Notes on a Hindsight page--

Update: Here's another link, an interesting reading of "The Wish for Roses."

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Just drove in from White River Junction and see that in my absence, something of mine has materialized on Sienna Latham's Hindsight, a new by-invitation site dedicated to historical museum collections around the world and the stories they tell. For Hindsight, I wrote a poem to go with a photograph (although this one is not in a public but in a private collection.)

The photograph captures a graceful moment in the life of a great-aunt of that interesting fellow, Fredric Koeppel. When he was books editor of The Commercial Appeal (Memphis), he once assigned a book of mine for review to writer and bookstore owner Corey Mesler; later, Mr. Koeppel reviewed several of my books. That's how he came to my attention. But long before that time, he was an English professor. Today he is probably best known for his wine website and blog, Bigger Than Your Head (although perhaps as much for his vast collection of mismatched socks and his wonderful homemade pizzas, both shared on facebook.)

Fredric Koeppel's photograph and account of what had happened to his pretty great-aunt broke my heart into tiny glittery pieces. As soon as I saw the picture and read the story, I knew that I would write about her. The poem is the result of a helpless wish to restore what cannot be restored--something like the flowers, stones, or tokens left on a grave. It's a reminder, too, of old times in the prairie, the ruggedness of a way of Western life that has passed away. As such, it is our story, the sometimes tragic tale of our ancestors, here or elsewhere, living a far harder life than our own.

There are places that are just as hard still, but they are few. My husband just returned from weeks spent wandering in the Kyrgyzstan Himalayas, sleeping in a flimsy tent with people who wore no gloves, dipped their frozen sardines or mutton fat in tea, and would sometimes just squat and turn their backs to the wind for hours if a snowstorm blew in. Most of us live a far cozier life, and though we may remember grandparents who lived in a shack, we are comfortable and warm and drowning in entertainment.

If you take a look at lovely Hazel, reaching toward the roses, and at the poem, you'll meet a doubly lost life. Imagine Hazel, one of us, deceived and broken, wandering at large on the planet.

Folded poems

A cheerful display of the books from www.origamipoems.com

One likeable thing about the web is the way it gives rise to new forms--my pen-friend Corey Mesler has just been published in an origami book, and you may have a copy at the price of a sheet of paper and a little ink. Here is the book, with a cover by Corey's teenage daughter Chloe. And here you may follow visual and verbal instructions on how to fold your sheet of paper, making a single cut and ending up with a small workable book. Afterward, you may read about the industrious and much-published author and bookstore owner here. A complete index of poets and places where the origami books are displayed is also available.

The House of Words (no. 19): Corey Mesler, bookseller & small press author

Corey Mesler, the Kilroy of books!

 Today novelist, short story writer, poet, and bookseller Corey Mesler talks about publishing with small presses and selling small press books.

You can find out about his many books (and many publishers) and Burke's Books, the Memphis bookshop he owns with Cheryl Mesler, at his website, http://www.coreymesler.com/, and at http://www.burkesbooks.com/. Signed copies of his books are always available through the store.



Corey and Cheryl Mesler,
co-owners of Burke's Books in Memphis

Marly:  You have published many books and chapbooks in the small press world. As a writer, can you talk about what's good (and bad--we're curious!) about that realm? As a longtime bookseller, would you talk about the obstacles and pleasures of selling small press books?

The first of his many books,
a few of which are shown here.

Corey:  The positives about small press publishing, in my experience, are passion and creativity. There are a lot of good folks doing good work for no other reward than seeing writers and their work reach readers. And some small press books are lovely creations, the work of real book artists. As more and more of the big houses make cheaper and crappier books, books made of paper and cardboard and spit, the lovingly created small press book, often, shines in comparison, or at least holds its own.

The downside to small press publishing is simple: one doesn’t get as wide a distribution. Every writer wants as many readers as possible. Every writer wants attention from the few remaining book review sources, and perhaps a well-placed ad in these same sources. Small presses, due to limited funds, simply don’t have the ability to promote like the big guys do. Though the truth is, possibly, that the big guys aren’t as supportive as they used to be either.

Which dovetails into your second question: it’s hard for small presses to make sure their wares reach bookstore shelves for these same reasons. Bookstores, especially the brick and mortar ones, have limited space, and that space is gonna go to the heavily hyped books, more often than not. But, thank God, there are great independent bookstores still left in America. There you have a wider range of choices. As the owner of a very small, cash-strapped, independent, locally-owned bookstore, I would love to give more space to small press books. As a proud small press author I try to read more of the work coming from small presses and hence try to sell more. But, I won’t kid you: it’s tough these days. It’s tough, really, to sell anything in our little brick and mortar shoppe. I ask you this question in return: what happened to browsing? That to me seems to be a core question. What happened to the readers who like to go into stores and discover something new simply by poking around?

Corey Mesler & more

Corey Mesler is one of the writers I consulted on my upcoming posts on writing and publishing--I asked him about the small press world from the point of views of writer and bookseller. You'll see him again later. But now he has a new interview up at Flutter. He is both poet and novelist, and Flutter asked him to put on his poetry hat. Here are a couple of bites from the pie:

10. What is your ultimate goal as a poet? Are there any specific awards or prizes you strive for?

Oh, I don’t know. I feel like I have been so lucky already. My goal as a writer, years ago, was to have one book in print, one ISBN that I could call my own. So, to have, as my loving wife calls it, a body of work, well, it’s just too sweet. Of course, I would love to have a novel published by FS&G, or Dalkey Archive, or McSweeney’s, or Dzanc, but, what writer wouldn’t? But, realistically, I am not going to land at Knopf. I am very happy with every single publishing credit I have ever received, with every press who has ever published me. I am a small press author and that is, I believe, a fine thing to be. I have received many Pushcart nominations, and, I suppose, just once appearing in that formidable year-end tome would be grand. Oh, and an Oscar. Someday I want an Oscar.

2. What is your writing process?

After years of late night, sad bastard, flesh-lonely, darkly scrivened verse in imitation of whomever I was currently reading, after years of zero discipline, I finally, after marrying my current wife who, among other things, centered me, became an early morning writer. I get up before anyone else, make the coffee for my wife and daughter, and then go to my room. I am normally in front of the keyboard by 6 a.m., every day of the week. Discipline came late to me but, at least, it did come.

* * *

And now I must go write some more and also whisk about the downstairs, attempting to make house-drudging light, before I dash off. Good week for lunch: had a lovely one with painters Yolanda Sharpe and Ashley Cooper and now am going out with novelists Peggy Leon and Alice Lichtenstein. Happy (slightly belated) birthday, Peg! Her new novel from Permanent Press is here.

Readings for the 12 Days of Christmas: Lucid Rhythms at Epiphany

It’s Epiphany and the end of Readings for the 12 Days of Christmas. I entirely missed posting yesterday because it was a child-ferrying day, and I had a round trip to make to Annandale-on-Hudson. This trip is always curious and full of missed-road risks because it is a patchwork: West Kurley Corners and Lowe Road at Seward (which I missed this time) and River and all sorts of tinies out in the boondocks. But I must say that I always see the most fabulous sunsets on my way back from Dutchess County. Since I was still a bit under the weather, I read a bit and then toppled into bed when I came home without giving more than an “eh” to the Readings for the 12 Days. But today I shall toss in an extra poem or two to make up for it. I’m featuring another online magazine.

David W. Landrum is editor of Lucid Rhythms, an online ‘zine out of Grand Rapids, Michigan. David is a writer and “a professor of Humanities at Cornerstone University, Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has published poetry and short stories in many magazines and journals, including Web Del Sol, The Barefoot Muse, Driftwood Review, Small Brushes, and many others. He is currently at work on a series of poems about 16th Century English poet Robert Herrick.”

Here’s a poem of his that’s not from Lucid Rhythms but from Web del Sol:

Abacus

Shoved side-to-side
by someone's hands—
God's, I'd have to say—
but my own too, since sometimes
I am hardly me—
loving out of pity, camel-considerate,
bearing the burdens of
someone else's soul.
No matter how they bunch
on one side or the other—
I mean the beads—
balance operates—my lacquered frame—
you understand—yes, it keeps me stable—
an equation—your gestures
adding, subtracting—
changing me at your finger's beck.

Ann Drysdale is invariably smart and amusing, and a grand wielder of British slang. She is an interesting poet to follow. This poem is sweeter than most I’ve seen by her, but it’s playful.

Ann Drysdale

Nuns, Skating

Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room
Because their spirits can escape beyond
The place that holds them in respectful gloom
To seek the Lord beside the frozen pond.
There He will make their laughter into bells
And turn their breath to incense. He will show
Shadows of magi on the distant hills
And flights of angels shining in the snow.
He will make rushes sing and grasses dance
To the intrusive music of their chatter,
Whispering in their ears that, just this once,
They too can walk as He did, on the water.
Oh, may the year to come be full of these
Small serendipitous epiphanies.

Forgotten your Wordsworth? Here’s the first “Nuns fret not”:

Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent's Narrow Room

Nuns fret not at their convent's narrow room;
And hermits are contented with their cells;
And students with their pensive citadels;
Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom,
High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells,
Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells:
In truth the prison, unto which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for me,
In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound
Within the Sonnet's scanty plot of ground;
Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
Should find brief solace there, as I have found.

Ann Drysdale is a British poet, born near Manchester, raised in London, married in Birmingham, ran a small holding and brought up three children on the North York Moors and now lives in South Wales. She was a journalist for many years, writing, among other things, the longest-running by-line column in the Yorkshire Evening Post, which she later made into a series of books. Her recent publications have included two memoirs, Three-three, Two-two, Five-six and Discussing Wittgenstein, both from Cinnamon Press, and a quirky guidebook in the Real Wales series - Real Newport, from Seren. Of her four volumes of poetry from Peterloo, the most recent, Between Dryden and Duffy, appeared in 2005. A fifth collection, Quaintness and Other Offences, was recently published by Cinnamon. She is also the current holder of the Dylan Thomas prize for Poetry in Performance.

Here’s a triolet by Marybeth Rua-Larsen.

Hanging the Wreath
I nail it to the door; it doesn't swing
or fall or blow away; I make it stick,
unlike our holidays, your latest fling,
I nail it to the door. It doesn't swing,
like you, proposing with a diamond ring --
and then surprised by No; I've learned the trick:
I nail it to the door; it doesn't swing
or fall or blow away; I make it stick.

Marybeth Rua-Larsen has had poetry published or forthcoming in The Paterson Literary Review, Concho River Review, kaleidowhirl, Blue Unicorn and The Worcester Review, among others, as well as the anthology Stories from Where We Live: The North Atlantic Coast. She was a semi-finalist in the 1999 Discovery/The Nation poetry contest and a finalist for the 2007 Philbrick Poetry Award.

I mentioned Paul Stevens earlier because he edits that imaginative ‘zine, The Flea. Caractacus has many moods, of which this is one:

Australian Christmas Carol

The bushfire's scorching the Santa display,
As the westerly blows the cinders through –
So give me a dozen cold, cleansing ales!
Give me a dozen, do!

Let's go to the beach, play backyard cricket,
Try out new games on the X-box too –
As long as I'm drinking some premium lagers!
Give me a dozen, do!

The temperature's hitting forty degrees,
The blowflies are eating the barbeque –
So give me another dozen cold ales!
Give me a dozen, do!

Paul Christian Stevens teaches literature and historiography to senior high school students, and has widely published verse and prose in both print and pixel. He was born in Yorkshire, lives in Australia, and dreams of Catalunya.

Corey Mesler is productive and widely published:

Again to the Mountain

I asked the mountain my secret name.
I asked it to show me its mouth.
The day was hot like Easter.
Slowly, the clouds began to form a
story, one I had heard many
years ago and discounted. I raised my
hand as if to shade my eyes.
I raised it as if I knew the answer.
The mountain knew my wretched perfidy.

Corey Mesler has published prose and/or poetry in Turnrow, Adirondack Review, American Poetry Journal, Paumanok Review, Blood Orange, Barnwood, Yankee Pot Roast, Monday Night, Elimae, H_NGM_N, Center, Poet Lore, Forklift OH, Euphony, Rattle, Jabberwock Review, Dicey Brown, Cordite, Smartish Pace, others. . His first full-length collection of poems, Some Identity Problems, is just out from Foothills Publishing. His poem, “Sweet Annie Divine,” was chosen for Garrison Keillor’s The Writer’s Almanac. He has been a book reviewer, fiction editor, university press sales rep, grant committee judge, father and son. "With my wife I own Burke’s Book Store, one of the country’s oldest (1875) and best independent bookstores. I can be found at http://www.coreymesler.com/."

John Milbury-Steen

Incarnate Print

The empty space in space excelsus high
is safe but getting down to earth is nigh
impossible, so when they take a dive,
of all the stars that shoot their inner gem
to try to make it down to Bethlehem,
few falling rocks of ice or gods survive
intact, but fall while flaming forth as tinder
and hit the ground, reduced to smoking cinder.
Into the manger of incarnate print
have I here fallen hoping that I might
be beautiful or pleasing in your sight.
Give me your blessing and I shall not want,
else this blood in ink will then have yet
another incarnation to regret.

John Milbury-Steen has poems published or forthcoming in 14 by 14, 32 Poems, Able Muse, The Anglican Theological Review, The Beloit Poetry Journal, Best Poem, Blue Unicorn, Bumbershoot, The Centrifugal Eye, Chimaera, Christianity and Literature, Contemporary Sonnet, Dark Horse, The Deronda Review (Neovictorian/Cochlea), The Evansville Review, Kayak, Hellas, The Innisfree Poetry Journal, The Listening Eye, The Piedmont Literary Review, Scholia Satyrica, Shenandoah, Shattercolors, the Shit Creek Review and Umbrella. He served in the Peace Corps in Liberia, West Africa and did a Master's in Creative Writing with Ruth Stone at Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana. He currently teach English as a Second Language at Temple University, Philadelphia.

Want more?

Try the flying trapeze: you may fly here with the greatest of ease

Twitterbrained

I'm trying Twittering. Just signed up and already Corey Mesler has found me. How is that possible?

Movie moment
Harry Potter: We have something worth fighting for, something that Voldemort doesn't have.
N, age 12, under his breath: Girls.

Long Grass Books no. 5, Corey Mesler

Some Identity Problems


Corey Mesler is a penpal of mine—met in the e-aether some time after he reviewed a book of mine for the Memphis Commercial Appeal—and so I want to pay some notice to the fact that he has published that most-ignored thing, a book of poems. FootHills Publishing has stitched up Some Identity Problems as an attractive book, generous in its profusion of poems.

You will never meet this amusing, charming poet and novelist on tour because he is agoraphobic and stays home in Memphis, but you can meet the joy, whimsy, love, anxiety, and contradiction in his poems. Many of these poems are modest in scale but have reach. As a whole they are kaleidoscopic—swerving from low to high in diction, playful, belated in feeling or elated, revealing a persona that struggles to find a center, meaning, worldview. He frolics in the realm of the absurd, then evinces a heart of ripped-open sincerity. He bumps from sacred to profane, leaping from monkey to man to deity. His favorite tropes involve repetition and variations on it, startling metaphor, and the yoking of opposites—a Barcalounger linked to mythic depths.

If you wish to buy a copy, the ideal place to buy is from the bookstore that Corey and his wife Cheryl run in Memphis—Burke’s Book Store, the oldest bookstore in Memphis, founded in 1875. That’s what I’m doing because I can support the book of poetry and bookstore at once. Mine is beautifully signed, so be sure and ask for an inscription!

Addendum:
If you'd like to ask Corey a question here, feel free!
I'll roust him for an answer.

CHTHONIC LIBRARY

The red book we keep high on a shelf
where children can’t reach.
The blue book is for those who won’t
read anything else. The black
book is where I write everything down,
the names of the children,
the reasons we keep the books, and the
way out, if that becomes necessary.

AN ORRERY FOR CHLOE

I will paint the paper sky
with pinpoints of light,
put a smile on the
waif-like moon.
I will walk with you onto
the sunbeams
that color our porch like
a prism exploding.
And, in the end, if the
wayward universe
will not bend to our every
wish, I will filibuster
god to give you all the
comforts of home,
on this rickety planet, even
as she speeds through
space on a collision course
with eternal profusion.

WHAT MOVES IS PAST

“A lonely moon is mirrored in the cold pool.
Down in the pool there is not really a moon…”
Hanshan

By remote water I have sat
thinking of this and that
and speaking names into
the water, as if there I would
receive back echo. Those
who no longer are near,
those who no longer care,
all those who took me into
themselves and then moved on,
I talk to the river about them.
The river itself is never still,
but it answers something in me
which is deep and almost beyond
recollection. It answers that those
names are now made of silence.

Yet another addition, October 30th: I took a peek at Corey's publisher, and feel that I have been remiss in neglecting to mention how interesting and industrious they appear. Poet and publisher Michael Czarnecki writes of the small company that "FootHills Publishing was formed in 1986 for the purpose of getting into print the words of poets who found it hard to get their work out to the public other than at readings or in the occasional magazine. The first few books were published in conjunction with Great Elm Press, operated by Walt Franklin. Since then, FootHills Publishing has released more than 250 chapbooks or books." The company has all the virtues and determination of a cottage industry: "I do the editorial work - Carolyn handles the book production and shipping and our two boys, Grayson (16) and Chapin (12), help with production. Grayson also assists with some design work. All of our books are now hand-stitched and we have received many compliments on the quality of the work, both in content and production." The picture of Corey's book below doesn't show the stitching, but it's quite evident and attractive when one sees a copy, as is the good quality of the materials. I looked them up and see that they are just barely west of the finger lakes, and probably got as much snow as we did yesterday...

Corey Mesler & The-Fall-from-Paradise Interview, etc.

MESLER & YOUMANS: TALK

On Tuesday, May 23, you may read COREY MESLER
& THE FALL FROM PARADISE INTERVIEW at Sue Henderson’s PublishersMarketplace blog. In it, “Marly Youmans talks to writer and bookseller Corey Mesler about the golden age of bookselling, his more than 30 years in the business, 9/11, the internet, book-browsing, Memphis, human nature, Fredric Koeppel, love, and destiny.”

This one will be a funny and sad interview, well worth perusing for book lovers. It has already made one reader "tear up," though only one reader has read it so far... See the little guys at the independents tilt (and sometimes fall) against the big guys.

These days, writers can't afford to ignore the behemoths of chain and online bookstores, but we really hate to see an independent bookseller lying wounded and bleeding by the side of the road. Let's keep some places where bookstores are governed by a local bookseller's passion, where local writers are supported by community, and where good books stay on the shelves after the "3-month window" (probably down to 2 by now!) for a new book closes.

Here’s a sample clip:

Youmans:
Last week I wrote, “Besides, you have to love a guy like Corey Mesler who would be so astonishingly foolhardy as to be a poet, a short story writer, a novelist, and a bookseller. That's somebody living on the front quad of risk! Then there's Cheryl, bookseller, mother of two, spouse-of-Corey: undoubtedly among the intrepid of this world.” It seems just as true this week. Despite Walmart and bookstore chains and web stores, you both go on striving to make a little world that words in good order and people can inhabit together. In the face of havoc and hard times, can you say something about why you chose such a life—why you choose it still?

Mesler:
It chose me. When I was 18, a mooncalf, a dope, I didn’t know anything about books. I didn’t even know that they came out in hardback and then a year later in paperback. I didn’t know Updike from Upjohn. I didn’t know Proust rhymed with roost. So, why was I led to apply at my neighborhood Waldenbooks? God thumped me on the back of the head, and said, here, mooncalf, here is your destiny.

Oh, and, thanks for the love.

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RAVENS ON THE WING

For those who ordered Raven Mockers during the promotion: the Ravens are still flying from the nest! I know, I know, but I ran out of cute little boxes! I suppose one has to suffer a bit for a bargain--at least, if it's my bargain.

I got punchy doing inscriptions and wrote James Simpson some hortative doggerel from the Witchmaster on his book. Jim, you have a unique copy! As for the rest of you readers (and sometimes budding writers), you may find all kinds of weird things (feathers! eggs in nests! ridiculous comments!) on yours if I inscribed it on Friday night. Afterward I dropped into bed at precisely 2:00 a.m. and dreamed of the Palace. (Okay, that's a fiction. I didn’t, so far as I know, but it sounds right. Might've.)

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ONE EENTSY MIRACLE OF BOOKS

Something marvelous has happened in the book world. N, age 8, has fallen utterly in love with a book. He found it in the ongoing Library Sale box at Huntington Library in Oneonta, and it is--drum roll, ta da! and confetti--Marjorie Cowley's Dar and the Spear-Thrower (Clarion Books, 1994), a novel about a Cro-Magnon boy living in southeastern France some 15,000 years ago. He checks traps, climbs for healing plants, receives the tribal mark of manhood, meets a stranger, ventures to another tribe, learns to carve and use a spear thrower, and makes peace with a difficult uncle. And one little boy is deep in the wonders and perils of the past.

Now that's magic.

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