More Grotesque Poltergeistism

I grew up in a midwestern area with lots of farms, farm equipment, and cornfields. I love various aspects of the gothic, the grotesque, strangely scary Ouija Board snippets, poltergeistism as unusual female powers and other creepy yumminess. Some thinks that are yummy to me might be grotesque to others. Do you think I care? Well, part of me does. Part of me really wishes to be myself (including my strange, dark, oddball interests); but part of me is bothered by the semi-unacceptable aspects of myself that often feel like some odd cross hatching in between weird little girlish horror and increasingly older looking but not older feeling husker, getting closer & closer to death. Like chip chop meat stuck in a deadly doll head, like blood flying out of doll legs, like more horrific confection.

(I just sent that little remark about some of my poetry to Susan Yount, a poet and editor who is starting a new horrifically fantastic, female-centric, burlesque/grotesque sort of poetry workshop and asked if she could use my poem 'Midwestern Gothic' as part of her workshop class. Of course I was honored and said yes and sent her the poem plus the above little snippet, hurrah! Also, soon I hope to add a video of me reading the poem 'Midwestern Gothic' at the Slash Pine Press poetry festival this past April. More coming soon!)

Is a Poltergeist a Ghostly Interference or a Manifestation of a Suppressed Female Psyche?
http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2402712/is_a_poltergeist_a_ghostly_interference.html?cat=34

Poetic Poems & Hot Reviews

These two fun photos were taken of me by the lovely poet Becca Claver during my reading at the recent Slash Pine Press poetry festival. I've not yet downloaded or uploaded my own photos, so just might post a few more soon.

As well as glancing at these darkly sweet little photos, you just might also want to read three very recent book reviews of three of my poetry collections. Scroll on down to my previous entry here to check out a review within the latest issue of Arsenic Lobster online literary magazine of my Slash Pine Press published print chapbook called FONDANT PIG ANGST.

Then look/lick/click below to read two other new reviews within the latest online issue of Galatea Resurrects--first a review of another print chapbook called MONDO CRAMPO; then a review of an online chapbook called Tongue Like a Stinger:

http://galatearesurrection14.blogspot.com/2010/04/chaps-by-juliet-cook-lucy-harvest.html

&

http://galatearesurrection14.blogspot.com/2010/04/tongue-like-stinger-by-juliet-cook.html

If any of these peeps give you the feeling a strange and creative collection of mine might be something you'd like to read yourself, you may purchase FONDANT PIG ANGST from Slash Pine Press or via my very own etsy shop at http://www.bloodpuddingpress.etsy.com/ AND/OR you may read the other two online. MONDO CRAMPO was published in fun and sexy print as part of the Dusie Kollektiv, has since sold out, but may now be read online. Tongue Like a Stinger has always been online. Enjoy!


FONDANT PIG ANGST - http://www.etsy.com/listing/46272508/fondant-pig-angst-by-juliet-cook


MONDO CRAMPO - http://www.dusie.org/JulietCOOK.pdf


Tongue Like a Stinger - http://www.wheelhousemagazine.com/chapbook/cook.pdf

Poetry Delight in Tuscaloosa Alabama, April 23-24!

I will be reading a few of my poems as one part of many other fun-filled poetry readers participating in the Slash Pine Press Poetry Festival during the evening of Friday April 23 & pretty much all day and night on Saturday April 24. Wheee!

Several different poetry reading spots in Alabama take place throughout this event (Slash Pine Press lives at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa). The reading I am part of takes place on Saturday between 3 PM - 5:30 PM within a local bar called Little Willies. Find out more about this location, plus details about all the readings and readers on the Slash Pine Press website here: http://www.slashpinepress.com/festival/

I am involved in this reading because Slash Pine Press published my poetry chapbook called FONDANT PIG ANGST. More information about that book is also available in the above website where you may even purchase a copy for yourself AND/OR you may also purchase a copy from me via my etsy shop at http://www.bloodpuddingpress.etsy.com/

If you live in or near Tusaloosa Alabama, maybe I'll see you at this yummy poetry festival! Yay!

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New-My Poetry Related Associated Content article:

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2848798/my_creative_writing_college_degree.html?image=804630&cat=4

a jelly donut was my roommate...

I've been reading various poems lately to prepare for my upcoming poetry reading as part of the Slash Pine Press special event, for which I will be a part of many readers next Saturday. Here's another poem from my Slash Pine Press chapbook; the chapbook is called FONDANT PIG ANGST; this poem itself is called Spiracular.

I won't be reading this particular poem as part of the above-mentioned event, but I will be reading another piece from FONDANT PIG ANGST--2 poems from PINK LEOTARD & SHOCK COLLAR--& one poem from my latest Blood Pudding Press for Dusie Kollektiv 4 chapbook Soft Foam.

Find out more about Slash Pine Press (including the upcoming event) here -http://www.slashpinepress.com/




Find out more about Blood Pudding Press here - http://www.etsy.com/shop/bloodpuddingpress

Poetry Readings & Writings

Dana Guthrie Martin, author of the poetry chapbook, 'The Spare Room', which was recently published by my Blood Pudding Press, was live on the Joe Milford Poetry Show this evening. During this show, she read quite a few pieces from 'The Spare Room' (as well as some sections from a quirkily delightful in-progress collaborative poem between her and Nathan Moore). She's really an excellent reader, plus listening to these poems read aloud (and the related conversation between Dana and Joe Milford) will give you a real feel for the content of this collection.

Listen to Dana read, here:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/joe-milford-show/2009/12/17/joe-milford-hosts-dana-guthrie-martin


Peruse the visuals and other details of her book in the Blood Puding Press etsy shop, here:
http://www.BloodPuddingPress.etsy.com

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If you're in the mood for even more poetry reading, you may listen to me read a piece from my own new poetry chapbook, FONDANT PIG ANGST by scrolling down a few entries on this very blogorama.

FONDANT PIG ANGST is also available in the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop, as well as directly from the stupendous publisher, Slash Pine Press.

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I've been feeling rather unfocused and out of it today, but I did manage to send submissions to four different poetry magazines, one of them something extra-fun sounding called TITS: A 24 Hour Journal of Poetry & Poetics. I submitted one animal, three designer vaginas, and a dessert product to the TITS project, so we shall see what happens.

Also wrote three book blurbs within the last few days, but have so much more writing to do. Another blurb, another couple reviews, a personal feminist treatise of sorts, a little article on gifts for travelers, maybe a holiday letter. Poetry. Pitter patter.

Oh and I received my new fingerless mittens inspired by the Log Lady from Twin Peaks! Huzzah!

"My log has something to tell you..."

Who Wants Fondant (and other goodies)?

And not only fondant, but $5.00 FONDANT PIG ANGST?

UPDATE: I have received my fabulous author copies, so this porky publication is now also available (signed copies) in my etsy shop at http://www.BloodPuddingPress.etsy.com.



Slash Pine Press finished hand stitching my new poetry chapbook, FONDANT PIG ANGST, this weekend and it is now available for only $5.00 online or by mail. For more details on how to acquire, please see the Slash Pine Press website at http://slashpinepress.blogspot.com/.

From the site: "Slash Pine Press is pleased to announce the release of our first chapbook of poems, Juliet Cook's dynamically gut-wrenching, Fondant Pig Angst. I feel confident in saying Juliet's voice is an American original, fusing pastry with grotesquerie, icing with amputation. These poems are not plainly 'dark'. No, they are alive and electric and full of verve and spunk, playfulness even, and it's these competing impulses that make for such an amazing collection of poems. "

When I receive my own copies of the book, I will also offer a few signed copies for sale in the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop at http://www.bloodpuddingpress.etsy.com/.

I will also be reading at the Slash Pine Press Poetry Festival this April, but more on that later.

The Birthday Pig image upon the cover of FONDANT PIG ANGST is by the marvelous Marnie Weber.


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In other poetry goodness news, the latest Blood Pudding Press chapbook, Dana Guthrie Martin's The Spare Room, which was launched on Black Friday, is already eliciting excitement and positive buzz. Acquire your very own hand-designed copy from the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop, either by its lonesome or in a money-saving Combination Pack with one other Blood Pudding Press chapbook of your choice.

See the previous entry here for more information about the latest chapbook--and visit the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop at http://www.bloodpuddingpress.etsy.com/ to select and partake of your own poetic morsels.


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I haven't been the most diligent blogger lately, so here are a few other tasty little vittles I shall mention in passing:

~Poet/critic Adam Fieled thinks I'm a total bad-ass in a recent entry over at Stoning the Devil:

http://adamfieled.blogspot.com/2009/12/two-threads.html

~Columbus indie film company CutThroat Entertainment premiered their short horror film, BREAK last week and I emerged from my hermetically sealed mason jar (did you know that's where I lived & wrote?) to attend the premiere party, which was pretty fun, but I probably should have skipped that Christmas Ale. It'll be interesting to see what CTE does next. Also, I liked my dress; it was like an off-fuschia shag rug.

~I emerged from my hermetically sealed mason jar again this past weekend to attend a holiday party of sorts, which I should have skipped. Why is it that more often than not when I go out in public, I end up feeling mortified the next day? Maybe it's because I'm usually out of my element, my element being a mason jar full of tainted gummi pigs or somesuch. At least I liked my dress that night, too; it was like a space age waitress dress or like some weird Judy Jetson on Polyvinylchloride. Like a hairless kitty, you can't wash this dress, you have to wipe it clean with a damp sponge.

~But enough about my dresses, submit some poetry to me for Thirteen Myna Birds, especially if you're of the female and/or queer persuasion. I get too much crusty straight male poetry. I'm looking for juicy moreso than crusty, especially fake crusty. You know what I mean by fake crusty? I'll tell you. It's like you're some college student guy in your early twenties and you're writing this Bukowski impersonation about your hard knock life when you should actually be putting on a belly shirt and doing a little dance. I mean I want YOUR voice; not some crusty old man's voice (unless you actually ARE a crusty old curmudgeon, in which case, that's a little different, but I would like the poetry to be different, too, pretty please). So check out the guidelines at http://13myna.blogspot.com/ and if you think you have something that might interest me, feel free to submit.

"icing with amputation"

Slash Pine Press has just sent out an email announcing that my newest poetry chapbook, FONDANT PIG ANGST, is now available for pre-order for only $5.00. If you would like me to forward you a copy of this email, which includes an attached form to order by mail, please feel free to let me know. They will also begin offering an online ordering option via their website (www.slashpinepress.blogspot.com) within the next few days. Here is an excerpt from the email announcement by Joseph P. Wood, co-editor of Slash Pine Press:

"Slash Pine Press is pleased to announce the upcoming release of our first chapbook of poems, Juliet Cook's dynamically gut-wrenching, Fondant Pig Angst. I feel confident in saying Juliet's voice is an American original, fusing pastry with grotesquerie, icing with amputation. These poems are not plainly 'dark'. No, they are alive and electric and full of verve and spunk, playfulness even, and it's these competing impulses that make for such an amazing collection of poems. Simply put, never have I seen a person convey the depths of human cruelty also be so in love with the language."

The tentative release date for FONDANT PIG ANGST is December 15.

(The Birthday Pig image, which will be the cover art on FONDANT PIG ANGST, is by the marvelous Marnie Weber.)

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In other news, here is an updated article about the aforementioned extra-special Columbus Ohio indie horror movie event happening at Studio 35 on December 3. As of right now, tickets are still available. Let me know if you want in:

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2431004/cutthroat_entertainment_film_premiere.html?cat=8

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And here is another announcement for Fondant Pig Angst AND the latest Blood Pudding Press poetry offering, in the form of a Black Friday alternative. Happy Thanksgiving and beyond!

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2431670/a_few_creative_black_friday_shopping.html?cat=2

It's coming!

FONDANT PIG ANGST coming soon!

See the Slash Pine Press blog:

http://slashpinepress.blogspot.com/2009/11/its-coming.html

In other news, my new hair cut kinda makes me look like a cockatoo.

what is this, a pie eating contest for anorexics?

I'm very pleased that I've almost completed a new designer vagina!

I had kind've thought I had lost the impetus or inspiration for that series, but now it's back and I'm pretty happy about that. The latest piece includes the line, 'What is this, a pie eating contest for anorexics?'

Speaking of force feeding, I've been experiencing more than usual weird bad dreams lately. I don't feel like talking about all of them, but here's a small synopsis of sorts of two.

1. My dog and I had been kidnapped and were in the midst of some kind of strange interrogation situation. We weren't cooperating with revealing the information. My dog can't talk and I didn't know what to say. Our kidnapper/interrogator was growing impatient. He looked like a scrawny high school kid, but was pretty much terrifying anyway, due to his lack of compassion and twisted sadism. He threatened us with a torture that involved being force fed these hideous live bugs until we couldn't possibly consume any more, before moving on to the next torture. These insects were grotesque. They resembled large scorpions except the main thorax areas of their bodies were shaped more like those of extra-plump spiders. They were black with mottled white markings and very ominous indeed. By far, the worst part of the whole dream was me imagining poor Sockeye being force fed these awful creatures. As a dog, he wouldn't understand what was happening and most certainly would not eat them willingly, no matter what threats were flung at him--so his mouth would have to be yanked open and he'd be whimpering, shaking, and cowering, and it would just be a terribly disturbing scene. I'd offer to eat his bugs for him, but my offer would not be accepted, because the sadist would sense that it would be even more tortuous for me to watch my dog being tortured.

2. I wanted to buy a second dog, but not a "real" dog. I didn't think I could handle another real dog, so I had my heart set on this new hybrid creature that wasn't alive per se, but still exhibited certain traits of living creatures. For example, it made these little breathing sounds and motions, almost like some kind of pulsating. It looked kind of like a stuffed animal version of a black poodle fused with a rather bedraggled version of a real toy poodle, minus the fancy hair cut. Everyone else seemd to think I was weird, maybe even perverse for wanting this thing, but I wanted it all the same. Everyone else thought these hybrid creatures were creepy and ugly, but I found them adorable. I would name it Dagmar.

Then the scene changed and I didn't look like me anymore. I looked like some girl from the late 80s or early 90s, with long straight hairsprayed hair and acid-washed jeans. I was in some kind of holding room, maybe even inside a prison, and a burly male security guard started frisking me for contraband and weaponry, and he was being very rough and convoluted with his frisking process. I mean it was clearly obvious that I had a large knife strapped to my thigh inside a holster; I wasn't even trying to hide it; it was fastened to the outside of my jeans. So why didn't he just confiscate my knife and be done with it? No, something more insidious seemed to be afoot here. He saw my knife, but didn't seem to care about that.

He started getting even rougher with his frisking process and I think he was trying to teach me a lesson for wanting that perverted poodle-like creature. I started to struggle with him, even though he was brawny. He turned me around so my backside was facing him, forced my hands down onto a chair, and started tugging at my shirt. I thought he was going to rape me.

Instead, he pulled up my shirt, exposing my lower back, and then used a special device to pierce a hole into the flesh. A dog leash would be attached to the hole in my skin and I would have to walk my new fake dog using this leash that was attached to my own body. Although not very pleased about this procedure, it did cross my mind that at least it would have made for more convenient dog walking if he had pierced that hole in the front of my body rather than the back.

*

Update: The coding glitch has been fixed and you can now read my poem in Denver Syntax 18 (in case you couldn't before and still want to)--

http://www.denversyntax.com/issue18/poems/poems.html

I had another real/fake animal hybrid dream last night, but this one involved a small panda bear like creature, sliding down the stairs...

Also, just a little note that my new poetry chapbook manuscript, FONDANT PIG ANGST, is coming soon from Slash Pine Press (tentatively sleighted for this December, which is very festive indeed, eh?). I love this little article/update on the Slash Pine Press blog, which includes the statement, "Juliet puts the Slash in Slash Pine"! (P.S. The cover art is going to include a woman riding a giant pig!)

http://slashpinepress.blogspot.com/2009/10/into-basement.html

Yay! I'm a slasher!

ALSO, new reviews are up at Tarpaulin Sky Reviews, including mine of Michelle Detorie's really good dusie kollektiv 3 poetry chapbook, 'Ode to Industry':

http://tsky-reviews.blogspot.com/

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Update: Another little dilemma of production versus creation:

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/2281067/the_ac_twitter_challengemixed_feelings.html?cat=15

Virtual Book Tour wrap up/Blood Pudding Press update

The final review of Read Write Poem's Virtual Book Tour (of Lisa Ciccarello's poetry chapbook 'At night, the dead:' published by Blood Pudding Press) was contributed by Ren Powell, editor of Babel Fruit magazine.

Some excerpts from this review:

“Lisa Ciccarello’s chapbook is an example of why poetry books are important as works of art. That is, 'poetry book' distinct from 'book of poems'.

...as with any charm, the context of the repetitive whole is mesmerising.

The vague references to superstitious practices are never fully fleshed within a cultural context…

This vagueness allows for the ambivalence that characterizes the collection. The charm to ward off the dead becomes seductive, just as children are seduced by the fear of the Ouija board, just as pleasurable touching becomes painful within the context of insistent repetition, just as pain can become almost pleasurable. The dead are feared and longed for: ‘The dead put their fingers in your mouth’.

The sestina-like repetition in the collection creates a pleasing tension with this reader, as I want to speed through the increasingly familiar phrases, but am stopped short for close reading by the poet’s attention to detail and abbreviated metaphors…

Clearly Ciccarrello’s poems grow from their communion with the dead – the kind of growth that needs the space of chapbook.”

You may read this review in its entirety at the More Babel blog:

http://morebabel.blogspot.com/2009/09/book-tour-at-night-dead.html

You may read excerpts from all seven preceding reviews on this Virtual Book Tour (and more) consolidated over at the Blood Pudding Press blog (click the bloody telekinetic female to your right OR the link below):

http://www.bloodyooze.blogspot.com/

I would like to thank Read Write Poem for orchestrating this Virtual Book Tour, everyone who contributed a review, and also those who have been reading along!

If your interest has been piqued re: 'At night, the dead:' it is not too late to acquire your very own ribbon-bound, spider-stamped copy from the Blood Pudding Press etsy shop:

http://www.bloodpuddingpress.etsy.com/.

Coming next (hopefully soon) from Blood Pudding Press, a new poetry chapbook by Dana Guthrie Martin, after which your intrepid Blood Pudding Press editor (that would be me) will be taking a spell to focus on her participation within the dusie kollektiv 4!

During this time, feathered and flighty submissions will still be accepted for Thirteen Myna Birds on an ongoing basis.

XO. Juliet

P.S. #1--Did you read my exciting Slash Pine Press news?--
http://slashpinepress.blogspot.com/2009/09/slash-pines-first-two-authors.html

P.S. #2--Did you read my article about CutThroat Entertainment's new horror film on the Columbus Underground blog?--http://www.columbusunderground.com/break-a-horror-film-from-cutthroat-entertainment

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update:

Kathrin Schaeppi/ellectrique press offers up a wonderful feature on the dusie 3 kollektiv collaborative chapbook swap project:

http://www.ellectriquepress.com/home/Feature.html

Dusie 3 is ending and Dusie 4 is starting up, but Dusie 3 will still have a last hurrah when all the completed chapbooks are published as free-to-read PDFs by editrix extraordinaire, Susana Gardner. Stay tuned!

IS THERE PIG IN FROSTING?

I was having one of those slow, achey, icky days in terms of personal physicality and productivity (um, maybe that is pretty much just an overly wordy way to say I have one of my headaches), BUT I must make mention of some extra-special excitingly delightful news I have received. Er, actually, you can read the news for yourself on the Slash Pine Press blog:

http://www.slashpinepress.blogspot.com/

Just in case you don't feel like leaving my blog until after you've read this whole entry: the gist is that my chapbook manuscript FONDANT PIG ANGST is going to be published by Slash Pine Press, a new independent press that not only has a great name, but also a highly appealing mission statement, which includes the resonant phrase, "a process of risk and otherness".

And I am going to be the press's very first author!

I'm super-duper excited about this and will have more to say on this matter soon.

Not right now, because despite this superb news, I am pretty off-kilter today.

This news is almost unbelievably exciting though, right? I can hardly believe I've won a book contest type thingee! Pinch me! Woohoo!

P.S. Also, Dana Guthrie Martin's ROBOT has agreed to write a book blurb for me. Pinch me again! Woohoo!