Acts of Appearance Forces of Nature / Forbidden Metadata Road Trip with Cupid / Marriage Poems
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NUMBER 112 SPRING 2019 $8.95 ACTS OF APPEARANCE FORCES OF NATURE / FORBIDDEN METADATA ROAD TRIP WITH CUPID / MARRIAGE POEMS Volume 28 · Number 112 · Spring 2019 FEATURES TRUE TO THE EYES Photographs from the Tanenbaum Collection 34 CONSOLATION Carole Glasser Langille I have hardly spoken for thirty years 42 MARRIAGE POEMS Matsuki Masutani Emphasize the positive 48 PHOTO: EDWARD BURTYNSKY, SHIPYARD #7, QILI PORT, ZHEJIANG PROVINCE, CHINA, 2005. THE HOWARD AND CAROLE TANENBAUM COLLECTION. The difficulty is to say no more than we know NOTES & DISPATCHES FINDINGS COLUMNS Randy Fred 18 BIRD’S EYE VIEW Blind Man Dance Distant Early Warning 6 Beau Dick: Devoured by Consumerism Lisa Bird-Wilson No-brainer Problem 50 Finn Wylie Black hole poetry Road Trip with Cupid Marshmallow Cases AFTERLIFE OF CULTURE 8 Force of Nature Vanished Shore Stephen Henighan Bradley Peters 52 Mission 9 CITY OF WORDS Reach Out and Touch (Somebody’s Hand) Stephen Osborne Alberto Manguel Wittgenstein Walks (Commercial Drive) 54 10 DEPARTMENTS Mary Schendlinger In Memoriam: Edith Iglauer, Prairie Monoloth 1917–2019 Getting out of the kitchen MISCELLANY 13 Last Words 4 Getting to sleep Watching E.T. with Grandpa ENDNOTES Forbidden Metadata 56 The world of Rocaterrania OFF THE SHELF, and more… NOTED ELSEWHERE 62 PUZZLE 63 COVER: The image on the cover is a detail of Untitled by Gauri Gill from her Acts of Appearance series, 2015–ongoing, archival pigment print, courtesy of the artist. CAUGHT MAPPING Acts of Appearance is an ongoing photography series for which Gill has worked closely with the 64 Adivasi residents of the Jawhar district in Maharashtra, India, who are known for the papier- mâché masks, including sacred traditional masks depicting mythological imagery, worn during an annual procession called Bahora. For Acts of Appearance, Gill proposed to her collaborators that they make new masks, depicting some aspect of their daily lives, which resulted in masks of human heads, animal heads—cobra, elephant, deer, goat, leopard—and objects, including a television, a mobile phone, among others. For the photographs, the subject-collaborators donned the masks while enacting scenes of everyday village life: working, socializing, waiting at a bus stop and others. Find out more about the project at gaurigill.com/works.html Acts of Appearance is part of the exhibition Moving Still: Performative Photography in India at the Vancouver Art Gallery, on display April 19 to September 2, 2019. MISCELLANY PUBLISHED BY The Geist Foundation PUBLISHER, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF AnnMarie MacKinnon OPERATIONS MANAGER Jocelyn Kuang ASSOCIATE EDITOR Michał Kozłowski ADMINISTRATION Interns: Anson Ching, Evelyn Kuang Volunteers: Patty Osborne, Jennesia Pedri BRAIN TRUST Stephen Osborne, Mary Schendlinger Co-founders, Consulting Publishers DESIGNER Eric Uhlich PROOFREADER Helen Godolphin ACCOUNTANT Mindy Abramowitz CGA, CPA OH, SWEET CANADA sound blueberries made when cooked. CIRCULATION Larry Wyatt n April 17, 2019, Canada Post Despite the confusion and concern released its Sweet Canada stamps. these Sweet Canada stamps have gen- WEB ARCHITECTS O Metro Publisher The stamps feature five Canadian des- erated, there is one thing that remains serts: sugar pie, butter tart, saskatoon certain: these permanent domestic rate DISTRIBUTION Magazines Canada berry pie, Nanaimo bar and blueberry stamps mean we are able to mail a let- grunt, arranged on a recipe card back- ter, provided it doesn’t weigh more than MANAGING EDITOR EMERITUS Barbara Zatyko ground. Since the release, Canadians 30 grams, anywhere in Canada, now or have voiced their concerns over the in the future. FIRST SUBSCRIBER Jane Springer Nanaimo bar illustration, stating that —The Editors the ratio of base to custard filling was MOST VALUABLE PUZZLERS PORTMANT-OMG! Jim Lowe & Brian Goth not correct on the stamp. The segment “Factchecker” on Edmonton AM, a CBC his spring, Heinz released Mayo- CONTRIBUTING EDITORS Jordan Abel, Bartosz Barczak, Kevin show, investigated the “Nanaimo bar- Tchup, a dip consisting of mayonnaise Barefoot, Kathy Battye, Trevor Battye, gument,” reporting that half the bar and ketchup mixed together into some andrea bennett, Jill Boettger, Jesmine should be the base (4/8 of an inch) and sort of unholy condiment for those who Cham, C.E. Coughlan, Brad Cran, Melissa Edwards, Robert Everett- the other half should comprise 3/8 of cannot decide what to put on their fries. Green, Daniel Francis, Randy Fred, an inch of custard filling and 1/8 inch While the name for the dip is a crowd- Lily Gontard, Michael Hayward, of chocolate layer on top. The Nanaimo sourced portmanteau of its constituent Jonathan Heggen, Gillian Jerome, bar on the stamp has more than half ingredients, apparently few Cree speak- Brian Lam, Thad McIlroy, Billeh Nickerson, Christine Novosel, Kelsea of the bar made up of the custard fill- ers weighed in (or did they?) because O’Connor, Patty Osborne, Eric ing, and as Edmonton AM reported, the “Mayochup” roughly translates to “shit Peterson, Dan Post, Debby Reis, Kris ratios depicted on the stamp weren’t face.” In an article on the Global News Rothstein, Norbert Ruebsaat, Jane Silcott, Roni Simunovic, Paul Tough, structurally sound: “It would fall right website, Arden Ogg, the director of Eric Uhlich, Michelle van der Merwe over.” Though this controversy caused the Cree Literacy Network, is cited as concerns among Canadians, at the Geist suggesting that those of Cree heritage office it was the blueberry grunt that seeking to reclaim their language will SUPPORT THE GEIST FOUNDATION: GEIST.COM/DONATION caught our attention: What is a grunt? likely never forget this particular trans- Is it a regional term? According to the lation. It’s likely no one else in Canada WWW.GEIST.COM online Canadian Encyclopedia, the des- is going to forget it either. sert got the name from the “grunting” —The Editors 4 Geist 112 Spring 2019 Geist is published four times a year. C’EST OÙ, LE LOUP-GAROU? people and their consistently warm he “Wolf Suite” (Wherewolf, welcome. I wondered if it was because Contents copyright © 2019 The Geist TWhenwolf, Whywolf,” Geist 111) tourism, especially from North Amer- Foundation. All rights reserved. reminded me of a news story that is ica, was new and Albanians weren’t Subscriptions: in Canada: $25 (1 year); in resurrected every so often in the fur- yet jaded. Then I learned about besa, the United States: $40; and elsewhere: $45. ther reaches of the internet about the the code of honour and hospitality Visa and MasterCard accepted. werewolf (loup-garou) of Quebec, a that Shucard described—the one that Correspondence and inquiries: creature that terrorized the citizens saved so many Jewish lives. I hope [email protected], [email protected], around Quebec city in the 1760s. besa survives or better yet brings its [email protected], [email protected]. The Quebec Gazette in 1766 reported influence to bear on the rest of us. Include SASE with Canadian postage or that a werewolf appeared in St. Rock, —Donna Macdonald, Nelson, BC IRC with all submissions and queries. near Cap Mouraska—on his hind #210 – 111 West Hastings Street Vancouver BC Canada V6B 1H4 legs, no less!—on June 17 and stayed only one night, departing for Mon- ARTISTS IN THIS ISSUE Submission guidelines are available at treal the following day. The paper Gauri Gill, born in Chandigarh, India, geist.com. warned its readers to be as cautious of studied photography in India and the ISSN 1181-6554. the loups-garous as one would be of US. Her work has been exhibited any ravenous wolf. Later in the year and collected throughout the world, Geist swaps its subscriber list with other cultural magazines for one-time mailings. the Quebec Gazette reported yet more including at the Kochi Biennale, the Please contact us if you prefer not to sightings of the beast in the region; a Smithsonian Institution, the Museum receive these mailings. story claimed the werewolf was reg- of Modern Art, the Art Gallery of Publications Mail Agreement 40069678 ularly attacked by other animals and Ontario and many others. local men, but that he continued to Registration No. 07582 harass the Quebecers. I have read Minimus is a chronic doodler who Return undeliverable Canadian addresses to: claims that the werewolf of Quebec lives in Vancouver. Circulation Department, came over on one of the early French #210 – 111 West Hastings Street settler ships. Eventually New Eng- Mary Schendlinger is a writer, editor Vancouver BC Canada V6B 1H4 Email: [email protected] land became more famous than Que- and (as Eve Corbel) a cartoonist. She Tel: (604) 681-9161, 1-888-GEIST-EH; bec for werewolf sightings, but many served as Senior Editor of Geist for Fax: (604) 677-6319; Web: geist.com believe that the New England were- twenty-five years. Geist is a member of Magazines Canada wolf was the very loup-garou of Que- and the Magazine Association of BC. Indexed bec, or at least a direct descendant. Adam Vajda was born and raised in in the Canadian Literary Periodicals Index and Keep up the good work. North Vancouver. He studied envi- available on Proquest. —Harris Neufeld, Cannon Beach, OR ronmental geography and geographic The Geist Foundation receives assistance information sciences at Simon Fra- from private donors, the Canada BESA-ME MUCHO ser University, and now does geo- Council, the BC Arts Council, the City of Vancouver and the Cultural Human eff Shucard’s article (“King Zog matics work for First Nations across Resources Council. Jand the Secret Heart of Albania,” British Columbia as well as freelance No. 110) reminded me of exploring cartography. various left wing “-isms” in Vancouver in the 1970s. One that I skirted was the Enver Hoxha Bookstore on Hast- ings Street. The store had such a for- WRITE TO GEIST G bidding aspect I never had the courage Thoughts, opinions, comments and to step through the door.