Diary of an Internet Poet:

Daily Typewriting Chez Jack the Raver

 

 

HOUSEHUSBAND.  March 12 - April 24.  68,000 words.  Brenda and I watch rented movies, read, talk about the TV, and what her co-workers said at work.  We keep the grandchildren.  She has backyard chickens and a hay-bale garden.  I write, in my writing room, shop for groceries, cook cheap, nutritious meals, from scratch, and do the dishes.  “Heap went out to the charcuterie for forcemeats.  On his bicycle.”

 

THE ANTHROPOLOGY MAJOR.  April 25 - May 9.  24,000 words.  I see that DIARY OF AN INTERNET POET:  DAILY TYPEWRITING CHEZ JACK THE RAVER is a book in two parts, “Househusband” and “The Anthropology Major,” rather than a pair of separate books.  As Ann Charters said, “Sanders—don't send me any more books.  They're all the same.  Spend the money on your wife and kids.”

 

BORN, DIED, IN-THE-SERVICE.  May 10 - May 17.  18,000 words.  Brenda and I go to Potterfest.  Balder drives, so I don’t have to worry about whether the family car will or will not start.  Rowan comes with us.  We see relatives and picker friends.  Balder brings a work print of Back From the Dread.  Dread Clampitt:  2005-2007 A. D. and a copy of their new CD, Learnin’ To Live, with Sam Bush on fiddle.  Whoa, boys, be careful, now.  You’re out there where the leaves tremble.  The tea leaves.  This is where it’s going.  Roots music, independent film, vernacular writing.  Look for me under your bootstep, Camerado.  On the worldwide web.  A self-produced CD, sold out of the back of the mini-van.  The swinette-picker of American letters.

 

 

I dream of playing the swinette on stage, at Americana music festivals, selling my books at the record table afterwards.  A swinette, you stretch two horsehairs across a hog's ass and pick it with your teeth.  Brew mounts the steps, walks across the stage with great dignity, takes a stuffed Miss Piggy doll out from under his robes, lifts her skirt, presses her butt to his face, and squeals like a stuck pig.  Great cry and little wool, as the Devil said when he sheared the hogs.

 

 

A WRITER’S VOICE.  May 18 – May 22.  8,000 words.  How did I develop the voice I have, and what affect did my voice have on my fortunes as a writer?  What are the implications for what I write next?  I see what I am going to write next.  40-Year Run:  The Penultimate Calendar Quarter.  June, July, and August 2010.  That will complete my 39th year as a writer.  Then I change the name of 40-Year Run:  The Penultimate Calendar Quarter to Enough Is as Good as a Feast.  The secret of happiness is being content with what you have.  Not wanting more.  Doing with less.  Being content with less.  Less isn’t more, it’s less.  Less is what you want.  A writing room and time to write.  A web site on the worldwide web and self-published pamphlets.  If you have that, what else do you need?  Blessed is the man who’s found his work.

 

 

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