One day, I\u2019ll act like I\u2019ve been there before (I have<\/a>). But it\u2019s still just so thrilling to get a poem published! Moist Poetry Journal<\/a><\/em> and their multimedia<\/a> superstar<\/a> editor<\/a> Han VanderHart<\/a> were kind enough to publish my poem, \u201cwarm February watching nature documentaries.\u201d<\/a> Because it\u2019s National Poetry Month, there\u2019s even a writing prompt in there!<\/p> What I\u2019ve Been Reading This Week: <\/strong>tipped my hat on these earlier, and I\u2019m not so sure either author is going to be reading this blog, so let\u2019s skip the professional wrestling buildup into. These books rule, and pair very well with what I read last week<\/a>. I\u2019m talking, of course, about The Odyssey<\/em> by Homer translated by Robert Fagles and 99 Stories of God<\/em> by Joy Williams. <\/p> The Odyssey<\/strong><\/em> by Homer, translated by Robert Fagles, Books 1-11: <\/strong>let\u2019s get something out of the way first: in Book 8, \u201cA Day For Songs and Contests,\u201d Odysseus carves a piece of meat and has it taken to Demodocus, the blind singer\/poet who has been entertaining everyone all day and night, saying, \u201cFrom all who walk the earth our bards deserve \/ esteem and awe, for the Muse herself has taught them paths of song. She loves the breed of harpers.\u201d<\/p> What the hell was the point of the Renaissance if we didn\u2019t structure \u201cWestern Civilization\u201d around giving musician\/poets tons of money and huge chunks of roasted boar as a basic income?<\/p> Anyway, 16 years or whatever since I first read this poem, and guess what? It still rips<\/em>. Gone is the monotonous bloody warring of The Iliad<\/em>, replaced with frame narratives, flashback recounting, raw goat milk-drinking Cyclops <\/em>and the perils of libertarian society, multiple stories of Agamemnon\u2019s death (hell yeah guy sucks), plenty of sailing and dashing ships on the rocks, and perhaps most important: stanza breaks. This poem breathes a little bit, and not only because every other line isn\u2019t Chekov\u2019s Gunning<\/a> the trenches of World War I. <\/p> Real quick: I gotta mention how much I love the Telemachy<\/a>. Why? I\u2019ve been asking myself that for 16 years. Besides the \u201cwhat a wild move, not having Odysseus show up in The Odyssey <\/em>for until book five\u201d shock value, it\u2019s such a great thought to show how a person is missed when they leave. We see the hole someone\u2019s absence creates in so many people\u2019s lives<\/em>. It\u2019s also legitimately thrilling to see Telemachus\u2019s growth into a self-assured man committed to honoring his dad and protecting his mom. At one point, he crews up with another young homie and they decide it\u2019s time for them to be Guys Being Dudes and it rocks. No joke, I got the same kind of excited reading the Telemachy as I did when the Animorphs would have to save the world but lie to their parents about where they were going. Yet every time I try to explain all of this to my kid when he\u2019s watching the doctor episode of Bluey<\/em>, I am told \u201cyou\u2019re blocking the TV.\u201d<\/p> 99 Stories of God<\/strong><\/em> by Joy Williams: <\/strong>we\u2019re genre-bending again this week. I hadn\u2019t read this before, but thought it would pair well with Short Talks<\/a><\/em>. These are\u2014and again, this is my Potter Stewart showing\u2014these are more stories than poems. They are stories that excite me in the same way as poems, though. These stories are fables, fairy tales, cautionary tales, jokes, religious, blasphemous, at once Old Timey and Radically New\u2014they\u2019re great! <\/p> One thing I sometimes have with whole collections of flash fiction is I sometimes start to get existential. \u201cWho can remember all these stories,\u201d I ask. \u201cBack-to-back-to-back like this, do they really pack the same punch? Does anything anywhere mean anything at all?\u201d These aren\u2019t as bleak of thoughts as they sound\u2014Bob and I have talked on the podcast before about how sometimes the back third of a poetry manuscript can start to bleed together if you\u2019re not careful. Around the time Chloe\u2019s <\/a>Collective Gravities<\/a><\/em> came out, we had a Twitter back-and-forth comparing the best story collections to multi-course meals. You know how you want a metric ton of the noodles, but only some of the bacon-wrapped dates? Or you take a portion of steamed seasonal veggies that you feel will be good for you, because you need something good for you after those 40-50 pieces of cocktail shrimp? Might just be me. Anyway, my usual hang-ups did not flare<\/em> while reading this book. The only time I resented it was Thursday, when I was on like story #75, and I thought \u201cdamnit, I don\u2019t want<\/em> to rush through these last 24.\u201d What I\u2019m trying to tell you is this: 99 Stories of God<\/em> is the Lindt Lindor truffles of story collections. The best way to read this book is three stories a day for 33 days.<\/p> LINKS!<\/strong><\/p> Something to listen to while you browse? This is probably only interesting to the proverbial \u201cme & Neal\u201d of this blog<\/a>, but I think I found someone who\u2019s as big of a CHON freak as me. YouTuber Tman<\/a> has a whole video about why Chon is his favorite band, and he also collected every live performance of a track from Homey<\/em> into one super video. Like I said, probably only interesting to me, but when Nathan hit those tsunami drums on the into to \u201cSleepy Tea,\u201d it was on. <\/p>![\"99](\"https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/a783913e-b7e3-4845-b017-32a9aa6ab947.heic\")
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