With the Condoms Hidden in the Hatband, the Damp Cigar Between My Teeth, I Could Become the Young Man Who Always Got Sentimental

My apologies. I meant I wasn't going to post today when I said it yesterday, but when I saw that photo of women GOP House members yesterday afternoon I knew there would be no shutdown and was reminded that once all bitter fights and arguments between buddies over divvying the loot are settled, there's still the matter of the bitches, how best to use their bodies as props and levers.

Other than to note that this theater is only prelude for next year's theater (when uteruses will again be used as ploy by both teams' to appease their rabid bases while both teams collude to steal more from the middle class), Jack covers it more so I don't have to, but as long as I'm here, links, poem, song.

• Though Democrats did agree to let the GOP fuck with poor black DC uteruses and further gut DC public education. Yay Democrats!
• Open for business.
• Obama's torture facilities.
• Obama's Justice Department.
• Wanting to help us communicate.
• Blink of an eye.
• Forgot that part.
• Inside joke theater.
• New pharmacist boogie.

INVENTING FATHER IN LAS VEGAS

Lynn Emanuel

If I could see nothing but the smoke
From the tip of his cigar, I would know everything
About the years before the war.
If his face were halved by shadow I would know
This was a street where an EATS sign trembled
And a Greek served coffee black as a dog's eye.
If I could see nothing but his wrist I would know
About the slot machine and I could reconstruct
The weak chin and ruin of his youth, the summer
My father was a gypsy with oiled hair sleeping
In a Murphy bed and practicing clairvoyance.
I could fill his vast Packard with showgirls
And keep him forever among the difficult buttons
Of the bodice, among the rustling of their names,
Miss Christina, Miss Lorraine.
I could put his money in my pocket
and wearing memory's black fedora
With the condoms hidden in the hatband
The damp cigar between my teeth,
I could become the young man who always got sentimental
About London especially in Las Vegas with its single bridge­-
So ridiculously tender--leaning across the river
To watch the starlight's soft explosions.
If I could trace the two veins that crossed
His temple, I would know what drove him
To this godforsaken place, I would keep him forever
Remote from war--like the come-hither tip of his lit cigar
Or the harvest moon, that gold planet, remote and pure
  American.

The Kiosk Shutters Crash Down

This is true: this theme song post was supposed to be today's post but I had done all the linking while thinking about it, went to save it and mistakenly hit publish, and then, well, there's no graceful unpublish in blooger. The post then got buried by the post I had created for Wednesday, so here it is again for more time at top of blog:

I found cassettes a friend I haven't thought about in twenty years gave me while looking for something else I didn't find. Isn't it always? Even if I still owned a cassette player the tapes would break. Song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song. Holyfuck.

I also found my stash of Bill Nelson cassettes:

There. Worth listening to again yes? Also, don't plunge publish when you don't want to publish. Also, don't start a new Friday post after you fucked up and published the original Friday post Wednesday.

The dispute between Democrats and Republicans isn't ideological, it's interpretive dance. Look at the markers on the far Right drawn that will be abandoned when this round is over. They will be mainstream, with administration and Democratic consent, by Obama's second mid-term election.

Meanwhile, Blegsylvania is dying, and I woke up today surprisingly tired of doing my part, so, barring kaboom - yesterday their were calls across the cubicles, There's another earthquake in Japan! (we fucking orkorkork for disaster porn) - I'll be back Sunday morning driving even more readers away with a United-Gax wrap-up.

• Why so many Americans hate Obama. Again, this thought experiment: what if HRC was president - what would be different?
• UPDATE! Unrestricted rise of the elite.
• We don't know the language we don't know.
• Boxed in.
• Bullshit. 
• I was going to write about today's Krugman/Brooks either/or on NYT op-ed page, but I knew this guy would, saving me the trouble.
• The consequences of no disaster-porn. 
• UPDATE! Post in haste, regret never.
• Unicorn.
• Memory.
• Meddling.
• Social mobility.
• Macaca! Getting no play in national media. Funny, that.
• Hilltop.
• Fullback sent me a Kind.
• Silliman's always generous lit-links.
• On being between books.  
• Two authors suggested to me last night over Thursday pints: Proust, and no, but Clarice Lispector? What would be a good one to start? Any particular translation better than others?
• New music notes.
• On why you like what you like.
• Bill Callahan.

SUICIDE OF A MODERATE DICTATOR

Elizabeth Bishop

This is a day when truths will out, perhaps;
leak from the dangling telephone earphones
sapping the festooned switchboards' strength;
fall from the windows, blow from off the sills,
—the vague, slight unremarkable contents
of emptying ash-trays; rub off on our fingers
like ink from the un-proof-read newspapers,
crocking the way the unfocused photographs
of crooked faces do that soil our coats,
our tropical-weight coats, like slapped-at moths.

Today's a day when those who work
are idling. Those who played must work
and hurry, too, to get it downe,
with little dignity or none.
The newspapers are sold; the kiosk shutters
crash down. But anyway, in the night
the headlines wrote themselves, see, on the streets
and sidewalks everywhere; a sediment's splashed
even to the first floors of apartment houses.

This is a day that's beautiful as well,
and warm and clear. At seven o'clock I saw
the dogs being walked along the famous beach
as usual, in a shiny gray-green dawn,
leaving their paw prints draining in the wet.
The line of breakers was steady and the pinkish,
segmented rainbow steadily hung above it.
At eight two little boys were flying kites.

United 2, Phunion 2 - United Advance 4-2 in Shootout

There are traditions to United's US Open Cup games at SoccerPlex in Germantown, the first being I post a photo of a stadium light stanchion against that night's mandatory gorgeous sunset. Also traditions: shitty referees who let the game out of hand, vicious fouls, yellow cards given that were not deserved and yellow cards not given for red card fouls, at least one red card and one coach ejected, Carlos Ruiz scoring, diving, leaving petulantly, overtime and shootouts. Last night? Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! and Yes!

United's win means they'll play Ningland at SoccerPlex on Tuesday April 26, and if you've never been to a game at SoccerPlex, do yourself a good. I love RFK, I love LOUD SIDE! (I'll be there day after tomorrow for Gax), but there is nothing like the experience of a game at SoccerPlex. What a blast. Planet and Hamster and Ilse and Landru, with guest appearances by Big C and the Oklahoma Kid. What a blast.

Oh, the game? Look, I can complain about Old Man Wolff (who did score in a scramble) and No Touch Ngwenya (who botched the shot on a three-on-one breakaway in the 2nd overtime that would have locked the game up) on the front line, I can complain about Fredsux ($100 to anyone who can provide a legit photo of Fredsux giving his thumbs-up my-bad with one hand while clutching his hamstring with the other) and the holding midfielders, this team is going to win or lose on the back line, and the back line (starters and seconds) is disorganized and, far too often, incapable of simple clearances out of the box. There is simply no excuse for either of Phunion's goals, especially the second, in the second overtime, with United up a goal and a man. That United points to the return of a rookie who has played exactly one professional game from U-20 USMNT duty as the solidifying key to the defense is damning.

Quick:

• I applaud Benny for running both Najar and Boskovic all 120 minutes and a system that put the ball on both their feet as often as possible. United won't score enough without contributions from both to compensate for the defense. Boskovic's swing-in CKs are good - Pontius had a duck on his forehead he put over.
• Brettschneider hit post in overtime, looked dangerous.
• Stephen King is a better holding-mid than Shut the Fuck Up, still way behind Simms.
• Bransesco left hurt, but he sucks. Kasper Payne should have his visa revoked for South American countries, because Bransesco is another in a long line of South Americans signed that suck.
• Hamid had yips, but he is the keeper of the future.
• What a blast.

Get a Footnote for Being the Only Marxist to Gain Power

My favorite perq at work is first crack at new book carts. Found the above two just now. I'll read the introductions and see where it goes from there. I still think Marx an excellent diagnostician for what ails your economic system. Besides, it's not like I can read fiction now anyway - I'm 0-for-last six novels - though I solicit suggestions.

Related loosely and shamelessly, here's a cat that looks like Stalin:

• Must wash hands.
• Capitalism.
• Techno duality.
• On Badiou and Nancy.
• Impotence of partisan loyalty.
• Cowardly, stupid, wrong.
• Banks win again.
• Jaundiced view.
• Blog post titled without irony.
• Things you might have missed.
• Terry Jones is to Charlie Sheen as....
• Heh.
• Maryland man glued to toilet seat.
• The stripper and the podiatrist.
• Ashbery poem. 
• Chico's groove.
• This week's new releases includes new Bill Callahan.
• New SEA AND CAKE! Holyfuck.

ALLENDE

Philip Lopate

In 200 years they won't remember me, Salvador
And they won't remember you, so let's skip the part about
He will live with us forever.
You may get a footnote for being the only Marxist
To gain power in Latin America via parliamentary means;
And the only sucker not to throw his enemies in jail.
You knew the power of the large land-owners, ITT,
The Army, U.S. Anaconda, the small frightened businessmen
Easily manipulated, the shop-owners who could go either way
And yet you didn't lift a finger to silence them.
You continued to defend the bicameral system of government
Until they bombed your palace and you shot yourself in the mouth.
Answer me this,
Now that you are a bunch of hairs on a blood-stained sofa:
I want to know why you killed yourself.
Because this was a very un-Marxist thing to do.
Because neither was this the way of a gradualist
With short graying hair and glasses,
     and a face like a prominent surgeon's,
Who, knowing this would happen, could have easily arranged for
The secret tunnel, the private plane, the unmarked car
In which you, huddled in grandmotherly wig, might begin
To write your memoirs. Was it too horrible to think of
Speaking at New York rallies to pockets of émigrés,
Forming shadow cabinets, and lunching with Juan Bosch
Or Andreas Papandreou, swapping stories over wine about
Where you were when the shit hit the fan?
I'm being vulgar, forgive me.
I would rather believe in your doggish retreat
Than the flamboyance of today's headlines which gloat:
MARXIST REPORTED TO TAKE HIS LIFE.
Even they are a little unsure. They leave room
     for the graduate students
Of the left, working in the carrels of libraries
For 100 years to discover the link,
The way it all fits together: Lumumba, King, Kennedy,
     Allende, CIA.

And it may turn out that my government actually murdered you
But what's the good of knowing that?
We know too many connections already, and they only satisfy
The pedantic urge that makes the world a crossword puzzle.
Salvador, I'm sorry, I don't know what to say any more.
Take back the bullet, it was a mistake, it redeems nothing.

Today I look at the faces of passers-by and I think:
It figures. The banks have the money to buy counter-
revolution,
This wino has no money. He's nice enough, so is
That girl in the flamingo summer dress on wobbly heels.
It's September 12, possibly the prettiest day of the year.
The blue has never been so pure around the chimneys—
"Almost like—a cartoon!" says the dental hygienist,
Grasping for a metaphor. I never said it even to myself,
Before today, but just between you and me,
And I don't want anyone else to hear: Senor.
It looks as if they have got us by the balls.
These faces in the street, how can they take power?
How can they rule?

Theme Song April 2011

I found cassettes a friend I haven't thought about in twenty years gave me while looking for something else I didn't find. Isn't it always? Even if I still owned a cassette player the tapes would break. Song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song and song. Holyfuck.


I also found my stash of Bill Nelson cassettes:

If You Love Me, Worship the Objects I Have Caused to Represent Me in My Absence

Tell me, did you ever think Obama would deliberately schedule the official announcement of his reelection campaign on the very same day his administration publicly concedes there will always be Guantanamo?

• Me neither. I am such a fucking rube.
• Yes, friends and old-timers, that's the last time I use that obamavatar. 
• Zobambies.
• Badiou on Libya.
• Springtime for NATO. Corporate defers to what Marketing says.
• Origins of humanitarian intervention.
• Sock-puppet rebels.
• America at its extremes. 
• It's a plutocracy. 
• Pastor Sanctimonious hearts Obama: The administration has transformed a weak record into a strong political position. What made this possible was Obama’s willingness to betray progressives in Congress even before the budget conflict began.
• Academic freedom.
• Manning.
• Vote or die.
• It's not the fucking Democrats that keep the less-shitty fairy alive.
• It's not the fucking Democrats that keep the less-shitty fairy alive.
• The redistribution fairy is dead.
• Sbarro files for bankruptcy protection?
• Oxtrot is dead. Ochstradt is here.
• Blegsylvania.
• Blogging macht frei.
• Looking for something else last night I found this:

• I bought this Elkin biography and couldn't believe how badly written it is.
• Sophie's Choice. It has to be at least 25 years since I read it. I remember Stingo.
• I'm not sure why Kramerbooks is being reviewed on a poetry blog because Kramerbooks' poetry stock sucks.
• New Kate Bush? Yes but no. There is this sentence: Kate is currently working on new material although no release date has been set for this. 
• Here's the reworked Deeper Understanding. Um. Suck.
• Obscure Sound's Best of March w/sound. I confess I don't get the fuss over of Montreal, which is OK. It feels like I should.
• I love Velocity Girl. Listen to this. Holyfuck.

EXACT

Rae Armantrout

Quick, before you die,
describe

the exact shade
of this hotel carpet.

What is the meaning
of the irregular, yellow

spheres, some
hollow,

gathered in patches
on this bedspread?

If you love me,
worship

the objects
I have caused

to represent me
in my absence.


*

Over and over
tiers

of houses spill
pleasantly

down that hillside.
It

might be possible
to count occurrences.





UPDATE! By request:

Harry Graham Crackers

Just to be clear - when I said I hate motherfucking christers I wasn't saying that motherfucking christers don't have the right to burn the Koran, nor was I saying that motherfucking christers shouldn't have the right to burn the Koran.

I am large in my smallness. I can hate motherfucking christers and hate Harry Reid and Lindsey Graham too (who are exceedingly grateful for the motherfucking christer burning the Koran, so grateful they want to write laws preventing motherfucking christers from burning Korans - and other people exercising their free speech rights - in the future). More later. Or not.

Colorado 4, United 1

United never wins in Colorado, never wins at altitude, so what sting there is in the last twenty minutes of collapse has passed. I didn't expect a draw, much less a win, with a decimated backline, so disappointment is minimal. As will be this post.

Five things:

• You can put a ten on a shirt and put the shirt on Dax McCarty but that doesn't make him a ten. It's only three games, but he's shown me shit.
• Onstad retired for a good reason.
• Brettscheider reminds me of - bwaha! - Taylor Twellman. Give him minutes. Hope he starts Wednesday so I can see him live and up close.
• What the fuck has happened to Najar?
• Either Branko can't or won't fit Olsen's system.

I'll withhold greater judgment until this coming Sunday morning. Day after tomorrow, USOC game versus Phunion in Germantown (with Planet and Seat Six and Landru and Ilse and Hamster, yay!), this Saturday night versus Gax at RFK. An 0-2 road trip is disappointing but not yet cause for anguish. An 0-2 homestand? Uh-oh.

Which Was Perhaps Immodest of Whoever I Am

CWCF I am, it may be my imagination but it feels like the burners under the rube soup have been turned down from a rolling boil to a ready simmer in the past week. Everything's quieter. Look at the sleeping blogrolls. Maybe it's exhaustion only, a catching of breath, resting the rubes before the also resting keepers begin boiling the rubes again in reaction to what the keepers can't control, boiling the rubes to try and control the rube-response best they can.

Yes, the weekly (not) paradigm-shifting OMFG! skipped this week, but is it me or has Corporate (in its own loosely coordinated and incompetently executed way) tamped the brakes on 24-7 rube-boiling, if only to catch its own breath and reorient before deciding (in its own loosely coordinated and incompetently executed way) how best next to raid grandma's kitchen pantry for ingredients for rube soup?

The simmering weirds me out. How strange to live in a world where a reduction in my boiling causes anxiety by an ominous calming of my happily agitated molecules.

• Greenwald and Silber on Drum. It's entirely possible to have faith in the judgment of Obama the politician while having zero faith in the judgment of Obama the moral agent.
• I hate motherfucking christers. Hate. I'm small this way.
• How much is too much. Yes, posted before, but put before my eyes again so put before yours again.
• Eternal punishment.
• What makes these people tick.
• The news from Japan.
• Tony Morrison could do that thing with her mouth.
• The most important thing about Libya is not in Libya.
• The perils of moralism.
• All war all the time.
• Someone wants a fatwa.
• New American Ghost Towns includes Oh So Shitty Maryland. 
• Bleggalgazing. There's a lot of that going on too.
• Speaking of blogrolls, there are a few new additions. Look.

• Les Murray.
• Burning man, part five.
• Spend three hours in the 60s?
• A sunset song.
• Cosmic cars.
• Theoretical girls.
• Gossip.
• Richard Thompson is 62 today.

FAME

Les Murray

We were at dinner in Soho
and the couple at the next table
rose to go. The woman paused to say
to me, I just wanted you to know
I have got all your cookbooks
and I swear by them!

I managed to answer her, Ma’am
they’ve done you nothing but good!
Which was perhaps immodest
of whoever I am.