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      • LEAVING PATACARA
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      • PSALM '66 – SUMMER '63
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      • Trane Ascending
      • There Is Something About Being An Episcopalian
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      • A Mockingbird's Song
      • There Are Times
      • Sandburg & Monroe (The Visit 1961)
      • Whenever You Watch Me
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      • Park Avenue
      • Storm Shadow
      • Śūnyatā - Emptiness is Form; Form is Emptiness
  • Poetry–In–Film
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  • Press Releases I
    • Bring Your Nights With You
    • Press Release - The Patron Saint of Cauliflower
    • Press Release - AMULET
    • Press Release – Deep Pockets
    • Nightbloom and Cenote
    • Dreamland Trash II
    • The Book of Trees – Press Release
    • PENIEL – Press Release
    • Press Release - Bearing the Cast
    • Press Release – NOW
    • Press Release - Hunger for Salt
    • Press Release – EROS
    • Press Release - DHARMA RAIN
    • Bird Light Press Release
    • Press Release - There is Something About Being and Episcopalian
    • Press Release - When Angels Are Born >
      • Recordings from When Angels Are Born
    • Press Release Savor Eternity by Fred LaMotte
    • Press Release - COAT THIEF by Jeffrey Davis
    • Press Release - FUEGO by LESLIE CONTRERAS SCHWARTZ
    • Press Release - Windward by Kevin McGrath
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    • Press Release - I Ate the Cosmos for Breakfast
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    • Press Release - Variations on a Theme of Desire
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    • GIVING GODHEAD
    • YOGA MASS
    • NOW
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    • BEYOND ELSEWHERE
    • Dreaming My Animal Selves
    • Tiferet Talk Interviews
    • Six Weeks to Yehidah
    • sometimes you sense the difference
  • Guest Authors I
    • William Miller >
      • Maha ‘ulepu Arch
      • Made In China
      • Reading Cheese
    • Amy Barone
    • Peter Shefler >
      • The Japanese Red Maple I - The Seed
      • The Japanese Red Maple II - Fallen In The Frost
      • The Japanese Red Maple III - Seeking Shelter
    • Lois P. Jones and Peter Shefler
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      • Alas
      • Take a Deep Breath
      • With God in the Morning
    • A Review - "Y" by Leslie Adrienne Miller
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    • RJ Jeffreys - Down To The Sea - Alone
    • Donna Baier Stein - The Yellow Brick Road
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      • Zero Gravity
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      • Defibrillation
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      • Song
      • Airborne
      • Heaven Laughed
      • Contemplation of the Sea
      • Germinate
      • Intonation
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      • Ten
      • Lo
      • The Maze
    • Susan Rogers >
      • The Origin is One
      • Kuan Yin
      • Awakening
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      • veils of Persephone definitions of Demeter mysteries of Orpheus
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      • Fisher of the Nile
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      • Spent Energy
      • Surrender
      • No Restrictions
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      • The Walk That Spoke
      • Your Existence
      • Your Name
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    • Erica Lehrer >
      • Alchemy At Eight O'Clock
      • The Rio Frio
      • 1558.4
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      • Our Feelings Are Like a House
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      • Falling into Pieces
      • Window and Mirror
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      • Four Preludes on Playthings of the Wind
      • TO A CONTEMPORARY BUNKSHOOTER
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    • Langston Hughes - Poetry for Black History Month
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    • Jesus: The Way That is Open to Other Ways by theologian Paul F. Knitter
    • Paul F. Knitter - Short Essay
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    • Event - Feb. 27, 2016
    • December 5th ~ A Midwinter Tale
    • Hélène Cardona & John FitzGerald - Recording from October 5, 2013
  • In My Father's House Are Many Mansions
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    • Ken Jones
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3/29/2018

On the Third Morning

ON THE THIRD MORNING


Picture


On the Third Morning
​
John 20: 1-18 and Luke 24:1-12
 
On the third morning
The women came first,
Somehow knowing in their wisdom
As women often do!
Anxious with sorrow,
Walking in the stillness of night
Just before dawn
And the movement of day.
 
They came,
Looking for their Lord.
Where they found the stone turned,
Rolled from His tomb.
Their Lord’s body gone,
Taken away!
 
Two disciples came later, to learn
That this was more than an “idle tale,”
Of women, unbelieved.
When entering the tomb, they too saw
 
The linens that once wrapped His body,
Lying where he was laid. Then
Returned home in amazement,
Not recalling the scriptures
Or the words of Jesus,
Even the one whom he most loved.
 
While Mary stayed, weeping outside, to
See angels sitting in the tomb
Where once her Lord’s body lay.
Jesus speaks, calling Mary by name after asking;
“Woman, why do you weep?
 
Whom do you seek?
The living are not
Among the dead.”
She sees him now, Rabbouni, her teacher,
Moving to embrace him, at last knowing his face and voice.
He says; “Hold me not, for I must ascend to my Father.
Go, and tell my brothers, what you have seen and heard.”
 
He has Risen, He has Risen!
He has risen from the places of the dead and dying,
He has risen from the solitude of the tomb.
He has Risen, to his Father and our Father.
He has Risen, to his God and our God.
Hallelujah, Christ is Risen!
 
Let us rise as well, above the noises and distractions of life
to understand that God calls us too to death and resurrection.
Calling us to die immeasurable times;
To die daily in ourselves.
 
Let there be a death to our egos and selfishness,
A death to our poverty of spirit and faithlessness,
A death to doubt, hopelessness, and sorrow,
A death to grief where grief can no longer be borne,
A death to intolerance and “the wish to kill,”
A death to violence and war, and fearful hearts,
A death to abused and unloved hearts.
 
Let there be a death to it all!
Let the illusion and suffering of life be washed away
by the Passion of Christ, creating in us the mind of Christ!
 
So that we me may join with Him
In many Resurrections,
Let there be Resurrections upon Resurrections
One after another and another,
let there be resurrections without end.


Ron Starbuck (C) 2016 from There Is Something About Being An Episcopalian.

​He, Qi. Empty Tomb, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. http://diglib.library.vanderbilt.edu/act-imagelink.pl?RC=46107 [retrieved March 26, 2016]. Original source: heqigallery.com.


12/25/2017

A WHITE COLT'S TALE


A  WHITE  COLT'S  TALE

A Short Story Written by Ron Starbuck

A White Colt's Tale – A new Poetry-In-Film production from Saint Julian Press.
PictureTrinity Episcopal Church Midtown Houston
There is always a story within a story, a tale within a tale. This is one of the myths told by the angels and archangels that watched over the Nativity the first night of Christmas.

A myth is a fairy tale that is truer than true, it is a story that grows stronger and stronger inside your heart as you mature in faith. A myth is a legend that inspires us. It offers us a lesson in wisdom, as well as an inward change that brings our souls closer to God and creation.  In truth, it is a story we know in our soul, one we have known forever and forgotten.

On the same night, the Baby Jesus was born; a pure white colt was also born.  The Holy Family gave him the Spanish name of Manuelo. This is Manuelo’s story, and the story of Jesus too.  Jesus, whom the Prophets of Israel once told us, we would call Emmanuel, is God’s gift of love to save the world.

This is still true even today, especially today, now in this moment. It is true yesterday too, as it will always be true tomorrow. And in all the yesterdays and tomorrows, we may try to imagine in a world without end.

Emmanuel means “God with us,” and in Spanish so does the name Maunelo.  So, Jesus and Manuelo, share a similar name with one another. Do you remember these words from an Advent hymn we sing every year, VENI EMMANUEL?

O come, O come, Emmanuel,
and ransom captive Israel,
that mourns in lonely exile here
until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice!
Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.

As God’s special gift to the Baby Jesus, Manuelo was so happy to become his friend. You see, it was Manuelo’s mother Isidora. Who wisely and humbly carried Mary from Nazareth to Bethlehem. Where Mary gave birth to the Baby Jesus. 

Isidora’s name means a gift of God in Spanish. The angels and archangels will tell you, that Isidora and Mary knew each other when Mary was first born. Manuelo and Jesus thought of this as God’s magical circle of love. Do you believe in the magic of God’s love?

When the three wise men, who traveled from the East, came with their gifts of gold and frankincense and myrrh. They looked at Manuelo and Jesus and knew they would become best friends. Manuelo and Jesus were so happy to be with one another as extraordinary friends.

Manuelo and Jesus played with one other, ate with one another, and prayed with and for one another. Sometimes, they even fell asleep together like two innocent lambs.  When Jesus as a young child started to school. Manuelo carried him from home to the schoolyard and back again.

PictureTrinity Episcopal Church Midtown Houston
Every year at the feast of Passover, the family journeyed to Jerusalem to visit the Jewish Temple. On their journey, Manuelo carried Jesus across the Roman roads of Israel and through the ancient stone streets to the temple. Which is where Jesus entered our heavenly Father’s house to learn and pray.

In the Jewish Temple, Jesus sat among the teachers, listening and asking them questions. They were all amazed at his inborn knowledge and understanding. Manuelo watched and listened as well, and saw how Jesus grew in wisdom and stature.

Many years later, after Jesus was baptized in the Jordon River. When led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness for forty days. Manuelo was there beside him, helping Jesus to make the journey. 

Manuelo was there through all the years that Jesus lived. As Jesus ministered to the poor, healed the sick, visited people in prison, and loved everyone who was heartbroken or in pain.

Whenever Manuelo traveled with Jesus he told all the other animals they met about who Jesus was, and how he loved them. He explained to all who would listen how our father in heaven sent his only-begotten son into the world to save the whole world.

Everywhere they went together, children gathered, drawn towards Jesus, who loved them so dearly.  And towards Manuelo as well, who they hugged and petted and felt a special love for, as Manuelo loved them all.

“So we know and believe the love God has for us. God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.” ~ 1 John 4:16



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When Jesus entered Jerusalem on what we now celebrate as Palm Sunday. Manuelo holding his head high, carried him into the city. They were together before and after the Last Supper. When Jesus prayed all night in the Garden of Gethsemane, Manuelo prayed with him too. And on the darkest day of their lives, Manuelo was with Jesus. As Jesus beaten and crucified on a cross, committed his spirit unto to our heavenly father and died.  

When the Roman soldiers finally took Jesus down from the cross. Manuelo helped Joseph of Arimathea, and carried Jesus one last time to his tomb. As any child can imagine, this was an extremely sad time for Manuelo, for he loved his friend Jesus so very much. And with every step Manuelo took, tears streamed from his sad eyes and fell to ground.

And yet, Manuelo knew in some mysterious way. As our animal friends often know things we do not, that this was a part of God’s plan to save the world.  For as each teardrop touched the ground. Where Manuelo’s hooves had carefully stepped, something wonderful happened. Each single tear turned into a beautiful priceless pearl. Which is a symbol of God’s love for the whole world and the people in the world. 

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” ~ John 3:16

It is almost as if Jesus shared a secret with Manuelo. Telling him that he shouldn’t be afraid and that they would see one another again soon. So, even though this was a time of great sadness for Manuelo, all his sorrow was balanced out by a great sense of joy. For Manuelo knew then, as he knows now that Jesus will always be with us. Even unto eternity and across all creation. 

Jesus lives within us each and is with us ever now. The Holy Spirit dwells within us, praying in and with and through us. Especially, when we don’t always know how to pray on our own.

As for Manuelo, his story continues up until today. He travels across all creation, always as an angel of light, telling his tale to all the animals and children he meets. You may see him appear sometimes as a Unicorn, a symbol of Christ. Jesus is forever a part of Manuelo, just like Jesus is forever a part of you too.

“Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.”

 "God is a Spirit and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth."

“That very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”

"That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us.”


Many Blessings ~ Ron Starbuck.




A White Colt’s Tale: A Children’s Christmas & Easter Story 

Copyright 2016 ~ Ron Starbuck & Saint Julian Press 
© 2016

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Trinity Episcopal Church Midtown Houston - Impressionistic Art

Audio Recording


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Trinity Episcopal Church Midtown Houston - Impressionistic Art from the Stained Glass Windows in the Sanctuary.

Trinity Episcopal Church Midtown Houston Facebook Page

Trinity Episcopal Church Website

Music is Available on Amazon & Apple iTunes

Music on iTunes
Title:  In the Bleak Midwinter
Album:  Mystic Christmas

Artists: Mystic Harmony
Year Recorded:  2008
Genre: World

Original Release Date: December 10, 2008
Release Date: January 13, 2009
Label: Mister Carmody Productions, Llc
Copyright: (C) 2008 Mister Carmody Productions, Llc

Categories

All Anglican Anglican Communion Books Buddhism Christianity Christmas Easter Episcopalian Ghost Story Interbeing Interconnections Interfaith Dialogue Jesus John Cobb Literature Mystery Nativity Paul F. Knitter Paul Knitter Poems Poetry Theology Thich Nhat Hanh Vietnam War

12/17/2017

A Poet & An Episcopalian Speaks of Mystery

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A POET & AN EPISCOPALIAN SPEAKS OF MYSTERY
Ron Starbuck – Saint Julian Press – ©  December 17, 2017

Of the Father's Heart Begotten
 
Every poet and writer I know has a story to tell, and tells his or her story through the formation of a personal mythology. As we travel through life, our life changes.  Our identity shifts, our sense of who we are as a person, turns with the seasons of events and people who enter into that life. 
 
This is the impermanence of the self, which Buddhist philosophy teaches. It is a vital theme and awareness at work throughout and within the whole concept of Pratītyasamutpāda – Dependent Arising. Being – Becoming – Existence: The infinite possibilities of all things held within creation.

"If this exists, that exists; if this ceases to exist, that also ceases to exist."

 
Buddhism directs us toward the concept of Śūnyatā–Nirvana–Emptiness–Openness, celebrated in the Heart Sutra. The impermanence of emptiness teaches us that our sense of self as being permanent is false. The self, whom we actively identify with, is empty of such permanence. Buddhism refers to this false self as not–self, or no–self, anattā (uhn-uht-tah). It is an ego clinging self, leading to suffering, misperceptions, and deceitful projections.
 
In the Christian tradition, there is a similar concept, kenosis, the Greek word for emptiness. Kenosis is ‘self–emptying’ one’s own will in becoming receptive to the divine, to be in unity and union with the divine. Christ emptied himself to become a servant of all humankind.  ​

       
       
Of the Father's Heart Begotten
        Divinum Mysterium – 
Aurelius Prudentius

       He assumed this mortal body,
       Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
       That the race from dust created,
       Might not perish utterly,
       Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
       In the depths of hell to lie,
       Evermore and evermore.

 

Both heaven and nirvana are alike when we understand them as a spiritual path towards non-duality, to this union with the divine ultimate mystery out of which all things arise.

In writing a poem, the poet goes through multiple stages and feelings, crafting their words together, until the poem itself comes to its end.  As any poet knows, the poem is never quite finished.  It is almost always incomplete in some sense.  The poet simply has to let go of it and trust that the creative process goes on within the people who may read their humble efforts.
 
I offer this thought in a spirit of humility.  All our works as poets and writers are a continuation of other works that came before us, the voices of humanity that have been passed down from one generation to another.
 
We are simple gatherers who have gathered from those poets, writers, and storytellers that came before us. Even the greatest among us have been inspired through learning and reading the literary works of humankind.  And we, we humble few, are following in their footsteps.  There is something more going on of course.
 
Each poem, in and of itself, begins in silence, in stillness, in emptiness, in an open place waiting to be filled, on a blank page, or as an even deeper divine memory perhaps.  And we, we are full participants in its creation.  There is I think a deeper mystery at work here, an inspiration.  To be creatively inspired, is to be filled by the spirit of something more, something beyond the mundane and ourselves.
 
Please let me share with you with this thought.  As much as any poem, you write, is your own work, it is also not your work.  You have been inspired. You have heard the whispering of the gods, of God or the muses of antiquity.  And now you are modestly returning to humankind the voices spoken before in a newer voice.
 
There are perhaps no accidents in life, merely a continuation of one life into and with another, in a continuation of consciousness grounded in the divine. Grounded in the great mystery of creation, we cannot quite name, written within us.  The Holy Spirit perhaps praying in and with and through us, when we know not how to prayer ourselves.
 
The words, you speak or write, are not your own; they have been fashioned before. They abide and rest in a universal divine consciousness and spirit that dwell within us each. They were written upon your soul, deep within your spirit, on your heart, and in your mind long ago.
 
And now, now you have been inspired to return them to humankind, in a healing for humankind.  The poet within you has heeded deeply the stillness and silence of creation. Out of such a listening comes a word, a verse, a poem. Each poem is composed as an act of creation, a loving act of giving, an act of healing and repairing the world.
 
Let me leave you please with these opening words from the Gospel of John, with an understanding that they too are a poetic metaphor and a symbol pointing us towards a deeper mystery in which we reside and that dwells within us.
 
“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” – (NIV)

You too are this light.


And then there is this great Christmas Carol that touches on the Mystery of Christ.  

Why indeed did God come in human form to serve humankind with an open and 
humble heart, to empty himself?  

This is one answer, given in the mystical language and poetry of the Anglican – Spiritual tradition.


Of the Father's Heart Begotten alternatively known as Of the Father's Love Begotten is a Christmas carol based on the Latin poem Corde natus by the Roman poet Aurelius Prudentius.

Of the Father's Heart Begotten
~ Divinum Mysterium ~

Translation by Roby Furley Davis​
 
Of the Father's heart begotten,
Ere the world from chaos rose,
He is Alpha, from that Fountain
All that is and hath been flows;
He is Omega, of all things,
Yet to come the mystic Close,
Evermore and evermore.

By His Word was all created

He commanded and 'twas done;
Earth and sky and boundless ocean,
Universe of three in one,
All that sees the moon's soft radiance,
All that breathes beneath the sun,
Evermore and evermore. 

He assumed this mortal body,
Frail and feeble, doomed to die,
That the race from dust created,
Might not perish utterly,
Which the dreadful Law had sentenced
In the depths of hell to lie,
Evermore and evermore.

O how blest that wondrous birthday,
When the Maid the curse retrieved,
Brought to birth mankind's salvation
By the Holy Ghost conceived,
And the Babe, the world's Redeemer
In her loving arms received,
Evermore and evermore.

Sing, ye heights of heaven, his praises;
Angels and Archangels, sing!
Wheresoe’er ye be, ye faithful,
Let your joyous anthems ring,
Every tongue his name confessing,
Countless voices answering,
Evermore and evermore.

This is He, whom seer and sibyl
Sang in ages long gone by,;
This is He of old revealed
In the page of prophecy;
Lo! He comes the promised Saviour;
Let the world his praises cry!
Evermore and evermore.

Hail! Thou Judge of souls departed;

Hail! of all the living King!
On the Father's right hand throned,
Through his courts thy praises ring,
Till at last for all offences
Righteous judgement thou shalt bring,
Evermore and evermore.

Now let old and young uniting
Chant to thee harmonious lays
Maid and matron hymn Thy glory,
Infant lips their anthem raise,
Boys and girls together singing
With pure heart their song of praise,
Evermore and evermore.

Let the storm and summer sunshine,
Gliding stream and sounding shore,
Sea and forest, frost and zephyr,
Day and night their Lord alone;
Let creation join to laud thee
Through the ages evermore,
Evermore and evermore.


Of the Father's Heart Begotten - Wellington School Chapel Choir

12/16/2017

T.S. Eliot ~ East Coker ~ from the Third Movement & Sleepers Awaken

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Marc Chagall’s – Passover Angel of Death, from Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN.



T.S. ELIOT ~ THE FOUR QUARTETS


​EAST COKER ~ THIRD MOVEMENT

&
​
​SLEEPERS AWAKEN
​


EAST COKER ~ THIRD MOVEMENT

I said to my soul, be still, and let the dark come upon you

Which shall be the darkness of God. As, in a theatre,
The lights are extinguished, for the scene to be changed
With a hollow rumble of wings, with a movement of darkness on darkness,
And we know that the hills and the trees, the distant panorama
And the bold imposing facade are all being rolled away–
Or as, when an underground train, in the tube, stops too long between stations
And the conversation rises and slowly fades into silence
And you see behind every face the mental emptiness deepen
Leaving only the growing terror of nothing to think about;
Or when, under ether, the mind is conscious but conscious of nothing–
I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love,
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.

Burnt Norton

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is,
But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards,
Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point,
There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.



Musical Background ~ 
The Essential Yo-Yo Ma ~ Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme (Sleepers Awake).  Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, Ton Koopman & Yo-Yo Ma
Year:  2004

12/15/2017

DREAMLAND TRASH BY DYLAN KRIEGER

Houston: Press Release

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​dreamland
trash



​by

​
Dylan Krieger

from

​Saint Julian Press

Houston: Press Release - For immediate release December 15, 2017. Saint Julian Press proudly presents a new collection of poems by Dylan Krieger, which will be available on February 2, 2018 through fine book distributors and retailers. 

Praise for dreamland trash 

This is the opposite of a sophomore slump. Like the latest subatomic experiments in above-the-speed-of-light velocity, for a fraction of a second, when the same particle is in two places at the same time, Dylan Krieger will be there and elsewhere. As if Giving Godhead weren't good enough, suddenly she hits out past light-years of stratospheres and reproductive insanities of biology back to the “invertebrate mother” and the lunacy of a planet organized largely around humanoid self-destruction. The scale becomes both precise and enormous, echoes of things heard as if through water in a glass. You will have to think about the sound of it all for a few days, it is both so familiar and so volatile. dreamland trash is one of the most perfect IED’s ever made.
​

Thomas Simmons – NOW


“Holding whole generations up at sexpoint,” dreamland trash is ingenious, witty, and electric. We are just as likely to wake up next to a moaning unicorn as we are to be abducted by deranged YouTube automatic captions. It’s in this derangement that we begin to see the late-capitalist world inside out and upside down, for its cheap thrills and absolute devaluation of the self. Abandon and alienation are rendered in a linguistically dense, gothic style, deeply aware of the “day-glo chokehold” we are all in.

Sandra Simonds – Further Problems with Pleasure, Steal It Back


​Dylan Krieger is a transistor radio picking up alien frequencies in south Louisiana, where she earned her MFA from LSU and now sunlights as a trade magazine editor. Her debut poetry collection, Giving Godhead (Delete Press, 2017), won LSU’s 2015 Robert Penn Warren Award and was dubbed “the best collection of poetry to appear in English in 2017” by the New York Times Book Review. She is also the author of no ledge left to love (Ping Pong Free Press, forthcoming) and an autobiographical meditation on the Church of Euthanasia called The Mother Wart. Find her at www.dylankrieger.com.
Available through ~ IndieBound ~ Ingram Content Group ~ Amazon ~ Barnes & Noble ~ Fine Book Distributors & Retailers
dreamland trash by Dylan Krieger *  ISBN-13: 978-0-9986404-4-0  *  ISBN: 0-9986404-4-1
Saint Julian Press, Inc. * 2053 Cortlandt, Suite 200 * Houston, TX 77008  * Ron Starbuck ~ Publisher-CEO
Phone: 281-734-8721 * Email: ronstarbuck@saintjulianpress.com * www.saintjulianpress.com

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    Ron Starbuck is an author, poet, the Publisher-CEO of Saint Julian Press, and an Episcopalian with certain  Buddhist leanings who values comparative literature and literary dialogues in many forms.

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