This is a Job for Super Kent
The Greatest Living Actor? Certainly. His cleft lip scar to me is mesmerizing....wonderful. And this too is wonderful.
"What can you tell us about your days with the Una Bomber?" Letterman to Phoenix
"The right of freedom of speech consists in speaking the truth."
27.9.10
Anselm Berrigan interlocutes an eloquent statement to an offscreen partner regarding his own particular refusenik status pertaining perhaps to poetry or perhaps to angelism scornforkery. Hard to tell but all the same, it's worth a read and holds the reader save for a bit of clumsy shirk-quirkspew in the middle. Perhaps he is not the most boring poet alive afterall.
http://peacockonlinereview.com/poems/july10/anselm_berrigan.pdf
http://peacockonlinereview.com/poems/july10/anselm_berrigan.pdf
22.9.10
Haris Homestead, 09/10
We know exactly where the grapes
these figs start and stop
where they fell and by which
hand they are brought to tent
and table, I wish for a longer
but less a vist than a lifestyle,
on the two banks of the ocean,
the water spelling and spreading
me, my eyes, cutting
all this property we've acquired
all of this in half, even
the memory of which closet
I locked last
is parceled out like summer
melon, the fog is sure
rolling in, peeling up
the summer layers, the weddings
scalping the low low waves
of the Mediterranean Sea
as boys are prepared for school,
each new book is a promise
and each girls' first smile
but there's no one to stop this
moving on that we're doing,
no tree to grab onto
as we flash by and away
years at a time.
We know exactly where the grapes
these figs start and stop
where they fell and by which
hand they are brought to tent
and table, I wish for a longer
but less a vist than a lifestyle,
on the two banks of the ocean,
the water spelling and spreading
me, my eyes, cutting
all this property we've acquired
all of this in half, even
the memory of which closet
I locked last
is parceled out like summer
melon, the fog is sure
rolling in, peeling up
the summer layers, the weddings
scalping the low low waves
of the Mediterranean Sea
as boys are prepared for school,
each new book is a promise
and each girls' first smile
but there's no one to stop this
moving on that we're doing,
no tree to grab onto
as we flash by and away
years at a time.
1.9.10
29.8.10
28.8.10
In The Mines Of Mexico They Weep
Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos . . . . the elder encourages the younger and shows him how . . . they two shall launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for itself and looks unabashed on the lesser orbits of the stars and sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be quiet again. - Walt Whitman, in the preface to Leaves of Grass.
In a twilight pilgrimmage
via these frost cracked streets
close to the Campbell shaft
full of our fathers breath and breathing,
we unfold our own cloth on the Fourth of July,
one crease at a time on the crags
near the ballpark in Warren, down from
the Loma Linda and the old mine-boss housing.
Flashlights dangle from the hands
of children. The night catches us deeply
unaware, but they don't think like that,
they are that,
think more about the starting time,
and the firemen on top of the dumps
who signal the end by waving lanterns,
how they crave that sort of thing
up there on those mountains of slag
thinking, as ours do, of the breath
of canaries and candles deep in those old holes.
A persistent and unheard whimper
fills space on this weary-
happy picnic in July or maybe
it only fills the weariness with something else.
I clasp a child tight in my arms,
a finger closes the tender wound,
hush hush, our waiting begins, we settle down.
Our Fourth of July is in sweet tortuous ruins
thrown in a trash bin of appetites lost.
We've run from one excitement to another
Now there shall be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos . . . . the elder encourages the younger and shows him how . . . they two shall launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for itself and looks unabashed on the lesser orbits of the stars and sweeps through the ceaseless rings and shall never be quiet again. - Walt Whitman, in the preface to Leaves of Grass.
In a twilight pilgrimmage
via these frost cracked streets
close to the Campbell shaft
full of our fathers breath and breathing,
we unfold our own cloth on the Fourth of July,
one crease at a time on the crags
near the ballpark in Warren, down from
the Loma Linda and the old mine-boss housing.
Flashlights dangle from the hands
of children. The night catches us deeply
unaware, but they don't think like that,
they are that,
think more about the starting time,
and the firemen on top of the dumps
who signal the end by waving lanterns,
how they crave that sort of thing
up there on those mountains of slag
thinking, as ours do, of the breath
of canaries and candles deep in those old holes.
A persistent and unheard whimper
fills space on this weary-
happy picnic in July or maybe
it only fills the weariness with something else.
I clasp a child tight in my arms,
a finger closes the tender wound,
hush hush, our waiting begins, we settle down.
Our Fourth of July is in sweet tortuous ruins
thrown in a trash bin of appetites lost.
We've run from one excitement to another
races, parades, contests, reunions
thankful for a gentle sun, there was no burning
and there will be few scars if any.
The miles between this and that
contract like stars in heaven where
light reaches us much too late
and we as well, get there accordingly.
This is the anniversary of all
that's happened here
for each body on this ragged old quilt,
each poor soul and dumbstruck
face tipped up toward the sky.
The silence between one person and the next
is only the truth where commentary has failed.
I look around me one last time
before the sun takes all the light away -
count the faces I own, erase what's left,
a small town thing to do on an occasion like this.
The darkness is complete and the fireworks begin.
My daughter tells me, during one of the beautiful
interims which goes like this:
thankful for a gentle sun, there was no burning
and there will be few scars if any.
The miles between this and that
contract like stars in heaven where
light reaches us much too late
and we as well, get there accordingly.
This is the anniversary of all
that's happened here
for each body on this ragged old quilt,
each poor soul and dumbstruck
face tipped up toward the sky.
The silence between one person and the next
is only the truth where commentary has failed.
I look around me one last time
before the sun takes all the light away -
count the faces I own, erase what's left,
a small town thing to do on an occasion like this.
The darkness is complete and the fireworks begin.
My daughter tells me, during one of the beautiful
interims which goes like this:
ooh, aah, wonderful! then another interim and another,
one day the sun will die
as copper sulphur spark comets flower dark,
my father scatters in the sky,
my father scatters in the sky,
Oh! Mufasa, talk to me!
First draft sometime 03/06 however the sketch for this poem much earlier...probably in the mid 90's.
25.8.10
Bisbee Blues Fest, September 25, 2010
Artist Videos here:
https://thebisbeebluesfestival.com/artist-videos/
Artist Videos here:
https://thebisbeebluesfestival.com/artist-videos/
19.8.10
Border Patrol Suicides Skyrocket
"It's unclear exactly why the men ended their lives. Few of them left notes. And the Border Patrol seems somewhat at odds with itself over the issue. The agency declined to provide details of the suicides and would only confirm the number of deaths since 2008. But the AP uncovered the names, locations and dates of the suicides by reviewing public records, including those obtained from medical examiners through the Freedom of Information Act, and speaking with people close to the Border Patrol."
Read between the lines wudja? I guarantee you, none of them were poets.
Alfombra Roja
-an explanation of the Cuban Necktie and the Disneyland Similacra of the Underworld of the Sicarios.
"Julio Scherer García, doyen of independent journalism in Mexico, recently published an illuminating book: La reina del Pacífico. For months, Scherer visited Sandra Ávila Beltrán in the penitentiary where she has been held since September 28, 2007. Presented to the media as if she were the “Queen of the South” from Arturo Pérez Reverte’s novel, Ávila has all the necessary traits to captivate the public imagination. She is a beautiful, strong, defiant woman, imprisoned by a weak head of state who broke his bones falling off a bicycle (a kindergartner’s accident), and who is further diminished by the suits he wears (on him they all look extra-large). The Queen was irresistible prey for a president with small feet. Displaying her to the public is part of a larger propaganda strategy that has done nothing to diminish the brutal impact of the drug trade."
"According to what she tells Scherer, Ávila’s involvement in crime has been less direct and in a certain way more alarming than what her jailers suggest. At 44, she has never known a life outside the drug trade. She talks about the industry the way Sofia Coppola might talk about film. She had open lines of communication to all the noteworthy capos, was kidnapped by a delinquent boyfriend, has been married to two narcos (one a corrupt police commander), underwent the kidnapping of her adolescent son, has watched people die at her feet, and has had at her disposal all the parties, all the jewels, all the cars, all the mansions (each occupied only for a couple of weeks)—every excess purchasable for cash. Although she studied journalism for a semester at the Universidad Autónoma de Guadalajara, she was not familiar with Julio Scherer, the country’s best-known journalist. For forty-four years she lived in a world apart, like the inmates of Biosphere 2.
-an explanation of the Cuban Necktie and the Disneyland Similacra of the Underworld of the Sicarios.
"Julio Scherer García, doyen of independent journalism in Mexico, recently published an illuminating book: La reina del Pacífico. For months, Scherer visited Sandra Ávila Beltrán in the penitentiary where she has been held since September 28, 2007. Presented to the media as if she were the “Queen of the South” from Arturo Pérez Reverte’s novel, Ávila has all the necessary traits to captivate the public imagination. She is a beautiful, strong, defiant woman, imprisoned by a weak head of state who broke his bones falling off a bicycle (a kindergartner’s accident), and who is further diminished by the suits he wears (on him they all look extra-large). The Queen was irresistible prey for a president with small feet. Displaying her to the public is part of a larger propaganda strategy that has done nothing to diminish the brutal impact of the drug trade."
"According to what she tells Scherer, Ávila’s involvement in crime has been less direct and in a certain way more alarming than what her jailers suggest. At 44, she has never known a life outside the drug trade. She talks about the industry the way Sofia Coppola might talk about film. She had open lines of communication to all the noteworthy capos, was kidnapped by a delinquent boyfriend, has been married to two narcos (one a corrupt police commander), underwent the kidnapping of her adolescent son, has watched people die at her feet, and has had at her disposal all the parties, all the jewels, all the cars, all the mansions (each occupied only for a couple of weeks)—every excess purchasable for cash. Although she studied journalism for a semester at the Universidad Autónoma de Guadalajara, she was not familiar with Julio Scherer, the country’s best-known journalist. For forty-four years she lived in a world apart, like the inmates of Biosphere 2.
The landscape has been transformed by the investment of dirty money. Any Mexican city features plenty of locations to film the death of a capo or a police commander. There, the ideal restaurant: a plastic and neon château where waitresses in miniskirts serve brontosaurus ribs, next to a Mercedes-Benz dealership and a hotel that looks like a mosque with Plexiglas cupolas. Places like Torreón or Mérida, which until recently had reputations as calm cities (because it was assumed that the narcos who built their homes there didn’t use them for “work”) have now also become the settings for executions.
In the new environment of fear, 10,000 companies offer security services, and close to 3,000 people have had a chip the size of a grain of rice implanted under their skin so that they can be easily located in the event of kidnapping. "
18.8.10
17.8.10
John Latta contemplates the Mentor/Manatee existence
http://isola-di-rifiuti.blogspot.com/2010/08/roberto-bolano-william-faulkner.html
Two Latta Paintings of Words with fine last lines and appropriateness. Poems that teach the poem about itself and what could be better than that!
http://isola-di-rifiuti.blogspot.com/2010/08/roberto-bolano-william-faulkner.html
Two Latta Paintings of Words with fine last lines and appropriateness. Poems that teach the poem about itself and what could be better than that!
Not my gospell Squall, my
Arch and holler, my sacerdotal
Imperium, my squawk, my Gun. -John Latta from Cold and Arch in Typo Mag #3
16.8.10
Sign of the Times
"Mobbing" is the term that has been coined for an increasingly common phenomenon in primarily Western employment environments that leads to divorce, unemployment and it has been documented in at least one study that 12% of all suicides experienced a 'mobbing' event shortly before they took their own life.
http://chronicle.com/article/What-Killed-Kevin-Morrissey-/123902/?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Suicide at prestigious Virginia Quarterly Review stirs concern over workplace bullying:
Family members and people close to the review say Mr. Morrissey, the review's managing editor, had been complaining to the university about workplace bullying by his boss, Ted Genoways. But, they contend, the institution did virtually nothing to help. "Kevin had been to the university as recently as the Monday before the Friday he died," says a person who worked for the review. "The university had tools to step in and mediate, and they didn't." Some close to the situation say that in the days before the death, they even warned the university that Mr. Morrissey, who suffered from serious depression, might commit suicide."
"They say Mr. Genoways, in turn, began cutting Mr. Morrissey out of key decisions and distancing himself from the office, refusing to answer staff members' e-mail messages, shirking many of his day-to-day duties, and dumping most of the work on his small staff. "The whole staff felt Ted took all the credit and did none of the work," said the person who worked for the review, adding that Mr. Genoways spent most of his time at VQR "scrambling to be a star." Mr. Genoways has been away from the office on a Guggenheim fellowship in recent months, but he still has been responsible for making sure the journal's issues are finished on time."
"Mobbing" is the term that has been coined for an increasingly common phenomenon in primarily Western employment environments that leads to divorce, unemployment and it has been documented in at least one study that 12% of all suicides experienced a 'mobbing' event shortly before they took their own life.
http://chronicle.com/article/What-Killed-Kevin-Morrissey-/123902/?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en
Suicide at prestigious Virginia Quarterly Review stirs concern over workplace bullying:
Family members and people close to the review say Mr. Morrissey, the review's managing editor, had been complaining to the university about workplace bullying by his boss, Ted Genoways. But, they contend, the institution did virtually nothing to help. "Kevin had been to the university as recently as the Monday before the Friday he died," says a person who worked for the review. "The university had tools to step in and mediate, and they didn't." Some close to the situation say that in the days before the death, they even warned the university that Mr. Morrissey, who suffered from serious depression, might commit suicide."
"They say Mr. Genoways, in turn, began cutting Mr. Morrissey out of key decisions and distancing himself from the office, refusing to answer staff members' e-mail messages, shirking many of his day-to-day duties, and dumping most of the work on his small staff. "The whole staff felt Ted took all the credit and did none of the work," said the person who worked for the review, adding that Mr. Genoways spent most of his time at VQR "scrambling to be a star." Mr. Genoways has been away from the office on a Guggenheim fellowship in recent months, but he still has been responsible for making sure the journal's issues are finished on time."
12.8.10
Ah Ramadan Kareem and it is
Evidence Reveals Direct Israeli Involvement
in the 2005 "Valentine's Day Assassination" of Rafik Hariri
in Beirut Lebanon. Simultaneously, other evidence was provided that demonstrates the way Hezbollah managed to capture at least 9 IDF commandoes several years prior in the village of Anjar which in turn demonstrates the advanced technology available that has enabled the world's most beloved resistance army to beat not one superpower but two and not once but thrice.
Footage intercepted by Hezbollah directly from Israeli sources embedded in the IDF and shows Israel directly monitoring the route upon which Hariri was to take when his safety warning system (the most high tech in the world and obtained from Israel to boot) was jammed. The evidence has been surpressed by Hezbollah due to the fact that it would weaken their security and the security of Lebaon if Israel knew their capabilities to intercept this data. Now, because the UN tribunal which was stacked in order to blame Hezbollah has begun, Hezbollah had no choice. It will however generate even more support now at this midnight hour for the legitimacy and rights not only of Hezbollah to retain their weapons for deterrence but to eventually transmute those into weapons and philosophy shared by the mostly Shi'i Lebanese Army.
Jews the biggest victims of the hate crime known as Zionism
Two million plus hits and counting ....gee....as many hits as Silliman has received in a lifetime
"Multiple Subjectivities" versus the exploitation of women's clothing, the role of the Hollywood script in abducting and unveiling not only Arab/Oriental women but women in general. A very interesting point is made about the script of the inferiority of various cultural dress codes from the inferiority of the Victorian era and it's collision with the scantily clad sub Saharan/North African female versus the inverse relationship now in which American scantily clad women are considered not only superior but exceptionally so when compared to their poor muslim sisters.
Evidence Reveals Direct Israeli Involvement
in the 2005 "Valentine's Day Assassination" of Rafik Hariri
in Beirut Lebanon. Simultaneously, other evidence was provided that demonstrates the way Hezbollah managed to capture at least 9 IDF commandoes several years prior in the village of Anjar which in turn demonstrates the advanced technology available that has enabled the world's most beloved resistance army to beat not one superpower but two and not once but thrice.
Footage intercepted by Hezbollah directly from Israeli sources embedded in the IDF and shows Israel directly monitoring the route upon which Hariri was to take when his safety warning system (the most high tech in the world and obtained from Israel to boot) was jammed. The evidence has been surpressed by Hezbollah due to the fact that it would weaken their security and the security of Lebaon if Israel knew their capabilities to intercept this data. Now, because the UN tribunal which was stacked in order to blame Hezbollah has begun, Hezbollah had no choice. It will however generate even more support now at this midnight hour for the legitimacy and rights not only of Hezbollah to retain their weapons for deterrence but to eventually transmute those into weapons and philosophy shared by the mostly Shi'i Lebanese Army.
Jews the biggest victims of the hate crime known as Zionism
Two million plus hits and counting ....gee....as many hits as Silliman has received in a lifetime
"Multiple Subjectivities" versus the exploitation of women's clothing, the role of the Hollywood script in abducting and unveiling not only Arab/Oriental women but women in general. A very interesting point is made about the script of the inferiority of various cultural dress codes from the inferiority of the Victorian era and it's collision with the scantily clad sub Saharan/North African female versus the inverse relationship now in which American scantily clad women are considered not only superior but exceptionally so when compared to their poor muslim sisters.
40,000 rockets and counting
Finally. Israel formally implicated in the Valentine's Day assassination of ex Prime Minister of Lebanon. About time I say, about time. The crater was so obviously caused by an aerial bombing and a person would have to be blind to have missed that. Or on the Israeli payroll. And apparently about a 100 people were on that payroll, many of them high ranking officials in the security apparatus in Lebanon, the army as well as employees in the telecommunications industry.http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=1&categ_id=2&article_id=118133#axzz0wMoUghsV
Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the US Senate Committee on Foreign Relations discusses the unbelievable (and apparently unpronouncable for the chairman who is a bit tongue tied) increase in strength and importance of Hezbollah in the region and the world (as a proxy of Iran of course, yadayada). The guy is hopelessly biased towards Israel and against the Lebanese people who it is well known by now, support not only the resistance but the actual and legitimate political party that represents a variety of sects not solely the Shia muslims of Lebanon.
http://foreign.senate.gov/hearings/hearing/?id=de51c6a4-5056-a032-52bc-dcf1f13de7ae
"Unless Hezbollah is defeated completely, in detail", well yes Doctor Norton. And it can't be defeated. Game over. And you are most welcome at bayt Sweid in Haris any time you care to stop in for a cup of tea. My pleasure.
11.8.10
Eloquence Found in Trash Can Called Chicago
Thanks to Micheal Rothenberg who kindly remembers me with each new Big Bridge issue, I'd like to suggest further reading for those who are too important to watch TV over at Silliman's house without really knowing why they are there doing so anymore and Ron practicing some form of idealized business communication much like the newest on the scene known as rimming, Reflective Information Management. The following thesis cum essay cum review hails from one Linda Rogers who I know nothing about. I do say though, the woman can write, think and dictate promises to me all she wants to (kicking that ole die hard Perloff right to the curb), promises about the political kingdom come we find ourselves in nowadays. The Cuban story which anymore is the story of dissidentism backwards and from the rear view mirror in poetry which no doubt would please my former colleague and editor Circles Robinson who now runs The Havana Times (last account anyway) from his home somewhere in Latinia, where he has been exiled for who knows how long. I found this while looking for something about Thax Douglas a troubadour in the highest sense of the word who writes poems for Rock Bands and gets into concerts for free. I happened upon a little Thax chapbook at the thrift store (who on earth would throw out a book of poetry especially from such an underground and persuasive metaphysical metaphorist?)....and began reading through it and imagining all the young boys I've had around lately who would benefit from such a magnificent and humble gift as a first edition signed copy of Rock Band Portraiture from their cougar mamma poet in residence, chief cook and bottle washer too.
POETRY AND THE SOCIAL GOSPEL
The Captivity and Liberation of Language
"I knew a child who lived on the wild side and painted pictures with no borders between his phenomenal and spirit worlds. His only rule was the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
He then encountered an elementary school teacher who moonlighted as a free soul bounty hunter. She would break his spirit and prove that his indigo wisdom and difficulty decoding language was waywardness. By the end of grade one, the boy was drawing heavy lines around every character; this is the church, this is the steeple… "
Thanks to Micheal Rothenberg who kindly remembers me with each new Big Bridge issue, I'd like to suggest further reading for those who are too important to watch TV over at Silliman's house without really knowing why they are there doing so anymore and Ron practicing some form of idealized business communication much like the newest on the scene known as rimming, Reflective Information Management. The following thesis cum essay cum review hails from one Linda Rogers who I know nothing about. I do say though, the woman can write, think and dictate promises to me all she wants to (kicking that ole die hard Perloff right to the curb), promises about the political kingdom come we find ourselves in nowadays. The Cuban story which anymore is the story of dissidentism backwards and from the rear view mirror in poetry which no doubt would please my former colleague and editor Circles Robinson who now runs The Havana Times (last account anyway) from his home somewhere in Latinia, where he has been exiled for who knows how long. I found this while looking for something about Thax Douglas a troubadour in the highest sense of the word who writes poems for Rock Bands and gets into concerts for free. I happened upon a little Thax chapbook at the thrift store (who on earth would throw out a book of poetry especially from such an underground and persuasive metaphysical metaphorist?)....and began reading through it and imagining all the young boys I've had around lately who would benefit from such a magnificent and humble gift as a first edition signed copy of Rock Band Portraiture from their cougar mamma poet in residence, chief cook and bottle washer too.
POETRY AND THE SOCIAL GOSPEL
The Captivity and Liberation of Language
"I knew a child who lived on the wild side and painted pictures with no borders between his phenomenal and spirit worlds. His only rule was the Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
He then encountered an elementary school teacher who moonlighted as a free soul bounty hunter. She would break his spirit and prove that his indigo wisdom and difficulty decoding language was waywardness. By the end of grade one, the boy was drawing heavy lines around every character; this is the church, this is the steeple… "
9.8.10
Internationalism versus Globalism in Literature
Is there a difference between a tourist and a tourist?
-"Thanks to your visit" A sign outside of the Maronite town in South Lebanon Bint Jubail, the site of the most recent battle with Zionism which to many people represents the reason why this essay is profoundly unenlightening. Thanks to YOUR visit Israel, English speakers do not even realize the word for earth is Arz.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/article.html?id=239464&commentsubmit=true#lastcomment
Ange Mlinko writes of her short stay in Beirut during a contested election. Unfortunately she gives the impression of gunmen on every block when in fact she was situated literally, within a block or two of the "Capitol Building". So yes, there are typically "machine gun armed" soldiers near any structure in the WORLD in which heads of state meet to discuss gas prices.
And, just a little note, the Quran is spelled with a Q and a U. With a Q. With a U. The anunciation of a short o followed by the vowel a sans silent e, inevitably produces the bastardization which has been disseminated in the English speaking media as "Koran" (a very unpretty sound) instead of the dove like Quran. Hear it? Stop spreading this type of mistake by stopping the spread of such stereotyped sound patterns in 'our' culture. I say 'our' but truly, the Western culture is no longer my home. Far from it, it's a tour of a church and a valley.
Is there a difference between a tourist and a tourist?
-"Thanks to your visit" A sign outside of the Maronite town in South Lebanon Bint Jubail, the site of the most recent battle with Zionism which to many people represents the reason why this essay is profoundly unenlightening. Thanks to YOUR visit Israel, English speakers do not even realize the word for earth is Arz.
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/journal/article.html?id=239464&commentsubmit=true#lastcomment
Ange Mlinko writes of her short stay in Beirut during a contested election. Unfortunately she gives the impression of gunmen on every block when in fact she was situated literally, within a block or two of the "Capitol Building". So yes, there are typically "machine gun armed" soldiers near any structure in the WORLD in which heads of state meet to discuss gas prices.
She describes 'fanatical' Arabic language patterns.....hmm. The Lebanese are very anal retentive people Ms. Mlinko. Very. Do not mistake their dialect for the less exact (not) classical Arabic. The Lebanese have improved the di-glossial (rather than 'fanatical as she puts it) language (fuhsa), improving it with a rather franco-phile flourish. As English speakers who have no classical intent left within our mutt-speak, we fail to understand the beauty of classical wonders exposed to cultural wonders which produce dialects:
"It’s dispiriting, I wrote in my journal, to have everything reduce to sectarianism—even the colloquial Arabic of my language class is tainted, I learn. Ah, he must be Muslim, said Miriam’s mother as she listened to me recite the phrases he had taught us for greetings and farewells. “Some of that is more literary Arabic.” “We say mneha, not aal, for ‘I’m fine,’ and we don’t say bihatrak, we say au revoir.” Then Miriam characterized the concern with the purity of Arabic as “fanatic”: at bottom it is about the sanctity of the language the Koran is written in. Fanatic too, she thought, was the insistence of her English professor last year that she write e-mail in formal language, not texting abbreviations. Language is for communication, she insisted, so what’s the harm if “you are” turns into “u r”?"
Mon Dieu!
It has literally nothing to do with religion so much as it has to do with a professor who hopes to teach a student the complicated and important role language has in all Pan Arab societies in which newspapers and television broadcast 'media Arabic' which is a close relative of the Egyptian Arabic (thought to be the most exact and teachable) in comparison to Fuhsa itself or 'Quran' Arabic. Educators only come in two varieties in the Levant, purists and charlatans and they cannot be identified by their out-of-date plaid coats...not usually anyway. There is a note of preservation in the discussion of 'classical' languages...you know..the PC concept or rather notion of the loss of culture through the watering down of same said 'languages'. Modern Arabic or rather, Lebanese has been infected with mutt-speak and there are no words for some ideas like 'television' and 'telephone' not to mention there is no P in the alphabet and Pepsi becomes Bebsi.And, just a little note, the Quran is spelled with a Q and a U. With a Q. With a U. The anunciation of a short o followed by the vowel a sans silent e, inevitably produces the bastardization which has been disseminated in the English speaking media as "Koran" (a very unpretty sound) instead of the dove like Quran. Hear it? Stop spreading this type of mistake by stopping the spread of such stereotyped sound patterns in 'our' culture. I say 'our' but truly, the Western culture is no longer my home. Far from it, it's a tour of a church and a valley.
"Mogrehbi" or Moroccan has become a buzz word in this valley called Americana by the way. Mogrehb 'jumaa' and 'djumma' is like genie to jinn is to djinn. It is a difference between alphabets, not dialects. If it were, the description would be one of Mogrehbi as being nearly impenetrable to most Arabic speakers (be they Lebanese, Egyptian or Oxford type-trainees such as yourself). It is spoken in North Africa all the way up into the Gizan area of Saudi Arabia by the Saudis themselves...the poor ones in that rural and mountainous zone so chock full of types of people who look more like Laplanders than they do inner city American school educated Saudi citizens. So of course he was confused...you were asking if the same word was different.
The name for university (Jumaa) translates most closely to "school of thought" as in, SoQ poetry or the like. It is an ethos minded word and is applied in a most religious sense to the five Madhabs in Islam. (Four if you ask the Sunnites who deny Shia their rightful place in Islamic history.) More importantly, it should be pointed out that the generic terms such as 'madrasa' have been taken wholly out of context in the West to mean 'terrorist' academies when in fact madrasa literally translates to school, elementary to be exact or any sub-level institution that falls more on the three RRRs than it does the philology scale (jumaa).
Even more interesting is the origin (first attested to a Latin origin) of the word TUTOR. It's actual origin is much more likely to be the same as madrasa...that much feared category of terrorese. Tudros (poor transliteration on my part) which is Arabic for "to study" or 'you study' and the root of maderroos (teacher), like all familiar groups of words in Arabic is highly relational to the issue of the transference of information which is headed off with 'da-ra-sa' (my son's best guess at the root letters). As with all Arabic root words, there are three consonants which are then taken and manipulated via the use of phoneticized vowel sounds to mean: teacher, school, learn, etc. Unlike English in which the word for school has literally nothing to do with the word to teach.
And the last paragraph is priceless....a Mohameddan is mentioned....are you uh stammering starlet like a Mohameddan? Yes, it is best to keep people guessing in Beirut but if you have to guess......perhaps you ought to rethink posting essays about it. Or maybe not, I do not mean to sound ungrateful on my own behalf or behalf of the poor Lebanese. It's so nice to see the little country that thinks it is big look a little bigger even if its through the eyes of a poorly trained observer. Next time you get the chance, ask him if he is Druze or Habashi. That will get you into the conversation you hope to have regardless of what he is or isn't. You'll find out about your spy schools and hostage places.
Furthermore, if investigating the nature of the exile (Beirut and Liban happen to be a city and a country of natural exiles, all of them escaping some dynasty or t'other) poet, one would hope a citation of Darwish be present in the actual discussion (but this essay was not a discussion so much as it was an honorary and complacent acknowledgement, literally a postcard with a poet in it feeling poetry like). A few lines from Darwish might have set the piece up brilliantly because Darwish was an external internal exile who is mistaken by the un-informed as an 'Arab' or rather, a 'resident' Arab and spokeman. Much like I am an exile in my own country, there are several levels to exilism beyond the merely personal which Ms. Mlinko portrays here in her essay that likely took less than an hour or two to compose from a few journal entries.
"Beirut is a city of gold and fatigue." or "Beirut, our tent, our star." Something along those lines anyway from a rather dated interview given when I too, was just a 'tourist' rather than what I am now, an exile in my own hometown.
On Beveled Glass and Annas
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