80. “…grandiloquent soliloquy, riot police.” On } Being Che.

I regret my inaction more often than my actions—tho, if I took action more often, the opposite might be true,—& thus, inaction.

At the Flim Forum table in the AWP book fair, Lori Anderson Moseman, Matthew Klane, and I hemmed & hawed about what to do to promote (Being) Che, Klane’s latest. My proposal: buy a Che poster at Newbury Comics and hang it up behind us. Not inspired. If I’d gone ahead and done, I’d’ve realized: not inspired, and would’ve gone across the street to Johnson Paint Co., bought a can of spray paint (gold? Maybe green?), some stencils, and sprayed “Being” across Che’s face. That’s better. Is that better?

So, Che is published, by Stockport Flats Press. Che is “Unquiet Youth,” “Being Che,” & “Making the New Man.” Find “Unquiet Youth” at Harp & Altar. From: “Spikenard // quince, oleander. / Kiss me on the mouth. / My jaw, / a sonnet of myrtle swoon. / My maw has no bottom.”

I know if I wrote about my ma like so, I’d be in trouble—but Klane cares not, he has cojones.

“Being Che,” of which an excerpt lives here, is a departure from Klane’s exploration of the square page toward “a series of radically left-justified spinal columns,” as he ironically describes the highly traditional appearance of this sequence. “pull the pin. // Here is hoping” Read the letters c, h, & e throughout. Being Chevrolet.

I’ll buy a copy when in Albany reading from The Problem of Boredom in Paradise for the Yes! series reading on Friday, April 26th. That is to say the Paul Hannigan selected I edited. Note that this Saturday’s Yes! event hosts Clark Coolidge. Me, I’ll see Coolidge in Hadley, the day before, when he’s still fresh. “Te amo, / dizzy pompoms…”