ASK ROD

"in mustard fields maybe,
    or the love jungle,
and as we talked
we were with others, not ourselves."

The complete poem is entitled "Twenty-Five" and is from the book "Listen To The Warm" and on the CD of the book is called "The Coming Of The Rain." Rod.



SISTER CORITA

Hi Rod! I remember reading your poetry way back in 67 when I was in Seminary training. I need to know, didn't you do some collaborative work with Sister Corita Kent? And, was that in California? I faintly recall something like that. Pepe

Dear Pepe, Sister Corita and I had a wonderful time together. What a fun collaboration. And the very best thing about it is that we did it for ourselves. Nobody but the two of us ever saw any of the work we did together.. Rod



LOVE

Dear Rod, So many of your poems seem to be an exploration of the nature of love. Is this simply a fascination or favorite topic of yours, or is it a search for something that is/was lacking in your life/childhood? Or, perhaps, some other reason? Joanna, Trumansburg NY

Dear Joanna, It is true the sixty or so books I’ve written do seem a bit top heavy with love poetry, I’d hate to be psychoanalyzed as to why. Love, the reasons for it, nature of it and the various kinds of it fascinates me.

As a child I grew up away from home and did feel neglected. What schooling I had didn’t offer much chance of making friends, because I was never in one place long enough to get to know my schoolmates. I’ve spent most of my adult life as somewhat of a loner working and traveling. This brief, but I hope to the point, history paints me as somewhat of an outsider. And, I still feel that way.

I have no regrets and no complaints because the friends I have made have been, and are, wonderful. As for love, in whatever guise it came or comes, it has always been appreciated. I feel I’ve learned as much from the not so successful experience as those that have lasted.

I know this is a somewhat superficial explanation of a complex subject, but this is only a flight plan, not a life plan. Thanks, Rod



BIOGRAPHY

I would like to know if there is a biography of you available in book form? I am having trouble finding one. Maude.

Dear Maude, Thank heavens there isn’t, but thanks for asking..



YOU & ME JOHNNY: TWO OF A KIND, WARPED!

Got your email address from my friend Kim at Scram Magazine. Just had to drop you a line and tell you that you made one of my fav-o-rite records of all time. I'm referring, of course, to THE CELEBRITY TWIST. This song is nothing short of pure brilliance. Of course "The Mummy" is fantastic, and "Beat Generation" is nuthin' to sneeze at either. I don't have Beatsville, but do have RM Takes a San Francisco Hippie Trip (found a sealed copy in Memphis, Tenn.). Being a native San Franciscan, I appreciate all the local references. Hopefully I can find a pad on August Alley. Thanks for contributing the "Celebrity Twist" to this world - it's a better place for it. Johnny Bartlett

Dear Johnny, You are warped, but join the club! And, you may be the only human being who ever confessed to knowing about, let alone liking, The Celebrity Twist. Next you’ll tell me you know all the words to such early and crazy songs from my brief Rock career as I Dig Here Wig, The Beverly Hills Telephone Directory, Everything’s So Sheik It’s A Bore and The Dracula Cha, Cha, Cha. Or maybe Alexis Was Too Greek For Me, [a very, pardon the expression, tongue in cheek song which I wrote for Elsa Lanchester to sing.]

In all truth I’m delighted that you’re letting the readers of the flight plan know I’m not always as serious as I paint myself and am painted. One of the things I miss most about not doing regular concert tours is the humor I was able to bounce off audiences. It was fun to sing a dark and moody If You Go Away & follow it with The Love Song From Jaws or The Girl Who Got Stabbed At The Prom. I guess what delights me most about Kim’s rediscovery of Beatsville and the subsequent re-release of the album on CD is the chance to listen to it with slightly different ears.

If I don’t go back on the road soon, who but my closest friends will have heard I Left My Prozac In Pasadena, Blame It On The Baby Boomers, The Gerital Song [We’re Spending Our Honeymoon In Viagra Falls?]" or The AOL Chat Room Song (One In The Hand Is Worth None On The Web).

Loved your letter. Rod



History Strikes Again

Today is Friday the 13th so don’t walk under any ladders or step on any sidewalk cracks while carrying your black cat. On this day in 1862 Lewis Carroll began writing Alice In Wonderland, hoping to finish it by Christmas.

In 1900 Besse Loraine Bowles is the first woman to give birth to a chicken. Just checking to see if you’re still with me. In 1858 Gioacchino Antonio Rossini, the composer of The Barber of Seville, gets his final shave and painter Camille Pissarro cleans his last brush on this day in 1903. In 1914 a patent was granted to Mary Phelps Jacobs for the first bra. She fashioned it from two handkerchiefs.. Isn’t it meaningful that the Stanyan Archives reveal and remember such important days in history? In 1927 The Holland Tunnel beneath the Hudson River opens between New York City and Jersey City.

Today in 1940 Walt Disney’s classic film Fantasia opens. It is a dismal flop, with some critics considering it to be a sacrilege of the music of Bach, Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and The Bee Gees. Some even claim that the movie is an indication of the impending collapse of Western Civilization [Gee, that’s what they said about "Beatsville" forty years ago]. Only after repeated releases does the film attain popularity and critical acclaim. It’s About Time Dept: 1956 The Supreme Court rules that segregation on interstate buses is unconstitutional.

Have a whale of a weekend. 

                                                    - RM 11/11/98

PASSENGERS

It’s not so much that it is difficult
to love and not be loved, or even
                         that it holds no hope.
It is that the business of so doing
           is impractical and incomplete.
At best not being loved affords only
the luxury and latitude of self-pity.

This time
there is some evidence
that knowing you or starting to
has made me better in a known
            and in some unknown way.

Ah, but we are greedy men
those of us who come to rest
                                     at last
on what we feel to be
                          our final, real love.

Better will not do.
We always want the best.
A taste of you has left an ache,
an opening for all the rest.

Passengers we are
traveling these same tracks
carried along by the same ribbon
                          of boardwalk.
All journeys end
or so we are told they should.

The destination looms,
is nearly in our sights.
Can you see it, feel it ?

Come closer one more time
and see it through my eyes
or stand behind me, hold on tight
and feel it through my shoulders
or feel it while I’m holding you.

There on the beach
beyond the boardwalk
two people stand
          looking into nothing.
Can’t you see them ?
There behind the snow fence
             where the track ends
                            standing
                       staring
some distance from each other.

One is holding little shells
and sea smooth rocks
gathered from some unnamed ocean.
The other’s hands are cupped
and filled with chips of colored glass
retrieved from that same sea.

Side by side they’ve come
down the same much traveled beach.
And having journeyed for a time
          on the same train
each has loped or run
the distance necessary
to have learned all lessons
               worth the learning.

Now each is gone
beyond the boardwalk separately
                   not together
where something surely waits
and found that there was nothing.

                                - From "Beyond The Boardwalk", 1975