George Ttoouli's Static Exile

Tonight at eight o' clock, George Ttoouli's first collection, Static Exile, has its London launch at The Slaughtered Lamb. Here is a poem from the collection, first published in Pomegranate.

Love on a Monday Evening

Today I felt fear and it was the grandest thing -
like the crown of my head would lift off.
Not a leaf could have flipped on its back in the wind

that I wouldn't have noticed.
An Arab sat opposite me on the train.
I had taken the first carriage,

the one we had imbued with likely death
in a way we can only substantiate for each other.
My fingers filled with static and my blood turned

to white noise. I could describe him for you,
a quick photo-fit sketch, but mostly it was his stubble
and the wart on his left cheek,

like in news reports. I have a spot in the same place
on my right cheek. You've never called me
a terrorist when I've not shaved for that long. Mostly

I have been supporting myself on wire link fences
looking at each partition of waste land,
square by square, until the police move me on.

George Ttoouli

Static Exile can be ordered directly from the publisher, Penned in the Margins.

Online Notices

Thanks to George Ttoouli for his kind remarks on the launch of The Son in Bath last week.

And somehow only now have I come across an article published in El Mercurio (according to Tony Frazer it's Chile's equivalent of The Times) on New Year's Eve in 2004. Tony Frazer translates the passage in which my name is mentioned thus: "As for poetry, the global scene is vast, dynamic, diversified and in some cases brilliant (the recently deceased Anthony Hecht, Monica Ferrel, John Ashbery, Charles Simic, John Mole, Carrie Etter, Brad Leithauser are mere sample [names] (or: illustrative examples) in the thriving English language poetry of today. In other words, if we left our parochial surroundings, we would be able to see a literary landscape [that is] stimulating, energetic, provocative, tempting, very diverse and a contrast with the backward republic of native letters."

How I got on that list--how I'm known to Camilo Marks--I don't know, but to be among those poets and to have my work described as "brilliant" thrills me.

An open letter to my niece

Dear Katelyn,

This letter is to apologize on behalf of all of us Etters, because we have disappointed you. We failed you. There are reasons for that, but you deserve an apology nonetheless.

When Grandma and Grandpa Etter took you and your brother Alex into their home, they hoped to care for you until your mother had gone through detox for her addiction and was able to care for you again. It was strange when Grandpa suddenly started gaining weight, almost ten pounds a week! You must have seen that; someday you'll have to tell me what that was like. When, as you know, Grandpa had put on forty pounds in a month, all water weight apparently, he had to go into the hospital for a kidney biopsy, and that was when you and Alex went into foster care with T****.

I don't know if anyone ever told you, but I wanted to bring you both to England to live with me. I talked to the social worker, though, and she suggested it'd be impossible, given that I lived abroad--there would be legal difficulties. Besides that, I figured I shouldn't take you away from your cousins and other relatives; you would have been very lonely here, I'm afraid.

If I had known the kind of care--or rather, lack of--you and Alex would receive at T****'s, I think I would have tried to move back to Illinois for a while, until we could find a better arrangement. But I didn't know, and by the time we did, there wasn't anything we could do about it. As the social worker and T**** were friends, any complaints we made were ignored. I even wrote twice to the local paper in the hope that they'd investigate, but apparently they never did anything.

When the case against your mother was finished, and she was able to return to her husband, your stepfather, she had your youngest brother, Andrew, and took Alex home. She said she didn't think she could handle three kids. I hope she has apologized to you for this. That must have been very painful for you. I'm so sorry.

What a great thing that Aunt Laura and Uncle Reggie took you in! From what everyone says, you became part of the family straight away, becoming even closer to Lindsey and helping out with Justin and Nate. But since the time Grandpa died, Reggie's health has worsened, Justin was diagnosed with autism, and Nate has started showing similar symptoms. What a year the Etters have had! I can't tell you how hard it was for Aunt Laura and Uncle Reggie to come to the decision that they couldn't take care of you any longer; they wouldn't have been able to do it if they didn't know a great family was eager to have a girl just like you, and that you would be at the center of their lives.

And now you are living with, and are going to be adopted by, Joe and Shannon. I will have to say thank you to them a thousand times. At last you have your own room, you live close to school, and they are taking you to Wisconsin to meet more of their family. What a welcome! At last you are receiving the kind of attention and care we have all wanted for you, but couldn't provide ourselves.

I am so sorry, Katie, for all you've been through in the last few years, more emotional trauma than many people go through in their life times. I am so sorry I couldn't do more to make your life better when you needed it most. Please forgive us for what we couldn't or didn't do. We love you so very much.

Love always,

Aunt Carrie

I decided to make this letter public in part because it seems to strengthen the declarations in the letter and in part because a friend recently asked me what she might tell her sister and brother-in-law (whom I associate with Shannon and Joe above) who are about to become foster parents. This isn't a complete answer, but it's a beginning.

Infinite Difference launches March 2010!

If I work very hard over the next two to three months, work like an ant, a bee, a cadmium yellow insect, Infinite Difference: Other Poetries by UK Women Poets will launch on schedule in March 2010. Indeed, the launch has already been scheduled by the perhaps-too-trusting Shearsman editor Tony Frazer, for Wednesday, 10 March 2010 at Swedenborg Hall in London. As many contributors either live in London or are planning to come to London specially for the occasion (as with Catherine Hales, who intends to fly in from Berlin), the launch should be a fabulous event with a wonderful range of poets and poetries, so mark the date!

Don't Women Write Great Books?

Please read the following press release from the Women in Letters and Literary Arts.

Why Weren’t Any Women Invited To Publishers Weekly’s Weenie Roast?

Publishers Weekly recently announced their Best Books Of 2009 list. In their top ten, chosen by editorial staff, no books written by women were included. Quoted in The Huffington Post, PW confidently admitted that they're “not the most politically correct" choices. This statement comes in a year in which new books appeared by writers such as Lorrie Moore, Margaret Atwood, Alice Munro, Mavis Gallant, Rita Dove, Heather McHugh and Alicia Ostriker.

“The absence made me nearly speechless,” said writer Cate Marvin, cofounder of the newly launched national literary organization WILLA (Women In Letters And Literary Arts), which, since August, has attracted close to 5400 members on their Facebook web page, including many major and emerging women writers. “It continues to surprise me that literary editors are so comfortable with their bias toward male writing, despite the great and obvious contributions that women authors make to our contemporary literary culture.”

WILLA’s other cofounder, Erin Belieu, Director of the Creative Writing Program at Florida State University, asked, “So is the flipside here that including women authors on the list would just have been an empty, politically correct gesture? When PW’s editors tell us they’re not worried about ‘political correctness,’ that’s code for ‘your concerns as a feminist aren’t legitimate.’ They know they’re being blatantly sexist, but it looks like they feel good about that. I, on the other hand, have heard from a whole lot of people—writers and readers--who don’t feel good about it at all.”

PW also did a Top 100 list and, of the authors included, only 29 were women. The WILLA Advisory Board is in the process of putting together a list titled “Great Books Published By Women In 2009.” This will be posted to the organization’s Facebook page and website. A WILLA Wiki has also been started for people to share their nominations for Great Books By Women in 2009. Press release to follow.

WILLA was founded to bring increased attention to women’s literary accomplishments and to question the American literary establishment’s historical slow-footedness in recognizing and rewarding women writers' achievements. WILLA is about to launch their website and is in the process of planning their first national conference to be held next year.

(Note: until recently, WILLA went under the acronym WILA, with one “L.” If you’re interested in the organization, please Google WILA with one “L” to see background on how this group was originally formed.)

For more information contact:
Erin Belieu ebelieu at fsu dot edu
Cate Marvin catemarvin at gmail dot com

Homesick, or A Few Photos from My August-September Visit Home

Back in Normal...

Andrew, age 2--mischief itself

Lindsey looking pensive--she's a thoughtful girl

Alex, age four--always in motion

Mom and Kaylee