09 Sep 12 Bay View Beach, Petoskey, Michigan

Bay View Beach, Little Traverse Bay, Petoskey, Michigan

August 30, 2012, shortly after finishing the entire 8th draft of The Parliament of Poets and the Summer Serialization, recovering and trying to clear out my head on the beach down in front of the historic Chautaugua Bay View Association and Terrace Inn, where I stayed.

Frederick Glaysher

Tags: Bay View Association, Epic, epic poetry, Frederick Glaysher, Michigan, Parliament of poets, Petosky, Poet, poetry, Terrace Inn

12 Aug 12 BOOK X Summer Serialization

BOOK X Summer Serialization

The Parliament of Poets: An Epic Poem, THE ARGUMENT:

“Passage from India. Passage to the Americas. Borges opens the door. Walt Whitman captains the Persona back from the “streams of the Indus and the Ganges,” “circumnavigation.” Pacific blue. Octavio Paz, a shape-shifting jaguar, and Teotihuacan, the Temple of the Moon. Neruda’s “The Heights of Machu Picchu.” Borges, through a mirror, on the pampas, Buenos Aires. Argentina’s “disappeared.” Under the Southern Cross, bitter juntas of the soul. Mirror moon draws in the Persona, onward to another continent.”

http://books.fglaysher.com/The-Parliament-of-Poets-An-Epic-Poem-Book-X-Book-X.htm 

Frederick Glaysher

Tags: Epic, epic poetry, Fatehpur Sikri, Frederick Glaysher, Octavio Paz, Pablo Neruda, Parliament of poets, Poet, poetry, Walt Whitman

05 Aug 12 BOOK VIII and IX Summer Serialization

BOOK VIII and IX Summer Serialization

BOOK VIII, THE ARGUMENT, online:

“Dante guides the Persona to Chartres Cathedral. Through the labyrinth, the Queen of Heaven. Europe, a hallowed tale, in colored glass. Erasmus returns to London, with the Persona, to outside Westminster Abbey. Browning’s poem “Christmas Eve” opens the door. Tennyson, a cordial reception and then a dressing down. The Federation of the World. Blake and Milton stroll over from St. Margaret’s Church. Milton guides the Persona to what Blake called, so rightly, “Englands green & pleasant land.” A simple parish church, surrounding graves, a church perhaps Thomas Hardy had restored, in need again of his services. A prayer. And the Lady of the Lake. Excalibur. Arthur returns. An inscription on the shining blade. Wainamoinen, along with Sigurd, Beowulf, and the Valkyries, lift the Persona from the Isle of green to a grove of green, turning toward early fall, as through a swirling tunnel of time, to a birch bench. Yasnaya Polyana. Tolstoy, along the path, discusses his beliefs, mourns his mistakes, grieves for Russia’s collapse into the crevasse. Two young poets swept away into the gulag emerge to carry the Persona from Russia, with Hadji Murad, heading south.”

http://books.fglaysher.com/The-Parliament-of-Poets-An-Epic-Poem-Book-VIII-Book-VIII.htm

BOOK IX, THE ARGUMENT:

“A house in Konya, Turkey, ancient Iconium, where St. Paul preached the Gospel. Around and around. Ethereal music and chanting. Another world. Rumi longing for the Beloved, the scent of her tresses, through fields of flowers to a riverbank of reeds. Attar and a soaring flock of birds fly the Persona, from the plain of Konya, that Valley of Search, to another plane, through Seven Valleys of the Soul, down into India and the plain of Agra. Leaving the Persona in Emperor Akbar’s city of Fatehpur Sikri, before the Ibadat Khana, the House of Worship, on the Pachisi Courtyard. Akbar’s court poet Faizi receives the Persona, along with many poet mystics and Sufis of India. Persuaded by Tagore, given the trials of the time, Rahman Baba, an Afghan Pashtun, comes down from his mountain village to confer with the Poet of the Moon. Evoking the majesty of human history, Lord Alfred Tennyson extols Akbar’s dream. The many oceans mingle. The dancing girls on the Pachisi Courtyard.”

http://books.fglaysher.com/The-Parliament-of-Poets-An-Epic-Poem-Book-IX-Book-IX.htm 

Frederick Glaysher

Tags: Attar, Dante, Epic, epic poetry, Erasmus, Fatehpur Sikri, John Milton, Parliament of poets, Poet, poetry, Rumi

22 Jul 12 BOOK VII Summer Serialization

Online, BOOK VII, THE ARGUMENT:

“Rising from zazen on the lunar platform, the Persona speaks with Job on an ash heap of moon dust. The Hebrew poets of Andalusia widen the perspective, with Hanagid directing Yehuda Halevi to guide him below to Mt. Carmel and Elijah’s slaughter of the prophets of Baal. Dante lifts the Persona from that scene of horror, flying up the boot of Italy, into Europe.”

“Through dark matter, through dark energy,
Saigyo guided me by satori’s brilliant light,
far beyond the Earth, supernal space…”

http://books.fglaysher.com/The-Parliament-of-Poets-An-Epic-Poem-Book-VII-Book-VII.htm

Frederick Glaysher

Tags: Andalusia, Boot of Italy, Epic, epic poetry, Hebrew poets, Job, Mt. Carmel, Parliament of poets, poetry, Prophets of Baal, Zazen

19 Jul 12 Poets on the Moon!

Tags: Apollo 11, ebooks, Epic, epic poetry, Frederick Glaysher, landing, man on moon, moon, Parliament of poets, Poet

15 Jul 12 Book VI Summer Serialization

Book VI of The Parliament of Poets: An Epic Poem, now available:

BOOK VI, THE ARGUMENT:

“After an arduous journey from Bagan, Burma, up over Lhasa, Tibet to Dunhuang, China, Sun Wukong, the Persona’s able guide, having traveled a different route with Xuanzang, sets down before the Mogao Caves. From there, Sun Wukong takes the Persona to Chang-an, where Du Fu leads him up the many stairs of the Big Wild Goose Pagoda. Bai Juyi lifts him up to Mt. Tai and the Azure Clouds, imbibing the beverage of the Three Vinegar Drinkers, savoring its harmonizing nature. Heading east, into the rising sun, past the Kingdom of Silla, ancient name of Korea, to the mountains of Lake Biwa, where Basho and Saigyo rested from their long journeys. Like much of Japan, the view of the lake has changed since Basho was interred at the Temple of Gichu-ji on its southern shore. Basho teaches the Persona the oneness of his vision, a Vinegar Drinker in his own way. Saigyo lifts the Persona back to his great metaphor, the moon.”

“In pre-dawn darkness I awoke, realizing
where I was, slipping away under the grove
to the riverside, leaving Sun Wukong
who seemed asleep in a tree above me…”

http://books.fglaysher.com/The-Parliament-of-Poets-An-Epic-Poem-Book-VI-Book-VI.htm

For further pictures of the Mogao Caves, see the ones I took in 1994: Mogao Caves, Dunhuang, China 

Frederick Glaysher

Tags: Bai Juyi, Du Fu, Dunhuang, Epic, epic poetry, Frederick Glaysher, Mogao Caves, Parliament of poets, Poet, poetry, Sun Wukong