Terrorist Attack, Suicide, Other?

My wife Penelope and me were talking about why Joe Stack's attack on the IRS was not considered a "terrorist attack". The good people at Common Dreams have an article up I thought worth sharing. I can't help but feel in a way, we're getting into Known Knowns and Unknown knowns and other Rumsfeldian bullshit with this defintions dance.

Donna Mae Woodruff

My grandmother, Donna Mae Woodruff, died last Thursday. I wanted to put up a post about her. Not just because she was such a big part of my life growing up, but because I sometimes I think it's my love of animals that helped me love at all during certain low points throughout my life and I owe that to her along with a great deal of gratitude.

I had always liked animals, but really came to grasp what a great honor it is to earn an animal’s trust, and how rewarding that can be, because of the time I spent with Grandma and Grandpa. My parents divorced when I was 9. A few years after that my father moved back to California and I began to go to my grandparent’s house (this is in Michigan) on weekends to work in my grandpa’s print shop keeping the floors sweep, presses cleaned and garbage emptied—he ran a small printing business on the side. My mother would drive me in Friday and pick me up Sunday. This is when my relationship with Donna really began. Both of them actually, because up until then I had been living in California where I was born.

One of my favorite Cummings poems begins: “if there are any heavens my mother will (all by herself) have one.” The same is true for Donna Mae. It will be a heaven of pony manes to brush, a spider monkey to dress, and a whole bestiary of animals to name, pet, and love. She sadly remarked to me once, on seeing a dog chained up in a yard, “What is the point of having a dog if you can’t feel it against you.” She knew all about feeling dogs against her. At one point she had a whole pack of mini and toy poodles that followed her every move and settled wherever she settled. They were, Shoo Shoo, Bon Bon, Emily, Cupcake, Poppa Touhy, Mister and JePaul. I may be forgetting one. Poppa Touhy had to wear a diaper because he was excitable. That was quite a sight so was seeing all these little gray and white bodies snuggled in around her on the couch where she sat and spent so much of her time reading.


Here are a few highlights. Clyde, the spider monkey, who she occasionally dressed in cowboy chaps and a little cowboy hat--doll clothes. She let him play around in the trees in the backyard and when it was time for him to come in she would offer him a small Styrofoam cup with a sip of whiskey in it—he really liked it. (This Google image looks like him minus the duds.) Over the years, she had doves, Great Danes, a giant Tom cat named Paisano, flemmish giant rabbits that they would turn loose from time to time so they could lope around the backyard like sweet little broncos, sixteen cats that came and went, all with funny names I can’t remember, and even a raccoon at one point that stayed out doors but was a good friend. (Somewhere there are Super 8 movies of me as a little kid playing with it in her backyard.) Some of these animals I was around for, some I heard about through the stories she and Grandpa would tell. They had two ponies as well, Lady Boo and Benny that I remember very well. I sat on their backs as a baby and patted their muzzles as a teenager when I would come there to work. Of course, one of the odd things about all this animal life is that they lived right in the city in a fairly suburban area—wasn’t always that way though. The neighborhood kind of grew up around them over the years until a pony run seemed to look more and more out of place. (Another Google image, but imagine 4 or 5 of these running and jumping around the backyard.)

Quite a few years after my Grandfather died, never one to be long without a dog of some kind, she took in a Rottweiler named Alex. She must have been in her 70’s at this point and at one point the dog was horsing around and knocked her over. She broke her hip and could not get up and lie there on the floor where she fell overnight until the next day when my Dad came by and happened to find her. I wrote this poem about her shortly after.

Kingdom

A woodchuck claims the quiet country
that he finds beneath your steps. Now,
his digging makes them tilt so much

that you could fall again. Mice gnaw holes
through boxes of what little food you keep,
build nests of your wig hair and grass

in the cellar’s ancient fuse box. Still
you will not set a trap. Your husband’s dead
and most would say you live alone.

But every day more webs darken the corners
of your ceilings. Every night, the play of squirrels
behind the walls. You remind me of that gentle poet Issa,

writing of lice, flies and fleas with affection
even as his wife sat counting bites
on their infant daughter. I recall your warning

from childhood: kill a spider you’ll make it rain.
Donna, there’s nothing you wouldn’t love,
wouldn’t spare. But how will you survive

when everything you see is so precious—
the tiny, the clawed, living their gentle lives
and aiming them right at you.

Comp Books, a Nerd's Confession

I have to admit, that one my greatest joys is finding notebooks, especially the comp book style, at super low, post-back-to-school prices. Here is the latest batch I got a Office Max for 80c a piece. A while back, I found some good ones at Target for 60 cents a piece. Cool.

Poetry News

THIS JUST IN ...

I am very upbeat about a recent rejection letter I got. The poem R.W.W. is on the death of my son Rainer back in 1998. There was a note scribbled on the form reject saying the poem was lovely, wish it didn't end with a question though. Not the first time I was told that and since poetry is what, 80% revision? I am working on a new last line and will resubmit it.

Nuts, It's Been Ages

What's up with the life stuff that keeps me from my beloved Poor Fool?

Here are few quick updates.

SPAM has discovered Poor Fool and at present I have 33 comments from Anonymous, for everything from Viagra offers to War Craft cheats. So if you comment and you are a legitimate Anonymous I probably won't see your message anymore. Alas!

On an off note, I have been beseiged by Peter Sellers-like (Pink Panther) missteps. Feeling all upbeat and cocky because of a good jog, I threw a handful of cashews into my mouth and a bunch of salt(because they were the last nuts in the container) got in my eyes.











As part of my efforts to be more relaxed throughout the day, I stopped working and took a deep sniff of a Vanilla candle and snorted the flame into my nostril. Now there's a smell you don't want to think about. Burnt nose hair. Trapped in your nose no less.





Other than that, freelance work has been crazy steady. I am jogging again. And I even have a few poems out.

"Bad, scary monkey. bad!"

Working on a freelance project today that could involve stuffed animals, I was sad and a little terrified to come across this one. It is a monkey, so they say. I would go so far as to say it tops the clown from Poltergeist -- furthermore, I am getting this weird Chucky meets flying Oz monkeys vibe.

Brussel Sprouts

No, it's not a prop from Day of the Triffids, but rather, Brussel Sprouts before they're harvested. I had no idea.

Little Bunnies Foo Foo

Inside my Black & Decker leaf sucker upper, there is a sizable and very toothy grinding element which makes quick but noisy work of leaves and buckeyes, and almost bunnies.

While doing the yard suck yesterday, I found two of these little fellas hiding in plain sight in the leaves and grass I was cleaning up. I thought they needed a little help getting to better cover so we worked out a deal where they would stay in the thicker ground cover by my porch and both promised to beware the cats in our neighborhood. We talked a bit about "stealth mode" a then I got back to work.

Lights out

My doctor's office just phoned and my doc' secretary Vicky says I have severe Sleep Apnea and I need to go back in for a, quote: "CPAP Titration Study".

Sad at slow moving paper work! They are sooooooo behind the old 8 ball. The sleep lab already got me in and out for the Titration before my primary even got back to me with results of the first test.

"Continuous Positive Airway Pressure (CPAP) is the main treatment for obstructive sleep apnoea. It is a pump which uses a gentle stream of air to splint open the airway at night. Depending on the case an overnight study may be conducted at the laboratory or in the home to determine the most effective setting for the machine to alleviate symptoms of apnoea." What you see in the picture is pretty much what I was wearing last night -- only I looked cool in it.

My technician dude for the Titration must have known I am a worrier, though, because when I asked him what the first test results showed, mild or moderate, he said, "You know, I don't really like to use terms like that ..." Blah blah blah. It took the courage of my primary's nurse, Vicky, to give it to me straight.

All I Need is the Air that I Breathe

So I have an update on the blackouts. (see below)

Did a Sleep Study the other night and it showed that I stopped breathing off and on during the short time I did sleep. Spooky. So I go back in tonight to sleep with a PAP something or other on my face. Sounds like it fits over my nose and face like that many-legged thing from Alien. Spooky again.

Andrew Sullivan & Me

Tonight at the pharmacy I was mistaken for several versions of Andrew Sullivan.

The Faces of Fear, ... & Stupidity, Hate, Racism

I am depressed enough these days without seeing this Freakshow, but alas it came my way and I want to share it with you. They are actually scared by the word Czar. I guess it sounds spooky and perhaps Muslim. But not as spooky as the Tea Baggers . They don't know who or what a Czar is and what kind of murky plans he has.

Speaking of words, I think they should take a break from the frenzy and look up the more contemporary meaning of Tea Bagger which they've proudly nicknamed themselves. This kind of unfocused, uninformed, and generally confused rage and indignation is painfully reminiscent of the terrifying video clips of Ohio Palin supporter during the election.)

Everyone is so tired of all the spending, and all the freedoms being eroded. You know, all the "stuff" that Obama has done in his short time in office.

God, these sad, noisy maniacs.