ALL MY RELATIONS ~ (book 2)

COUSIN SMOKE:



Tree  

        become

ghost.








COUSIN CROW:



What a big

family

          you

sometimes are!







COUSIN LIGHTNING:



How

        you can

throw

your voice!







COUSIN SUNFLOWER:



As

     the earth

turns.







COUSIN HORNED-TOAD:



Remember  

                   how

many years

ago

       I

held you

in

    my

child-

hand

         just

like this?



———————————

JD Whitney
All My Relations
(book 2)
Many Voices Press 2018





Meet your cousins !
This is a back-pocket size book
ready for you to take anywhere.

LAST WORKS ~

———————————

Strong, personal, deep-seated essays on

Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Blanchot, Freud,

Derrida, Poe, Woolf, Hemingway,

David Foster Wallace, Melville,

Thoreau —

with now and then odd quibbles:

the author describes Melville's Pittsfield home "Arrowhead"

which "lay at the base of Mount Greylock."

Far from it, miles away. Greylock actually 

overwhelms the small old mill town of Adams

which lays at the base of Mount Greylock.

Quibbles. Stones in a spring stream rushing

down the Thunderbolt Trail.

An important book.

Yale 2018

DOUGLAS CRASE ~

The essays in this handsome collection are so toothsome, so vital, so nourishing I begin to feel while holding the book and reading, say about Niedecker, or immersing into Emerson or George Bradley's cosmos (so few have since heard of this poet) and then the author spotting Ursa Major "standing on her tail" over Times Square, as if I am holding a picnic basket, and the gingham cloth for over the spring grass, and I'm with the girl, or the boy, however you prefer, and we are tempting our meal to never end. There is the slope of the hill, the splendid view, and since when has a book of essays on poetry and poets felt this good to you? Or think of it as toolbox, and I can in my combined life of feasting and working hard, as you grab in the slot for hammer, cat's paw, nail-set, 12 point handsaw, just as exact and precise each tool for the job are these essays. You'd be a fool not to own this book for your poetry library. It could very well be the first book for your poetry library.

[ BA ]

PRESSED WAFER

375 Parkside Avenue

Brooklyn, NY 11226

www.pressedwafer.com

HEREDITARY ~

Small Difference

We bought

a jackknife

for our son

his first

I thought the

blade was sharp

you liked the

pretty handle

Autobiography

I stopped thinking

About my name today

When in the truck

Returning home with

My son after working

Together at a farm

Splitting wood

Picking kindling

Around the chopping

Stump, slinging manure

Onto the winter garden

And later hiking

High into the heather

Pasture, now in the

Truck with his gloves

Still on he sized it

Up by saying he didn’t 

Like the name Bob — it

Was too short, only three

Letters — and it sounded

Like a name half-city

Half-country

Suddenly Mississippi

he lost his

lucky rabbit’s

foot, green with

a key-chain in

Greenwood, MS

so returning to

find it wait-

ress brought

it to us on

a tray

Hereditary

I kid him

& he argues

with me which 

turns me to

argue with

him as he

begins to

kid me

————————————

BOB ARNOLD

I'm In Love With You

Who Is In Love With Me

Longhouse 2012

FRISELL ~

III ~

R E A D     M E

I have followed this musician's career from the start and on the bright-side: this is the father of Rufus and Martha and equally sweet singer Lucy; also Loudon Wainwright and Leonard Cohen were related (Rufus had a daughter, Viva, with Lorca Cohen) and LW can still play, from time to time, a fine, nimble talkin' folk-blues of his own mode. 
Otherwise, the book's storyteller is a wiggler on the edge of irksome.

DENIS JOHNSON ~

Denis Johnson (1983)

Everything Denis Johnson wrote and published was well written. Everything.

None of it was as strong and original and potent as his short and vivid Jesus' Son, but it was still very good, and you weren't going to do wrong, or waste your time. That includes his new book of stories

(and last book) The Largesse of the Sea Maiden. Again, don't go expecting Jesus' Son, it isn't there, try as he might. Every writer wants to top his best book. Denis Johnson is now dead. He left us a small library to read — nine novels, one novella, two books of short stories, five collections of poetry, two collections of plays, and one book of reportage, Seek: Reports from the edges of America & Beyond that should be really hunted down and read. I happen to like, and I read each of his books as they appeared over time, his poetry, Jesus' Son (naturally), his little crime caper Nobody Move and Train Dreams. The other books were fine books but the ones I mention were Denis Johnson as played by John Garfield.

I always think of John Garfield when I read Denis Johnson.

[ BA ]

Random House 2018

BLIND WILLIE MCTELL ~

ONE LESS BELL TO ANSWER ~

sorry, another dud — not every apple on the tree. . .

WHY BOB DYLAN MATTERS ~

Bland title, one great photograph (the cover), handy size volume,

and all written by a senior professor of Latin at Harvard University

where ages ago Dylan curled up in the grass with guitars and Eric Von Schmidt.

The reading won't hurt you.

In fact, it will help you grow!

M O R E

Dey St. / Morrow

2017

PABLO NERUDA (SONG) ~

TRAVEL PICTURES ~

“There was still a unity in the world and there were complete poets."

And Heine was one of them in more ways than one.

(1797-1856)

R E A D      M O R E

Archipelago Books

TINY ISLAND ~

TIM HARDIN ~

SKIP JAMES ~

BIG MAMA THORNTON ~

SPREAD YOUR LOVE ~

THE ANDALUCIAN DOGS ~

BOOGIE WOOGIE COUNTRY GIRL ~

IF I WERE A CARPENTER ~

PATSY CLINE ~

ELLEN BASS ~

Prayer


Once I wore a dress liquid as vodka.

My lover watched me ascend

from the subway

like I was an underground spring

breaking through.

I want to stop wanting to be wanted like that.

I'm tired of the song the rain sings in June,

the earth, her ornate crown of trees

spiking up from her loamy head.

There are things I wanted, like everyone.

But to this angel of wishes I've worshiped

so long, I ask now to admit

the world as it is.


————————
ELLEN BASS
Like a Beggar
Copper Canyon Press, 2014





Oddly, Copper Canyon Press claims Like A Beggar is the poet's third book of poetry,
neglecting to note her first book of poetry — one that I fell for at the time — 
I'm Not Your Laughing Daughter (Univ. Mass. Press, 1973). Find that neglected book.

END OF STORY ~

5 Year Old Logic On A Winter Night

Under quilts he

says he is too hot

folding down the bed to

a sheet & one blanket

he looks up & says

he is too cold

End Of Story

Looking out at the hillside

Across the river and over the

Trees from our home Carson asks —

Did we climb that mountain?

I say, No, but mommy and I did.

Nodding, he decides, Oh yeah,

We climbed that before I was born.

Childhood

jumping

to look

into a

mirror

Off To School

except for

his base-

ball cap I

could kiss

him easily

————————————

BOB ARNOLD

I'm In Love With You

Who Is In Love With Me

Longhouse 2012

MABLE JOHN ~

JESUS IS MY AIR-O-PLANE

GERALD STERN ~

R E A D     M E

Trinity University Press

2012

JONI MITCHELL ~

ANITA CARTER ~

I STOLE THE RIGHT TO LIVE ~

A COTTAGE ON THE MOSS ~

R E A D      M E

I'm sure I have showcased this book in the past ~

I was running an eye across the den library

here where I work and spotted this lovely book again

and pulled it out to read again 

Join me

I've supplied what Google will give to us

You'd love a copy of the book

Library Empyreal

PO Box 36503

Canton, Ohio

44735