if. this.

if Semele had a mortgage
she would have been happy
to have Zeus
halfway

a quickie in the backroom
when Hera turned her head

then skirts down
back to work
a pat and a kiss
goodbye

but no

too much time on her hands

it was gimme all you got
and baby, you'll be sorry
and so she was

but for her curiousity
I have this glass of red

and a scattering
of Dionysian dreams

wondering about persephone

Pomme de Granada
Originally uploaded by The Department.


a found poem

I wonder now about Demeter and Persephone

Maybe Persephone was glad
To run off with the king of death
To his underground realm

Maybe Persephone thought Hades
Was the infinitely cooler older man
Who held the knowledge she sought

Maybe she loved the darkness
The six months of winter
The pomegranates
The freedom from her mother

Maybe she knew
That to be truly alive
Death had to be a part
Of the picture

Just as winter must


Another one found in Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost.

I’m a chapter away from putting this book to bed and I still can’t decide if I like it. But I’ve enjoyed the ride – highly meditative, impressionistic. Not sure that we’ll arrive anywhere in particular by the time I close the cover – but the read is like a long desert ride -- good alone for what it is, just then, and for the way it takes you places off the map you didn't quite anticipate.

fondling the calabash

In the Popol Vuh, The Mayan Book of the Dawn of Life and the Glories of Gods and Kings, the severed head of One Hunahpuh, one of the Hero Twins, winds up in a calabash tree (long story) -- a position which he uses to full advantage when the lovely maiden Blood Moon stops by. He spits in her hand, subsequently impregnating her with twins -- and so our story begins again.

(Being one with a point to make, Hunahpu explains as his spit finds its mark that now the father's face will survive his son, even after his own face has rotted away and left nothing but bone.)

It's a great read. Honest.

santiago atitlan

santiago atitlan
Originally uploaded by suttonhoo.

"Before the world was made, only Lake Atitlan existed at the center of everything. Everything was covered with water. Then the three volcanoes grew out of the lake and lifted up the sky to support it. Today, when our town is threatened with disaster or enemies try to attack us, these volcanoes come together to form a barrier that protects us from harm."

Atiteco creation myth as told by the artist Nicolás Chávez. The traditional Mayan hearth is composed of three hearthstones which are thought to emulate the three volcanoes that embrace the lake.

whole lotta sweetness

Unlike some brave souls I passed on a full weekend of Patty doing the Rose at Ravinia -- fearing mostly that, after a night like Friday, I’d be left like Semele when she begged Zeus to give it to her full on – and was split in half by the force of what he had to give.

I opted instead to hang out in a dark cellar of a theatre with the playwright Jeffrey Sweet.

Not a bad trade.

I only knew a little bit about this guy going in – the Chicago Dramatists blurbed him as an influence behind Wicked, so I was ready to be disappointed. A succession of phone calls on Saturday morning that pushed back the start time by three and half hours only added to the dread. But that turned out to be Amtrak’s fault, and the workshop – which was billed as a Playwriting Nuts and Bolts Intensive -- delivered the goods.

Two days later I came out with moleskine packed with techniques for turning it on, and a head full of stories from a man who’s lived his life in the theatre.

Sweet is a fierce technician with a great sense for a good story. He's also a gorgeous gossip and a name dropper and I loved every minute of it: How can you not get excited about hearing someone tell a story they got straight from Jack Klugman -- about being there the day that Clifford Odets returned to NYC (to run Golden Boy through rehearsals) from D.C. -- where he had just named the names of half of his Golden Boy cast and crew to Joe McCarthy. (Talk about a rough day at the office.) (Rat fink.)

Also came away with a list things to read and watch and listen to – some for a second time:

The Apartment
Beyond Culture
Fires in the Mirror
Waiting for Lefty
Daughter of Time
The Collection
The Gin Game
The Cradle Will Rock
The Dramatist's Toolkit

The weekend also succeeded in splitting me down the middle (kinda like Semele) -- torn between the impulse to do nothing but write and the impulse to do anything else at all.