GARY PANTER BLOG

At Play in the Fields of the Lord- Peter Mathiessen

Far Tortuga- Peter Mathiessen

You Bright and Risen Angels-William T. Vollman

The Franchiser- Stanley Elkin

Bernhard-Yoel Hoffmann

The Last Voyage of Somebody the Sailor-John Barth

Not Fade Away-Jim Dodge

Little Lulu; April Fools-John Stanley and Irving Tripp

The Acme Novelty Library #19-Chris Ware

Rebels, Turn out Your Dead-Michael Drinkard

Comics Journal -Deitch issue

Herbie- Shane O’Shay and Ogden Whitney

Omege the Unknown-Jonathan Lethem

Schmoo- Al Capp

Espectacular de Lucha Libre-Lourdes Grobet

The Ganzfeld #7-Nadel, Jones

PowerMasters#2-CF

How Fiction Works-James Wood

Groovy Bob-Harriet Vyner

B.C.; Big Wheel-Johnny Hart

Grandpa’s Troll Stories-Art Stavig

Bob Zoell-Norman Hathaway

The Genius Bakabon- Fujio Akatsuka

Mike’s World- Michael Smith & Joshua White

I Can’t Believe a Girl Is Playing Me Metallica-Valerie Phillips

Spaced Out-Alistair Gordon

Guston-Robert Storr

No Wave-Thurston Moore & Byron Coley

The Killing Machine-Janet Cardiff & George Bures Miller

The Unfortunates-B.S. Johnson

Henry Darger’s Room-851 Webster

Wormdye- Eamon Espey

The Virtuoso- Thomas Shadwell

Double Down-Frederick & Steven Barthelme

Guston In Time- Ross Feld

The Acme Novelty Date Book; Volume Two-Chris Ware

Zaha Hadid- Hans Ulrich Obrist

Flying To America- Donald Barthelme

Monster Men BUREIKO- Takashi Nemoto

Lost In the Funhouse- John Barth

The Teachings of Don B.-Donald Barthelme

Illuminations-Walter Benjamin

Remainder- Tom McCarthy

Happy Hooligan-Frederick Opper

Mutt and Jeff- Bud Fisher

Collected Poems- Wallace Stevens

Odd Number- Gilbert Sorrentino

Layers- Keiichi Tanaami

Gilead- Marilynne Robinson

Peter Saul- Cameron, Duncan, Storr

Storeyville-Frank Santoro

The Origin of the Brunists-Robert Coover

I’m a fucking beaver, out here in the woods chewing down a fucking tree, is what’s happening. What do you think, smart ass?!

I saw you talking to the fish. Fuck fish! Fish think they are so fucking smart, but hey, fish are stone cold candy-assed fools. They have no fucking idea what goes on up and out and over and around here. Out in our woods of the clear air with the whispering elm and shaky maple or whatever the fuck; the bitter fir or sibilant martin; glowing lichen and wildcat pee-stained moss bank. No fuckin clue. A little jump out of the drink and what do they learn? Not much, sister! Something about a worm? Get out and walk around and learn something, Karl. Live a little! Carry something over a stump for as change. Spoiled brats! I have no sympathy for them. They don’t deserve— they deserve what ever they get.

Me, as I chew down a friggin tree, I am watching those tall pale motherfuckers grope and stumble about and all their shenanigans and hijinx and goings-on far away from their white meat hive. They are always up to something and it is not good! I hunch in the under-bush and observe piously. The Whatchacallums. I don’t know what they call em, but I am keeping a close eye, believe me, sailor. They are crunching around hooting and such—making hot spots and smelly areas, dis-infections, wire barriers and deafening reports— and corks. Kind of like Pepto Bismol colored or cocoa-flavored walking stick insects, but seven tails erect, some of them, cheap bastards in shabby threads and shecky Tees. Fleshy blabbing lemurs in stripes and dots or jaggered with canopies or jugends. Never for a minute quiet. Can’t shut up.

Last night in my sub-pond hidey hole, or beaver cave if you prefer, suit yourself, either way. I was shaking like a leaf, no shit. There was a BIG WHOPPING THUD right on my crap and I was freakin out, Inspector Fenwick. The twigs were heaving and shaking, rattling—I thought the whole mess would come loose, whisking me up some shit creek with a big fat functional fucking paddle, right? You with me? Sittin in splinters? But somehow! Gee whizz! Holey moley! Somehow my little soggy wet dripping love shack withstood whatever ever the fuck was going on out there. I didn’t dare look. Those fucking ass-holes—maybe Yogi or Bullwinkle J Moose or Wally Gator or some other dick, probably. Officer Ranger or some stupid fuck. Fucking around. Rattling on and on and on about something! Not minding their own damn business. Coming around here like mincing gaylords and tearing shit up in their propulsion units or dropping a royal pain in the loaf. Me, I chew a gas hose or starter connection now and then, I eagerly admit it. Slow up the snivelling shits, I say. Give em a kick. It’s only fair! They are fucking with my shit, right? Fuck, man! Boo hoo, right?

A gas hose is nothing. I can chew straight through a big honking log even! No problem! In no time flat. Like you would a carrot. But I’m not stuck up about it. How do i do it? You of all people should ask. Well, that’s for me to know and for you to miserably fail to find out. A trade secret. There is a technique and maybe a little show biz and deception involved, but I sincerely do gnaw my way through plank, heavy timber, branch or bough. There is a certain sincere angle that helps. I don’t try to analyze it, really. I knew since I was a little peckerwood that I had a gift, knack, talent, luck—a witching way with wood. Whatever you people call it. Board-feet. length-o-pine, pole, shim. peg. shilleleagh or switch!

Hooks nearby, with writhing half dead worms on them. I don’t know if worms can breathe underwater. Doubt it. These guys are mortally wounded—not happy. Oh yeah—that one’s a goner. Inert. Bobbing in the current. Fishfood.

I admit that they smell nice. Wormy. Like the mud in the ground at the bottom of the lake. Night crawlers are night-crawlers, because they love to crawl out of the wet grass at midnight and amble and tremble in the moonlight. Everything wonders what’s up there. Fish wonder. Worms, too. Up there in the Black and twinkly area up there. Around that area.

During the day night-crawlers lie under the lip of grass that demarcates the flower bed from lawn—to the earthworm a substantial braided canopy, a shield against the searing rays of the sun. How do I know this? I who have only leaped into the air for a momentary glimpse of what passes up there on the forced dry air? I tell you now that we have our sources and traditions— our ways of gathering and protecting the knowledge we amass from all realms over the long ages of vertebrate memory; our sacred notions and halls of learning, including encyclopedic gleanings concerning the airy ether and of certain information to do with the close packed earth to the depth of 4000 miles; our scroll-filled underwater lending libraries; our Davey Jones Locker, if you will.

Undersea, we have many suns apparent that dance and sing in the sky. One and many. Red and yellow and blue and green and pink and orange and purple, depending. Even under a fathom of emollient, we still seek the coolness of shadow—of docks, of boats, of reefs and jetties, underwater caverns and lagoons. Nice chilly spots. With speckles of heat light. A little variety is nice.

Which hook to bite? Better think it over. Every decision a path. Some say a crown and throne and glory is at the end of the line. Multitudes of mammalian and monotrematic life-forms bow and quake or kowtow there in the celestial throne room where each cod and mackeral waves a golden scepter with majesty and radiant glory. Well, really only reflecting the glory of the biggest whale on the biggest throne of all the heavens, that’s all!!!

What is dropping those worms impaled on cruel hooks into the briny brine? Are there giant worms with no consideration for tiny worms? Worms whose pain is too small to register on any sensitive instrument relative to the astounding bulk of their tormentors? I wonder what they taste like? Maybe like worms. Worms serving a greater cause, perhaps? Maybe a ritualistic effort conducted by believer worms. Perhaps the giant walking manatees or worms or whatever they are up there—and I sincerely do believe something is out there, are up to something or another. Otherwise: worms on hooks from no-where? I don’t think so. Worms on hooks come from somewhere. It may be a simple mechanical or natural process, like swamp gas, or it may involve intent. With all our knowledge of land-life, some very important parts of the conundrum seem to be missing. We fish are great observers and eager listeners, ready joiners, flockers, even, but lousy theoreticians. Metaphor, analogy, simile, rubric, parable and aphorism are only words to me. I am more comfortable with bubbles. Trails of bubbles heading somewhere. Bubbles going out there.

In heaven you get: A baloney sandwich with a slice of American cheese, a sheet of iceberg lettuce, mustard, and/or Miracle Whip, some Fritos or Ruffles on a paper plate, also home to a crowd of migrating pork ‘n beans buoying a white plastic fork. Also, a cold king-size Coke in a glass bottle, dripping picturesque rivulets.

There is a redwood picnic table on the grass with napkins and a jar of butter pickles. And a yard with a swingset to stand by. The sky is blue. There are three fluffy white clouds adrift. Birds are singing like crazy and occasionally zip by, quick as a wink, but they are not standing around in plain sight twittering or tweeting. There are no wires for them to loiter on.

The swing is too small for your ass, but it is really just for looks. It looks nice. There is a slight breeze, just a puff. Not much is happening. It’s almost time to sit on the freezer. More ass appropriate.

Later means cinnamon Pop Tarts with butter, blisteringly hot. Great Shakes and the Monkees or Jetsons, take your pick. That’s in the Den, also called the rumpus allusion.

Outside the yard is the horizon. There are some bare gray trees on it. They trace invisible forces with their limbs. But they are very tiny and far far away.

No insects—well, there are ants, but they are just quietly singing In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida waiting for a crumb. No problem.

There is a little league game, if you want to watch. The announcer is a real character. His warm voice booms to the treeline and back and all around. The little guys sure swing and shout and kick up a storm of dust.