Line tamer.
The handsome Stephen Mills interviewed me for his new monthly interview series featuring emerging LGBT poets on his blog, Joe’s Jacket. Click on over to find out whether or not I write poems in the nude, how “anagram me” can be your new pick-up line, and which luscious-locked actor would play me in my bio-pic. Read More …
Here is Salvador Dali’s 1937 oil painting Metamorphosis of Narcissus, referenced in the five sections of the same title in Narcissus Resists: I wrote “Metamorphosis of Narcissuss” in Provincetown during the summer of 2002 when I was taking Mark Doty’s advanced poetry workshop and workshopped this poem in his class. I had originally included it Read More …
I finished Homer’s Iliad (Fagles translation) last night (it’s been my subway reading since the turn of the year) and had my hairs stand on end when I read these lines by the ghost of Patroclus speaking to Achilles: “So now let a single urn, the gold two-handled urn / your noble mother gave you, Read More …
I found this lovely commentary on my poem “Two Men On a Bed” over at Steve Fellner’s blog Pansy Poetics. It’s a thoughtful close-read, and it’s refreshing to have someone identify the source inspiration (A. R. Ammons, who I was reading heavily at the time I wrote this poem). Alice Fulton is a huge influence Read More …
Around the time Narcissus Resists was released poet Andrew Demcak wrote his five-part poem sequence Pink Narcissus in response to the 1971 James Bidgood film, which I also reference in the “Celluloid” section of Narcissus Resists. Andrew was kind enough to dedicate his poem to me in celebration of the release of Narcissus Resists (very sweet Andrew, thank Read More …
One of the many images informing Narcissus Resists is this massive drawing by the artist Jess (Burgess Collins), poet Robert Duncan’s long-time companion and lover. This is all graphite on paper and collage paste-up; Jess began it in 1976 and finished it in 1991: I first saw it at SFMOMA back in March 2005 when I was Read More …
There was this viral post floating around Facebook to name your top 20 poetry books. I tweaked it; 20 felt too limiting, but 25 felt about right. I excluded more recent discoveries/obsessions/influences to sample some of the books that were important to me during my “formative” years (1998-2004). I limited myself to one book per poet, Read More …
I heart the Canadian poet and classicist Anne Carson. I was introduced to her work during grad school by my friend Suzanne Hancock (also from Canada and also an amazing poet; check out her Another Name for Bridge). I had heard much about Anne’s Autobiography of Red and Suzanne lent me her copy. I read it in Read More …