I AM A MAN ~

Ernest C. Withers

Ernest C. Withers (1922-2007), photographer, worked sixty years documenting the civil rights movement in America, the Memphis blues scene, the Negro Baseball League, black folklore, and he traveled with Martin Luther King, Jr., during most of his public life, garnering photographs that are today the hallmark of that period. No one else had quite the touch nor knew how to instinctively position portraits — the sweat, the earth, the sound — between the very public street and the killing floor. His baseball photographs show faces rarely seen as he found them. When you hold his now scarce book of photographs gathering all these worlds, you're holding something. I found my copy in a dim-lit basement shop. In the dross there, it glowed.

Amongst the highlights and courage of the man now come allegations he worked as a paid informant for the FBI from 1968-1970. Who knows what that entailed? His family, and he had eight children, aren't buying the charges; others are affixing negative labels. This was a very complicated and hopeful, yet murderous time in American history (lots of snitches), and this is quite a versatile artist. He had a large family to support, plus he was known to give his photographs away to ministers who couldn't afford to pay. Look at the character of the man, but not at the expense of the brilliant work. These are photographs that lead the way.

ernest c. withers

mule train leaving Mississippi for Washington D.C. Poor People's March 1968

ernest c. withers

sanitation workers solidarity march Memphis 1968

ernest c. withers

ernest c. withers

Ernie Banks, Larry Doby, Matty Brescia, Jackie Robinson, youngster, Memphis 1953

ernest c. withers

Satchel Paige




Memphis Red Sox

ernest c. withers

ernest c. withers

Martin Luther King, Jr. Washington D.C.

ernest c. withers

Pops Staples


When we listen to the gospel and rhythm & blues of Roebuck "Pops" Staples (1914-2000), we're hearing the soul of a man born on a Mississippi cotton plantation, was one of 14 kids, and who dropped out of school after the eighth grade. He'd go on to know and play with Charlie Patton, Robert Johnson, Son House — a killer line-up. Then there was his personal friendship with Martin Luther King, Jr. By 1948 he formed The Staple Singers with his young children (Mavis, Yvonne, Pervis, Cleotha) singing in local churches; this spread all over the country, all over the world. Forever legendary on Stax Records. Pops Staples' peaceable yet resonant and shimmering recordings may be picked up as an influence for many current acts, including the stage sound of Bob Dylan. His youngest, Mavis, carries on the music and the grace.

ernest c. withers

Ike & Tina Turner
paradise, ca. 1962

Howlin' Wolf
wdia goodwill revue
city auditorium, ca. 1960

ernest c. withers

ever cool B.B. King

ernest c. withers

Elvis Presley & B.B. King
december 7, 1956

ernest c. withers

ernest c. withers

Lionel Hampton, Memphis 1955

ernest c. withers

Ernest C. Withers

a gorgeous moment: young woman w/ her voter registration card, Fayette County, Tennessee, 1960

ernest c. withers

ernest c. withers

PASSING ~

The loveliest holiday lit village we saw in 2010








photo © bob arnold

WITHNAIL ~

My thumbs have gone weird!









Withnail & I
directed & written by Bruce Robinson
Handmade Films 1986

WITH ME ~

steve lacy

SON ~

For the holiday season Carson brought us out the new album by Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan. Campbell (b. 1976, Glasgow) is best known with the band Belle & Sebastian, which she departed from in 2002. Lanegan (b. 1964, USA) is a versatile swingman with many bands: starting with Screaming Trees and Queens of the Stone Age. His collaborative abilities with others seems limitless. We're showing a song, or maybe I'll find two, from Campbell & Lanegan's third album Hawk. Carson knew we would like it.

street photo © bob arnold

ATOMIC ~

Count Basie with his orchestra

His mother taught him how to play piano while taking in wash for a living in Red Bank, New Jersey — and Fats Waller would help out with some music pointers years later — born in 1904 and gone by 1984, Basie ran his orchestras like a well-timed train for nearly 50 years. A man born in racism, as were many in his bands, never mind two world wars, depressions, economic crashes to eat your eyes out, Red Scare, McCarthy witch hunts, the jitterbug, fox-trot, congas, the fading of swing and the up-step of be-bop, and all Basie ever wanted was for his audience "to get the beat." Turn it up. The walls of the houses and trees or neighborhoods should shake.

YESTERDAY ~

image © bob arnold

THE SMILE ~

Thank you Monica ~
Poet Janine Pommy Vega reads at the College of Poetry, Warwick, New York. November 13, 2010. Video by Monica Claire Antonie.

EARTH ~

"Janine Vega has the capacity to channel the intuition of children down to death, Hell and the devil. If my child attends her classes, we'll sue.
-- Excerpt from a parent's letter to a local school."
from Janine Pommy Vega, Mad Dogs of Trieste

A TREE FULL OF BIRDS

--------------------for Janine Pommy Vega



That's what I heard one morning

In a no-nothing town between

Phoenix and Tucson, where it

Appeared desolate and desperate

With a mall and a motel and a big

Highway running through it all

And even the motel desk didn't

Know the name of the route number

Of the highway when I asked the

Next morning with a desire to go

To the mountains north — as if no

One went to the mountains from here —

But I did, and before I left, hours

Before I asked any questions, birds

By the hundreds came to the trees and

Bushes of this motel square, dipping

Even into the swimming pool, and whether

It was sunrise that lit each bird yellow

Or if in fact they were yellow and each

Singing magnificently in the coolness of

Daybreak when I was awakened gladly

And stepped out my door and onto a long

Balcony to see and hear and feel the most

Beautiful day in the world begin


Bob Arnold
from Once In Vermont
Gnomon





SOME GREATEST HITS WITH JANINE


She wrote to me from Lake Titicaca, the heart of the Inca Civilization,
my first 'fan letter' (we laugh), for my first book of poems, both of
us young authors with the same publisher (Cherry Valley Editions).


When we finally met, after a few years first of correspondence, I introduced
Susan and myself after Janine's reading at Jack Powers' Stone Soup in
Boston. Janine gasped, lit up, told the first person right next to her


"These guys raise ducks & geese!" Yes we did. Two hours away and far from home.
Janine nodding and smiling and sizing us both up for years to come.
She would love Susan with the same lovely quiet that is Susan.


That night, none of us slept. We hiked over the Longfellow Bridge
twice, slow with talk and the dark Charles River below. A phantom fellow
joined us, unknown to us, probably until that night unknown


to Janine. As a boy I learned quickly things aren't always as they appear.
Susan and Janine agreed: driving the Mass Pike west to east is the pits.
Better east to west. Something about Berkshire, Catskill, Niagara...


A few years later Janine visited us in our cabin, slept in my library of bark,
books and twigs; rose hours and hours after we did. Made sure to do yoga,
meditation, had special drinks and brought her own blender. A pot of rice.


Soon after we all drove through New Hampshire, higher into the White
Mountains. When we stopped to show her the Old Man in the Mountain
the Jersey girl got out and gazed publicly, "Aw, man, look at that." This was


after years of living on the streets with the pros, then as a hermit in Bolivia ~
Peru, writing two or three singular books of poems, losing a husband to an
early death who she never stopped loving, and paying attention always to the


down-trodden, phantoms. She climbed the peaks of the Catskills / Himalayas.
Worked the toughest prisons in North and South America. Adored the children
of the world. She worked with me twice at the same girls school and was so good


some of the teachers were afraid to have her back. The students begged to have her back.
Who wins that fight in the real world? We had a dog named Bo who Janine called
"Mister Bo". Cats took precedence. She, Susan and I once hiked her woods all


day for a bear she insisted we would find. It didn't matter. Hunting with Janine
is a poetry class with your eyes wide open. 35 years later we are talking on the phone
and maybe she knows she is dying but she will never tell me this. This is the second


time an elder poet friend has called me a week before they die. I'm starting to pick up
the signals of how ordinary and simply beautiful the conversation is. In this conversation
I reminded Janine how the battery on my phone would soon die. We always had a good


laugh over that one — machines ran out of gas; we didn't. I also tried to caution the one
I love, as she railed on with a myriad of health problems, that she must remember that
not everyone was as tough as she was. Without losing a beat she dazzled,"You-think?"


with the best giggle of any 68 year old girl I've ever known. Today I was in her library for
12 straight hours sifting and saving, sifting and saving, I couldn't stop, neither could Susan.
You would burst into tears if I told you and showed you how many piles and stacks and boxes


of children and prisoner and migrant worker and hopeful student poets work she has saved
for decades. Without any ability to throw them out. In the same care and position as her own
bundles, files, books on her library shelves. I won't tell you. I don't want you to cry.

On Raglan Road of an Autumn day
I saw her first and knew,
That her dark hair would weave a snare
That I might someday rue.
I saw the danger and I passed
Along the enchanted way.
And I said,"Let grief be a fallen leaf
At the dawning of the day."

On Grafton Street in November, we
Tripped lightly along the ledge
Of a deep ravine where can be seen
The worth of passion play.
The Queen of Hearts still making tarts
And I not making hay;
Oh, I loved too much and by such and such
Is happiness thrown away.

I gave her gifts of the mind,
I gave her the secret signs,
That's known to the artists who have known
The true gods of sound and stone.
And her words and tint without stint
I gave her poems to say
With her own name there and her own dark hair
Like clouds over fields of May.

On a quiet street where old ghosts meet
I see her walking now,
And away from me so hurriedly
My reason must allow.
That I had loved, not as I should
A creature made of clay,
When the angel woos the clay, he'll lose
His wings at the dawn of day.

Patrick Kavanagh

First published in 1946 as Dark Haired Myriam Ran Away

One of Janine's favorite — poem & song

photo © bob arnold

EARTH ~

"VIEWED UP CLOSE
NOBODY IS NORMAL"

Caetano Veloso

photo: Jack Vartoogian/FrontRowPhotos

BLESSINGS ~

All good wishes to family, friends, neighbors

customers & readers of our press ~ bookshop

fellow workers, animals, birds, strangers, unknown

weather, rivers, woodland, starry ceilings

we walk the earth together

Susan & Bob ~ LONGHOUSE








photo © bob arnold

Our Lovely Friend ~

Janine Pommy Vega

5 February 1942 ~ 23 December 2010






photo © bob arnold

VILLAIN ~

Lyle Bettger


Born in Philadelphia in 1915 and passing away 88 years later, Lyle Bettger is barely recalled in today's Hollywood, but to film noir and western fans he's never been forgotten.

His father played infield for the St. Louis Cardinals, while Bettger became one of the villains of American cinema.

Watch him stand up against Barbara Stanwyck in his first film No Man of Her Own (1950), an adaptation of Cornell Woolrich's I Married A Dead Man. He'll go up against William Holden in Union Station as the killer "Joe Beacom".

And, what stops me in my tracks each time I've seen these films, is how much Lyle Bettger, with my eyes open or closed, sounds like the writer Charles Bukowski.

The same soft voice with tumbling sharp blades.

EARTH ~

Wislawa Szymborska


Born 87 years ago (July 2, 1923) in Poland

and publishing, with care, about 250 poems

so far

everyone knows poet, essayist, translator

Wislawa Szymborska

Nobel Prize for Literature, 1996.

MICROCOSMOS


When they first started looking through microscopes
a cold fear blew and it is still blowing.
Life hitherto had been frantic enough
in all its shapes and dimensions.
Which is why it created small-scale creatures,
assorted tiny worms and flies,
but at least the naked human eye
could see them.


But then suddenly beneath the glass,
foreign to a fault
and so petite,
that what they occupy in space
can only charitably be called a spot.


The glass doesn't even touch them,
they double and triple unobstructed,
with room to spare, willy-nilly.


To say they're many isn't saying much.
The stronger the microscope
the more exactly, avidly they're multiplied.


They don't even have decent innards.
They don't know gender, childhood, age.
They may not even know they are — or aren't.
Still they decide our life and death.


Some freeze in momentary stasis,
although we don't know what their moment is.
Since they're so minuscule themselves,
their duration may be pulverized accordingly.


A windborne speck of dust is a meteor
from deepest space,
a fingerprint is a far-flung labyrinth,
where they may gather
for their mute parades,
their blind iliads and upanishads.


I've wanted to write about them for a long-while,
but it's a tricky subject,
always put off for later
and perhaps worthy of a better poet,
even more stunned by the world than I.
But time is short. I write.


ASSASSINS

They think for days on end,

how to kill so as to kill,

and how many killed will be many.

Apart from this they eat their meals with gusto,

pray, wash their feet, feed the birds,

make phone calls while scratching their armpits,

stanch blood when they cut a finger,

if they're women they buy sanitary napkins,

eye-shadow, flowers for vases,

they make jokes on their good days,

drink citrus juice from the fridge,

watch the moon and stars at night,

place headphones with soft music on their ears

and sleep sweetly till the crack of dawn

— unless what they're thinking needs doing at night.

VERMEER


So long as that woman from the Rijksmuseum
in painted quiet and concentration
keeps pouring milk day after day
from the pitcher to the bowl
the World hasn't earned
the world's end.





translated from the Polish by
Clare Cavanagh & Stanislaw Baranczak
Here (Houghton Mifflin)

EARTH ~

Patricia Walsh, survivalist, in her nest

read more:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/17/nyregion/17neediest.html

photo: michael kirby smith/new york times

Longhouse Special Special extra Special ~

Act fast ~ there's still time to sneak in a Christmas or New Year's gift for someone special

Our ever thanks to all who have!

In less than two weeks Longhouse will be 40 years old !
A day hasn't gone by where we haven't worked at it.


To help celebrate the 40th anniversary
(and to get to the 50th)
we are offering a treasure chest to draw from

=

Send $50 and we will send to you 8 publications
of our choosing from the Longhouse treasure chest...


One-of-a-kind
Booklets, cards, broadsides for framing, books !


And on top of that we'll pay for shipping, too!

International orders the only exception so please inquire.


With this, you can gift yourself, or better:
have the bundle shipped to someone else.


Just tell us where to send the gift and we will.


Don't even ask what publications will be sent, that's half the fun.
We're capable of fitting in some real surprises and sizes.


You may pay by credit card, personal check, money order,
or use the easy Paypal account below.


Got a great friend you want to make even greater —
here's your chance.


Mom, Dad, brother, sister, kids, neighbor : "hate poetry"
— try this gift on them.


While supplies last!

Send info, pay us, we'll take care of the rest.

photo © bob arnold

ONCE IN VERMONT ~
SOME VERY GOOD BOOKS 2010

camera: bob arnold

FAREWELL ~

Don Van Vliet (1941-2010)

Don Van Vliet, Check Bif, 1986



The artist Don Van Vliet has passed away today in a hospital in northern California.


As well known to the music world as Captain Beefheart, who with his Magic Band, merrily terrorized the world from 1965-1982. There were twelve studio albums released, the last being Ice Cream for Crow.


Trout Mask Replica (1969) should be listened to to be believed. All the albums are required listening for entrance to either heaven or hell.


If you saw the group, you probably haven't forgotten, no matter the drugs or time delay.


Susan still smiles and shakes her head "no thanks" when asked what it was like seeing the master and his band in concert in its heyday (early). She has a little bit of say here being second cousin to Don Van Vliet's wife Janet. Janet "Jan" Van Vliet was older sister to Jim Jenkins, skilled mountaineer, who wrote two detailed guide books mapping out much of the southern Sierra, including the Pacific Crest Trail. Jim died young, in 1979, on a California highway stopping to assist a motorist in need. His mother Ruby would continue the good work revising the guide books until her own passing in 2007.





This deep deep California history.


One day the town of Lancaster, California will be remembered as the town that survived having both Frank Zappa and Don Van Vliet in the same high school (Antelope Valley High School), already teaming up with their combined hothead interest in rhythm & blues.





The Captain would retire from music in 1982 and devote the rest of his life, far from the maddening crowd, to his expressionist paintings. Here and there he was known to show up as a contributor to a few recordings. Years enduring multiple sclerosis would eventually take him.

don van vliet photo: beefheart.com
beefheart & zappa: last.fm

WITH ME ~

photo: atomicpinup.com