#George Bilgere

[dabiconcordia]

How I Met Your Mother

I saw her at a party, walked up and said, I wonder if you would mind getting married, buying a house, enduring the agony of childbirth a couple of times, watching a lot of Netflix together, dining out (I'm thinking, specifically, of the osso buco at Rugerri's), getting a dog, negotiating mortgages, and finally sitting by me in those last days, arranging the funeral, tidying up, then starting your strange new life, the one without me. Is that too much to ask? And she sipped her mojito and said, what are we waiting for? by George Bilgere

[fatterpussycat-kill-kill]

Poem by George Bilgere

[soulmaking]

[nsantand]

George Bilgere – Tudo bem

Eu me sento aqui na calçada da cafeteria, / emitindo a doentia fumaça amarela da decomposição / enquanto as pessoas passam fingindo / não notar, olhando para longe / ou para os seus telefones, (...) George Bilgere – Tudo bem

Eu me sento aqui na calçada da cafeteria,emitindo a doentia fumaça amarela da senescênciaenquanto as pessoas passam fingindonão notar, olhando para longeou para os seus telefones,fazendo o melhor por cortesia ou comoçãopara me ignorar sentado aqui envelhecendo,e eu não os culpo, é mesmo difícil de assistir. E agora a garçonete em sua beleza abrasadora,em sua feminilidade incandescente e…

[victusinveritas]

Once again, George Bilgere delivers something perfect... As for why he chose this one, he says simply, "A poem for our times."

I can't figure out how to share his substack, but if you go to his website, there is a place to sign up at the bottom for his newsletter.

[finishinglinepress]

FLP BOOK OF THE DAY: Rare Fuel by Rex Wilder “WINNER OF THE 2023 The Donna Wolf-Palacio Poetry Prize”

On SALE now! Pre-order Price Guarantee: https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/rare-fuel-by-rex-wilder-winner-of-the-2023-the-donna-wolf-palacio-poetry-prize/

In Rare Fuel, Rex Wilder’s fourth book, #winner of the Finishing Line Press Donna Wolf-Palacio #Poetry Prize, the author is “the Virgil who guides us through the underworld of his own personal hell” (George Bilgere), “his time as an inpatient in a mental health facility, alongside the kindness, the weirdness, the characters and the discoveries he made there. You can place it alongside the language’s other great verse chronicles of madness: Christopher Smart, say, or Ivor Gurney” (Stephanie Burt). The book resonates with the wisdom of a man “deeply invested in the mortal world,” as A.E. Stallings once highlighted. The poems ring with “the exhilaration of freedom from the chains of confinement” (Grace Schulman). Rex Wilder does not merely return to form here; he transcends it, offering readers a rare and vibrant fuel to illuminate their darkest nights.

PRAISE FOR Rare Fuel by Rex Wilder “WINNER OF THE 2023 The Donna Wolf-Palacio Poetry Prize”

Technically deft and emotionally intelligent, devoted to clarity and never simple, open to all and yet resistant to normies, worldly and otherworldly, “off leash at last,” Wilder’s fourth collection holds together around its memorable topic: the poet’s time as an inpatient in a mental health facility, alongside the kindness, the weirdness, the characters and the discoveries he made there. You can place it alongside the language’s other great verse chronicles of madness: Christopher Smart, say, or Ivor Gurney. You can also place it, easily, in the company of poets known for a fine ear: half-rhyming “tell” with “economical,” say, and finding the assonance between “ashore” and “love” amid the “standoffish deeps. Also, “grave” and “grieve” and the sand in a sieve. Don’t let this one slip through your living hands.

–Stephanie Burt (she/her) Donald and Catherine Loker Professor of English, Harvard University, poet, and “one of the most influential poetry critics of her generation” (New York Times)

In Rare Fuel, Rex Wilder is the Virgil who guides us through the underworld of his own personal hell, a mental breakdown that nearly killed him. With utter candor, Wilder describes his remarkable, harrowing journey from the brink of self-annihilation and back to this lovely world, and what I admire most about these poems is that he finds a way to give language to the unsayable. How do you describe the mind unmoored, the soul deranged? Wilder finds words for this, in a collection that will leave you shaken—but nonetheless full of hope. A beautiful book.

–George Bilgere, Poet Laureate Billy Collins’ “welcome breath of fresh, American air” and Distinguished Professor of English at John Carroll University

Rex Wilder makes words unveil feelings, and his poems are new and surprising while hewing to traditional forms. He writes about serious mental illness with sly wit, unfolding meaning, and unsentimental pathos. This collection is generous and universal—embracing the world with all its trials and triumphs and grounding us in memory, recollection, and joy; as he writes in “Recipe,” “It will get dark with or without us / but without us, I won’t care.”

–Katherine Howell, Literary Editor, National Review

In Rex Wilder‘s poems, his “traumatized heart” beats with troubled and tenacious language. Excruciating experiences toward self-worth and sanity keep the reader rapt, awaiting an uneasy affirmation of “peaceable suspense.” These are honest poems of perseverance, seeking clarity and calm while his cri de coeur persists.

–Susan Kinsolving, winner of the Poetry Society of America’s Lyric Poetry Award and finalist for The National Book Critics Circle Award

Honestly, as a psychiatrist and a human, I would read anything Rex Wilder writes. In these penetrating, intimate poems, the author courageously chronicles a dark night of the soul depression, his inpatient stay in a psychiatric facility, and breathtaking emergence into the light. I applaud Rex as a powerful role model for others on similar journeys as they grow in ways that will uplift their souls. Highly recommended.

–Judith Orloff, MD and New York Times bestselling author of The Genius of Empathy

In Rare Fuel, by Rex Wilder, a severe illness leads to reparation, even wholeness, in language that is fresh and lyrical, and in an original use of classical forms. After recovery, the poet gains wisdom and shares it with us all. There’s a new music in many of his lines: “every song / begins in song’s absence,” in “looking is no substitute for seeing,/ And every illness can startle love into being,” “this strain of love, its stain,” “the high note / only a lover can bear” or “I laugh / at the Church of I Guess./ I have nothing to confess.” “Canal Nocturne” is a sensitive, original take on the pandemic. The book rings with the exhilaration of freedom from the chains of confinement.

–Grace Schulman, Author of Again, the Dawn: New and Selected Poems and winner of the Frost Medal for Distinguished Lifetime Achievement in Poetry

Please share/please repost #flpauthor #preorder #AwesomeCoverArt #poetrybook #read #poems

[pansexual-pied-piper]

Am 30. Juni 2017 stimmte der Deutsche Bundestag über den Gesetzesentwurf zur "Ehe für alle" ab. Von 623 Abgeordneten (7 der eigentlich 630 Bundestagsmitglieder nahmen an der Abstimmung nicht teil) stimmten 393 für und 226 gegen die Verabschiedung des Gesetzes, welches gleichgeschlechtlichen Paaren die Eheschließung ermöglichen sollte. 4 Abgeordnete (allesamt der CDU/CSU-Fraktion angehörig) enthielten sich.

Bis auf die Stimme der fraktionslosen Abgeordneten Erika Steinbach (ursprünglich CDU, seit 2022 Mitglied der AfD) kamen alle Nein-Stimmen aus den Rängen der CDU/CSU-Fraktion, was bei 225 von 309 Abgeordneten bedeutet, dass knapp 73% der Fraktionsmitglieder gegen die "Ehe für alle" stimmten. (Ja-Stimmen gab es von ca. 24%, die Abwesenden und Enthaltungen machten zusammen ca. 3% der CDU/CSU-Stimmen aus.)

Von den 226 Abgeordneten, die damals gegen den Gesetzesentwurf zur "Ehe für alle" stimmten, amtieren zur Zeit 87 als Mitglieder des Bundestags.

Alle von ihnen sind Mitglieder der CDU/CSU-Fraktion. Im Einzelnen handelt es sich bei diesen Abgeordneten um:

Artur Auernhammer (Bayern)

Dorothee Bär (Bayern)

Thomas Bareiß (Baden-Württemberg)

Dr. André Berghegger (Niedersachsen)

Steffen Bilger (Baden-Württemberg)

Michael Brand (Hessen)

Dr. Reinhard Brandl (Bayern)

Prof. Dr. Helge Braun (Hessen)

Heike Brehmer (Sachsen-Anhalt)

Ralph Brinkhaus (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Alexander Dobrindt (Bayern)

Michael Donth (Baden-Württemberg)

Hansjörg Durz (Bayern)

Hermann Färber (Baden-Württemberg)

Uwe Feiler (Brandenburg)

Enak Ferlemann (Niedersachsen)

Thorsten Frei (Baden-Württemberg)

Dr. Hans-Peter Friedrich (Bayern)

Michael Frieser (Bayern)

Ingo Gädechens (Schleswig-Holstein)

Hermann Gröhe (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Michael Grosse-Brömer (Niedersachsen)

Markus Grübel (Baden-Württemberg)

Manfred Grund (Thüringen)

Oliver Grundmann (Niedersachsen)

Olav Gutting (Baden-Württemberg)

Christian Haase (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Florian Hahn (Bayern)

Jürgen Hardt (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Dr. Stefan Heck (Hessen)

Ansgar Heveling (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Christian Hirte (Thüringen)

Alexander Hoffmann (Bayern)

Hubert Hüppe (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Erich Irlstorfer (Bayern)

Thomas Jarzombek (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Anja Karliczek (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Ronja Kemmer (Baden-Württemberg)

Dr. Georg Kippels (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Volkmar Klein (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Axel Knoerig (Niedersachsen)

Jens Koeppen (Brandenburg)

Markus Koob (Hessen)

Gunther Krichbaum (Baden-Württemberg)

Dr. Günter Krings (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Ulrich Lange (Bayern)

Paul Lehrieder (Bayern)

Dr. Andreas Lenz (Bayern)

Andrea Lindholz (Bayern)

Dr. Carsten Linnemann (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Patricia Lips (Hessen)

Daniela Ludwig (Bayern)

Yvonne Magwas (Sachsen)

Stephan Mayer (Bayern)

Dr. Michael Meister (Hessen)

Dietrich Monstadt (Mecklenburg-Vorpommern)

Stefan Müller (Bayern)

Wilfried Oellers (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Florian Oßner (Bayern)

Henning Otte (Niedersachsen)

Thomas Rachel (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Kerstin Radomski (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Alexander Radwan (Bayern)

Alois Rainer (Bayern)

Dr. Peter Ramsauer (Bayern)

Josef Rief (Baden-Württemberg)

Dr. Norbert Röttgen (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Erwin Rüddel (Rheinland-Pfalz)

Albert Rupprecht (Bayern)

Dr. Wolfgang Schäuble (Baden-Württemberg)

Andreas Scheuer (Bayern)

Jana Schimke (Brandenburg)

Patrick Schnieder (Rheinland-Pfalz)

Detlef Seif (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Thomas Silberhorn (Bayern)

Albert Stegemann (Niedersachsen)

Christian Freiherr von Stetten (Baden-Württemberg)

Stephan Stracke (Bayern)

Max Straubinger (Bayern)

Astrid Timmermann-Fechter (Nordrhein-Westfalen)

Dr. Volker Ullrich (Bayern)

Marco Wanderwitz (Sachsen)

Nina Warken (Baden-Württemberg)

Dr. Anja Weisgerber (Bayern)

Annette Widmann-Mauz (Baden-Württemberg)

Klaus-Peter Willsch (Hessen)

Emmi Zeulner (Bayern)

[mirandamckenni1]

Finding A Trans Voice Do I sound trans? 🏳️‍⚧️ https://ift.tt/5d24NT9 "more here than there" interpolates a line from Bruz Fletcher's song "Drunk With Love": "Someday she'll walk out my door/I guess that's what doors are for" A special thanks to JD Doyle for providing research, resources, and recordings regarding Billy Tipton. Please check out his work over at Queer Music Heritage! https://ift.tt/z1UkOyv ____________________ The soundtrack for this video features piano recordings from my great-grandfather Bill Vuono as well as original pieces and songs of mine, with performances from Hans Bilger (bass), Alexander Dubovoy (piano), and Dexter Stanley-Tauvao (drums). It also features covers of "The Best Things In Life Are Free" (DeSylva/Brown/Henderson) and "Ramona" (Gilbert/Wayne) as well as Billy Tipton's version of "The Man I Love" (George/Ira Gershwin) ____________________ Voice training resources that were most helpful for me as a binary trans woman: @ZoeyAlexandria's "Whispering Siren" exercise: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F6Noi2qERus The entire @TransVoiceLessons channel, but specifically these two videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfCS01MkbIY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BW8X2nXexQs But, as I highlight in this video, one of the most helpful things for me was listening to a lot of voices I admired while watching this frequency tracker so I could learn about the "melody" of feminine- and masculine-perceived voices: https://ift.tt/jOiXd4q ____________________ 00:00:00 Trans Voices 00:07:27 Gay Bears 00:15:44 Passing 00:24:02 Candy 00:28:21 Self Hatred 00:41:41 Deutsch 00:44:17 What's Underneath 00:53:16 TikTok 01:01:20 A Way Out 01:05:08 More Here Than There via YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aDGhTGzZGU

[castyourline]

Really Eternal City

by George Bilgere

After we’d walked for at least an hour,

heading toward the Vatican

on a broiling August day,

I began thinking about how long

the tour we’d signed up for was going to be,

and how many sacred things would be on view,

and how much complicated information

the guide would tell us about the ancient paintings

and Roman numerals and relics

and tombs and holy knuckle bones.

I knew it would all kind of just melt together

and congeal into one big lumpen mass

of guilt and suffering and miracles

and gloomy old men in sandals.

And as I was thinking this

we were passing through a shady little square

where a couple of bare-breasted marble nymphs

were playing in the fountain,

and there were no tour guides anywhere,

there was no suffering or crucifixions,

nor was there even one important name or date

I would have to try to remember.

And the cheap red wine at the sidewalk ristorante

where we ended up spending the afternoon

instead of going to the Vatican

was wonderful, even miraculous,

as was the spaghetti bolognese.

[irguardian]

13th annual LRJF Poetry & Barbeque event

arts & entertainment Laura (Riding) Jackson Foundation announces its 13th Annual Poetry and Barbeque on April 13, 2024, during National Poetry Month. Our headline event, Fathered/Father, features the rare opportunity to hear two of our greatest living American poets: John Balaban, of Cary, NC and George Bilgere of Cleveland, Ohio. The event will be held from 2:30 p.m. – 6:30 p.m. on Saturday,…

[apoemaday]

How I Met Your Mother

by George Bilgere

I saw her at a party, walked up and said, I wonder if you would mind getting married, buying a house, enduring the agony of childbirth a couple of times, watching a lot of Netflix together, dining out (I’m thinking, specifically, of the osso buco at Rugerri’s), getting a dog, negotiating mortgages, and finally sitting by me in those last days, arranging the funeral, tidying up, then starting your strange new life, the one without me. Is that too much to ask? And she sipped her mojito and said, what are we waiting for?

[rabbit-light]

Chernobyl

I wish I were in Chernobyl today. The streets are peaceful there.

No cars or bicycles rush by, no one is late for work. No children are crying on the playground or getting into trouble.

The file cabinets in the police department are full of mice, and the outcome of the important vote at the General Assembly doesn't matter.

There are plenty of vacancies in the brand-new state prison, and for once, no one is talking in the library. Not even a dog is out today, pursuing mysterious errands.

Life in my city is tiring. Deadlines and unread books. Making love, or dinner. So many people to disappoint, so much to buy in the supermarket. Almost unbearable, this city.

But today in Chernobyl the clocks have given up. No one is tapping the phones, and every night the movie theater shows the same old silent film.

Does anyone have a question? No.

The houses of Chernobyl tend their silences and on the dinner table two gray sandwiches are waiting with such quiet patience. Like an old married couple.

George Bilgere

[writerystuff]

YOU CAN TOO

Problem by George Bilgere

Jerry is at his usual table this morning with his cup of coffee and his laptop, working on his science fiction/fantasy novel.

In every café in America men and women are hard at work on their science fiction/fantasy novels. Perhaps you are one of them. If so, I salute you; it's a very competitive field.

Forty years, says Jerry, I sold life insurance. Now I can do what I really want to do.

The planet where his story takes place has three suns, and the problem he's working on is how do the people there tell time.

I suggest having everyone wear three watches, which Jerry doesn't think is funny. This is a serious novel, he's taking it seriously, and he wants to get everything just right.

Forty years I sold life insurance, he says. Now I can do what I really want to do.

[allyourprettywords]

“Unwise Purchases,” George Bilgere

They sit around in the house Not doing much of anything: the boxed set Of the complete works of Verdi, unopened. The complete Proust, unread. The French cut silk shirts Which hang like expensive ghosts in the closet, And make me look exactly Like the kind of middle-aged man Who would wear a French cut silk shirt.

The reflector telescope I thought would unlock The mysteries of the heavens But which I used only once or twice, And which now stares disconsolately at the ceiling When it could be examining the Crab Nebula.

The 30-day course in Spanish, Whose text I barely opened, Whose dozen cassette tapes remain unplayed, Save for Tape One, where I never learned Whether the suave American, Conversing with a sultry-sounding desk clerk At a Spanish hotel about the possibility Of obtaining a room, Actually managed to check in. I like to think That one thing led to another between them And that by Tape Six or so

They’re happily married And raising a bilingual child in Seville or Terra Haute.

But I’ll never know.

Suddenly I realize I have constructed the perfect home For a sexy, Spanish-speaking astronomer Who reads Proust while listening to Italian arias, And I wonder if somewhere in this teeming city There lives a woman with, say, A fencing foil gathering dust in the corner Near her unused easel, a rainbow Of oil paints drying in their tubes On the table where the violin lies entombed In the permanent darkness of its locked case Next to the dusty chess set,

A woman who has always dreamed of becoming The kind of woman the man I’ve dreamed of becoming Has always dreamed of meeting,

And while the two of them discuss star clusters And Cezanne, while they fence delicately In Castilian Spanish to the strains of Rigoletto,

She and I will stand in the steamy kitchen, Fixing up a little risotto, Enjoying a modest cabernet While talking over a day so ordinary As to seem miraculous.

[dearhankandjohnpodshortpoems]

#017: The Return of Odysseus

When Odysseus finally does get home he is understandably upset about the suitors, who have been mooching off his wife for twenty years, drinking his wine, eating his mutton, etc.

In a similar situation today he would seek legal counsel. But those were different times. With the help of his son Telemachus he slaughters roughly one hundred and ten suitors and quite a number of young ladies, although in view of their behavior I use the term loosely. Rivers of blood course across the palace floor.

I too have come home in a bad mood. Yesterday, for instance, after the department meeting, when I ended up losing my choice parking spot behind the library to the new provost.

I slammed the door. I threw down my book bag in this particular way I have perfected over the years that lets my wife understand the contempt I have for my enemies, which is prodigious. And then with great skill she built a gin and tonic that would have pleased the very gods, and with epic patience she listened as I told her of my wrath, and of what I intended to do to so-and-so, and also to what's-his-name.

And then there was another gin and tonic and presently my wrath abated and was forgotten, and peace came to reign once more in the great halls and courtyards of my house.

-George Biligere

[theshortpoems]

When Odysseus finally does get home he is understandably upset about the suitors, who have been mooching off his wife for twenty years, drinking his wine, eating his mutton, etc. In a similar situation today he would seek legal counsel. But those were different times. With the help of his son Telemachus he slaughters roughly one hundred and ten suitors and quite a number of young ladies, although in view of their behavior I use the term loosely. Rivers of blood course across the palace floor. I too have come home in a bad mood. Yesterday, for instance, after the department meeting, when I ended up losing my choice parking spot behind the library to the new provost. I slammed the door. I threw down my book bag in this particular way I have perfected over the years that lets my wife understand the contempt I have for my enemies, which is prodigious. And then with great skill she built a gin and tonic that would have pleased the very gods, and with epic patience she listened as I told her of my wrath, and of what I intended to do to so-and-so, and also to what’s-his-name. And then there was another gin and tonic and presently my wrath abated and was forgotten, and peace came to reign once more in the great halls and courtyards of my house.

George Bilgere, The Return of  Odysseus

Featured in Dear Hank & John Episode  017 - Meeting Taylor Swift('s parents)