FRiGG | Fall 2011/issue 34/"The Man from TSA— Unrequited Love Did Not Stop Glenn Close" and Other Poems

My comments about my five poems published in the Winter 2011 issue of Frigg.
These poems are about present-time experiences and the memory of past experiences (childhood, family gatherings, regular trash-collection pickup—kinder, gentler times (nostalgia perhaps?) and the effect the craziness of today’s world can have on our psyches.

http://www.friggmagazine.com/issuethirtyfour/splashpages/ElizabethPGlixman.htm

The world is transforming. Changes are everywhere. All is in flux. I've been reacting to many of the changes by writing poems, some are humorous. Comedy and tragedy are siblings.

Is it tragic that change is in the air? Probably not but like all transformation letting go of the past is not easy. What to keep and what to let go?

Frigg is a gem of an online magazine. If you haven't read Frigg you are in for a treat. Enjoy the the covers and layout designed by EnoaraF.

Two previous covers out of 34.

Check out Frigg's Archives

http://www.friggmagazine.com/volumeonearchive/archivedirectory.htm

Can Poetry Help to Create Peace in this World? Can the Arts in General Promote Understanding and Peace Between Cultures?

Midas Public Relations

News for release: 21 October 2011

POETRY TOWARDS PEACEFUL CO-EXISTENCE

Promoting dialogue between civilisations through poetry –

Dubai forum comes to London

"Seminars and themes presented at The Foundation of Abdulaziz Saud Al-Babtain's Prize for Poetic Creativity’s literary and intellectual symposium in Dubai (17-18 October) were discussed yesterday evening at an event held at The Mosaic Rooms, London.

The Dubai forum, entitled "Poetry Towards Peaceful Co-Existence", was held under the patronage of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President of the United Arab Emirates, Prime Minister and Ruler of Dubai, who attended the opening session. The London forum was programmed to complement the subject areas debated in Dubai. The two events were linked by author and broadcaster Paul Blezard, who flew from Dubai to London, to participate in both Forums.

In his opening speech in Dubai, Abdul Aziz Saud Al-Babtain, Chairman of The Foundation, highlighted the role of poetry in promoting dialogue between civilisations and said that the decision to hold the event in Dubai reflected the Emirate’s leading role in bringing about peaceful coexistence and understanding between people from different cultural backgrounds.

Speakers who took part in the London event were:

· Rosie Goldsmith, journalist and broadcaster, chair

· Sarah Ardizzone, award winning translator

· Sharmila Beezmohun, deputy editor Wasafiri magazine

· Paul Blezard, Literary director, The Firebird Poetry Prizes

· Christina Patterson , writer and columnist, The Independent

· Rhona Wells, assistant editor, The Middle East magazine

The London panellists discussed issues of translation and interpretation, poetry and performance, as well as debating the role poetry can play in today’s world, and its impact on different cultures globally.

The Dubai Forum was attended by Arab and foreign academics and poets from five continents. Sessions discussed the impact of Arabic and world poetry on human communication throughout the ages, and readings from an international line up of poets included prolific writer and poet Yang Lian from Beijing; Egyptian poet and writer Yaser Anwar; poet and cultural critic Kirpal Singh from Singapore; American poet, essayist and professor Brian Turner and the International Kristal Vilenica Prize 2009 winner Luljeta Lleshanaku from Albania.

The head of The Foundation, Abdul Aziz Saud Al-Babtain, himself a prominent Kuwaiti poet and businessman, well known in Kuwait, the Gulf area and the Arab world, established and fully financed The Foundation of Abdulaziz Saud Al-Babtain's Prize for Poetic Creativity.

Abdul Aziz Saud Al-Babtain, Chairman of the Foundation, said: “I am delighted with the response to the Forum in Dubai. Academics and poets travelled from far and wide to take part in the symposium, and the result was three days of inspiring speeches and debate. Speakers were in general agreement with the theme of this year’s Forum – that poetry can play a role in developing cultural understanding in a time of political, social and economic change around the world.”

Video footage from the London event can be found at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XsWlsmF8ZQ

Spirit Poem

This poem was published in 3 A.M. Magazine in 2002. It is about the seed of creative possibilities that lives inside all of us.

Spirit

In the where we are world
intangible and tangled
a space of movies in holy time
without intermission
there is no waiting to rewrite the script.
It is happening as the popcorn crunches
in our mouths
as gunshots and diplomats talk
pulverizing the seeds of the living.

I am the seed they are trying to kill
created from an inner space of infinity
from musical strings a universe Einstein
could not imagine but longed for.
The Theory of Everything is in the oscillating ringing
the waves of unified motion
the tender inquisitiveness of time.

Vibration is all there is and time knows this.
Chords of sounds sunbathing on legs, arms,
lips, eyes, and inward in to ecstasy
grandiose and microscopic.
Wide open sounds that tenderize sunburns
and dance as the black holes pop open
when the journey is over
and we are sucked back into the beginning of time
where we see ourselves
in silence.
The seed they try to kill
waving undulating holding an infinite space
where fear is not found is the dream maker
of this dream time.
It will never be destroyed

Earth light beams into waters
that are in touch with feeling.
Waters that rush still
intoxicating inlets
with a happiness our human minds
would dance on the head of a pin to find.
Minted green foliage grows
light bound untangled
with all, lives in peace birthing choruses
with the bark of its neighbor.
Earth light is the director of sprouting seed souls
creator of the trunk and the roots.
It digs down
humming to earth.

In this where we are world change
sits in each quark of non linear time
rejoicing in the
freedom
of a creative mind.
Whirlpools of possibilities swim
as seed in little husks and kernels that
go dance or slide or ride
in the earth's decay, in it rise
in the soul's ability to multiple
and divide
with help from the chorus master who lives
sleeps and breaths
in each of us.
harmonizing all in creative reverie.

Elizabeth P. Glixman
copyright © 2002 all rights reserved

Tweeter- I Tweeted my First Poem

By the Salem Sea

16 Sept.

1.
Boats numbered by the sun
watery trawlers
whaling towards
widows waiting for the one
Read the rest

http://unfoldmag.wordpress.com/2011/09/16/by-the-salem-sea/



Writing a poem with 140 words (including spaces) is no easy feat. Word choice is always important when you write anything. In poetry it is critical. I found this 140 word tweet a wonderful challenge. I focused on creating the feel of the sea and beach with imagery and sound (alliteration). Although the 3 stanzas are posted as one poem, to me they are each separate snapshots of the beach, sea, and Salem.

Salem Mass is known for its Victorian homes that have widow walks where sailors' wives kept watch waiting for their loved ones to come home from the sea.
http://www.fishermensvoice.com/0310widowsWalk.html

http://flickrhivemind.net/Tags/widowswalk/Interesting

It Sure Has Been Hot This Summer- Poem Audio

Heat Mp3 by happiness2

Summer Eclectica

There is a lot of good reading in the summer Eclectica: poetry, fiction, travel pieces, commentary, non-fiction, book reviews and interviews. I interviewed poet John Vick whose You Tube "conceptual" poetry caught my eye.
http://www.eclectica.org/v15n3/glixman_vick.html

Poet Kimberly Becker interviewed poet Molly McGlennen author of Fried Fish and Flour Biscuits.

http://www.eclectica.org/v15n3/toc.html

Poetry editor Jennifer Finstrom offers an opportunity to meet a word challenge each issue.
Read more about this at

http://www.eclectica.org/v15n3/poetry_special.html

Poetry and Animation - Motion Poems- Best American Poetry anthology

"Hello from Angella and Todd!

We have news.

We've got a really exciting new partnership to tell you about.

This year, with your help, we'll produce 12-15 new motionpoems to accompany Scribner's celebrated annual Best American Poetry anthology... the 2011 volume. It's a new pilot-year collaboration that significantly raises the profile for us. It means we'll be working with a stellar lineup of poets this summer, from emerging writers to multiple Pulitzer Prize winners. The completed projects will be free online for general audiences and educators. The entire publishing industry will be watching. We can't wait to show you the results!"

Read the rest.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/375616979/poems-on-the-big-screen-motionpoems

Poems in Wordgathering

Volume 5 Issue 2 June 2011

http://www.wordgathering.com/issue18/poetry/glixman.html


What's it like to be disabled or have a chronic illness? How do you experience life and how do others experience you? The poems in Wordgathering are written by people who understand. They show the reader a world not everyone knows and worlds that are all too familiar to people dealing with daily challenges whether their own or loved ones. Many of the poems in this online magazine grasp the human condition in a profound way.

Other poets in this issue.

http://www.wordgathering.com/issue18/poetry/poetry18.html

Dinosaur Bees/ Issue 3. Check it Out. My "Strange" Art and Writing is in this Issue.

http://www.dinosaurbees.com/3_glixman_cats.html

http://www.dinosaurbees.com/dinosaurbees_news.html

YouTube - ‪"The The Impotence of Proofreading," by TAYLOR MALI. Hilarious‬‏

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OonDPGwAyfQ

Rumi- 13th Century Persian Mystic

http://www.amazon.com/Illuminated-Rumi-Jalal-Al-Din/dp/0767900022

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty
and frightened. Don't open the door to the study
and begin reading. Take down a musical instrument.
Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

translated by John Moyne and Coleman Barks

Listen to audios of Rumi's poetry
http://being.publicradio.org/programs/rumi/poetry.shtml

Sculpture as Poetry and Science- Janet Echelman's Vision

http://www.echelman.com/

 Watch Video at Ted.com

poetry 180: A Turning Back To Poetry

http://www.amazon.com/Poetry-180-Turning-Back/dp/0812968875

Some readers and writers do not like Billy Collin's poetry. They say it is too easy among other things. They write

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/08/books/review/08orr.html

and here

http://poetsonline.blogspot.com/2005/10/trouble-with-poetry-and-billy-collins.html

and here on his recent book Nine Horses

Amazon.com Review

"In Nine Horses, Billy Collins, U.S. poet laureate and author of the bestselling collection Sailing Alone Around the Room, attempts to find beauty in simplicity, but ends up achieving the simply banal. Some poems, such as "Rooms" and "Obituaries," in which readers are given freedom to draw their own conclusions, are memorable, but the language in Nine Horses has little music and thoughts are plainly stated." 

Read the rest of the review and readers' comments.

http://www.amazon.com/Nine-Horses-Poems-Billy-Collins/dp/0375755209

There are days when I find  what the naysayers say about B.C.'s  poetry true. Other days I revel in his writing for the very same reasons. Some days all I want is a warm piece of freshly baked bread smothered with butter or an apple in a poem that is an an apple nothing more.

I am a bit behind on my reading. poetry 180, the anthology and the poetry 180 website  have been around for a while. Read about Collin's poetry 180 project that was created with high school students in mind to make poetry more accessible and enjoyable for these readers and with the intention that one poem could be read or listened to each of the 180 days school was in session that year. http://www.loc.gov/poetry/180/

I was curious what kind of poems would be in a Billy Collin's edited anthology. Many are witty and charming as are Collin's poems. Many do not require minutes or hours of reflection but there are poems that ellicit  reflection and that feeling of angst that appears in much contemporary poetry, that feeling some naysayers of Collins suggest is not in his own work.

Among the poets whose work appears in the anthology are Stephen Dobyns, Sharon Olds, Phillip Levine, Charles Simic, David Ray, Rebecca Wee, Naomi Shihab Nye, Lucille Clifton and Daisey Fried.

 These are three of my favorite poems in the anthology

 One is by children's book author Jane Yolen.

Fat Is Not a Fairy Tale

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Cinder Elephant,
Sleeping Tubby,
Snow Weight,
where the princess is not
anorexic, wasp-waisted,
flinging herself down the stairs.

I am thinking of a fairy tale,
Hansel and Great,
Repoundsel,
Bounty and the Beast,
where the beauty
has a pillowed breast,
and fingers plump as sausage.
I am thinking of a fairy tale
that is not yet written,
for a teller not yet born,
for a listener not yet conceived,
for a world not yet won,
where everything round is good:
the sun, wheels, cookies, and the princess.
~ Jane Yolen

 

My Father's Hat
by Mark Irwin
Sunday mornings I would reach high into his dark closet while standing on a chair and tiptoeing reach higher, touching, sometimes fumbling the soft crowns and imagine I was in a forest, wind hymning through pines, where the musky scent of rain clinging to damp earth was his scent I loved, lingering on bands, leather, and on the inner silk crowns where I would smell his hair and almost think I was being held, or climbing a tree, touching the yellow fruit, leaves whose scent was that of a clove in the godsome air, as now, thinking of his fabulous sleep, I stand on this canyon floor and watch light slowly close on water I'm not sure is there. http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/16707     Dog's Death by John Updike She must have been kicked unseen or brushed by a car. Too young to know much, she was beginning to learn To use the newspapers spread on the kitchen floor And to win, wetting there, the words, "Good dog!                                                                     Good dog!" We thought her shy malaise was a shot reaction. The autopsy disclosed a rupture in her liver. As we teased her with play, blood was filling her skin And her heart was learning to lie down forever. Monday morning, as the children were noisily fed And sent to school, she crawled beneath the youngest's bed. We found her twisted and limp but still alive. In the car to the vet's, on my lap, she tried To bite my hand and died. I stroked her warm fur And my wife called in a voice imperious with tears. Though surrounded by love that would have upheld her, Nevertheless she sank and, stiffening, disappeared. Back home, we found that in the night her frame, Drawing near to dissolution, had endured the shame Of diarrhoea and had dragged across the floor To a newspaper carelessly left there.  Good dog. John Updike, POETSPEAK In Their Work, About Their Work (A Selection by Paul B. Janeczko)