i sold my soul for rock&roll

walking along the levy

kicking the stones

watching them roll to the american river

--how am i -- who do i belong -- what have i done

mi henry rollins pose

even in bed i pose...i know you know i know you know

--thom gunn

hemingway vs. hedberg

paris 

is a moveable feast

i used to want to go, i still do, but i used to too

quote unquote

i need to believe in the romantic myth of home -- a place to belong to or die in -- in order to stay alive/sane.  without roots...a writer will die slowly...being home keeps reaffirming that central fact of my existence that i am an outsider, permanently. 

--albert wendt [via nz/cook island poet rob hack]

to the moon & back

i am enchanted by the artemiss ii crew.  i watched its livestreams & am astonished by their cool, their composure, their gifts that living so tightly for 9 days in a very serious mission how they expressed such joy. 

yes, i've been an avid watcher of these livestreams.  saw the launch.  watched their touchdown.  seen them as they worked & lived in such a tiny space.  it was a delight for me here in CA to see the best of our human species working together for a greater understanding of our place in the universe/solar system.  but also, the very technologies we use to harm each other, i.e rockets used either to deliver bombs or lift us out of earth's gravity well.  

well then anyway, color me stoked.  but when i see the images taken by the crew i think perhaps the mission needs a poet.  because some of these images, such as the solar eclipse via the moon, is fucking next level shit.  how to put those images those scenes, that human conscious into words.  i am reminded of jodie foster's character in Contact [1997], ellie, who is whisked along an ancient alien highway of wormholes to arrive at the star system of Vega.  ellie said, of the awesome voyage, they should have sent a poet.

i recall too, james dickey wrote a poem about the first moon landing.  which was pretty cool.  but dickey never rode aboard any of the apollo missions.  but to have a poet on these missions to place into words, into context, into the universe, the wildness of space exploration.

perhaps they could train a poet to become an astronaut?  maybe.  but if they asked me i'd be the laziest motherfucking astronaut ever!  i'd want to drink beer & look out the window at the moon, the stars, the cosmos, & the earth & make notes for poems on my phone.  not sure if astronauts are cleared to drink booze during the mission.  okay, i know it is uncool to be a poet who likes drinking but sue me!  as benjamin franklin said, beer is proof that god love us. 

but even so, the artemis ii crew did well in their expressions of their mission. & it is a great pleasure to have seen this crew in real time fly to the moon & back.  the thing is, when we look toward the stars we always look to ourselves.  recall Earth Day was founded after the pic Earthrise 1969.  the first picture of our planet.  that pic jolted us.  we saw for the first time how fragile our home planet really is.  so we founded Earth Day in 1970.

maybe for a future mission they might send a poet into the cosmos.  perhaps.  but by then maybe space travel becomes as common as boarding a plane to your next town.  in the meantime, i will dig the astronauts, these exquisite human beings, the best of the best, who are forging paths to the stars.  

song with a bullet

for an ordinary day in april 

a hit of sunshine

on the king's lead hat

quote unquote

 

                                           --nicanor parra

you know you want to!