Summer reading, maybe

Summer’s here and I see reading lists. Though I’d love to order fresh books, this morning I looked at my shelves to see what’s languishing there unread. Found quite a few, some of which I’m glad to be reminded of, others that might not make it. I confess I bought a number of these neglected books, but some were foisted upon me by my mother and other well-meaning friends. Here’s how they stack up: 

Still on My List
What a Carve Up by Jonathan Coe
Fingersmith by Sarah Waters
Mr Peanut by Adam Ross
The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein
Crash by JG Ballard

Quite Possible
Invisible Cities by Italo Calvino
Small Ceremonies by Carol Shields
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The End of The World by Haruki Murakami
The Girl With Curious Hair by David Foster Wallace
Down by The River by Edna O’Brien

Could Happen, Someday
Hitler’s Willing Executioners by Daniel Jonah Goldhagen
The Mill on The Floss by George Eliot
The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Alison Hoover Bartlett
The Gift By Vladimir Nabokov

Not Ruling It Out Entirely
The Thief and the Dogs by Naguib Mahfouz
City of Glass by Paul Auster
Tree of Smoke by Denis Johnson 

Suspended Animation by F. Gonzalez-Crussi

Snowball’s Chance
A Spy in the House of Love by Anais Nin
Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum
The Kite Runner by Khalid Hosseini

We Watch The Imitation Game with the Subtitles on

(quiet laughter)
(laughs) (phone ringing)
(mechanical whirring)
(rhythmic marching)
(music) (exhales)
(panting) (sonar pinging)
(indistinct chatter)
(children’s playful shouts in the distance)
(door opens) (panting)
(gasps) (birds chirping)
(chuckles, stammers)
(indistinct voices in the background)
(music) (sobbing)
(groans) (claps hands)
(alarm blaring)
(chuckles) (chuckles) (chuckles)
(music chatter fading)
(quiet sigh) (gunfire)
(rhythmic clacking)
(loud whirring) (deep whirring)
(whirring and clacking winding down)
(door closes)

(dog barking in the distance)

The semi-productive weekend

I thwarted a bamboo plant.

I sat down to finish In The Shadow of Young Girls in Flower, in which the narrator leaves his mother behind for a seaside holiday that becomes a rhapsodic meditation on adolescent girls. I found it much slower than Swann’s Way, which was gorgeous and even revelatory. 

Wore my monocle in honor. 

So now I’m free to decide whether to go on to volume III of In Search of Lost Time. Leaning towards yes, but perhaps not. First I am reading Monsieur Proust, a memoir by Proust’s housekeeper. I’m a quarter of the way through and feeling like a satisfied voyeur. Proust liked to eat sole, when he ate at all. He did not use soap. It is down to earth.

Also, they say you shouldn’t feel restricted by your age, gender or situation in choosing what to put on, but I don’t buy that brand of soap. Most of the time I feel like a 14-year old boy embarrassed by a propensity for nosebleeds, but that doesn’t mean I want to go about shirtless in shorts and flip-flops. So after many a tortuous I-hate-myself shopping excursion, I was happy to find two shirts that are comfortable and ok for the office. A bigger victory than it seems.  

I wrote a poem that I was happy with. So far. 

Also did a tiny bit of exercise, which is more than I can say for most days - week or weekend. 

The spit that directly disgusts me

Happy Fernando Pessoa's birthday. Here is a little of The Book of Disquiet, rendered by two different translators. 

Travel? One need only exist to travel. I go from day to day, as from station to station, in the train of my body or my destiny, leaning out over the streets and squares, over people’s faces and gestures, always the same and always different, just like scenery. (Richard Zenith, p. 370)

You want to travel? To travel you simply need to exist. In the train of my body or of my destiny I travel from day to day, as from station to station, leaning out to look at the streets and the squares, at gestures and faces, always the same and always different as, ultimately, is the way with all landscapes. (Margaret Jull Costa, p. 75)

I envy all people, because I’m not them. Since this always seemed to me like the most impossible of all impossibilities, it’s what I yearned for every day, and despaired of in every sad moment. (RZ, p. 39)

I envy in everyone the fact that they are not me. Of all impossibilities, and this always seemed the greatest, this was the one that made up the greater part of my daily dose of anguish, the despair that fills every sad hour. (MJC, p. 139)

I’m astounded whenever I finish something. Astounded and distressed. My perfectionist instinct should inhibit me from finishing; it should inhibit me from even beginning. (RZ, p. 136) 

I’m always astonished whenever I finish anything. Astonished and depressed. My desire for perfection should prevent me from ever finishing anything; it should prevent me from even starting. (MJC, p. 129)

I have no social of political sentiments, and yet there is a way in which I’m highly nationalistic. My nation is the Portuguese language. It wouldn’t trouble me if all Portugal were invaded or occupied, as long as I was left in peace. But I hate with genuine hatred, with the only hatred I can feel, not those who write bad Portuguese, not those whose syntax is faulty, not those who used phonetic rather that etymological spelling, but the badly written page itself, as if it were a person, incorrect syntax, as someone who ought to be flogged, the substitution of i for y, as the spit that directly disgusts me, independent of who spat it. 

Yes, because spelling is also a person. (RZ, p. 225) 

I have no political of social sense. In a way, though, I do have a highly developed patriotic sense. My fatherland is the Portuguese language. It wouldn’t grieve me if someone invaded and took over Portugal as long as they didn’t bother me personally. What I hate, with all the hatred I can muster, is not the person who writes bad Portuguese, or who does not know his grammar, or who writes using the new simplified orthography; what I hate, as if it were an actual person, is the poorly written page of Portuguese itself; what I hate, as if it were someone who deserved a beating, is the bad grammar itself; what I hate, as I hate a gob of spit independently of its perpetrator, is the modern orthography with its preference of ‘i’ over ‘y.’
For orthography is just as much a living thing as we are. (MJC, p. 233)

The monstrously long week

Listened to: Titled by Arto Lindsay, my new favorite song
Read: Dusk Litany (what is better than a good short poem?)

Ate: Cheeseburger, grilled tuna, cake, broccoli, cookies
Drank: Juice with disgusting iodine/iron supplement poured in

Outside: Heat, sunshine, pollen
Inside: Chores & tasks 

Yeah: Wore a blouse that I have hardly worn at all, making me feel better about the money I spent on it 10 years ago
Nay: 149 euro t-shirt, 27 euro body lotion 

Cursed: The moment I was ready to submit a poem & realized the title sucked
Learned: ‘Monstrous’ means large as much as it means monster-like

Visited: Frankfurt cemetery, Germany’s biggest
Dreamed: I was in prison for a minor offense. I was sentenced to a year but escaped to see my mother. I fled in the dark in uncomfortable shoes. I got to her house. I was changing into Birkenstocks & knew I had to return to prison or get more time but as I was making to return two Chinese ladies came in. They were prison reps come to apprehend me & although my story made them cry they took me back.

Made: Meatballs
Discarded: More moth-nibbled clothes

Word of the week: Purview

Pithiness: Man loves company, even if it is only that of a smoldering candle. - Lichtenberg

Nothing fits me anymore

It reached 90 degrees today, unusual for early June. I dislike hot weather and such strong sun. I had jeans and a long sleeve shirt on and that was a mistake. After work I stopped by the café where my daughter works and she brought me a coffee. My daughter is a beautiful girl who is having a hard time now. I didn’t want to disappoint her by not drinking it. A couple sips and I broke a sweat. 

Anyway, all this is an excuse to say I have a couple of poems out this month.

Nothing Fits Me Anymore is in Gravel
and Reader’s Block is in Bird’s Thumb.

I also have a poem, Electric Singer, in RHINO, which I got in the mail today. It’s a print publication so I can’t link to the poem unless they post in online, which I expect they will eventually. Still, if you like a good, eclectic annual, buy a copy of RHINO. There’s always something marvelous in there.