Sep 25, 2013

'WHAT POETRY IS'--PHILIP LEVINE @ DENISON

On Thursday morning, Levine joined Professor Ann Townsend ’85 and eight students from her advanced poetry-writing workshop to share thoughts on creativity and craft. - See more at: http://www.denison.edu/theden/2013/09/what-poetry-is/#sthash.LEBiN3wA.dpuf
 (Philip Levine & Ann Townsend)


On Thursday morning, Levine joined Professor Ann Townsend ’85 and eight students from her advanced poetry-writing workshop to share thoughts on creativity and craft. After asking some of the students which poets they’d been enjoying recently, Levine talked about the writers who influenced him in his youth: T.S. Eliot, whose “vignettes of city life” inspired him to find the poetic in his native Detroit; William Butler Yeats, who possessed “a speaking voice that’s also a singing voice”; and Wilfred Owen, whose thoughts on war resonated deeply with him as a young man coming of age during World War II.
One student asked Levine when he first began to write poetry. “It began as a verbal exercise, a kind of communion with the universe,” he replied. At 13, he would go outside after dinner and make up poems — although, he recalls, “I did not call them poems, because they had no resemblance to
- See more at: http://www.denison.edu/theden/2013/09/what-poetry-is/#sthash.LEBiN3wA.dpuf
On Thursday morning, Levine joined Professor Ann Townsend ’85 and eight students from her advanced poetry-writing workshop to share thoughts on creativity and craft. After asking some of the students which poets they’d been enjoying recently, Levine talked about the writers who influenced him in his youth: T.S. Eliot, whose “vignettes of city life” inspired him to find the poetic in his native Detroit; William Butler Yeats, who possessed “a speaking voice that’s also a singing voice”; and Wilfred Owen, whose thoughts on war resonated deeply with him as a young man coming of age during World War II.
One student asked Levine when he first began to write poetry. “It began as a verbal exercise, a kind of communion with the universe,” he replied. At 13, he would go outside after dinner and make up poems — although, he recalls, “I did not call them poems, because they had no resemblance to
- See more at: http://www.denison.edu/theden/2013/09/what-poetry-is/#sthash.LEBiN3wA.dpuf
On Thursday morning, Levine joined Professor Ann Townsend ’85 and eight students from her advanced poetry-writing workshop to share thoughts on creativity and craft. After asking some of the students which poets they’d been enjoying recently, Levine talked about the writers who influenced him in his youth: T.S. Eliot, whose “vignettes of city life” inspired him to find the poetic in his native Detroit; William Butler Yeats, who possessed “a speaking voice that’s also a singing voice”; and Wilfred Owen, whose thoughts on war resonated deeply with him as a young man coming of age during World War II.
One student asked Levine when he first began to write poetry. “It began as a verbal exercise, a kind of communion with the universe,” he replied. At 13, he would go outside after dinner and make up poems — although, he recalls, “I did not call them poems, because they had no resemblance to
- See more at: http://www.denison.edu/theden/2013/09/what-poetry-is/#sthash.LEBiN3wA.dpuf

Sep 11, 2013

MARGENTO European-American Sampling with Improvisations

Here is the bilingual (Romanian & English) version of a MARGENTO graph poem recently published in Romanian in Luceafarul literary magazine:
   


MARGENTO performing the Graph Poem ("Graph-ormance") at E-Poetry, London 2013, photos (c) Raluca Tanasescu


MARGENTO
Poeme de făcut bine / Doing Good Poems
(Live Sampling)
Samples from: / Extrase din:
Bruce Bond, Florin Caragiu, Paul Celan, Iarina Copuzaru, Laura Dan, Jacques Dupin, Page Hill-Starzinger, Iulia Miltaru, Czeslaw Milosz, Gellu Naum, O. Nimigean, Andra Rotaru, Maggie Schwed, William Shakespeare, Marin Sorescu, Raluca Tanasescu, John Taylor, G.C. Waldrep;
cu improvizații MARGENTO / with MARGENTO improvisations
 


Animale vindecătoare de cancer

Un prieten se luptă cu cancerul,/ glasul lui sună a rugăciune,/ rugăciunea lui e o lentilă/ prin care lumina se focalizează/ intr-un punct din inima ta.[1]
Inima mea e un adăpost pentru animale sălbatice,[2]
câteodată auzim cum ne dizolvăm în întuneric.[3]
Sub cămașa udă inima mea e despicată precum burțile peștilor
mișcările sunt funii care mă rod mă pregãtesc să devin o hrană,[4]
câinele și el lâncezește pe-un pietroi încălzit de soare –
eu și moartea cam atâția bani facem. O zi întreagă nr. 284
zace pe-un sac gol de nutreț, vizitată de-o primă/ muscă a stricăciunii. Înainte de-a se umfla și-a plesni,[5]
arată comun; după care, va vădi ce urmează-n comun.[6]
De cel ce scuipă oglinda pentru
a luci, fie-ți milă. Cu tine vorbesc,
lumeo, fața ce-ți dau e de monstru,/ rușinea în care m-arunc un strâmt cerc./ Spun asta cum zorile zic fii înaltă
umbrei. Gropii, fii adâncă.[7]


Cancer Healing Animals

A friend is struggling with cancer/ his voice got to sound like a prayer/ his prayer a lens/ focusing the light/ into a spot in your heart.[8]
My heart is a shelter for wild animals,[9]
sometimes we hear ourselves dissolve in the dark.[10]
Under my wet shirt the heart is slit open like a fish’s belly
my own moves are ropes cutting through me turning me into feed,[11]
the dog lolls too, on sun-warmed fieldstone—
death and I, that unremarkable.  For a day #284 lies
on an empty feed sack in the toolshed, visited by the first/ of the destroying flies.  Before she swells and bursts,[12]
she looks common; when she does, she’ll prove the coming common[13].
Pity the man who spits on the mirror
to make it shine.  I am talking to you,
world, the face I gave you a monster,/ my shame a little circle I plunged into./  I say this the way daybreak says be tall
to the shadows.  Be deep to the grave.[14]


Poem de adus lumina după moarte

Siloz spintecat. Mamă oarbă. . .  Rezonanță a sumei/ și scăderii pe-o coardă întinsă. De trecătoare sau/ contrabas. . .  Stârnind un palimpsest de graffiti/ pe zid. Lămurind minunea spațiilor
dintre dalele din curte. . . [15] de la clipa morţii,
când, straturi-straturi, muzica şi cerurile
iau locul vieţii, mai ales al trupurilor noastre[16].
Se indepărtează un chip – ca apa
a curs şi lumea lui e un văl ce-l acoperă[17].
Dreptunghiul negru săpat în iarbă
cu-o simplitate de capac de coșciug,
cu rânduri drepte de roșii și sfeclă – colorat argument/ contra morții, un așa de răspicat document[18]/ pe cât e solia de-asediu a soldaților de teracotă[19].
Mereu moartea, utilă, fertilă, însă
tot moarte – ca-nchipuirea, nu poate fi ucisă.//
Ai grijă, prunculu-i spune mama, blând/ focu-i foc, fumul fum. Din lemn – un semn? Nicicând// nu uita, spune focul. De fum să nu uiți.
Sfârșitul lumii e oriunde te uiți[20].


Bringing Light after Death Poem

Slashed-open silo.  Blind mother. . .  Resonance of the sum/ and the withdrawal, on a taut string.  Of a gully, or of a/ double bass. . .  That arouses a palimpsest of graffiti/ on the wall.  That casts light on the miracle of the interstice,
between the flagstones of the courtyard. . .[21]  from the moment
of death, when layer by layer music and heavens
usurp our lives, and moreover, our bodies.[22]
A face furthers away—flowing like water—
all wrapped in the world as if in its own veil.[23]
The black rectangle dug from the lawn
has the simplicity of a coffin lid,
its ordered rows of tomato and beet a colored argument/ against death, as strongly worded a document/[24] as a declaration of war from the terracotta army.[25]
Always death that is useful, fertile, but still
death, and so, like fantasy, cannot be killed.//
Careful, the mother tells her child because/ fire is fire, smoke smoke.  Matter matters.  Always//
remember, says the fire.  Remember, the smoke.
The end of the world is everywhere you look.[26]


Poem respirator

La fiecare respiraţie se va auzi o muzică nouă/ Ceva asemănător plânsului furnicilor./ Atunci o să murim frumos şi repetabil,/ Fiecare dintre noi va fi o petală de bujor ţinută între coperţile unei cărţi
Despre grădinăritul norilor[27].
Schele templiere      ale crimei, la rece// un drum făcut cu maimuțele     o transfuzie      de muște//
până-ntr-o preistorie dubioasă
bălăngănindu-se – a lor// sau o rupere-a buclei   mașinei de scris – prăbușire// în timp ce aerul            intrând șuieră și desenează
delectabil          lizibil la final    prin crăpă
turile-n talpă     ale singurei maimuțe ce se-ntoarce. . .[28]
Fără apă nu ne-ntâlnim, fără aer n-am ce citi[29];
pare-așa improbabil, la felul cum trăim
să pătrundem și-astfel să fim pătrunși, rechinul
ce ni-i mintea, ce-noată să respire, chiar și-n somn[30].
Și-n clipa aceea când pietrele-au devenit râuri,
Cartea a rămas cu foile în aer
în timp ce zidul s-a făcut deodată cald[31].


Respiratory Poem

With each breath a new music shall come out/ Something quite like the ants’ sobbing./ That’s when we’ll die beautifully and repeatedly,/ And each of us will be a peony petal inside a book
On cloud gardening.[32]
Templar scaffolding      of the crime and the coolness// a voyage with monkeys  a transfusion     of flies//
all the way to a seedy, staggering
prehistory—theirs// or the breaking of a typewriter         ribbon—collapse// while the air rushes in and draws,
delectably,        at the end legibly
on the crackled heel      of the only monkey who comes back[33]. . .
With no water, we can’t meet, with no air, I can’t read;[34]
it seems so unlikely, the way we live
to enter and so be entered, our mind the shark
that swims to breathe, even as we sleep.[35]
And at that moment of stones becoming rivers,
The Book remained open with its pages in the air
while the wall suddenly turned warm.[36]


Poem elixir

(locul ăsta îi face rău.) atunci[37]
se lipsește de hrană, nu vorbește cu nimeni,       e atent
la manii.           lovește zi de zi în aceleași
puncte fixe[38]. . .                        nu a vãzut lumina de peste o sãptã
mână[39]în Beznã se pãrea a fi salcâm
uscat, și hrana lui era cãldura a
nimalã, sulful fixat pe corpul fi
x pe drumul drept unde acela și aceea
se iubeau unindu-și aripile de jad               și de rubine[40],
Și-și luau îndemânarea din brânca de lemur./ Peste orașe unde-s lichenii gânditori/ Pterodactilii făceau legea zburând jur împrejur[41]./ Uneori auzim cum ne dizolvăm în întuneric[42].
Și batem în aer, împletiți, ca-ntr-un țărm
mut[43]. Strigăt           albastru albastru alb
astru. albă Lună întrezărită în plină zi[44]. . .
Harul nodului e-n cum și-nchide
ochiul prinzându-l pe al nostru, fascinația[45]. . .
muzica,            ne spune muzica, nu-i o oglindă[46]. . .
În oglindă-i duminică. . . ochiu-mi coboară la sexul iubitei mele[47]:


Elixir Poem

(this place makes him sick.) hence[48]
he quits eating, doesn’t talk to anyone,      is mindful
of manias.           Day after day he hits the same
fixed spots. . .[49]             he hasn’t seen the daylight for wee-
x[50]—in the Dark there seemed to be a dry
locust feeding off the animal he-
at, the sulfur fixed on core
poreal fixedness on the straight path where he and she
made love uniting their wings of jade    and rubies,[51]
And took their deftness from the lemur’s paw./ Above the cities of the thinking lichen,/ Flights of pterodactyls proclaimed the law. [52]/ Sometimes we hear ourselves melt in the dark.[53]/
Entwined we beat the air as if it were a silent
shore.[54]  Bluish yell      bluish bluish bluish yel-
low.  glow of the Moon in the blue daylight.[55]
The grace of the knot is how it closes
its eye to fix ours to it, our fascination. . .[56]
music,     says the music, is no mirror. . .[57]
In the mirror it’s Sunday. . . my eye moves down to the sex of my loved one:[58]


Poem de liniștit sângele

Dumnezeului tău           Dacă istoria unui mare noroc
e o crimă uitată, atunci       este nenorocirea
reamintirea                   generozităţii?[59]
Adesea, în drum spre o aniversare,/ un nou Reper – un nou Eveniment –/ este adăugat memoriei,/ schițat, de fapt, în Calendar[60]. Dă
ca şi când ei ar fi           pomană[61]. Asta pur
și simplu produce-o altă aniversare[62].

Doar arareori călătoria spre ani
versare e-ntreruptă de un Mijloc de Inter
val. Mult mai probabil va apărea un nou mijloc
de transport[63]. A fi. . . Cartea-ți mă transportă din-
colo[64]. . . (Chiar vrei să se-ntâmple? Ține ritmul[65].)
de-acest prezent neghiob, căci simt acum/ tot viitoru-ntr-o clipă[66]; A fi recursiv/ nu e un punct major, nici măcar          în teo
ria lui Chomsky – entităţi înserate-n n
tităţi similare – structură de arbor[67]. De-am atinge cor
tina – de ne-am părăsi locurile – am simți scoarța[68].


Blood Appeasing Poem

Thy Lord           If the story of a great fortune
is a forgotten crime, then          is misfortune
a remembered               generosity?[69]
Often, along the way to an anniversary,/ a new Point of Reference—a new Event—/ is added to memory,/ that is, adumbrated within the Calendar.[70]  Give
as if they were              alms.[71]  This simply
creates another anniversary.[72]

Only rarely does a new Means of Inter
val interrupt a journey to an anni
versary.  It is more likely that a new means
of transportation will present itself.[73]  To be. . .  Thy letters have transported me be
yond[74]. . .  (You really want it to happen?  Keep the pace up.[75])
this ignorant present, and I feel now/ the future in the instant;[76] Recursive/ is not the point, not even
Chomsky’s theory—embedding n
tities within like entities—a tree structure.[77]  If we touched the curt-
teens—if we could leave our seats to touch them—we would feel bark.[78]
 

Poem de înlocuire la timp

În ploaie, rezemat de un copac.
El are legatura cu pamântul.
Și simt sub coaja-i, palma bătucită[79],
sub o piatră era o piatră sub care                        fusese/  un mormânt sub care    fusese o biserică/ mai veche şi sub ea depozit            şi sub el/ o casă. . .  acolo am ajuns?   Nu ştiu[80]. . .
„Animale vindecătoare de cancer” e un titlu/ tare. Merge la orice – la un poem, o trupă
de punk de subsol, o marcă de sucuri. O națiune[81]. / [. . .] Mai nou, m-am hotărât într-o privință:
copacii-s niște suflete răzlețe,/ amputate din trupuri. Există patos[82].
Cântând ajungem acolo unde creștem[83].
Vi se va provoca în permanență/ trecutul. Vi-l vor băga în memorie până
veți uita viitorul (cod 3627)[84],/ forme ale căror emoţii     le recunoşti,/ fără să fie nevoie să le-nveleşti în limba locului[85].
Pe drumul spre aniversare vorbeam despre astfel de lucruri[86].
 

On Time Replacement Poem

Out in the rain, leaning on a tree.
It has its own connection to the earth.
And I can sense that callous hand under its bark,[87]
under a rock there was a rock under which/ an old tomb under which     an older church/ under which a storehouse            under which a house. . ./ We there now?  Dunno[88]. . .  
“Cancer Healing Animals” is a really great/ title.  For anything:  a poem, a basement
punk band, a soda pop.  A nation.[89]/ [. . .] In other news, I've decided I think
trees are misplaced souls, cut out of the body.  There is pathos.[90]
As we sing we reach the point where we shall grow.[91]
The past shall be recurrently provoked/ in you.  They’ll stick it in your memory until
you forget about the future (code 3627)[92],/ the forms whose emotions    you recognize/ without having to translate them into the language of the place.[93]
As we journeyed toward the anniversary we discussed these things.[94]


[1] Florin Caragiu, ,,Fiecare poem e o respirație”, blogul autorului 
[2] Iarina Copuzaru, ,,Frumusețea aceea nenumită” din Domnișoara Miller era nespus de ciudată
[3] Ibidem
[5] Maggie Schwed, „În trecere” din Blackbird, primăvara 2011, Vol. 10, No. 1
[6] MARGENTO
[7] Bruce Bond, „Ginsberg” din Kenyon Review Online
[8] Florin Caragiu, “Every Poem Is Another Breath,” http://florincaragiu.blogspot.ro/2012/02/fiecare-poem-e-o-respiratie.html
[9] Iarina Copuzaru, “That Nameless Beauty” from Miss Miller Was Utterly Weird
[10] Idem
[11] Laura Dan, “***,” from You Tube
[12] Maggie Schwed, ,,Passing Through” from Blackbird, Spring 2011, Vol. 10, No. 1, http://www.blackbird.vcu.edu/v10n1/poetry/schwed_m/passing_page.shtml
[13] MARGENTO
[14] Bruce Bond, ,,Ginsberg” from The Kenyon Review Online, Winter 2013, http://www.kenyonreview.org/kr-online-issue/2013-winter/selections/bruce-bond-763879/
[15] Jacques Dupin, Mame, fragment
[16] Iarina Copuzaru, „Liturghia Bujorilor”, ibidem
[17] Florin Caragiu, „Căușul palmei”, de pe blogul autorului
[18] Maggie Schwed, „Grădinar nedezmințit” din The Malahat Review, 2011, no. 175
[19] MARGENTO
[20] Bruce Bond, „Poarta raiului”, Cuvinte scrise peste zidurile orașului
[21] Jacques Dupin, trans. John Taylor, from Mothers
[22] Iarina Copuzaru, “The Peonies’ Liturgy,” Ibidem
[24] Maggie Schwed, “Constant Gardener” from The Malahat Review, Summer 2011, no. 175
[25] MARGENTO
[26] Bruce Bond, “Heaven’s Gate,” Ibidem
[27] Iarina Copuzaru, „Liturghia bujorilor”, op. cit.
[28] Jacques Dupin, din Muște și maimuțe
[29] MARGENTO
[30] Bruce Bond, „În”, op. cit.
[31] Florin Caragiu, „I. retrăire” din Sentic
[32] Iarina Copuzaru, “The Peonies’ Sermon,” op. cit.
[33] Jacques Dupin, from Monkeys and Flies, translated from the French by John Taylor
[34] MARGENTO
[35] Bruce Bond, “In,” op. cit.
[36] Florin Caragiu, “I. Reliving” from Sentic
[37] Andra Rotaru, „Locuri”, din Lemur
[38] Ibidem
[39] ibidem
[40] Gellu Naum, „Hrăninrea pietrei” din Fața și suprafața urmat de Malul albastru
[41] Czeslaw Milosz, „Și steaua se chema Pelin” din „Caietele răzlețe”, Imnul perlei
[42] Iarina Copuzaru, ,,Frumusețea aceea nenumită”, op. cit.
[43] MARGENTO
[44] Iulia Militaru, „Impresii din Olimp”, Câteva poeme, manuscris în lucru
[45] Bruce Bond, „Cartea lui Columba” din Imnul negru
[46] Bruce Bond, „Amurg”, ibidem
[47] Paul Celan, „Corona”, de pe site-ul Art of Europe
[48] Andra Rotaru, “Places” from Lemur
[49] Ibidem
[50] Ibidem
[51] Gellu Naum, “Feeding the Stone” from The Face and the Surface and The Blue Riverbank
[52] Czeslaw Milosz, “The Wormwood Star” from “The Separate Notebooks,” Hymn of the Pearl
[53] Iarina Copuzaru, “That Nameless Beauty,” op. cit.
[54] MARGENTO
[55] Iulia Militaru, “Notes from Olympus,” from A Few Poems, manuscript in progress
[56] Bruce Bond, “Book of Kells” from Black Anthem
[57] Bruce Bond, “Dusk,” ibidem
[59] Page Hill-Starzinger, „Collectio” din Vestigial, trad. Raluca Tanasescu
[60] G.C. Waldrep, „Aniversare” din Submergența
[61] Page Hill-Starzinger, idem
[62] G.C. Waldrep, idem
[63] G.C. Waldrep. idem
[64] William Shakespeare, Hamlet și Macbeth
[65] MARGENTO
[66] Shakespeare, Macbeth, continuarea citatului precedent
[67] Page Hill-Starzinger, „Reducere”, manuscris trimis de autoare
[68] G.C. Waldrep, „Avem o viziune a pădurii, și atunci pădurea are o viziune despre noi”, editorial în revista Double Room, 2009
[69] Page Hill-Starzinger, “Collectio” from Vestigial
[70] G.C. Waldrep, “Anniversary” from Submergency
[71] Page Hill-Starzinger, idem
[72] G.C. Waldrep, idem
[73] Idem
[74] Shakespeare, Hamlet and Macbeth
[75] MARGENTO
[76] Shakespeare, the previous quote continued
[77] Page Hill-Starzinger, “Reduction” from a manuscript contributed via email
[78] G.C. Waldrep, “We Have a Vision of the Forest, and then the Forest Has a Vision of Us”—Guest Editor’s Introduction to Double Room no 9, 2009
[80] MARGENTO, „Vid avid”, Nomadosofia
[81] G.C. Waldrep, mesaj e-mail
[82] Idem
[83] MARGENTO
[84] O. Nimigean, „In memoriam professoris Romulus Priscornic”, adio adio dragi poezii
[85] Florin Caragiu, epigraf, op. cit.
[86] G.C. Waldrep, „Aniversare” din Submergența
[88] MARGENTO, “Avid Void” from Nomadosophy
[89] G.C. Waldrep, e-mail message sent to margento
[90] Idem
[91] MARGENTO
[92] O. Nimigean, “In Memoriam Professoris Romulus Priscornic” from farewell farewell dear poems
[93] Florin Caragiu, epigraph to op. cit.
[94] G.C. Waldrep, “Anniversary” from Submergency
Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...