Can-Can

Last Day in Korea

The last day of my Korean adventure is here. So Gee, Mom, and I took our baggage to be checked in at the Kangnam City Airport. Then the ladies got their nails done, while I poked around an Apple store and braved one of those Korean versions of a Supercuts, simply because I didn't want to end up spending money on gadgets I couldn't afford. After my haircut, which lasted about ten nanoseconds, I took the ladies to a Mexican joint, where my Amani (Mom) got to try her first spot of guacamole. "Gooood!" she exclaimed.

"Yes," I agreed in Korean. "Now have a jalepeno."

"Oh!" she scowled. "Spicy!"

"See! Kim chi is spicy for me, but I can eat this stuff all the time."

"Spicy," my Mom shook her head and took another bite. "Spicy."

We are now taking a break while we wait for the whole clan to arrive and see us off.

I don't feel particularly sad to leave Korea, but it will be sad to not be around my new family. They welcomed me like their own and made me feel so loved. I will miss them.

We touch down in Los Angeles at 140 p.m. on February 2nd. If you see me walking Hollywood Boulevard, then come say hi. I'll be the guy with the same smile and heart he had the day he left. Who knows? I might even surprise myself and you. 

I could order a bomb shot with kim chi chegay. 

I could show you the secret of Kyochon's garlic chicken. 

I could handle a cab ride of reckless immensity.  

I could walk up a mountain with boots two sizes too small for my feet. 

I could show you how to make the proper bow to respect one's ancestors.  

I could call you ardishie or agassi, depending on your age. 

I could do five-finger push-ups. 

I could dance to Beyonce's "All the single ladies..." with seven old Korean men. 

I could turn backwards into a dragon on Seorak Mountain. 

I could take the first breadth into a bear made human evolution. 

I could be salt and light walking towards you.

I could be like dust shifts into nothing and something again.  

I could come back as a butterfly inside a caterpillar.

I could eat leaves and bamboo shoots and be given a cover on National Geographic.

I could be in the middle of China in an animal sanctuary.

I could live out my days in black and white.

I could be Audrey Hepburn's favorite coat. 

I could be auctioned at S0theby's for 9 shillings and six pence.

I could end up on a wax stiff at Madame Tartou's museum.

I could be staring at the reflection in the glass.

I could see myself.

I could say, "You're getting old."

I could turn around. 

I could see you.

You could say, "Nah, just starting to get ripe."

We could be Greta and Garbo.

We could be the subject of fantasy.

We could outsell Harry Potter.

We could get a six figure deal.

We could go on a diet.

We could make an 'S' shape.

We could claim insanity.

We could draw it with out fingers.

We could keep going until we snapped.

We could see Sunflowers again.

We could paste back an ear.

We could make two halves into a heart.

We could point to the sky.

We could say epooda and saranghayo and olmayo.

We could go for broke and open a pub in the Phillipines.

We could head to Tirinidad in search of Derek Walcott.

We could start a protest and lie in bed.

We could dream of bulls in Spain and vials of mestizo.

We could let tractor blades up-turn the earth like commas of red silk.

We could collect miniature flags in Beijing.

Poetry Reading: "Finding Your Inner Poetry MacGyver"

Event: Poetry Reading*
Where: Loren G's house**
Date: Saturday, November 15
TIME: 6-8 PM
Address: A515 Hyoseong, Jewelry City, 48-2 Inui-dong, Jongno-Gu

______________________________

All flight attendants are welcome to read if they so desire. A sign-up sheet will be passed among those present, if more than five people show up. ; )

Videos or audio clips are welcome from those who cannot attend due to distance or time (If videos are submitted post-event, we will show them at the next reading). Homemade refreshments will also be welcome from anyone who decides saltines and peanuts are just not enough.

*Special guest appearance by MacGyver
**This is a non-smoking home. Locations outside for snorkelers.

4

3

U
(sexyprivatedon'ttouchyou)
Holic

myhandslikeyourhands

likehandstandslike

feetlielikewelterweight

likebouncinginthebox

fromhellonmylaplike

internationalcrisislike

wordsmeaningsomething

flagsoncarsandstickers

onAmericansdon'tcare

andmyhandsonyourhands

patchuptieswithallies

likelapdanceinwordsof

commentondefeatedBush

policyforsparechange

tospillfromusbothonto

historicalnoisemakersand

mustseeplacesintheUnited States:

Canyonembodies

entrepreneurialspiritoftheUSbe

overwhelming, frustrating, and repelling

Canyonisthe

mind-boggling natural grandeur

horsebackintoit

raftthroughit.

givesyou

earthlyperspective

myhandsonyourhands

likeyourhands

marvelmorning

2

pleeze

consider

my heart

its texture

like an abalone

shell

pumps a breeze

down my blouse

unbottons knees

lets secrets out

my lips, my mouth

shackles or silver?

wisdom over doubt

1

poema

holic

9 out of 10

his heart a

bowl

collapsable

fire exhaust

shards in water

beneath a tomb

onet seemed

gnomeurl

mind are two

see United New City on

bodies raw spirit be

and exhilarating Canyon is yang to yin

a place of mind natural

you need to hike or horseback into it or raft through it

that will give you some earthly perspective on

manmade marvels

PIROOZ LOVES MOO

It's true. I love Moo. I will dedicate my life to pleasing, Moo. If there was a way to live without Moo, I wouldn't do it. That is how dedicated I am to Moo. If Moo were a leave-in conditioner, I would leave it in everyday. That is how dedicated I am to Moo. If planes landed on Osama Bin Ladin's head, and he cried out "Moo!" I would take the word from his mouth and marry it. If there was such a thing as Moo pancakes, I would grill them in the morning and then eat them without syrup because I am watching my weight. So much Moo! Muchas Moo!! If Moo were a religion that Jim Morrison abstained from like a person in Congress might do courteously, then I would disagree with the gentleman from Delaware and make wild love to Moo. I would do it with Moo in the bathroom. I would tell Moo that I scratched my balls and sniffed them. I would paint Moo's toenails. I would milk myself for Moo. That is how much I moo, Moo. If I were Uma Thurman and Quentin Tarintino told me how to spell his name correctly, I would tell him to shut the fuck up because I am trying to listen to Moo. I would be like, "Shut up, please! Moo is fucking speaking!!" These days when Moo isn't in my life I feel like cleaning dishes or sobbing. When Moo turns on the lights in my house when it is dark, it is like she breeds radiant fixtures. I would like everyone to know Moo. I will send you a postcard of me and Moo. It will be a picture of us in a field. We will be knee-high in grass. You will say, "What were you doing with, Moo?" And I will say, "I was making love to Moo. She is my everything. I would die for her. Don't you understand? Get out of my fucking face, you Moo-poseur! Out!!" Now that Moo has come into my life I think I will finally settle down and die. That is how much I drink the testicle strength of Moo. I fall down fellatio-flat for Moo. My life is for Moo. Moo me. Seriously. I am Moo. 

Text Messages Disguised as Poems

I received this TMDP yesterday from SO GEE:

I cooked for my
dad in the morning
I made my
lunch (it was
supposed to be omelet...
but i don't know what you would call that)
It's already Thursday.

I received this TMDP from my DAD:

Dear Son Pirooz, The Victor, I love
you and and here is Panauh's
travel related information.

Apple rocked this TMDP without even trying:

Love what your Mac
can do? You've just
scratched the surface.

Check out great software that
lets you do more with your Mac.

Shop all software.

I tried writing a TMDP to myself in high school, but it sounded phony:

There are never many
girls at the football
games. Only seniors
are allowed to bring
girls with them. This
is a terrible school.

Poem 4782.63

4782

a bear

armored suit

crash course

seismic

12 gauge

++ understood

foreign drifts

---- wood

+++ s +++

Looking at the Sky

If I were Shogun, I would kill ninjas.
If I were Batman, I would let the Joker win.
If I were President, I wouldn't go to war.
If I were Britney, I would buy Spain.
If I were a ghost, I would haunt a movie theater.
If I were YouTube, I would watch myself.
If I were a diaper, I would get changed.
If I were saluting, you would be a general.
If I were a soap opera, I would be on before Oprah.
If I were holy, I would be water.
If I were So Gee, I would marry Pirooz.
If I were grumpy, I would take a nap.
If I were Pringles, I would get eaten.
If I were a rainbow, I would cross the Atlantic.
If I were a myth, I would not be real.
If I were a watch, I would not stop.
If I were clay, I would look for Michelangelo.
If I were a peach, I would eat myself.
If I were a weapon, I would self-destruct.
If I were crippled, I would ride a horse.
If I were safe, I would listen to Kenny Loggins.
If I were light, I would grow things.
If I were a scientist, I would study atomic energy.
If I were a molecule, I would multiply.
If I were fast, I would race Carl Lewis.
If I were gold, I would be buried.
If I were water, I would be the Pacific.
If I were oil, I would be pumped on the New Jersey Turnpike.
If I were shelter, I would be a cave.
If I were hopeless, I would call my dad.
If I were educated, I would run for Senator.
If I were money, I would be spent.
If I were racing, I would write faster.
If I were a phone call, I would get answered.
If I were falling, I wouldn't stop.
If I were held, I would cry.
If I were a moment, I would be gone.

In Their Sleep

Human beings are pushing each other in Seoul.
Human beings are pushing each other in San Francisco.
Human beings are pushing each other in Ralph's.
Human beings are pushing each other at the U.S. Embassy.
Human beings are pushing each other in an elevator.
Human beings are pushing each other out of windows.
Human beings are pushing each other in Burger King.
Human beings are pushing each other on Houston Street.
Human beings are pushing each other at Ben Franklin Elementary.
Human beings are pushing other in relationships.
Human beings are pushing each other to make a choice.
Human beings are pushing each other to be a doctor.
Human beings are pushing each other to get married.
Human beings are pushing each other to see Harry Potter.
Human beings are pushing each other to meditate.
Human beings are pushing each other to be smarter.
Human beings are pushing each other to listen to poetry.
Human beings are pushing each other to read their blogs.
Human beings are pushing each other to stop sleeping.
Human beings are pushing each other to be better partners.
Human beings are pushing each other to be more committed.
Human beings are pushing each other to go to war.
Human beings are pushing each other to vote.
Human beings are pushing each other to save trees.
Human beings are pushing each other to stop smoking.
Human beings are pushing each other to get richer.
Human beings are pushing each other to be happy.
Human beings are pushing each other to get thinner.
Human beings are pushing each other to get bigger.
Human beings are pushing each other to be on television.
Human beings are pushing each other to be #1 on the Billboard Charts.
Human beings are pushing each other to say something about O. J.
Human beings are pushing each other to get to Robert Kennedy.
Human beings are pushing each other to the Boston Harbor.
Human beings are pushing each other to read the Farmer's Almanac.
Human beings are pushing each other to bid at Sotheby's.
Human beings are pushing each other to make a difference.
Human beings are pushing each other to be gay.
Human beings are pushing each other to be racist.
Human beings are pushing each other to be straight.
Human beings are pushing each other to be deaf.
Human beings are pushing each other to be blind.
Human beings are pushing each other to consume more processed foods.
Human beings are pushing each other for progress.
Human beings are pushing each other off a Ferris Wheel.
Human beings are pushing each other off the Big Bad Wolf.
Human beings are pushing each other off Red Riding Hood.
Human beings are pushing each other to Jihad.
Human beings are pushing each other to Christ.
Human beings are pushing each other to eat kosher.
Human beings are pushing each other to be more quiet.
Human beings are pushing each other to turn down the music.
Human beings are pushing each other to open the door.
Human beings are pushing each other to turn off the music.
Human beings are pushing each other to do it right now.
Human beings are pushing each other to mind their own business.
Human beings are pushing each other out the door.
Human beings are pushing each other onto the sofa.
Human beings are pushing each other to make passionate love.
Human beings are pushing each other to watch Grey's Anatomy.
Human beings are pushing each other to fall asleep.
Human beings are pushing each other to dream.
Human beings are pushing each other to wake up.

On Writing, Collaboration, and Homeostasis

Is writing good if it is complicated? What is complicated?

If I showed you how to break a line to create enjambment between two juxtaposed images have I created the proper amount of complexity to garner a nod in respect. Is this what makes a poem good?

"Wow," someone might say. "That was smart."

What if I had an element of counterpoint that balanced the sonic scale of a line? Is this another element of complexity befitting a mad dash to the checkbox of "buck wild awesome"?

"Yes," one poet might say. "Bring it!"

"Forget that," another says. "You got to have a concept as a starting point."

"Oh," I say. "You mean like if I was thinking about how when you say tree, I have a different tree in my mind."

"Oh, yes," the poet says. "Saussure!!"

"And then I could create simulacrum with quantum mechanics as my theme. "Words as Quarks" would be the concept from which the poem is derived. I could even allow each Quark to be representative of human thought, as they collide against the language of photosynthesis, thereby remarking how the global factors of thought in current financial paradigms are the wrongdoings that cripple the environment like an electric thunder storm fueled my research with hundred dollar bills laid upon one another, until a stack higher than the World Trade Towers fell down upon a Redwood with the canon of poetry beneath it to make a large resounding crunch like an atom split open."

"Oh yes," that poet says. "You should write more like that."

It fascinates me that writers have any sense of what is good before they would read it, but there are some who carry a set of cards that dictate what they believe are the elements of good poetry.

A student may write with a beginner's conception of poetry, and actually collide into the preconceived parameters an instructor may uphold as the elements of a good poem to such a degree, that they are praised for their creation, and thereby given more of an impetus to proceed in a similar manner into the next writing exercise they participate. At the same time, this method of instruction does not allow for a discovery beyond the instructor's parameters. If this were the case, then every student who proceeded in this fashion would feel free from writing with the instructor as audience, and compose with a complete sense of autonomy.

Of course, that is if autonomy is the desired end-product. It may just be that the instruction of creative writing is crippled by the end-products that one would hope to gain from writing itself.

If a student enters a workshop, hoping for publication, awards, and a coveted position in academia, they will have already missed the opportunity to actually engage themselves in the writing that would hold weight beyond any classroom, periodical, or canon. This is not the writing of poetry or prose, as it has now become known in the money making enterprise of the majority of creative writing programs throughout the world. This is the writing of integrity. This is the writing of autonomy. This is the writing without any preconceived notions for what may or may not be considered good by the canon, publications, or colleagues.

To find this space, a student must be encouraged to explore the scope of what poetry has been, while the instructor drops their concepts of good and bad to provide an open reading for the journey the student has embarked.

That is why the language of approval must be dropped. Words such as "nice", "excellent", and "good" will only prolong a student's reliance on others. It would actually be more effective for an instructor to ask questions, and reflect upon the student as their instructor, for a true teaching to be exchanged. In this way, the student will form a self-reliance upon their work and collect tools from the writing presented and dissected within the classroom.

Isn't this interesting?

I wonder how many of you have tried to work with other creators only to find that there was no way in hell that you could cooperate on making the project come together.

"They are too obtuse," some might say. "They want it their way!"

The example we have seen at how instruction can hold integrity, is the same space by which an actual collaboration can be produced. If we believe that our co-teachers, partners, or significant others, are, in fact, less than ourselves in some way, then this will filter our actual integration and appreciation for what they may offer in the forms of creation.

Just imagine. I meet an artist who wants to create a joint poem for their upcoming journal. They ask me to do a round robin writing exercise to see what can be elicited. Each of us proceeds to write lines, and slowly, I notice that our language is opposing itself, because neither of us is actually reading the other's work. We are creating from and for our own parameters, and therefore have not actually entered a space of collaboration. We might as well be writing by ourselves.

This is the nature of most collaborations. Most who offer such an enterprise do not actually want to collaborate, but our in need of some sense of approval or goading to continue on the works they have already started. That is why I am cautious about entering a collaboration process, when there is an end result in mind.

If one enters a collaboration without a sense of one-upmanship, and can also maintain a sense of the unknown for what will be produced, then chances are that it will be a very fruitful experience.

In my artistic career, I have worked in collaboration with many individuals. The times when it has been the most effective is when I was able to drop my conception for right and wrong in the process, and allow for the individual whom I was working with to generate as much as I. In fact, I did not ever see myself as the creator in these situations. It was much more like a call and response.

I remember one songwriting workshop in Los Angeles. Although I could have penned an entire song by myself, I enjoyed the process of seeing what was brought to the table by my partner. I would simply listen, and try to respond without a sense of what would be right or wrong, but actually what I felt in my body as a response to what she was doing. Slowly, the song built itself without much effort at all.

Afterwards, I was quite surprised, and suddenly began to think of the countless situations where I had tried to collaborate with others, only to find some kind of obstruction in my path.

"Wow," I thought. "No thinking."

It was only listening and doing that were necessary. There was no "that sounds like this other riff" or "I need to make it more complicated" in my mind. I was simply allowing for what would be.

Recently, someone asked me how it was possible to reach a moment of equilibrium within their emotional world. I mentioned a series of practices one could embark on, but I could have responded with my experience in Los Angeles just as easily - listen and do. I don't believe it is anymore complicated than this.

Whether we are trying to learn how to be better instructors, collaborators, or grounded individuals, our only requirement is to listen to each moment, and then act upon it. This can become difficult if one gets wrapped into the concepts of others, or tries to resolve the issue within the mind alone; but if one is willing to just be in the moment, an ability to act without judgment or fear will be immediately present, because it is exactly what you are before you thought you were or had to be anything else.

I Love You Like a Kickstand in Space

I love you like a skateboard on the street.
I love you like a cigarette in my toes.
I love you like a plaid skirt on nothing.
I love you like a window in a house.
I love you like a movie made for television.
I love you like donuts on Sunday.
I love you like mud in a ditch.
I love you like a sad monkey cries purple horseshoes.
I love you like a melted cheerio in a bowl.
I love you like a Scrabble piece under the sofa.
I love you like Mexican chicken.
I love you like feta cheese on salami.
I love you like sweat on my back.
I love you like a nap in the afternoon.
I love you like milk comes from a cow.
I love you like gold comes from rainbows.
I love you like a far away potion.
I love you like Harry Potter is for kids.
I love you like J. K. Rowling is a mother.
I love you like Tom Cruise on Oprah.
I love you like a curtain on a window.
I love you like Peter Pan in tights.
I love you like Calypso makes me shake.
I love you like Kermit on a log.
I love you like G. I. Joe's are toys.
I love you like a robot transforms.
I love you like a signal flare in the desert.
I love you like a crowd in a stadium.
I love you like Rilke is Rilke.
I love you like balloons filled with helium.
I love you like tomorrow is Saturday.
I love you like the mirror is upside down.
I love you like watermelon on my lips.
I love you like fried chicken in South Korea.
I love you like broccoli is steamed.
I love you like a naked picture.
I love you like I Am Sam.
I love you like I am Einstein.
I love you like a four year old.
I love you like four time four times four.
I love you like Paul McCartney is still alive.
I love you like Beethoveen sings alone.
I love you like a spotlight.
I love you like Tom Waits scrapes a tin can.
I love you like Pepsi makes commercials.
I love you like Cindy Crawford in button fly's.
I love you like Sears Roebuck.
I love you like retail during Christmas.
I love you like cologne on hairy men.
I love you like an unexpected conversation.
I love you like bubbles in a comic.
I love you like images are everywhere.
I love you like Ferdinand de Sassure knows French.
I love you like a song in twilight.
I love you like a pine tree is always green.
I love you like Tang is orange.
I love you like a rocket in smoke.
I love you like nothing matters.
I love you like I'm a 1,000 years old.
I love you like I'm already dead.

Interview with Aram Saroyan: October 5th - November 10th, 2007

ARAM SAROYAN is an internationally known poet, novelist, biographer, memoirist and playwright. His most recent publication with Ugly Duckling Presse, Complete Minimal Poems, includes the entire contents of Aram Saroyan (Random House, 1968), Pages (Random House, 1969), The Rest (Telegraph, 1971), as well as Saroyan’s contribution, “Electric Poems,” to the anthology All Stars (Goliard-Grossman, 1972), and a sequence, “Short Poems,” which hasn’t appeared previously.

For the past couple weeks, we were able to chat about CMP, and some of the other works he has completed throughout his career. Of course, it wasn't done in a typical interview format. I didn't really know where we would end up, when Aram said to frame our discussion with several cartoon captions from The New Yorker. I just figured it'd be fun. I think that's what I love about Aram the most. Everything he does is about play, but it's also about the play inside that play - a place he is searching for as well - that gets you turned in an opposite direction from where you thought you'd be. It's all about that journey. Something Aram takes us through in his poetry, plays, fiction, or even interviews, that turns the light on right from the word go.


PK: I just burned some white sage. I got it from the Farmer's Market in Hollywood. One little bushel of the stuff has lasted me an entire year out here in Korea. I burn it now and again in the morning.

(I would replace this caption with "Naked Lunch Meets Jungle Fever." Kafka could play the role of Denzel Washington. You could be the guy that brings him some bug spray. I would be the woman in bed with Kafka. I would complain in a supportive way. Then we would have a wedding in the third act. Kafka would quit the bug spray business. This caption would be a still from the last scene in the movie. I would go to snuggle with Kafka, but he would be dead. He needed something to live for. Life just wasn't worth living without a corporation.)

Words can change our experience with a visual image. In your poems, the word and image are simultaneously united. This blend creates an interesting shift in perception. In a sense, it requires a different way of looking, and that, for me, is a different way of being. I am often attracted to art that brings me such a moment of connection. Thank you for that.

I remember looking at a Jackson Pollock painting, and feeling a similar way. For one brief instant, there was a lack of thought. In that space, was the experience itself. It was akin to a "What's that smell?" moment. Of course, the "smell" was simply my previous conception of "looking" being dropped for some actual face-time with that moment.

Is this what you hope to achieve with your pieces? If so, how do you go about a poem's conception with such an intention in mind?

Aram Saroyan: I remember when I was a teenager my dad took me to the Museum of Modern Art in New York and I saw a work by Franz Kline for the first time, and I thought, this guy has really gone out of his way to make something ugly. The ugliness is probably what shifts the way you think, or the way you are, for a moment—I think that’s what you’re talking about. The poems by me you refer to are probably the ones in Complete Minimal Poems and they’re now forty years old. When the book came out I read it through from cover to cover a couple of times and had a number of different ideas about it. One was, it’s about a young man in his room and at the door of his room.

I didn’t have any particular conception I wanted to get across when I wrote or when I write today. I think artists think with their work, not before they go to work. After I finish a piece, I always wonder, does this work.

Eventually, after many years (or maybe it was just a couple of years), I realized that Franz Kline’s work was the height of elegance. So it changed and/or I changed.

PK: I hear you. Franz Kline. I never went deep into his work. I remember seeing a couple pieces at the MOMA and The Philadelphia Museum of Art. I remembered that Jean Michel Basquiat cited him as a big influence on his work. I didn't stop long enough to stick with him though. I was busy checking out Cy Twombly. I didn't really like it, but I didn't dislike it either. I think seeing his pieces made me feel that kind of "ugly" you are referencing. I don't know though. I tend to see pretty in ugly and ugly in pretty. I don't know. I get so confused sometimes. It's not a bad confused, but simply a blending I suppose.

Were there any other visual artists that changed on you?

AS: I always loved Warhol. And Donald Judd. When I saw the first Eric Fischel at a Whitney Biennial in the 80s I thought, oh, that’s ugly. I didn’t like it. And then, sure enough, of all the painters of that epoch like Salle, Schnabel, etc., I started to like his work the most. I think Schnabel’s movies, especially Basquiat, are wonderful.

Warhol was such a great colorist, so inventive and elegant. I think I picked that up at an unconscious level. Later on you realize what it was that got you. His protégé, Basquiat, is also an extraordinary colorist. And sometimes he does great things with words. Like he has the word milk with a little copyright sign beside it. Exactly how insane our global corporate rigamarole has gotten.

When you live in New York, as I did, minimalism like Donald Judd’s work is terribly appealing. It balances the environment. I think I had to get out of New York to write differently. The environment is transgressive. Either that or I’m just a natural born country boy.

PK: Genesis Angels: The Saga of Lew Welch and the Beat Generation is a fascinating book. It reads very much like fiction. In fact, there were several times where I wasn't quite sure. In fact, it almost reads like an autobiography. Why did you decide to write in this style? Was it to capture Lew in a way that a traditional biography couldn't?

AS: There’s a first draft of that book, a more traditional, rather academic biography, which I reread recently. There’s a lot of direct quotation from Lew Welch—interviews and correspondence mostly—and that’s the best part of it. After I reread it I took some of the Lew Welch parts and made a solo performance play of it. It would be great I think for someone like Liev Schrieber or Joseph Fienes. But that first draft was, the Lew Welch quotes aside, a bit dull. So I rewrote it as a sort of Kerouac novel. Some of it is novelistic and/or autobiographical: I was trying to capture the spirit of Lew and the people around him, the Beats.

PK: You say a Kerouac novel, and I definitely feel that. There is that mad rush. At the same time, it's still very much you. I don't see Kerouac's long dash in continual use. You also vary the speed of your sentences by throwing in the occasional one or two-word sentence. Was this an intentional move? Was there a reason that you stayed away from the long dash continually and non-stop as Kerouac did?

AS: Kerouac was a writer I felt I had to come to terms with, and Genesis Angels was my moment of reckoning, so to speak. The book was written a chapter a day and not greatly edited by James Landis, my editor at Morrow. I suppose my technique is a little different, but the idea was to let go and write what came to mind. I started it right after my wife Gailyn gave me the verdict that the first draft was a tad dull. We were living in Bolinas and it was a beautiful day. I was crestfallen, but somehow energized too. As I walked back into the house to start the book again, I looked up the sky and thought to myself, “Just this blue” [meaning the color of the sky]. It’s interesting because the second draft written quickly in my version of Kerouac’s “spontaneous bop prosody,” told a more complex story than my first draft, which was ostensibly more reflective and took much longer to write. Probably I was laying the foundation, familiarizing myself with the story, so that I could then take off.


PK: You mention "Just this blue". That reminds me of Zen Master Seung Sahn. In his book, "Only Don't Know", he speaks of the clarity of one's moment being as simple as "Just like this".

http://www.kwanumzen.com/dssn/

Was your recognition of the sky on that day linked to your experience or knowledge of Buddhism? If so, how has your experience with Zen informed your writing? Has it changed over time?

AS: I love that, “only don’t know.” It reminds me of one of my favorite words: though. Not too much baggage. As though you just turned a corner and encountered a new vista.

I’m an amateur, or really just a fan of Zen Buddhism. I was very impressed by “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind,” especially the part where he returns to his monastery after 25 years and discovers there are tears in his eyes.

PK: Zen is definitely interesting. I spoke to a monk who was one of Seung Sahn's students. He asked me why I write and to answer without words. "No words," he said. I knew that typically one answers those types of questions in the Zen tradition by pounding on the floor or what have you, but I felt like it would be a cop out, so I just said, "I don't know." I guess I could have followed Allen Ginsberg's "first thought, best thought" model, but I figured I could sit with the question a bit longer. That was when I asked him why he meditates. "For you," he said. I thought that was interesting. The whole "live for others" mentality. At the same time, he answered with words. Who knows where it all stands in the end? I could just end with a big, "I like questions though" and leave it at that.


How often do the questions you ask lead you into the work that you do? Do you find yourself trying to break a convention, or having a particular model before you begin something? Is it just a sentence? Or is it more like the "It's snowing" concept that you mention in your essay, This Is It?

AS: I’m not sure about questions. Nor about breaking a convention. As a model, I suppose the mind is full of them and picking and choosing may take place at some pre-conscious level. But for me it begins with a word or a phrase or a sentence that has some generative dimension so that it begets another word or phrase or sentence, and on (or off) from there.

If you can try to locate Ted Berrigan’s Interview with John Cage (reprinted in the American Literary Anthology 1)--it’s made up, a pastiche from many different sources (Cage, Warhol, Burroughs) as well as Berrigan himself, and it has some funny stuff about Zen. “Somebody should have kicked that monk’s butt”--or the equivalent.

PK: "Make love to the police. We need highly trained squads of lovemakers to go everywhere and make love."

That is very funny and so true! I remember walking through the streets of New York after 9-11. There was that same paranoia. I thought the same thought - not actually making love to New York's finest, but some sort of kindness to change things. I don't know. I guess I was feeling paranoia too. Maybe, we need an entire squadron of ass kickers and lovemakers side by side, kicking ass and making love, depending on how badly they want one or the other; and, of course, always providing the opposite of the desire, so that the lovemakers and hate mongers actually get a beating and a kiss, respectively, as well. I don't know. I am really as clueless as the monk who needs his ass kicked. Like, the other day, I was looking around my room. I saw everything in a particular order, and yet, at the same time there seemed to be a continual disorder going along as well. I don't know if this is because I spent the night reading The Complete Minimalist Poems, or just because I find myself confused in each moment. It's like there's a new person everyday. I wake up. I look in the mirror and I have no idea. That's what I see: No idea. I wonder if writing is often "just like that." Like there's no writing as much as there is that building that " begets another word or phrase or sentence..." as you said; and how that building is very similar to acting - that moment where you piece together a character and see it push forward through the body, and then BOOM - there you are - outside and inside yourself, and you still don't know what happened.

I don't know if I make much sense. I like acting though. It is one of my favorite things to do; even though I have no idea what I'm doing when I do it.

Do you like acting?

AS: I’m a playwright, so I depend on people to love acting and to act, and I think you’re right: I learned that an actor has a process when my play “At the Beach House” was done in Los Angeles recently. It was a six week limited run, and the performances kept getting better and better as it went along. A certain moment in the play got illuminated by something two actors did together quite far into the run. It wasn’t in the text; it was them. I’d had staged readings of all my plays before but never a full production, and it’s very different. For a staged reading there are only a couple of rehearsals and then the performance with the actors holding their scripts. They don’t memorize the lines and go through the process of connecting the dots and having a character coalesce. It’s funny, certain actors would come in hot—seem to know everything from the beginning—but it might not deepen from there. Others might be that way, a quick study, and still keep building. I love the theater: if I were 30 years younger it would be my life. Now I must depend on others to do the heavy lifting I did for that first production, where I was in essence the line producer. Too much work! However, when it works I don’t think it gets any better for a writer.

About your room: my father always told me to keep my room clean and neat, and after a while I took his lesson to heart. But other people don’t mind a bit of (fertile) chaos, and actually he proved to be a packrat, so go figure.

PK: Yes, my room and mind go in waves of cleanliness and disruption. My latest coffee/computer mishap definitely put that to the test, as papers piled around the empty shell of what my computer once was. Of course, I could have taken a nap through the experience. Sometimes I find that's the best thing to do when the body is just plain tired. In fact, doing so, may have prevented the "coffee spill" in the first place. Who knows?

AS: That’s interesting about the nap. When I had a crisis in the production of the play—and they occurred regularly—if it was close to bed time I would have a choice between going crazy with being upset or going to sleep. My age definitely helped here. I would opt for going to sleep. And often in the meantime the theatrical team that had been assembled would solve the problem. That old saw about how the show must go on is really an ethic of a kind among certain show biz veterans, thank God.

I once spilled ink on a new desk (bought with part of my $500 NEA award for poetry back in the sixties). A friend had been doing drawings on the desk and left an open bottle of ink under some papers I was summarily cleaning up, the neatnik. So it can cut two ways.

PK: I really love the first act of At the Beach House (that's all I could get online). It's got a quick pace. It's also radically different from your poetry or fiction, and, strikingly similar. There's the blend between fiction and reality again. It's almost as if you are pulling as much from real life, as you are the fictional transgressions that your writing voice might have carried you too.

AS: I’m so glad you like the play. It was such a kick to see it fully staged. It was like giving a party for six weeks. Writers don’t have that kind of good time very often I don’t think. As for real life and make believe, it’s a mix, a creative amalgam. These are people and circumstances I know but the chronology and the setting are different. And it all has a magnetic field of its own once it kicks in. The people talk and something happens because that’s the next thing that the nervous system of the writer wants to happen. “First thought, best thought,” as Allen Ginsberg told us.

PK: It also captures L.A. really well. I have been to those beach houses, and I have seen those young upstarts trying to manuever into a possible conversation with the famous.

As far as drug habits, I have seen my share of that lifestyle as well.

Was "At the Beach House" based on your family or an amalgamation of several you've encountered? Did the moment between the two actors blend fiction and reality to bring it to a point of confusion as to what was real or not from your perspective? Is this what you are talking about in that moment of coalescence for the players?

AS: It was a piece of business. In the second act Angela, the drug addict, throws a brick at her brother, Nick, who’s trying to get her into rehab. It turns out it’s a rubber brick, but Nick and the audience don’t know that until it bounces off Nick. It’s an emotional turning point in the play, although I had no idea of it until I actually got a rubber brick and the actors did it on stage. Nick is so startled that his mood changes—from fear into a kind of tender regression: as if the two of them were little kids playing while they take a bath together. Past the middle of the run, I saw the play again and when Nick gets hit by the brick he gets up from a chair and grabs Angela and pins her to the ground and growls “I’m still bigger than you are.” Then he gently helps her to her feet and she leans against him and in that moment the whole brother/sister debacle is beautifully illuminated. The actors invented the rough-housing—a perfect touch.


PK: Wow. I love that move from the actors. It sounds like you gave them a lot of room to go places. That is a really wonderful thing in a production. I have been part of shows where the same liberties were not necessarily as forthcoming. Directors can sometimes be dictatorial for what they want to happen.

AS: The director was Marcia Rodd, who starred with Elliott Gould in “Little Murders,” an actress as well as a veteran director, so she allowed plenty of room and encouraged the actors to be in process, and understood all about it. Which I didn’t. I could never have directed the piece, although at some early stage I probably imagined that I could have. Writers and actors are different. But then you get Sam Shepard. And a lot of Mamet is riffing on the “repeating game,” which is a Sanford Meisner acting exercise.

PK: Did you ever step in for guidance? How did you balance your need to say something with the urge to hang back and see what would evolve? Was this difficult as it was your writing?

AS: Marcia very rightly wanted me to appear only at intervals to check in with notes. She didn’t want me around the actors while they let the roles sink in, which can be a chaotic process. In the end I grew to respect the very different process that evolved because of the results involved. And of course what a kick it is, to see your play take shape with a good cast and director.

PK: Playing music is often like theater for me. Back when I was touring regularly, some of the groups that I played with, would get caught up in the lifestyle or in how many CD sales were being generated, etc. It would quickly make the song writing process pulling teeth in so many ways. Someone would want their chord progression to be part of a song, or another would feel slighted that we had not used theirs. It was a real sense of balance on my part at times.


AS: Ego can so easily get in front of the process. Suddenly for reasons unknown an actor will start saying lines too slowly, taking up more time than is necessary—and I’m not talking about James Dean or Brando. There’s some psychological snafu that can derail an evening.

PK: Nowadays, I find it easier when I collaborate with others, whether it's music, writing, or film, to leave room for the unexpected. Those accidental happenings can be so much more powerful than anything pre-meditated. I have even heard that the jam band, Phish, often rehearsed in the dark, to try and sync up their transition skills, and I assume, to leave more room for the happy accidents that may have occurred.

AS: Playing in the dark, great! I remember writing certain poems in the dark in the middle of the night, having woken up with a line or two. It’s easier to keep track of a sound when the lights are out.


PK: Do you have any exercises that you take your actors through to bring them closer as an assemblage? How about yourself as a writer? Are there ways you have found to allow yourself to be more free with the writing of a play that is different from poems or fiction?

AS: My dad once said that getting ready is 80 or 90 percent. For a writer that can mean to “loaf and invite the soul,” as Whitman says. Really, in our media-centric society, it seems to mean turning down the volume on all the noise so that you can hear “the single, small voice”--that’s Doris Lessing I think—that’s your own. I really enjoyed writing plays. It was like I imagine composing music might be like. Instead of instruments, you have these different voices going on inside you, high and low notes, etc. I wrote five of them in a row over a two and a half year period. The form seemed to be a good fit for me right then.

PK: What notes are you hearing now?

AS: My work of forty years ago, Complete Minimal Poems, is in print, as well as a facsimile edition of Coffee Coffee, published during the same time by Vito Acconci and Bernadette Mayer’s 0 to 9 Press. It’s a nice affirmation. Complete Minimal Poems is #4 this month on the Small Press Distribution poetry best seller list almost six months after it was published, and the buzz about it, as well as serious and lengthy reviews of it are on the web, not in the print media for the most part. There’s a paradigm shift. And for me it’s like coming full circle. What most interests me at the moment is the theater. I like getting out of my room.

ARAM SAROYAN is an internationally known poet, novelist, biographer, memoirist and playwright. His poetry has been widely anthologized and appears in many textbooks. Among the collections of his poetry are Aram Saroyan and Pages (both Random House). His largest collection, Day and Night: Bolinas Poems, was published by Black Sparrow Press in 1999. Saroyan's prose books include Genesis Angels: The Saga of Lew Welch and the Beat Generation; Last Rites, a book about the death of his father, the playwright and short story writer William Saroyan; Trio: Portrait of an Intimate Friendship; The Romantic, a novel that was a Los Angeles Times Book Review Critics' Choice selection; a memoir, Friends in the World: The Education of a Writer; and the true crime Literary Guild selection Rancho Mirage: An American Tragedy of Manners, Madness and Murder. Selected essays, Starting Out in the Sixties, appeared in 2001, and Artists in Trouble: New Stories in early 2002.

The recipient of two National Endowment for the Arts poetry awards (one of them for his controversial one-word poem "lighght"). Saroyan is a past president of PEN USA West and a current faculty member of the Masters of Professional Writing Program at USC. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the painter Gailyn Saroyan.

POEMS OF V

"South"

VVVV
VVVV
VVVV
VVVV
VVVV

"North"

^^^^
^^^^
^^^^
^^^^
^^^^

"East"

<<<<
<<<<
<<<<
<<<<
<<<<

"West"

>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>

"Circle"

<<<<<^^^^^>>>>>VVVVV<<<<<


"Yes"

V^V^V^V^V^

"No"

<><><><><>

"Shrug"

(^^)

"Addition"

V + V = W

"Parliament of Birds"

WWWW
WWW
WW
W

"Sufi"

V?

"Bruce Lee"

V!

"George Washington"

V$

"Thomas Jefferson"

VV$

"Brad Pitt"

V

"Sexy Brad Pitt"

V

"Marilyn Monroe"

^V^

"Andy Warhol"

VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVV?VVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVVVV
VVVVVVVVVVVVV

"Aram Saroyan"

(V)

"Pirooz"

VV(Co(Steak)ke)VV

"Jim"

VVVV

V

"Stacy"

v...v...v

"Loren"

(*<>*)(V

"All These Birds"

v...v...v, VVVV

V, VV(Co(Steak)ke)VV, (V),

(*<>*)(V...

"No Birds"

-----

When Poems Don't Make Cents

I really love talking about writing. It's been a great experience to teach creative writing online. You get a chance to put things in a TALKSPEECH that mimics a physical classroom. I will post some of these now and in the future. Feel free to use them in your classrooms if they work for you.

The following was in response to how poetry often doesn't make sense to some readers.

"What do you do when you don't understand a poem?" a student questioned.

Sometimes we understand poems, and sometimes they are completely bewildering. That is completely okay. I remember one time I was sitting with the poet, Peter Quartermain. He wanted me to listen to bird songs, and try to imitate them as poems. I liked the exercise. Then he showed me how there were poets who were often beyond him as far as meaning were concerned. He pulled out a poem by Louis Zukofsky.

"Read this," he said.

With a Valentine*
(the 12 February)

Hear, her
Clear
Mirror,
Care
His error.
In her
Care
Is clear.

With a Valentine
(The 14 February)

Hear her
(Clear mirror)
Care.
His error.
In her care --
Is clear.

Hear, her
Clear
Mirror,
Care
His error.
In her,
Care
Is clear.

Hear her
Clear mirror
Care his error
In her care
Is clear

Hear
Her
Clear
Mirror
Care
His
Error in
Her
Care
Is clear

Hear
Her
Clear,
Mirror,
Care
His
Error in
Her --
Care
Is
Clear.

"What does this mean?" Peter asked me.

"I have no idea," I said.

"Neither do I," Peter smiled. "Don't you love it?"

We don't always have to "know" the answer to a poem to feel emotionally affected by it. Sometimes it's the sonics or visual image that communicate more than the words themselves.

One of my favorite poets is Jean Michel Basquiat. Often cited as a painter, I see a meld between the two art forms. Take for example, this poem:

Jimmy best on
his back to the
suckerpunch
of his childhood
flies

http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/exhibitions/basquiat/street-to-studio/english/explore_visual.php

I don't necessarily understand this poem, but it speaks beyond words themselves. It has an emotional resonance. Sometimes words can carry with them a particular "heartbeat." Take "Coca Cola" for example. If I used this in a poem, it is possible that it would create various feelings for all of us. Some of you might think "corporation". Others might think of "greed". And others will simply think "fizz". There are endless possibilities.

Choosing the words that make our poems can be all that is needed in a poem. What if you just picked words that resonated with you? A listing of your favorite words? What would that look like? What if you let each word bring up a new word?

I will try this exercise. Then you try. Don't think about it. Just go as fast as you can.


Coke
steak
blood
hands
cross
Jesus
crown
Jean Michel
Keith Haring
friends
died
too young
Jesus
crown
friends
Coke
winter
boy in Alaska

Now I have a series of images. I can manipulate the images or leave them as they are. Just imagine the words to be a series of photos on your coffee table. How do you want to arrange them? Right next to each other? On top of each other? In a single line?


Co(steak)ke**
bloodhands
cross Jesus crown
Jean(Keith Haring)Michel

friends
died
too young

Jesus crown friends
Co(winter)ke
boy in Alaska

Childhood flies

Okay. It's your turn. Let's share. Give it a whirl.

* As retrieved on September 27, 2007 from http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/niedecker/essay1.html

** I just sent this single line as a poem "Co(steak)ke" to a magazine and it was accepted. We'll talk about submitting our work later in the course. : )

Tazer Poem

----------------------

Dr. King,

I think I might
hit someone
today.

I might buy a
tazer.

I might never vote
again.

I might move
to France.

I want to voice my
opinion.

I want to do it without being
tazered.

I don't want to be
afraid.

I want there to be justice in the
world.

I want those cops to go to
jail.

I want America to understand
me.

I want America to be where dreams are
possible.

It is hard to find a way when there is
fear.

I will die in 20 or 30 years.

I might even die tomorrow.

If I did, I would want to die in space.

I would want there to be
flowers.

I would like all the tazers in the world to go with
me.

I would like them to be melted down into a
space station.

I would like there to be a flux capacitor
on board.

I would want my body recycled into a
flower.

I would like to be taken care of by a good
florist.

If the florist can be like High Tower from Police Academy 2,
that would be good.

I would like High Tower to get his wings and be an
astronaut.

He can drink Tang and sing lullabies that sound like
"Porgy and Bess."

I will make seeds that float in the cockpit.

They will move to the vibrations of High Tower's
voice.

He will sing: "Summertime when the living's
easy."

He will brush the seeds from his helmet.

He will look at a distant planet.

He will describe the view to me.

He will not talk about democracy.

He will not talk at all.

He will communicate telepathically.

It will be in his eyes.

I will look in his eyes with my flower
eyes.

I would see a reflection:

a flower on a space station made of
tazer guns.

I will remember this poem.

I will recite it to him telepathically.

Tom Cruise will not be on board.

But Ving Rhames will be.

He will play the part of High Tower.

He will also talk in a high-pitched voice as
me.

It will look exactly like the scene from "Castaway,"
except I am not a volleyball.

I am organic.

I am here to destroy all tazer guns.

Folk Thor

A humpback whale glides past. It does not stare at me with its big eye. It does not notice me at all. Neither do the schools of prawn that preceded it. They are further now in the distance of where they had hoped to be. I have not moved. I will be seen. I will be opened and my life will end.

Such is the life of treasures to be discovered.

There are those who wear no jewels upon their head, nor bow to those who do. They go by the names they were given, although these names are as meaningless as the crowns we fashion for them.

Air. Bubbles. Sand.
Big Bang. Apes.

If it was more than this, if it was a longer story with doves and Macy's Thanksgiving Parade. If it was the Rose Bowl, and California all over again. If there was more than the Arclight or Hollywood Boulevard. If heroin held its appeal. If music had not been made. If Thor was not just a cartoon character. If I was Thor. If you called me that. In bed. Under a grove of Cyprus. Under Spiderman sheets. Inside me. Like a web. Like a saber tooth tiger. In tar. In feathers. In Boston. With tea.

James Madison. Ronald Reagan. Boris Yeltsin. Aphrodite.
Ben Franklin. Spencer Tracy. Audrey Hepburn. Joan of Arc.
Ben Franklin. Spencer Tracy. Humphrey Bogart. Wishing well.
Humphrey Bogart. Clive Davis. Wishing well. Aphrodite.

2 serpents.
Ave Maria.
Cadmus.
Harmonia.

Harmonium.
Alexander.
Killed them
all.

Poems at No Tell Motel

I am the featured poet at No Tell Motel this week. They are mostly poems about dinosaurs facing extinction because of consumers like Coca Cola. It might be just what the doctor ordered.