A poem whose subject needs no introduction! Melissa Balmain lives in New York State, and her most recent book is Walking in on People, from Able Muse Press.

Nightmare

Your TV cable’s on the fritz.

Your Xbox is corroded.

Your iPod sits in useless bits.

Your Game Boy just imploded.

Your cell phone? Static’s off the scale.

Your land line? Disconnected.

You’ve got no mail—E, junk or snail.

Your hard drive is infected.

So here you idle, dumb and blue,

with children, spouse and mother—

and wish you knew what people do

to entertain each other.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright 2014 by Melissa Balmain, “Nightmare,” from Walking in on People, (Able Muse Press, 2014). Poem reprinted by permission of Melissa Balmain and Able Muse Press. Introduction copyright 2015 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts. 

KELSEYVILLE, Calif. – The opening event of the Summer Poetry Series takes place Wednesday, June 24, at 6 p.m. at the Saw Shop Gallery Bistro, 3825 Main St. in Kelseyville, hosted by Lake County Poet Laureate Casey Carney. 

The June 24 reading features poets Richard Schmidt and Lourdes Thuesen, and special guest musician Mike Wilhelm. 

Open mic signups start at 6 p.m. Poets are invited to share up to five minutes of poetry.

The three readings will take place on the last Wednesday of the month, June 24, July 29 and Aug. 26, at 6 p.m., on the back patio of the restaurant.

Each reading will feature local poets, musicians and an open mic. 

The $10 admission includes a glass of wine, an appetizer and $20 in Saw Shop bucks, to be redeemed at the patron’s convenience. 

I love richly detailed descriptive poems, and this one by Barbara Crooker, who lives in Pennsylvania, is a good example of how vivid a picture a poem can offer to us. Her most recent book is “Selected Poems” (Future Cycle Press, 2015).

Strewn

It’d been a long winter, rags of snow hanging on; then, at the end
of April, an icy nor’easter, powerful as a hurricane. But now
I’ve landed on the coast of Maine, visiting a friend who lives
two blocks from the ocean, and I can’t believe my luck,
out this mild morning, race-walking along the strand.
Every dog within fifty miles is off-leash, running
for the sheer dopey joy of it. No one’s in the water,
but walkers and shellers leave their tracks on the hardpack.
The flat sand shines as if varnished in a painting. Underfoot,
strewn, are broken bits and pieces, deep indigo mussels, whorls
of whelk, chips of purple and white wampum, hinges of quahog,
fragments of sand dollars. Nothing whole, everything
broken, washed up here, stranded. The light pours down, a rinse
of lemon on a cold plate. All of us, broken, some way
or other. All of us dazzling in the brilliant slanting light.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation ( www.poetryfoundation.org ), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright 2015 by Barbara Crooker, “Strewn,” from More (C&R Press, 2010). Poem reprinted by permission of Barbara Crooker and the publisher. Introduction copyright 2015 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction's author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004 to 2006. They do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.

MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – The summer showings of free movies in Middletown Square Park will begin on Saturday, July 11.

The showing will begin at sundown at the park, located in front of the Middletown Library and Senior Center at 21256 Washington St.

The featured film will be “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.”

The Middletown Merchants Association, Hardester's Market and Star Gardens is hosting the event.

The Boy Scouts will offer a concession stand.

MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – The Middletown Art Center (MAC) is pleased to invite the public to attend its third opening reception, “Sum of its Parts,” on Saturday, June 27.

The opening will take place from 6 to 8 p.m. at the center's gallery, 21456 State Hwy 175, located at the junction of Highway 29 and Highway 175.

The exhibit features works made by combining found or unrelated objects or compositing parts into an aesthetic and cohesive whole. Work on view by local artists is curious, humorous, meaningful and aesthetically pleasing.

Compelling artwork, friends old and new, harmonic music provided by Kay Ashley, and organic and biodynamic wine poured by Beaver Creek Vineyards promise a delightful evening of art, culture and community not to be missed.

MAC is open Thursday through Saturday, from noon to 6 p.m., and Sunday from 12:30 to 6:00 p.m.

The gallery will be closed Thursday, June 25, and Friday, June 26, for installation.

To learn more about classes and events, to become a member or support MAC with a donation, please visit www.middletownartcenter.org or call 707-809-8118.

Maybe the entertainment stakes are so serious with “Game of Thrones” and “True Detective” and frivolous with “Veep” that HBO felt the need to strike a balance with a sobering mix of comedy and drama, or what is called “dramedy” in the rarefied atmosphere of show business.

However one may wish to characterize the Sunday night lineup of “Ballers” and “The Brink,” two new series that seem oddly derivative, HBO succeeded in picking leading cast members with wide appeal beyond the narrow confines of the television medium.

Few big screen stars, particularly of the action variety, are more popular today than Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson.

Actually, we can drop “The Rock” moniker, because this massive, hulking man (more of a gentle giant) is so much more than the sum of his muscles and brawn.

Nevertheless, it seems fitting, if not exactly the usual typecasting, to put Dwayne Johnson front and center in “Ballers,” which explores the whirlwind lifestyle and real-life problems of a group of former and current football players.

Johnson’s Spencer Strasmore, a retired NFL superstar, is trying to reinvent himself as a financial manager for current players in sun-drenched Miami, where pretty girls in bikinis are more plentiful than pink flamingos and everyone seemingly drives a fancy sports car.

It does not seem coincidental that show creator Stephen Levinson was the mastermind behind “Entourage.”

Spencer has his own posse, an inner circle that includes Ricky (John David Washington), a talented wide receiver, and Charles (Omar Miller), a reluctantly retired lineman.

Tapped by his jerk boss (Rob Corddry) to deliver well-heeled athletes as financial clients, Spencer has trouble adjusting to his new position, and things are made more complicated as he tries to lure rookie sensation Vernon Littlefield (Donovan Carter) to a big contract deal.

Life in the world of “Ballers” consists mostly of raucous yacht parties, fast cars, copious drugs, and topless women cavorting in spas.

There’s some football practice thrown in just to keep it real, but other than that, it’s like an adolescent fantasy paradise.

Keeping it real, however, is Dwayne Johnson’s charismatic star quality. To be sure, the always likable action star is fun to watch.

And yet, an undercurrent of solemnity touches on the subject of neurological damage suffered from Spencer’s playing days.

As “Ballers” unfolds over 10 episodes, this series may have more on its mind than the just the wild and crazy antics of football players.

The thinking behind “The Brink” may be a little more difficult to fathom. Is it a satire on foreign diplomacy, or a comedy about the absurdity of geopolitical intrigue?

On its face, “The Brink” could be viewed as a contemporary take on “Dr. Strangelove.”

The fate of the world hinges on the actions of disparate characters: a sex-obsessed secretary of state, a bellicose secretary of defense, a fighter pilot high on morphine, and an inept, low-level bureaucrat at the American Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan.

The linchpin to the possible outbreak of World War III just might be the idiotic Alex Talbot (Jack Black), the lowly Foreign Service officer who uses the Embassy driver Rafiq (Aasif Mandvi) to take him to the local bazaar where he can score the best weed.

Meanwhile, street riots break out as the lunatic General Zaman stages a coup to install himself as the new leader of Pakistan.

Talbot takes refuge at Rafiq’s home, promptly putting the entire Pakistani family in danger of political reprisals.

Back in the United States, Secretary of State Walter Larson (Tim Robbins) is hoping to defuse an international crisis, while the secretary of defense (Geoff Pierson) is urging the president (Esai Morales) to launch a preemptive strike on Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal before Zaman can use the weapons.

Having trouble keeping his pants zipped, Larson is perpetually horny but somehow manages a frenetic schedule of shuttle diplomacy.

Even though in need of urgent surgical treatment for a kidney stone, Larson hops over to Pakistan and India to mediate disputes, all the while sizing up opportunities for his next sexual conquest.

By sheer dumb luck, Talbot scores incriminating psychiatric documents about the mental instability of General Zaman, which he’s only too eager to parlay into getting a plum assignment to the Embassy in Paris.

On the other hand, the nutty American ambassador to Pakistan (John Larroquette), thinking that the apocalypse is at hand, blames local unrest on Talbot and considers that his best option is to send the obscure State Department employee to a post in war-torn Baghdad.

Aircraft carrier fighter pilot Zeke (Pablo Schreiber) and his dim-witted co-pilot Glenn (Eric Ladin) mistakenly ingest mind-altering drugs instead of painkillers and veer off-course while shooting down foreign satellites.

They end up grounded by the Taliban and then stranded in the desert, only to be found by an eccentric British couple.

“The Brink” has a scattershot approach to its targets and renders almost every character little more than a grotesque caricature. Considering the increasingly dangerous geopolitical landscape of our times, it’s not an easy job getting laughs, but there is some oddball humor to “The Brink.”

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.