The first time I heard this record, it was January in 2024 as I was goingthrough a stack of records bequeathed to me by my brother-in-law, Kevin. This is what I wrote: Embarrassed a little bit to admit it, but even though I have seen this album cover a thousand times, and wondered in stupefactionContinue reading “#737: I is for It’s A Beautiful Day”
Tag Archives: National Poetry Month
#735: The Teacher, April 3, 2026
The Teacher, April 3, 2026 Tries to stop his studentsfrom thinking. Tries to inspireall manner of bad habits. Encourages errors of every stripe and color. Stop endingyour sentences with a period, he says. Use the passive voicewhenever possible and spellingthese days is overrated. Verb tenseagreement is passé and who everheard of a question mark.There’s no reason for learning toContinue reading “#735: The Teacher, April 3, 2026”
#733: A Memory Poem on April 2, 2026
Once, as a grade schooler, my father and my uncle took me out on a boat into the oceanfor deep sea fishing. Worriedthat I might get sick, my fathergave me a Dramamine. I remember crawling into theboat’s cabin and sleepingthrough the entire fishing trip. When I woke, long after the boat had come back to dock, I remember feeling peevedthat IContinue reading “#733: A Memory Poem on April 2, 2026”
#731: A Tanka on April 1st, 2026
Happy April 1, the first day of National Poetry Month, and for those who participate, National Poetry WRITING Month, or NaPoWriMo for short. I find myself in a little bit of a pickle. If you’ve been reading my almost daily work here on the blog, you will know that I am writing poem-like-things about eachContinue reading “#731: A Tanka on April 1st, 2026”
#577: DMV Meditation
The line is three blocks long, people waiting to get into the DMV. I’m in this line half an hour before opening, and even when the doors open and the line begins to move, the wait is interminable. The old woman in front of me, who can barely stand, is cheerful, wants to chat. I amContinue reading “#577: DMV Meditation”
#576: Ode to Andy
Somewhat of a recluse,stopped touring in the 80son the brink of your heyday,debilitating anxiety tookyou forever off the stagebut not from the studio,thanks be. Skylarking, a masterpiece, found youworking and fighting with Todd Rundgren to make the greatest record of the decade, for me, perhaps, the greatest of all time. I don’t knowa whole lotContinue reading “#576: Ode to Andy”
#575: There Is A Ritual To It
The dance floor is open, she says, and people begin dancing. Sometimes, she doesn’t have to say anything. From the first downbeat people leave their seatsand flock. They don’t even haveto be sure that the music is good. It starts, they begin, as if they could not help it. They are exercising, they areentertaining themselves,Continue reading “#575: There Is A Ritual To It”
#574: Saucers and Blimps and False Starts
Once something goes upside down it can never again be seen as the thing it once was. Or.Just model the opening statement after Auden:About some abstract noun they were never wrong,These young masters. How well they understood . . .Or.Poets sometimes, after 26 straight days of writing a poem every day,are visited by a bigContinue reading “#574: Saucers and Blimps and False Starts”
#573: A Double Loose Love Sonnet for Daily Records
I When I was a teen, 45 years ago now, I’d walk weekly to a neighborhoodrecord store. There were, in fact, three to choose from on the samesuburban strip, otherwise, a culturalwasteland. By the time I was an adult,all three of them were shuttered. My favorite, Everybody’s Records, turned into a pornshop. ALL ADULT VIDEOContinue reading “#573: A Double Loose Love Sonnet for Daily Records”
#572: On Seeing Your Son Perform at the University of Dayton Arena with Pulse Percussion
You try not to cry. Absolutely mind-blownby the ability, the skill,the prowess, the intensity of hisparts, his movement, his seamless integrationwith this group, a groupthat plays and movesas if it were one body. The tug comes from different directions. On the one hand, you miss him. He has been away from home for nearly sixContinue reading “#572: On Seeing Your Son Perform at the University of Dayton Arena with Pulse Percussion”
michael jarmer 