Banned Books Week

As you may not know, September 26th to October 3rd is Banned Books Week, a nation-wide event that encourages people to read books that have been banned or challenged.

What sort of books have been banned or challenged? Some are easy to guess, like Snow Falling On Cedars, but others are stranger, like Where's Waldo? and Harriet the Spy. There's also Harry Potter, Fahrenheit 451, and pretty much anything dealing with homosexuality.

The Golda Meir Library at UWM currently has a display up on the third floor of the East Wing of banned books. They also have information on book bannings and the week-long event. Stop by and express your First Amendment rights by picking up an (almost) banned book!

More information from the library can be found here.

Boswell Books Events!

So, for those of you who don't know, there's this sweet book store on Downer Avenue in Milwaukee, called Boswell Books, formerly known as Harry W. Schwartz Bookshop. And guess what? They're having some sweet events next month. Check it out:

:: Ralph Nader, Sunday, September 27th, 5 PM

:: Lizzie Skurnick, Tuesday, September 29th, 7 PM

:: Lisa Yee, Wednesday, September 30th, 4 PM

:: Catherine Gilbert Murdock, Thursday, October 1st, 7 PM

:: Phil Hanrahan, Friday, October 2nd, 7 PM

:: Michael Bowen, Wednesday, October 7th, 7PM

:: Ben Merens, Thursday, October 8th, 7 PM :: Ann Basting, Wednesday, October 14th, 7 PM :: Sherman Alexie, Thursday, October 22th, 8 PM

:: From David Rhodes to David Wroblewski

:: Double Bananagrams and Appletters

:: Chocolate and Reading Glasses

:: What's Happening on our Blogs

:: Milwaukee Film Festival

:: Artwork from ColettaScope

To learn more about these and other awesome events, go to http://boswell.indiebound.com/ or to their Facebook page. For that matter, go to Furrow's Facebook page. Yeah, we have one now.

Blast From the Past!

Hello people of the internet!

We said we'd be back, and here we are, with a new feature that we call "Blast From the Past." Once a week, probably on Thursdays, we will be posting a poem or two from previous editions of Furrow. Why? Because we can.

This feature will probably end up morphing into a "Poet of the Week" type situation, once you good people start sending us your submissions. (hint, hint) But for now, please enjoy these following selections from our Spring 2004 edition, "The Big O" by Adam Houle and "Dance Floor Voodoo" by Bryan Hurt.

Enjoy!

(If you are the owner of any of the poems we post, and you want it taken down from this blog for whatever reason, please email us. Thank you.)

*~*


"The Big O" by Adam Houle


In French, they're called the little death.

In America, we're not so honest.
It's called living, the upheavals
put off until madness-

think of 100 horses stampeded
by a rearing rattler under pinion
tree shade. In the sweaty after,

though, as I splash water on my face,
breathe thick musk & smoke,
I feel an emptiness, that little death,

as distinct as hominid footprints cast
in a sand-blasted arroyo; Antler said,

Waterfalls are eternal orgasms.

But cracked mudflats are new
road maps, deep lines tracing

history like wrinkles
around an old woman's peircing gaze.

*~*

"Dance Floor Voodoo" by Bryan Hurt

A thousand, thousand dragging feet loaded
with pistoled pockets. Good to see a friend-
ly face among the concealed carriers
and anti-smoking socialites. A black
clad and malignant, cellular lung.
Old school, faux cool, original, hipster
in guacamole jungles you slither,
a twisted slinky tripping through a tech-
no beat. The fiber-optic shimmy shakes
neue sachlichkeit symmetricals into
incongruous auld lang syne girls. Under
a mirror-balled and thatched cabana roof,
alone the tiki castaway hulas
down exotic, sexy lubricants.
A hunter, leopard-spotting zebra prey.
The spiral, voodoo speakers singing, "Dance,
you mechanical zombie fuckers, dance."

*~*

Furrow isn't Forgotten!

Hey all!

We are the new Editors of the Furrow Literary Magazine for the 2009-2010 school season. We're planning on making great use of this blogspot our forefathers (and foremothers) so kindly created for us.

So, starting in about a week or so, we will start updating this blog more regularly, with one or two past submissions, and new ones as the year goes on, leading up to our big release in the Spring. So stay tuned for some awesome poetry and prose, and feel free to send anything for consideration at furrowmag@gmail.com

Thanks!

Lita and Corey