Nathan Awesome- whoops, I mean Nathan AUSTIN, author of the famous Survey Says! was interviewed on Studio 360 this Friday!
July 12, 2009
Alex Smith v Ryan Manning on thunk!!!!!
Alex Smith is interviewed in the most recent post of thunk. Also Amy Lawless, Ben Mirov, and other friends. Do check it out!
thunk
where interviews go to die
Also–remember to come to Botanica Bar in NYC tomorrow (Monday) night for a special night with AMY LAWLESS!!!!
July 7, 2009
Weekly Selection – Alex Smith
A History of Love
When we were connected
we developed like an X-ray.
I continually apologized
for those things about me
and believed such things worthwhile.
I decanted a bottle of wine and set about
seducing the truth out of you
and when you got away I promised
a divine plagiarism of sorts
that would weed out the myth
of your vagina. In passing I uttered
comments and then imagined myself
becoming you momentarily
only to find that I was you
as much as a tree trunk was a bead of semen.
Lovingly, you stayed honest the longest.
I was more like a videogame,
light fare, nothing truly astounding
about the way coffee tastes
in Old France, nothing astounding
about the Old Hotel in Chelsea
or the way I fuck quietly,
trying my darndest to communicate
some physicality I can’t understand.
(from Alex Smith’s Lux, p. 77)
June 28, 2009
Amy Lawless – Celebrate Excellence From Boston
“AMY LAWLESS continues to bring us the manhood, the womanhood, the sex, the thrashing and the porno-comedy.” Best American Poetry Blog
We’re hosting Amy Lawless, author of Noctis Licentia and Dick Pig Review editor, with the help of Botanica Bar, for a special reading to celebrate this excellent product of the Boston School System.
Noctis Licentia
When: Monday, July 13th, 7-10PM
Where: Botanica Bar (Come for the reading and stay for an extended happy hour- yelp says “strong drinks“).
47 E. Houston Street
(between Greene St & Mott St)
Back Room
Lawless to read around 8.
See you there!
June 23, 2009
Giant Announcements
Dear Men and Women,
Many exciting announcements, things we’ve been brewing for a thousand months.
CELEBRATE EXCELLENCE FROM BOSTON with the Sporting Gentlemen
To commemorate the beginning of a sporadic Salon Series, we’re hosting our very own Amy Lawless, author of Noctis Licentia and recently knighted co-editor of Black Maze Books, at a TBA location on JULY 14th. Details before the end of this week.
NEW BMB BOOKS
We are excited to announce to new books from two excellent authors to be released over the next few seasons.
Christie Ann Reynolds and Francis Raven are two excellent poets that we will be discussing in greater detail extremely soon. We’ll also sample their goods to give you a taste of the strength a little later.
And show you the covers and stuff…all that stuff we do.
TODAY’S EVENTS
Open Letters reviewed Nathan Austin’s Survey Says! Do see what they’ve got to say here.
Nathan will also be reading tomorrow with our best friend Dan Magers at The Reading at Chrystie Street. Details here.
June 20, 2009
Austin and Magers…The Reading
THIS WEDNESDAY!
Nathan Austin, BMB author of Survey Says!, and Dan Magers, family friend and editor of sink review and future editor of Dick Pig Review, will be reading at THE READING ON CHRYSTIE STREET.
It’s an excellent reading series hosted by Lauren Ireland and Steve Roberts. Please join us!
Nathan Austin & Dan Magers
Weds., June 24. 7:00p.
Home Sweet Home
131 Chrystie Street
(J,M,Z to Bowery. F,V to 2nd Av., B,D to Grand St.)
http://thereadingseries.blogspot.com/
Nathan Austin’s publications include Tie an O (Burning Press, 1998), (glost) (Handwritten Books, 2002) and Survey Says! (Black Maze Books, 2009). Poems have appeared, or are forthcoming, in Kiosk, Combo, Aufgabe, Tight, Diagram, and Little Red Leaves.
Dan Magers graduated from The New School’s MFA program in 2005, and is co-editor of Sink Review (sinkreview.org), an online poetry magazine. He’s had poems published in the tiny and Red China Magazine, Dick Pig Review, and Thirteen Myna Birds. He works at the publishing company John Wiley & Sons and lives in Brooklyn, NY.
If you haven’t yet picked up a copy of Survey Says!, they will be on hand. Join us!
June 16, 2009
Weekly Selection – Alex Smith
Blue Routine
Betty Ford,
crippled before the coffin of her Gerald,
her grimace like a ruddy tongue extending
from the television screen and licking your neck.
You would think sorrow
a child’s game until this moment.
Sorrow is men
standing behind you, terrified at your loss.
They rub your back while pain
scrambles out of you like so many marbles
from a fish tank.
This is no act.
Shit like this gets you through your daily
jog, your next blind date.
You throw your ruined clothes
in the yellow hamper.
You floss,
make idle remarks about
seasonal anomalies.
You keep your gun clean.
You see her kneeling at the threshold
every time you close your eyes.
Your patience is a Jesus
who washes the sin
from your body with fine soap
and fresh breath.
(from Alex Smith’s Lux, p. 31)
June 9, 2009
Weekly Selection – Amy Lawless
Baker’s Daughter
“They say the owl was a baker’s daughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know not what we may be.” Ophelia, Hamlet
No! I am not Ophelia.
O yeah, I lay with a crazy
But it was just for one night
Among him as his own
To sing a boding song, wave a tender bone.
I fed the meter, built a bridge,
Grabbed a honey, pumped the midg’.
Alack, the smack of truth.
The prince did insert his fangs into my back
And then, ok, ok, you were right!
It all went black!
But tremble I did not. My father lives
Don’t have a brother and I never will
Let my flesh stink to high heaven
Cover it with a wreath homemade
And expect it to do the job of Glade
(from Amy Lawless’ Noctis Licentia, p. 67)
June 2, 2009
Weekly Selection – Nathan Austin
A bra. Abraham Lincoln. A building. Scaffolding. Scalpel. A car. A card game. A cat. A cat. Ice cream. Ice cream. Ice cream. Ice cream. A cell phone. A chance to be with the kids for the day. A chick flick. A Chihuahua. School. School. School of fish. Schools. Ick – beets! Acne. Acne (damn!). A Cocker Spaniel, please. A collection agent. A companion – a friend. A cooler. A coroner. Scorpion. A cow. Scream! Scrub. C.D. I.D. A Dalmatian. A dam. A date. Addiction – like, addiction to something or you’re addicted. Address. I declare war! I’d have to say decorating. Adjust the seats. I’d like to go with a slang term, so I’m going to go with “drawers.” A doctor. A dog. A dog. A dog. I don’t believe this, but tarot cards. I don’t, but some people might buy alcohol. (from Nathan Austin’s Suvery Says!, p. 15)
May 26, 2009
Weekly Selection – Alex Smith
At Stake
Let paper fly
and light the cross-hair
Let gas sink
from weight and let
this day remind us
of what was at stake
before we both quit
began exploring each
the day yours went cold
was like the day I will die
like the day this field is cleared
of these straight soldiers
They’ll drop their guns
and scream “We don’t trust.
We anymore trust!”
(from Alex Smith’s Lux, p. 49)
