allen ginsberg, poet & muscian, died 12 years ago today :(

allen ginsberg, a dharma lion, died 12 years ago today, april 5, 1997. he was 70 years old. his powerful influence on american poetry and letters - well beyond his role as a poet of the beat generation - can't be overstated. beyond his poems, ginsberg influenced the development of free speech and expression when "howl" was put on trial and held not to be obscene. he was a world traveller, a convert to buddhism, a photographer, and even found time to become an "actor" and then a "musician," during the course of his life.

while i've posted about the beats, his photographs, and the "howl" trial, i've never posted on his connection to music. it was, perhaps, a logical stepping stone from his many readings and appearances. for example, his relationship to bob dylan - and the effect they had on each other - is truly amazing. they first met in 1963 and remained friends until allen's death. dylan and ginsberg even "recorded together" (i use those terms loosely) in 1971 and, again, in 1982. ginsberg was a member of dylan's famed (or infamous) 1975-6 rolling thunder revue - and appeared in dylan's film, "renaldo and clara."

while not "musical" in nature, this clip of allen and dylan at jack kerouac's grave is a favorite of mine:



ginsberg went on to record, with paul mccartney, the incredible "ballad of the skeletons" (clip below), he also recorded albums with phillip glass ("hydrogen jukebox") and the kronos quartet (reading "howl"). a far cry from the image typically associated with a beat poet!




check out "holy soul jelly roll: poems & songs," a four cd boxed set, to sample ginsberg's diverse body of muscial work.

back to poetry, which i'd like to end this post with, here is one ginsberg wrote about dylan:

ON READING DYLAN'S WRITINGS

Now that it's dust and ashes
now that it's human skin
Here's to you Bob Dylan
a poem for the laurels you win

Sincerest form of flattery
is imitation they say
I've broke my long line down
to write a song your way

Those "chains of flashing images" that came to you at night
were highest farm boy's day dreams
that glimpse the Angels light.

And tho the dross of wisdom's come
and left you lone on earth
remember when the Angels call
your soul for a new birth

It wasn't dope that gave you truth
nor money that you stole-- was God himself that entered in
shining your heavenly soul.

allen ginsberg, july, 1973, london

r.i.p. in heaven (or nothingness) allen ginsberg

triathlons pose twice the deadly risk of marathons: the journalism of fear

thanks to laura for posting about the u.s.a today story "triathlons pose a greater health risk than marathons. that story itself reported the results of a research study, "triathlons can pose deadly heart risks," led by dr. kevin harris, a cardiologist at the minneapolis heart institute at abbott northwestern hospital and presented last saturday at the american college of cardiology conference in florida. right off the bat, the title of the study is misleading: it focused on sudden deaths, not just heart attacks, that occurred during triathlons.

ignoring that small detail in the title, i we simply took all the deaths reported, 14, that occurred during the triathlons in the 2 year study, relative to the number of finishers, 922,810, we get a sudden death mortality percentage of .0015 (yes, that's two zeros after the decimal point)! even more astonishing, this statistic is touted as 1.5 time greater that the risk of just running a marathon!

i found it remarkable - but at all unusual - that the headline didn't read: "participants have a 99.9985% chance of survival competing in a triathlon!" but that, of course, wouldn't deter anyone from training for and competing in a triathlon.

honestly, do we really need these "studies" - especially if the results are hyped for all the wrong reasons? for a devastating critique of the reporting (and a detailed breakdown of the statistics), check out the great post, "Yahoo! and heart institute inflate risk of death among triathletes."

"drugstore cowboy" movie review

funny, when i first watched drugstore cowboy - amazingly, now 20 years ago - at an actual movie theatre in 1989 - it was william s. burroughs' appearance that stuck with me (and matt dillon's great performance). now, in 2009, i'll forever associate drugstore cowboy with packing my drop bags for umstead and, remarkably, the onset of what would be diagnosed the next day as pneumonia! what a sad, but interesting dichotomy!

i haven't seen drugstore cowboy in since 1989. i did catch snippets of it during the intervening years, but this was the first time i watched the entire film since then. drugstore cowbody was the first of a drug double feature, followed, as it was by "trainspotting" - another great film of that genre. but i missed that one. ironically, in less than 24 hours i'd be taking prescription pharmaceuticals - albeit the antibiotic biaxin xl (not noted for any psychedelic proprieties) - ha!

dillon plays bob, the deadpan antihero, who leads a quartet of drug addicts on their continual quest to score drugs. in one sense, this is a traditional road movie populated with drug users and set in the underground world they occupy. what makes the film powerful, and captivating, is it doesn't portray them as either criminals or heroes. they're just people who are physically sick from addiction. dillon's narration, in a flat, matter of fact delivery, underscores the apparent normalcy of their existence.

the film is set in 1971, in the northwest, alternating between washington and oregon. the four, dillon, his wife (kelly lynch), dillon's buddy and his (underage) girlfriend, move thru a seemingly endless string of hotels and motels. the film gets its name from dillon's idea to rob drugstores - why not go to where the drugs are - to satisfy their collective habits. the plan works well until a hospital heist goes bad. for dillon it's not too bad because he escapes capture and suffers only a bloody gash to the head for the effort.

but upon their return to the motel room, they find the teenage girlfriend dead on the floor from an overdose. her death, they believe, is from the bad luck she unleashed by purposefully throwing a hat on the bed to tempt fate. in their world, hats on beds and dogs are seriously bad karma. their efforts to dispose of the body, first in the attic crawl space, then to a hastily dug grave following word they had to vacate the room because a deputy sherriff convention arrived that day - had all the trappings of a comedy, but was played for pathos!

that anonymous burial was the catharsis for dillon to say he wanted to go home and get into a methadone treatment program. a plan soundly rejected by his wife and buddy. they split up the remaining drugs and go separate ways. dillon's efforts to go straight - a factory job and the methadone program - are almost derailed by the appearance of william s. burroughs, as the defrocked priest. he could easily have been a metaphor for death incarnate.

by rejecting burrough's entreaties to get high with him, dillon realized that had he done so it would have been the end of him. ironically, dillon's rejection of the drugs brought to him in a sudden visit by his wife - who he also rejects (clinging to the hope of getting straight) sets in motion his final confrontation. he gives the drugs to burroughs, returns to his room and is set upon by a pair of hoods who want the drugs - and decide to kill him when they don't get any drugs from dillon.

the fade out, with him in the ambulance clinging to life - being driven to the hospital - is an irony not lost on dillon himself. whether he survives the gunshot wound is left unresolved. normally this is a movie ending that i despise with a passion. but somehow, in this context - where dillion had lived somewhere between life and death throughout his addiction, it seemed somehow an appropriate ambiguity.

twenty years later, this is still a film worth watching. fyi, dillon won the 1989 independent spirit best actor award for his performance.
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for a great double feature, check out matt dillon in "factotum," where he trades in drugs for alcohol.

in a shocker, giants release plaxico burress!

just days after plaxico burress appeared in court to adjourn the hearing on his criminal gun possession charges, and less than two weeks after the giants said they'd give plaxico a second chance, the team suddenly announced his release today!

“I am an optimist, and I believe most situations can be worked out,” said General Manager Jerry Reese. “We hung in there as long as we could in hopes that there could be a resolution to this situation other than the decision we made today to release Plaxico. It wasn’t to be, so now we have to move on. Like everybody else here, we want nothing but the best for Plaxico, and we are appreciative of the contributions he made to this franchise.”

now, four+ months after the gunshot that set this all in motion - the giants can finally attend to the business of securing a wide receiver to replace him!

pneumonia, not umstead :(

imagine my surprise that instead of posting about umstead, or a review of drugstore cowboy which i watched on wednesday night as i was preparing my drop bags for umstead, i spent yesterday with nasty flu-like symptoms. my doctor squeezed me in for a 2:30 visit and, after i couple of chest x-rays, walked out of the office with a diagnosis of pneumonia!!

surprise, even shock, was an understatement. i couldn't believe the irony. with my bags packed for the trip down to north carolina, pat and katie would fly down while i spent the next 10 days taking antibiotics and getting bed rest. i couldn't dwell on the injustice of it all because for the next several hours i was in bed bouncing from chills to muscles aches to the bathroom.

since wednesday night all i've had to eat is a cup of jello and two slices of toast. my appetite shows signs of returning this morning. thank god, because the liquid diet of gatorade and water was about to drive me to crazy. i think i'll move up the solids chain to chicken soup today. on the postive side, i've easily dropped five pounds+ since wednesday!

i'm incredibly bummed about missing umstead. for some reason, coupled with last years injuries at the race, this event must be generating some seriously negative karma for me. aside from the race itself, i won't get to see my in-laws, or friends at the race. another - unpleasant - irony is having to miss katie's birthday on sunday. and, finally, i rescheduled my thursday night and monday afternoon classes to make this trip - now all for naught!

that said, the worst thing is having to be sidetracked for up to 10 days with no running - much less racing. that will drive me nuts!

in the meantime, good luck to emmy, anthony, wayne, tammy, grant, hugo, admas, roger, bob, dave, fred, and everyone from kickrunners! have a great race (and take plenty of pictures)!

april is national poetry month :D

since 1996, april is officially "national poetry month:"

"Inaugurated by the Academy of American Poets in 1996, National Poetry Month is now held every April, when publishers, booksellers, literary organizations, libraries, schools and poets around the country band together to celebrate poetry and its vital place in American culture. Thousands of businesses and non-profit organizations participate through readings, festivals, book displays, workshops, and other events."

last year, i literally stumbled upon the month long poetry celebration half way thru the month, on april 17, when i heard of (and took part in) the "poem in your pocket" day. i carried around a great poem from gary synder, "john muir on mt. ritter." this year, "poem in your pocket day" has been moved to the end of the month, april 30.

here is another fantastic gary snyder poem (whether i carry this particular one in my pocket is to be seen) to kick off the month:

At Tower Peak

Every tan rolling meadow will turn into housing
Freeways are clogged all day
Academies packed with scholars writing papers
City people lean and dark
This land most real As its western-tending golden slopes
And bird-entangled central valley swamps
Sea-lion, urchin coasts
Southerly salmon-probes Into the aromatic almost-Mexican hills
Along a range of granite peaks
The names forgotten,
An eastward running river that ends out in desert
The chipping ground-squirrels in the tumbled blocks
The gloss of glacier ghost on slab
Where we wake refreshed from ten hours sleep
After a long day's walking
Packing burdens to the snow
Wake to the same old world of no names,
No things, new as ever, rock and water,
Cool dawn birdcalls, high jet contrails.
A day or two or million, breathing
A few steps back from what goes down
In the current realm.
A kind of ice age, spreading, filling valleys
Shaving soils, paving fields, you can walk in it
Live in it, drive through it then It melts away
For whatever sprouts
After the age of
Frozen hearts. Flesh-carved rock
And gusts on the summit,
Smoke from forest fires is white,
The haze above the distant valley like a dusk.
It's just one world, this spine of rock and streams
And snow, and the wash of gravels, silts
Sands, bunchgrasses, salt
brush, bee-fields,
Twenty million human people, downstream, here below.

from "No Nature," by Gary Snyder.

happy april fools' day!

happy april fools' day!

while today is not technically a "holiday," if you've ever been the subject of a prank on this day - or played the role of prankster - you may have a different perspective on april 1st. personally, april fools' day doesn't do much for me, either way.

april 1st is, however, also the first day (since 1996) of national poetry month! now that's something worthy to celebrate!