poems that dance on a faultline... @Mistress_Tweet on #That Strapless Bra in Heaven ...Mary Meriam-reviews #poems

That Strapless Bra in Heaven on Amazon. 

Thank you, Mary, although I'm really not erudite. I simply remember

books I read in college. Sarah 

 Mary Meriam

 5.0 out of 5 stars

 dazzling, intellectual, brave

 Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2020

 Mary Meriam

 5.0 out of 5 stars dazzling, intellectual, brave

 Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2020

Sarah Sarai throws her balls of erudition in the air and juggles them into poems that dance on a faultline between frolic and rage. What does “that strapless bra in heaven” represent? It’s a subversive, underwire, feminist image: breasts free of straps, comfortably supported, floating like angels. It’s also a lesbian image: a symbol of 

pink and lacy bliss. “Who wouldn’t want to spend millennia  / in a fine female breast?” Sarai asks queer questions and answers them in a dazzling milieu of her own creation. No one writes like Sarah Sarai.

The Next Big Thing: I Go Viral

"The Next Big Thing" has been going around for a few weeks now like a flu you hope to get. Part chain letter, part credo, authors are asked to respond to ten questions AND to tag five more writers to do the same.  I was tagged by poet and fiction writer Rachel Dacus (click Here for her Q/A).

Here I go:

What is the title of your book?
It's not a book, it's a chapbook:  I Feel Good.

Where did the idea for the book come from?
Grammar, as in the direct-address comma.

What genre is your book?
 E-chapbook of poems, swashingbuckling epic, romance novel with a frisson of manifesto, a hint of saffron.

If your book were made into a movie, what actors would you choose to play the part of your characters?
Penélope Cruz as Jezebel.

What is a one-sentence synopsis of your book?
You can't win, so try.

How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
It came in winds, not drafts.

Who or what inspired the writing of your book?

The philosophy of Sun Ra; the musical stylings of Swedenborg; the grandeur and compassion of Emma Goldman.

What else about your book might pique the reader’s interest?
Poem #1 is "You, Jezebel" (note direct-address comma). In its own way, this poem questions the habitual and age-old vilification of Jezebel, Ahab's wife who was greatly misrepresented by history, which, it turns out, is written by historians who are hired by the victors. Such as the victory was. Get a clue, history. No one wins for long, or in the long run. Jezebel, for instance, was not unspiritual nor a-religious. She continued to worship goddesses and gods of her parents, and that served as insult and vexing provocation to Mr. Deuteronomy.

Who published or will publish your book?
It will be published in the next few months by Beard of Bees, Eric Elshtain, editor.

My tagged writers for next Wednesday:

I'll link when links are given to me (unless they post on Facebook, which is also good), but the writers are Melissa Studdard, Mary Meriam (more, forthcoming).
 

Ms. Magazine...I'm in a Q&A with Stonborough and Meriam

by Andrea Heimer

Please take a look at the Ms. Magazine blog posting of April 23, 2012. [Link below.]

Mary Meriam, poet and editor of Lavender Review, poses questions for Elaine Stonborough, poet, and me, poet et al.  I'll let you follow the links on the posting (links which reveal splendid insights into Stonborough, who is English and a scholar, and Meriam, who is tri-state-al, those states being New York, New Jersey, and somewhere in a forest region in the middle of this continent).

"A Woman, A Lesbian, A Poet" on the Ms. Magazine blog.  I'm honored to be part of this.

Lavender: new journal; new poem; was the Faerie Queen swathed in lavender?

Proud here, yes, but not too proud to reveal I did not know the meaning of epithalamion when Mary Meriam, in response to a comment I had made on a listserv, invited me to submit to issue #2 of the journal Lavender. The theme being Epithalamion, which, when last spotted by this blogger, was in the fine hands of Edmund Spenser, 1552–1599, in his poem entitled "Epithalamion."

Spenser died young, at age 41. And lived in different times. From wikipedia: "Through his poetry Spenser hoped to secure a place at court, which he visited in Raleigh's company to deliver his most famous work, the Faerie Queene." Poetry as political influence? Make it so.

I digress. The word epithalamion is generally used to mean a song or poem in honor of a bride or bridegroom. Editor Mary Meriam's comments are the theme she choose and response from poets are wry and can be read here, here being http://lavrev.net.

My poem (it's all about me, always has been, always will be until I catch on and God knows when that'll happen), "Longing for a Blue Sky," is there (click on the title), next to Emily Roysdon's very beautiful photograph, The Piers Untitled (#2), 2010. I write "I take the Hudson River as my lover / the Southwest as my comforter / Mount Shasta as my tomb."

While I don't want to tie down my meaning, I did have in mind when I wrote those lines an early decision of mine, in my twenties, to end my days/retire in one of the three beautiful landscapes I knew, the Hudson Valley, northern New Mexico, or northern California.

Other poets in this issue are Marilyn Hacker, Rose Kelleher, R. Nemo Hill and a host of others accessible through, ta-da, the table of contents.