ART Arnold J. Kemp COMICS Jim Behrle MUSIC Sounds of Greg D, Brian Speaker POETRY Lawrence Giffin, Mark Wallace BOOG CITY PRINTED MATTER Tom Beckett, Paolo Javier A COMMUNITY NEWSPAPER FROM A GROUP OF ARTISTS AND WRITERS BASED IN AND AROUND NEW YORK CITY’S EAST VILLAGE ISSUE 50 FREE and Ernest Concepcion The Poet Who Once Ran for President A Conversation with Eileen Myles INTERVIEW BY candidate that everyone would prefer a JEN BENKA AND younger, inexperienced man. I like young CAROL MIRAKOVE people but the fact that young people are We caught up with the only turning out in droves for someone younger poet we know who has run for that reminds them of the sixties seems de- president—Eileen Myles—to discuss mented. I trust young people’s taste for a electoral matters. Eileen is the au- million things, but I remember the sixties thor of more than 20 volumes of and, for instance, John F. Kennedy wasn’t poetry as well as fiction, articles, such a great president. Plus I’m very un- plays, and libretti. Her most recent comfortable with the media support for book, Sorry, Tree, was published Obama and Hillary getting slammed. last year by Wave Books. I remember Al Gore getting torn apart, I remember [Howard] Dean being shamed Boog City: You ran for Presi- and once [John] Kerry got nominated then dent in 1992 as an “openly he was the butt of jokes. I feel we are be- female” write-in candidate. ing prepared to see Obama be totally buf- What did you think the value feted in the press if he gets the nomination. would be at that time, and He has been treated with kid gloves, and looking back, what was the Hillary’s being treated like a bully. It’s such value? a set up. I think she as the strong candidate Eileen Myles: I was actually is getting the entire force of the media flung shocked that this massive American at her—and she can take it! I think she will ritual, the presidential campaign, stomp all over [John] McCain when she was about to be- gets the nomina- gin and that there tion. I am floored was no female I’m sorry, I think the Obama campaign is a lot of spin. He’s a charming, good by the negativ- candidate and ity towards her no acknowledge- looking man and there’s a groundswell of hope around him, and I think that’s campaign. Yes ment in any way she voted for that other kinds of pretty fucking empty. Amy Steiner photo the war. But she Americans’ needs was the senator should be represented. In fact George [H.W.] Bush was making poetry in our culture and the resistance to political par- for New York and that includes upstate N.Y., and I think she it clear that women and “minorities” and queers and activists ticipation? wanted to stay in office. And to get more information. I’m not should limit their expression. I was making it loud and clear from EM: I think they are both a myth. It’s like the many boring so impressed that he in a much less critical point in time (he was my corner, and everywhere I could spread the idea, that that panels we are invited to be on in which we are asked if poetry is not in office, he was running as he still is. When does this guy was not okay and that there were many of us and we political rather than how we’re experiencing or activat- just be, and do something?) was against the war. I was too, were American and valuable. I gained an immedi- ing it as a political force lately. I think the idea of weren’t you. But no one really makes much of our opposition ate access to the political by getting this thing the resistance is the resistance. I don’t believe it to the war. Yes he was “like us.” That was why I was running, going. I gained my right to speak political. I exists. It’s like knitting class. Someone construct- but I don’t think it’s a great loss to America that I didn’t win. think my campaign shed some light for a lot of ing pot-holders of resistance and saying look. My nephew is a political organizer and he supports Obama people on how alienated they were from the It’s a waste of time. because the feeling is that Obama is being supported by process. people considerably more left than he is and they will hold BC: A political organizer friend of him to those positions. But I don’t think it works that way. Re- BC: In a campaign letter you distrib- ours has asserted that the culture has member George [W.] Bush was going to bring us together. uted in 1992 you wrote: “When you step in to change before social change can hap- the booth on election day, do write in a vote pen. In your leaving NYC and living in San ... You’ll be alone in that booth and it’s so dirty Diego, we wonder if we might benefit from like a peephole or a dressing room or a confession. But your broadened perspective: what do you see being Uche Nduka you’re really not so free—until pen in hand, you pull the especially available to people in NYC towards making Flatbush, Brooklyn lever, you push the button, I believe it’s a red and then culture change? If I Snag a Fracture on the upper left face of the voting booth you spread the EM: I think there are more of us here. I don’t live in San Diego metal wings above the title, ‘President,’ and an empty anymore, by the way, and I moved back to N.Y. the day before white space appears, empty as poetry, and this is your yesterday. I think we have the joy of congress here. We fight and if i snag a fracture. freedom of speech.” What are the connections between squawk, and cheer and laugh and retreat and barge back out. It’s if my lust is too loud. the poem and the vote? How are creative expression such a human environment. In S.D. I found myself endlessly encoun- if i sigh into and political expression similar? tering malls, and a lot of vegetation and quiet. I’ve been living in L.A. a threshold. EM: The vote is similar to the impulse to write. Not what you too for the past year and there there’s a distant teeming. People love if my foot is on asphalt. write but the desire to write at all. I wouldn’t isolate the impulse to coming together but the cars block them, but they try and it happens. if stress rises. write a poem from any other impulse to write—to write in a note- Also bicycles are a powerful force for change. It’s political to ride a if i tell it to slide away. book, to write a novel, to write to the city complaining about a bike in L.A. Living in S.D. was like living in America. Wow. Everything if a geography of grace ticket. The will to write, to act seems very similar to me to voting. Just was right from the news. Here there’s more platforms of information, is all it takes. from teaching, or from being in the poetry community I’m always other people in particular. We are its shocks. if i nibble at a trufle. affected by how many people write, how much there is. It seems if a cornice breaks off. to make so little difference in the body politic but I think that’s a top BC: What do you think about the statement made if tattoos murmur. down analysis by journalists, who are often just bitter poets. They by New York Feminists for Peace and Barack Obama if i lean close to them. prefer the idea that writing, that poetry doesn’t happen at all. It’s (www.ipetitions.com/petition/NYfeministsforpeace/) if i start from scratch. happening all the time and it matters a great deal. Kids should be which is, in short, that the policies proposed and the en- if a sea grass reels. taught about voting, and running for president. And poetry. ergy released, is more significant than electing a female if i crumple it. president in Hillary Clinton? if Darfurs teem. BC: Muriel Rukeyser described poetry as “one of the EM: I think that’s total bullshit. I’m sorry I think the Obama if i am being importunate. most underutilized resources” in the U.S. Do you think it campaign is a lot of spin. He’s a charming, good looking man if Biafras throng. could be said that the vote falls in the same category? and there’s a groundswell of hope around him, and I think that’s if a backyard is the issue. EM: I think I have said that. I wouldn’t put it in the nega- pretty fucking empty. I like Hillary. I trust her knowledge, I think if my telephone bill squeals. tive. I think it is a burgeoning force to be reckoned with. she’s the consummate politician, and I think she’ll make a great if i quieten it. president. I can’t believe people are so affected by Mr. Smooth- if four buttons remain unbuttoned.