Looking Up

I don't often present the work of others on this page, but I was just going through some of my Buenos Aires photos, when I remembered looking up to see the image shown above, which got me to looking up "Dorothy Parker", who is too little remembered by people of my generation, and even less by those younger. Things are looking up in the field of looking up: the Googlization of Dorothy yielded, among other things, these quotes:

A little bad taste is like a nice dash of paprika.
Dorothy Parker
Brevity is the soul of lingerie.
Dorothy Parker
I don't care what is written about me so long as it isn't true.
Dorothy Parker
I might repeat to myself slowly and soothingly, a list of quotations beautiful from minds profound - if I can remember any of the damn things.
Dorothy Parker
I've never been a millionaire but I just know I'd be darling at it.
Dorothy Parker
If all the girls who attended the Yale prom were laid end to end, I wouldn't be a bit surprised.
Dorothy Parker
If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to.
Dorothy Parker
Take care of the luxuries and the necessities will take care of themselves.
Dorothy Parker
The best way to keep children home is to make the home atmosphere pleasant--and let the air out of the tires.
Dorothy Parker
This is not a novel to be tossed aside lightly. It should be thrown with great force.
Dorothy Parker

The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity.
Dorothy Parker, (attributed)
I'm never going to be famous. My name will never be writ large on the roster of Those Who Do Things. I don't do any thing. Not one single thing. I used to bite my nails, but I don't even do that any more.
Dorothy Parker, Here Lies (1939), "The Little Hours"
That would be a good thing for them to cut on my tombstone: Wherever she went, including here, it was against her better judgment.
Dorothy Parker, 'But the One on the Right,' in New Yorker, 1929

Sadly, there was nothing listed for D RO HY PARKER . . .

- RM

the process

it ain't always pretty

unCONVENTIONal wisdom?

it looks like

I could drive

across the state

to be with poets

or stay home

and be a poet

- r.m.

shades

and look! there I am

with the other shades of blue

in your dark glasses

- arem

short stuff

So, I'm sitting in a coffee shop and minding my own business (as much as a writer can), when I have the great good fortune to recognize haiku master Jeffrey Winke, similarly minding his own business (as much as a writer can). We talk. I score his new broadside, That Smirking Face, AND his sensational new chapbook of sensual haiku, coquette. This, after many readings of his broader collection, what's not there. If you are at all a fan of the short stuff, you NEED these books! Visit http://www.jeffwinke.com/ and do whatever it takes to get them.

- RM

sputzies

the species of sputzies

(as the birds were known there)

would shit on your car,

would shit in your hair.

their music-less chirping

would go on all day,

as they'd perch in the barn

and shit in the hay.

the species of sputzies

(as english sparrows were called)

would shit in mid-air,

would shit on the bald.

we'd shoot 'em with bb's

and with slings and with arrows,

for we were young marksmen

and they were just sparrows.

the species of sputzies

(who just weren't very pretty)

were clouds over farms

and great swirls in the city.

they were good fun to shoot

and we had to learn killing,

for we'd enlist very soon

and we'd draft the unwilling.

the species of sputzies

(as we came home under flags)

still flew in great number

and we, in plain boxes,

slept underground slumber.

the hunted still fly

and the hunters still die,

and still,

the cold ground waits for summer.

- Ralph Murre

such a mourning

If it's Monday

I'll be reading some of my old, and much of my new stuff at Montello, Wisconsin Monday evening, April 7th at 7:00, to be followed by an open mike session in which you may be reading your stuff.

Montello Public Library
128 Lake Avenue

Be there, dammit!

After Word: My thanks, to the good people of Montello, who so warmly received me; for allowing me to stand for a few minutes in the shadows of John Muir and Aldo Leopold, and to speak my bit. -RM

and finally,

they were able to purchase
rooms and furniture so very large
that he and Eileen were small again,
and wished for someone
to tell them a story.

- RM