5th & 6th June, 2008

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rod at Dos Vidas. Photo by Thomas Kist from the 2006 Arjan Vlakveld film “Rod McKuen: A Man Alone” for Netherlands Public Television. Photo ©2006, 2007 by Stanyan Audio Video Archives. All Rights Reserved.

A Thought for Today

Too often most of us worry about where our next screw is coming from instead of who is screwing us over.

 

TO BEGIN WITH

I had so much fun at Dale’s Lost Highway last year that Jerry and I decided it was time for me to play a supper club again, but where? Well everybody knows I love the desert so why not head for The Palm Springs Area again? Why not indeed?

I keep hearing terrific reports about Buddy Greco’s Dinner Club in Cathedral City so that seemed like a logical choice. The great Greco and his talented wife Lezlie Anders perform at the club when they are in residence in the desert, and when they go on tour it makes a perfect home away from home for guest artists.

Since I’m taking the summer off to work on other projects I’ve decided to close out the year by appearing for three nights in November at Greco’s famed nightspot. These will be my only public performances this year; here are the details.

AN INTIMATE EVENING
with
ROD McKUEN

Thursday, Friday & Saturday November 6, 7 & 8

Buddy Greco’s Dinner Club
68805 E. Palm Canyon Drive
Cathedral City, CA 92234
Reservations: 760-883-5812

$47.50 plus dinner•
$60.00 plus cocktails only (2 drink minimum)

Dinner seating at 6:00 / Showtime: 8:00 PM
Special All Request Show • Saturday, 11:00 PM*

*Suggestions for the All Request Show should be made to my e-mail address at least 3 weeks in advance of the engagement so they can be properly programmed and rehearsed.

Here’s a photograph of the ever youthful Buddy Greco and his damsel Lezlie Anders.

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ROD McKUEN CONCERTS

ROD McKUEN APPEARANCES
notable birthdays

THURSDAY 5 June

Chad Allen o Martha Argerich o Hopalong Cassidy (William Boyd) o George Deukmejian, Jr. o Lisa Dosa o Margaret Drabble o Ken Follett o Spalding Gray o David Hare o Bill Hayes o Lisa Hempy o John Maynard Keynes o Robert Lansing o Frederico Garcia Lorca o Bill Moyers o Tony Richardson o Igor Stravinsky o Pancho Villa o Mark Wahlberg

FRIDAY 6 June

Sandra Bernhard o Gary U.S. Bonds o Bjorn Borg o The Dalai Lama o David Dukes o Harvey Fierstein o Nathan Hale o Neeme Jarvi o Kirk Kerkorian o Aram Khachaturian o Ted Lewis o Andrew McFarlane o Thomas Mann o Maria Montez o Alexander Pushkin o Klaus Tennstedt o Dwight Twilley
Rod's random thoughts I work. I think. I wish I were better at doing both at the same time.

Immortality must be terrific, no one’s ever complained about it.

Love, like magic, depends on believing.

SLOW DANCE ON THE
MATING GROUND / June 5

 You said your name
while we were walking home,
       my mind was on ahead
already settled up atop the covers,
and who you are still circles
in the outside air
unlearned, so unremembered.

We beat down brainwaves
with makeshift conversation,
stay locked in stories started
       not worth ending,
and when a sentence
made of thought arrives and stops
we fail to recognize it for itself.
I would not burn words,
but here beneath your tent of hair
communication voice to ear
       is all but useless
as mouth-to-mouth resuscitation
       revives us both
and tells us more about each other
than all the family histories
printed on the widest page.

Forgive me
if your name seems unimportant,
        I only just discovered
your appendix scar,
while learning what you are.

Your legs are sentences
not said aloud to me before,
literate enough to challenge wordsmiths.
Your breath tell stories new to me
your mouth puts Gulliver in reach.
Fact and fiction meet
        behind your tongue.
I swallow mouthfuls of it
       while I swallow you.
Whole dictionaries pass between us
               in a blur
the way the night is passing.

Your hand. One more time.
Spread it back across my face
and feel the stories inside lines
that time has carved here.

I say hello by traversing
your eyelids with my own.
Body conversation
proves your thighs to be
not just the framework of the world
but intellectuals in themselves.

The universe beyond this mattress
holds more danger than a fog.
I will not let you leave
or go beyond my eyes’ protection.

No world is larger now
than that land mass above your eyes.

-from The Sound of Solitude, 1983
 
    AND FINALLY

As always I’m looking forward to performing again and as usual the best part of it all is seeing old friends and making new ones. Oh, and they have at least three Cosco’s within driving distance of where I’ll be staying in The Springs.

Join me for more questions and answers on Ask Rod this weekend. Sleep warm.

RM Holmby Hills, CA June 3, 2008 7:06PM PDST
 
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