5.4.21

POEM

The sun travels all day,
then falls down.

Let us use your shoes 
as they have almost demonstrated. 

From its inscrutable lap 
a chicken with a wooden leg issues

All these people are running around.
I wonder what they do in real time.

— John Ashbery, Planisphere, 79.

Up 8:30. Had been up a bit around 3:30 am.
Send a couple photos re chapbook to Rob McLennan.
10 p. Fanon bio. Learning about Martinique.
Extended a twitter exchange about octave identity w/ a friend of Peli Greizer’s - actually interesting, for once.
Notebook poem.
Harmony lesson 1:30-1. I didn’t do much work the last 2 weeks, but I understood where we are; I’ll do more exercises before the next lesson.
Wasted time. Watched a mildly interesting YouTube explainer on free jazz. Got semi-involved w/ an Ellery Queen TV movie w/ Peter Lawford, Harry Morgan, E.G. Marshall, and Stefanie Powers, largely for the Jerry Fielding score
30 p. Broven, could of poems in JA. (Pretty sure I did this yesterday, forgot to note it down).
Cleaned up my desk and inbox; made sure I filed my vaccination card somewhere I’d remember.
Watched first hour of Aleph (2010, Iva Radivojević) via MoMa. Some of it, I really loved. I like movies that take place partly in cafes.
Bed around 11:30, read a ch. of Cluny Brown.

5.3.21

While attending an Alec Wilder memorial concert in New York in 1992, I ran into Mitch Miller, still a commanding figure although well into his eighties. Locked in an elevator with him, I asked if it was true that he had criticized rock ’n’ roll in the late 1950s as being “no more than ‘three chords’.” “Too right,” the great man retorted, and “that was being fucking generous!” 

— John Broven, Record Makers and Breakers, 90

Up 7:30. Weighed 216.2, a little down. Coffee, breakfast, hand exercise.
Read 10 p. Fanon bio, chapter of Deep Work.
Worked 11:00-1:30, though only productive for 2 hrs. Of that. Wrote about minor blues, started trying to improve section on 8-bar blues.
Looked at info on roach traps w/ Bree; ordered something a little higher-grade than Roach Motels later on.
Therapy.
Ordered Thai food.
Read 30 p. Broven. Short walk outside. Raining.
Went to bed 11, skimmed more of Deep Work e-book, ch. of Cluny Brown.

5.2.21

“…people like your mother
or others unlike your. Mother who have nothing 
in common with you except to be like you
whom they never know.”

— John Ashbery, “O Knave,” Planisphere, 64.

Up 9:30. Breakfast/coffee. Did very little with the morning and early afternoon. Located a book I needed, Richard J. Ripano, The New Blue Music, but didn’t find the passage I thought I remembered (that happens a lot). 
Called my dad 2-3. D/l’ed a copy of Cal Newport’s Deep Work, skimmed around in it. This kind of disciplinarian productivity stuff bugs me so much, but I need to take myself in hand.
Wrote 6-8 - more or less done w/ the paragraph at hand. Worked w/ a Pomodoro app and a “Study With Me” video - some guy in Scotland looking out a library window, w/ rain sounds. It all kinda helped. 
Read 30 p. quota of Broven, pencil in hand. Short walk outside.
3 p. JA (2 poems). 2 days behind in poetry notebook.
Read some of Deep Work in bed. I’m not proud.

5.1.21

“If you had a smattering of education you would realize that perfection of form can give validity to any sentiment however preposterous.”

— Margery Sharp, Cluny Brown, 84-5

Up about 7. Read a chapter or so of Sharp.
Breakfast, coffee.
Started John Broven, Record Makers and Breakers: Voices of the Independent Rock ’N’ Roll Pioneers. Read about 30 p.
Also 10 p. David Macey, Frantz Fanon. Those 2 books are about 500 p. each; I think that will amount to the bulk of my reading for May.
Very slow day. Got involved in a silly Lifetime movie on YouTube. Answered a few emails, DMs. Helped Bree put away groceries.
Finally worked on a graf for a half-hour or so around 8:30.
Read 3 JA poems. Short walk outside.
Another 10 p. Fanon bio.
Lights out around 11.

4.30.21

As his physical powers defined, making hunting impossible, Sir Henry had taken to the pen; all over the world the friends of his youth began to receive very long, very dull letters from him. To Rhodesia, Tanganyika, Singapore; Australian, India, New Zealand and the Bermudas--Sir Henry’s epistles went forth; for he never considered it worth while to write to anyone nearer at hand. So the letters took a long time to get there, and the replies even longer to get back, and all the news was out of date; and this gave his correspondence a peculiar timeless quality which was very soothing.

— Margery Sharp, Cluny Brown, 30

Woke up 5:30, fussed around online, tried to get back to bed w/ limited success.
Up 8. Coffee, breakfast. Made some changes to a grocery order.
Read 25 p. Margery Sharp, Cluny Brown (the source of the Lubitsch movie). Amusing.
Read 2 JA poems.
Worked on blues 45 minutes - about 4 sentences, starting to get into “Trouble In Mind.”
Therapy 1 pm.
Blew off an hr., then listened to Linda Smith’s instrumental LP. Read a few more p. Sharp.
Ordered a couple of books/CDs and a Chantal Akerman DVD, worked on some email, paid bills.
Made Swiss chard and a pot of rice for dinner. Heard most of a CD of later Tampa Red sides, 40s-50s, that Bree was using as exercise music, inc. “It Hurts Me Too,” which happens to run over the same “Trouble in Mind” 8-bar progression I was writing about earlier.
Watched Pebbles (P.S. Vinothraj, 2021) via MoMa. Hard not to compare (facilely) with Ray, though far angrier in tone. Also a touch of What Maisie Knew.
Uploaded Laurie Anderson video to send to friends. Opened up some mail - finally got the Dry Cleaning album.
Short walk outside at 10 pm.
Read more Sharp in bed.