Clockcleaner

I have no idea how I slept on Clockcleaner for so long. I should have listened to my mom when she told me about I would like them. Watch this video of "Missing Dick"



I've a new poem up at The Pedestal. Work also coming soon in No Tell Motel & Puerto del Sol. Got my contributor copy of Caketrain the other day. Pretty fancy, but kinda lackluster after that Clockcleaner song.

Extremely well put together magazine: Harp&Alter. Read this

Black Lawrence Press has decided to put out Julia Cohen's first book Triggermoon Triggermoon. What a good decision. Congratulations Julia. I will be waiting for it.

A solid poem by Carl at the new Lamination Colony. Write Carl to tell him he should write more poems. Write Blake Butler to tell him thanks for the new issue of Lamination Colony.

Sub-Lit and The Pedestal have accepted a sum of four poems.
Thanks MO & AA.

Someone should review SIR! for New Pages.


I want this for Christmas and everyday after.

Safe Mode - Music for Torture

From the Guardian

Music that has been used to torture at Guantanamo Bay include :

• AC/DC - Hell's Bells
• AC/DC - Shoot to Thrill
• Aerosmith
• Barney the Purple Dinosaur - theme tune
• Bee Gees - Stayin' Alive
• Britney Spears
• Bruce Springsteen - Born in the USA
• Christina Aguilera - Dirrty
• David Gray - Babylon
• Deicide - Fuck Your God
• Don McLean - American Pie
• Dope - Die MF Die
• Dope - Take Your Best Shot
• Dr. Dre
• Drowning Pools - Bodies
• Eminem - Kim
• Eminem - Slim Shady
• Eminem - White America
• Li'l Kim
• Limp Bizkit
• Matchbox Twenty - Gold
• Meat Loaf
• Metallica - Enter Sandman
• Neil Diamond - America
• Nine Inch Nails - March of the Pigs
• Nine Inch Nails - Mr. Self-Destruct
• Prince - Raspberry Beret
• Queen - We are The Champions
• Rage Against the Machine - Killing in the Name Of
• Red Hot Chilli Peppers
• Saliva - Click Click Boom
• Sesame Street - theme tune
• Tupac - All Eyes on Me

Games

Mathias Svalina has been writing these awesome poems about childrens games. You can see them up at the new Glitterpony and Sleeping Fish. They remind me of Vasko Popa and his poems on games. See?

Nobody rests

This one constantly shifts his eyes
Hangs them on his head
And whether he wants it or not starts walking
backwards
He puts them on the soles of his feet
And whether he wants it or not returns walking
on his head

This one turns into an ear
He hears all that won't let itself be heard
But he grows bored
Yearns to turn again into himself
But without eyes he can't see how

That one bares all his faces
One after the other he throws them over the roof
The last one he throws under his feet
And sinks his head into his hands

This one stretches his sight
Stretches it from thumb to thumb
Walks over it walks
First slow then fast
Then faster and faster

That one plays with his head
Juggles it in the air
Meets it with his index finger
Or doesn't meet it at all

Nobody rests

When I was a kid I didn't have games. I raked leaves and ate chicken fingers for fun. I'm not good at writing themed poems, or poem that belong to a larger body. My poems are like fingernails you bite off and forget about until they grow back.

I took the GRE's today. After wards I felt mugged. I don't have a barometer on what a good score should be. Tonight I'm going to listen to Whitehouse. Maybe watch House. Maybe spend money. Maybe then I'll know.

Keyhole

Keyhole Magazine has published a poem of mine called Silent Spring. Its an older poem. Peter has also accepted two poems for the Nashville is Reads project, where small broadsides are printed and posted on street signs and walls around the city. I've been to Nashville. I like it there. I'm glad to have an ambassador in Nashville, even when it becomes wet and falls into a gutter.

I have two new poems coming from Rain Fade as well. Rain Fade is a fresh little magazine that's already posted some interesting poems by K. Silem Mohammad, Mike Young, and Juliet Cook. I like the way it cooks. Submit.

I sometimes wonder if its obnoxious to post announcements about your poetry. Then I remember that I am in a lonely vacuum and a blog is not the place to practice modest.y I'm not going to lie. This blog exists because I want you to read my poems. I am here to indulge.

Speaking of K Silem Mohammad, he has a movie diary blog. I like KSM's taste. It runs extremely similar to mine. He watches lots of movies starring Anna Farris. He watches old noir. He is my Ebert.

Recently watched movies -

The Bridge
Synedoche, NY
Funny Ha Ha
The Kingdom: series one
Spaced: complete television series
Benny's Video
Iron Man

I was so utterly ravaged by the solipsism in Synedoche, NY. I have never seen a more perilously self indulgent film. The Brown Bunny is a close runner up, but at least there is a memorable blow job scene and Gordon Lightfoot on the soundtrack. There were a some imaginative and brave ideas - the confusion of alternate reality mixing with reality, an endless play with a scope that is seemingly infinite, the tiny paintings - but all of these flashes of intrigue were lost and corrupted in the neuroses of the director/writer. The presence of the director/writer, to me, was felt in every frame, kind of like a trauma of a rape victim. His tendency to lapse into surrealism I thought was amateurish and without merit. During Phillip Seymor Hoffman's attempts at the degradation of loneliness (again), I felt as if I were a child being coerced with candy into a strangers' van, totally exploited and undervalued as a viewer. And like a lover who slaps their girlfriend then regrets it out loud, the end, no matter how apologetic and willfully poignant, does not justify the means.
Is this the mind that scribbled Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and Being John Malkovich? Was Adaptation a warning sign? Apparently. Synedoche, NY was not a film I hated. As someone who once ate film and breathed in a celluloid dark, for all my weird tastes ,this,I can honestly say, was a film I believe should never have been made. Duped. Totally duped.

Anyway....

SIR! received a lot of submissions this past week. Its impressive how many people are writing today, and with a certain sense of humor. If you've been thinking about submitting, please don't hesitate to send work.

Pronouncements

A review I wrote of Nin Andrews has been posted on this months New Pages. Unfortunately I would only recommend this book if you were a teacher with a class like the one from Dangerous Minds. If you are a teacher with a class like Last House on the Left, I recommend pre ordering Blake Butler's new novella, EVER. An excerpt can be found at Unsaid and probably 40 other journals. None more prolific than Blake. Use ten minutes to watch these moody films made by Derek White for the book.

SIR! contributor Nathan Logan has a new chapbook out called Holly From Muncie. Nate creates some nice worlds filled with terrified children- read his work in SIR! and in No Colony.

Who is William Minor?

Who is Bill Hicok?

Yesterday I joined a gym so I could run during the wintertime and watch more CNN.

When you Google the words "Matthew Klane" it will ask you if you meant "Matthew Kline." Say no. You meant Matthew Klane.
I saw Matthew Klane read the other week. It was something generous. I am still thinking about it. His new book is called B . Matthew is behind Flim Forum. He is an experimental writer and reader. I am usually suspicious of this type of language poetry, but Matthew quickens the pulse with humor and intelligence. Read a poem of his here. Read it very slowly.

SIR! is now open to submissions

SIR! will be taking submissions from December to January for an upcoming February issue. There is no outright emphasis on content or form, but we remain enthusiastic about poetry of all sorts. Flash fiction is accepted, but again, we are mostly looking for poetry. Send 3-6 of your latest and best inventions. You may send them in the body of an email, or as a WORD or RTF attachment. Translations very welcome. Simultaneous submissions are accepted. Please include a short cover letter and a bio. Submissions without any sort of bio will be deleted.

Send all work to - sir.editor@gmail.com