by David Burn | Jun 20, 2004 | Go Big Red
Franklin & Marshall has a new president, John Fry, who came from Penn. He’s young and he’s agressive. To succeed in his new job he will need to raise a mountain of money. That’s his job, as it is every private college president’s job. I do not know Mr. Fry, but this week I received a letter from him. It detailed his support for bringing official recognition back to the Greek system which the college abandoned 16 years ago. Whatever Fry’s motivation, and I suspect it is directly related to fundraising, the Greek system will do nothing to improve the quality of student life on campus. Unless one considers exclusionary practices, alcohol abuse, sexual assault, everyday degradation of women, cheating, fighting, and the inability to wear a baseball hat correctly as improvements.
by David Burn | Jun 20, 2004 | Literature
I receive a lot of rejection notices. In fact, it might be said I seek them out. I got one the other day from Cutbank. Four poems sent. All rejected. They communicate this finality (as do most lit mags) in little rectangular blocks of paper that can easily be mass-produced at the Xerox machine. The logo’d blocks come in an envelope you, the writer, provide for this very purpose—the delivery of your formulaic rejection notice. I have an entire spreadsheet of my rejection notices and a neat collection of these paper blocks.
In direct counterpoint to this official rejection there is the personal encouragement of a friend. My college buddy, DK, a professor of philosophy and force of nature, contributed cold hard cash via my Pay Pal account to support the efforts here. Thanks Deacon!
by David Burn | Jun 20, 2004 | Music
From the estate of Jerry Garcia we have a new imprint, Jerry Made. Like the Dick’s Picks series which features gems from the Grateful Dead vault, Jerry Made will release choice live recordings of Jerry’s various side-projects. The first in the Pure Jerry series is a three-disc affair, recorded in 1977 at Theatre 1839 in San Francisco.
by David Burn | Jun 19, 2004 | Nebraska
Omaha’s Rosenblatt Stadium plays host this week to baseball’s College World Series for the 55th year in a row. My grandpa took me to CWS games there when I was a boy. More recently, while living in Omaha as an adult, I saw what a big party the CWS is and what a boost it is for the city’s image, as well. Watching on ESPN from my apartment in Chicago, I see my hometown the way it truly is—as a great place for baseball and sports in general.
Rosenblatt is also home to the Omaha Royals, KC’s triple A farm club.
by David Burn | Jun 15, 2004 | Digital culture
When I logged on to my free Web-based e-mail account today, I was pleasantly shocked to see that Yahoo expanded my inbox storage to 100 megs from 6 megs (a gigantic leap forward). And the size limit for a single e-mail is now 10 megs, perfect for song files, photos, and book-length PDFs. Thanks Yahoo.
p.s. Here’s the Wired article explaining Yahoo’s motivation.
by David Burn | Jun 15, 2004 | Art, Politics
Malika and Weez hosted a great brunch this past Sunday. To help support their friends in the arts, they encouraged the display of photography by one young woman. Another friend displayed his anarchist politics in the form of this t-shirt:
You can order one from Controvert.com. Strangely enough, I have a Web site devoted to this very topic. However, I’d like to think my spin on the subject contains at least a shred of hope.
by David Burn | Jun 14, 2004 | Chicago, Music, Nebraska
Jeff Tweedy, alt-county superstar and leader of the Chicago-based band Wilco graced the cover of the Chicago Reader this week and news of his rehab for addiction to pain killers has been recently in the news. He’s also been top of mind this week due to our viewing of the band’s documentary, I Am Trying to Break Your Heart, a revealing look at the creative process and the business end of the music industry.
Tweedy also has his first book out, Adult Head, a collection of poems released in March by Omaha’s Zoo Press and distributed by University of Nebraska Press, the nation’s second largest university press.
by David Burn | Jun 8, 2004 | Go Big Red
Can you ever really know what it is like to walk in someone else’s shoes? Probably not. But if you want to give it the old college try, here are my new kicks. They’re handmade in Burbank.
Fueler by Cydwoq (pronounced sidewalk)
by David Burn | Jun 5, 2004 | Literature, Music
Tonight we saw two grand American voices on stage and they happened to be father and daughter. The gathering was a benefit for The Poetry Center and was held at Rubloff Auditorium in Grant Park. Poet and professor, Miller Williams, and his breathtakingly talented singer-songwriter daugter, Lucinda Williams, swapped turns at the mic. Poem. Song. Poem. Song. Poem. Song. It was awe-inspiring. It makes me want to write real shit again. Not ad copy. Not this blog. Real shit. Like this:
Minuet for Army Boots and Orchestra
by Miller Williams
Whose tongues are twisted and whose hearts are shrunk
may play as puppets, may in that disguise
while towns burn in their brains, drink to be drunk.
So when God comes to catch this crumbling chunk
of dirt, what do we say? That we despise
whose tongues are twisted and whose hearts are shrunk?
If Thomas had told us the gnawed body stunk,
what would it change? Men knowing what men devise
while towns burn in their brains, drink to be drunk.
If Calvin came to tell us Christ is bunk,
what could he hope to teach us? Pain? Surprise?
Whose tongues are twisted and whose hearts are shrunk?
So the viking sails for home and is sunk,
so Napoleon is poisoned, so Lorca dies,
while towns burn in their brains. Drink to be drunk
until they lay us to sleep and slam the trunk,
two people more who open and close their eyes,
whose tongues are twisted and whose hearts are shrunk,
while towns burn in their brains. Drink to be drunk.
by David Burn | May 31, 2004 | Literature
I’ve recently completed two heavy books. No Logo by Naomi Klein and A People’s History of The United States by Howard Zinn. Both authors point to many more people and organizations and events that deserve further inquiry. Klein mentions Who Will Tell the People? and other works by William Greider of The Nation.
Zinn’s research is exhaustive, but I’m left wanting to know more about The Wobblies, Big Bill Haywood, Mother Jones, Lucy Parsons, The Haymarket Afffair, and The Ludlow Massacre to name a few important, but often overlooked, facts and figures in American history.
Mother Jones
