Juliet Cook's Blog, page 158

dark purple

Three new photos from August 2011, taken at Lakeside Ohio.



Also please feel free to read my interview, linked to at the post below this one. It is my first poetry-related interview in over a year.

profiles in poetics: ME!

'women's quarterly conversation' presents the first long poetry related 'interview' I have completed in over a year; it focuses on my stroke/my aphasia/my loss of love AND how this has affected my poetry.



partake here: https://womensquarterlyconversation.wordpress.com/



a small snippet: "I sometimes feel as if I am buzzing around from one feeling to the next like an unstable swarm; like a bee sea creature hybrid who doesn't know how to fly or swim."



a ghostly Juliet photo (taken by Joe Gallagher):

this tornado loves you

Semi-related to my small love post below, today I feel compeled to post this Neko Case song. I've liked Neko Case for years, so did D. (ex-husband), he & I saw her in concert together, among a number of other concerts we attended. I have not been to a single music concert in over a year now.



I pilfered this Neko Case song link from a facebook friend of mine's site; he had noted that he & his woman were seeing her in concert tonight at the Beachland Ballroom; a fun little concert venue near Euclid OH.; which is also a place that D. & me & his brother J. had been to together quite a few times; and again, I have not been there since; & sometimes I miss it & sometimes I miss them; but alas, none of that is part of my life anymore right now.



So even though I like this song (and at this point in time, 'this tornado loves you' strikes me as a strangely pertinent phrase), it also made me feel a bit sad.



Perhaps I ought to plan a concert with someone else semi-soon?

FEMALE INFESTATION(poem culled from old blog post about...

FEMALE INFESTATION



(poem culled from old blog post about girlhood thoughts and child play)



cutting girls out of catalogs, holding child-sized scissor blades deep inside



scissoring images of women, categorizing them into portals



making flashcards out of some of them, gluing them onto squares



a hole series comprised of busty ladies, in the back



subject subconscious mind to skimpy assets



make fun of little girls' matchbox cars and transformers



rap their knuckles, slap their heads, retail their brains into bikini zone palettes



slash me into desirable womanly creature over under



conjure up my broken doll legs, sink me inside my odd doll factory



mounted on a strange colored vase – I am a poisonous beautyskull lollipop

love

Everyone has their own definitions of 'love', which can make the word very challenging to grasp and believe in - especially after you've lost something you thought was real love. For me, in terms of romantic love, it's a word I don't usually like to hear unless the person saying it really feels strongly about me as an individual (instead of feeling strongly about sexually-oriented women in general) AND expects to feel that strongly (or stronger) for a very long time. Much as part of me might crave the word, I don't really crave easy little blurts, fakery, or 'love' from a person who loves 100 others. I only want it if the person feels truly intense about me as an individual; if the person adores the way I am (my good parts and my imperfections) and will not quickly/easily get tired of me, give up, or back away all of the sudden.

FLOWING (ebbing) FLOWING

Had a bothersome phone conversation yesterday, during which it was suggested that the reason a lot of people probably back away from me is because I talk too much, revealing too much personal information, revealing stuff that most people aren't comfortable with or interested in talking/hearing about.

Part of the reason this came up is because I was talking a bit about how part of me felt a bit badly that I did not attend my 20 year high school reunion this past weekend - whereupon I was reminded that I often say I don't do well in group settings anyway - which is true - AND that I often semi-reconnect with someone, but then our conversational connections semi-suddenly seem to end and that is probably because of the too much/too detailed way I express myself - and that made me feel a little bad/sad, because I realized that was probably true too.

Occasionally I do crave fitting in a little better, but I don't really want to tone myself down in order for that to happen. If I talk too much for some people's liking (or talk about subject matter that most people don't like), then fine; they don't have to talk/listen to me. Yes that sometimes bums me out, but so be it. I'm not going to force myself upon anyone.

I want to be myself and I want people to like the way I am and the way I express myself, even if it IS sometimes a little over the top or extreme or oddly contradictory seeming or whatever. I'd rather be that way than toned done borderline fake. I mean I'll tone myself down at a job obviously. But real life? No thank you. Why would I want to tone myself down for a friend and then have a friend that really doesn't care that much about me in a detail oriented manner? I like more real, intense caring.

Thirteen Myna Birds New Snippets (& more)

slip under my tongue, our fingers will fuse and split, my body convulsing – so fertile and so brazen – magnificent desire, hearts bloody – the smell of ginger, sea salt, and starlight – loud music – deep hands – pink handled guillotine – whirling – eyelash-thick wires - egg-speckled swirl –eyes splitting themselves - love comes in many forms, higher then drugs or heaven

The above snippets are fused from the poems within the newly updated Thirteen Myna Birds. Here it is in its entirety: http://13myna.blogspot.com/

Poem #13 is by Margaret Bashaar from her chapbook called LETTERS FROM ROOM 27 OF THE GRAND MIDWAY HOTEL, soon to be published in artsy print by my Blood Pudding Press.

Next month's Thirteen Myna Birds update will include another poem from Margaret Bashaar's LETTERS and the chapbook and the chapbook will be available for sale in all its artsy glory within the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/BloodPuddingPress.

Please feel free to take a gander at the shop and/or make a purchase – and stay tuned for the new strange innards next month!

Marabou Deaths Head

I've been feeling low energy lately and that bothers me on several levels. I've always been a high energy, productive, passionate person, so feeling low energy is not my style and it worries me.

I've been frequently overly tired and am starting to think what if I have cancer or something (granted, I can sometimes be some sort of...what's the word? not "nymphomaniac" which suddenly semi-randomly spurted out of my head; not "kleptomaniac" either; probably not maniacal anything, but the word for people with a tendency to exaggerate possible health issues they might have; I don't do that all the time, BUT if I am more frequently than usual experiencing some symptom of physical discomfort, then that also seems to lead to more mental discomfort for me too).

So lately I've been thinking, "What if I have cancer?" and "What if I'm pregnant?" and then realizing that I can't even remember the last time I've been to the doctor for a regular physical not to mention a gynecological exam (and why did the word "kleptomaniac" spurt forth again, before my brain got "gynecological"?;) I can hardly remember time/timing at all, but I do know that in more recent year(s), I had so many non-regular hospital/doctor appointments, that the regular visits stopped AND my health insurance changed AND my location changed and I've never been to a doctor in my current locale, so…

My over-tiredness made me think of cancer, because I remember my ex-husband telling me about how his first wife (who suddenly died young of cancer) had early symptoms of losing her energy and feeling overly tired. My pregnancy concern is because my stomach seems to be sticking out a little more than usual and feeling a bit oddly uncomfortable too. Is it my stomach or my cervix? I am not entirely sure. Do I need gynecological testing? Who wants to give it to me? (Just kidding and teasing my own sudden frequent infiltration of the "nymphomaniac" word.)

Speaking of teasing and words, this morning I thought about how yesterday my dad was jokingly making fun of someone because he drove past their garage sale sign and they had spelled the word "sale" wrong; they had spelled it "sail'. Even though I didn't say anything about this out loud, I IMMEDIATELY thought something like, "Well what if the person who wrote that sign had a stroke and that's why there spelling is off?" I used to be an excellent speller, but now I have trouble spelling easy little words; for example, the word of that thing you take flight upon at an airline - is it spelled "plane" or "plain"? I think it's "plane" but I'm not sure; I'm never sure. In fact, editing this very blog-style piece of writing, mainly due to spelling reasons, is literally giving me a headache right now. Oftentimes when I am unsure how to spell an easy word, I just switch to a different word (often a bigger word, oddly enough), so at least I have that capability.

Back to my possible new health issues, maybe I have just not been sleeping very well. Maybe I have often been staying up too late and ought to work harder on adhering to a more consistent sleep schedule. In any case, I sure did not stay up too late last night for cripes sake.

I was at my sister's place for several hours yesterday evening (with family members, dinner etc...) and got back to my place a little after 7:00. My other sister and her family checked out my new place for a little bit and then left. I played with Sockeye for a little bit. By the time it was only a little after 8:00, I was feeling really tired. This is nothing new these days. However, despite feeling tired, I usually stay up and work on things until about 2:00 A.M. (sometimes even later), in part because getting things done takes me longer than it used to. So last night I told myself I'd have a cup of coffee and then start working on Margaret's chapbook for a while. I started drinking that cup of coffee and after just a few sips, I felt so tired that I told myself I would lie down for half an hour or so and then get into my swing of things. I'm not usually a nap taker at all, so this was already unusual for me. I took another sip of coffee and then placed my coffee next to my bed and laid down.

It wasn't even 9:00 yet when I laid down, but I ended up laying down and resting until after 11:00, STILL felt really tired after that, and so decided that instead of getting up at midnight and then maybe staying up way too late, I was just going to bed for the night. So I did. I meant to bed at 9:00 for fuck sake.

Since I went to bed at 9:00, I was not about to sleep in as late as I usually do, so I got up at about 5:30 in the morning. It was actually quite interesting to get up much earlier than usual (even though I STILL felt tired) because when I first took Sockeye out for a walk, I loved the cool almost autumnal way it felt outside.

While walking Sockeye, I saw this other little disabled creature (I can't think of its name; it's a creature that is very similar in size and shape to a mouse, but has a different kind of mouth). Unlike some people, I like mice and mousy critters. This critter was alive but lying on its back, moving around as if it couldn't get upright on its stomach. I carefully used my leg to shift it upright, but then found out that something was seriously wrong with it, because it swiftly shifted onto its back again; then I realized that it was uncomfortably twitching rather than simply stuck in an unusual position. I made a second attempt to position it upright, but no luck. The creature continued to twitch and I felt strangely sad.

A few minutes later, I took Sockeye back into our home, but then went back outside with my camera and took a few pictures of the twitching creature (only a few, thinking that if someone happened to see me doing so, that might seem rather perverted, or worse yet what if they thought I had smashed the creature and now was taking perverse photos; this is the way my weird mind works sometimes). Interestingly enough, less than a month ago, I took a substantial amount of photos of a dead baby mouse (as did my artsy photographer friend K. who was visiting me for a few days, thus I am not the only one who enjoys unusual photos), but that creature was dead not twitching and about to die.

Less than half an hour later, when I walked back out to look again, it was gone. Perhaps a bird seized it up.

As for me, despite having now been up for more than five hours (whereas I would usually just be getting up at this hour), I have not gotten much accomplished yet today, I am STILL feeling tired, and my head hurts.



P.S. Mole. (Pasta.)

Designer V's inside Burning Grapes

Read three of my Designer Vaginas in The Burning Grape:

http://theburninggrape.blogspot.com/2011/05/works.html

Then scroll down and partake if you would like more.

Thirteen Designer Vaginas (Snip Pivot)

NEW!

A few signed copies of my Thirteen Designer Vaginas are now available in my own etsy shop too!

http://www.etsy.com/shop/BloodPuddingPress?ref=pr_shop_more

Find out more about this new poetry chapbook via my post below.