg and other Beat poets of the San Francisco scene. She has spent almost 30 years as a librarian, mostly in NM but for 6 Â˝ years in San Diego where she retired to pursue mental health activism. She writes, swims, and does battle with the behavioral health system, which is at best inadequate and at worst abandoning the population it should serve." Poem of Laurie's from Roosevelt Park Albuquerque days: http://www.dukecityfix.com/p rofiles/blogs/the-sunday-poem -laurie-macrae-roosevelt-parktheory-and-practice And another, Baseball caps! http://www.dukecityfix.com/p rofiles/blogs/the-sunday-poem -laurie-macrae-the-reason-wewear-our-baseball Memento! (Hope you don't mind my adding this, Laurie.) This was choice, a lot of fun to do, thanks to the Taos Poetry Circus friends. -20-

California Dream Awake, a boat, Sinew stretched Between the hollows of the bolstered bed Grains of sand sift in the sheets The slings of sleep so recently adrift Warmed by friction, ignite The same quarrel with each wave: To sail into the deep Where ancient hunger and dread collide Where a swell, plunderer of senses, Seduces each synapse with undertow allure And a beach Benignly beckons As Pacific turbulence dresses For evening in a flash of green Or raise a clouded eye to dawn Again the damp sea air, the clutch Of my own arms Against the bluster of the day Warped limbs planted on a shifting deck Sucked from beneath me By the rip of time, I stagger But I stand Laurie Macrae

Nov. 10, 2014 San Diego

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John Macker Hi Larry & thanks. Guest edited latest Malpais Review w/14 Colorado poets: "there is nothing so beautiful as the sound of dreaming across borders" & wrote an essay on Venice West legend Tony Shigella. Also Harare, Abate, Camp, Stabling, Tabi Farness, Fell Robertson, Simon Ortiz, etc etc. Nice issue. Also participating in panel discussion on Southwestern author Frank Waters with John Nizalowski & Alexander Blackburn up at the Harwood in Taos on Wed. Aug. 3rd. 7 p.m. Going to write an essay on Todd Moore for last Malpais. Busy working & worrying about the state of the world. Here's a poem about some things I've been thinking about. Massacre !for Joe Somoza On any other Sunday if the kitchen light had a voice it would sing like Mavis Staples all the birds would be politely silenced by the poet who sits in his Las Cruces garden on mornings like this for twenty-two years writing poems in the shade of a tall tree so he wouldnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t later on lose his mind. The rooster would crow dawn up from polished black to soft blue full-throated throughout the neighborhood many of the children would go politely and without incident to mass my prayer flags would still have nine lives. On any other Sunday, nobody would rise haunted with the ghost sickness or deny the Coyote within. Anybody would believe the full moon or at least the ghost of moon as yellow as yarrow -22-

as it traveled across the shores of our eyes or June with its rampaging fahrenheits. Each tree is an indeterminate amount of time rooted deep I think, therefore I think Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m an act of faith unfathomable morning Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m walking through cottonwood snow. John Macker thanks for all you do, Larry. I very much like your latest books. Bravo. well maybe life as a poet is worthwhile after all - thank you John Comment: John, nice poem. thanks for dedicating it to me. I sent a comment earlier but evidently didn't proceed properly (technology is not my strong suit). I'm only reading this now because we were in the Bay Area for 3 weeks, and without a computer to check e-mail. Joseph Somoza thanks, much, Joe. Was going to send you a copy. John Macker

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Geoffrey Young

NOWHERE Is there a gun more dangerous than the one whose owner defends his god? Look where we are now, worlds poisoned by belief. How far is it to the horizon, to the Sun going down, to Thou Shalt Not? Grab something of value from the burning house! Be smart, be fearless, be focused on present necessity, with liberty and yogurt for all. Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s my vote for the equitable distribution of goods. One pie, one family, one Earth, one knife, etc. Whatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s a stack of cheese if we lose a planet? Geoffrey Young I run a contemporary art gallery (for the last 25 yrs). Geoffrey Young Gallery. I make my leetle books and do drawings, but only show other people's work. my next show, Hanging Paper, is a group show. will use the new colored pencil drawings in my next book (of short prose). no title yet . . .

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geoffrey young

thank you, Geoff . . . -25-

Miriam Sagan (and a photograph by Isabel Winson-Sagan)

Miriam writes: I'm blogging at Miriam's Well which is always looking for work tied in to our interests. And I interview poets who have published a book. Email for blog submissions or interview questions is msagan1035@aol.com. The current theme is "Letter To My Younger Self." Right now I'm at Herekeke on Lama Mountain, working with my daughter Isabel Winson-Sagan on an ongoing collaboration of text and image. Here is a poem. The tattooed girl draws the mountain surprisingly soft-lined fences and trees, as a child -26-

obsessed by rivers, black and red ants crawl over the bark of an old piĂąon traveling through gullies and canyons, suminagashi lines on paper pulled once through ink floating on water wet fractal of a topo map some place real yet imagined right now I might not even see Lama Mountain Miriam Sagan

check Amazon Books -27-

Katrina K Guarascio How to be in love with a ghost Sleep in his old t-shirt savoring the scent trapped inside thread and collar. Leave the smell of hair in pillow. Mimic the sound of shutting doors slapping goodbye. Play a melody of afternoon thunderstorms and chase the scent of rain through the house. Flick ash to pavement, bare feet to sidewalk, leave a trail from the rubble that built your favorite mythology. Refuse to release him from mind and motion, bite lower lip to keep words from falling out. Find a boy at the bar with the same shade of eyes and a smile kind enough to resurrect the past. Sing all the words to Patsy Cline’s “Crazy” in his ear in a slow dance to last call. Stare into eyes a little too long, listen to stories with too much care thirsty for truths. Tell him he reminds you of someone you used to know. Then no longer hide bruises. Show him the peaceful side of your nature, the sleepless side of your soul.

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Walk across the broken glass of beer bottles to nudge him awake, replace missing pages about last night over a breakfast where you laugh to loud to be in public, still drunk from one another. When he leaves thank him for wearing the skin of memory and gifting the kindness of patience. Do not kiss him goodbye. Reclaim evening habits, curled in tattered wool sweater, beer and cigarette, tangled in all the parts of what once was. Watch in solitude as the full moon creeps across the sky and breathe in all that has come to pass. Katrina Guarascio

Hi Larry, I wish I was up to more poetry and writing wise. Right now, I am keeping myself busy updating my blog: katrinakguarascio.com and working on my novel. I've had few features this year but am hopeful to get out to more poetry readings in the future. I am the current editor of The Sunday Poem on the Duke City Fix and would love some submissions (hint! hint!) Kat "The Sunday Poem" is an ongoing feature of Duke City Fix (I did a round of editing for it myself). Note: Merimee Moffitt is the current editor. and Katrina was editor. Here's a list of poems. http://www.dukecityfix.com/profiles/blog/list?user=278nz5pzp12my

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Mitch Rayes I've been working on writing my Chiapas years, and I got a manuscript under consideration . . . . Here's a new poem for Chiapas poet Joaquin Vasquez Aguilar. Joaquin in a forest in the clouds far above your adopted city zapatistas emerge from the shadows to answer their time to fight alone in a room you retreat forever from the battles of the living waves pound the sands of your birthplace there is a flash in the water your brother abandons his nets hurries to catch the last bus to tuxtla only to find you already lifeless the swallows ask about you and I offer them a morsel of Whitman to carry back to their secret chambers to see if it finds you in the most stubborn droplet of the deepest calcium and I trace my regrets in a saucer of salt on the flimsiest table of our favorite cantina to see if you might join me again after one more drink and I place a thank you into the longest pause of our final handshake for the words you have gifted us for the years as they carry us closer to the darkness that shines closer to you Mitch Rayes

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Mitch Rayes doing one of his songs in Silvaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Saloon, Bernalillo, NM

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Georgia Santa Maria

Photograph by Georgia Santa Maria Hi, Larry— I cheated—this was from the Balloon Fiesta last year, but it’s kind of fun for the 4th. Given the World’s political climate, I’m not feeling terribly gung-ho patriotic right now. More, a little depressed and wishing, as they used to say about children in school, that “we were living up to our potential (for good.)” Curious that we celebrate our country’s history by blowing shit up. The dogs have it right—hiding under the bed and waiting for it all to be over. Some fun news was that I was First Runner-up for the Lummox Poetry Contest, and my buddy Jane Lipman was 2nd. RD Armstrong came out from LA last week to visit and see what kind of magic JuJu our Sunday night writing group has. Here is a short poem for you, (from when Merimee & I were in Berlin and were awakened one night to an astonishing performance event.)

A Little Night Music A little night music lends itself to thoughts metaphysical: the orgasm, publicly shared -32-

throughout the public breezeway, like cats, like coyotes, like dinosaurs, growl and roar and scream their delight, their joy, their pain. Everybody wake up! Observe the moon in its starry wake. Hear the entire city shake. The sleep-deprived observer smiles, contemplates the variables going toward the improbable ten minute orgasm without a break! Sexual eclectic, always profoundâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; an art installation in fury and sound, we all want to know the sacred key, (but, the heretic in me says fakery.) Georgia Santa Maria

A book not to be missed, "Lichen Kisses." -lg

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MacNaughton General Relativity we fly west to go east passing the moon Anne MacNaughton

Anne is the silken voice of history illuminating the present and bringing us in to a deeper sense of the now, now-now, the now of all time that includes the past and is evidence of the future.

a little collage in appreciation of Peter Rabbit Max Finstein Anne MacNaughton and the Taos Poetry Circus Renaissance

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Jules Nyquist Gun Crazy Gun Crazy is a film noir movie from 1950 directed by Joseph H. Lewis. Does it start with boys and bb guns Aiming at anything that moves Including the dog? Movie theater madness Bonnie & Clyde The Judge asks the boy Why did you do it? I don’t know, he says. My sister says shooting is the only thing I’m good at. It’s what I want to do When I grow up. I feel good when I shoot Like I’m somebody.

Jules Nyquist

Haiku white yucca flowers irreversible time at Trinity Site

Jules Nyquist is the founder of Jules Poetry Playhouse, LLC in Albuquerque, NM where she teaches poetry classes and invites visiting poets to read. http://www.julesnyquist.com/poetry_playhouse.html -35-

Donald Levering Larry, "I attended an artist residency in Willapa Bay, Washington during April and have been doing readings from my newest book, Coltrane's God, since I returned. The attached poem was written after hearing Bill Nevins speak about the Trump rally in Albuquerque he attended (as an observer) in May" Donald

No Compass Now that our stars are aligned over our watchtowers, no compass is needed to go with the press of the throng, rushing through streets headlong toward the miracle that will banish fear and make us millionaires, -36-

drawn to the spectacle morphed to pop-up carnival— smells of caramel corn and elephants, shrieks from the Tilt o’ Whirl & Wall of Death the demagogue’s cant blasted from speakers and old rock hits everybody bobs to falling in with the torch-lit mob that swells into a rip-tide pulling me through the park past bonfires his partisans fan into phantoms and sparks and I bump my head on the feet of hanged scapegoats and feel sick with the way they swing on their ropes bouncing from one blind head to the next without words of reproach Donald Levering

beautiful 2012 book by Donald . . . https://www.amazon.com/Number-Names-Poems-Donald-Levering/dp/0 86534860X

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D.R. Wagner ABOVE THE WORDS Already the poem no longer belongs to me. Its road of miracles shows wondrous horses Shining with brilliance even in the darkest of nights. My voice shakes above the words. It is no longer witness To the weather, or the moon, Or this silent scratching upon Whatever beach this is, catching Waves like tears, voices Heard only in sleep. Still, I can see you. Even without time collected Around you. You are more Than breath to me now. We are as intimate as lovers In a carriage, in an unknown city, Plying the streets all of the night. The clatter of our horses hard Against the cobblestones as we Make love to one another, again and again. Street lights flashing past, falling On our naked flesh. D. R. Wagner

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Douglas Blazek & D.R. Wagner (photo courtesy of D.R.)

2 books by D. R. Wagner -39-

Jim Fish THE GOOD LIFE The early morning meditation Picking wild cherries In the orchard In the upper reaches Of the historic village of Placitas Qualifies As part of the good life Of making wild cherry wine Some years ago Later in my dadâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s life He and I were riding At the ranch Where I grew up And Where he lived the better part of his life We rode thru the landscape Looking Listening Talking At the top of a ridge He stopped his horse And turned to me You know I never got rich But I have always been surrounded By wide open spaces My brother calls it The Church of the Original Creation He attends the sermons As both the pastor And the audience of one Often times The sermons take place -40-

At the Milton Puckett Ranch Ten miles south of Fort Stockton On Wednesday afternoons After he closes his veterinarian clinic at noon For the day Sometimes He holds a weekend retreat With himself Thirty miles southwest of Marfa On the W. E. Love Ranch Sometimes He leans back in his recliner On a Sunday morning With a cup of coffee To watch some game he recorded the night before Late June Early July Finds me Picking wild cherries Jim Fish Jim is the generous fruit wine vintner and owner of Anasazi Fields Winery in Placitas. His hand-built place, mostly adobe structure, has a PA, seats, and welcoming atmosphere for poets, musicians, artists . . . it was the home of the Duende Poetry Series of 11 + years. Bravo to Jim! http://www.anasazifieldswinery.com/Events.html

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Michael Boughn larry . . . here from a book I am working on -- it's called Hermetic Divagations. ... [2-15] Where you go is part deflection, part memory of water. Then she is there terrified but splendent. War raged, a word of incandescent complications in later contexts she would ignore, it rends earth and sky, the shock announces strange opening alive with electrical energy of the Celestial Bed. In thrall to the Whore of Babylon electrifies sex beyond acceptable sociological standards of simply explicable agony and contracted loss of laundry day vulval extasis somehow ends up with electromagnetizing Freemasons dancing politely while exact intellectual components, olive green, suggest distant mist wreathed lake, embrace her in other harmonious analogies as some one who knows what was lost Michael Boughn

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thanks Michael - I love "contracted//loss of laundry day vulval/extasis somehow ends up/with electromagnetizing Freemasons" - and that's not all -lg

Poet and teacher Robin Blaser on the left, Michael on the right Notable among other notable items: The H.D. Book by Robert Duncan edited by Boughn and Victor Coleman, UC Press. And, new . . . Resist Much, Obey Little, Inaugural Poems to the Resistance is available from Spuyten Press - over 700 pages, edited by Michael and others. http://www.spuytenduyvil.net/resist-much-obey-little.html

-lg

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Jennifer Bartlett Hi Larry! Thank you so much for doing this! I didn't understand that that we were supposed to write something about what I have been doing. Which is a lot! I founded the first AWP disability caucus which was up and running last spring. I am starting a non-profit organization for writers with disabilities called Zoeglossia with my colleagues Sheila Black and Connie Voisine. George Hart and I have a book on essays about Larry Eigner coming from the University of New Mexico Press. These are just a few things. Poem by Jennifer and a Drawing Like all of Jennifers, Jennifer had a best friend. This best friend was called Andrea. Andrea and Jennifer discussed many things. They discussed childrearing and husbands and boyfriends and potential husbands and boyfriends. They discussed philosophy and memoirs and the best subway routes. They discussed al-non and Buddhism: disability and the mom-po list; Portland poets and food. They discussed Jennifer’s alcoholism and Jennifer’s outfits and Jennnifer’s reluctance to be in the world. They discussed Andrea’s pot habit and Andrea’s family and homeschooling and television. They discussed neurology and the right side of Andrea’s body and eating meat versus not eating meat. -44-

They discuss rape and abortion and being sexualized versus being desexualized. They discussed Larry Eigner and Jennifer’s garden and what she should do about it. They discussed how the neighbor stole Andrea’s bike and sold it and what she should do about that. They discussed chandeliers and mirrors and clothes they landed at the thrift store. They discussed AWP and why you can’t use a cell phone on an airplane and the price of hotel rooms and pets and Jennifer’s husband’s girlfriend and being an artist versus a poet. They discussed meditation and their dharma teacher and common household cleaning products and which was the best public library branch. They discussed college versus no college and grants and business plans and swimming pools and yoga. They discussed the projects of others and what it would take to get a teaching job. They traded ideas and books and groceries and clothes. They traded sorrows and worries and happinesses and printer paper. Andrea could do things that Jennifer could not do and she did some of these things for her. Conversely, Jennifer did things for Andrea; things that Andrea did not know how to do.

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He is my true friend in the sense that he deeply cares, I mean, deeply does not care, who I am. Jennifer Bartlett

Jennifer's drawing

Jennifer Bartlett is working on her biography of Larry Eigner (1927-1996).

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Brendan Douthit "I'm Brendan Douthit, Anne MacNaughton's son. She suggested I send a few poems of mine . . . " Thank you Brendan. New Strings of Silk new strings of silk between me and my morning chair bright light sunrise tethered optic fiber back and forth back and forth on air I walk the long way

Raised by Old People Mowgli was raised by wolves Tarzan was raised by apes I was raised by old people

RASQUACHE

I was gonna tape the tape but realized the tape hadta be retaped Brendan Douthit

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Joe Bottone Swallows

I ride the train to Florence from Lucca and think of the pueblo in New Mexico where Corn Dance Clowns shake the earth as the train clickity clacks over the rails incantation. Visit Dante's home on Dante Alighieri street climb the stairs with the few curious tourist from China I gaze at his dagger, his masterpiece open, lovingly placed under glass with blue illumination. Dante, your streets the old winding roads of your Comedia still weep in anguish and the swallows, as always leave drops of blood in the sky to fall on us like so much else. After all these years do you still miss the sweet charms of her soft earth? In the morning pale sky the church bells awaken the dead . Shepherd flocks graze the green hillsides - oh, where is my name among the poets? in these enchanted woodlands you might think mischievous gods still rule the world.

Joseph Bottone

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Years ago (1968) when Joe was living in Placitas, we had a lot of fun putting together the rather wild Oriental Blue Streak, a mimeo pub from duende . . .

Here's Joe Bottone on the right. The late Bill Pearlman sitting in foreground. In the back, Gene Frumkin, Betsy Robertson with Penelope, Fell Robertson, Mel and Beverly Buffington sitting, Lora Linsley, me, Stephen Rodefer and Olivia Bottone in doorway, Charlie Vermont . . . Thanks, Joe. Do see his website: http://www.josephbottone.com/

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Anne Valley-Fox New Mexico poet Anne Valley-Fox was born in Paterson, New Jersey, raised in California; and schooled at U.C. Berkeley. Her latest poetry collection is How Shadows Are Bundled (University of New Mexico Press, 2009). A new collection, Nightfall, will be out from Red Mountain Press in October, 2016. See AnnValleyFox.com - "It was great to see & hear you at the Duende final festival, Larry. The whole event was a memorable moment in our time." Note: Anne is referring to the Duende Small Press & Poetry Celebration in Placitas. https://duende.bandcamp.com/album/duende-celebration-1-poetry-art-s mall-presses-morning-june-11-2016 JOANNE IN EVERY STANZA for Joanne Kyger Joanne in a dream reads a slinky poem about shelves— I want to build a set of my own to those specifications. “I’m here because I read too much,” Joanne confessed on Day One of a Zen Buddhist retreat. From ten to twenty, Joanne practiced the violin. In San Francisco she gamboled with poets and that’s how the syllables settled. Joanne in Japan was "whalloped" by Olson’s Projective Verse. His kinetic line: “But breath is man’s special qualification as animal.” Joanne, Donald and I are talking of writing, doing, not doing. “Do you also paint?” “I only do words," I admit. Now in a dream I’m building a bookcase à la Joanne— nine adjustable pine shelves for poems coming and going.

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POET FROM FORT LEE for August Kleinzahler He sculpts the space around the stage with his visceral purr, inducing frisson—vamp on a barstool lacing silken legs. Swinburne, jazz, bridges in fog, mobster or doggy palaver—pile it on, it’s all how you stack it. He holds a choke of words in his throat benevolently, like Shiva the Rescuer, blue-faced with poison. Tidal rhythms rinse and pull back, as gratitude floods the sheer shelves of continents. As for heartbreak, eye-dropped into our sparkling vials, this is how we recognize animal warmth in others. He's making a bluesy racket in the basement, raking the bars of his cell with a spoon— I’m innocent, damn it! Forgive me. Anne Valley-Fox

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THE KINGâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S HAIRCUT The king comes for a haircut wearing his royal robes. May I remove them? He shrugs his assent and sits on the stool in sleeveless tee-shirt, unnervingly sexy, like Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire. He tells me he wants to leave his wife, the stick-thin queen, for another woman. Shaping curls to noble head, I advise him in the hairdresserâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s way, to take it easy, follow his heart. I once knew a man of power, I say, who made a similar switch at his age; it was a train wreck but in the end, everyone came out okay. The queen keeps popping into the room to lob an acerbic remark. Because he believes it's his absolute right, he'll leave her for someone who morphs into somebody else. There may be more children. No one involved will be happy, or exactly unhappy. Bored by our antics, fate turns a blind eye. Anne Valley-Fox

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Latif William Harris

Latif with (not Jack Spicer) but Jack Hirschman Latif William Harris writes us from San Francisco. I just gave a reading with David Meltzer at Bird & Beckett Books, backed up by tenor sax player Zan Stewart. It was on Fatherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Day and we had a huge turn out. Sending a long poem for Jack Spicer written some time ago but never published in its completed form. If too much ask for something else. Latif Latif no! now's the opportunity to present your 5 pages concerning Jack Spicer! Gratefully. -53-

THANK YOU MASKED MAN (Dictated in whispers from Jack Spicer May, 10 to August 20, 1993) when I came longing here from Los Angeles where no poets lived (1959) I said to you: Poetry is a cold blooded ax (that falls far) And you smiled that subtle smile and said: “then I make you my master of dead flies and will come (from time to time) like a woodsman dictating crossing Columbus and Kearny (with my ax) to whisper in your ear” (On May 10th 1993 such a dictation began) “The native place like my salmon’s face is (Lorca) shooting pool in back of Gino & Carlo’s (where there is a there) a clock in the birdbath standing in (Osborne’s) meadow (surrounded by) an all igneous ellipse and dance band lyncean (the eyes of bucks and does) laying in that caldera called hell scanning (for) ghosts of cougars yet (troubled by) rabbits slashing through the grasses night (falls faster) than a frog’s tongue on a lazy dragonfly (as the striped and solid balls fall…)

“The resurrection of the dead through technology tabby cat Giants (in 1st place) Dostoevsky’s work was imperfect (remember) he had little time (for perfection)

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(and resented Tolstoy and Turgenev (for their) intimations of perfection (when an artist) starts trying to save the world he starts losing himself ideas form like blisters on his brain (Thank you again for your application (as of) the present we have no positions available (in the English) department (Do not use a fly swatter do not swat the mosquito do not…” Here he breaks off for breath “Dear Lorca, We will use up your rhetoric here so that it will not show up in our poems. (In the pantheon of voices (choices) need to be made (take) your fly powder (like an aspirin) tell everyone to have the guts even Roberts one, two and three (gee) are they dead too (say cheese if you please) lead our darling ones astray into a (meadow of) back slapping waltzes (they) the leaders resent the magical fly powder (of a man) like yourself your dead sons educate you (it is sad) this waltz too (but take apart) your lovely heart and put it together again -55-

one last run a (a pennant) those Giants holy moly “They have no brandy here and no milk they don’t care if a man’s fly is down they don’t care about fly paper either (or powder) to darken the cheeks the least among us can fly “The ocean (is) humiliating in its disguises NO ONE LISTENS to poetry. (Period) (as the last fly ball is caught) the last pool ball clunks down retrieved only by quarters ressurecto this leather hide oh plunk your quarters down (Mr. Whilikers) those revolving poets (have) taken refuge (in) OH GOD Universities In UNIVERSITIES! do they hear Mr. Eliotic declaim prancing at the parades in Prague the May Queen (on) the Naropes theocracy of obdurate voices messaging each other (again) and again and again despite my tales of caution (will you tell them) William what’ that oh yes I forgot and you were so beautiful…” At this point the dictation breaks off I can hear Jack weeping quietly Lamenting the loss of his body -56-

“No one ever really loved me (you see) not exactly the way I wanted them to (my) body (for love) was not final the ocean does not mean (to be final) The poet is a counterpunching radio. and those messages (God would not damn them) do not even know they are champions only parking lots (are) final gee whiz (what’s a disembodied dictator to do (I ask you) to do? Sweet William dearest sweet bodied William never mind all the weeping sisters your fly powder I’m I’nt (add water) and poof blown away (it is) impossible to escape the context of one’s life August and the Giants still I’nt” here Jack begins to reminisce about some very private matters (I cannot distinguish) nor would I try to pry further

Some months have passed Only whispers A word or two now and then So I read: “The fast take is a good sign that you’re hooked up with some source -57-

of power, some source of energy” remembering (that) Surrealism is the business of poets who cannot (or will not) benefit from Surrealism He clears his throat through a mist “when a message comes that you hate like the eyes should fall out (instead of) the eyes shoulder a lot then you are hooked up with a power like your fly powder and an energy which starts the big record spinning again YOUR DEAD CHILDREN are here with me they are wonderful young men (you know?) we’re on our way to the ball park we can hear the thwack of the bat from here” Latif William Harris

It is my rewarding aplomb to announce: Barter Within the Bark of Trees is available from the resurrected Duende Press. "It's a book of poetry on memory, aging and Buddhism which includes 2 sections: First: Older work which presages Section Two which were written in 2014 as an ongoing flow of imagery and illusions which speak to the authors state of mind at 75 years of age." Duende Press published his first book of poems Poems 1965 and 50 years later this new book - thus we celebrate! Latif is the man who drove Jack Spicer to his last poetry reading at the Berkeley Conference (1965), by the way. -58-

Mr. Harris & Neeli Cherkovski's Beatitude Golden Anniversary (about 600 pages) is an essential for any contemporary poet's library with a good chunk of the original Beatitude from City Lights included. lg

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Joseph Somoza and Jill Somoza

Jill and Joe Somoza in the Organ Mountains when the poppies were in full bloom. Joseph Somoza sends us 3 poems. Double Talk Sitting in my lawn chair, I’m walking down Bush Street toward the Fillmore, your arm entwined in mine. Now that we’re old enough it doesn’t matter. People may think what they think. What are we anyway, famous? Step outside ourselves and notice the flowering bushes, the Victorian facades, the old -60-

Japanese woman walking home with groceries. If we lived here? If we came from here? If we had gone to grade school here? If we hadnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t become who we are?

Poet He speaks nonsensical whimsy for the love of hearing speech phrases in a visible form he can modulate, re-combine fancifully, evocatively, or, just, undermine his own expectations, liking to hear a possible, new language one would speak for no reason but the love of how it sounds.

A Million Lives Amazing always, but especially now in the early. A freight train passing through town, down the hill where tracks lie in wait for a train to come blow its whistle while I sit in morning shade -61-

under the tree, Marty, the black cat, lying nearby, Jill watering the flowers, the wooden picket fence as somber as itâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ever been, unlike my somberness that varies, often mixed with joy, unbelief, or other mixed feelingsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;colorations that make the world seem mine for the moment, a moment that, at the time, lasts forever. Joseph Somoza construction by Jill Somoza

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Jerome Rothenberg

Jerome Rothenberg with Tulips at Kelly Writer’s House Larry -This was just finished up ... so from my computer directly to yours. Abrazos, JERRY

from FURTHER AUTOVARIATIONS “I Feel the Sand Between My Teeth” brittle like teeth the mouth can’t hold but take the shape of tiny arrows what the wolf in dreams spews out a cry more like a tapping sound like pebbles in a brook the rat-a-tat -63-

a wash board makes against your fingers or like castanets the click & clack precisely sand pressed in your mouth your tongue & teeth feeling the grit the particles in motion bit after bit you cough them up or spit them out leaving a mark on canvas filled with blood & leaves as many grains as stars signaling the news from space the dark world filled with signals more than the mind can hold like dreams that capture us making a lie of time where time runs wild never to find its equal in the worlds below through which you fall & still will follow absent your voice that stays behind silent as theirs the black worlds opening to let the stars sing from unbounded space more like a scream than what we cling to rhyme & reason stripped from us -64-

the days ahead turned backwards where a river ran & houses on the shore were ringed by bears encounters endless trials & woes we ran from would not find an equal in the time we knew the end of politics as farce & tragedy foretold & fatal where the naked ape sets forth again the power in his finger pointing at the sky the hidden universe & things beyond his knowing soon reduced to worms a sky where stars are also worms the words pronounced in foreign tongues sounds like gusanos waiting watching with the others & myself among them eyes obscured by moonlight without time to think or find a place that saves us from the dark the light -65-

the nameless killers aiming to embark & claim their prize 23.vi.16 Jerome Rothenberg Comment: Wonderful work, as usual, and we seem to be in the same groove. See my poem "California Dream" at the beginning of this blog .... Laurie Macrae

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Bill Nevins

A Gentile Kaddish Sung for All Fallen in the Sun (Written after finishing the book Spain in Our Hearts, about those who died 1936-1939) No, son, only a lucky few of us are Jews -thick micks, Belgians, Germans -we were and are-- yet proud enough to have known those earth deep people of that Tribe of Moses, or the Gente of Nuevo Mexico and the loving folk of Vietnam Louisiane, Africa, Spain-- oh, any fine land where they still breathe free Aghanistan Iraq those of faith those of Allah or even the good believers in Pope or Lenin, Rastafari or Buddha, for sweet Christ's sake! even those who cherish this Fourth this weird old falling down Amerikay Hey! brother son strong fighter man I, non-Jew old man of yours yet do strive to sing Kaddish -67-

for you in this troubled land in anyway I can I do This mountain morning as I think of the fallen heroes of Spain of Gardez Base of this falling rising world May you fall softy rise gently in our holy star's blaze in our fierce moon's pull Bill Nevins

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oh omar in darkness, what the hell ya dreaming now? oh omar in darkness, what the hell ya dreaming now? in that night we dreamed as you could well dream, macho mateen destroyer of worlds, of what could have been, of what could be: why not turn those bullets away with love and poetry and songs and laughter --and touch and kisses-so they spin off into the sea of false memory and fade away like ice melting in warm waters of our heart-blood while our brothers sisters lovers and friends all alive all fresh and wild arise open their eyes recognize us even you, poor little omar looking for love, habibi, and smile? hey! we were only dreaming-such a bad joke, hermano-now, here we are together forever let's dance even you, oh flatfoot clumsy pendejo omar! drop your gun brother fool take our hands and dance then the sun arose once more and we whirled as we all turned to light, turned to love Bill Nevins

Comment: Very nice work, Bill. Laurie Macrae -69-

Mary Oishi Larry, Attached are 2 poems that I haven't already published. One is obviously really recent. What I've been up to? Working in public radio takes up much of my time not spent sleeping. Then there's writing and performing poems, both of which are acts of joy and magic. Oh, and there's taking care of dogs--mine and friends' on occasion. Volunteering with gay youth one night a week, which I've done for 19 years. Preparing my blues show--that's about 9 hours of prep time. Listening to and cataloging new CDs for airworthy tracks. Checking Facebook. Ranting about the state of things. Trying to grab hope and keep dancing. Nothing much, I guess. Note: Mary is a luminary at KUNM-FM and her blues show on Wednesday is fantastic and gutsy. cottontail cop hulkin' philadelphia cop under mayor rizzo braggin' to his fellow civil war reenactors-i used to dress up in a bunny suit yeah, a full bunny suit head to toe big fuckin' ears and all damn straight i got a confession out of the stupid sonsabitches worked every damn time what're they gonna say? some giant bunny came in, beat the piss outta me oh yeah, go ahead, go ahead asshole! they're really gonna believe that one alright! mary oishi

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orlando 2 when I encounter the consequences of hate I canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t help but wish for a widespread outbreak of kindness I am not less than nor am I a threat because of my mixed heritage or mixed gender (though you perceive me woman) some times past in many places I would have been feared punished forcibly repressed for being left handed I have never fit the mold. but you need me the Big You needs us all: right, left, and ambidextrous bi, straight, trans, and gay hey! when you really stop and think about it weâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re all queer in some kind of some which way mary oishi

Spirit Birds They Told Me is available - West End Press -71-

Gloria Frym

New Book by Gloria from Spuyten Devil http://www.spuytenduyvil.net/the-true-patriot.html Dear Larry, Here's something for the blog. A brutal something. Gloria

Fiction If you create a man at the door with a gun and he fires at the person behind the door, he’s fulfilled his fictive role. If he fires into a crowd, he’s a different character than the one you had in mind. It’s worth investigating this character.

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If he kills ten people by firing a gun into a crowd, he may be a character in another story. He may loom too large for the story you had in mind. If he kills fifty, he may require an essay. If another character declares, It’s opened my eyes, I want to keep a gun in the house to protect myself and my family, this character needs a course in reasoning. If this character needs a course in reasoning, you might send him to France to learn pure and applied logic and new depths of deadpan. Or you might want to open a whole new aspect of the narrative featuring this second character. If it’s tempting to create an interlocutor who asks, and what kind of gun would you keep? And if the answer is an AK 47, this character could well belong in another story. This character doesn’t work in fiction, only in America. If the man fires into a classroom where he assassinates the teacher and nearly all the children, then turns the gun on himself after firing several rounds at the police who enter by the same door, you have the beginning of a Great American Novel. Gloria Frym

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John Roche 78 Grandmothers When Sinjar was liberated in November 2015 the Peshmerga uncovered mass graves, one containing 78 Yazidi grandmothers. When the black-clad conquerors arrived in August 2014 they sorted the Yazidi women by age, a simple triage: The maidens to be sex slaves, their mothers to be servants, their grandmothers to be shot or buried alive. This poet will refrain from comparisons to the Rape of Nanking, My Lai, Sabra & Shatila, or countless historical parallels. Neither posit the Rape of the Sabine Women as the starting point of Roman Civilization. Nor equate warrior culture, religious fundamentalism, and patriarchy. Nor analyze the rise of this particularly savage apocalyptic cult. Only say, there is a grave in Sinjar containing 78 grandmothers. Only say, the poet's curse be on those who disrespect grandmothers. Only say, the poet's curse fierce and ineradicable be upon the heads of those who slay the 78 grandmothers, and upon those who slay the 778 grandmothers, and upon those who slay the 7,778 grandmothers. May they be immediately rendered impotent and suffer a thousand humiliations and torments, and may a coward's death soon follow.

Only say, may peace come to Sinjar, and children play with grandmothers, and brides be dressed by grandmothers, and babes be held in the arms of grandmothers. John Roche (who, by the way, lives when he can in Albuquerque, in fact has moved here and just got married to Jules Nyquist of the very active Poets Playhouse) -74-

John & Jules

The Moâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Joe Anthology that John Roche assembled is something of a phenomenon. Who would not agree? http://www.beatlick.com/joethepoet.html

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Larry Goodell I wrote this early morning of the wedding of Jules Nyquist and John Roche and was so honored to read it during the wedding ceremony. And Margaret Randall read for John and Jules too. Thanks to all.

Arrival for John and Jules Historic ether as the moon comes up and mesmerizes, the glimmer in the clouds is full burst the old terms catch the tongue as well as the new as seen through the upheaval of the oral place takes up dance in the plaza all lenses along the borders improve the light as stars will tell you late at night â&#x20AC;&#x201C; as you come home anytime the light lifts up to greet you whirling in on the old 66 or I-25 I-10 64 60 285 54 84 to I-40 or descending as the land gets closer and you bump down on it you have arrived! the slightly expanded-out square like a skirt with the strange toe to Sonora the state will bring you to an illumination of its past as the Voices of the Rio Grande the Indian Rio Grande is in company with poverty as a starving drought will enter your soul as well as the vistas of gypsum and striking red â&#x20AC;&#x201C;

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what sustains and turns into love is the honesty, the this is what is what is and along with this delight in the friendship of voice the articulation of friends, the real ones the real emergence as those who come here long before us as my fatherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s mother and father in a wagon from Kansas as all of us any way we can arrived where we are as they did in Grenville in Artesia and Roswell as you did Connecticut New York Minneapolis and all or truly emerging up from the ground and building the first empires here. Love finds love in happenstance, in chance in mystery and change as I celebrate my love finding New York to New Mexico and New Mexico already here may you and you all see with brighter eyes and hear what comes to you to hear as true partnership is possible breaks through like the moon and shining stars â&#x20AC;&#x201C; and water, when thought absent, suddenly surprises as Las Huertas every day in mind and actuality greets me. Blessings in festival of the seasonal reverberates, history making new history the story telling itself over and over in ever new ways is what you are beginning to tell. Love folds out in creaturehood and presents us with a map of understanding and your partnership. Love always and with gratitude June 18th 2016 Wedding Day, from Larry

Note: 3 lg poems just appeared thanks to Kenneth P. Gurney whose Adobe Walls published many of our area poems. This new venture is called Watermelon Isotope. https://watermelonisotope.com/2017/03/27/larry-goodell-3-poems/ -77-

Deborah Coy Sidekick

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I have no name. I turn my foot as zombies chase. I go to the basement to change the fuse. I leave to pee and never return. I wear red on the away team. I know that glorious cantankerous craving to be special, to be the one and only to not be mistaken for someone else. That’s what keeps me at the hero’s side. I’m the also ran, the buddy, pal and buffoon. There are perks to being the sidekick. No autograph hounds pester me. I don’t have to hide my identity. But lets face it. I’ll never get the girl. I’ll be left sweeping up the glass while the hero rides into the sunset. Call me Robin, or Wilson, or Watson, or Tonto. We are famous in our own ways. We are also necessary. We remember their stories. We ride behind them. We have their backs. Deborah Coy

See Beatlick Press for some of Deborah's editing publishing and original work. http://www.beatlick.com/

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Jonathan Penton "In 1998, Jonathan Penton founded UnlikelyStories.org in the fires of Mount Doom, and into it poured his hatred, cruelty, and will to dominate. Since then, he has lent editorial and management assistance to a number of literary and artistic ventures, such as MadHat, Inc. and Big Bridge. He has organized literary performances, and performed himself, in places like Arkansas, California, Chihuahua, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Louisiana, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Texas, and Washington, state and DC. His poetry books are Last Chap (Vergin’ Press, 2004), Blood and Salsa and Painting Rust (Unlikely Books, 2006) and Prosthetic Gods (New Sins Press/Winged City Chapbooks, 2008). Both of these poems are from his forthcoming collection, Standards of Sadiddy (Lit Fest Press, August 2016)." Unlikely Stories has even ventured into the Goodell world of cosmic trickery and for that I thank you! Because We Still Eat at a Chinese Buffet You remember, running down the street in your sister’s prom dress, calling for help thinking that help would always be there, assured, secure, only marginally afraid. You remember when you truly understood that no help was on the way. Since then, you find pleasure in your own company and rely on your own mind to occupy you. Since then you grow as the tree, at once into the sky and into the earth. The lotto numbers on fortune cookies have become your numerology, power found in patterns that have weight due to your will.

Dogs will fight over your remains. But when you are alone with yourself, there is always one stranger present. Within you is the woman who broke, who was not made stronger by trauma—the woman who grows as the tree, putting out new leaves in the spring, never acquiring permanence, never adequately nourished, a bird trapped by her feet, a man trapped in his tongue. -80-

Friends know her with both eyes open, but see her with one eye shut. She knows that friends are generous because life is cheap. They will give her many gallons of blood before she dies. North the fields of tar are breaking under copper-smelting towers and you ask if you can cut me to make our photos just pyrite I grab hold of those fences still formed from ocotillo and I try to wrap up in them but they don’t think they’re part of this so don’t do anything at all we head east on Montana back to your mother’s bedroom where she’s laid out all her gris-gris in hope of keeping me away you get out your tattoo gun and you promise me Picasso but it seems my back’s forgotten so my hands best push you anywhere but here where I can see the scar across your neck the one that tanglewebs in all directions like something no doctor has the fingertips to do since it seems my back has lost a great deal more than your tattoo gun which didn’t work much better than the spine you still must keep Outside, the dust storm is starting the sun is falling down in daylight we should scamper to lower ground though we know we’ll never make it before the grey and brown surround the way our eyes forget the sunset our hands forget the how of when we climbed those yielding rocks those pieces pointed skyward to see the tapestry of femicide -81-

a map of smallpox comforts dust embedded in our teeth â&#x20AC;&#x2122;cause if my hands are forgetful I think my mouth remembers how you begged it to cut you to get the Glamour Shot just right I would have you die in beauty like a Fante heroine so please-please when you read to me put down the Earnest Gaines. Jonathan Penton jonathan@unlikelystories.org

Unlikely Stories published "Alien Classified" which is all I can tell you about my Roswell, NM upbringing concerning this subject. http://www.unlikelystories.org/13/goodell0213.shtml also, my "Outer Space Workout" which is guaranteed to leave you lost somewhere in outer space. http://www.unlikelystories.org/12/goodell0612.shtml Thank you Jonathan and Michelle Greenblatt Currently, see: http://www.unlikelystories.org/

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James Burbank Three Takes and a Riposte Bone I turned over and over in my hand complexity of it whiteness starkness angles many ridges and summits that have never been explored except for the flicker who assaults at every opportunity why are we blind to that poverty of this moment with skull in hand picking at dry corners why? Look there into my own death turning that over and over in my hands

. Up on that ridge nothing can be said that has not been said before into clear blue air all those trees speaking to one another -83-

throughout time weigh on the heart and bring tears to the eyes old eyes those blind eyes those that see beyond nothing stars or clarity even beyond in wind in air in . Sometimes a blessing lies hidden and other times open to air and the incidence of touch how remains the edge without choice sharpness where remains time and the redtail hawk over deep canyon small creature invisible below beneath leaf . Some years back my favorite way up the ridge back of old turtle mountain an older tree still against a bear-scratched stump upward seeming forever upward and out over the river plain home again I cry out nowhere to hear no one Sometimes the dead live more than the living and the living have no appreciation for what it takes to sit still inside nothing

James Clarke Burbank

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The resurrected duende press presents The OxBow Poems, Slow Walks on the Rio Grande, poems and photographs and writings by Mr. Burbank. See his website. http://jimbu0.wixsite.com/mysite

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Mark Weber Hey Mark, what have you been up to and please send a poem. I've been working on the mixes of the concerts we gave at Outpost Performance Space in early May called Interlace, which might become a double-cd. (KAZZRIE JAXEN QUARTET W. CHARLEY KRACHY, DON MESSINA & BILL CHATTIN; VIRG DZURINKO, SOLO PIANO; PAYNE LIEBOWITZ DUO WITH MARK WEBER.) I'm reading Karen Armstrong's HISTORY OF GOD, and Nicholas Wade's BEFORE THE DAWN (anthropology) and re-reading the KALEVALA and for a break am re-re-re-reading Ross Macdonald. Still doing my Thursday jazz radio show on KUNM-FM. And weekly installments on my on-line music journal JAZZ FOR MOSTLY. https://markweber.free-jazz.net/ POEM FOR SUPRITI And now you're an orphan like the rest of us adrift out on the Western Sea in your little boat with the tattered sail . . . . Those far distant lands where your mother went on Saturday the only telephone that can reach her now is called memory pumpkin pie, a novena, that spanking you got for refusing to do the dishes (or was it when you used your uncle's tennis racket to bounce rocks?) and your mother never spanked you again because she cried and you didn't . . . . adrift with the dust particles floating in the afternoon window light the bleak trees are beginning to remember their leaves something like tea that is memory in a cup, warm -86-

and slightly acerbic, or is that melancholia? something . . . something . . . you trail your hand in the water over the side of your boat, there's a jet way overhead above the troposphere do jets fly this far over the Western Sea? maybe . . . . maybe the Buddha is up there? going somewhere in a jiffy 22mar16 Mark Weber

Extraordinarily up on jazz!

Mark Weber, Jazz for Mostly https://markweber.free-jazz.net/ -87-

John Tritica At the Edge of Hearing Seeing for Richard Hample I am listening at the edge of hearing leaves’ mottled shade flutters me a swallow-tail’s flyway parallel to the bike the brilliant wings alight on a sycamore *** industrial warehouses beside the bike path goat heads weeds wild grass out here a hummingbird finds no nectar hovers then carries the wind straight up *** a good reason this is a first the bird’s lost along hard soil draught datura could grow here but no seeds no moisture a stiff wind in the face you ride a bike along a diversion channel into the sun -- John Tritica -88-

John Tritica Larry: I've been painting my house & working the garden & not diligent about my e-mail--sorry. Thank you for using my poem--it's one that I like, situated in the high desert that is my place & home . . . I loved seeing your archive--Steve Clay is terrific human being. I once read in his gallery in Soho, which was closed a long time ago. In any case, he's a great publisher, & an astute agent for landing archival materials. What a fascinating collection of materials--thanks for sending this to me. . . . John (sneaking in at the last minute a poem by John Tritica and I thank you!)

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A Page for Satyrs Please send a spoof for this page. Larry. WHAT A BUNCH OF HOOEY May you topple the bobble that is your bubble your impossible babble. You're the Tower of Blubber the badass boogie man of bubblegum. Oh boo boo ba ba bladder blast of puff dust. Inflated ego of thin weather balloon popped. Particles too frail to decompose. What's left of you but useless garbage if you can find it. What a rear collision comes to when there's nothing to collide with. Did you topple your bubble and bust your buffoonery. Drop your pantaloons and find there's nothing there but hot air? Nothing is as nothing was and nothing is as shall be. What a bunch of hooey and tomfoolery. larry goodell / placitas, nm / 28Jun2016

And now from the source of all health in America, lovely to present this on the 4th of July, 2016! Thank you Mr. Burbank.

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THE REAMING: Bend Over Please, and Say, "OMMMMMMMMM.” Let’s face it, health insurance is uplifting and ecstatic, almost a new religious epiphany, especially the so-called customer service experience. Just like dying from rat poison writhing in a forgotten cement corner, a moment of supreme clarity arrives, so an enlightening and refreshing customer service session with Blueballs National Health Insurance, “my carrier of choice,” will fill your anus with a strange and wonderous blue light that most probably comes from God. You are one of the chosen. “Hello, human. Please provide your name, your social security number, your zip code, your address, your plan number, and your bill amount.” “My name is Jimbu. My Social Security number is seven. My zip code is nine. My address is ½, Albuquerque, New Mexico. My plan number is twenty-three. My bill is one billion seven hundred million twenty three thousand nine hundred dollars and fifteen cents .” The Customer Service Rep tells me she is Dog’s minion, her name is Meticula, and she says she will walk on her knees through broken glass to satisfy my health insurance needs. “So, what’s your problem, Mr. Jimbu? Did you try Nexium?” she says, “Did you try Nauseum? Did you try Trichenosis? I can talk to you in a calm and reassuring voice about your health plan,” she says, “ But you will have to consult your on-line pharmacy for further information about your opioids and your constipation, your diabetes medication, your steroids, your pot, and your smack. We don’t deal with that shit here, only good clean health stuff like you see on TV ads where you are supposed to ask your doctor,” “Why do I have such a bill the size of the national debt for my colonoscopy?” I plead. “Jimbu, you wanted to be reamed, didn’t you?” And at that moment, thanks to my carrier of choice, I attained the highest and the most pure and perfect enlightenment. James Clarke Burbank

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Thank you to everyone for contributing and please please link to this July 2016 collection of poems and information . . . here it is for you all to use! And thanks to Hal Johnson who invited me to ask some poets to send work. larry

Truck's editor-drivers, past and present as of December 1, 2016 "Truck set out on its travels in April 2011, and ended this month, in December 2016, in a very different terrain. During those several years, Truck was guided by 69 different editors, each taking a month at the wheel. Those driver/editors had carte blanche and were free to proceed as they liked, doing as much or as little as they cared to, so long as they didn't, as I sometimes told them, wreck the joint." Halvard Johnson The full run: http://halvard-johnson.blogspot.com/

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Apr. 2011 -- Kate Schapira May 2011 -- Wendy Battin June 2011 -- Frank Parker July 2011 -- Skip Fox Aug. 2011 -- Ken Wolman Sept. 2011 -- Michael Tod Edgerton Oct. 2011 -- Kelly Cherry Nov. 2011 -- Andrew Burke Dec. 2011 -- Lewis LaCook Jan. 2012 -- Larissa Shmailo Feb. 2012 -- Gerald Schwartz Mar. 2012 -- Jukka-Pekka Kervinen Apr. 2012 -- Lynda Schor May 2012 -- David Graham June 2012 -- Lars Palm July 2012 -- Elizabeth Switaj Aug. 2012 -- rob mclennan Sept. 2012 -- Georgios Tsangaris Oct. 2012 -- Douglas Barbour Nov. 2012 -- Dirk Vekemans Dec. 2012 -- Erik Rzepka Jan. 2013 -- Alan Britt Feb. 2013 -- Mark Weiss Mar. 2013-- Mary Kasimor Apr. 2013-- John M. Bennett May 2013-- Orchid Tierney June 2013--Victoria Marinelli July 2013 -- Volodymyr Bilyk Aug. 2013 -- David Howard Sept. 2013 -- Philip Meersman Oct. 2013 -- Chris Lott Nov. 2013 -- Alexander Cigale Dec. 2013 -- Catherine Daly Jan. 2014 -- Maria Damon Feb. 2014 -- John Oughton

Mar. 2014 -- Colin Morton and MaryLee Bragg Apr. 2014 -- Alan Sondheim May 2014 -- Glenn Bach June 2014 -- Bill Pearlman July 2014 -- Edgar Gabriel Silex Aug. 2014 -- Jerry McGuire Sept. 2014 -- Karri Kokko Oct. 2014 -- Mรกrton Koppรกny Nov. 2014 -- Anny Ballardini Dec. 2014 -- Chris Lott Jan. 2015 -- Marc Vincenz Feb. 2015 -- mIEKAL aND Mar. 2015 -- Eileen Tabios Apr. 2015 -- Crag Hill May 2015 -- Rudolfo Carrillo June 2015 -- Gwyn McVay July 2015 -- Matt Margo Aug. 2015 -- Volodymyr Bilyk Sept. 2015 -- Stephen Vincent Oct. 2015 -- Maxianne Berger Nov. 2015 -- Alexander Jorgensen Dec. 2015 -- Jane Joritz-Nakagawa Jan. 2016 -- Michael Rothenberg Feb. 2016 -- CL Bledsoe Mar. 2016 -- Paul Sampson Apr. 2016 -- Lynda Schor May 2016 -- Allen Bramhall June 2016 -- Joanne Howard July 2016 -- Larry Goodell Aug. 2016 -- Lori Horvitz Sept. 2016 -- Tero Hannula Oct. 2016 -- Laura Young Nov. 2016 -- Ric Carfagna Dec. 2016 -- Philip Garrison

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Larry and Friends #1

from Hal Johnsonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Truck July 2016 larry goodell guest editor

a duende free for all production 2017 http://www.larrygoodell.com/