What was she thinking, being swallowed by the water whole?

[sovay]

1. Late yesterday brought my contributor's copy of Niteblade #19, containing a reprint of my poem "The Coast Guard." The full content becomes available online once the magazine reaches its hard-costs goal, so I shall point you in the direction of the PDF and simply tell you this is one of the poems I am proudest of. It was written in the late fall of 2008 after fleurdelis28 and I drove out to Cape Cod to look for the wreck of a nineteenth-century schooner in the sand of Newcomb Hollow Beach. If you would also like to pick up the poem in its original setting of Sirenia Digest #41 or the shell-bound Chanteys for the Fisherangels, I will not protest.

2. This is my public service announcement of the day: Bryher's poetry. Read it. She is even less well known as a writer nowadays than H.D., who is one of my favorite poets and unwarranted secret history; I have decent luck with H.D. in used book stores, but in the fall of 2010 I ran into a copy of Bryher's Visa for Avalon (1965) and I still count myself blessed, because I have never seen anything by her in stores before or since. I discovered the Emory cache yesterday. "Horses of Tros" is one of the poems I want everyone to read on principle of language; I think "From Helix" and "Amazon" are not far behind. Her two semi-auto-romans à clef Development (1920) and Two Selves (1923) are also amazing and I will be tracking them down in print as soon as I can. She could write the sea. None of these people should be obscure.

(And then I found that H.D.'s daughter Perdita worked for Bletchley Park and the OSS and her son wrote that book about the cat at the Algonquin Hotel and everything became synchronous.)

3. Do not read this article if you do not like very large insects. If you don't mind twelve-centimeter tree lobsters, however, it is a lovely story of the rediscovery of the Lord Howe stick insect (Dryocelus australis) and how it did not go extinct in 1920 after all, no thanks to us.

4. Caitlín R. Kiernan's Confessions of a Five-Chambered Heart is now taking preorders. I wrote the afterword. You want to read the stories.

5. derspatchel's recipe for hot buttered rum is really good, especially with Kraken. (I am not drinking it right now. I am not the person with the bottle in their kitchen. I kind of wish I were.)

I should go shovel the front steps again.

Comments

[strange-selkie.livejournal.com]

I am really interested to examine their poems in conjunction. Thank heaven that was a book I never, in all the peregrinations and upheaval, got rid of...

I do mind twelve-centimeter HARDSHELL DEATH CRUSTACEANS, but you get a pass.

[schreibergasse.livejournal.com]

Dude! (On the stick insects.) Just...duuude. And Balls pyramid! I saw the photo of that thing, and...wow.

I promise to read the poems. Once I actually get some work done.

(Music: Rock Lobster)

...which actually they should really use in the PR campaign.

[steepholm.livejournal.com]

The most expensive book I ever bought was a copy of Bryher's edition of Mary Butts' Last Stories - which is a roundabout way of asking if you have ever come across Butts?

I used to be married to her biographer, and read a lot of her work in consequence, and I think you'd appreciate it. She's poetic and classical in the same way as Bryher and HD, but there are many other fascinating ingredients there as well: an early passion for Jane Harrison, a sojourn with Crowley at Thelema, publishing Eliot and Pound on a small press, a Parisian '20s, a Cornish '30s.

There's a handful of novels, of which I'd particularly recommend Armed with Madness (1928) and Death of Felicity Taverner (1932), although her novels about Alexander and Cleopatra are well worth reading; and there are poems too, but I think her short stories show her to best advantage.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I am enjoying the theme in your recent listening material. "Granite Hills" is a good one.

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

(And then I found that H.D.'s daughter Perdita worked for Bletchley Park and the OSS and her son wrote that book about the cat at the Algonquin Hotel and everything became synchronous.)

I bought that book out of a hotel room in Atlanta after following ghostly music down the hall. Life is oddly synchronous sometimes.

[gwynnega]

I've read lots of H.D. but nothing by Bryher. I've long been curious about her work, though, ever since I read Marilyn Hacker talking about her & H.D. in Russ's How To Suppress Women's Writing.

[ap-aelfwine.livejournal.com]

I'm glad for the contributor's copy.

Thank you for sharing the Bryher poetry. I'm just after reading "Horses of Tros", which is stunning. I'll be reading the rest of what's there soon, I reckon.

I'm not especial fond of very large insects, but I'm very glad for the survival of the Lord Howe stick insect, all the same.

Thanks for sharing the hot buttered rum recipe!

I should go shovel the front steps again.

I hope all's gone well. We've not had any more actual snow here, only little drifting flakes.

[maratai.livejournal.com]

Good God, "The Horses of Tros" is spectacular. I have to read the rest now.--YHL

[ashlyme.livejournal.com]

I shall research both H.D. and Bryher when I'm a bit less frazzled! Thanks for the heads-up.

[selidor]

I shall make it a personal point of pride to go and see these delightful critters if ever I get across to the Melbourne Zoo.
(Take all excuses to go to Melbourne. Delightfully many-cultured city.)

The way Bryher writes the sea is heartbreakingly amazing.

And now, all the rum is gone. Sigh, no recipe making...