Saturday, July 05, 2008
"and remember to die"
"and remember to die" is from Jonathan Williams's MARVELOUS poem "POEM BEGINNING WITH FIVE WORDS BY GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS" for Jesse Helms.OOOOO! I WISH JONATHAN WAS ALIVE to READ this poem in honor of Jesse's death yesterday! And I'm sure Jonathan would have hooted and hollered with us here in Philly over Jesse dying on the 4th of July! THAT INDEPENDENCE DAY DEATH IS POETRY!
For those unfamiliar with Jonathan's poem, CELEBRATE Jesse's DEATH with us in reading it OUT LOUD wherever you happen to be right now! Click HERE!
When I asked Jonathan for permission to reprint the poem in this issue of EOAGH (published by Tim Peterson), that I was co-editing with others (kari edwards, Paul Foster Johnson, Erica Kaufman, Jack Kimball, and Stacy Szymaszek), Jonathan said on the phone, "ONLY IF IT'S THE LEAD POEM!" And I said, "YOU BETCHA JONATHAN!" HEHEHE! That was a fun and sometimes disturbing phone conversation, Jonathan talking about Jesse's reign of terror against Southern queers, African Americans, and ANY OTHER minorities, as you can imagine. He would tell horror stories of Jesse's EXTREME bigotry, then pepper the conversation with talking about greasing his asshole for the corn poke, and such. "JUST KEEPING IT REAL, AS THEY SAY," he said!
DING DONG THE WITCH IS DEAD! I'm NOW LISTENING to the Klaus Nomi version of DING DONG THE WITCH IS DEAD, a fitting tribute!
Glad Jesse FINALLY remembered to die!
CAConrad
