Live Nude Poems

from Julia Cohen at  http://onthemessiersideofneat.blogspot.com/2013/06/open-letter-to-mark-edmundson.html Dear Mark Edmundson, I read your article, “Poetry Slam,” in the latest issue of  Harper’s and I’d like to respond directly to your “slam” of contemporary poetry by offering the same audience an alternative perspective: Using only brief fragments of single poems from only 9 living poets (including 1 Canadian, 1 Irish, and 1 actually dead)(endnote 1), Mark Edmundson lambasts the current state of American poetry. I think it’s important to bring to the attention of a larger readership the recent misdirected and lazy criticisms lavished upon contemporary poets that distract from the depth, diversity, and relevance of the work itself. Yes, some readers actually seek out and find poetry that is intellectually, emotionally, and relationally vital. There are two basic cause/effect accusations in “Poetry Slam” that are worthwhile to dissect to show the dubious connections and...

Revere at 92 Degrees Cops swirl the rotary like feral cats or cock- roaches while in the beachhouse bathroom someone is fucking someone or having it out with their violent bowels at 10:30 AM. If I were a horse I’d be split-hoofed but sedate, a little out of my field lathered with ocean spume the dirt of a thousand filled diapers abandoned to sand or caught in kelp washed up from Nahant or the Back Bay or fuck--the Azores? England? On the road opposite the beach cops stop a latino kid on a skateboard (I don’t know why it takes three cars) and send him off in a different direction. My kids are yank- ing at my shorts so we hit the beach sand and broken bottles with the occasional needle or nip bottle. It’s a grand public place America’s first public beach. A horse cop trots along the beach but the horse leaves a sodden dump in front of kids who have nothing to do but play with it while their dark- skinned mothers scream in three different tongues to s...