I just received the latest issue of Trigger93, which contains my essay “Marks: Uniting Spirit and Flesh”.

The theme of this issue is “Flesh”, and my piece is a personal essay on spiritual tattoos.  Though the ways this theme has been interpreted are as varied as they are powerful, from the interview with Anna Blume on ACT UP’s AIDS activism in the 90s to field notes on crucifixion in the Philippines from Christina Verano Carter – complete with striking photographs, to editor Ayesha Adamo’s piece on method acting, and the path she took to really get inside her character.

It’s a great issue, and I’ve only touched on some of the content. It’s well worth checking out.

Last Tuesday I submitted another short story submitted to an American magazine. Holy cow IRCs⁽¹⁾ are expensive. Four dollars. For the cost of a stamp to mail a letter from America to Canada. Oh. Em. Gee. The entire package ended up costing almost eight bucks. For something that may or may not be picked up.

To my American friends: Pls to be sendink American stamps for postage to Canada. Will send money via PayPal. Contact me. Thx.

I received confirmation of my submission to the poetry contest I entered last week, which is good to hear. Still haven’t heard back on submissions sent in February of this year, but responses from pieces sent late last year are arriving slowly but surely.

Speaking of, an essay of mine submitted last autumn has appeared in the latest issue of the online magazine Rending the Veil, you can find it here. Short but sweet.

In a week I head for Paris via Montreal. Until then, more poetry to edit, and a short story I’m trying to get finished for a contest that closes on the 15th.

Footnotes:

1. IRC = International Reply Coupon [↩]

How to Travel with a Salmon & Other Essays, by Umberto Eco
Harcourt, 0-15-600235-X, 248 pp., 1992, 1994

I always feel behind in my reading: many of the classics, certain authors, certain works by certain authors. No matter often I remind myself that there’s only so much time to read in any given day, or that I’m relatively young and will have time to catch up, this feeling of being behind persists.

Thus, when I think of Umberto Eco, it’s usually as a novelist. In this capacity he is probably best known as the author of The Name of the Rose (1980, made into a film in 1986), Foucault’s Pendulum (1988) and, more recently, The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana (2006).⁽¹⁾ But he’s written far more non- than fiction; on philosophy, linguistics, literary criticism, and the present selection of delightful parodies. And I had no idea he could be so funny.

As Eco explains Continue reading »

Footnotes:

1. All great books. Especially the first two. Especially Foucault’s Pendulum. And In the Name of the Rose.  Okok, The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana was pretty good, too. But not as good as the first two. [↩]