Poem 4 – Bissextile

The assignment was an erasure poem. This Bickerstaffian donation called out for the white-out.

Poem 3 – Untitled love poem

Poem 2 – the Tradition

1.

I hold out my hand.
I hand over
and I pass on.
I hold out my hand.
I hold out my hand.
I hand over
and I pass on.
Some call this mothering,
this way I begin each day by holding out my hand and then all day long pass on.
Some call this caretaking,
this way all day and all night long, I hold out my hand and take engine oil additive into me and then I pass on this engine oil additive to this other thing that once was me, this not really me.
This soothing obligation
This love.
This hand over
and this pass on.
This part of me and this not really me.
This me and engine oil additive.
This me and not really me and engine oil additive.
Back and forth.
All day long, like a lion I lie where I will with not really me
and I bestow upon not really me
refractive index testing oils and wood preservatives.
I lie with not really me all day long,
and so I bequeath not really me a honeyed wine of flame retardants and fire preventing agents.
I make a milk like nectar,
a honeyed nectar of capacitator dielectrics, dyes, and electrical insulation
and I pass it on it every two hours to not really me.
Not really me is a ram perched on a cliff above a stream,
unable to be quenched by the flame retardant in furniture.
Not really me comes near
and takes a nectar of insulated pipes, and some industrial paints.
Later I pass the breast cup to not really me,
a breast cup filled with sound insulation panels and imitation wood with a little nectar and sweetness.
And not really me drinks it and then complains a little,
rebuking me for my cakes of nuts and raisons
are cakes of extraction of crude petroleum and natural gas,
for my apples are filled with televisions and windshield wiper blades.
On my breast are the curls of not really me
and against the brow of not really me wafts plasticizer used in heat transfer systems.
As drinking not really me takes in anger and in need
not really me drinks from the hand of that sweetest sleep the juice of me
that cup of adhesives,
that cup of fire retardants,
of pesticide extenders.
And as not really me drinks
I cradle the moon and not really me in my right hand
my lips kissing with the dedusting agents and wax extenders.
Then later in the night,
the bed scattered with the stains of cutting oils and gas-transmission turbines,
the blankets with blends of hydraulic fluid,
we lie there together
handing over and passing on
filled up and attempting to think our way through
economics and labor and time and biology
me and not really me
together.


2.

I’d like to think we had agreed upon this together,
that we had a tradition,
that we agreed these things explained us to us
but when not really me wakes
after drinking the pharmaceuticals and photo chemicals
night after night
and day after day
not really me will sing a song of rebuke,
sing the song of not really me, the song that
goes like Salutations to brominated fire retardants of Koppers Ind.
goes like Salutations to water/oil repellent paper coating of 3M
goes like Salutations to wiper blades of Asahi
goes like Salutations to bike chain lubricant of Clariant International
goes like Salutations to wire and cable insulation of Daikin
goes like Salutations to pharmaceutical packaging of DuPont
goes like Salutations to nail polish of Dyneon
goes like Salutations to engine oil additive of Agrevo E
goes like Salutations to hair curling and straightening of Agsin Ptd. Ltd.
goes like Salutations to insecticide and termiticide for empty greenhouses of Chevron Chemical
goes like Salutations to greenhouse flowers of Monsanto
goes like Salutations to insecticide to kill fire ants of Rigo Co.
goes like Salutations to plasticizers of US Borax Inc.
Not really me’s song will go on and on.
Not really me will sing it all night long
hour after hour for weeks on end.
It will have eighty five company names in it.
It will have twenty one chemical functions in it.
It will have ninety seven products in it.
It will have two hundred trade names in it.
Not really me’s song will rotate through these names in all their combinations.
And then it will end with another part that is as long as the first
and inventories the chemicals that not really me does not yet know.


3.

Oh those of you who are not really me at all
I say let wisdom be your anvil and knowledge your hammer.
Hand this over.
Pass this on.

Poem 1 – A limit laid down

The assignment was to meditate on a single word using the Oxford English Dictionary. One could probably guess what word popped to mind.


A limit laid down

Intercommunity of various sentiments

Na persoun sould intromet thairwith

Satisfied the curiosity of the astonished black

And Naked shaking to shew his indulgence

Flourishing despite infection with the sleeping sick

Capacity of a tree to endure catholicity of spirit

Tamarack, Poplar, Bird Cherry, White and Black

Ash borne without producing gastric symptoms

To decorate with all the splendor of panegyric

Trees give way as water drops below standard fineness

Throwing a veil over the deformities of a product parameter

Imperfection with the instrumentality of Perfection

Under control, or to use a more Christian word, charity

How the metal cools and can be withdrawn

To what extent “dancing girls” forbears euphemism

No such thing as a literally harmless dose of radiation

Fragments

Still working diligently on the poems for next week's workshop, but another assignment is to keep a diary of fragments for our minimalist literature class. Here's a taste from the archive and this eventful week. Barcodes at bottom of post.

She’s

BACK

to school

get some

[valuable]

skills. skeeoos.

Orientation:

I like to write about people that are really flawed
I like to write about urban space and love
I like to write about religion and identity

Brekekekex, ko-ax, ko-ax

Brekekekex, ko-ax, ko-ax

Brekekekex, ko-ax, ko-ax

It’s exactly

an exact

exit

Which slender and hollow do you mean?

Malaprops:

Manual of fact
Confession stand
Ear confection
Incompossible
Homodernist
Septical

I write about being broke and blue collar and baking –

things that start with b

Snow on top

When the dark clouds part

Rain of pink petals

Our loss is dog’s heaven’s gain

Oil Floats—

Bloats

American Man:

I try to write about everyday relationships in a harsh but endearing way

I want to touch your eyes

a lamp sporting erotic characters

grief in a box

Brain, ball, spiral, maze, fractal, fist.

“The emergence of relations among things, more than the things themselves, always gives rise to new meanings.”

I try to write something quirky and heartbreaking

Outlying the dense

Capture and effusion of

Meaning our fall from

Identity will convert us

Our touching the images

I tend to write about people getting murdered

That are us fallen from us

Remote control pride has had fifteen whips.

Read Canadian poems; have half-flapped waffles;

random cankers pierced; homicidal hasbeens fly witless.

Xerox sweet poems: have fotocopies wept?

Xerox sucky poems: have fotocopies wounded?

Xerox shitty poems: have fotocopy warriors.

je parle hebrew verse in full visionary kandour.

je parle hedonistic verse in favoured vector koordinates.

I’m done writing about Calcutta and am looking for the next thing

jejune pretty hate verse into fowl vicious kurses.

domestic isolation & capital’s reach

“our social personality is a creation of the thoughts of other people”

ritual provides a context in which beauty is possible

leathery, green, & shiny

plucked & dried

2 hours ago

Moribund Facekvetch is si dnubirom, o lonely tylenol.

2 hours ago

George Murray is asking himself, How do I work this? And George Murray is asking himself, Where is that large automobile?

3 hours ago

Judy MacDonald is on the internets too much. And Facebook wants to help her stop.

4 hours ago

Faustine Faubert is swearing this much is true.

My writing tends to be about spirituality and people like myself who are in their late 20s and coming to age extremely late in life and how that dovetails with urban decay in small-town America

4 hours ago

Jesse Hirsh is still fuct.

4 hours ago

Dave Murphy is feeling particlarly hirsute on these hot days.

5 hours ago

Trina Langille is going to have her husband's company in San Francisco next week.

5 hours ago

Kate Armstrong is in a borrowed cubicle.

5 hours ago

Lisa Sloniowski is weighing the options.

NEW YORK IS POSSIBILITY

THE NEW SCHOOL

IS NEW YORK

Dear Bob Grenier, I don’t know if you remember but we read together at New Yipes in Oakland a couple years ago. I think you called me a revolutionary and said I reminded you of Allen Ginsberg. Anyway, here is a call for a new project of mine. I would love it if you would donate, particularly because I have to take a Minimalist Mystique class this fall and don’t have much talent in minimalist forms!