Dear readers, fellow bloggers and poets, friends, Romans, countrymen, Lend me your ears and eyes, if you would. Every year there is a dry spell, a fallow period for yours truly in which almost nothing gets written. The last time I posted, it was December, 2021. This year that fallow period was way longer thanContinue reading “Back At It To Celebrate National Poetry Month”
Author Archives: michaeljarmer
#405: A Poem Inspired by the Etymology of Jargon and Clementine on April 2, 2022
The word jargon originally meant:birdsong. As in: this morning the backyard oaks were full of jargon. And the clementine orange was named after a French monk.And I wonder: how did the word for orange becomeassociated with lovers, and I learn,after a little digging, that the famous song is abouta specific woman, named afterthe orange, perhaps,Continue reading “#405: A Poem Inspired by the Etymology of Jargon and Clementine on April 2, 2022”
#404: Two Erasure Poems on April 1, 2022
Grotesquely muffled,the dancers, facesflushed with food, packed into a throngof neighbors. My heart gave a jump–a storm door, wooden. She was there in another moment, into the night. No mercy. The horse’s headhanging under the umbrella,water running in the gutter. Pleasant journey! The coachman,the waiter:transparent,shelter at the stationin the shadows. Goodbye.Goodbye.The hospital? Take good care.Goodbye.IContinue reading “#404: Two Erasure Poems on April 1, 2022”
The Book I Read: Charles Dickens Says What? A Christmas Carol
Listen to the podcast version of this blog entry here! First, I have a supposition, a theory, a hypothesis: Essentially, we’d have to be living under a rock not to know the story of the famous Dickens novel, A Christmas Carol. Right? We’ve seen the Albert Finney, the George C. Scott. We’ve seen the muppetsContinue reading “The Book I Read: Charles Dickens Says What? A Christmas Carol”
The Book I Read: I Got the Music in Me–Talking Heads 77 and Annie Kim’s Award Winning Eros, Unbroken
Listen to the podcast version of this blog entry! I’m writing ’bout the book I read I have to sing about the book I read I’m embarassed to admit it hit the soft spot in my heart When I found out you wrote the book I read David Byrne, from “The Book I Read,” TalkingContinue reading “The Book I Read: I Got the Music in Me–Talking Heads 77 and Annie Kim’s Award Winning Eros, Unbroken”
The Book I Read: I Had An Idea–The Failed Magic Mountain Reaction Videos and a Redemptive Attempt at Podcasting Instead
Listen to the podcast version of this blog entry! In the summer of 2020, the pandemic beginning to rage, after a school year shut down 3 quarters of the way through, trying not to think about what the next school year might look like, I had a creative impulse. Inspired by a number of whatContinue reading “The Book I Read: I Had An Idea–The Failed Magic Mountain Reaction Videos and a Redemptive Attempt at Podcasting Instead”
The Book I Read: Works Unfinished, Finishing the Appalachian Book of the Dead, and a Prayer for October
Listen to the Podcast version of this blog entry here! True confession: I often abandon books before I finish them. Sometimes I go back, sometimes I never do. The reasons for the abandonment vary–but rarely, is it because I am disinterested. Only a couple of times have I ever stopped reading because I thought theContinue reading “The Book I Read: Works Unfinished, Finishing the Appalachian Book of the Dead, and a Prayer for October”
The Book I Read: Choices! More Books of the Dead! Climbing the Mountain! and the Freakout Commencement
For this entry in The Book I Read series (which is also a podcast, by the way), I am writing about, not what I’ve read, but what I’ve started to read, AND, what I’ve tried reading and then abandoned. I had these ideas that I might get well into one of those things, or wellContinue reading “The Book I Read: Choices! More Books of the Dead! Climbing the Mountain! and the Freakout Commencement”
The Book I Read: Wisdom Lit, the Power of Allusion, Lincoln in the Bardo, and the President’s Hat
As a student of literature, always a beginner, and one interested in a wide variety of wisdom literature or philosophical texts, certain books of historical and literary significance have crossed my radar, have maybe even made it into the home library, but have never been read, you know, famous philosophical or spiritual texts like theContinue reading “The Book I Read: Wisdom Lit, the Power of Allusion, Lincoln in the Bardo, and the President’s Hat”
The Book I Read: Podcasts (Apparently, They’re Not All That Easy To Do)
Recently, Sara Silverman did a stint as a guest host on Jimmy Kimmel Live. One of the last bits in one of her monologues was an uproariously funny satire on the proliferation of podcasts in the world. It was brilliant. I laughed out loud, but it also made me seriously self-conscious. The bit was framedContinue reading “The Book I Read: Podcasts (Apparently, They’re Not All That Easy To Do)”
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