dirt and art

My father is a surveyor for the copper mine in Morenci, Arizona. This means he had just enough trade school and talent for drawing and math to eventually rise up and out, from the depths of the open pit-- where the other men in the family moved dirt to the concentrators and smelters--to the rim of the maw: "the largest open-pit copper mine in North America." He walks the mine's radius, a diviner of pipe lines and ore lines and shaft lines from the palimsests of the mine's previous lives. He tells the company where to dig. That's how he describes his job.

My father brought home rocks. Iron pyrite, mica, azurite, malachite, obsidian, pink and white agate, flint--and history through rocks--obsidian arrowheads, pottery shards, geodes, fool's gold, mica windows, limestone canyons, turquois beads, grinding stones, slag, and sometimes the red metal itself extracted from the hole, whole and in its natural state.

My father brought home graphite pencils painted turquoise blue and numbered in gradations of hardness and darkness which he kept sharpened to the quick and bound in rubberbands. He brought home watercolors and oils and tiny brushes and colored pencils and fat gum erasers and tracing paper and paper with tiny grids, and at night he wrote his tiny numbers in his tiny gridded books and took his surveying scope out to the front yard and pointed it up to show me what he could of the moon and stars. He tells me da Vinci mixed his paints from ground minerals and linseed oil, that the indians did something similar.

He kept his map of the sky.

**********

Stuck [meme]

Never did know what to do with the stick once it was put into my hands. Stick it where? Suzanne suggests I run with it.

You're stuck inside Fahrenheit 451. Which book do you want to be?

Book of Revelations

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

The Percy Bysshe Shelley of Richard Holme's The Pursuit. I met up with Shelley once in a dream: Mexico, a bar on Rocky Point beach. It is warm and crowded and the sand is soaked with beer. He and Byron are deep in a game of chess beneath a pink umbrella, and all I can think is: I've forgotton my Norton. And when Shelley puts his arm around me: where is Mary??? --Then I realize: he thinks I'm Mary...

The last book you bought is: (bought all at once while in Denver, in no particular order)

Robert Lowell Collected Poems, Anne Carson's Glass, Irony and God, Thomas Sayers Ellis' The Maverick Room, Dorianne Laux's Smoke, Benjamin Saenz's Dark and Perfect Angels and Elegies in Blue, Marquis de Sade's Incest, Lorine Niedecker's Collected Works, and 'I Am' : The Selected Poetry of John Clare.

The last book you read is:

Thomas Sayers Ellis, The Maverick Room

What are you currently reading?

Benjamin Saenz, Elegies in Blue

Five books you'd take with you to a deserted island: (five? I don't pack that light on weekend trips anywhere)

James Agee & Walker Evans, Let Us Now Praise Famous Men
Henry James, The Golden Bowl
Herman Melville, Moby Dick
The Shelleys' Complete Works
Milton's Complete Works
Robert Lowell's Collected Poems
Archie Ammons, Sphere
Julia Kristeva, Black Sun
Sartre, Being and Nothingness
Plato's Symposium
a big blank Moleskine notebook

Who are you going to pass this stick to (3 people) and why?

Jake York
Jasper Bernes
Herman Carrillo

Because I love how they think.

My Denver

was Magnlia Hotel room service, bath water and bottled water and car pick-up spoiled, oh I was doomed: after the years I put into working the resort show and after all that's unavailable in Galesburg, I was not only impressed but grateful for the care that arrived when I paid for it or someone else did: the driver this morning brought me a cup of Starbucks coffee "on the house" when I said I was tired, and I settled into leather seats feeling safe and indifferent about my flight for nearly half an hour, and read Niedecker. Then: the Denver airport is fun, it's true. You move along from line to train, to shopping, to exhibit, to the gates close by. I didn't manage to eat, I forgot.

It was the end of the winter term, and all the exhaustion of grading and conferencing for four twelve-hour days, and the teaching crash, and the post-reading crash hit hard. I was weepy on the way out there, and nervous about the Friday reading, and almost too sore to rise on Saturday. I needed care and silence and good conversation and found it with my hosts, my wonderful hosts, Jake and Carol, who fed me shrimp, potatoes, corn, and guacamole, and who also have the little silver and cobalt glass shakers (mine have no S&P) on their table, and St. Christopher, and Burt's Bees Carrot Creme for faces, and Hart Crane's worm (for now I have it too), and on this one miraculous faux spring day, they are Carol in short-sleeved green linen and Jake in an embossed white cotton button-down. And sandals. And sangria.

Two views: from their living room, sunset, mountain range, blue and salmon cumulus (precisely like the Tucson sky). From the dining room, night and the glittering city.

Thank you, both.

Made it to Denver:

yes!

Rachel kicked ass

last night. Her paper for Senior Seminar Symposium was brilliant and she responded to questions with aplomb. Kid may decide to go to grad school after all.

And she's asked me to lead her post-bac.

10 Poems, first teachers [meme]

in no particular order:

T. S Eliot, Four Quartets
James Wright, "With the Shell of a Hermit Crab"
Robert Lowell, "The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket"
Pablo Neruda, "Walking Around"
James Dickey, "The Sheep Child"
Percy Shelley, "The Witch of Atlas"
Genesis, King James Bible
Sylvia Plath, "The Moon and the Yew Tree"
James Merrill, "The Octopus"
Milton, Paradise Lost

Where are the women, I wonder, when I look at this list. Where are the men and women of color? The world poems, the Southwest poems, the border poems, the experimental poems? --Not part of my education in the beginning, truthfully. My training was almost purely canonical until I got to grad school. I suppose that's the hazard of being an English major at a college that believes in teaching literary tradition, and Smith College did, at the time. Don't know if that's changed. That was 10 years ago. --Anyway, I don't regret it. I love these poems.

Drafts

I'll write about earth, oh my river, the sluiced iron
earth, the pan-smooth stones, gray and organ pink this
way coming to some conclusion. March now. To shake
the crows let in the back way, east window, mornings, to
ask them my fearful questions, the black-rimmed eyes
in the trees. The sleeping mother in the bedroom whose
fetal legs leave the sheets and let us eye her black-haired
vulva. Rock through water. The clock on a nearby roof
ticks off, I should sleep, though you sweep in, your usual
way with me, a wake of black iron on the west bank
soft with fish. Scoop the dying minnows from their pool
of green moss, still the mother woke in her yellow
body veil and discovered us. The lookI’ve forgotten.
The smell is hairbrush sweet. She is sweet in the mornings
and mirrored mirrored in vanity lights and tethered
to the coiled turquoise phone cord and the brush
of contour shadow pink or gray. Eye and shadow. The philodendron
in the corner window sprawls, misses its tree. The mulberry
out front sheds seed and rots into the wood stoop. They sand
and paint each spring. Tree: come. But later, it is
winter. The mother stoops, she sweeps the step clean with her
hand. She is under the trees and rooting
among the windfalls, and the wind wakes the child. They talk.
You, further south oh my river and I sleep, I will. I saw her on her
knees. You too. She sucked her life from where you were. From clay.

I will write about earth, oh my river, the sluiced iron earth,
the pan-smooth stones, gray and organ pink this way
coming to some conclusion. March now. To shake the crows
let in the back way, east window and mornings. To ask
them my fearful questions. The black-rimmed eyes
in the trees. The sleeping mother in the bedroom
whose fetal legs leave the sheets and let us eye her
black-haired vulva. To let me know where you’re going
won’t you, in the future? The clock on the roof
nearby is right, I should sleep, though you sweep in, your
usual way with me, you move in me, a wake of black iron
on the west bank soft with fish. To scoop the dying
minnows from their pool of green moss. The mother
woke in her yellow body veil and discovered us. The look
I’ve forgotten. The smell is hairbrush sweet. She is sweet
in the mornings and mirrored mirrored in vanity
lights and tethered to the coiled turquoise phone cord
and the brush of contour shadow pink or gray. The philodendron
in the corner window sprawls, misses its tree. Tree
come. The mulberry out front sheds seed and rots into the wood
stoop. They sand and paint each spring. But later, it is
winter. The mother stoops, she sweeps the step clean. Eye,
shadow. She is under the trees and rooting among the windfalls,
and the wind wakes the child. They talk. You, further south
oh my river and I sleep, I will. I saw her on her knees.
You too. She sucked her life from what you saw. To clay.

I will write about earth, oh my river, the sluiced iron earth,
the pan-smooth stones, gray and organ pink this way I think
coming to some conclusion. March now. To shake the crows
let in the back way, east window and mornings. To ask
of them my fearful questions. The black-rimmed eyes
in the trees. The sleeping mother in the bedroom
whose fetal legs leave the sheets and let us eye her
black-haired cunt. Let me know where you’re going
won’t you, in the future? The clock on the roof
nearby is right, I should sleep, though you sweep in, your
usual way, me through you, a wake of black iron
on the westbank soft with fish. Green moss. You forget?
The mother woke in her yellow body veil and discovered us.
The lookI’ve forgotten. The smell is hairbrush sweet. She is
sweet in the mornings and mirrored in the vanity lights
and tethered to the coiled turquoise phone cord
and the brushof contour pink or gray. Eye shadow.
The philodendron in the corner window sprawls,
misses its tree. Tree come.Make up. The mulberry out front
sheds seed and rots into the wood stoop. They sand
and paint each spring. But later. The mother stoops, sweeps
the step clean with her hand. Who are you? She is under
the trees and rooting. You go
south my home. I sleep. I will. But you go home.