Shampoo Poetry and Anne Babson

January 17th, 2009 / 7:21 pm jereme—

old timey

hi pr! i like that you believe in god and are not afraid to talk about it. you are special like a neon butterfly.

January 17th, 2009 / 7:45 pm ryan—

i liked this. for some reason it reminded me of a poem by ellen bass. i can’t remember the exact title but it’s something like, “Ode to an Atheist God.” anyway, good post, much enjoyed as always!

January 17th, 2009 / 4:05 pm pr—

thanks you two! You are the sweetest.

January 17th, 2009 / 4:39 pm Brandon Hobson—

Hi Pr, I very much believe in God and angels. I believe that angels can manifest on Earth and that we can see them at times. I don’t think it’s crazy at all. If you’d like to discuss it more I could send you my email address.

January 17th, 2009 / 11:03 pm barry—

thanks for the post pr. i like the poetry and i like you being open about your struggle between belief and disbelief. i have the same struggle inside. i am most impressed by god’s power when he lets little kids starve to death. or when he turns water to wine for the sake of a wedding celebration, that seems like a good miracle. or when i say grace before meals then he lets me eat an extra steak and potato. mmmmmmmm.

January 17th, 2009 / 7:21 pm pr—

thanks for appreciating my post, barry.
i made a rib roast last night (9 pounder) and potato au gratin (with heavy cream, not half and half) and broccoli. I was in heaven. I poured T-Bone TIckler on my steak. It is my latest favorite steak sauce. I also love horseradish, a1 and peter lugar. I ate like a champ. Today, maybe not quite so champy.

January 17th, 2009 / 7:24 pm ryan—

i didn’t have time to comment fully earlier, but i wanted to say that, i too have dealt with the issue of belief/disbelief for a long time. i grew up in a somewhat religious family, but outside of the christian tradition, i constantly have gone through times of belief and those of utter doubt. i went to a catholic high school, which didn’t help. just when i came to a spot where i felt comfortable with my own level of belief, i was cast out from the religion i was raised in because of marrying someone who was not of the same tradition, and as thus we chose not to have a religious ceremony, opting instead to do our own thing gathering words we felt appropriate and applying them.

anyway, that’s a long post, but i just wanted to let you know that you are not crazy, and that if you are we all are.

January 17th, 2009 / 7:57 pm barry—

“and that if you are we all are.”
amen.

pr:
try heinz 57. thats my favorite.

January 17th, 2009 / 8:01 pm pr—

i have not tried Heinz57 or have I? Is it the fig one? I love all steak sauces. I love steak. I have high cholesteral, sort of. I ate six pieces of bacon this morning. I love bacon, too. Tonight, salad and leftover lasagna?
Barry, I am going to send you a bottle of T Bone Tickler. No joke.

January 17th, 2009 / 8:10 pm barry—

pr:

i like anything with the word tickler in the title, i think.

i am not nearly as cynical about religion as my comment indicates. i have spent a large part of my life, studying, researching, experiencing, contemplating, religion / spirituality, etc. i have only come to one conclusion. that truth lies in our own perceptions. nothing is absolute.

January 18th, 2009 / 12:37 am barry—

hmmmm. should i revisit her? will i like it? what do you recommend?

have you ever read kevin keck’s oedipus wrecked? great stuff. his newest one is, hey god its me kevin.

January 17th, 2009 / 8:48 pm pr—

I will go google this kevin keck guy. have you heard of a book called, are you there vodka, it’s me chelsea? I think it’s chelsea. Not sure.

the story of Flannery’s that is fat in my brain is Parker’s Back. Her letters are great. She has a small book of essays called Mystery and Manners but her letters are the bomb. They expain her so well to me.

January 17th, 2009 / 9:03 pm ryan—

pr,

my wife is at best agnostic, and i am at worst agnostic, i think would be the best way to describe it. neither of us wanted a “traditional” wedding, and that in and of itself would have been okay, but i also wouldn’t let there be any “god talk” in the ceremony, because i felt like that should not be forced on my wife. that is what got me in “the bad” with my chosen faith. because i was being tolerant and supportive of my wife’s beliefs. silly stuff.

i, too, have a deep affection for O’Connor, wrote about her in my essay for my MFA, which will end up as an appendix of sorts for my thesis collection. she writes with an unaffected voice about things she was supposed to be affected by. but she managed to do it with grace, beauty, and compassion. amazing.

i’ve often wondered when i’ve searched my soul if i should be immersing myself in faith (your shrink’s “go to church” doctrine) but it never made anything feel better. being in love with my wife makes things feel better. looking at my son makes things feel better. writing something meaningful, playing guitar, etc. and thinking about the questions of faith, too.

i will definitely let you know when i get the stuff in the mail, and as always am very grateful. i will also be back at work on monday and will check out our remaining calendars ;)

January 17th, 2009 / 9:21 pm pr—

Ryan,
the last few times I went to church, i just cried the whole time. That was six years ago. I am definitely someone with no answers. Again, love your comments and thanks for them.

January 17th, 2009 / 9:22 pm barry—

i only read one thing by flannery. i think it was called wise blood. it was quite a few years ago and i remember liking it but not being blown away, whatever that means. i liked oedipus wrecked a lot. havent read the god book yet, but i bet its a winner.

yeah, that sounds like a good title. the vodka one. thats why i read, lullabies for little criminals. you have to read that. i promise it will not let you down. when i read it for the first time i just arrived in vegas. saturday night. and i couldnt leave the hotel room cuz i couldnt put the book down. it was that great.

January 17th, 2009 / 9:23 pm ryan—

none of us have answers, that’s what keeps us asking questions. i’m glad my posts don’t come across poorly, because i often have a lot of doubt about whether to push the submit button.

January 17th, 2009 / 9:26 pm barry—

hesitation kills ryan. just go with it. deal with the repercussions after the fact.

January 17th, 2009 / 9:28 pm ryan—

barry i often go with it. and i often deal with the repercussions. that doesn’t keep the doubt at bay.

January 17th, 2009 / 9:50 pm barry—

im just babbling between commercials of this show im watching.

January 18th, 2009 / 2:52 am jereme—

puttiing sauce on good steak is like getting a handjob from a virgin.

January 17th, 2009 / 11:08 pm pr—

I understand that argument Jereme. I really do. I also eat Bugles. I bought a bag today. When I was little, I used to suck cheese out of a squirt bottle. I never like spam, though. I am not very high class, except that I am sometimes. I’ll order a Delmonico with herb butter when I go out, but at home? STEAK SAUCE. Plus, a handjob from a virgin? Wouldn’t you rather that than from a miserable 50 yr old meth whore? Just thinkin.

January 18th, 2009 / 3:44 am jereme—

i am not high class either. you are more classy than me. trust me on this.

but the whole point of eating steak is to taste steak. not sauce. i dunno. the steak is pure and good. otherwise just poor the sauce on some chuck and be just as content.

no i would rather stick my penis in the virgin.

January 18th, 2009 / 3:45 am jereme—

hell yes.

January 17th, 2009 / 11:52 pm pr—

Well, I am also an oyster fanatic. I eat them for the horseradish and all the other crap you put on and the…texture. The saltiness. The challengingness of it. The cold taste of sea. Sauces can enhance, not drown, flavors. Have you read your fellow Californian’s -my brain just freezed -food writing? She’s dead. I am not telling you her name. It’ll come ot me. Her writing was wierdly sad, even when she was writing about food she liked. She wrote a great thing about spagetti and butter and I think, parmeson. It might have just been spagetti and butter.

MLK Fisher!!!!! That is the sad lady who like spagetti.

maybe the virgin is giving you a handjob so she can STAY a virgin? Huh? What bout that?

January 18th, 2009 / 12:00 am jereme—

i like oysters too. they make me frisky.

I have not read MLK Fisher. I’ll google her later if I remember.

what ever the reason, it sucks for me. i won’t be able to enjoy the handjob. i will just keep thinking ‘she is a virgin. this sucks.’

January 18th, 2009 / 12:05 am Crustacean—

Only at HTML Giant could Jereme and PR coexist, and, perhaps, coalesce.

Catholicism–at least in America–has always been a bit counter cultural. The rituals of this faith are fascinating, mystifying, and for most practitioners–including myself–necessary and healing. It is, perhaps, the most maligned Christian denomination/adherence because it is the most misunderstood. I think it provides solace to many, and it is eminently productive of dialogue, in both the intellectual and metaphysical realms. It is a wonderful thing to believe in God. Actually, it is a wonderful thing to channel that belief into tangible action. Often that action can be within the world of writing, editing, reading. Or it could be farming. Or making sandwiches.

Hope everybody has a good night–

January 18th, 2009 / 12:08 am ryan—

pr,

i have you to live up to.

January 18th, 2009 / 12:11 am pr—

Crustacean! thanks for commenting! “necessary and healing” and “channel that belief into tangibe action”- made me very happy. You have a a good night too.

January 18th, 2009 / 12:47 am Justin Taylor—

thanks for posting this. sorry i missed most of the conversation. i finished reading Bloom’s Ruin the Sacred Truths and picked up another one of his- Jesus and Yahweh: The Names Divine. he’s pretty brilliant.

i left poor augustine off at book vii. i want to get back to him. darcey steinke has written some interesting things in Easter Everywhere, her nonfiction book about her priest father and her lifelong struggle with religion. she writes that even as a believer, or would-be believer, the belief itself still comes in flashes, or periods—moments, in other words. it struck me as oddly resonant with something david berman said in an interview about his newfound sense of judaism (when it was still new): someone asked him what he was working on (or something like that) and he said (paraphrase again) he was working on sustaining belief for ten straight minutes.

Kierkegaard reminds us in Training in Xianity that the man who prayed “Lord give me more faith in you” was not an agnostic, but already a believer.

The work of developing, keeping, and growing faith is not work apart from or a pre-text to the rest and fullness of religious experience or practice. Rather this work is central to the process and the project. Part of that work–like any work–is false starts, some failure, and maybe changing out tools that no longer work for others better suited to the job.

One very oool thing the new Bloom book has pointed me to is the William Tyndale bible. Tyndale was the Renaissance-era translator (later martyred for his trouble) who did–Bloom argues–the best translation of the bible since St Jerome. In any case, Tyndale’s bible was THE major source on the bibles that followed, including the Geneva bible and most importantly the Authorized King James. I read Tyndale’s epistle of James out loud today. give it a shot-

http://wesley.nnu.edu/biblical_studies/tyndale/jam.txt

January 18th, 2009 / 12:48 am Justin Taylor—

oh and i forgot to say what i really came here to say, which was pr if you haven’t read Steinke’s novella _Milk_ you should really not pass GO until you’ve done that. it’s tiny and you’ll love it.

January 18th, 2009 / 2:04 am pr—

Ryan,
no, I am not someone to live up to in anyway. but maybe our dialogue will feed me– and maybe feed you. I am grateful.

January 18th, 2009 / 2:35 am Mike—

That’s true, the Australian Open is soon! I am excited. I always forget how quick it comes because it’s all cold where I am, usually.

Thank you, pr, for the shoutout in the post.

January 18th, 2009 / 2:36 am Brandon Hobson—

pr,
Thanks for nice words and for going to ravenna for my book. Keep listening and keep watching!

January 18th, 2009 / 2:48 am jereme—

because i am going to think ‘she is a virgin i want to stick my penis in her’

?

how do you not see this pr?

January 18th, 2009 / 4:40 am ryan—

pr,

i will always look forward to any dialogue with you. i look forward to our future exchanges.

January 18th, 2009 / 4:41 am ryan—

i got distracted and repeated myself. oops.

January 18th, 2009 / 11:50 am barry—

justin:

i really like the tyndale version of the new testament. have you checked out the douay-rheims version, from 1580’s, its supposed to be a “catholic” bible. it rolls off the tongue. i like it.

jereme & pr:

i.e. steak and virgins. virgins are overrated. why would you rather fuck someone who’s never done it before, as opposed to someone who is very good at it, at 22 yr old girls gone wild whore for example. she’d be a better fuck to me than a 14 yr old kid who lays there and makes breathy half moans because she thinks she should. i rather fuck stifler’s mom.

and with the steak sauce. i agree and disagree. for different reasons on different days. depends on the steak and the sauce and the chef.

January 18th, 2009 / 12:31 pm Justin Taylor—

i had an amazing steak yesterday for bunch at a spanish place on the LES. it was this super juicy tender skirt steak that came with two eggs over easy on top and a side of black beans. they also make wicked good margaritas, and something whose name i dont remember well enough to attempt to type out but was basially a pacifico beer mixed with fresh lime juice over ice in a salt-rimmed glass. YES.

barry- my introduction to all this stuff is so belated. im only now struggling to understand the full scope of what’s available, much less avail myself of it. i know of the d-r bible but have never glimpsed it. ive only read as much of tyndale as i recommended last night. this is a totally ongoing project, and one moreover which is barely barely off the ground. my standard reference bible is the KJV. i have an oxford world classics edition that lives on my desk. that’s the one i can mark up and take notes in. i always think about getting another, fancier one that i would be too humble to mess with or write in, but so far i havent done it.

how cool would it be to be a bible scholar? i think a lot of people feel like there’s this divide between studying religion and practicing/having it, but i have to say that i never feel better or stronger about things like faith and God than when I’m knee-deep in the contradictions, source-texts, ur-texts, and minutiae. I think this is why I’m responding to Bloom so strongly. he identifies as a Jewish Gnostic, and is really open about his struggle to believe and desire to believe more. I think he is a Gnostic because, rather than worshipping knowledge, he worships through knowledge. the written word is itself a mystical, spiritual experience for him, which i think is why he argues against the secular-spiritual divide in Ruin the Sacred Truths. i view this as a HIGHLY tenable position. it might sound academic and sort of dry, and i guess in practice it is, but the part of me that it is speaking to and green-lighting is not that part. it’s like a message straight to the gut/heart/soul that says HEY, IF THIS IS THE WAY YOU FIND ME, THEN KNOCK YOURSELF OUT BECAUSE IT’S REALLY OK.

January 18th, 2009 / 1:27 pm pr—

i guess i get it. i just think i’d be grateful to be getting my dick touched, thats all. but now i guess i get the disappointment angle, too.

January 18th, 2009 / 1:37 pm pr—

Brandon. I will keep watching and listening. I look forward to getting your book! I really, really was impressed with your work online.

Justin– that comment just made me interested in Bloom. Wow. Great comment.

And I want to go to that place on the LES- what a great meal! Beer with lemonde or other juices has different names in different places. In Germany, it’s a Rattler? Is that right? And now i forget the dominican name for it. But, man, so refreshing after a day on the slopes or a day at the beach.

Barry, i am with you on steak and sauces. It all depends on where and what and who’s cooking and so forth. A steak is not a a steak is not a steak.

And virgins. Just saying the word virgin is enough for me. It’s just a blood heater.

January 18th, 2009 / 1:39 pm jereme—

ah 22 year old girls gone wild whore will have the beginning stages of Tore Up Pussy Syndrome.

Anyways I did not say I would or would not pick a virgin over an experienced woman.

But if a virgin is giving me a handjob, all i’m going to think is ‘i want to stick it in her vagina’.

January 18th, 2009 / 1:41 pm jereme—

skirt steak is not good steak. put sauce on it all you like.

it is tasty though.

January 18th, 2009 / 2:46 pm Peter Markus—

I like to watch hockey too. I like God too.

January 18th, 2009 / 4:39 pm sampink—

the blackhawks are formidable this year.

January 19th, 2009 / 12:13 am barry—

justin:

i think the book of james is a good place to start. that is my favorite book in the bible. i prefer the king james as well. im strongly considering doing my phd in religous studies. hopefully at temple.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:24 am Justin Taylor—

Barry- have you spent much time looking at religion PhDs? if so, i would love to pick your brain sometime. ive gotten as far as the departmental homepage of several divinity schools, but never farther. shoot me an email if you feel like it.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:25 am Justin Taylor—

oh and PS Jereme- different steaks for different reasons. this wasn’t a dinner t-bone, it was brunch. it was tasy as shit and the ‘sauce’ it had was runny egg yolk from the eggs over easy served on top of it.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:34 am barry—

justin:

not much looking, unfortunately. im sorta landlocked. i only looked at temple.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:03 am pr—

Justin- Jereme made it clear- this post had many digressions, so I in no way hold it againt you–that certain steaks are breakfast, or cheaper, steaks. But there are many comments here. So my guess is you missed his post onhow skirt steaks desere saue or egg or whatnot.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:21 am jereme—

hahaha the whole point was to make you laugh about putting sauce on beautiful steak.

we went through a lot of shit to get to this point. you better laugh now.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:26 am jereme—

justin,

yes i think that is what i said?

January 19th, 2009 / 2:20 am jereme—

pr,

it is okay. justin didn’t dismiss me this time and not say anything so that is a positive.

always look on the bright side of life.

January 19th, 2009 / 11:55 am pr—

I find the embedded replies confusing. I’m sure others do too.

I laughed from the get go re: virgin handjobs and steaks. I repeated it to my husband and we got all excited imagining being 16 and in the back of some car (OK, 14). I also SMILED at the very first thing “neon butterfly”. Jereme, when you wrote that, you made me feel special, like a neon butterfly. The power of words! The power of kindness.

January 19th, 2009 / 1:25 pm barry—

PITTSBURGH

i like kindness.

January 19th, 2009 / 2:05 pm ryan—

pr,

no more “place” calendars :(

here’s what we have:

victorian scrapbook
impressionism
monet
van gogh
“the reading woman”

if any of these sound like something you would enjoy more than the 3D skateboard one let me know.

January 19th, 2009 / 7:07 pm pr—

I think Van Gogh is a pretty great painter. If you want to send it to me, I think I have a return address on my package to you. Let me know when you get the books and THANKS, RYAN!!

January 19th, 2009 / 7:11 pm ryan—

Van Gogh would have been my pick, too. i will be happy to send it your way.

January 19th, 2009 / 10:07 pm jereme—

van gogh rocks motherfucking socks off.

score for you pr

January 20th, 2009 / 5:55 am jeff coleman—

pr,

You are crazy. God does not exist.

I still like you, regardless.

January 26th, 2009 / 7:33 pm Anne Babson—

Dear PR,

Whether or not God exists and whether or not I am crazy are two different questions. I tend to think the answer to both is yes.

Serioustly, I am deeply touched by your recollection of my reading of “In Thanks For Mary” in the East Village years ago. I am glad that it made you have an idea of what I have have faith in. When churchy people talk about “witness” and “testimony,” that’s what they tend to mean. It also applies in principle to good writing. A good writer on any topic makes other people see the unseen.

You have asked for no advice. I offer one bit of it nonetheless, in case you are thinking about it — I recommend exploring this possible belief of yours further by reading the Bible. If there is no God, it is still a great, gorgeous piece of writing. If there is a God (as I believe there is) then you can learn more about what others have seen.

Sacred writing is something amazing. In orthodox Judaism, the belief that God is present in His Written Word, the Torah, is so strong that if a synagogue catches fire, the people are obligated to save the Torah with the same urgency as if it were an infant trapped in the building. The birth of Jesus for Christians signifies the notion of the Word made Flesh.

It’s a fascinating way to examine text, even for an atheist, which you admit you may not be.

Obviously, I believe in God. Take everything I say with that grain of salt. I exhort you nonetheless to pursue the passion of that possibility in your own heart without reservation, with the ardor of a new lover for his crush. What have you really got to lose?

Thank you for commenting on my work, PR. It means a lot to me.

Anne Babson

January 27th, 2009 / 3:52 am Anne Babson—

Let me share a sonnet with you that I wrote a while ago — it will either make you think we are both crazy or both listening to the quotidian langauge of the divine:

THE VOICE

No one will believe me when I proclaim that I
Heard the Voice of Jehovah Poet twinkling
In the Mister Softee truck song, exhaling sighs
In the ignition of buzz saws, blessing-sprinkling
In the dandelion-white whispers of stale air,
Clearing throat and “ahem”ing jack hammers
Under my city window. Who will let me share
This mystery sounding – His staccato stammer?
The devil is in the details. So is Heaven!
Don’t wait for castrated angels bearing trumpets.
God calls us now head-on. Disguised as our brethren,
Our hairstylists, the homeless and the local strumpets,
Messengers sent by the Most High bark, bong, quack, coo,
Squeak, screech, clatter-bang and whistle Dixie for you.

The founder of the hassidic movement in Judaism was the rabbi known as the Baal Shem Tov. He once explained the language of God in this way to someone who claimed that those who believed they received signs from God were crazy:

If a deaf man walks by a room where there is a wedding reception with revelers raucously dancing and celebrating to music, the deaf man will say to himself, “those people have lost their minds.”

To hear from God is like that — it is not that we are crazy, said the Baal Shem Tov, it is that the others are deaf to the music that makes us dance.

Be well.

Anne

January 27th, 2009 / 12:43 am pr—

What an amazing poem. Thank you so much for sharing it with me.

You asked, “what have you really got to lose?” The answer to that, is my very soul. If I don’t have a soul, I have nothing to lose.

But I have the same “feeling” that you do, sometimes. I have moments of clarity, of sight and sound and the lack of belief in coincidence, the intensity of moments where I think “this is meaningful, purposeful”, that make me believe. Yes, the “disguise” you talk about. God is so unexpected for me. I am always grateful, even if afraid.I know many who walk around not worried about these feelings, they revel in them, which I think you do. I admire these people, I admire you. For me, after my moments of clarity, I then get plagued with fears for my mental well being. I also can get very into a mode of dry thinking where I am so horrified by the history of the church, and of all religions, frankly. It is hard for me to combine the great joy I have in my moments of feeling God, with the reality of the hate and war that religious differences have caused on this planet. But then – in my better moments- I think- I am not the history of religion. I am a person who finds God in life.

I have written about belief and craziness a few times- the Judith Hearne post and the Swedenborg post. Also, regarding the loss of my soul, I addessed that sort of (maybe obliquely) in writing about the long road to damnation in a post about the novel The Monk.

But I want to reiterate my great appreciation that you do not dismiss my searching way.

February 3rd, 2009 / 3:13 pm Kevin Keck—

I googled “Kevin Keck sucks” and this website came up, though I’m glad to see no one used that exact phrase.

So, speaking as the author Kevin Keck let me thank you for buying my God book. I hope you’re not as terribly disappointed as everyone else who reads it. It’s a good book, but it lacks clear categorization. On the other hand, Oedipus Wrecked is probably the more tightly written of the two, and (if I do humbly say so myself) incredibly funny. I got lucky on that one.

Cheers.

March 19th, 2009 / 1:33 am Chef—

I thought that you would have a bit more feedback posted but anyway, great blog.

December 15th, 2009 / 9:49 am Organ—

Not many people think the same way as you. That includes me.. sorry :)

Shampoo Poetry and Anne Babson

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