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Unleashing the Howl: When the ACLU Defended Allen Ginsberg

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“Sixty years ago, ACLU of Northern California staff attorney Al Bendich defended City Lights Books publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti, who was accused of obscenity for publishing Allen Ginsberg’s poem Howl.

Over 500 freshly-printed copies of Howl and Other Poems were seized by the government, rather than allowed to exist as thought-provoking literature. The trial against City Lights Books made its way to the California State Superior Court in 1957, where Judge Clayton Horn ruled in favor of Ferlinghetti and the ACLU.”   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Easter Island

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At midnight
a door in darkness opens
light is dispensed –
from one candle to another
carried through streets
starved by the austerity of shadows   [Read more…]

For the Love of Cars, for the Love of Community: ‘San Diego Lowriders’

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There is a new and exciting book titled “San Diego Lowriders: A History of Cars and Cruising”. Authors Alberto López Pulido and Rigoberto “Rigo” Reyes capture a history and culture that is not always thought of when the history of San Diego is related.

This book begins with the roots of lowriding and introduces us to organized car clubs. The authors emphasize the pride and respect Lowriders had for their community, for their cars, and for each other. Car clubs became a focal point and have remained a common ground for community drivers to the present day.

The general public is not aware that Lowriders are actually part of the history of San Diego as early as 1950.   [Read more…]

Walking in Chicano Park, Winter ’13

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walking in Chicano Park
one morning hazy with
shipyard fumes and shipyard lies

I stop in front of the mural
depicting Quetzalcoatl
who is half-bird, half-serpent   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Invaded

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In waves and by stealth
the marsh
  outflanked
      invaded –   [Read more…]

Music Theory

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I am driving on that street
that long ago led to a record store.
And it’s raining.
It’s been years since we used to go there
since we strolled down aisles of beautiful albums,
music filling the store
and our lives.   [Read more…]

John Steinbeck’s ‘To a God Unknown’: How to Be a Writer In the Age of Donald Trump

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It’s easy to read John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath, winner of the 1940 Pulitzer Prize, and as Stephen King describes in his best-selling book On Writing, to have “feelings of despair and good old-fashioned jealousy—[thoughts like] I’ll never be able to write anything that good, not if I live to be a thousand.”

Like King’s wise counsel about how to be a writer, John Steinbeck’s masterwork is a “spur” that “goad[s] the writer to work harder and aim higher.” During President Donald Trump’s regime of diminished-to-defunct arts funding, new writers—in addition to emerging musicians, painters, sculptors, photographers, and all creative people committed to contributing to civilization through art—can take inspiration from the inauspicious circumstances surrounding the publication of Steinbeck’s difficult second novel.   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Palm Tuesday

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The palm celebrates
itself as a sacrament
in purple vestments   [Read more…]

Geo-Poetic Spaces: Drinking From the Lion’s Heart

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In the footsteps of my ancestor Richard the Lionheart-

The wine is in my blood
I drank from its cup long ago

Blown to beach by storm
I sacked the island
for my shipwrecked bride
left the vanquished in silver chains   [Read more…]

The President’s (In Need of an) Analyst

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By Robert L. Schmidt

My novel, Natural Born Leader, asks the reader to believe a character — who looks like Cary Grant but has the mind of Beaver Cleaver — could compete neck-and-neck with a second character who is a New York real estate billionaire called The Ronald for the Republican presidential nomination (OK, based on the election it’s half a farce).

The movie The President’s Analyst asks the viewer to believe a U.S. president could need psychoanalysis. Welcome to another example where fiction becomes reality, because, based on The Donald’s recent wiretapping accusations, he does. Hollywood is big on remakes, but if they greenlight The President’s Analyst II, it should be a documentary starring The Donald.

The notion The Donald would ever seek professional help is as fantastic as most of his tweets, of course, mostly due to many of the disorders I’ll describe. The only “psycho-therapy” in The Donald’s immediate future will be the venomous rants of Steve Bannon.   [Read more…]

What We Did In The Resistance (Part 1)

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By Alison Luterman / Rattle

In the beginning, we wept.
Well, some of us wept.
Some of us walked around stunned
as if pieces of sky
had fallen out of the sky and revealed themselves
to be chunks of blue plaster.
We examined the chunks.
We shook plaster dust out of our hair—there was so much dust!
We craned our necks and stared up.   [Read more…]

Trumpty Dumpty Sat on His Wall

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By RMR Kroopkin

Trumpty Dumpty sat on his wall?
Trumpty Dumpty had a ‘huge’ fall?

No repeal deal,
No Muslim Ban,
No Mexico paying for wall,
Nobody went to the mall.   [Read more…]

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