28 February 2011
review of Godzenie
Nice review of Godzenie in Goodreads. Kept meaning to post it. Thanks Fish.
Fish's review Oct 13, 09
bookshelves: transculture
Finally got a copy of this in Japan. Read it almost immediately! Here's part of what I wrote in my journal immediately afterwards:
Still processing but:
A. It is full of truth moment coins, singular phrasal objects-- the units, it would seem, of his poems. At times these beauties are rough and bring the larger object out of focus-- its jarring at times, but that, at least in [Block 7A:], the fact that there is such consistent play (and to whatever degree this "play" is controlled) may be a clue to help understand Marcus' project at least in a rudimentary, structural way... I lost myself just then thinking about mortgage brokers in the early 2000s drinking expensive liquor with b-list celebrities.
B. Lets see-- other than the presence of these truth coins that Marcus Block 7A is full of, there is def. some prankishness-- a quality, a sense of humor that attracted me to Marcus' writing initially when I met him in Spring & Summer 2004 or 2005 I guess it was. It's not just a clever-ness, but its still very boyish at times-- playful-- there's that word, 'play' again. Some of his truth beauty coin moments are mixed/ spring from a sort of teenage giggle-snort kind of entertainment value-- "clubbing a fish in the bathtub" or "cum" or splattering bird poo. It's distinctly silly at times and charming.
C. I want to say something about the connection to place. The section title page locates the poems in a town in Poland. And each iteration of Block 7A seems to further flesh out some otherwise stale, numerical place that could just as easily be a prison cell block as anywhere. That each successive Block 7A is labeled as such gives the sense of a recycling motion, an elastic piston-turn back and back and back to BLOCK 7A. If these are successive visits are they attempts towards some goal? Are they a full realization of BLOCK 7A, or are we supposed to read an elipsis at the end fo the section? As the next section moves to a new location (or at least a new name-- the Hotel Diament-- perhaps alluded to in BLOCK 7A as the "Diamond Hotel" or something-- it seems unlikely that what felt like continuous returns to BLOCK 7A would be resolved or actually continued in any clear or meaningful way.
D. Joe Donahue in a blurb says that (and I'm paraphrasing here) uses Poland to access a poetics. I believe that Joe knows what he's talking about. But I'm not sure this poetics is fully activated until the final section of GODZENIE. I want to read through section one again with an eye out for some certain clues dropped in section three regarding the connection between WHERE these poems are and HOW these poems are. HOW does Marcus extract a poetics from a study of some place? How? And how can I-- how will I? A compelling read and re-read!
-Fish
Fish's review Oct 13, 09
bookshelves: transculture
Finally got a copy of this in Japan. Read it almost immediately! Here's part of what I wrote in my journal immediately afterwards:
Still processing but:
A. It is full of truth moment coins, singular phrasal objects-- the units, it would seem, of his poems. At times these beauties are rough and bring the larger object out of focus-- its jarring at times, but that, at least in [Block 7A:], the fact that there is such consistent play (and to whatever degree this "play" is controlled) may be a clue to help understand Marcus' project at least in a rudimentary, structural way... I lost myself just then thinking about mortgage brokers in the early 2000s drinking expensive liquor with b-list celebrities.
B. Lets see-- other than the presence of these truth coins that Marcus Block 7A is full of, there is def. some prankishness-- a quality, a sense of humor that attracted me to Marcus' writing initially when I met him in Spring & Summer 2004 or 2005 I guess it was. It's not just a clever-ness, but its still very boyish at times-- playful-- there's that word, 'play' again. Some of his truth beauty coin moments are mixed/ spring from a sort of teenage giggle-snort kind of entertainment value-- "clubbing a fish in the bathtub" or "cum" or splattering bird poo. It's distinctly silly at times and charming.
C. I want to say something about the connection to place. The section title page locates the poems in a town in Poland. And each iteration of Block 7A seems to further flesh out some otherwise stale, numerical place that could just as easily be a prison cell block as anywhere. That each successive Block 7A is labeled as such gives the sense of a recycling motion, an elastic piston-turn back and back and back to BLOCK 7A. If these are successive visits are they attempts towards some goal? Are they a full realization of BLOCK 7A, or are we supposed to read an elipsis at the end fo the section? As the next section moves to a new location (or at least a new name-- the Hotel Diament-- perhaps alluded to in BLOCK 7A as the "Diamond Hotel" or something-- it seems unlikely that what felt like continuous returns to BLOCK 7A would be resolved or actually continued in any clear or meaningful way.
D. Joe Donahue in a blurb says that (and I'm paraphrasing here) uses Poland to access a poetics. I believe that Joe knows what he's talking about. But I'm not sure this poetics is fully activated until the final section of GODZENIE. I want to read through section one again with an eye out for some certain clues dropped in section three regarding the connection between WHERE these poems are and HOW these poems are. HOW does Marcus extract a poetics from a study of some place? How? And how can I-- how will I? A compelling read and re-read!
-Fish
DEPARTMENT 3
The UK revolution in language continues . . . . Department 3 now available. . .
edited by the super duper editorial vision of
Richard Barrett & Simon Howard
writing from Marie-Angelique Bueler, Wayne Clements, Matt Dalby, David Grundy, Catherine Hales, Ryan Ormonde, Posie Rider, Marcus Slease, & Tom Watts.
check it:
Department Magazine
edited by the super duper editorial vision of
Richard Barrett & Simon Howard
writing from Marie-Angelique Bueler, Wayne Clements, Matt Dalby, David Grundy, Catherine Hales, Ryan Ormonde, Posie Rider, Marcus Slease, & Tom Watts.
check it:
Department Magazine
27 February 2011
Books borrowed from poetry library in London
1) Many Happy Returns by Ted Berrigan
2) Train Ride by Ted Berrigan
3) Tuned Droves by Eric Baus
4) Nothing to You by Ted Berrigan
Finished those fine books this week. Love to hold them in my hand. Fine specimens.
Heading to poetry library now.
Hoping to pick up
1) Alice Notely: Grave of Light (or some rare chapbooks from the 70's and 80's)
2) Eileen Myles School of Fish
3) Philip Whalen (some hard to find rare shit)
ONWARDS!!!
2) Train Ride by Ted Berrigan
3) Tuned Droves by Eric Baus
4) Nothing to You by Ted Berrigan
Finished those fine books this week. Love to hold them in my hand. Fine specimens.
Heading to poetry library now.
Hoping to pick up
1) Alice Notely: Grave of Light (or some rare chapbooks from the 70's and 80's)
2) Eileen Myles School of Fish
3) Philip Whalen (some hard to find rare shit)
ONWARDS!!!
26 February 2011
some poems gone for a wee while
some poems in progress taken off . . . . poems sent onward to magazines who count this humble blog as already publishing them . . . . yadda yadda yadda
20 February 2011
Lunch break
I'm thinking of the human voice. Of speech. Of the subversion of communication. Of the pre-fabrication of meaning. Of Emotions language and meanings. What slips past.
What infer requires of the logic of thinking. A systematic ordering may go, have gone, too far into a systematic disordering. What is the form or norm for variation? Who are WE fighting?
I'm enriched by the everyday and how to awaken the discarded the disused language. There is a lot to discover or re-discover in the rubbish that surrounds us. We are smothered and inundated by the language of persuasion, by deadened rhetoric.
A slip of the tongue: a slip thru the wet head.
Or/and the exuberance of song.
I want to walk, or perhaps tear, thru the contempt. The contemplative. Sometimes veer off into the impure pleasures of sounds. Somewhere between a song and a chant.
There is no I shan’t. No commandments.
I find pleasures in these language arts, an impure poetics, which is a motion and a delay. A pedestrian poetics. A nomadic poetics. Always an impurity.
A steady beat or wobbly but something that tracks and derails the mind, the constrictive mind awakened not deadened by language visual rhetoric theatre music education etc. etc.
We think we know what we think but we seldom know what thinks thru us.
Someone has already said this.
L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Poetics of the 80's and 90's and form as content. The structure/grammar of a language is also content. Artifices of absorption and all the rest.
Considerations of audience and crass marketing. I DO NOT write from the hill above the city but IN the city. Among the rubble of everyday. The discarded. The cliched.
THIS is also a kind of difficulty: the complexity of the simple. Mind it.
Modernist techniques: collage, weird little juxtapositions, (even lineation) are used in advertising but often tells us little, or perhaps a lot, in terms of depth? Is there a faux depth? A foxy depth? A foxy death?
Intellectual and or emotional. Abstractness can be both.
(14/2/2011 from the notebook)
What infer requires of the logic of thinking. A systematic ordering may go, have gone, too far into a systematic disordering. What is the form or norm for variation? Who are WE fighting?
I'm enriched by the everyday and how to awaken the discarded the disused language. There is a lot to discover or re-discover in the rubbish that surrounds us. We are smothered and inundated by the language of persuasion, by deadened rhetoric.
A slip of the tongue: a slip thru the wet head.
Or/and the exuberance of song.
I want to walk, or perhaps tear, thru the contempt. The contemplative. Sometimes veer off into the impure pleasures of sounds. Somewhere between a song and a chant.
There is no I shan’t. No commandments.
I find pleasures in these language arts, an impure poetics, which is a motion and a delay. A pedestrian poetics. A nomadic poetics. Always an impurity.
A steady beat or wobbly but something that tracks and derails the mind, the constrictive mind awakened not deadened by language visual rhetoric theatre music education etc. etc.
We think we know what we think but we seldom know what thinks thru us.
Someone has already said this.
L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E Poetics of the 80's and 90's and form as content. The structure/grammar of a language is also content. Artifices of absorption and all the rest.
Considerations of audience and crass marketing. I DO NOT write from the hill above the city but IN the city. Among the rubble of everyday. The discarded. The cliched.
THIS is also a kind of difficulty: the complexity of the simple. Mind it.
Modernist techniques: collage, weird little juxtapositions, (even lineation) are used in advertising but often tells us little, or perhaps a lot, in terms of depth? Is there a faux depth? A foxy depth? A foxy death?
Intellectual and or emotional. Abstractness can be both.
(14/2/2011 from the notebook)
15 February 2011
13 February 2011
back against the wall
perfect position to write.
not sure if the heat from this laptop will decrease the potency of my sperm.
I do not need potent sperm at this time, or perhaps ever.
wondering bout Neil Gaiman?
Children's stories etc.
It is time for M&M, peanuts, yellow, mostly.
A pedestrian poetics??????
Tomorrow is Monday. How does that feel?
not sure if the heat from this laptop will decrease the potency of my sperm.
I do not need potent sperm at this time, or perhaps ever.
wondering bout Neil Gaiman?
Children's stories etc.
It is time for M&M, peanuts, yellow, mostly.
A pedestrian poetics??????
Tomorrow is Monday. How does that feel?
some Sunday reading
some fascinating answers and questions . . . not the usual fluff:
Interview with Sean Bonney
some interesting new translations of the poet Grzegorz Wróblewski:
Grzegorz Wróblewski
Interview with Sean Bonney
some interesting new translations of the poet Grzegorz Wróblewski:
Grzegorz Wróblewski
10 February 2011
and now back to life!!!
now after a very intense month in London of nothing but almost mindless work my mind is coming round again. memories. Turkey. Italy. poland. nights of flickers and shadows. revising primitive pianos. lookin for a good poetry reading. will be reading at poetry cafe in covent garden in march with a bunch of other poets to celebrate the launch of the movie Howl in the UK. Should be interesting. Nice announcement today about a poetry reading in Oxford at a bookshop called Albion Beatnik. Nice name for a bookshop. Live jazz. poetry. Albion is the oldest name for England. oh white cliffs of Dover etc. Beatnik is the counter culture of the 50's in America. Yeah. God there needs to be some serious juice. So many youngish and young poets workin sooooo hard to connect communities and build bridges. small presses. labours of love. readings. mighty fine poets out here. Hope the energy explodes again. miss the Openned readings in London. Just gotta not let job stuff suck me dry. Must reconnect with poetry communities soon!!!
8 February 2011
from the notebook
Treetop Flyers
"not common speech / a dead level / but the uncommon speech of paradise /
tongue in which oracles/ speak to beggars and pilgrims."
-- Denise Levertov "A Common Ground"
"A language / excelling itself to be itself"
--Denise Levertov "A Common Ground"
--------------------------
the anti-poetic for the peeps
ok
there's beauty
a drop kick
a tune or tone
ironic detached warm
compassionate love riddled
the academy is back
lets build another lemon
teaching English as a foreign
grammar
---------------------------------
fine hairs on the white
bedsheet
toast crumbs and sperm stains and malt vinegar and curry
stain (small)
in a dream after a snowy Christmas
in London and eating
a £2 frozen dinner
he said goodbye
to former lovers
in Turkey in Poland in Korea
in a double-bedded room
overlooking the waves
In Wood Green he found
the pound shop
the fan from the old laptop was constant
the rain: stopped. Blue sky patches.
has he shit in
his nose
from the underground
or
from the fresh flowers
blowing out their fluff
to mate?
if you fail to talk
do you fail
to wake up?
the hypnotist all over
YOU TUBE
tricked people into taking
blank pieces
of paper for money
sleepwalkers
how to know or believe
we are more than machines
-----------------------------------
"not common speech / a dead level / but the uncommon speech of paradise /
tongue in which oracles/ speak to beggars and pilgrims."
-- Denise Levertov "A Common Ground"
"A language / excelling itself to be itself"
--Denise Levertov "A Common Ground"
--------------------------
the anti-poetic for the peeps
ok
there's beauty
a drop kick
a tune or tone
ironic detached warm
compassionate love riddled
the academy is back
lets build another lemon
teaching English as a foreign
grammar
---------------------------------
fine hairs on the white
bedsheet
toast crumbs and sperm stains and malt vinegar and curry
stain (small)
in a dream after a snowy Christmas
in London and eating
a £2 frozen dinner
he said goodbye
to former lovers
in Turkey in Poland in Korea
in a double-bedded room
overlooking the waves
In Wood Green he found
the pound shop
the fan from the old laptop was constant
the rain: stopped. Blue sky patches.
has he shit in
his nose
from the underground
or
from the fresh flowers
blowing out their fluff
to mate?
if you fail to talk
do you fail
to wake up?
the hypnotist all over
YOU TUBE
tricked people into taking
blank pieces
of paper for money
sleepwalkers
how to know or believe
we are more than machines
-----------------------------------
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