Thoughts on Rockaway, myself and Inertia
I am going to break a longstanding rule and actually talk a little about my writing and lit editing as of late–I know, it’s shocking for a blogger to talk about himself. Lately I’ve actually been writing poems again–about 3 or 4 in the last week–and this is a bit unusual given that I’m working on a novel, which means focusing on an entirely different sort of expression from poetry. Yet, what inspired me initially was not a desire to write about anything specific. I just wanted to write a poem. I scrapped the initial poem that came out of my attempts, but subsequent poems have had real focus. In the example below, I write about where I live:
Rockaway
Sometimes the winds from the bay
Or the sideways rain
Hinder my errands on dark afternoons
When even the birds take shelter
Perhaps I question myself too much
Asking what got into me this time
Having had it with Brooklyn
And moving to the seaside
Along Rockaway Beach where the sand
Stretches in millions of parts
Into one long garment lining the peninsula
Where I awake in foggy mornings
Shun coffee and sleepily come alive
For matters of the day that need attention
Mine it seems—yet it is here that the silence
Of the twilight hours save me
Yes, I know, I could have dropped an article or two, and maybe one day I’ll remember to do that. The “Rockaway” in the title happens to be Rockaway Park, New York, which is the area encompassing Neponsit, Belle Harbor and Rockaway Park in Queens—these neighborhoods are bracketed by Jamaica Bay on the north and Rockaway Beach and the Atlantic Ocean on the south, and are situated on the western end of the Rockaway Peninsula. Although technically New York City, “Rock Park” is very much a hidden gem of suburban quiet. Sometimes, however, I find it a little too quiet and too lonely, too removed from the coffee shops in places like Williamsburg, Brooklyn or the bookstores of Manhattan (think Strand).
Further east is the “Rockaway Beach” neighborhood, which is famous for 1) the beach, 2) the Ramones song “Rockaway Beach” & 3) that a subway line actually runs through it. To be sure, Rock Beach is something of an urban blight–boarded-up windows, trash on thrown on the streets, shadowy figures trolling at all hours.
One interesting factoid about the Rockaways is the that there are literally hundreds of streets with the word “Beach” in the name (e.g. Beach Channel Drive, Rockaway Beach Boulevard, Beach 90th Street etc.). It all serves to underscore that this is in fact a beach community.
Another occupation of mine at the moment is the upcoming issue of Inertia, which is a literary journal I founded in 2003. The next issue has taken on an interesting feeling as of late, with several new ‘firsts’ as we enter new realms. I don’t want to spoil the surprise, but I will say this: we’ve simply never done anything like what we’re about to do. For the poets and writers who have submitted their work, let me say that I am taking a more hands-on approach to things and have asked Associate Editor, Karen Neuberg, to assign me submissions to read (something usually done exclusively by Assistant Editors). It’s actually a lot of fun to read submissions, and I can spend hours going through them.
The journal itself has sprouted wings in the last eighteen months. Our readership reached it’s peak before our latest issue, and has been steadily improving since 2007 thanks to an array of incoming traffic from various sources, and from word-of-mouth.
Lastly, I just want to say a thing or two about Deborah Digges, who I saw read in Greenwich Village back in 1996 or 7 (yikes, I can’t remember which). It’s very rare that a poem grabs me from the first word, but that’s literally what DD did to me when I saw and heard her read; now she is gone.
