The Man

Most of my generation vaguely remembers Gary Soto as a short fiction writer who we had to read in late grade school or junior high. He was that one guy who sometimes used spanish words, forcing the kids who cared to delve into their emerging second language skills just to complete a sentence, even when the word we struggled minutes over was something as simple as amigo or abuela or adios (the one word we felt proud to know automatically as if we were Mexican ourselves). Who knew, however, that Gary Soto is actually The Man.
I'm currently reading New & Selected Poems by Gary Soto as part of my honors project. It's a thick book for poetry with an artistically flat cover - one I wouldn't be mesmerized by, in fact, probably not one I would even pick up off the shelf. And that's why I shouldn't look at covers. But the inside... the inside makes The Man. The Man owns words and makes words new. I have already stolen the preface title: Sizing Up the Sparrows. Soon, perhaps, I will be brilliant and write something as beautiful and no longer be a theif. But those skies look rather rusty.
The book is a dense 177 pages with poems divided into 7 chronological sections. So far my favorite section is "Black Hair" but here are some of my favorite poems, just in case you want something to Google:
"The Tale of Sunlight"
"The First"
"Her"
"The Widow Perez"
"Morning on This Street"
"The Trees That Change Our Lives"
"Heaven"
"Small Town with One Road"

And here's a little taste of Soto:

"I say it is enough/To be where the smells/Of creatures/Braid like rope/And to know if/The grasses rustle/It is only/A lizard passing."
from "The Space"

And this is why Soto is The Man and the first poet in my project.

I hope you are intrigued, just as I am.

Basalil

New Last Name, New Superman Movie, New Blog... Hold onto Your Bellybuttons, That's a Whole Lotta New

Well, Basalil is now the fourth Zephyrs to ever grace this planet. That's right, I'm married, and who wouldn't want to inherit such an incredibly made-up last name? Zephyrs: like the Greek god of wind. It goes quite well with the similarly made-up first name Basalil. It also fits well with my real name: Jessica Zephyrs. Do you like it?

So I decided it is time to establish a new blog.

In an attempt to be more scholarly, globaly aware, and all-in-all out of the sticks, I will try to also establish a ring of local (Springfield, MO... maybe even an area as wide as the "midwest") writers and poets who exchange ideas and news and writing through blogs, and considering that most of the writers who have already committed their souls to this project have blogger accounts, a Blogger blog is, for no other reason than stated above, necessary. We'll see how this project falls apart.
(I'm a writer. I'm incapable of being optimistic.) :)

In a further attempt to bore my small audience and to keep myself on top of things, I will also update on my honors project which began last week and will end sometime in the spring of '07.
What's Basalil's honors project?
Oh, I knew you wanted to know. Well, in short I'm reading books by three comtemporary poets of my choosing, studying everything about their writing that I can think to study, interviewing them because they're still alive, and then writing about this process and findings. In the interim, I'll be writing my own poetry and about that process.
Man, that was sssoooo entertaining.

My uterus is schluffing (sp?). I bet that's more entertaining.

In other news:
I am reading Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, and it's amazing so far. (Yay, I got to use more hyperbolic adjectives/adverbs.)
I am looking for a job. Hint, hint, you Springfield employers. My skills: uterus battling.
Joe and I are planning a day hiking trip. For details, ask Joe. He's the one who's actually planning.
I make delicious quiche.
And flat bread.
Joe makes delicious coffee with lots of cool whip.

I'm losing the utero battle. I must go and defend the battlegrounds.

A la sinistra,

Basalil

"There will be no balls without meat." - Alton Brown from Good Eats