#209 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007
PRICE $5.00 ST. MARK’S CHURCH IN-THE-BOWERY 131 EAST 10TH STREET NEW YORK NY 10003 www.poetryproject.com #209 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007
NEWSLETTER EDITOR Brendan Lorber THIS EPISODE...
DISTRIBUTION Small Press Distribution, 1341 Seventh St., Berkeley, CA 94710 4 ANNOUNCEMENTS THE POETRY PROJECT LTD. STAFF ARTISTIC DIRECTOR Anselm Berrigan 5 FROM THE PAST PROGRAM COORDINATOR Stacy Szymaszek PROGRAM ASSISTANT Corrine Fitzpatrick 6, 12, 21, 26 YEARS AGO IN THE NEWSLETTER MONDAY NIGHT COORDINATOR Stacy Szymaszek WEDNESDAY NIGHT COORDINATOR Anselm Berrigan 8 WORLD NEWS FRIDAY NIGHT COORDINATOR Corrine Fitzpatrick SOUND TECHNICIANS Corrine Fitzpatrick, Arlo Quint, David Vogen BREAKING REPORTS JUST IN FROM BOOKKEEPER Stephen Rosenthal ALBANY / THE BAY AREA / BROOKLYN DEVELOPMENT CONSULTANT Stephanie Gray THE CATSKILLS / CHICAGO / CINCINNATI BOX OFFICE Courtney Frederick, Stefania Iryne Marthakis, Erika Recordon NEW ORLEANS / PETALUMA / PHILADELPHIA INTERNS Dixie Appel, Wallis Meza, Lucy Morris PROVIDENCE / SEATTLE / TUCSON / THE TWIN CITIES VOLUNTEERS David Cameron, Christine Gans, Maxwell Heller, Erica Kaufman, Evan Kennedy, Stefania Iryne Marthakis, Martha Oatis, Jessica Rogers, Lauren Russell, Nathiel Siegel, Azareen Van der Vliet Oloomi, Erica Wessmann, Sally Whiting 15 WHY MOST POETRY IS SO BORING, AGAIN BY AMIRI BARAKA THE POETRY PROJECT NEWSLETTER is published four times a year and mailed free of charge to members of and contributors to the Poetry Project. Subscriptions are available for $25/year domestic, $35/year international. Checks should 16 EVENTS AT THE POETRY PROJECT be made payable to The Poetry Project, St. Mark’s Church, 131 East 10th St., NYC, NY 10003. The views and opinions expressed in the Newsletter are those of the individual ALL OTHER MONTHS EVERYWHERE ELSE WISH authors and, while everyone in their right mind might be like, of course, duh!, they are not THEY COULD BE DECEMBER & JANUARY AT THE necessarily those of the Poetry Project itself. For more information call (212) 674-0910, or e- POETRY PROJECT IF ONLY FOR ONE GLORIOUS EVENING mail [email protected].
BOARD OF DIRECTORS Rosemary Carroll, Jordan Davis, Gregory Fuchs, Ted Greenwald, John 18 THE POLITICS OF “POLITICS” S. Hall, Steve Hamilton, Kimberly Lyons, Gillian McCain, Elinor Nauen, Paul Slovak, Edwin Torres, Hal Willner, John Yau. A CONVERSATION WITH HERETICAL TEXTS EDITOR BILL MARSH FRIENDS COMMITTEE Brooke Alexander, Dianne Benson, Raymond Foye, Michael Friedman, Vicki Hudspith, Siri Hustvedt, Yvonne Jacquette, Patricia Spears Jones, Michel de Konkoly Thege, Greg Masters, Ron Padgett and Anne Waldman. 26 BOOK REVIEWS TOM CLARK / ROBERT FITTERMAN & DIRK ROWNTREE FUNDERS The Aeroflex Foundation; the Axe-Houghton Foundation; Brooke Alexander Gallery/Brooke Alexander Editions; The American-Scandinavian Foundation; Erato Press; Farrar, Straus and Giroux; the NATHANIEL MACKEY / E. TRACY GRINNELL Foundation for Contemporary Arts, Inc.; Edge Books; The Herman Goldman Foundation; Granary Books; The BENJAMIN HOLLANDER / GLORIA FRYM / JEN BENKA Greenwich Collection, Ltd., The Heyday Foundation; Instance Press; Irwin, Lewin, Cohn &Lewis; the Laura (Riding) PETER LAMBORN WILSON / MAUREEN OWEN Jackson Board of Literary Management; Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.; the Lila Acheson Wallace Theater Fund; Nenaker & Herrmann; Penguin; Poets & Writers, Inc.; Scribner; Soho Letterpress; Studio One; Talisman House; The Tomorrow Foundation; Vehicle Editions; The Winslow Family Foundation; Anonymous Foundations and Corporations; Russell 32 JOIN NOW Banks; Dianne Benson; Katherine Bradford; Mary Rose Brusewitz; Rosemary Carroll; Willem Dafoe; Peggy DeCoursey; Georgia & Bill Delano; Anne Delaney & Steve Staso; Agnes Gund & Daniel Shapiro; Ada & Alex Katz; Mary and Dave Kite; The Estate of Kenneth Koch; Michel de Konkoly Thege; Vicki Hudspith & Wallace Turbeville; Jonathan Lasker; Katy Lederer; Mark McCain; Deborah Berg McCarthy & Michael McCarthy; Jerome & Diane Rothenberg; Jeannette Sanger; Hank O'Neal & VISUALS Shelley Shier; Simon Schuchat; Andre Spears; Peter & Susan Straub; The Harold & Alma White Memorial Fund; Joan Wilentz; COVER & INSIDE ART: ELIZABETH ZECHEL members of the Poetry Project; and other individual contributors..
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NEXT EPISODE(PERHAPS) •CHARLES BERNSTEIN ON ROBIN BLASER •AN INTERVIEW WITH HOWARD ZINN •REVIEWS OF ROBERT CREELY SPARROW / AMANDA NADELBERG JOE ELLIOT / PADCHA TUNTHA-OBAS ED ROBERSON / LYTLE SHAW SAMIH AL QASIM / ANNE PORTER
DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 3 that, like Scorcese’s The Departed, have more go at enlightenment. While you’re (8 deaths) Compose angry email to editor & Southie accents while actually being pro- here you oughta pick up a copy of every- send without proofreading (2 deaths). Blog duced in New York. Yet another reader thing they’ve published & see how it’s done about the sick passenger this morning (4 thinks maybe we ought to not be so glib for real real. deaths) and the new Important Book (3 about the lack of oral sex in Boston. deaths). Go get a slice (.16 tax = almost Everyone else who complained about the TO ERR IS LUNGFULL! another bullet). Go to reading. Such brave FROM THE DIRECTOR wrong people being mentioned in (or poems! (8 deaths) Have a smoke at the authoring) any of the Boston reports gets Please go back in time & distract the staff of break $2.11 tax/pack=10 bullets). Return to Dear Readers, our apologies & as a consolation prize: they the Poetry Project as they proofread the reading. Climber poet who once rejected As we go to press with the Poetry Project get to keep living in Boston with each other. Newsletter so that this announcment is you reads long (How’m I for time? Plenty of Newsletter in early November we are sad- Have fun! allowed to run: Lungfull!15 will arrive on time!) (12 deaths). Go out for drinks with dened by the news of Brad Will’s death. December 10 7pm. At Zinc (90 West friends. (42 deaths). Buy a round ($1.68 tax Many readers of the Newsletter will likely Houston, NYC). Full of rough drafts & let- = 8 bullets). Write a drunken collaborative recognize Brad as the journalist and activist SINGING SHANXING’S ters published without permission it will be poem that takes real risks (15 deaths). Get who was shot and killed by paramilitaries in PRAISES a night of mortal embarrassment for all. with cute poet in bar (25 deaths). Cab it Now’s your chance to give the finger to the Oaxaca, Mexico on Friday, October 27 Shanxing Wang's book Mad Science in back to cute poets apartment (8 deaths). while reporting for Indymedia.com, but editor of the Newsletter AND Lungfull! in Things get kind of foggy from here (102 The book table is a greatly anticipated part Imperial City from Futurepoem just won the unless you happened to know Brad – and NEW YEARS IRON MAN the same ergonomic gesture. of the event, a rare bookshop that manifests 2006 Asian American Literature Award for deaths). Wake up hungover. It’s New Years he did make a large number of friends dur- TRIATHALON ENDS IN one day per year, and we are counting on Poetry. Congratulations! There will be an Eve. It’s against the law to suggest you not ing his 36 years – you’re less likely to know DISASTER. POOR TRAINING, the generosity of poets, publishers and official awards ceremony at the Asian FROM THE EDITOR: pay war taxes. (Schiff v. United States that he was also a poet and musician who DEHYDRATION CITED. patrons to donate chapbooks, broadsides, Society on December 4th. THE DIRTY HAND (2005)). It is against the law to suggest you supported the arts and artists from the POETRY PROJECT RETURNS out of print classics or any other printed not sign up to fight or refuse to fight if you ground up. Brad hosted a terrific radio OF THE POET TO MARATHON FORMAT matter of interest. already signed up (Schenck v. United States, show that mixed music with live readings of 40 CHEERS FOR Morning already? (100 more deaths in Iraq 249 U.S. 47 (1919)). So I won’t. And neither poetry and fiction in the late nineties on Mice are popping out of the garbage cans We have a lot of poets and performers par- 40 YEARS OF while you slept). Shower, brush teeth, walk will the 500 people who died today, the 500 and flies are desperate to winter in Corrine’s Steal This Radio (a pirate radio station shut ticipating in the event for the first time this UNITED ARTISTS BOOKS to subway (21 deaths). Because of a sick pas- yesterday & the 500 tomorrow. On January hair. We’re going to get her a hair net, and down in 1998), worked as a stagehand and year as well as your some of your past senger at 34th Street…(18 deaths). Pick up 1, 2007 the toll will be 695,500. Happy New the mice, well, they’ve been blessed at St. favorites. We will have people stamping Founded as Angel Hair Books in 1967 lighting engineer in order to finance his coffee & bagel ($3 plus 24 cents tax. Round Year, ye who still live. Good job “opposing journalistic endeavors, and was a gracious Mark’s Celebration of Saint Francis of your hand “paid” so you can come and go they’ve been bringing great books down to of ammo in Iraq=21 cents of tax money). the war.” and generous reader, performer, audience Assisi, they’re peace loving. All these cues at leisure. earth from heaven since before a lot of us Go to job/class (210 deaths). Go home (10 member and volunteer at dozens of Poetry lead us to believe it’s time to start planning —Brendan Lorber Make a day of it with us, and remember, were born. Perhaps you were seduced from deaths). Open mail…rejected poems! (1 Project events over the years. He also had for our 33rd Annual New Year’s Day the Marathon can’t and won’t happen with- the bardo by their bards, lured back for one death) Check email (11 deaths). Read blogs sources: The Lancet, US OMB. strong ties with the Jack Kerouac School of Marathon Reading. Our email invitations out your help! Please be interested in vol- Disembodied Poetics, and was a good friend went out a week earlier than last year (we unteering or making a food or book dona- to many in the broader poetry community. revel in achieving simple goals) and the tion and email [email protected] or yeses are streaming in — see who will be 6 YEARS AGO Brad’s company was a pleasure and, as can call 212-674-0910. Thank you friends. reading so far in the calendar listing. It will be gathered by the many reports and trib- What is your pet aversion? take place on Monday, January 1st, 2007 —Stacy Szymaszek utes circulating on the web since his untime- from 2 pm till 2 am. Dale Smith: Working the room. ly and utterly unjustified death, he had a MUCH ADO Lila Zemborain: Cats. knack for bringing and tailing news of vari- As always, we are appealing to the commu- Jack Collum: Cats. 26 YEARS AGO ous kinds. I knew Brad as a person commit- nity for donations of labor, food and books. ABOUT BOSTON Edwin Torres: His name is Harry and I feed him a version of food. ted to direct action and devoted to the tene- The Marathon Reading is the Poetry At the Gotham book party for Maureen Owen’s new book, Hearts Unlike responses to other world news 12/2000 ments and community gardens of Project’s major fundraising event, and it reports, most complaints about Boston cov- in Space, George Schneeman told me he intended to write the Manhattan’s lower east side. His focus continues to take place thanks to the sup- erage revolve around who was mentioned 21 YEARS AGO newsletter a letter to the editor. He wanted to point out that Gary seemed, from a distance, to be sharpening port of writers, artists, musicians, publishers rather than who wasn’t. One notable excep- Lenhart’s comment at the end of his review of Ted Berrigan’s So all the time. At the 2006 New Year’s Day and vendors, and the very upright back- tion was our neglect of Derek Fenner’s role The Poetry Project is not great because Patti Smith started here, or Going Around Cities, that the George Schneeman drawings might Marathon he read from a longer prose piece bone of the event, volunteers. We need at as cohost of the Union Square Poetry because Yoko Ono was in a benefit, or because we are the living have been used differently, showed insight. As it turns out, the detailing his harrowing experiences docu- least 10 people an hour to make people Reading series in Somerville with Daniel canon, or the poetry revival is just around the corner, so you bet- drawings were intended for different points in the book. Mr. menting the plight of Brazilian squatters in wonder “how do they do it, it seems to have Bouchard. Perhaps Derek was enjoying the ter start watching now. We are not the only show in town, but we Schneeman [with Berrigan] had carefully chosen specific pages Goiania, Brazil, and a version of it organized itself?” That’s more than 100 vol- invisiblity among poets who would other- are the only show like this. For twenty years the version of with which to accompany specific poems and the publisher, with- can be read at the Boog City blog: unteers total over the course of the day. wise have harassed him for readings & now American poetry authorized by those who make it, gets play here. out consulting the artist, rearranged them to satisfy his own lay-out bradwillboogcity.blogspot.com/. Another Historically, the community response has we’ve blown it. Apologies both for the ini- needs. George just wanted to point out in this letter the disrespect site, www.friendsofbradwill.org/, has been equaled our resounding need so we hope tial omission & for the subsequent exposi- —Eileen Myles 1/1986 set up to spread the word about the circum- you will continue to be compelled by the tion. Another reader asserts our reports are that an artist’s work can suffer in an editor/publisher’s hands. Ron stances of Brad’s death and, by extension, promise of a poem or two or three opening “New York-centric” and suggests that we 12 YEARS AGO Padgett said George didn’t know how to write and probably would the political situation he was documenting your mind as well as by the aroma of Bob mention the Ibbetson Street Press, the Bagel never do it. Darius James went from being a panelist on the Revolutionary in Oaxaca – a situation Brad obviously and Don’s vegetarian chili and the exquisite Bards Anthology, the Out of the Blue —Greg Masters 12/1980 Poetry Symposium to a guest reader on The Jon Stewart Show believed demanded greater attention from melt of Gillian’s Oreo Truffles in your Gallery series, the Lizard Lounge open the world. A clear way to honor Brad’s life mouth. Your senses will be frenzied! We will mike, Club Passim's Poetry theatre, and the in honor of Banned Book Week. No, he wasn’t reading from and death is to look closely then, and move be accepting donations of other food to sell Cantab slam as examples of readings that Negrophobia, he was reading from Doris day’s autobiography forward from there. as well. Sadly, with the closing of Second are the real Boston events. Never! Oh shit, which was recently banned from a public library in California… Avenue Deli, we will be without the W.H. —Anselm Berrigan we just did. But from now on we’re comit- —Gillian McCain 12/1994 Auden Tuna Mold. Tuna mold anyone? ted to coverage of no events except those
4 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 5 NEW ORLEANS WORLD NEWS CINCINNATI ALBANY TUCSON THE BAY PROVIDENCE LOUISIANA HEADQUARTERS OHIO NEW YORK ARIZONA AREA RHODE ISLAND the “art” in the mensroom. OK. The walls were painted a day-glo mer here, meaning fog—then brilliant sun. Kyger’s work is like that THE TWIN CHICAGO SEATTLE THE PHILADELPHIA BROOKLYN PETALUMA CITIES ILLINOIS WASHINGTON CATSKILLS PENNSYLVANIA NEW YORK CALIFORNIA orange and someone had drawn an abstract shape in bright blue sun which keeps appearing and offering us another inclination to over one of the urinals. True found op art (I’m still seeing the trac- wake up. ers). I wonder what they’ll find on their bus tour? Laynie Browne’s eldest son wants to initiate legislation to protect the lives C.E. Putnam lives in Seattle, WA. Crawlspace is coming!
6 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 7 the series which is nationally renowned. This coming year, the Poetry Center will feature readings and classes with Albert Goldbarth; Jimmy Santiago Baca; Carolyn Forché; Naomi Shihab DAVE BRINKS IN priately about the weather, but we knew something was up. They Nye; Tracie Morris; Next Word poets Srikanth Reedy, Joshua told us they were the Wave Poetry Bus and flashed around a lot of Marie Wilkinson, Deborah Bernhardt, and Brian Turner; as well NEW ORLEANS, LA as Native Voices, a symposium of poets who write in indigenous money that later proved to be mostly rolls of KFC coupons. We the caveat onus ::: one hundred and fourteen the caveat onus ::: one hundred and twenty didn’t trust them but we loved them. It is our duty as languages. Midwesterners to love the beings of earth. Tucson is a thriving locale for small presses and journals. Richard a hurricane blows in from the south pulled down from a knowledge Sponsored by ordinary local citizens working for such ideologi- Siken, who was last year’s Yale Younger Poet, (and also won the a wide flat river sits down in the room whose eye is the moon cally pristine organizations as the Walker Art Center and Rain Lambda Literary Award this year, as well as the Thom Gunn now it’s a year later and Mina asks there’s no need to properly introduce Taxi, some poets of Minneapolis (including Chris Fishbach, award), is co-editor, with Drew Burk, of Spork, a terrific magazine “When did the storm come?” myself to myself Amanda Nadelberg, Brian Engel, G. E. Patterson, Kelly Everding with incredible “production values.” Cue is edited by Morgan “Did it come when you & Mommy were little?” the moan is in the oak tree’s crotch and yours truly) collaborated on a reading with the interlopers. Schuldt, and is a simple and elegant journal (a black dress with back in Natchez last Sept the answers the watermarks from the storm Incidentally, guns were banned at diamonds) publishing work by to our own questions seemed further away are nearly invisible now the reading. important contemporaries. The Paul & Beth & Andy & Khaled & I whether I am alive or not Sonora Review is the longest running sat at a table in the Under the Hill Saloon is no longer a guess For each performance, a student edited poetry journal in the trying to figure out where the rest of our friends were what’s your neighborhood look like Minneapolis poet held hands with country and has a great sense of the it was around that time born raised and hope to die here a Wave Poetry Bus poet, in a show moment. The latest issue has a the days of the week had names is what most New Orleanians say of solidarity. The poets read in the beautiful piece of conceptual art on but I couldn’t tell you which one it was and you can see it for miles outdoor sculpture garden, inside its cover and spine. The under- the museum, in the auditorium, graduates here also produce a mag- even in the rest rooms. But then azine, Persona. the caveat onus ::: one hundred and eighteen the caveat onus ::: one hundred and twenty-three Kelly Everding’s poem “Puppet for Lenny Emmanuel Corrupter” scared the hell out of Long a flower of Tucson, is Charles I’ve become an expert at self-hypnosis everybody. Afterward the usual Alexander’s Chax Press, which my fingers feel like Edgar Allen Poe summer goes by simple as a hello hyperbolic rumors surfaced – that publishes poetry of the avant- beating time with a coffin lid the light entering the holes in my head several audience members had been bleeding from the eyes. The garde. This year’s big books for sometimes it takes all day seems brighter crowd diminished. But the Minneapolis poets had already been Charles were Linh Dinh’s American Tatts and Tenney Nathanson’s to realize it’s not a bad trip I dress myself up in a hammock for the afternoon “brilliant.” That is a direct quote from an ordinary citizen. Erased Art. Nathanson teaches in the English Department at the University and is a primary force in POG, an alternative poetry water where the swell says heavy things everything that’s gone Later, deep in the silver gallery, there was an amazing pop art group which hosts readings and other activities. children calling their mother goes on from a distance influenced foodfight, that in its pastiche use of pop art instantly stairwell filled with cement chunks & dirt today I’m staring at childhood pictures Tucson is also home to Kore Press, which publishes handmade became super postmodern. Then it got awesomer. The real poet- a pink & purple scooter looking for clues and trade editions by women. Kore’s catalogue represents a diver- ry started. We trudged waist deep in snow to a speakeasy beneath put a candle between your eyes rise up carcass and walk sity of aesthetics and their projects include broadsides, chapbooks, the 394 overpass. It was all improv. It was all silver. blow the flame out put on your finest robes an essay pamphlet series, and, recently, a first book prize. you are a ghost in splendid form Eventually the mayor of Minneapolis, using an elaborate system the storm’s been gone a year an arithmetic of wind & water of mirrors and a revolving stage and wearing a really hot black The MFA program at the University of Arizona, founded in 1974, and that’s a third of my daughter’s life twisting under the trees jumpsuit, made the poetry bus disappear. We don’t know where includes nationally known writers Richard Shelton, Alison they are now. And since that night, I’ve kept my distance from Deming and Fenton Johnson. The UA also has poets Barbara poetry. In fact, this may be my last report. Several people in “the Cully, Boyer Rickel, Luci Tapahonso, and Ofelia Zepeda on hand. the caveat onus ::: one hundred and nineteen the caveat onus ::: one hundred and twenty-four community” have expressed the feeling that an evil presence has Among Creative Writing’s major attractions is Jane Miller, who surfaced. We know that poetry still happens in our city, but now last year lectured on Federico Garcia Lorca for the Poetry Center it’s natural & exciting to be alert born from an unnatural scenery we have larger concerns – security. We’ve become obsessively and Tucson Writers’ Project’s Poetry Lecture Series. This year Jane the duck quacks seen from all sides worried about poets crossing the Canadian Border. And we’re won the Audre Lorde Award. the lizard ambles through leafy cover the dog chases its tongue inside this house without floors or walls considering building a snow fence. Now let’s all get back to work. Tucson has any number of poetry bloggers, including but not lim- I too am the product of my own turn in any direction ited to: Kristi Maxwell (oar), Morgan Lucas Schuldt (A Peek of John Colburn has 3 jobs: Editor for Spout Press, instructor at the Perpich catalog of survival stand on the front porch Reach), Stephanie Balzer (Textisle), Ann M. Fine (Epistle Center for Arts Education and oppressor of Dobby Gibson. my vocabulary did this to me note the crepe myrtles’ growth Whipped), Rodney Phillips (elephan’twirl), Richard Siken (Aye, there are no medium-sized emotions inspect the limbs that are without flower Wobot). remove the leaves near both storm drains RODNEY PHILLIPS AND FRANCES SJOBERG IN how does your family The annual Tucson Poetry Festival is more than 25 years old now, spend the afternoon for the unobstructed flow of water TUCSON, AZ and presents an exciting roster of poets every year. Casa Libre en becalmed or not becalmed retrace your steps la Solana, an inn for writers, widens Tucson’s aperture by provid- the waves coming up between the sidewalk and the curb For all of the obvious reasons, we don’t want to say that Tucson is ing residencies and affordable accommodations for writers. then sweeping them away there are only two paths a literary oasis, but, well, it’s kind of a literary oasis. Tucson is the Hola! one is a flatboat going by over my head most beautiful and least spoiled (this last being a relative term) of Arizona’s two major cities. Since 1960, The University of Arizona Frances Sjoberg is Literary Director and Rodney Phillips is Librarian at Dave lives in New Orleans with his wife Megan Burns and their two Poetry Center has provided a poetry library and, since 1962, has the University of Arizona Poetry Center, Tucson. kids, Mina and Blaise. presented a series of free readings. Over 500 writers have read in 8 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 9 because the humor worked masterfully to offset the dry lines and the peppers from the broiler. Place them in a brown paper bag. the dreadful lines (and these poems are full of sin and dread). Shake them gently. Then refrigerate the peppers for 15 minutes. Looking over his reading glasses, Fuller’s poem tumbled to its Peel and chop. Set aside. DAVID PAVELICH IN close – “For covetousness is all.” 3. In your chili pot, heat the extra virgin olive oil. Chop the garlic Room of Never Grieve. Allen Ginsberg was generous enough to let CHICAGO, IL David Pavelich is a librarian at the University of Chicago. and the onions and sauté them in the oil (DO NOT BURN Wilcox raffle off photos of him for a local charity. YOUR GARLIC!). Add the salt and a pepper and half of the As we conversed, Wilcox looked me up in his archive. Within vodka. When the onions are translucent, add the chopped roast- To me – a squinting and griping Mr. Magoo – the defining feature moments, he produced an image from nearly five years ago, when MATT HART IN ed peppers, the cumin, the crushed red pepper, ? cup of chopped of Danny’s Tavern is darkness. I groped, I stumbled, I hum- I was presenting Anselm and Edmund Berrigan at the now cilantro, and 2-3 quarter wedges of lime. Sauté for another 2-3 bugged. Beer in hand, I tripped up the step that leads to level two, defunct Loft. I don’t recall there being a camera in the room, yet CINCINNATI, OH minutes. and saw a tiny spotlight shining on a bar stool. “So this is where there I am, a bit younger, a bit greener, caught in the moment. Autumn has arrived, and here in Cincinnati (a.k.a. the Queen City William Fuller will read,” I thought as I sipped the foam. It was 4. Over the next 10 minutes or so, have some drinks (I prefer beer, Wilcox’s overarching goal with his collection has always been to of the West, a.k.a. Porkopolis, a.k.a. Forklift, Ohio—official home Wednesday, September 13. but again, you know what you like). Then add, at your leisure, in share his images. He is in the process of putting together a pro- of Poetry, Cooking, and Light Industrial Safety) all the poetry talk the following order: the tomatoes with juice (if using whole toma- Then a surprise: in the violent flash of my digital camera I dis- posal to have them made into a book that celebrates the many is centered (as it is every year at this time) on only one thing— toes, tear them into smallish chunks with your hands), the beans, covered that Danny’s walls are plaid – a shocking plaid of Pepto poets who take the mic to share their ideas with the world. CHILI! oregano, sugar, cocoa, cinnamon and the rest of the vodka. pink, black, and lemon-lime green on a cornflower ground. And His collection is an amazing resource for poets who want to So here it is, from our city to yours, Eric Appleby & Tricia Suit’s Simmer 45-60 minutes. If the chili becomes too thick, just add at Danny’s, in the heart of Bucktown, everyone sits on toadstools rewind time and visit a past event. It is not simply evidence of recently declassified recipe for Oktober Revolution Chili. Enjoy. water. (and the smokers were straight out of Lewis Carroll), except for what has happened, but a reminder that poetry is active and will the bravest of the latecomers who actually sat on the gritty floor of 3 Tbl extra virgin olive oil 5. Serve with shredded cheddar cheese, sour cream, chopped always be happening. the bar that night. I was on a toadstool in a kind of cubby, sur- 6-8 cloves of garlic cilantro, lime wedges and your favorite cornbread and cold beer. rounded by friends, staring at a motionless Mylar star balloon that You can reach Dan Wilcox at [email protected]. 2 yellow onions Matt Hart is the executive director of the Greater Cincinnati Chili Council. was stuck at the juncture of the wall and the ceiling. 1 bunch fresh cilantro Erik Sweet lives in Albany, N.Y. where he just made a nice pot of iced Before poet Michael Theune opened with his comic aphorisms, dash salt & black pepper green tea. He also co-edits Tool a Magazine (toolamagazine.com) and is Joel Craig, one of the Danny’s Series founders, began the evening 1 tsp cumin seed ERIK SWEET IN co-organizer of Behind the Egg, a monthly reading series. with a sad announcement. John Beer, longtime co-curator of the 1 tsp crushed red pepper 2 Tbl dried oregano (or use fresh to taste) ALBANY, NY series, is moving to New York City. The reading, then, opened SPARROW IN properly with Beer reading his work to a cheering crowd, and 1 Tbl white sugar If a poet sees a flash in Albany, chances are good that Dan Wilcox everyone wished him luck with their clapping. Still, from darkness 1 tsp unsweetened cocoa is behind the lens. While Wilcox cannot be described as The Flash THE CATSKILLS comes light, and we were happy to learn that Chris Glomski, 1/2 tsp cinnamon (according to my research, that moniker goes to Jay Garrick), author of Transparencies Lifted from Noon (MEB/Spuyten Duyvil), is 1/2 cup VODKA! since moving to the city over two decades ago he has been a tire- Damien T. Toman, 24, is a poet, musician and journalism student. joining Joel Craig in coordinating this series. 2 limes, quartered less presence on the Albany poetry scene. I interviewed him recently, under a linden tree. 3 red bell peppers William Fuller’s reading promoted the publication of his fifth Wilcox is the proud owner of what he refers to as, “the world’s Sparrow: Perhaps we can discuss your new band. 1-2 habanero peppers book, Watchword, published by Chicago’s own Flood Editions largest collection of unknown poet photographs.” The snapshots 2 Anaheim peppers Toman: The new band, we call it The Stratford Brats. It currently (www.floodeditions.com). Straight off we were amazed – Fuller’s are taken the old fashioned way and filed neatly in boxes accord- 1-2 jalapeno peppers consists of my wife Dorothy and myself. And the pretext for the reading style had an edgy quickness (reminiscent of Tom ing to date, name, and venue. By his estimation, the collection 1 lg. & 1 reg. can whole or diced tomatoes (with the juice) band is to play knockoffish late-’70s punk rock with lyrics directly Raworth’s), which transformed his short poems into nearly includes over 8,000 shots. Here, among his boxes, local poets and 2 cans pinto beans, rinsed lifted from the works of Shakespeare. ephemeral pieces, thrown off like parade candy. A short seven- up-and-comers rub shoulders with luminaries like Lawrence 1 can black beans, rinsed Sparrow: And who’s going to sing? couplet poem like Fuller’s “Traherne” – named for the 17th cen- Ferlinghetti and Allen Ginsberg. 1. Play some cooking music. Here in Toman: Dorothy is going to do the lead tury English poet Thomas Traherne The man behind the lens also plays an Cincinnati all the poets are talking singing, and I may do backup vocals. who wrote lines like, “My naked sim- active role in organizing Albany’s open about the new Ornette Coleman ple life was I” – was nearly outrun by mic readings. Wilcox’s latest offering is Sparrow: So what’s the goal of your record, Sound Grammar, and also Yo La the poet’s voice. It may be that this held every third Thursday at the Social Shakespearean punk band? Tengo’s latest offering, I Am Not Afraid of rendition is fitting, because “Traherne” Justice Center, located at 33 Central You and I Will Beat Your Ass. But the real Toman: The goal, I suppose, is both is a beautifully balanced poem about Avenue. Each summer, he runs the deal is Extra Golden’s OK-OYOT SYS- personal and social. Dorothy comes our brief moment on earth: “Clouds Poets in the Park series, held in TEM. Extra Golden, who just played from a highly trained theatrical back- Air / Light Rain seemed tending / and Washington Park near the statue of last week at Publico Gallery (where the ground — where she holds her B.A. gliding toward poles of / self-preserva- lyric-poet Robert Burns. tion.” Clay Poetry Series readings are held) from — and I recently decided to end tore the place apart. Even the hipsters Wilcox is also part of a collaboration my individual musical pursuits, But when Fuller read his prose poem were shaking their butts. Of course, if called 3 Guys from Albany. Their mis- because they were making me antiso- “Ode (At Work),” his rapid delivery none of this sounds good to you, pick sion is to travel to the 18 towns, cities, cial. I decided that if I’m to continue enhanced the poem’s vying elements instead of outrunning them. your own damn music. You know what you like. or villages named Albany in the U.S. and perform their poetry. So playing music, it needs to be in the context of a band, and that I’d Perhaps more than any poem performed that night, “Ode” incor- far, they’ve visited over half of them. Founding member Tom be happiest if I didn’t have to write lyrics, because my lyrics Now for the main event: porated a full spectrum from Fuller’s lexical paint box: finance Nattell passed away last year, but Wilcox and Charlie Rossiter will depress me, as well as the listener. Dot mentioned offhandedly (“And thanks to our partners in Attrition Management”), 17th cen- 2. Cut in half, remove seeds, and roast in a broiler the red bell continue the quest. that she didn’t care if we had to borrow the lyrics from tury English (“And take this bloodstained broadsheet”), the basics peppers, habanero(s – if you want the chili really friggin’ hot), Shakespeare — and I thought about that for a moment, and decid- Some poets who have noticed Wilcox’s flashbulbs have kept in in modern living (“And do I smell bacon?”). Importantly, the Anaheim peppers, and jalapenos (again, watch the heat). When ed it was too brilliant to pass on. contact with him, requesting photos after the events. Anne humor in these poems became even clearer. I say importantly the skins of the peppers turn black (about 10-15 minutes), remove Waldman used one of his images in her recent collection, In the Sparrow: Do you think Shakespeare was punk?
10 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 11 how what we ingest helps or hinders our experience with making made me cut for space If people hate me they have to let me poems, hoping to find newer and NEWER understandings about know. Don’t keep your hate of me to yourself, it’s bad for you. ourselves, to understand the best food for the best poems. We’ll be Besides, I have VERY thick skin! using 9 different gem stones to toss onto a Philadelphia map to Toman: No. I have my qualms with Shakespeare, in the same way CAConrad has a new project which you can see online: TISA BRYANT IN grip a new understanding of location-poem-gem, the properties of I have my qualms with Mozart, in that everything that he did, he http://DEVIANCE4U.blogspot.com gem to location. At Logan Circle Fountain we will meditate Reiki did commercially. But at the same time, he was philosophically PROVIDENCE, RI Energy onto one another and write another collaborative poem. extraordinarily well-rounded, and every view that he had in mind, We’ll investigate the INCREDIBLE trees of the city, and how EDMUND BERRIGAN This report of Providence’s literary activity takes the form of a he presented thoroughly and beautifully. touching them, being with them taps into poetry. We’ll go to review capsule: breaking news rewound in slow-motion, as shot Sparrow: What is the function of your poetry? Benjamin Franklin’s first library to create INSTANT poems with IN BROOKLYN, NY through a wistful eye that missed as much as it saw. Toman: My goal as a poet now is, in random book choices from the Fall is here in South Slope, & the poems are rejoicing. The fall of (Missed: Jennifer Moxley and Jennifer Martenson, the staged a very real sense, to erase the shelves. SO MANY OTHER civilization? No, not yet, just some strategic teetering on the part adaptation of Kevin Young’s Black Maria poems at the Providence metaphor from poetry. I’m trying to THINGS WE WILL DO! Also we of the nuclear jerks. The fall of the republican party, the party of Black Repertory Theatre, Kate Schapira’s poetry parties, Jen write poetry that directly presents its will work on drafting a missionary Lincoln, etc? No, not really, they’ll just be hanging around in sec- Tynes and Erica Carpenter at Myopic Books, Mark McMorris at message, however facile and inane statement aiding EVERYONE we ond place until a Democrat gets caught with their pants down, vir- Brown, Mairead Byrne, everywhere, the whole time I lived there!) know to be as creative as possible, as that message is. tual or otherwise, and then the trend will reverse, to be reversed The review capsule is also perfect for the limbic space I now occu- THIS is what we have GOT to GET again and again until several someones have the heart to buck our py, barely two months transplanted from Providence to New Sparrow: Are you replacing to in order to make the Real Changes grand lack of vision. The fall of Atheism, Christianity, Islam, York. I went back to ol’ PVD September 23rd 2006 for the The metaphor with something else? needed in this disintegrating world we Judaism, et al? Well, if you don’t believe in something, can it fall? Encyclopedia Project’s launch party for Vol. 1 A-E, at space all Love SO FUCKING MUCH! Toman: I’m replacing metaphor with We’re all about nihilist gravity in south slope, or at least I am, and AS220, featuring readings by Popahna Brandes, Melissa Buzzeo, Missionaries for self actualization, for impartial observation. (I was tempt- my cats would probably agree, or else bite each other on the Mary Cappello, Matt Derby, Brian Evenson, Renee Gladman and the TRUE FUCKING GIFTS each ed to refer to it as “journalistic poet- spine. But no, I don’t think a belief can fall, since it’s not an object. EE Miller, wry fun music by Sara Jaffe, the lovely sounds of the human being has within! Poetry as one ry.”) I believe that especially with A believer (or non) sure can fall though, and there’s a lot of that band Callers, a rather champagne-soaked celebrity play by of the best weapons in a fascist regime! our language being as advanced and to go around, but violence is only and always violence, solving Encyclo editor Kate Schatz, the curly specter created by the complex as it is, there is positively Recently I dreamt that there was a nothing. So no outs for our moral, political, religious straits here, absence of Encyclo editor Miranda Mellis, aided and abetted by nothing that cannot be described. poetry library in Philadelphia, and forsooth. the scent of delicious fruit pies baked by Encyclo editor Joanna Baudelaire said about his mentor, to Cathleen Miller (the AMAZING Of course it should be winter by the time you peruse of this report. Howard. Surely I toot the horn for the fantastic project I also co- whom he devoted his Les fleurs du Cathleen Miller) was the librarian. Yet Fall is here still in South Slope nonetheless (South Slope not edit, but the event was wonderful, and made me sad to no longer mal, that he had such a grasp of the But she was more than a librarian, she being on the neighborhood maps, I take great license in its live in the city. It reminded me of AS220 just two months prior, French language that he never need- was the keeper of an extraordinary expanse). The leaves are falling, the wind is blowing, paper is during an impromptu show by Dave Rawlings and Gillian Welch, ed to resort to making comparisons door, I mean literally a door with liv- falling to the floor from the table, and we’re picking up some of it intimately peopled by many of the same blissfully swaying poets — alluding to one picture by painting ing coral and crustaceans bubbling on to see what it says. and writers (Tod Edgerton, Jen Haley, Nicole Terez, Lynn Xu, another. And I think it’s frightful if its surface. Everyone seemed to be Sarah Madsen) whose presence girded almost all the literary every passion we feel needs to be enjoying the library. When I asked Here’s one: a bill from the IRS. I’ll put it back down—I prefer to events Providence offered in the land of spectacular maples, his- communicated in terms of this vul- Cathleen if we could have a Chocolate conduct my own internal revenue. Here’s some more: a wedding toric houses and fine gatherings. Thanks to the efforts of Mike garly, blindly accepted language of metaphor. Especially when we Conservatory she seemed happy about the idea, and what I invitation, some copies of YAWP magazine, and a copy of 1602, a Magee and Michael Gizzi, the Downcity Poetry Series provided a drag the most majestic aspects of nature, for instance, into the remember of the dream fizzles out in that conversation for the Marvel graphic novel in which characters from the so-called succession of such events, thankfully attended by a variety of muck of our own feelings. new CHOCOLATE wing. Oh, and I was wearing sandals, which Marvel Universe are recast as if living in 1602. Providence’s schools of fish, as well as those who swim freely with- I write poems that are often about the little things I’m experienc- I never wear, which makes me suspicious of everything now, but, What about us in that light? Would our president be a prince or out academic affiliation. I especially liked observing people who ing within myself, but I try to describe them with the pettiness that no less happy. Learning to be suspicious and happy at the same king in 1602? Or a soldier perhaps? I’m guessing draft-dodging were at the venue, Tazza, sitting at the bar, for reasons complete- they deserve. time might be the real lesson of the dream. and non combat status were harder to attain back in ye olde ly unrelated to hearing, say, Anne Waldman’s impassioned aria, I world, & political power had not quite the same substance. Would want to straaaangle George Bush, Mary Burger’s treatise on passion Damien’s recent book of poems, &c., may be ordered for two dol- Joseph Massey JUST came to Philadelphia to read from his FAN- he be a poet, perhaps, then a more prestigious and less bloody and the existence of the universe vis-à-vis Yoko Ono, or Gary lars from: Damien T. Toman 41 Howland Ave. Kingston, NY TASTIC new book Property Line (fewfurpress.blogspot.com)! We occupation. I imagine myself to be a minstrel, if not a toad, and a Lutz, reading what I can only describe as “very bodily” stories 12401 miss seeing him in Philadelphia, now that he’s moved to California. And he read with one of Philly’s newest resident poets, blind one as glasses technology was not quite up to par yet. What from crumpled sheets produced from his front pocket. The facial Sparrow is quickly growing tired of wind chimes. the one, the only, the fucking wild-ASSED swami-animal-totem- would you be doing, dear reader? Hunting game to help your expressions among the incidental audience were at once puzzled, namer poet DOROTHEA LASKY! Have you ever heard her family survive? Or perhaps already in the afterlife, due to some intrigued, and occasionally scandalized, not unlike those on the incurable condition (influenza), or some unchecked emotion that faces of the evening’s more intentional audience. I’d wonder, CACONRAD IN read? CHECK YOUR LISTINGS! Missing Dorothea (Dottie as she likes to be called) is like missing an essential part of yourself, got the better of you (or someone else). “Why aren’t we all friends here?” But then we were, weren’t we, Providence? I remember a Trinity Rep dress rehearsal of WWII- PHILADELPHIA, PA poets! She will give you an animal totem if you ask. She said to Well, alas or thankfully, we’re all still here, stuck in the present (to me, “CAConrad, yes, you are flamingo!” HEHEHE! Oh, I era Hamlet with Wendy Walters, and marveling at how her mind Soon you will be hearing more about PHILADELPHIA each their own). Deception and news are intertwined like a thorn- LOVE that! And of course I’m hoping to be a plastic one, in a works its way through poetic forms and stages. I remember SUPERNATURAL CITY POETRY WORKSHOPS where I bush and rose growing from a cold and buried heart (or so trailer park! But her BOOM at the microphone is really a poet/actor Nehessaiu deGannes’ indignance in Lorca’s The House take groups into the subway to write a collaborative poem on the Barbara Allen told me). I’ll likely be taking a walk in the cemetery BOOM, it’s Janis Joplin meets Mina Loy! She’s chocolate and of Bernarda Alba at the Black Rep. I remember sitting under a tree floor of moving cars IN THE VIBRATION, then up to the feet soon with my friend, checking out the Fall that I prefer, left up to whiskey, good whiskey, and she’s going to leave you thinking with Khalil Huffman, wondering where we’d all end up, wonder- of William Penn’s statue atop city hall for a 360 view of where gravity and wind, covering the already covered bodies in more about PLENTY of things you had no idea you would be thinking ing what it would all look like from the outside. words kaleidoscope back at you INTO you AS they ARE you! colorful and transient clutter. about, and leave you wanting much more! Tisa Bryant is a poet. We’ll be eating and drinking all through the workshops, discussing Edmund Berrigan is currently transitioning from Quark to Indesign. There’s always so much I forget and more that the cruel editor 12 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 13 world (outside the classroom) & all its 40’s, was another form of Stalinism. prominence and power, claiming to be bloody turbulence and contradiction, have “new” but actually carrying the very But just as Langston Hughes and William been systematically kicked to the curb. ancient baggage of minority rule. Carlos Williams were in the Real World. The literary establishment has always tried Likewise writers like Henry Dumas, Ed Amiri Baraka has two books oncoming. Tales of to do this, but there has always been a par- Dorn, Larry Neal and Charles Olson were The Out & The Gone: short stories WHY MOST POETRY allel movement by those artists concerned also in the real world. In fact DuBois was (Akashic) Jan 07 and Digging: The Afro with transforming the world by trying to excluded (just as those other writers I men- American Soul of American Classical IS SO BORING, create an alternative superstructure. The tion are) from the Britannica’s list of the Mussic (Agincourt) Spring 07. His play generation of the 60’s were exploding in “100 Greatest Writers in The World” for the Dutchman is being revived where it began: AGAIN reaction to the pit of abstruse irrelevance reason that like those other writers he Cherry Lane Theater NYC in Jan 07 the academic conservative, often stooped to talk about the real world. The Anglophilic literature that dominated in the institutions, publications, media of the BY AMIRI BARAKA 50’s which co existed with and was a bourgeois superstructure influence and dic- microcosm of the vicious backwardness of tate to artists and intellectuals that art McCarthyism. should not be used to directly transform society, but is more profound when it is a You look at these various chapbooks and magazines, with wild As the poet Michael Pingarron sd, in a poem defending me (Big In part such a literary trend, in itself, was a solipsistic individual gratification, a mantra titles, titles that announce that the titlers think they’re “way out,” Hammer, 4/05) “we’re free to speak/provided we keep our mouths repudiation of the socially engaged and of the grand isolated elitism of aesthetic bil- with “work” inside that these same folks and their “critical” exten- shut.” experimental writing of the 20’s and 30’s, lionaires. sions think is “the cat’s pajamas.” But if, like me, you receive maybe just as McCarthyism was a “correction” to In the case(s) I speak of, poetry has become the devil’s tail waggling a hundred such works per year, what you notice is that after a few the red 30’s and the US war against Nazi The “Thermidor” to the revolutionary peri- flashily out of Bush’s behind, like Gerald 2X’s 60’s devil cartoons. minutes of perusal or a few more if there’s some sign of life, you can fascism which hoisted expectations of a post od is being insufficiently resisted by all of One wonders, is it still called “high art?” Now too high to deal with close the opus with out much reflection. war progressive democracy. But the retro- us, particularly the artists. Ironically, the the angst and pain and ignorance of the real world – though cer- grade superstructure and political fortress of civil rights and anti imperialist movements The crux is that we’re caught between two trends tainly an obtuse registry of it. Content with the monopoly capitalism opposed such ideal- of that period have, at worst, enabled a class which are actually forces. The dialectic of the world masturbatory inoffensiveness of an actual loyal ism. BeBop, one anti progressive sd in the of neo-con slackers to step into positions of permits not only of the objective, the actual, the opposition, inferred loudly as “deep” intellectual- real, world, but also of subjective, distorted reflec- “we’re free to ism. Childish feints at surrealism, useless abstrac- tions of that objective reality. tion, jokey pop art, inside jokes for the speak/provided uncognoscenti, all pass as, wow, poetry! Of course, reality itself, though diverse, can still be objectively determined in terms of the exact context we keep our For all the self hype that such posturing is “far of time, place and condition. Mao sd that art is an mouths shut.” out,” in reality it is all the way in. As Brecht sd, ideological reflection of the world in the mind of the how much safer is abstract red, because it does not artist. The key phrase here is “ideological reflec- have to “take sides,” like blood pumping out of tion.” What you think is what you see. But then the the slain worker’s chest. Duchamps commode is measure of sanity must be how close one’s perception & rational- in the most revered of bourgeois showplaces, and, after a brief shuf- ization of the world corresponds to objective reality. fle of recognition, the banks much prefer abstraction, pop art, the weirder the better, so that there are no living images of this hell we The bourgeois intellectual (or to place it at the level of bar room inhabit. dialogue) viz. most of these dull ass writers, eschew the actual for some tamponed version which pleasures their ideological & socio- Part of the impetus of the Black Arts Movement, created after psychological persona. Malcolm X’s murder by the same forces that control the white house today, was that we wanted an art that actually reflected the Another, more or less spontaneous aspect of this dullness includes culture & feeling of the Afro-American people, and by extension the desire to be “included” in the social diarrheic of the society’s what existed in America itself. An art that wd come out of the class- value and meaning. This isn’t limited to “Academic Cowards of rooms & elitist dens of obscurity & help move the masses of peo- Reaction” — the title of a poem of mine about e.g., the conjurers of ple to revolutionary positions. the phrase “post modern” which cd only mean a society in retro- grade, where the believers in such are passive road warriors of Today, that movement & its paradigm are either covered or reviled, tenured security. They provide answers to the Bushmen’s need for usually by establishment call persons. One such person sd he did- “intellectual” justification for the march to fascism. n’t know anything about the Black Arts Movement but he was sure Black people didn’t dig it! But these kinds of attacks are not just This would include certain babbling crypto-Babbits – of the so aimed at the BAM – also targeted are the most moving arts of that called L*A*N*G*U*A*G*E poets whose theoretical quasi “Left” generation of whatever nationality (e.g., The Beats, SF School, masquerade seeks to obscure a limp conservatism that opposes Black Mountain, New York School). The whole generation that political activism by artists (e.g., Ginsberg) as “an impossible ideol- formed an active United Front against boring academia are dissed ogy.” And with that construe their dullness to be profoundly arty. directly by the New York Times in their critiques of Frank O’Hara There is certainly the blunt consideration of “being safe,” not rock- and Ginsberg. The entire generation of artists who actually worked ing career, academic, employment, boats by “saying something.” to register some understanding of “the great outdoors” i.e., the real
14 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 15 EVENTS AT THE POETRY PROJECT WEDNESDAY 12/13 Since I Moved In is forthcoming from Chax Press Penetralia, and Hidden Proofs. From 1987 to MARK PAWLAK & BILL ZAVATSKY WEDNESDAY 1/3 in 2006. He edits EOAGH: A Journal of the Arts 1997 Roberto Tejada lived and worked in Mexico DECEMBER Mark Pawlak is the author of five poetry collec- JANUARY JOANNA FUHRMAN & DAVID SHAPIRO and acts as a curator for the Segue Reading City where he founded the journal Mandorla: New tions, most recently, Official Versions. He is the Joanna Fuhrman is the author of three books of Series. Other recent work has been published by Writing From the Americas, a forum for advanced MONDAY 12/4 editor of four anthologies, most recently, MONDAY 1/1 poetry published by Hanging Loose Press, Freud Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs, Faux Press/e, and poetry and translation. He teaches Art History, RODNEY KOENEKE & ARTHUR SZE Present/Tense: Poets in the World, an anthology in Brooklyn, Ugh Ugh Ocean and Moraine. She has Transgender Tapestry. Theory, and Criticism at the University of Rodney Koeneke is the author of Musee of contemporary American political poetry. He 33RD ANNUAL an essay forthcoming in Burning Interiors: The California, San Diego, where he is faculty in the Mechanique and Rouge State. Empires of the also co-edited Shooting the Rat: Outstanding NEW YEAR’S DAY Poetry and Poetics of David Shapiro. Recent WEDNESDAY 1/17 Visual Arts Department. He is the author of the Mind: I.A. Richards and Basic English in China is Poems and Stories by High School Writers, the MARATHON READING poems have appeared in Conduit, American KAMAU BRATHWAITE & SUSAN HOWE Gift & Verdict, Amulet Anatomy, and Mirrors for a souvenir from his History days that’s unlikely third in a series of anthologies drawn from the Letters and Commentary and Traffic. David Kamau Brathwaite is an internationally celebrat- Gold. to have much bearing on this reading. He has celebrated high school section of Hanging Loose (2 PM – 2 AM) Shapiro is the author of thirty books of poetry ed poet, performer, and cultural theorist. His recently left San Francisco for Portland, OR. magazine, of which he has been an editor since with John Coletti, Erica Kaufman, Jenny Smith, Dael and criticism. He recently wrote Rabbit/Duck with book The Zea Mexican Diary (1993) was the FRIDAY 1/26 Arthur Sze is the author of eight books of poet- 1980. Bill Zavatsky has published two collec- Orlandersmith, Edwin Torres, Chris Martin, Anne Tardos, Richard Hell and his New and Selected Poems is Village Voice Book of the Year. Some of his many UP IS UP, BUT SO IS DOWN ry, most recently Quipu, The Silk Dragon: tions of poems, Theories of Rain and Other Tracey McTague, Rebecca Moore, Nina Karacosta, Bob forthcoming from Overlook Press. He co-edited works include Middle Passages, Ancestors, and (10:30 PM) Hershon, Filip Marinovic, Wanda Phipps, Shanxing Wang, Contributors Maggie Dubris, Richard Hell, Eileen Translations from the Chinese, The Redshifting Poems and Where X Marks the Spot. His co- John Giorno, Jen Benka, Tim Peterson, Michael Scharf, R. the Anthology of New York Poets with Ron The Development of Creole Society, 1770-1820. Web: Poems and Archipelago. He has conducted translation of Earthlight: Poems by André Breton, Erica Doyle, Simone White, Joanna Fuhrman, Frank Sherlock, Padgett. His movies with Rudy Burckhardt include Co-founder of the Caribbean Artists Movement, Myles, Susie Timmons and David Trinidad, join residencies at Brown University, Bard College, with Zack Rogow, won the PEN/Book-of-the- Brendan Lorber, Todd Colby, Ed Friedman, Eliot Katz, Mobile Homes, Dandelions and Great Regular Brathwaite is currently a professor of compara- editor Brandon Stosuy in a celebratory reading and Naropa University, and is a professor emer- Month Translation Prize in 1993. Zavatsky has Michael Cirelli, Steve Earle, Chris Rael, Joshua Clover, Lenny Flavor. tive literature at New York University, and shares for the recently published Up Is Up, But So Is Kaye, Lytle Shaw, Donna Brook, Dale Sherrard, Murat itus at the Institute of American Indian Art. He is published poems as liner notes to six CDs by the Nemet-Nejat, John S. Hall, Eve Packer, Steven Hall and Ernie his time between CowPastor, Barbados, and New Down: New York’s Downtown Literary Scene, currently poet laureate of Santa Fe. jazz pianist Marc Copland, most recently Brooks, Dustin Williamson, Brenda Bordofsky, CA Conrad, MONDAY 1/8 York City. His latest book, Born to Slow Horses, 1974-1992 (NYU Press). Using the book as a Copland’s duo-piano CD with Bill Carrothers, No Hassen, Patti Smith, Maggie Dubris, Evan Kennedy, Susan OPEN READING won the International Griffin Poetry Prize in launching pad, the authors will step outside its WEDNESDAY 12/6 Choice, and the trio album called Modinha. Briante, Simon Pettet, Merry Fortune, Nathaniel Siegel, (SIGN-UP 7:45 PM, READING AT 8 PM) 2006. Susan Howe’s most recent books are The table of contents, selecting and reading key New Rodrigo Toscano, Stephanie Gray, Dan Machlin, Stefania EDWARD FOSTER & JOHN HIGH Marthakis, Elinor Nauen, David Cameron, David Vogen, Midnight published by New Directions, and York texts from their own oeuvres. A reception, Edward Foster is the founding editor of FRIDAY 12/15 Urayoan Noel, Patricia Spears Jones, Carol Mirakove, Farid WEDNESDAY 1/10 Kidnapped from Coracle Books. She is also the co-sponsored by NYU Press, will follow. For bios Talisman: A Journal of Contemporary Poetry and A VERY BRODEY CHRISTMAS Matuk, Tracie Morris, Barbara Blatner, Elliott Sharp, Tisa CAMILLE GUTHRIE & SUSAN WHEELER author of two books of criticism, My Emily of all participants see www.poetryproject.com. Poetics, Talisman House, Publishers, and (10:30 PM) Bryant, Jim Carroll, Brenda Coultas, Mónica de la Torre, Camille Guthrie is the author of In Captivity and Dickinson, and The Birth-Mark: unsettling the Kimiko Hahn, Tony Hoffman, Amy King, Rachel Levitsky, Jensen/Daniels, Publishers. He is the author or HAVE YOURSELF A VERY BRODEY CHRISTMAS! Eileen Myles, Lee Ranaldo, Gillian McCain, Erika Recordon, The Master Thief both published by Subpress. wilderness in American literary expression. A CD MONDAY 1/29 editor of two dozen books, the most recent of Celebrate any holiday with the poems of Jim Evelyn Reilly, Keith Roach, Renato Rosaldo, Lauren Russell, She also has a chapbook, “Defending Oneself,” called Thiefth in collaboration with the musician/ CORRINE FITZPATRICK & HEATHER NAGAMI which include Answerable to None: Berrigan, Brodey and music by Dear Old Stockholm Elliott Sharp, Brian Kim Stefans, Anne Waldman, John from Beardofbees.com. Recent poems have composer David Grubbs was released from Blue Corrine Fitzpatrick can often be found lugging Bronk, and the American Real, The Angelus Bell, Syndrome. Featuring Richard Hell, John Coletti, Sinclair, Chris Stackhouse, Marisol Limon Martinez, Lourdes appeared in Bird Dog, The Gig, and Radical Chopsticks in 2005 and Souls of the Labadie amps at Poetry Project events. Her poems can Vazquez, Judith Malina & Hanon Reznikov, Bruce Weber, Mahrem: Things Men Should Do for Men: A Suite Lewis Warsh, Erica Kaufman, Dustin Williamson, Tony Towle, Janet Hamill, Billy Lamont, Jeffrey Jullich, Vicki Society. She grew up in Seattle and Pittsburgh, Tract, another collaboration with Grubbs will be be found or are forthcoming in Cock Now, The for O, and What He Ought to Know: New and Anselm Berrigan and many more. Co-curated Hudspith, Michael Lydon & Ellen Mandel, Guillermo Castro, was schooled in Poughkeepsie and Providence, released this February. Brooklyn Rail, sonaweb and EOAGH. She has a Selected Poems. With Joseph Donahue, he edited with Jim Behrle. For bios of all participants see Nada & Gary, Peter Bushyeager, Cliff Fyman, Samantha and now lives in Brooklyn with her husband and chapbook in the works from Sona Books and is The World in Time and Space: Towards a History www.poetryproject.com. Barrow, Kim Lyons, Arlo Quint, Regie Cabico, Bob son. Susan Wheeler is the author of four collec- MONDAY 1/22 the Program Assistant and Friday Late Night Rosenthal, Harris Schiff, Tom Savage, Susan Landers, Bill of Innovative Poetry in Our Time. John High is Kushner, Ted Greenwald, Jackie Waters and so many more! tions of poetry, Bag ‘o’ Diamonds, Smokes, GREGG BIGLIERI & EVELYN REILLY Series Coordinator at the Poetry Project. the author of eight books, including The Desire Source Codes, and Ledger; and of Record Palace, Gregg Biglieri is the author of five chapbooks: Heather Nagami’s first book, Hostile, was pub- Notebooks (Village Voice top 25 books of the a novel. Her work has appeared in eight editions Profession, Roma, Los Books, Reading Keats to lished in 2005. Her poetry and reviews have year). A translator of several books of contem- of the Scribner anthology Best American Poetry, Sleep and I Heart My Zeppelin. He currently lives appeared in Antennae, Galatea Resurrects, porary Russian poetry, he was the chief editor of as well as in The Paris Review, London Review of in Buffalo, where he is finishing a dissertation on Rattle, Shifter, and Xcp (Cross-Cultural Poetics). Crossing Centuries: The New Generation in Books, Verse, Talisman, The New Yorker and Louis Zukofsky’s Bottom: On Shakespeare in the Nagami currently lives near Boston with her hus- Russian Poetry. A Zen practitioner, he is on the many other journals. English Department at Temple University. Evelyn band Bryan, where they run overhere press, a faculty of the English Department at Long Island Reilly’s first book, Hiatus, was published in small press that publishes chapbooks by people University, Brooklyn where he teaches creative FRIDAY 1/12 2004. A chapbook, Fervent Remnants of of color and other underrepresented individuals. writing and literature. THIS IS THE BIKE RIDE TO WORK: Reflective Surfaces, is just out. Reilly co- PROSE POEMS & SUPER 8: STEPHANIE GRAY curates the winter segment of the Segue Reading WEDNESDAY 1/31 MONDAY 12/11 (10:30 PM) Series. She is currently pondering the relation of C.S. GISCOMBE & LESLIE SCALAPINO MICHAEL CROSS & MYUNG MI KIM An evening of poems, super 8 shorts (silent & ecology and poetry, and is editing ((eco (lang) C. S. Giscombe’s recent poetry books are Here, Michael Cross edited Involuntary Vision: after sound, shown on a real film projector), poems (uage ( reader)), a collection of essays on the Giscome Road, Two Sections from Practical Akira Kurosawa’s Dreams and is currently editing read live with films, a keyboard and surprises. subject, with Brenda Iijima. Geography, and Inland. A new book, Prairie an anthology of the George Oppen Memorial Work will tackle Joan of Arc, Buffalo, Metallica, Style, is awaiting publication. He’s recently Lectures at San Francisco State University. He grain elevators, a bike ride to work, and include WEDNESDAY 1/24 returned from half a year spent in Halifax among publishes Atticus/Finch Chapbooks, and his first a film set to the words of Eileen Myles’ School ALAN GILBERT, BILL MOHR & ROBERTO TEJADA the descendents of the Black Loyalists (the book, in felt treeling, is forthcoming. He is a of Fish. Stephanie Gray writes mostly prose Alan Gilbert’s book of critical writings, Another American slaves who fought on the side of Britain Ph.D. candidate in the Poetics Program at SUNY poems and makes super 8 films. She works at Future: Poetry and Art in a Postmodern Twilight, against George Washington and who then went Buffalo. Myung Mi Kim is the author of the latest Anthology Film Archives. was published in the spring of 2006 by Wesleyan into exile in Nova Scotia). He will be teaching, as Atticus/Finch book, River Antes, as well as the University Press. He is currently a Creative of fall 2007, at the University of California at collections Commons, Spelt, The Bounty, and MONDAY 1/15 Capital Foundation grantee in the field of Berkeley. Leslie Scalapino is the author of thirty Under Flag. She is presently on faculty in the CHARLES ALEXANDER & TIM PETERSON Innovative Literature (poetry). Bill Mohr has books of poetry and inter-genre fiction-poetry- Poetics Program at SUNY Buffalo. Charles Alexander’s books of poetry include worked as a teacher of creative writing since plays-criticism. Recent books include Zither & ALL EVENTS BEGIN AT 8PM Hopeful Buildings, arc of light / dark matter, 1974. As the editor and publisher of Momentum Autobiography and The Tango. Forthcoming from UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED Pushing Water: parts one through six, Pushing Press from 1974-1988, he published two major Green Integer is a collection of eight years of THE POETRY PROJECT IS LOCATED IN Water: part seven, Etudes: D & D and Near or anthologies of Los Angeles poets as well as indi- poetry titled Day Ocean State Of Stars’ Night and ST. MARK'S CHURCH AT THE CORNER ADMISSION $8 Random Acts. Certain Slants (Junction Press) is vidual titles by over twenty poets and writers. from UC Berkeley Press, her Selected Poems. OF 2ND AVE &10TH STREET IN MANHATTAN STUDENTS & SENIORS $7 forthcoming. Alexander is founder, director, and His collections of poetry include Bittersweet 212.674.0910 FOR MORE INFORMATION THE POETRY PROJECT IS WHEELCHAIR ACCESSIBLE WITH ASSIS- MEMBERS $5 OR FREE book artist of Chax Press. Tim Peterson’s book Kaleidoscope, Thoughtful Outlaw, Vehemence, TANCE AND ADVANCE NOTICE. SCHEDULE SUBJECT TO CHANGE. THE POLITICS OF “POLITICS” A CONVERSATION WITH HERETICAL TEXTS EDITOR BILL MARSH Shortly after Bill Marsh’s arrival in New York City, he met with Newsletter editor Brendan Lorber to set up the parameters of an email interview. They convened at The Subway Inn, a seedy throwback to 1970’s dive bar culture tucked amid the corporate petting zoo of the Upper East Side. Having never met before, they both idled at the bar for a long time unaware of the other’s presence. They spoke to several people none of whom were editors of anything but the whiskey in front of them. Finally, Lorber called Marsh’s cell & heard the phone ring about five feet away. Marsh edits Factory School’s Heretical Texts series, a series that will ultimately number 20 books and which, according to their site, operates “in the tradition of modernist documentarist poetics, ethnopo- etics, and sub-cultural resistance poetries. The series intends to investigate and challenge the notion that poetry, as art and communication activity, is political.”
Brendan Lorber: You’ve told me you no agree there are sharp variations between “syndicate” of authors, too, in so far as each longer identify primarily as a poet. There books (with even more variation on the book is a strategic response to these initial are plenty of other identities that come to way in Volume 3, I’m happy to report). I provocations, realized in ways I couldn’t mind: editor, traveler, saxophone player, had hoped that the prompt would motivate have imagined. plagiarism expert. While most Americans authors to write specifically for the series, Lorber: One connotation of heretical per- are dismissive of poets, many poets are dis- and with some books that’s the case, while tains to the departure from orthodox belief missive of anyone who claims to be any- others collect work often years in the mak- systems into sorcery. Insofar as such prac- thing but a poet. Yet there are discoveries ing. tices involve the use of specific language that are impossible through poetry alone. What unites I guess is (i.e., spells, invocation) Are there experiences that have only been Corporate gangsterism, the provocation of to generate marvelous allowed to emerge through the syncretism “political poetry” as a diversionary wars, effects, the production of your many states of being? guiding theme or of the books could be Bill Marsh: The question has me thinking channel of inquiry. voter fraud, ownership seen as the act of an about some early desktop publishing The prompt came adept. Anthropologists work—chapbooks and rough ephemera, a out of the idea that societies, privatized public describe such measures lot of which never made it to the streets. I we (authors, editors, schools, college loan as the exertion of the remember having some genuine eureka designers) would all practitioner’s will upon moments about the possibilities of DIY investigate and chal- sharking, surveillance “key joints.” What are publishing, and that led me to look a little lenge that concept the social, economic deeper into small and micro-press print cul- and not take for bubbles (within bubbles), and political key joints ture, both the history and what people were granted that poetry is “life” brokers, activist upon which the series doing at the time (mid-Nineties). Factory inherently political in focuses its will? either some loose School in fact came out of a small press generals, Hotel Halliburton Marsh: Enchanting rhetorical sense or merger and some common interests among question. For starters, via the particular — the joints go on and on the founding members to combine there was the “case” of political/activist pro- resources and skill sets and see what (else) Terri Schiavo, which jects of those involved. In my initial call, I might come of it. I don’t see this as an out- reached peak absurdity in March 05 and proposed a pretty broad definition of polit- growth of poetry so much—though the con- got me thinking back then about the pure ical poetry as radical (root-work) considera- nections to poetry and poetics were cer- poetry of right-wing God speak. The series tions of writing as a mode of social resis- tainly there—but rather as a focusing of name was born in that moment of anger tance and public intervention. The tenuous other impulses toward organization and and amusement. Otherwise, it’s really nature of this language points, for me at collaboration, as well as a big interest in tough to pinpoint the “heretical” these days least, to problems of imagining poetry in design technologies as they relate to given as anything more than “connotation.” Still I relation to political action. As an editor structures and infrastructures of publishing. thought it worth trying to document, in (and teacher, writer, parent, etc.), I wasn’t Lorber: The books within your latest pub- poetry, the culture of systematic “depar- prepared, for example, to accept at face lishing exploration, the Heretical Texts ture”—to use that word in a slightly different value Charles Bernstein’s claim that as series, vary sharply in terms of the subject way—that seems to permeate everything. poets, we “affect the public sphere with and nature of their investigations. Is there a Corporate gangsterism, diversionary wars, each reader, with the fact of the poem” and central guiding principle that unites the voter fraud, ownership societies, privatized through those forms we choose to “legiti- syndicate of Heretical Texts authors? public schools, college loan sharking, mate” in our poems. surveillance bubbles (within bubbles), “life” Marsh: The series started with a prompt: I wasn’t ready to ditch this idea either, so brokers, activist generals, Hotel Write and send work that breaks down (in) the series has that ambivalence and skepti- Halliburton—the joints go on and on. If the communication as a precedent and accom- cism written into it. And this unites the poetry can’t put pressure on all this—blast it paniment to revolution. A tall order, and I 18 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 19 better way to do that than to apply point new “cultural adjustment tactics,” as Mark values to books read (like they did for my Nowak recently urged, to match our ongo- half-life of twenty books, published over the is, is it better to actively resist the oppres- course of what I think will be twenty months sion of coercive force or to choose non-par- 4th and 6th grade kids) and distribute Pizza ing textual work. Here’s, I think, where dis- (late 2005 thru early 2007). As I noted ticipation? plagiarism and piracy. On my end, I’ve open somehow—then what good’s the poet- Hut coupons in accordance with accumu- tribution and design come in, as well as above, the series started with the idea of recently taken to the idea of “knowledge ry? lated totals. Where private, silent reading pedagogy and curriculum. Marsh: Non-participation is the anti-force documenting a historical moment (in poetry laundering” as a way into theorizing and Lorber: What would a society be like in was once considered heretical, it is now of oppression. To choose it is to participate [ *See Fredy Perlman’s book on the topic, mostly, but not entirely). I anticipate radical mobilizing the retrieval of genre or disci- which the Heretical Texts series was super- nothing short of “fundamental” (a divine in the inhumane, to coerce resistance. released soon as a Factory School / changes in the way this basic strategy plays plinary secrets wrongfully stolen—and com- fluous? That is, what changes would we see RIGHT even)—but fundamental, of course, Therefore, in dodging policy, humans must Southpaw Culture reprint. ] out—not only in the remaining titles but also modified—by textbook companies and in the social landscape if industrial capital- to the “new freedom” of corporate capital- also mutiny, and actively. This requires bet- in whatever new shape/direction the series other info-racketeers. However, the kinds of ism were the heretical idea and the theoret- ism* if not the liberation and enlightenment Lorber: You and other operatives of ter tactics, demanding more of society. I takes after that initial “life” has ended. One genre knowledge I’m looking to borrow ical tendrils that run through these books of every soul on the planet. Factory School just moved to New York pledge allegiance to this laundered logic. thing I can say for certain is that late-night back (for a community handbook/resource were the dominant ideol- City. Beyond the obvious benefits (cultural So, in answer to what I subway rides (from Queens to Manhattan Lorber: You are fin- database of sorts, for stu- ogy? If they paved Hotel incursion, dense human ecology) and pit- think would pass as a and back again) have changed my thinking ishing up your disser- dents and teachers) are Halliburton & put up we’re all falls (how to earn enough to continue living I’ve recently version of your ques- entirely. I love this town! tation on plagiarism. not explicitly owned or Zero Star Hotel and the indoors without forsaking the reasons to tion, a ubiquitous Most people look at authored in any sense that Hotel Wentley? eager and have moved here in the first place), what Lorber: Factory School exists more con- taken to the idea Heretical Texts cur- vicking other people’s classify their taking/steal- are your expectations & how do you antic- ceptually than physically, yet it has had Marsh: I’ve been charged but riculum would mean work as a bad thing. of “knowledge ing as either an IP or pla- ipate being changed? By you I mean you, plans in the past for the construction of impressed with the fluctu- that by the age of 15 But Bernadette giarism offense. I could be your writing, Heretical Texts, Factory actual schools and utopian communities. ating historical status of also humbled by every kid in this coun- Mayer’s encomium, laundering” as a wrong on that, though, so School, and perhaps, through those My sources tell me that you are connected literacy and literacy train- try could not only read “Experiment with we’ll see. the sheer volume changes, life as everyone else knows it. to Factory Farm, a real place in Ottawa, way into...secrets ing as both agent for and and write fluently but theft and plagiarism Illinois. What are your plans for it? & how And didn’t Berrigan lift agent against the propa- of what’s here. could read and write Marsh: The move here was so abrupt and in any form that wrongfully stolen are you going to entice people to get with that line from Eliot? gation of dominant ide- “heretical texts” that unexpected that we’re still reeling — we occurs to you” and the program? ologies. Books weren’t systematically would, among other things, challenge the meaning Octavia (Davis), my partner in lit- Ted Berrigan’s “Great poets steal” opens Lorber: As poets we’ve made a choice to banned, for example, until 10th-century contradictions and assumptions (not to erary crime (and also one of the founding Marsh: FS has always been a play of con- things up a bit. What’s the interplay be cultural dissidents. Yet many poets seek “silent reading” techniques paved the way mention dominant ideologies) inherent to FS members), and me. You’ll have to ask cepts, initiatives, projects, programs, between your sense of plagiarism and your to replicate the same kind of vertical hierar- for individualized textual practices and the artifacts that currently operate under Joel (Kuszai) how he’s feeling about the dreams, plans, fantasies, and intrigues, but work at Factory School? chy you’d expect in an office. What are you the HT banner. With all due respect to all anchored somehow to particular, if often doing about that? people started authoring and reading books whole thing. I suspect from recent conver- Marsh: Actually, the diss is done and the poetry and poets (including those in this shifting, locales. This makes it “physical”— that spoke to what today might be called sations that we’re all eager and charged but book version is due out soon from SUNY, Marsh: The question is usefully at odds series), the HT books, as books of poetry, maybe corporeal—in ways that are hard to personal opinion. Medieval monks saw also humbled by the sheer volume of copyright 2007 (thus plugged). Plagiarism is with itself, since obviously there are plenty are not solutions or roadmaps to utopian describe. But as for actual, physical schools reading (with the eyes alone) as a private what’s here. I expect good things—let’s put a funny thing, and you’d be surprised how of poets who make no such choice, or who social-democratic futures — much as they taking up space on real dirt, etc.,... well, let’s “abuse” requiring strict regulations. New it that way. We moved here for a bunch of little it has to do, really, with cribbing other having made that choice are nonetheless de emerge, by and large, either out of or in say they’re in the works. intimacies linking author, text and reader — reasons, including the good fortune of land- people’s work. It’s usually more about sta- facto agents of hierarchy and replication in relation to broader commitments to social in silent communion — nudged aside older ing jobs that help us avoid those “pitfalls” of Joel and I used to talk about opening a tus and money and knowledge hierarchies... their daily practices, and still others who justice, equity, confederal coordination, public reading practices and later became NYC, for the time being at least. Changes I storefront somewhere in San Diego—or clos- controlling information flows and believe that in choosing to be poets they and other democratic principles. They the dominant pedagogical technique in anticipate include new formulae for and er to the border, National City or San re/deploying age-old administrative thera- have thereby assumed, by default, a life of deliver nothing, in and of themselves, that Renaissance universities. New juristic con- attitudes about production work fueled by Ysidro—but then the price of real estate pies to generate revenue. In education, for cultural dissidence, etcetera. I’m not so sure would administer or legislate social trols were required to keep all this private the work I’m doing (teaching writing at a went up. Joel had this wonderful scheme for example, plagiarism is an excuse for raising what choices we’ve made, but I’d rather “change,” much as they speak to social study (reading, learning) in check. Michel university in Queens) and, quite simply, the an underground campus at the Salton Sea in tuitions to pay for plagiarism-detection soft- separate the choices we make “as poets” problems in need of careful and thoughtful de Montaigne, one of my favorite examples eye-opening truths and beauties of life in Southern California. That’s been a model, ware. (Compare terrorism.) from those we make elsewise, under differ- response. These books, in fact, are thought- for all this, developed a nasty reputation by this town. of sorts, for all other in-potentia utopian ent arrangements, in the sway, let’s say, of ful responses, but I don’t think that makes Odder still in poetry. Great poets can assaying on topics like farting and haircuts projects. Factory Farm was something of a different itineraries, agendas, lifelines. As a them “political” or politically efficacious in As for Factory School, what we need (in “steal” precisely because they’re not plagia- (from a decidedly personal point of view, no-brainer when I moved back to the writer the only thing I can do is try to write any active sense. addition to donations and book purchases, rizing, they’re borrowing — and the rhetori- no doubt) but also because he poked fun at Midwest (before moving out here, that is). through this stuff, ear to ground basically. I should say) are more people involved— cal nuances are great fodder for cocktail 16th-century university scholasticism (not Which is not to say that they shouldn’t be My grandparents ran a farm in the Illinois As a series curator I try hard to keep the helping out with current projects, propos- party chit-chat. More important, the premi- too far removed from NCLB testing proto- read with “change” in mind—deep, struc- Valley, at the junction of the Illinois and Fox questions open: How might we “affect” ing new ones, assuming editorial and advi- um on the poem itself, as material artifact, is cols) because it taught reading and writing tural, socially meaningful change. I would Rivers, and left behind all this infrastructure change with “the fact of the poem”? How sory roles. I would guess that we’re most negligible compared to, say, an original as “foraging” practices that ended in the hope that the series offers this kind of in the form of abandoned barns, corn cribs does the poem change the way we think commonly viewed as a small press imprint, Magritte. Donald Hall loses nothing if I crib neat accumulation and classification of activist orientation toward reading, writing, and silos, sheds, coops, pens... you name it. about facts, and effects? What effects do our and while that’s a large component of what these lines: “Then we row for years on the knowledge. and production as coordinated, structurally So yeah, this is a “real place” that basically choices as poets—regardless of poetry—have we do, we’re also committed to the idea of midsummer / pond, ignorant and content.” resistant activities. Reading away from ide- came ready-made with a plan: organize a on other choices? on how we go about More recently, textbooks, public school “learning and production” as a means of Which has as much to do with economies of ology—and toward the revision and exten- yearly rainbow gathering of sorts but with a imagining, mobilizing for change? classrooms, standardized curricula, writing building community, reclaiming history, textual reproduction as it does with Hall’s sion of “our convictions as to the state of more focused agenda and without any programs (including creative writing facto- conducting research, and pursuing social- pilfering of Wordsworth’s “Lines Written Lorber: How long will the series run and things,” as John Dewey put it—is the basic inherent prejudice against dogs. ries), plagiarism detection devices... all democratic ideals in ways more than just While Sailing in a Boat at Evening.” what will be the conditions under which promise, maybe, of experimental and polit- these and other administrative therapies theoretical or aesthetically fashionable. If Enticement will not be a problem. you’d end it? If it ends, are we to suspect ical poetries. Poetry helps bring those Interplay with Factory School? Joel’s intro- help to constrain and regulate reading and there’s going to be change (in me, FS, the Everyone will want to show up for the sec- that someone got to you? “things” into focus. But in an age when duced the idea of “fostering” out-of-print, writing activities even while western, indus- HT series), I suspect it will come from the ond one once they find out what a wonder- trialized nations strive for 100% literacy poets can write and publish just about any- sometimes “orphaned,” texts via reproduc- Marsh: As a series of five-book volumes, it entrenchment and (re)deployment of that ful flop the first one will be. rates. Everybody must read—this IS a thing, there’s nothing all that heretical, or tion techniques that, arguably, verge on ends after volume four. I have ideas for a basic Factory School mission in this amaz- democracy, after all—and if they can’t, then even risky, in writing and publishing anti- Lorber: In societies that demand allegiance piracy, but this would be an indirect con- post-mortem corpus, if conditions are right, ing locale. we sure as hell better teach them! And what ideological refrains for a captured audience to policies that are inhumane, which is a nection, particularly given the serious his- but much depends. If it ends, I’ve either of converts. Something else is required— Heretical Texts, as one facet of all that, has a better tactic, mutiny or draft dodging? That torical and practical differences between gone fishing or gone to sleep with the fishes.
20 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 21 TOM CLARK LIGHT & SHADE: NEW AND SELECTED POEMS inant personification here and throughout the book, for she appears Coffee House Press / 2006 in other poems such as “One” and “Nimble Rays” where she is par- ticularly identified as “wife.” In her “honor” the poem relates “the Tom Clark’s poetry provides an eloquent emotional connection to laconic azure” of the sky and argues for a renewal of perception things, people, animals, and places. He complicates any easy notion that is guided by the active imagination. The surface language, with of the self, exploring lyric form as a vehicle that relates the myriad surreal amplification and the etymological complication of “pipes” facets of poetic identity in language. The message Clark communi- and “pumps,” sounds the message. “Sky” does not objectively ren- cates comes from the formal and rhetorical surface of the poem, der the blue dome above our heads. It enacts particular relation- sounded with etymological resonance. The occasion of writing pre- ships in language that show sky’s influence inwardly. The sky’s vast sents itself through him, and yet he vanishes under the weight of apparentness leaves the poem quite alone, a confluence of lyric words he brings to the work. This self-effacing lightness-of-touch song in dissolution. defines his approach to the poem with a thoughtful sensitivity to A selection from 1972’s “Smack” offers epigrammatic analysis of patterns of feeling and perception. poetic vision in a world dominated by other social and biological Many have noted Clark’s literary connections to the Paris Review, necessities. “It / is not / surprising / that faced / with / universal / the New York School, and Black Mountain. Elaine Equi recently destruction / our art / should / at last / speak / with unimpeded / acknowledged his influence on her generation by referring to him force / and unveiled / honesty / to a future / which / may well / be in a Jacket Magazine article as the “Godfather of Metaphysical Pop.” non-existent” (88-9). This frustration between individual art and the Her claim for Clark pays homage to his seminal influence on the forces of interference that impede such poetic practice haunt poetics of the 1970s, and she finds in him “one of the great Clark’s work. “The sky is blue / there is no one to talk to,” he writes poet/painters of California and the American West” for whom “the in “Safari,” suggesting a lonely tension in subjective experience truest beauty of all turns out to be that of form.” unanswered by the impressions of the world that populate atten- The attention to form remains evident in a new book, Light & tion. While other writers might focus on social responses to this sit- Shade: New and Selected Poems. Clark plays over his linguistic sur- uation, Clark imposes philosophical measure. The tension of expe- faces with great skill, tempting a reader to engage the poem’s rience and the pleasure of words join in lyric consequence to find facade, but beneath this many forces are at work that render greater meaning through the tool of self. It’s the fleeting pleasure of that depth. Because he is a master lyricist we are often left by poem’s word surface that obsesses Clark, even as personal experience pro- end apprehending a process that leaves us hanging in the air, with vides uncertain ground for the poetic play of a mind that is keenly no great certainty. His poems challenge our habits of perception by observant. showing us how to read and think. A short poem, “Sky” (1968), Later poems continue to explore the theme of the individual in con- extends a formal surface that is composed of surreal-ish metaphor- flict with forces of annihilation. This works in many different ways— ical imagery. Such disjunctive word placement nonetheless per- at the level of the lyric, for instance, which since the 19th century suades readers of the fragile, ever-shifting nature of perception. He has operated under the unique assumption of the subject’s exteri- writes: ority to words in a kind of trade of presence for an obliterating The green world thinks the sun utterance. In Clark’s poems the threat of dissolution simultaneous- Into one flower, then outraces ly lifts the burden of self and its otherness by forcing words to inter- It to the sea in sunken pipes. fere with such awareness at the very limits of perception and artic- But twisting in sleep to poetry ulation. So we arrive at poems like “Prolepsis,” where Clark’s local, The blood pumps its flares out personal grief receives magnification through the lyric to express Of earth and scatters them. And “days atonal as white noise,” expanding self-experience into uni- They become, when they shine on versal gesture. The poem like a force of nature appears with Beauty to honor her, a part of startling presence: “Melodious liquid warble in the plum / Tree tells Her laconic azure, her façade. (68) the sinking year how to feel / Its recession into grief as if a thorn / Poked a nester in an old wounded heart” (254). The essential gift of In all daylight accuracy, the “green world,” of course, does not think this work in Light & Shade is Clark’s sacrifice of an easily construct- “the sun.” But such pedantic accuracies are beyond the point here. ed self for that surface play of forms in which self’s renewal is dis- Instead the surprising verbal shifts argue for a fresh perception by persed through the interference of language. This is the message— turning thought outward from the usual reasonable assurances of the “news”—of his work, and it should be evaluated in this context impressions the mind receives. Those “sunken pipes” could also as a significant contribution to late 20th century American poetics. refer to the poet’s musical instrument, submerged as it deepens into a kind of experience of the unconscious. “Beauty” figures as a dom- Dale Smith is a poet who lives in Austin, Texas.
DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 23 22 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 ROBERT FITTERMAN aspects—are treated as regrettable but neces- commonly imparted. A highly literate the Dogon funeral rites, tells the story of “a Michael Magee is the author of a book of literal- of sensory experience are reconciled: & DIRK ROWNTREE sary byproducts of the publishing process, work, War recognizes that literacy is more failed, earlier form of human being in ly criticism, Emancipating Pragmatism, and “pigeons at four o’clock / a dream about WAR, THE MUSICAL ones that the reader bypasses in his haste to than the ability to read text; it must, by Dogon cosmogony.” Mackey has been fas- four books of poetry including most recently bow ties / flying / my former residence.” It Subpress / 2006 get to the real “work.” necessity, include visual literacy, cultural lit- cinated by it since the 1970s and the Mainstream and the forthcoming My Angie is interesting to consider here that a woman eracy, and above all, critical literacy. War, Andoumboulou have been on stage in his Dickinson. walking alone in the city has a unique set of Instead, War, the musical begins where most Consider a musical as the pop opera of the musical excoriates the modern media earlier poetry collections while also inform- concerns about safety, and that an books don’t: on the cover. With its innocu- modernism—a hybrid form, it combines machine even as it declares a war of its own ing his fiction and criticism. In Splay Anthem, ingrained vigilance to accessing environs ous yellow spine and chlorophyll matte, it aspects of stagecraft, instrumental perfor- on the traditional form of the book. In Mackey has foregrounded moreso than in E. TRACY GRINNELL and gauging response could be a factor in appears, from a distance, to be a handbook mance and dance; as such, it is a genre that doing so, it provides a blueprint of where previous books how closely the SOME CLEAR SOUVENIR the creation of this remarkable poetic con- of plant species or a how-to volume on gar- is equal parts visual and aural. As noted in the book has been and gives hints as to its Andoumboulou resemble us. “I couldn’t O Books / 2006 sciousness. However, the sense of the omi- the preface, the authors “…[were] struck by dening. Proceed to the front matter and future whereabouts. help thinking of the Andoumboulou as not E. Tracy Grinnell’s Some Clear Souvenir con- nous in this work is free-floating and mani- how the American subjects have, through- you’re in for another surprise: the book’s simply a failed, or flawed, earlier form of tinues the peregrinations in time, memory fests in images of “the owl / around / me / out the ages, regarding attitudes and man- title, which usually appears directly after the Chris Pusateri’s most recent chapbooks are human being,” he writes in his preface, “but and place that she began in music or forget- for / the heart / of my / thief,” “a fugue / ners, delighted their understanding of war fly leaf, is lavishly splashed, one letter at a Flowers in Miniature (Big Game) and VI a rough draft of human being, the work-in- ting, published by O Books in 2001. A empty of organs,” and a proliferation of through entertainment.” Comprised of an time, across the first fifteen pages. It’s not Fictions (Gong). progress we continue to be. The common- Jasper Johns quote in the front matter sug- tombs, cemeteries and obituaries. overture, nine songs, and a libretto, War, the until twenty-five pages into the book that place expression ‘man’s inhumanity to gests a direction: “Think of the edge of the musical tells an “unoriginal tragic love story” we encounter the metadata: the ISBN, With Dickinsonian symmetry she writes in NATHANIEL MACKEY man’ has long acknowledged our andoum- city, and the traffic there. Some clear sou- of Robert and Rachel, who work together in acknowledgments and so forth. “Clip 13”: SPLAY ANTHEM boulouness” (xi). venir—A photograph. (A newspaper clip- a restaurant, experience the inflation and These formal provocations continue my interior surrounds me New Directions / 2006 By tightly interweaving “Song of the ping caught in the frame of the mirror).” burst of the dotcom bubble, join the mili- throughout: certain letters are replaced with then impossibility, being such Andoumboulou” with his other on-going Follow that car! And this poet. tary and perish in an ensuing war. nonstandard symbols to create a typogra- In the preface to Nathaniel Mackey’s latest a troubled boundary series of poems “Mu” (based more explicit- phy that makes this book almost collection of poems, Splay Anthem, the Written in “clips” followed by “examples,” Lest you think this just another easy satire ly in the contemporary world, on two Don Souvenirs becomes relics over time and we unquotable; pages—often as many as ten in author describes the relationship between we get the sense that Grinnell has just of the memorable wreck that is the state of Cherry compositions), Mackey makes “our quickly discern that Grinnell isn’t after a a row—are left blank or blacked out, creat- the book’s two serial poems, “Song of the expanded the possibilities of what the des- our union, consider again the notion of a Andoumboulouness” overt. deck of The Cyclone playing cards, but the ing an unsettling tension that is no less a Andoumboulou” and “Mu” this way: “Each ignation “city poet” could mean. The narra- citizenry that “delighted their understand- parts of speech themselves, and to write part of the action for being silent. At other is the other, each is both, announcedly so in The mood Mackey evokes in Splay Anthem tor in this series moves through the land- ing of war through entertainment.” This through the organic experience of emotion- times, a sentence slices through the right this book by way of number, in earlier is of a world increasingly characterized by scape with an intimate remove, an archivist Fitterman/Rowntree vehicle patterns itself al and physical disorientation/reorienta- margin, plunges into the gutter and runs books not so announcedly so.” Even in a “fugitivity” (a word he himself uses in his looking for, if it exists, some clear souvenir, after nothing so much as the television wars tion. Grinnell is one of our most perceptive onto the opposite page. This is a work piece of ostensibly informational writing recent conversation with Sarah Rosenthal and “to gather / what epics / I will.” The that are scripted by Pentagon-approved word-workers, and reading these poems in whose formal elements are at war with its Mackey proceeds by assonant play, really, in New American Writing 24). What seemed reader doesn’t find the candid, urbane ache embedded reporters, reassembled as heroic the context of delving into the conception subject matter, and the proceeding friction just a hair’s breadth away from Stein’s “and to this reader primarily mythological/philo- of Jacques Roubaud for Paris, in his also narrative and exported via satellite for of language and the psychological imprint makes reading War, the musical like eating a also and so and so and also.” Everything sophical in Mackey’s earlier books now recently published, The form of a city changes domestic consumption. Adapting war to the of sound proves rewarding over multiple sockful of broken glass. It tastes like chicken moves forward in Mackey’s poetry through seems prophetic and actual. The final sec- faster, alas, than the human heart (Dalkey small screen requires the existence of plot, readings. The sorrowful mood infused in but it hurts going down. “sonic semblance” –– a following of sound’s tion of Splay Anthem, “Nub”, puts us right Archive), nor do we find any trace of the which reduces war’s unimaginable horrors these poems seems to be located in the bit- suggested path outward –– and thus the where we seem to be: “the ballot-box open- revelry in friendship and conversation asso- to newsreel realism and renders it as enter- Like a musical, this book is infused with a tersweet inscrutabilities of language, after logocentric reader can sometimes feel ing grinned / and grinned again” (124) and ciated with the New York School, the city tainment. rich variety of visuals: countless pho- all, a poet’s true love: “or perhaps a swallow awash and adrift, even “played.” A better I can’t think of a better expression of our where Grinnell lives and works. This poet’s tographs, fragments, and collages. While understands the intimacy / of sentences.” A But to call War, the musical a book is to bur- option though is to treat these poems as an commonly felt disenchantment with what sight, directed outward, seems to be refract- there is something early Atari about the pix- tenet of linguistics is that a sign is the basic den it with semantics. A book brings with it invitation to move neither forward nor back the powerful have recently wrought than ed inward by the site. The sustained line of ilated way that the images strafe the page, unit of language. As we know, a sign stands centuries of post-Gutenberg baggage: its but rather to step with their author eccentri- the following: energy creates a space comprised of they serve as contrast to the highly-pureed in for something else. It is this inherent lacu- functional elements—the cover, table of con- cally to the side. With the smallest turn of reportage and solipsism where all varieties montage through which modern war is Back seemed all there was, alive nae between the thing and itself that gener- tents, front matter and typographical phrase –– “Clavicle spill,” say ( 4) –– begun to appear to be ember, interregnum, Mackey provokes you to immerse yourself, deathroll exception, proof… Terrain to go to school on its true and false ety- like no other, nubscape. Flags mologies, search out its anagrams and puns, filled to splay it and see where it leads. That path Up the sky… (110) is yours. The alternative is “ansonance,” that which is lacking sound, the thing that Unlike, say, Amiri Baraka’s or June the Andoumboulou find “walling their Jordan’s seminal political poetry, Mackey’s way” (7) until assonance –– a semblance of poems do not scream. But the effect is sim- sounds but also “sounding in answer” as ilar –– because Mackey’s is the poetry of with the call-and-response form central to someone listening to screams and register- black music –– somewhat mysteriously ing them as dis-orientation while proposing shows them a way out, through, or around. subsequent re-orientations for us, the read- ers. This latter communion and communi- The “Song of the Andoumboulou,” part of cation is our latest best hope.
24 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 25 ates a sense of loss. There is a delightful slip- tionships, the endless voice of power to and World War II and the sudden shrieks of believing our myths about freedom (“I You can put your finger into this book, Maybe then dawn could come sooner with page that serves to illustrate how words can which non-communication is essential. the loved ones who don’t know you any- don’t understand why I can’t buy a burka in begin anywhere and experience a type of a lot less grief. haunt us as well as each other: “rupture is / more. And they’re true, and the kids who the surplus store. Did Milan or Paris get revelation, the work so witty it might make The voices of the powerless get lost in the Barbara Henning is the author of several books of rapture,” “violet light, violent / night,” and saw them first, unwillingly, won’t forget eas- hold of them?”). you laugh, but it’s that kind of laugh that in fugue states of the vocabularies that have poetry and two novels, the latest, You, Me and another clue, “no one word settles / me.” ily. They’re the real March of Time news- the next second, hey you’re shaking your been inflicted on them. The weak come to Frym opens the book with an overture, the Insects (Spuyten Duyvil). Nor does the sight of flags, those infamous reels, and if the camera lingers on a pair of head with your tongue stuck in your mouth. understand that not only are they invisible looking back on the present as many histo- signs, flying out train windows, and a tattoo bronzed baby shoes you can feel reason- “I is mad at I’s country” (68). Yes. Yes. to power, they can’t be heard either rians will surely see it: Afghanistan occu- only recovers a scar. Cole Swenson notes ably certain that the baby’s father will be through the rituals of prompt and response pied, the US terrorizing it’s own citizens Day-by-day, poem-by-poem, Frym cracks PETER LAMBORN WILSON that in this work “every naming becomes a beaten to death with them, inevitably, so that go nowhere, finally, and leave them and others, the whole world fracturing into apart the way we talk and the lies we hear. GOTHICK INSTITUTIONS complex failure of communication,” but that all the words exchanged are as nothing. twisting on lines, like fish. a state of hostility, violence and suicidal In the title poem,” Solution Simulacra”, she Xexoxial Editions / 2005 Grinnell handles the human condition of Vigilance, on the other hand, is more com- activity. It doesn’t have to be like this. She elaborates on a recipe for empire building. Gothick Institutions is unlike any book I have suffering with an uncommon emotional Hollander is working this ground pretty plex so the voices have flashes of light. invokes Emerson: “A rush of thoughts is the ever held. [But I mostly read Agatha intelligence and grace. As the same sen- much by himself, and he gives himself up to First, suck all the money out of the Above all they jump and flicker, so that only conceivable prosperity that can come Christie, the New York Post, and old Thor tence is “accelerated to silence” her role is the voices admirably and painfully. It’s real- house to fashion the haute couture sometimes we can hear the outside coming to us.” Frym uses all of her poetic tools, rep- comics.] According to a Chinese tale, Lao “to still go on, enumerating / things.” ly quite terrifying. It’s the poem of the weapons. . . . Color in the sections of in ambiguously, and the possibility of grace. etition, rap, word play, concrete manipula- poem’s opposite—the poem requires you to the world one would like to have. . . . Tzu (the Taoist master) was escaping the Stacy Szymaszek is the author of Emptied of All tions of the alphabet and symbols in an be able to say whatever it needs you to say, and to me it was said in the world design Demand that first adversary hand over Imperial City, when a guard commanded: Ships. active, engaged response to daily news, but the discourses of power require that you his arms and the arms of all his dou- “Before you leave, first summarize your there is a sign for every occasion reports, overheard conversations, hammer- say what you’re expected to say. bles, and send them Fed Ex. When teachings!” The resulting book is the Ta o Te and this one happened to be on you ing away at those words, fracturing the glib they arrive, thank him, and demand he Ching (awkwardly translated as “The Way BENJAMIN HOLLANDER There’s been a strain of high bloodlessness lies and excuses. for all the thrownness of being there is in being do the same with his head and the of Life”), possibly the first self-help manual. VIGILANCE running through American poetry—as if Homer’s rosy fingered dawn appears when heads of all his doubles and theirs. Gothick Institutions has a similar air — as if Beyond Baroque / 2005 communication is impossible, were a real this one. heroes return from having ransacked far off When they arrive, have these parts Peter Lamborn Wilson were fleeing answer to a real question. Fortunately, the And despite the focus on our anguish and Benjamin Hollander has lived and worked places. But here there are no heroes. “Dawn well-photographed in color and print- Brooklyn on camelback, only to be ordered real question rises immediately—if it’s impos- avoidance and the final helplessness and in San Francisco for the past twenty-eight seemed as though it would never arrive.... ed on the front page of The New York by a gatekeeper of the Williamsburg Bridge sible, how come it happens all the time? Despair invisibility of the suffering other, the poems years and he’s been everything a poet One’s empire [is] choking. One doesn’t Times and every other medium will to first indite his wisdom. For example: should be—trying to get out, trying to let the is only fashionable to those who haven’t felt are open for poetry to snake through them believe one’s president who attends church, follow suit. Eliminate the text. No one Knowledge of mountains as source of pain it, and evasion is not the work of poetry— on its own. outside in, keeping his own counsel. his slightly perfumed wife by his side, his wants to read seventeen pages about evasion is the work of the state. Never ask a but dreamy (an anesthetic revelation) their bones get hummed in them. daughters stoned out on downers. He read reasons. Reading is treason in a simu- The mind sees the mind sees the mind question if you don’t know the answer, the as real estate itself. watching the stars and pretty soon a wall the bible in Cliff’s Notes. Forgot the past lated solution. (42) prosecutor says. Vigilance is the real thing, and there’s noth- Gothick Institutions is a book, mostly in rises up with a sign on it that says, Do about gluttony as a sin” (23). She imagines ing higher you can say about a book of Solution Simulacra is cathartic, as well as an verse, confiding ways to reach the Fairy Something. And that’s what writing poetry is, In a movie the hood makes the guy laugh punishing the politicians for catapulting us poetry. exposé. This book should be required read- realms. It is a compendium of esoteric then says “What am I? Funny? Do I amuse into a disastrous future. really, performing in front of the wall. ing in as many college and high school lit you?” and the game is crystal clear, for an Take a look too at Hollander’s The Book of knowledge. Or maybe a hoax? (Or maybe And we’re standing there like a bunch of and poetry classes as possible. Then there Hollander has the stuff to do it—he knows instant. Who Are Was, an investigation of family, the the true esoteric path posing as a hoax?) about things—history, politics, science, dummies. Frym ruminates, “Why should might be a chance that some folks might Holocaust, Celan, identity, and the endless One theme is the link between botany and sports, art, gossip—and is always ready In the playground the kid is five years older dawn want to face the day, considering its actually start to read the world and the hallways and apartments words make. Or hallucination. Many human souls awaken when the poem arrives to let it rearrange as than you and he says, Hey kid, nice bike, and quiet, fragile light? Dawn can’t save one civ- word as the great Brazilian educator Paulo his Rituals of Truce and the Other Israeli, a cold by ingesting plants — especially flowers: the words you use to answer will be dis- ilization from unraveling, or another from Freire advocated, their thoughts and dia- it sees fit. This is important. He also believes and passionate look at the traps of history jointed because he knows all they mean is erasing words for a living.” This is a classic logue rushing in between Gloria Frym’s Incense — the trembling butler in a trance in truth, which is difficult and generally and language in the Middle East—the end- fear. You’re thinking they mean, give me a Frym move, a spiritual understanding that sharp analytic thought twisting poems. serves cakes & tea — like mist between the hills unfashionable in any age. lessly dictated and evasive conversation little time and maybe I can change things and get segues immediately into a political Readers are conditioned to recognize around and through a mound of corpses. away. He knows that too, because power observation. I stand back watching the poems by how they look on the page, but imposes the form of the call and response. Larry Kearney was born in Brooklyn, moved to sun rise and then set again, as humans how it looks has nothing at all to do with the San Francisco in 1964, and has written a num- do what humans are doing. But while I presence or absence of poetry, the only This is history—the child standing helpless ber of books. stand here on my porch, shop for gro- measure of what is or isn’t a poem. The real and frightened in the middle of the endless, ceries, read the newspapers, groups of poem is a measure of the substance called leaden, false dialogue that will bring him people are working in think tanks to poetry in a set of words that try to say what eventually to what he fears most. When the GLORIA FRYM come up with ways of maneuvering can’t be said. Sometimes the content, the words are empty, nothing happens. SOLUTION SIMULACRA and manipulating the public. “A gov- poetry, is so fugitive as to be just the haunt- So impossible communication is the fondest United Artists Books /2006 ernment goes after an enemy it ing of a demanding ghost that breathes on hope of the state, and jargon is the currency Gloria Frym’s new book of poems Solution installed itself” (38). “Frustrated with its own in a corner. of the bureaucracy. Watch the movies called Simulacra is a yowl, a scream and a stamp- one’s adversary? Annihilate him. noir in which brutality belongs half to the Vigilance breathes that way. It consists of two ing of the foot at the U.S. government and Otherwise one will remain impotent, underworld and half to the powers that be. poems, Onome and Levinas and the Police. its stupid citizens. Murder, mayhem, and that will disturb one’s sleep” (42). Each considers, among myriad shifting rela- They’re dreams of the industrial revolution destruction and we go on shopping and
26 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 27 tea spills on the flowers — wisps of steam... gious community, the Order of the Catholic church (“Pope Paul has cleared the Considering how men and women interact He is said to have remarked he could said hmmmmmm & put in a big picture Resurrection, Anglican Benedictine (Non- way for dozens/of martyrs to become as artists, Owen remembers Dora Maar, a never see her window Flowers are befriended by fairies. If we Juring) — a.k.a. the “Greenfriars” — repopu- saints what can you say about a situation lover and model of Picasso’s. Maar was a never imagine her except crying…” have courage, and gentleness — guided by That we’re no experts on our own circum- late it, living in “anarcho-monachism” & like/that”). Her considerations create noted photographer, established well precise insight — fairies will visit us. Of The “ifs” of life seem much on Owen’s stances, past or present, is made clear in experimenting with dream-inducing plants. glimpses of womanhood, artisthood, and before she and Picasso met. Recognizing course, fairies are not the only subtle mind, whether or not we have power to act one of the collection’s loveliest couplets: humanhood deserving of careful attention. the importance of “Guernica,” she pho- Citizens of air: Peter is right. Why not just call paganism on them: tographed it in progressive stages of com- it’s pitch outside until I turn off the light “Christianity”? One hears in these poems the conviction of Gnomes Sylphs Salamanders Undines pletion. In “Picasso’s Chair or Breaking (If she had sent the tulips if she had not inside. someone who, from her early writing days, worn the shirt… in dream or waking vision or reverie Sparrow just began a new career as an anti-war out in thorns,” Owen imagines a lovers’ Still, we try to see and to connect. Owen has been uninterested in accepting exclu- if she had not in abandoned mines or palaces of clouds floutist. His latest book is America: A fight preempting this: ends this collection with the hopeful imag- sion. Arriving in New York City in the laughed at the small electrical smoke athanor’s glow or glimmer of rain Prophecy — The Sparrow Reader (Soft Skull inings of “for Ulysses and Georgia 1960s, she faced a writing community that he paints for hours then does sit-ups gravity & levity: one great animal Press). plume rising from she doesn’t come back that night or the next O’Keeffe” seemed less than enthusiastic about the dashboard of his brother’s doesn’t return to pose for ‘Weeping Woman’ Peter is best known as a social visionkeeper, women’s work. (“The Beats may have had a car…) From the window of Ulysses’ room so this is not a lonely story. The first seg- MAUREEN OWEN lot to do with it…. A lot [of them] didn’t like a garage light has been In this scenario, the painter’s dedication to Such writing is an act of defiance against the ment of the book, “Sion County: Fragment EROSION’S PULL women. Burroughs, Corso—he loved left on by someone for his own work falters: past’s stubborn immutability. For Owen, the of a Pastoral Letter,” describes a “remote, Coffee House Press / 2006 women, but did he really like them?” Owen someone who has yet to come home record of bygone events takes on a life of its rural, and poor” region with a secretly wondered aloud in a recent interview with without her record he finds it less interesting “I’m not alone,” writes Maureen Owen, own, one that cannot help but affect future a garage light left on socialist government (nominally part of the poet Marcella Durand.) Her solution was to to continue “When I’m on the phone.” Erosion’s Pull, conditions. And sometimes, even apparent for someone by someone Republican Party) financed through mari- establish, edit, and publish the now leg- gradually he abandons the painting Guernica the tenth book of Owen’s career, finds her calamities pave the way—literally—for juana. Like the rest of the book, it is both endary Telephone Books press and in the corner unfinished In the blackness of night contemplating themes of solitude and con- improvements: impossible and eminently reasonable. Telephone zine. Her dedication to the notion But in life as it actually unfolded, Picasso’s a solid bar of light nectedness—along with, to name a few oth- of an open “poetry community” led her to confidence in his work and in his right to When the eldest daughter lost control of Pamela Grossman regularly publishes poems and Within Sion County is the Monastery of St. ers, trains, snow, fire, leftovers, lights, the work in various capacities at the Poetry behave as he pleased, regardless of others, the diesel tractor with the front loader & essays and is a contributing arts writer for Seed John-in-the-Wilderness, built in 1910 and conditional tenses, and the modern fallen into ruin when a new self-created reli- Project. seems to have been unbridled: came through the wall of the dark living magazine. room they
28 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 DECEMBER 2006 - JANUARY 2007 29 gaze inside each drawer, see what is hid- JEN BENKA den in the big box of longing. We get A BOX OF LONGING glimmers of scenes to imagine. Bring your WITH 50 DRAWERS imagination to this word, she suggests. Soft Skull Press / 2005 This poem/scene/site could be about “AMERICA” is the last word in the Slave ships from Africa, Mayflower Preamble to the U.S. Constitution, and Pilgrims, caravans to the West, immigra- the last poem in Jen Benka’s sequentially- tion now. This is creating a history, a ordered 52-word pick up. But we arrive timeline, perhaps with a different kind of there only after having passed through glory, and always with traces of conse- Benka’s thorough re-membering of quence. America’s varying visions of itself. Benka explores what it is to write a “promised land lemonade stand / Constitution – or anything with words – Auction block stew pot” and arrives at an examination of the very Benka, a poet, performer and activist, dis- nature of verbal promises. How would we tills a message from each word of the rewrite that document now? What do we Preamble. She opens these word-drawers, do with the Constitution that we have? labeled “We,” “the,” “People” and hears How are we integrating our lives with the their essences. Benka begins “WE” with a first hopes of our early history as question: “Where were we during the expressed by the framers? In “CONSTI- convening / two hundred years ago or TUTION” Benka sets the scene: today.” Come to the blank page and write the first Benka’s trajectory is about framing pre- words destined territory. She traces and whis- There in the blind dark of our history— pers suggestive plots of our history. Benka Order sprung from the center of chaos. links forgotten, overlooked, or estranged And in “DO” she brings us into it, associations, locates the underside of the instructing: Preamble, re-stitches truths. command this page into action. A favorite aunt of mine often says, “I love Give it purpose beyond its meaning. you to pieces!” Love, pieces, you, I, to. Perform this word. Benka’s examination of the Preamble sep- Benka’s formulaic undertaking, a poetics arates each word out, in order to stop of the Preamble, shakes up and shifts our their never before questioned drone. Just whereabouts, our wherewithal, and our as Humpty Dumpty’s great fall reveals sense of this limited yet open-ended doc- the limitations of the king’s men, so too ument. does Benka’s process of breaking open, and then putting back together, the The poems re-pattern our views by revis- Constitution. This breakdown and iting constructs taken for granted or sim- reassembly provides a sightline to the ply ignored. How do we embrace a US social truth in our collective history Constitution that appears to support polit- revealing the faces inside the drawers of ical, religious, racial, class, and other longing. transgressions like wars that have cast a pall over the nation even just in our life- Benka’s poems belie their titles and mind- time? How can we accept the dominant fully jumble their original context, trig- interpretations of this manuscript, inter- gering unpredictable memories. Her pretations that appear to yield the abso- wordplay and ripe minimalism recall lute non-embodiment of the ideas and Harryette Mullen’s Trimmings. However, ideals the framers called for? Let’s rede- where Mullen trips and drools purposely fine it, Benka says, by asking what the over embedded hypocrisy with a bawdy words themselves want to say. By this poetic tongue, to jut out the truth, Benka’s parceling out of the truer nature of the tone rifts and subtlely burns its way into Constitution’s language, she rewrites the our conception of U.S. territory. Her forest for the trees. words can generate abstract visions, but more often they land before us as tangibly Alystyre Julian lives on MacDougal St. below as a stop sign. We can look through her Houston as a writer and a yoga teacher.
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NEW AND RECENTLY RENEWED MEMBERS: Dominick Arbolay, Paul Beatty, Lynn Behrendt, Dianne Benson, Charles Borkhuis, David Cameron, Tom Carey, Jim Carroll, Penelope Creeley, Ulla Dydo, Frederick Eberstadt, Isabel Eberstadt, Michael Friedman, Dianne Perry, Susan Gevirtz, Michael Goldberg, Ted Greenwald, Yukihide Maeshima Hartman, Susan Greene, Michael Heller, Jane Augustine, Robert Hershon, Donna Brook, Vicki Hudspith, Wallace Turbeville, Bill Kushner, Roselyn Leibowitz, Alfred Leslie, Sharon Mesmer, David Borchart, Murat Nemet-Nejat, Charles and Paula North, Marie Ponsot, Leonard Schwartz, Zhang Er, David C. Tinling, M.D., Daniel Wilcox, Richard Chammings, Susan Levin, Albert Onello, Joanna Fuhrman, Lewis Schwartz, Patricia Dienstfrey, Tony Hoffman, Evelyn Reilly, Bill Zavatsky, Mac McGinnes, Tom Devaney, Terence Diggory, Jocelyn Saidenberg, Susan DeMaio, Henry Abelove, Jason Notte, Erica Kaufman, Corina Copp, Paul Killebrew, David Wilk, Miles Champion, Joanna Sondheim, Shanxing Wang, Bethany Spiers, Katt Lissard, Michael E. Lindgren, Jennifer Firestone, Nina Karacosta, Georgia Christgau, Ian Bascetta, Ann McGovern Scheiner, Carol Bazelais, Rob Casper, Filip Marinovich, Phyllis Wat, Meredith Walters, Uday Jhunjhunwala, Elizabeth Looke-Stewart, Gregory Botts, Alec Swinburne, Jessica Dessner, Kim Irwin, Katherine Leiner, Barry Denny, Dustin Freeley, Rita Stein-Grollman, Gabriella Santoro, Todd Colby (as of 10/25/06).
THE POETRY PROJECT ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED NON-PROFIT RETURN POSTAGE GUARANTEED ST. MARK’S CHURCH IN-THE-BOWERY ORGANIZATION 131 EAST 10TH STREET U.S. POSTAGE NEW YORK, NY 10003 PAID NEW YORK, NY PERMIT NO. 7021