Archive for the ‘poetry by Jean Jones’ Category

This past Saturday, in Carrboro, near Chapel Hill, NC, poets Jean Arthur Jones and David Capps read some of their poetry for about 30 minutes each and the performance by both was stunning! Before I review that, let me tell you about the open-mike portion of the event, which came first.

We had poetry by David Grinstead, Jane Penland Hoover, Ricky Garni and Margaret (I forget her last name). We also had the music of John Fallon. We each read twice with about 3 poems each. I read a one or two new poems and some poems that had been picked up for publication as well as poems from my collection “What Really Matters,” which is awaiting final edits and introduction by Thomas Childs. We do have some video of this section of the event as well.

We then had a great performance by David Capps. I hadn’t seen too many David Capps readings and so I was glad to be here tonight. David is a very dynamic reader when presenting his poems to a crowd. I also enjoyed the discussions that David gave behind the different poems, their meaning to him and his inspiration. It was also nice to hear some history about David Capps, as well. Very enjoyable! Look for videos of this event that I will present. I’ll keep you posted on this.

Jean Jones read a variety of poetry as well. While Jean did offer less of a discussion than David did in his portion of the reading, Jean did provide us with some interesting stories and background behind some of his poems. Jean read from a few of his collections. He read from “The Birds of Djakarta,” published by St. Andrews Press and published by Bruce Whealton on Word Salad (Word Salad Publications is here: http://wsmagazine.net/zine/word-salad-publications.html). He also read from his Angel of Death series, which has been published by Scott Urban as well as by Bruce Whealton on Word Salad Publication.. Lastly, he wrapped up with some poetry from his latest collection “Post Mortem: New and Selected Poems.” This latest collection is also featured on Word Salad Publications, with editing and an Introduction by Scott Urban.

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Word Salad staff editors Jean Arthur Jones and Bruce Whealton are proud to announce the latest editions of Word Salad Poetry Magazine and Haiku Ramblings. These two publications are available here:
http://WordSaladPoetryMagazine.com
and here: http://WordSaladPoetryMagazine.com/Haiku/
This is Volume XVI, No. I for Word Salad Poetry Magazine – that means we are moving into our 16th year! Word Salad is made great by the contributions of the many poets and by the talents of Co-editor Jean Jones and Co-Editor and Publisher Bruce Whealton. Haiku Ramblings is a huge success and we are moving into our second year with that publication.
You will find various other publications on Word Salad beyond the quarterly magazine. Just click on Word Salad Publications from the top menu. We’d like to highlight one publication in particular and that is a new poetry collection of poems by Jean Jones. Bruce Whealton reports that this is one publication that he doesn’t take much credit for publication, unlike the rest of what you will see on the site. This manuscript, for “Post Mortem: New and Selected Poems” by Jean Jones, was created and edited by Wilmington poet and contributor to Word Salad, Scott Urban. Scott also provides a nice introduction to the publication. Scott also collaborated with Bruce Whealton in a collection of poems about vampires and vampirism, called “Puncture Wounds,” which can also be found among the Word Salad Publications.
Bruce Whealton would like to share his first edition of “What Really Matters,” one of the “Word Salad Publications,” available from the top menu. Wilmington poet and writer, Thomas Childs will be contributing to the editing of this publication as the second edition of this publication is in the works. So check back soon for updates to this.”
Word Salad also announces a slightly new look to the publication online. Bruce Whealton, writes, “I wanted to accomodate a growing amount of content on the site and make it easier to find what we have. Originally, Word Salad was just a quarterly poetry magazine, but we’ve grown from that.”
Word Salad would like to submit a request for artwork and photography that will become a part of the permanent features of Word Salad. So, if you are an artist, graphic artist, or photographer, this is your chance to showcase your work in a great publication. All contributors get full credit for their work if it is used on Word Salad.
Print copies of Word Salad are available for $10 each plus $1 shipping per copy. Payments can be sent via paypal to editors@wordsaladpoetrymagazine.com
or you can mail the payment, made out to Bruce Whealton and sent to
Bruce Whealton
Word Salad Poetry Magazine
112A Dillard St.
Carrboro, NC 27510
Thanks,
The Staff of Word Salad.

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I started watching “A Christmas Carol” tonight, the version with Patrick Stewart. It is interesting what I noticed. Scrooge makes a comment, early in the movie, long before he has his change of heart as a result of the ghosts visitations. Scrooge says of his old partner, or as if speaking to his old partner “we thrived on the idleness of others.” It reminds me of that message I heard from a conservative, a story of the Ant and the Grasshopper. The grasshopper is idle and so he isn’t as shrewd as the ant. This is an Aesop’s Fable designed to teach children about the importance of diligence and hard work and other related values. I’m not against diligence and hard work but it is interesting to prosper off the so called “idleness” of others. It’s also interesting to judge others in such a non-forgiving perfectionist way. In the fable the grasshopper went about being merry thinking winter was far off and that he’d be okay. Have we never failed to foresee possible future struggles? Who is so perfect to say that they never made that mistake? In this fable the ant have zero compassion for the grasshopper because supposedly he was working to store up for the winter.

Interestingly, it was found in a survey of children under 12 (I forget the ages of the children surveyed in this study) the reactions of the children were one of hatred, anger or other negative feelings toward the ant who was seen as cruel, mean or in other similarly negative ways. I heard that story about the ant and the grasshopper from a conservative. I don’t know what the person would have thought to learn the results of this study.

It may seem unrelated but I was touched also by the story in the poem by Jean Jones, my friend and co-editor for Word Salad, called “Tent Cities.” In the poem there is such compassion for the unfortunate and empathy that is amazing. I’ll share the poem below, again, as I did recently. The poem shows his effort to connect with and understand what it might be like to be homeless, or to live in a “tent city.” Tent Cities are popping up in the news recently as examples of poverty and the face of or reaction to homelessness in our nation of late. I was moved by the second to last lines, the comment about how we accept things like this and move on.

I was thinking of another message I heard years ago related to me about a message from a rather detestable person, a Rush Limbaugh – gee, I wonder if he would ever get the message of “A Christmas Carol” by Charles Dickens? He made a comment about a news story about a woman dying from the cold, a homeless woman. His point that he wanted to relate about the incident was that she chose to not come into a shelter, she chose to stay outside. I’m sure we didn’t hear the whole story. Even if we did, the message was clear. Don’t feel sympathy or concern if a person dies in the cold, or feel like you anything is wrong with anything. When this happens, it’s by choice. So, what can you do? It could never be that any city might not have enough shelter beds for everyone? Impossible, right? Or maybe the person felt unsafe going into that particular shelter because she was raped or otherwise violently assaulted in the shelter. Or any other possible explanations. Rush’s message was clear… don’t worry about things, or imagine what it is like to be out there, homeless, vulnerable, cold, this is their choice. And there is nothing you can do. Or at least no reason for you to wonder what it might be like, as Jean did in his poem. Here is his poem:

Tent Cities

by Jean Jones

I try to imagine living in a tent city, and I can’t.
I keep picturing the cold at night and in the morning but I can’t picture it.
I keep imagining what the sky would look like as it turned to dusk and darkness
how beautiful the sky would turn, from peach to orange to red but I can’t see it.
I keep thinking how it would be like with no toilets, no money, and trying to imagine
where to get food and where to go begging but I can’t conceive it
Every time a man says to me on the street, “Could you give money to a disabled vet,”
or a guy parks next to an intersection with a cardboard sign that says “Will work for food,”
I try to imagine where those guys go when it gets dark. I can’t.
I’ve been to the library when the janitor has had to clean up where a man has defecated on himself
at the library bathroom. I’ve looked for sleeping homeless men that I was told were sleeping drunk by the church
and were defecating on the church lawn. I was told to call the police if they didn’t leave when I asked them to.
I’ve tried to picture the lives of these men. I can’t.
This is taking place in our cities and counties every night, not in some third world country.
It is unbelievable and yet we accept it like finding dog shit on our shoes: we hate it, we wipe
it off our shoes by scraping our shoes on the sidewalk, and we move on.

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