Editor Notes About Russell Streur.
I must start out by saying I find
Russell Streur to be a unique blend of human and beyond personal traits: eccentric, pragmatic, and strong-willed with
firm opinions and convictions. Russell
hits me as someone who has visited many places, done many things, hit the
coffee shops, wrote his poems on napkins or torn sheets of yellow paper, and
tapped into more than his share of local bars.
After all, he is the "Barkeeper"
at The
Camel Saloon: http://thecamelsaloon.blogspot.com/. All patrons treated with respect and welcome
to come in. On a personal note, I have found Russell to be
open to new ideas, ways of expanding his website, great with insights, and very
generous and responsive with his time.
I found this introduction bio of
Russell at the Blues.Gr! I'm only using
a part of it here: http://blues.gr/profiles/blogs/talking-with-poet-writer-russell-streur-of-on-line-poetry-bar-the
"Russell Streur is a
born-again dissident residing in Johns Creek, Georgia. His work has been
published in Europe, certain islands and the United States. He operates
the world’s original on-line poetry bar, The Camel Saloon, catering to
dromedaries, malcontents and jewels of the world at thecamelsaloon.blogspot.com. He cofounded Poets Democracy in 2010 with
Christi Kochifos Caceres and ---is the author of The Muse of Many Names, The
Petition to Free Zhu Yufu, and other works."
"Many heartfelt thanks to all
who voted for The Camel Saloon in the 2013 Preditors and Editors Readers Poll.
The Chicago vote is in and I am delighted to share the news that the
joint has won this elusive award."
Interview With Russell Streur, Writer, Poet,
Editor, Local Barkeeper @ The Camel Saloon- Johns Creek,
Georgia
Nine
Questions with Russell Streur
(I gave him nine questions, and told him to feel
free, to be original-and Russel starts out with a baseball game-I warned you he
was different)
Questions
According to Russell Streur
Why nine?
Baseball. Nine innings.
It’s a good number.
Does that count as the first question?
And the
second. It’s a tough game.
Who’s your favorite player?
Bobo
Newsom. One of the all-time great arms
of the game. Pitched forever, pitched
for everybody, only guy to pitch to Babe Ruth and to Mickey Mantle, that’s how
long he pitched. Also, one of the
all-time great mouths of the game.
Late one game
on the mound against the Indians, a line drive off the bat of Earl Averill
smashes into Bobo’s knee and down goes the big lunk in a heap.
His manager
comes bounding out onto the field and asks Newsom how he feels.
“My knee’s
broke,” he says.
“I’ll get a
reliever in for you,” says the skipper.
“Take me out of
the game? Are you kidding me?” says
Bobo. “I said my knee was broke. I didn’t say I was dead.”
You know the
baseball immortals poem by Ogden Nash?
Bobo’s the only guy mentioned in it who isn’t in the Hall of Fame. Course, Nash gives him an honorary place in
the hall. Says Bobo talked himself into
the place.
Big drinker
too. Might have been a little hung over
one day in spring training. He walked
three straight batters.
“Hey, Ump,” he
yells from the mound. “Stop wriggling
the plate!”
Dirt floor bar
in Florida he used to go to after he finally retired, always stood in the same
place. After he died, cirrhosis of the
liver, they encased his footprints in concrete.
There’s a
thousand stories about him, dig through old Sporting News issues in the
thirties, forties and fifties, he’s all over the pages.
They could’ve
nicknamed him Poet, because he told his stories in diamonds. Bobo was from what he called everybody else,
so everybody called him the same thing back, and there was already a player
nicknamed poet, Poet Kenna, early 1900s, if you want to look him up, the bard
of Kanawha County. The sportswriter
Charles Dryden said Kenna was ‘long on meter but pitched ragtime,’ whatever the
hell that is supposed to mean.
Are you a big baseball fan these days?
Nah, I’m a
traditionalist. They ruined the game
when they started wearing gloves.
Do you write poems about baseball?
I wrote one
once, about Jesus tripling to the wall in right. He tried to stretch it home.
Then what?
Got nailed at
the plate. Cut-off man had a good arm. I know, blasphemy. Get over it.
I’ll give you blasphemy, The Ten Commandments. Comes out of two places. One is a Ten Commandments I read somewhere
and don’t remember, an avant-garde piece from the 1920s or so, a Ten
Commandments of the Sun or the Sun God or somebody, and the other place is from The White Goddess by Robert Graves,
what he says in the foreword to the 1966 edition: “The function of poetry is
religious invocation of the Muse,” he says, “its use is the experience of mixed
exaltation and horror that her presence excites.”
You bet it is.
And he ends the foreword with this: “How you come to terms with the Goddess is no
concern of mine. I do not even know that
you are serious in your poetic profession.”
Get in tune with that.
So I am much less a poet than I am a believer
in the Muse. My Ten Commandments go like
this:
And the High
One spoke these words saying,
I am thy Sole Adored, who
raised you from the grave and gave you breath when you were dead and voice to
sing when you could not even speak; who brought you out of the Land of Egypt,
out of the House of Bondage:
Thou shall have no other Brides before me.
Thou shall not be deceived by hollow charms; for I am a jealous and green-eyed WONDER; neither shall false spells beguile you; and neither shall you serve them; lest my anger rise against you and topple you from the face of the earth.
Thou shall
sound the truth and truth alone like the bellow of the thunder upon a winter
sea; for I will not hold him guiltless who takes my love and word in vain.
Thou shall honor the serpent.
Thou shall honor the vine.
Thou shall wield a Radiant Sword and slay my enemies with ABANDON and GLEE.
Thou shall play with fire.
Thou shall sow the whirlwind.
Thou shall remember the auburn hours of my outstretched arms and the mighty hammer of my fist upon the gloom of dawn.
Thou shall kneel down before no one save for me.
For I am thy Fury, thy Grace, thy Muse, who
favors you beyond compare and above all others.
Defy me not.
And by the way, if you don’t kneel down before the
Goddess, I have no idea how you can call yourself a poet. My suggestion is that you take up prose. Or be quiet.
The White Goddess is an
indispensable book for poetry.
What other books does a poet have to have on
a shelf?
I’m of the belief that poetic language goes back a real
long and dark way and the closer a poet can get to the root of that language,
the better he or she is going to be able to express whatever it is the Muse
wants expressed. So what I keep near is
a dictionary of the Bible, an encyclopedia of symbols, and telling of myths. Those are the tools I keep, the keys to the
old ways.
And I have some favorite books, too, ones I have kept
forever. Like those four wonderful books
issued by The Peter Pauper Press. Japanese Haiku (1955), The Four Seasons (1958), Cherry-Blossoms
(1960) all translated by Peter Beilenson and the fourth, Haiku Harvest (1962) completed by Harry Behn after Beilenson
crossed the river.
I just learned recently that the first volume is now in
the public domain, the copyright was apparently not renewed somewhere along the
way, it can be accessed online among the sacred texts at http://www.sacred-texts.com/shi/jh/jh00.htm
It belongs with the sacred text, that’s for sure.
Then two books of Chinese poetry, a paperback, The White Pony, and a hardcover, The
Jade Mountain, which was due back at the library sometime in 1969. I’m a little late with that. So with the west, you know, the Bible and the
myths, and the east with haiku and the Chinese classics, and the symbols from
the subconscious, those are my essentials alongside Graves.
Are you writing much these days?
I am writing nothing these days. I’ve written a lot, at least a lot for me, I
am not one of those prolific people with thousands of poems, or what the author
says are poems, and I am not about to start repeating myself or typing thoughts
in broken lines and pretending it’s poetry.
That’s where the Saloon starts, to stay engaged with poetry on a
continual and daily basis, to be the editor and barkeep there. My ego was satisfied, I had said what I had
to say, I had seen most of it published.
I was also becoming more and
more personally interested in global free speech and self-expression issues and
principles back in 2010 when I opened the joint. I have been reminiscing about my late friend,
Danny Harmon. We would go to a
particular bar and work on poems together.
We would try out lines on not only each other but also other customers
and staff. It was a very social place
where we all felt safe to write there.
Even with all the noise with the ball game on and the jukebox playing,
all the bustle of the place.
So out of all that a resolution
to start giving back, to start standing, and to do that in a social
environment, and it felt like a bar would be a fine place to do all that in,
especially since I was in one in the first place. Why not, since I spent most of my life in
Milwaukee and all the wonderful neighborhood taps there, can't be beat.
I'm also in appreciation of a
few editors I have gotten to know to one degree or another. Especially Chloe
Caldwell at Sleep Snort Fuck
for the courage it took her to create and run that space. Also Ross Vassilev of
Asphodel Madness, and Opium
Poetry for the sheer energy these sites extended and how much time he must have
put in it.
And G. Tod Slone of The American Dissident
also was in the mix of the Saloon, how he refuses to compromise his ideals and
has given a forum to so many people who might not have otherwise found a place
in the world for their voice. I wanted to make something that could redeem
that same promise, to create a space in the world for voices.
The camel
arrived because I was reading Persian poetry at the time; and camels appeared
here and there in the poems. There was
an unrelated article I read about the value given to camels in Bedouin poetry,
it
seemed
fitting for a journey to have a mode of transportation, and so the Camel. Which is a real interesting animal in the
first place as it turns out.
The policy at the Saloon is
one of inclusion and mostly because of that; it has been very
gratifying running the place. Still,
some things just don’t work: condescension of
tone doesn’t work, and either does assuming the pose of superiority some poets
assume. That type of arrogance is the
antithesis of what the Saloon is about. So
are interior monologs and abstract philosophizing. Give me some colors of the world, a place and
a time of day or a season to share, some language or secret that
surprises. Stuffed shirts, intellectuals
and arty, pretentious types can buy a glass at a different joint.
Are cats still banned at the Saloon?
Yes.
Why?
That’s the tenth question, so mum’s the word. Maybe the relief pitcher can answer. In the meantime, come by the joint: http://thecamelsaloon.blogspot.com/ The door is
always open.
-The
End-
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