Letter Day: 302; Literary requests
June 3, 2009
HEY AJ! Sorry to bother you but I need to write two poems for my college compositional class. Proper poets won’t reply to my emails, so I figured I’d ask you. Can you write me a poem about mans alienation from nature and tendency for self destruction?. If you could make it dark and moody, with a complex rhyme scheme, with a deep thematic counterpoint. I know it’s a lot ask…but what else are you doing these days?
TWO SHEET TWO DA WIND
T-Dot
I have to tell you, Sheets, you’re not much of salesmen. Still, I do have some free time on my hands, and my heart does course with molten poetry, so maybe I can help you out.
Chasing the dragon/My father lament Read the rest of this entry »
Genetic Outrage
May 14, 2009
Did you read this: http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/05/13/genes.patent.myriad/index.html
They are patenting pure human genes, so if anyone develops medical treatments direct at them the corporation has to given their permission first (and wet their beak on any future profits). What the fuck. Where does rank on your outrage scale?
Ethan Morrow,
Former citizen of the Democratic Republic of the United States of America
***
Damn, that is a bigger slap in the face than actually being slapped in the face. The idea that the fundament of our being is property is offensive enough, but that the motivation for making it property is to ensure people can’t treat disease for free: that takes a special kind of shamelessness. It is getting to the point where they will patent the Hard-On and I’ll have to sleep with an elastic band around my junk to keep my morning wood from driving me to financial ruin.
Letter Day Aught Aught Aught: The holidation
December 8, 2008
A friend and I are having a friendly wager we’d like you to settle: What is the most painfully earnest song ever recorded? Your insight is appreciated.
Wally Segovia
That would be: Beautiful, by James Blount
James Blount: It’s like David Bowie and a Quavering ghost from the moor had a child and forced it to play nothing but tea party and dress up for the first five years of its life.
Not only is this a painfully earnest song about falling in love: it’s a painful earnest song about falling in love with some chick you saw once and never had the sack to talk to. That is just above an epic poem about how the bus splashed you on your way to work on the pathetic scale.
What really puts it over the top is that it was created in the age of irony, where piteous emotive wailing is roundly scorned. I can just picture the sound engineers catcalling and pelting Blount with garbage during the recording. Somewhere Dan Hill* walks with a slightly less emasculated limp; knowing James Blount has taken his station on the folk rock cross.
*Note his uncanny resemblance to the Geico caveman.
Letter Day 100: Listful ponderings
September 16, 2008
Wow…so, the U.S. economy sort of broke. What happened? How fucked are we?
Daniel Rogers
Kapashaw, NY
Well, Dan, I’m not sure a unemployed aspiring writer, whose idea of financial planning is seeding his apartment with random pockets of change, is really the best source of economic insight. Still, it’s not like actual economist are any good at this either, so I’ll give it a shot.
Here’s the math
Bank + old rich guy (barren wife)/cheap thrills*not their money
No oversight+ too many episodes of flip this house*predatory lending
Equals: China hosting the next politburo meeting in the Statue of Liberty’s torch
I hope that cleared things up for you.
Letter Day Fo’ Fo’ F0′: The cost of bullying
August 14, 2008
I lieu of a proper intro I present you the best thing ever: The secret life of Julia Childs
That’s right, the 6′2 queen of French Cuisine was a WWII spy and saboteur, for the precursor of the CIA. It’s enough to make me dig up her husky bones and dance a waltz beneath the moonlight. Ah, granddame, your kind will not be seen again. Let’s get down to business.
*********
Are you this random a fucker in real life?
Dave
Yep. A brief sampling
-I told my girlfriend the Stinkenheim[1] museum had been broken into last night, and some kids had vandalized her exhibit. This information had been relayed to me via a telephone I keep hidden from her at all times. When she questioned the legitimacy (and fairness) of this phone call, I suggested her doubt was politically motivated, and an attempt to undermine my bid for a curator position.
Ask BE: A question of decency
May 15, 2008
“I fear for my moral well being. Could you please rate the fruits and vegetables in terms of their inherent decency
Lucas Darden”
You set difficult task, Lucas. I’m not really a proponent of objective morality to begin with, and my dietary choices offers limited opportunity for vegetable dalliance, but a question is a question….so I’ll give it a shot.
(Ranked in descending order from Most to Least Decent. The Majority fruits and vegetables are fairly neutral, so I will emphasis the less reliable of their ilk.)
Vegetables/Fruits/Tubers ranked in order of their moral forthrightness
********
Letter Day 107: A brief interlude
February 26, 2008
As soon as I finish the songs I sings, I’ve already forgotten the words. The second I figure the meaning of things, the sounds becomes absurd. Letter Day won’t fix my problems; who the hell are you to judge? Lets get down to business.
*****
What advertising slogans do you hate the most and why?
Rodney
It’s more the dance, than the slogan, but I hate that Hey PeptoBismol jig. I can deal with the nausea, upset stomach, and heart burn parts… but the Diarrhea portion of the dance, wherein they place two hands over their rears (presumably to stem a hot gusher of crap) while grimacing, is unpardonable. Let me tell you something: I’ve had diarrhea before; I did not dance, I did not sing, and trying to contain the pressure manually would have resulted in two rank and scalded hands, shame filthed and forever unusable. How dare they teach that to children. Read the rest of this entry »
Letter Day 101: Slam Politics
February 13, 2008
I been down, but I ain’t beat; I been gone, but I ain’t dead. If I must be condemned let it be for one of these two truths:
1. I am not a helicopter.
2. Letter Day is late.
Enough lament. Let us get down the business.
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So what do think about the upcoming presidential election?
Julie C.
Vetterburg, VA
Letter Day 47: For fun or Prophet.
January 21, 2008
Deep in the heart of Dreamtime there stands rock shaped like a Fathers Lament. Were you to climb this rock, a thousand fathoms to the top, you would see the edges of the word of god…and the only discernable erg would beckon. L E T T E R DAY. Let’s get down to business.
******
Are really going to post naked Pictures if you win a Bloggy?
Dina,
Letter 35: Simple questions and mild retardation
January 16, 2008
I’ve had so much caffeine today I can see through winter…to the blazing cold sun that fevers my dreams. I do not know my name. I cannot find my way. Yet letter day must go on. Let’s get down to business.
**********
You seem like a fairly on the ball adult; were you this bright as kid?
Gina,
Ridgemont, Ill
Letter Day: 25; General Malfeasance
December 10, 2007
I have two questions. Why does poetry suck so hard? Why are sandwiches so good?
This is important.
Zack the Wis,
Pemberton, Il
Letter day: Alpha Hotel Foxtrot Umbrella Charlie Kangaroo
September 17, 2007
I spent my typing on the title; let’s get down to business.
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What do you want?
Curious Zach
Woonsocket, OH
What do I want?
I want Raisin bread that doesn’t put lie to it’s name with every bite.
I want to beat a midget with a 9 iron and have him laugh like it’s was sunshine.
I want to drink gasoline until my eyes shimmer with rainbows and my words combust.
I want to shake ugly babies until we both start crying
I want a better world for bastards, just because
Letter Day 99: Where I been; you don’t even know
August 8, 2007
I Ain’t a clown killer…but I’ve killed a clown.
I didn’t plunge the knife…but I held him down.
Truer words have never been spoken…by me, at least. Because I lie. Almost exclusively. Let us try and put that ugliness aside… in the interest of LETTER DAY!
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Poppa AJ, Sing me a song of summertime.
Lucy Sweetmess
Letter Day 88: Racing towards indecency
July 17, 2007
The only advice my Grandfather ever gave me was “If you’re going to kill a clown make sure he’s dead. Cause they got’s long memory and lots of friends“. He died peacefully in sleep twenty years later. Fucking clowns! I dedicate this Letter Day to his memory. Let us, get down, to business.
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I don’t think you use real letters. Or if you do, your fans are just as caustic and biting as you are.But i could be wrong. It happens. So here goes nothing. Do you beat your entropy often? Or do you find as you get older you only need to beat it every now and again? “What advice would you give to young readers who might want to beat their entropy? Do you have any tips that might make it a more pleasurable experience? Or are you one of those who believes that beating one’s entropy should be an inherently unpleasant experience.If i got fan letters like this one I’d use fake letters, too.
+++Cardboard Casanova
Letter Day 97: Oh the places I have been
July 4, 2007
Oh the cats in the cradle and the silver spoon, the little boy blue and the man in the moon. “When you coming home, Poppa AJ”, I don’t know when…we’ll have a Letter Day then….you know we’ll have letter day then…
It’s been a long time my children’s… and I don’t have much excuse, save my heart went wandering and took my narrative gumption with it. In my defense I also haven’t fed my cat in a week, or beaten her properly in three days. Hell of world we live in. Let us get down to business.
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What about the guvament? I been inside so long I reached the out within the center. Why can’t I mezmerate the endogenous conclusion of my obvious subsumation? There are three thoughts I must propose:
1. Bureaucracy functions as a anti truth engine that converts an economy of linear deception into false industry of non productive thought.
2. Authority is a measure of anironic buying in: to the stated principles.
3. You can hammer a thought flat and it retains all meaning; put one dent in man and he becomes inchoate and meaningless.
Danny Dangerous, Privy Council.
