MFA/PhD Debate

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My friend and fellow writer Rachel Strayer recently posted an interesting blog entry regarding getting an M.F.A. in creative writing as opposed to a PhD, especially if you want to teach in academia full-time. I recommend reading her post, which she wrote in a response to a blog post by Michael Nye, an editor of the Missouri Review. Check out his post, too.

Nye makes a great point that there are A LOT of M.F.A. graduates seeking full-time teaching work, and maybe a PhD makes a candidate more attractive to a school looking to hire.  There are also so many growing M.F.A. programs out there, but limited teaching  jobs. Rachel points out some of the positives of an M.F.A. It’s a terminal degree, and it puts writers in touch with a larger writing community.

  I enjoyed both posts. Personally, I’m glad  I got an M.F.A. Since graduating with one, I’ve published in journals, released  a chapbook, read all over the tri-state area, and taught poetry/creative writing classes. The M.F.A made this possible because the program expanded my knowledge of poetic movements and gave me time to hone my skills. I’m a far better reader/writer now than before I finished the program.

An M.F.A. could lead to full-time employment in academia, but other factors also  lead to that, including a school’s budget and faculty retirements, as well as writer’s publishing credits.  Furthermore, having an M.F.A. doesn’t mean one needs to be a tenure-track professor. There are also jobs in journalism, publishing, tech writing, etc.  And sometimes, the class load and committee work of full-time professors leaves less time to write.

If the circumstances are right, an M.F.A. can lead to teaching, but other factors must be considered, and other job opportunities exist, too.

Poetry News

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Just wanted to mention that The Portland Review published two of my poems online this week, and they will appear in print later this year. The first, “The Summer of Our Fall,” can be read here. It’s a poem left over from the Front Man manuscript, but it was taken out during the final edits. The second poem, “Missed Cues,” which is part of my new manuscript, can be read here.  I also have three poems forthcoming in Yes, Poetry. They will appear online in October. I also have a poem forthcoming in the fall issue of Evening Street Review.

I also want to announce that the Osterhout Free Library in Wilkes-Barre is hosting free poetry workshops throughout the fall months. I’m hosting one in November, and several of my friends are also involved. The workshops start next week and run from 6:30-8. The dates and some blurbs are listed below.

September 6–“Writing Tools and Habits.”
Rachael Goetzke, teen poetry coordinator, will host a session on environment, writing tools, and making poetry a part of your daily life.

September 20–Dawn Leas “Channeling Memories.”

October 4–Amye Archer “Language Poems”

October 18–“Performance Poetry”  Not sure who’s teaching this section.

November 1–Alexis Czencz Belluzi Not sure what her focus will be.

November 15–Jenny Hill “Heavy Metaphor.”
We’ll explore the use of metaphor in prose and poetry and use the library resources to write our own extended metaphors.

November 29–Brian Fanelli will focus on writing about home/place in poetry. We will look at how certain poets depict home/place in their work, and do some writing prompts that tie into home/place.

All sessions held in the Gates Lab.

Final workshop/oration/open mic December 13 (Reading Room)

New Work and Beyond

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About a year ago, Big Table Publishing accepted my manuscript of poems that became a chapbook- Front Man. Since then, I’ve done a slew of readings around the tri-state area, making new friends and meeting fellow poets along the way. With the readings winding down once the fall is over, I’m going to have time to work more on a second manuscript of poems.  I worked on it heavily this summer, and I’m always surprised where the writing process can take you, once it takes over. I thought this second book would be another chapbook of 25-30 poems, much like my first manuscript. I thought it would be centered on relationship-based poems and the way men and women communicate with each other. There are certainly a lot of poems that deal with that, but after spending the last few months working heavily on this project, this project has spread out more than I envisioned. I started writing about my hometown more, the people that inhabit it, its working-class history, the working-class struggles of the here and now in this political climate.

I think there’s a thread to all of these poems, in the sense that a lot of them deal with relationships, not only with the opposite gender, but also with home, family, and friends.

These poems also differ in the sense that they stray from the punk rock language and imagery that anchored Front Man.  There are a few poems that re-use some of those characters, but only to depict them as older, to push their narratives forward, and to speak to some of the other poems in the new manuscript.

I’m also thinking this project could grow larger than a chapbook, especially since I already have about 35 pages or so, and another 15 would make it a full-length manuscript. I didn’t plan that either, but I’m just writing and writing.

I assume other writers encounter similar cases where they plan something so specific, but once they dig in and follow the writing process, the project changes somewhat. This can be a a wonderful thing because being so anchored and hooked to a particular subject matter, form, or thread throughout a manuscript can sometimes leave little room for other poems and other voices. Write and see where it goes!

Upcoming Events/Readings

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There’s some upcoming events I wanted to mention briefly on my blog. First, I’m going to be a poet-in-residence tomorrow at a fundraiser/benefit called Tree of Life, which aims to preserve farm land and animals in Wayne County, PA.  This event will be held at 33 Osborne Road in South Sterling, PA. I will be hosting a reading at 6 pm., and the other featured readers include  fiction writer Bridget McIntyre and poets Dale Wilsey Jr, Victoria Garafola, and Steve Keating. There are a slew of other events throughout the day,including an art program led by my girlfriend, Jenna Casaldi. That takes place at 3 pm. For more info and a full schedule of events, click here.

On Saturday, August 27, I’m reading at Cherry Alley Cafe in Lewisburg, PA with fellow poet Alexis Czencz Belluzi. The reading starts at 7 pm, and the cafe is located at 21 N. 3rd Street.

If you can, try to come out to one of the events!

Completed Summer Reading

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In a mere week and a half, the fall semester begins, and I’ll return to my normal teaching schedule. This summer consisted of preparing a second MS of poems, camping, traveling, and teaching two poetry classes.  I also hit up a few different towns/cities for poetry readings, and I still have two left before summer concludes– one in South Sterling, PA this Saturday and one in Lewisburg, PA next Saturday.

Summer also provided the chance to get a lot of reading done, and I thought I’d post what I read over the summer. Also, feel free to comment and share what you read this summer.

Drama:

I was on a Greek mythology kick and re-read the Oedipus trilogy by Sophocles. I still like it just as much as I did when I was in college.

I also re-read Prometheus Bound by Aeschylus. Is there a greater rebel in ancient Greek literature than Prometheus?

 Fiction:

The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen.  After hearing hype about Franzen for years and reading him in the New Yorker, I finally gave in and read The Corrections, the novel that won him the National Book Award. Yes, he is worth reading, and yes, he is probably one of the most important American writers alive today, due to the way he addresses a slew of contemporary social/political issues.

Mickelsson’s Ghosts by John Gardner. This is Gardner’s last novel, released shortly before he died in a  motorcycle accident in the early 1980s. This is a great, fat American novel, and I love the way he wove supernatural elements into this novel, and the way he poked fun at the politics of academia.

Collected Stories by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. So glad he’s still alive and publishing sometimes.

Rabbit is Rich by John Updike. I love the way in which Updike captured periods of American history through the “Rabbit” novels, in this case the Carter/early Reagan years.

The Centaur by John Updike. This novel won Updike the National Book Award in 1961. It’s a moving story about father and son, and it also retells the myth of Chiron.

Terrorist by John Updike. I guess I was on an Updike kick this summer. This is a powerful novel, one whose main character is an Islamic fundamentalist. This is one of the most interesting post-9/11 novels I’ve read, one that points out the hypocrisy of certain U.S. actions regarding the Middle East and the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism.

Poetry

Poets in their Youth by Eileen Simpson. This is a fantastic memoir written by a woman who was married to John Berryman for a while. It offers a glimpse into the lives of some of the mid-20th Century’s most important American poets, including Berryman, Robert Lowell, Randal Jarrell, and Delmore Schwartz.

Angle of Ascent: New and Selected Poems by Robert Hayden. I think readers sometimes forget he wrote more than “Those Winter Sundays.”

T.S. Eliot: Selected Prose and Essays.  I tend to revisit Eliot’s essays every now and then as a refresher.

The Shadow of Sirius by W.S. Merwin. It took me a while, but I’m finally getting into Merwin’s work.

Collected Poems by Joseph Brodsky. He is one of the 20th Century’s most non-political Russian poets. Compare him to Mayakovsky and notice the difference. Brodsky wrote such beautiful love poems.

Here, Bullet by Brian Turner. This is a great collection of poems written by an Iraq war veteran. I’m amazed at the scope of voices in this collection. Turner succeeded in capturing the complexity of the second Iraq war.

World Tree by David Wojahn.  Anything Wojahn releases is worth checking out. Here, he continues writing about music, pop culture,and politics, while displaying a  wide range of forms. My review of the book will be published by PANK sometime soon.

Sailing Around the Room: New and Selected Poems by Billy Collins. There’s a reason Billy Collins is a bestseller. I can’t think of a contemporary American poet who’s wittier.

Reading Now:

Tar by C.K. Williams. I’ve read his collected poems, but never a collection as a whole.

The Eye of a Poet. This is a collection of essays on poetry, featuring Billy Collins, Yusef Komunyakaa, Maxine Kumin, and others.

How to be Alone: Collected Essays by Jonathan Franzen. I guess I’m on a Franzen kick now. I also plan to read his latest novel, Freedom, soon.

So what did you read over the summer?  What are you reading now?

New U.S. Poet Laureate

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A new U.S. Poet Laureate has just been named, and that honor goes to Philip Levine, who follows W.S.  Merwin  in the role. Upon learning the other day that Levine has been named poet laureate, I was surprised he never has been so before. He has been publishing for decades now, and it seems that at least one or two of his poems appear in every creative writing/poetry textbook or contemporary American poetry anthology.

Levine is one of my favorite contemporary American poets, and I’m so glad he got the honor. I first discovered his work through the anthology we used in my undergraduate poetry workshop courses. I then purchased his collecton of new and selected poems. Levine is a native of Detroit, and though he spent years working at prestigious colleges, he never stopped writing about his working-class roots. That’s what I’ve always liked about his poetry-how he focuses on the marginalized and the working-class, honoring such folks.

Despite the rough characters in his poems, there’s always tenderness to his work, no matter the labor the characters in his poems perform. One of my favorite Levine poems is “You Can Have it,” which is about the loss of his brother, who is “hard and furious, with wide shoulders and a curse for God and burning eyes that look upon/all creation and say, ‘You can have it.'” Like a lot of Levine’s work, that poem features direct, blue-collar language and description, but there’s a real tenderness and sorrow to it. The speaker is crying out for his brother, who died young, due to hard labor jobs.

The New York Times, Washington Post, and other publications ran nice articles about Levine this past week. But I especially like the Philadelphia Inquirer’s article. The article has nice background info about Levine, as well as a decent analysis of some of his poems and some strong quotes from the poet. I especially like that Levine promises  he will use the role of poet laureate as a bully pulpit for the kinds of characters that fill his poems– the working-class and marginalized.

Check out his work by clicking here.  And you should also check out the work of W.S. Merwin, the last poet laureate. He’s another great contemporary poet.

Best Election Money Can Buy

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Last night, I stayed up late streaming news channels on my computer to find out the result of the recall elections in Wisconsin. Though I don’t live in Wisconsin, I had a heavy interest in the recall election because I feel it may be a preview of the 2012 elections, as well as a test of how Democrats now compete in a political climate in which corporations can now dump as much money into elections as they want, thanks to a 2010 Supreme Court ruling called Citizens United, which basically gave corporations unlimited spending power in our election cycles. Furthermore, the election was also a test of organized labor, which normally helps Democrats. This whole recall election began in March, when Republican Gov. Scott Walker and his Republican allies in the state legislature succeeded at stripping most public employees of their right to collectively bargain. This attack on unions drew massive protests in Madison. After Walker succeeded, progressives pushed back and organized recall elections to try to gain control of the state Senate and halt Walker’s right-wing agenda

Like other progressives, I was optimistic Democrats would win 3 out of the 6 races, oust the GOP incumbents, and restore public employees right to collectively bargain. Unfortunately, the Democrats only won 2 out of the 6 races and did not flip the majority in the state Senate.  There are several thoughts I have about the importance of this race.

I want to point out this election may go down in history as the most expensive state race in the country’s history. So far, about $35 million has been spent on these recall elections, according to the Milwuakee-Wisconsin Journal Sentinel, which quotes the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign, an organization that tracks campaign money. Unions poured millions into these campaigns, but so did right-wing organizations and right-wing billionaires like the Koch brothers. This race was a real test of the power of unions and progressive groups to compete with right-wing funding in the post-Citizens United world. Unfortunately, unions and progressives lost, no matter how they spin this.

It’s true Dems were fighting on the GOP’s turf, against GOP incumbents, and in districts that are generally Republican, but progressives had the momentum on their side. What’s alarming is that grassroots action, which was seen in Wisconsin, simply may not be enough to compete with right-wing funding and the ability of people like the Koch brothers to pour millions and millions into campaigns, thanks to the Citizens United ruling.  This race is only a preview of the money that will be spent in 2012. And I’m starting to believe our elections are indeed now bought by the highest bidder.

What will the left’s solution be going forward? This race was a test of organized labor’s power to organize and spend money to compete with right-wing groups. Organized labor and progressives lost, no matter how Dems may try to spin this story. They lost. What does the left have that can compete with the money spent by the right? How will Obama and Democrats running for House and Senate seats survive against the millions, possibly billions that will be spent by right-wing millionaires and billionaires to defeat them next year?  What answer do they have to that? Unions have always been the Democrats’ greatest fundraising tools, but unions are now being outspent drastically, as seen in Wisconsin.

What’s even more unsettling about the results of last night is the fact that Gov. Walker’s war on the middle class will not stop, and it’s likely to inspire other right-wing legislatures, especially in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida. The Republicans in some of those states, especially in Ohio ad Michigan,  have already cracked down on unions, and now they’ll see that the recall elections in WI didn’t give Democrats enough needed victories. These are also generally swing states that Democrats must win in 2012 if they want to do well overall.

Democrats need an answer to Citizens United, the Tea Party, and the general energy on the right. A movement did grow in Wisconsin, and the fact these grassroots organizers were able to even force recall elections and take away two seats from the GOP is remarkable, but there still needs to be more. There needs to be a greater pushback against Citizens United and the fact corporations now can dump unlimited funding into our election cycles. Progressives need a movement and fundraising efforts that can compete with the right. I hope what happened in Wisconsin over these last several months sparks a larger movement. And I doubt the fight in Wisconsin is over yet. There are two more recall elections next Tuesday in the state, both against Democrats. Next year, it’s likely there will be more recall elections against other Republican state Senators, and eventually Scott Walker.  Victory may come at some point against Walker’s agenda, but how much damage will be done prior to that?

good news all around

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I want to pass along some positive news about my poetry. First, another review of my chapbook, Front Man, was just published by the journal Blood Lotus. You can read the review by clicking here and flipping to page 56 of the journal.  You can also read the review by visiting the blog of the reviewer, Kacy Muir. Click here to do so (this option is probably the easiest).

I also recieved word yesterday that three of my poems, “What They Forgot by Morning,” “Late Night Stop,” and “Remembering Names,” were accepted for publication by the NYC-based journal Yes, Poetry. They will be released in the October issue, the same time frame another new poem, “How She Hides Her Age,” will be published by the California-based journal the San Pedro River Review.

Finally, I want to announce that my friend and fellow writer, Amye Archer, just released a chapbook, A Shotgun Life, with Big Table Publishing, the same folks who released my book. Buy a copy and help support another local writer! You can get a copy by clicking here, or by seeing her read at Prose in Pubs on Jack’s Draft House in Scranton on  Sunday, Sept. 25 at 7 pm.

Return of HWM

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One of my all-time favorite bands, Hot Water Music, has reunited (again) to release new music and hopefully launch a proper tour. HWM has always fascinated me because I’ve always found them to be one of the more interesting bands in the punk rock/post-hardcore genre circa late 1990s/early 2000s. What makes them especially unique is the fact they have two vocalists, Chuck Ragan and Chris Wollard, which has always created some pretty awesome dueling vocal parts in their songs. They also stand out because of their rhythm section. Bassist Jason black and drummer George Rebelo grew up studying jazz music, so they add  technicality and intricacy to the music that most bands in their genre lack.

A few years ago, the band played a series of one-off reunion shows, and I had a chance to catch them in New Jersey and Atlanta. I have NEVER seen a crowd so into a band before. As soon as the first power chord blasted through the speakers, the crowd surged forward and sang along to every song throughout the show. But after those reunion shows, the band never released any proper new music, and even after I interviewed Wollard and Ragan for a music zine I ran at the time, I was still skeptical they’d release a proper full-length album again and do a tour, despite their promises about new HWM material.  The guys were also busy with their own new projects. Chuck Ragan has a successful solo career now, and Chris Wollard has a new band-Chris Wollard and the Ship Thieves. Both acts stray far from the post-hardcore roots of HWM. Chuck Ragan’s solo act is built on the folk revival movement, and the Ship Thieves is mellow rock ‘n roll/indie rock.

So when I found out the band was going to release a new album in 2012, I couldn’t wait to hear some new tracks. Luckily, the band has already released new tracks via a brand new 7-inch. The songs, “The Fire, the Steel, the Tread” and “Adds Up to Nothing,” are available via Itunes, and the physical release of the 7-inch is slated for September. I’m waiting to buy that, especially so I can marvel at the cover, which is done by Scott Sinclair, the same artist HWM has used for every single one of their album covers/7-inches.

Of course, some long-time fans will complain that the new album or the new 7-inch doesn’t sound like the tracks on No Division or Forever and Counting, or even some of the band’s later albums, like Caution, but so what?  I’m just happy to hear Chuck Ragan’s trademark raspy vocals over electric guitar again and to have new music from one of my all-time favorite bands of the genre. That’s enough to be thankful for.

Cut, Cut, Cut

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It seems unlikely now that the U.S. government is going to default, which would have led to a major spike in interest rates, possibly higher taxes, and a load of other economic woes. On Sunday, Congressional leaders and the Obama White House announced that a debt deal has been reached. It will face a vote in the House and Senate today. The deal would essentially cut $2 trillion over a decade, and it will create a bipartisan committee to determine what should be cut after the initial round of cuts occur.

The Democrats mostly lost everything they had hoped to get in a deal, especially raising revenue to stimulate the economy by restoring tax rates to what they were during the Clinton years for millionaires and billionaires only. They did, however, get to postpone debate about raising the debt ceiling again until 2013, after the president’s re-election campaign. The deal would also create cuts to defense spending, something some Dems have wanted to do for a while.

But it seems clear here that the Republicans have mostly controlled the narrative of the debate because members of the House, mostly freshman Tea Party backed folks, were utterly willing to let the U.S. default and crash the economy if they didn’t get their way. They didn’t even listen to House Speaker John Boehner when he told them to “get their asses in line” and vote for his bill a few days ago that failed. I hope that during the 2012 elections voters will remember that these Tea Party members were totally willing to crash the economy. The GOP no longer has a center or middle. The party has gone SO far to the right.

Americans should breathe a little easier knowing the U.S. is not likely to default now; however, the fact so much is going to be cut as the economy is still weak is rather alarming. Famed economist and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has a great article about this out today. Check it out here. In it, he basically argues that deep cuts are the last thing you want to do in an economy. When the economy is weak, it’s better to create stimulus packages to put more money in people’s pockets that will cause them to spend. Stimulus also gives more money to businesses and allows them to hire. Krugman points out that the economy is still “deeply depressed” and is likely to remain that way until at least 2013. The debt deal, he argues, could also lead to higher unemployment rates and major changes or elimination to social safety net programs.

What Krugman fails to point out, though, is the possibility that things could really change after 2012. The Democrats, if they play this right, can take back the House and defeat a lot of these Tea Party members. A lot of the House seats the GOP won in 2010 were in swing districts. If the Dems regain their majorities, that would make it easier to create more jobs programs. Furthermore, the Bush era tax cuts for the wealthy are set to expire in 2013, and if the Dems succeed at letting them expire, that would create much needed revenue for the economy.

Perhaps the Democrats are living to fight another day.