Oversion’s Weblog

One for the ages, so much history going into it, like a symbol of where things are at at this late stage, almost symbolic. A Thursday evening at the end of May, 2009 of all the years, with chronic era displacement, colossal technological heaves across the bow of art and war, and science, the midge revolution, a kind of kaleidoscope of say, 1949 to the present, poetry, relations among people, developments of cities, questions like ‘what takes power, and what is continuously more pleasent but always defeated, juvenile headgame national politics versus verdant viral subtle thought, and choices in representation at the micro level. In short, a poetry reading, put on by the always likeable and always reasonable and always friendly and smiling bookthug books here in Toronto. Just to hear that Ken Belford was reading in Toronto was enough to sense all things were possible, upon first hearing of it months or weeks ago, a kind of ‘legend of the best minds sort of known of by that way poet and chanteur, whenawonce the feathers of the further birds were signalling this way, just days before, Mark Truscott and Kemeny Babineau were added to the bill. Suddenly a rare and immense occassion, once again. They are both, as we who so carefully swim in the lean waters of the notion of having dependents, fathers, besides being writers and publishers, genuinely devoted, so to get them out to do a reading and enter into a full fledged night in Toronto, it is something across months. As with many others present, and on Bathurst, a short walk from my building, on a night my usual confident arrival home from work to Dupont Station to collect my bike met ! like a housecat discovering his bowl is missing ! my bike had been stolen, ohhhh, i watched Law&Order with passion of that eveninghour! Ill-construing villains?! With 15 minutes to go in the episode, Kemeny’s voice broke the focus on th tv thru the window

with a Bandido’s Burrito large enough to split

Amazingly fresh spring air, electricity of a possible storm, like a memory of Canlit, we made our way to the local reading! And with such little premonition of just what an adventure it would be. 

jay drives up

truscott^belford

drumbolis strolls in

poems as intros

Jay has several inventive format altrations a show, and this one read poems of his own as approximate random introduction of each reader. A perfectly pleasent result. Each reader was then announced to begin in an already established calm poetry reading brocade of imagery and wondering. Truly believe Bathurst St put on a show to this effect as well as the whole city. 

And then there they were, poetry readings. Mark Truscott began with his very short ellipses and passionately read them, his breathing intense to get across what he was trying to. I thought it was quite successful, tho at one point, fairly early on, I suddenly recalled his west end gallery reading series was 90 minutes a reader, and, knowing Jay angles away from wasting a lot of time on breaks, suddenly thought 4 hours of reading could lie ahead, but no. Oddly, I found myself making up Truscott-like poems as I waited for the bus up in Downsview this aft. 

Mark Truscott at k6c

kemeny babineau at

Kemeny visually described a tree or vine to contextualize a poem

I sleep in his grandmother’s bed. My home seems so private. It could make me biased, but his poems this night were as alive spreading trees and night’s verdancy of intense growth and much unseen but sensed domain, bringing thusly the countryside south or north of brantford – reminding again a Stanley Cup Final at Gretzky’s, if there’s an afternoon game - 

And then Ken Belford, all the way from Prince George, one night only, on Bathurst, like a Springstein Townsend DiPrima Lander of a poet, trying, so trying to bring all that was possible for the first time to Bathurst ST  - some poems old, some utterly current, fine entertaining cosmological theories, 

showing on theoretical map where he lives

he lives just northeast of where he’s showing. Hmmm, take a break: 

belford drumbolis goldstein kaufman babineau

And hey, that’s no product placement. I was an Expos fan since they came to Montreal back in the 60s. I had no idea what baseball was, we didn’t get the station that well from Plattsburgh, a guy made of fuzzing specs would stand there, then Pop! Then all the static noise would increase, and I’d wonder, and resume ramping the dial to find the hidden cartoons, so when with great import it was said the Montreal Expos were on their way, as a seven year old well, all I could think about was zoning laws, state/business crossover in terms of liability, and the real effect of beer commercials on poetry, but whatever, soon after the season began there we were along the first base line. It was the names, the batting stances, and the great bird-like pyrotechnics of the pitchers on their little mounds, Mack Jones, in left field, like a prototypical power hitter, Jose Bocabella, the very definer of third base, and other great names, Stone, Steve Rogers, Andre Dawson, Tim Raines, as the years went by. Jarry Park was alright, great poetry name and so, no, those Blue Jays in the photo are neither Scutaro nor Lind, and this cat is not named Guinness:

As soon as I entered this exciteable excellency of a fine and aptly named new friend was having a lively visit, between the old 30 bites means down and super important zips back and forths through the house, running through legs, leaping for flies, and peeling off poems from the crack in the door to be let back out, once in.

An enjoyable writerly evening. 

Life is not purely defined by success, is immune to perfection, if spring petals land quietly amidst soaring blazing guitar and one is briefly amazed, if the haunting abbreviated rage of a crow, or the bleak deafness of an owl, or the critically unacclaimed cloistered biology of the entertainment tonight vehicle fetish gun understanding – as if I could ever disagree with anyone quite that much – the eternal mind is forever neutral, impenetrable to mine or anyone else’s claims, and, as a Leaf fan, I say whether you are a jackoninetales like brian mulroney, or a classy clear minded well educated person of stellar values (polar oppositeness qua Canada) success and failure rates may easily compare with baseball pitching and batting averages, and you will have the instincts of a sparrow or trout ~ that right 

The Threnodies are tremendous. Who slipped that cd into my backpack over the last few months. So kind. Unless it was really them at Phog Easter Saturday night. CBC has high up Reggae “don’t have to be like that” so I’ll pause from the threnodies, not go off on such tangents. 90,000 blogs an hour were being newly made, at one point, the massive wads of text on them, all that writing advancing and developing language, language abilities, quickly becoming unfollowable, it was only when the blog movement gave way to the capricious allthingsatonce networks, that the blue jays and leafs and raptors and tfc but not the argos, finally began rebuilding. The conversations last night, really good ones, but with hints of Windsor and Vancouver image-du-humane did I really wonder how Toronto really does perceive itself, so comically, transcendentedly distinct from how it is viewed. We accept that. Every city is a collage of peoples from the whole planet, not all people are from St Jean, I know it must seem that way, and some have heard of Kelowna, somehow, but don’t remember the context. The male host of the party went to Rockets games growing up, and his BC bud actually literally supports Kelowna versus Windsor Sunday afternoon, la Coupe Meme, (Quebec may have been a lot smarter about what was up in WW1 but take your national hubris home if you think the Berniers and Bouchards and Montmouths – and the Bedards, *practically Depardieu Canadiens, the Montcalms and Quennevilles, and nihilists and atheists and supernatural occultic painters of bird habitat, the meaning of Cups,

Coupe du Meme? Don Cherry doesn’t know either. It’s surprising that my comments about Rufus Wainwright’s version of the sacred song Trailor For Sale Or Rent is greeted with the previously unheard version of Hallejula

…there is italics supernatural, musical coincidence, and true subtlety in every kind of food preparation

One could so easily flow into one’s home after a day’s work, let the world be, rest, think, and imagine the world, letting the infinitely exploding internet diaspora
thin out into contemplated occasions, or hop on the bike and go, which if one does, it winds up running late
and it is too late to fully write up the night, or load the photos, to combine the scene with the thoughts, so save it, save most of it, but echo bits
before it’s too late, – and save expanded discussion
for after having collected all of it, and ideally, after having read the book. An essay, review, soon…

Upon knowing with what grim concern
that the feral cats whose careers began
in the summer of 2007 with such
minimal optimism, watching
one rare little family hurrying
across the hilltops, becoming
mom and 4 then mom and 3
then mom and 2, and of course
the long unseen periods, but now knowing
the third and fourth generation
live in that truck yard, waiting,
I’ve not been wasting trips over there
to confound the cats or the truck yard or
the restaurent just beyond
meanwhile, the regularly returning
very familiar sparrows, like family,
are on hand day to day. Their remarkable
struggles with the heavy winds this week
were spectacular, and wildly fun to try to
photograph. The amazing contraptions
of body position they’d get into
two males scrapping at one point
and all of them riled
because they have two full nests
in our pipeholes (and there’s starlings,

Marshall finds us, after we searched for him and all an hour

we, being, mike hillis, on bike,

and myself, john barlow,

largest at-once assemblage

More later!

one of my renkus, (refused!), 2 lines spring

Very pleasent news. I used the double-back-of route to lunch today. And quietly enough the feral group mostly didn’t notice my approaching. Clearly the tiny orange and white kitten beside the momcat sleeping, (if you focus your eyes just right, you can tell is kind of demurely turning head around to look, while the large orange cat is watching closely and intensely. But the others, great giant gem, sleeping, another one stretched out and playing. At least 4 generations represented there. It’s half zoomed this photo, under their truck, I’d been able to see with my eyes about 3 of them as I was taking the photo, (very next footfall resulted in a storm of them zipping awake and hurrying farther back under the truck. Any big cat fast asleep can look that way, but I would tend to wonder for the gem cat right now. They tend to look (and apparently feel) very old at about 3 or 4 years living in or just above the ravine. (It’s a bit worrisome gem’s now sizeable family is quite so enamoured of the human help being provided to them under that truck of all places, relying on humans can sabotage instincts for living in the ravines, and is the truck permanent? Winter it was great, but a dusty hot parking lot in the summer even in the shade, no water unless that or those humans bring it. My impression is the visitors or visitor is perhaps there a couple of times a week. The onus becomes on them to persist, lest the ravine cats just become truck cats entire. They wander vastly less now, regular routes with few daylight sightings, though the people who start work at 6am see them daily. Back when it was the old momcat the black and white and caramel marbly one with the sieving right eye, leading her little band across the hillsides, with gem scampering around a few feet behind, august of 200, him or her and his brothers or sisters, their lives were desperate and frightening to contemplate. Generations later (all of mayday 2009) they are winterizedly accustomed to this parking lot.