April 2003 Archives

I just looked at my blog and noticed there weren't any entries. That's because the blog is configured to show only the last seven days of posts. I guess it's been over a week!

Seeing the empty blog made me think of my fondness for white space in poems. The white space at the end of lines and the white space surrounding the poem.

I'm interested in what happens, for example, in the white space at the end of the line as you move through it to the beginning of the next line. How do those events in the white spaces at the end of lines help shape the poem? What is the structural forces of the white space?

I forgot to mention that the official time of the Meramec Maniac's River to River relay was 12:07:49.

Yesterday I ran the River to River Relay with seven colleagues from Meramec. 8 Runners. 80 Miles. From the Mississippi to the Ohio River. Through the hills, some quite steep, of Southern Illinois. When we started, looking west, we could see over the Mississippi River to Missouri. When we ended, looking east, we could see over the Ohio to Kentucky. It was very much like running in paradise.

Now I'm trying to think of poems about running. Couldn't find too much online, except for these and a less than glowing review of Running on Main Street, a chapbook of poems with an interesting title and a cover of a runner.

Why can't writers use the form of writing being discussed to discuss that form of writing? I just read an article on the art of blogging in which George Siemens calls blogging a new medium for connecting and interacting, yet his article does none of that. The article is your typical dead paper sort of essay. I was wanting to know instead what a blog essay about blogging would be like.

Terrible weather this morning for the St. Louis Marathon. Mid 30's with steady wind and rain, often sleet, at times snow. I ran the half marathon segment of the race, and the first ten miles were fine, despite the weather. But when I turned around at the ten mile mark and headed back to the city, running into a brisk wind, I got terribly cold, especially my hands. After the race it took me a good ten minutes just to change my socks. But overall, a great day. A good run. A time better than anticpated.

There's a rally for peace occurring here at Meramec today. Maybe a hundred or so students are on the lawn. It is in fact a beautiful, almost summer like, day. Peace, a lasting peace, would be the true shock and awe. Rilke's terrible angles come to mind. But there are students outside heckling the speakers, telling them to shut up and go home. With such people, there'll never be peace.

There's nothing better than a reliable online poetry journal. Stirring is one such site. Like the first of the month, it's always there, a new issue on the 1st of every month. Erin Elisabeth has gathered around her a talented bunch of young writers in Upstate New York, all of whom do a fantastic editorial job ensuring Stirring remains a reliable read.