From A Word a Day (one of my favorite sites):

This week's theme: words with double connections.

didymous (DID-uh-muhs) adjective

Occurring in pairs; twin.

[From Greek didymos (twin). Ultimately from the Indo-European root dwo- (two)
that also gave us dual, double, dubious, doubt, diploma, twin, and between.]

-Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)

"Shakespeare portrays the didymous functionaries as if they were
a unit comprised of two parts."
Peter Usher; Hamlet's Universe; Aventine Press; 2006

WWOTB on NPR

Our local NPR affiliate, KUOW, will feature excerpts of my reading from WHAT’S WRITTEN ON THE BODY (Open Books, March 11) on "The Beat" at 2pm on July 30. It will be archived on the site after the live broadcast. You can go here or here to listen. They actually did some fascinating analysis of the poems. I am in awe.

Enjoy!

*

At 2:05 p.m. - Peter Pereira
Primary care physician and self-described Scrabble junkie Peter Pereira reads from his new collection of poetry, What's Written on the Body (Copper Canyon Press, 2007). Today he reads poems that explore how the way we perceive a thing shapes how we experience it. Peter Pereira is a family physician at High Point Community Clinic in West Seattle. His previous books are The Lost Twin and Saying the World. Recorded March 11th, 2007 at Open Books: A Poem Emporium.

Water for our Troops!

from poet Anne Caston:

"Dear friends, colleagues, and acquaintances,
I am writing to tell you that I have just learned from my son (a medic in Iraq, in Baghdad) that there is a shortage of potable water there now: the troops are having to ration water...and there are more troops arriving every day. He works nights and has to sleep days - in a tent that often reaches into the low 100s during the day. While there is probably nothing the current administration can do about the desert heat, I suspect that it does have some ability to get drinking water to the troops. So please, if you are so moved - by your heart or by your conscience - send a letter to the President and ask that he acts immediately to insure that our soldiers have sufficient drinking water.
I am currently begging the local Postmaster to allow us to send bottled water to our son's unit, though the USPS has a policy which prohibits the mailing of liquids. Perhaps if I can convince them that I will ship it in styrofoam coolers, well-taped to avoid leakage, they will allow it. So, if you don't feel comfortable sending a letter to President Bush, perhaps a letter to the Postmaster General would be more amenable for you?
Thank you for your time and attention. Let us pray that "staying the course" doesn't mean our sons and daughters overseas go without drinking water for much longer.

Sincerely,
Anne Caston"

*

Happy Birthday you-know-who.

*

Dean and I spent about 5 hours pressure-washing the front and back decks yesterday. What back-breaking work! If they dry out enough today we'll reseal them this afternoon. It's a lot of work, but so worth it.

*

What I posted on a red state blogger's blog the other day, re a disparaging post about the new Tommy Lee Jones movie "In the Valley of Elah":

You don't have a clue, do you?

This war was wrong. It has ruined the lives of countless Americans and Iraqis and more. And to what end? So Cheney and his crew can get oil revenue. It has done nothing to protect us from terrorism, and has only served to make us more enemies in the world. When will you and your ilk wake up?

I can hardly wait to see this movie. I *heart* Tommy Lee Jones and Susan Sarandon. They both have integrity for being a part of this important film.

the comment was subsequently deleted . . . (by me, of course; I'm a chicken flamer)

To Simplify and Enlarge

Annie Dillard was on NPR this morning, talking about her new novel The Maytrees. Apparently it went from 1200 pages down to 200 in the process of revision. She said her primary goal in revision is to "simplify and enlarge." I *love* that idea. How it is important not just to make the story (sentence, poem, paragraph . . .) shorter, but to simultaneously make it bigger, in its impact, its resonance, its universality.


*

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (July 26) - Dogs can sometimes predict an epileptic owner's seizure or sniff at an owner's mole, signaling a possible cancer.

When Oscar, a hospice cat, curls up on a patient's bed and stays there, the staff knows it's time to call the family. It usually means the patient has less than four hours to live.

Poetry and CEO's

Via Jilly at Poetry Hut Blog:

Poetry speaks to many C.E.O.’s. “I used to tell my senior staff to get me poets as managers,” says Sidney Harman, founder of Harman Industries, a $3 billion producer of sound systems for luxury cars, theaters and airports. Mr. Harman maintains a library in each of his three homes, in Washington, Los Angeles and Aspen, Colo. “Poets are our original systems thinkers,” he said. “They look at our most complex environments and they reduce the complexity to something they begin to understand.”

WA Sate Domestic Partner Registration Now in Effect

Isn't this a sweet picture? Dean and I already have a Domestic Partner Agreement, Durable Power of Attorney, Living Wills, and etc, but we're going to register using the online forms and mail it in anyway. Hopefully there are at least a few more protections. It so funny that this is happening at the same time as the movie "I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry."

OLYMPIA, WA -- Same-sex couples came here Monday with mixed feelings, lining up to register as domestic partners with the Secretary of State's Office.
They said the new set of legal rights that went into effect Monday morning -- including hospital visitation, property inheritance and funeral planning -- were steps in the right direction but still a far cry from full marriage equality.

Decked out in a veil, the top half of a wedding gown and black leather pants, Amanda Swarr, 34, walked with her partner T Steele, 41, carrying a small sign that read: "When we get the rest of our rights, we'll wear the rest of the dress."

It has been raining and muggy for three days straight. Very unseasonable weather here. They say it is from a typhoon in Japan that moved our way. I say it sucks.

*

Had an old med school friend over for dinner last night. She and I were the only two gay people in our first year class (or so we thought!). She is now at the CDC and partnered and has two boys. It was so fun to hear about where her life has taken her. Though we hadn't seen each other in almost seven years, it was as if no time had passed.

She does pottery and ceramics, and is thinking about trying stained glass. Check out this very cool site, for the process she wants to use. Here's an example:

This is too freaky -- 1500 inmates in a Philippine prison, one of them dressed in drag, performing in unison the dance for MJ's "Thriller."

Been to Oregon Lately?

I have five poems up at Oregon Literary Review.
They are all from What's Written on the Body. It's an interesting selection of poems, and I didn't know they would be appearing at OLR, so it was a pleasant surprise to see them there today. It looks like a lovely journal, all on-line content, including artwork, interviews, essays and reviews. Check it out, if you are so inclined.

F.O.S.

WASHINGTON (July 20) - President Bush will have a routine colonoscopy Saturday and temporarily hand presidential powers to Vice President Dick Cheney, the White House said.

Press secretary Tony Snow told reporters Friday that Bush will have the procedure at his Camp David, Md., mountaintop retreat.

He last had such a colorectal cancer check on June 29, 2002.

Funny.

I bet they'll find he is still full of shit.

*

Po-Jacking

Had a fun time at the Soulfood Books reading. A group of us went out beforehand for dinner at Spazzo in Redmond Towne Centre (great restaurant, but it is so bizarre how it is located in a mall -- "Towne Centre" is really just a giant mall). Great food and coversation. Dean and I shared a flight of Pinto Grigios.

Soulfood (also located in a mall, there is a theme here) has a nice large stage, well-lit, with a good microphone. Michael and Lana were gracious hosts. And there was a decent turnout (though thank god the people playing noisy dominoes at the front of the stage left before the reading started ~grin~). There was a lot of open mic at the end, including drumming and chanting and teen angst and performance pieces (one woman reading her poem/song from some sort of hand-held PDA or blackberry or something).

I had fun reading some newer work, as well as some pieces from WWOTB that I had not read in public before.

Nancy Pagh's reading from No Sweeter Fat was terrific. I just love that book, and if you have not heard of it you should really check it out. The poems in the voice of the "Fat Lady" are just so poignant and moving and funny and real.

Nancy also read a poem she had written recently in response to a poem of mine in WWOTB, "Ravenna at Dusk." She did her own riff off on it, using some of my lines/phrases, but making it all her own. (I believe this is called po-jacking?"). I was very honored. Don't they say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery?

Anyway, here are the two poems, hers first, and then mine:

Whatcom Falls Park Today

Today when I looked in the road
I saw the gray squirrel’s viscera
trail from its body and thought
is that why we call them entrails.
I like walking alone in the park.
One can be happy in cotton shorts
even though synthetic dries faster.
Dogs do not understand personal boundaries.
There are such things as red dragonflies;
I saw five rest on this iron bridge last summer.
What can you do about a creosote stain?
Rabbit! no rabbit: white grocery sack
handles tied up as ears. What’s with
the used doggie poop bags, twisted
and set on the trail like wrong dim sum?
I have always found that garter snakes
remind me of zippers, but not known why.
I would have cared more
if it had been a native red squirrel.
I know what that says about me.
That’s a thrush. It sounds
how I felt to fingerpaint when I was six.
Now I am glad I chose the caffeinated tea.
Waterfall~waterfall~waterfall~stream.
Haruspicy is the word I almost thought.
I will cook the rice in chicken stock.
I am thinking: will I cut the yellow squash
in rounds or cubes and
not of you, sorry man. Not you.

*

Ravenna at Dusk

Today when I looked in the mirror
I saw my father looking back.
I like walking alone at night.
One can be happy not only without love,
but despite it. It’s best to fertilize roses
in March, plant gladioli bulbs in October.
I love the sound of thunder before rain.
Country Western dancing can be fun.
Oak floors with a Swedish finish last longest.
Espresso after six will keep you awake
past two. Antique floor lamps are cheap
at Capitol Hill garage sales in summer.
What can you do to give your life meaning?
It’s useless to repair socks once the heels are out.
My married friends make babies because they can.
Bath towels stack best when folded in thirds.
I have always found the lives of mystics
and clerics more appealing. I still read
the funnies and sleep in late on Saturdays.
Life is not so much invented as composed.
In high school I loved my English teacher
and wrote my first poems for him.

*

Kinda fun, huh?
I need to try this now.

*

Come to Soulfood

I am reading at the Soulfood Books poetry series in Redmond tonight, with Nancy Pagh of No Sweeter Fat fame.
If you are nearby, come on down! (Especially all you Microsofties, you know you need a break). The reading starts at 7pm. Directions here.

*

From Webster's Daily:

Abyss, n.

That which is immeasurable. That in which any thing is lost.

After three days and nine chapters of writing ficiton, this is where I feel I have been.

Littlefoot

I wrote three more chapters yesterday (all very very rough), and have planned 14 total. Almost 15,000 words so far. Eeeesh. It flies by when you are in a zone, and it is excruciatingly slow when you are not. I hope to get three more done today. We'll see.

I've been reading Littlefoot, Charles Wright's new one. The cover is all white, with just the title and author's name, and the words "a poem." Sort of like the Beatle's White Album, I thought to myself yesterday. And this is Wright's White Album, in a sense. (BTW, Littlefoot is the name of a horse, as far as I can tell).

The book is one long poem in 35 sections. And it is all the same. All exactly the same one endless poem that Wright has been writing over and over for the past 25 years (or more). The one poem of keen nature imagery and lonely observation interspersed with a Southern whiskey drawl and Zen koan-like insights about life, death, memory, the work of the poet. It would get old if Wright weren't so damn good at it.

Here's one section that grabbed me while I was having dinner at Fins last night:

We've all lead raucous lives,
some of them inside, some of them out.
But only the poem you leave behind is what's important.
Everyone knows this.
The voyage into the interior is all that matters,
Whatever your ride.
Sometimes I can't sit still for all the asininities I read.
Give me a hummingbird, who has to eat sixty times
His own weight a day just to stay alive.
Now that's life on the edge.

pg 65

*

Happy reading . . . .