After Atalanta

somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond by E. E. Cummings somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond any experience,your eyes have their silence: in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me, or which i cannot touch because they are too near your slightest look easily will unclose me though i have closed myself as fingers, you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens (touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose or if your wish be to close me, i and my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly, as when the heart of this flower imagines the snow carefully everywhere descending; nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals the power of your intense fragility:whose texture compels me with the color of its countries, rendering death and forever with each breathing (i do not know what it is about you that closes and opens;only something in me understands the voice of your eyes is deeper than all ro...

I frequently try to convince people (my students, my girlfriend, random strangers) that the concept of "things are getting better" or "things are better than they used to be" is problematic. Progress is not one of those straight 45 degree angle lines streaking across a graph. The x and y axes are not so 1) measurable and 2) in sync that we have this perfect progress line. And this not-so-neat-and-easy "progress" can be applied to sport--women's sports specifically. Look at the women playing sports! Isn't it great!? It totally is. But there has been some backlash--some subtle, some not-so-subtle. There's the obvious crusade against Title IX in the US. There's the rampant, yet largely hush-hush and/or hard-to-prove homophobia. And now there's skirts. Skirts where none existed before. Skirts in soccer. (Remember the fashion show in 2009 when the WUSA debuted its Puma kit complete with "wraps"?) Skirts in badminton. Skirt...

I've had over a day to sit on this story because of other obligations. This has meant that the highly acerbic tone laced with expletives that I was going to use yesterday has been slightly tempered by time. I'm still a little irked by ESPNW though. I really haven't seen anything to like about this endeavor yet. Shouldn't we be shooting for more than just mere visibility? Anyway, what got me all hot and bothered (and not in a good way) yesterday was this article about the different paths Hope Solo and Abby Wambach have taken post World Cup. In case you haven't heard, Hope Solo is on Dancing with the Stars this season. She was also on (one of) the cover of ESPN Magazine's The Body Issue a few weeks ago. She is racking up endorsements (worth millions of dollars)--and turning down offers for photo shoots in men's magazines. In other words, she's making the most of this (likely) brief spike in the popularity of women's soccer. (Let's note, for the...

The Women's Sports Foundation held their annual Salute to Women in Sports Awards ceremony last night in NYC. Abby Wambach won best sportswoman in a team sports; Yani Tseng (I guess people are paying attention to her!) won for individual sport. The US Women's Ski Jumping team won the Wilma Rudolph Courage Award for their activist work in getting their sport included in the winter olympics. A theme of the evening was Title IX because the Foundation is gearing up for the 40th anniversary. It was a little disappointing that the :Billie Jean King Contribution Award, which recognizes an individual or organization that demonstrates a lasting commitment and dedication to the growth of sports, fitness and physical activity for women and girls" was given to Visa. Given the current climate of backlash against corporate America--which began right on the streets of NYC, it didn't seem to be the b est choice. I would have liked to see WSF go a little less corporate.  Like...

The NCAA in August, during the Presidential Retreat, started talking about some of the ongoing controveries and the need for reform. Everyone else already is, so they should be too. And they have some ideas, apparently. In September the Resource Allocations Working Group suggested cutting scholarships for FBS (Footbal Bowl Series) teams from 85 to 80. The FCS will have their scholarships reduced from 63 to 60. They are also considering reducing men's (13 --> 12) and women's (15 --> 13) basketball scholarships. Yeah. I'm pretty sure that will take care of it.

...about the Immaculata College women's basketball team? Why yes, yes there was. And apparently there is . It was actually filmed in 2007. But the film, The Mighty Macs , which chronicles the 1971-72 team as it made its ways to the NCAA championships, only recently got a distributor. The movie stars Carla Gugino (Entourage, Sin City ) , David Boreanaz (currently of Bones but formally of Buffy the Vampire Slayer --his best role in my opinion), Ellen Burstyn (Ya Ya Sisterhood, Big Love ) , and Marley Shelton (Uptown Girls. Pleasantville ) .   The movie comes out in limited release (1000 theaters) next week. You can watch the trailer here . It looks good.

Like the poem, but I'm thinking the translation could be better. Nevertheless... Bring me the sunflower Eugenio Montale Bring me the sunflower so I may transplant it in my native soil burnt by the sea-salt, let it display all day to the mirroring blue spaces of the sky the anxiety of its yellow face. Obscure things tend towards clarity, bodies dissolve themselves in a weightless flow of colors: these then into music. To vanish is thus the supreme fate of all fates. Bring me the plant that points to where pale transparencies rise to the heights and life itself evaporates like air; bring me the sunflower crazed with light. translated from the Italian by Margaret Brose

I flipped on the Golf Channel, which was airing the LPGA's HanaBank Championship this past weekend. It was background and it was on less than two minutes when I heard the British male commentator say that it would have been a "wussy" move if Yani Tseng hadn't pulled out her driver for her tee shot because her playing partner had just done so. Really, wussy--in golf? I mean wussy anywhere is problematic. But in golf it seems all the more weird to use such sexually suggestive slang . And in the context of Yani Tseng? The woman is dominating the LPGA . Never heard of the current number one player who has 9 victories this season and has held the number 1 spot for 34 weeks? Well she's not American and she's not white--which means she isn't getting a lot of attention in the American media. But at least she's not a wussy after all. She hit an amazing tee shot at that hole--and she won the whole thing.

Because I've been teaching transitions in my composition classes... A Word About Transitions by Billy Collins Moreover is not a good way to start a poem though many begin somewhere in the middle. Secondly does not belong at the opening of your second stanza. Furthermore is to be avoided no matter how long the poem. Aforementioned is rarely found in poems at all, and for good reason. Most steer clear of notwithstanding , and the same goes for nevertheless, however, as a consequence, in any event , subsequently , and as we have seen in the previous chapters . The appearance of finally in your final stanza will be of no help. All of which suggests (another no-no) that poems don't need to tell us where we are or what is soon to come. For example , the white bowl of lemons on a table by a window can go anywhere all by itself and, in conclusion , so can seven elephants standing in the rain.

Did anyone really believe that Reebok's special Easytone sneakers were going to firm legs, thighs, and butts? Well if you did--congratulations, you may be getting some money . Reebok has settled a class action lawsuit for $25 million. A Federal Trade Commission investigation found that claims of what the sneakers could do were slightly exaggerated--as in they couldn't be proven. I knew though sneakers were trouble from the start. I mean, did anyone else note the irony? In order to get a hot ass, you have to wear ugly shoes. That seems wrong. Also, the commercials were particularly egregious in terms of the sexualization of the female body. But it's kind of too late now. Those rocker shoes are all over the place. Sketchers has their own version. Not sure if Sketchers will be on the hook as well. It's possible they aren't making the same kind of claims about what the shoes can do. They have chosen not to comment on the settlement. Reebok is standing behind its sho...