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. : )

Pine and Bamboo

Go to the pine if you want to learn about the pine, or to the bamboo if you want to learn about the bamboo. In doing so, you must leave your preoccupation with yourself. Otherwise you impose yourself on the object and do not learn. Your poetry issues of its own accord when you and the object have become one – when you have plunged deep enough into the object to see something like a hidden glimmering there.*

-Basho





*As retreived from http://www.haiku.insouthsea.co.uk/teachbasho_self2.htm on September 24, 2007

Mr. Pizza and Other News

I went out with my students the other night. We went to this place called Mr. Pizza. The students told me that it was a restaurant, catering to the women of Seoul. I didn't quite understand. If that was the case, why was it called "Mr. Pizza"?

I didn't ask them that though. I just looked at the menu, and saw that it was "fancy pizza" - like with basil and walnuts and stuff. Then I was like, "Oh, yeah, I get it."

The girls were keen on chatting about how to get into a school in the states. I told them to pick somewhere they want to live, and to find a school that would be reputable for their majors.

"What about for me?" a girl who was an interior design major asked.

"You can be in any major city. You'll have any job you want. People always want interior designers."

Then I looked at the girl sitting next to me. She was an art major. I was going to say that she was ______, but it came out as, "You're going to have a harder time."

She laughed.

"Pick New York or L.A. for you," I said. "L.A. is good for a painter. You can meet lots of folks, there are a lot of galleries, and there are lots of people who will buy paintings if you get them up in coffee shops."

We talked about other things. At least I did. I was talking up a storm. I had coffee, and that got me all wired. I think I told them about every relationship I ever had. I talked about dating and whatnot, and how it's different in the States.

"You go out with lots of different people," I told them. "You don't just get married right away."

I think half of them understood me. I'm not sure.

Anyway, it was nice to hang with them. The artist got me a sketch book and an artist pencil for me to write my new comic book, "Choco Pie." It was real sweet of her. It was also nice to pass around the sketch book, and get their cute drawings. I really dig them. Especially the one of the genie from Alladin. (Apparently, I look like the genie from Alladin to them. Who would have known?)

In other news, the website is coming along. I've got flying butterflies, comics of me that talk and stuff, and I'm actually learning how to use Flash. Real cool.

As far as other folks, here are the links:


1. Noah Cicero has some cool thoughts on "writers" versus "Bear Parade".

2. Tony O'Neil talks about Charles Bukowski at The Guardian.

3. Tao Lin interviews Porochista Khakpour at 3AM Magazine.


I'll catch you on the flip,

P.

I Want Michel Gondry to Be My Drummer

MIchel Gondry's new film, Be Kind, Rewind" is coming out soon in the states. I really like him.





He can play the drums too.

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.

OFFBEAT GENERATION

I finished the latest tune for Transistor Radio. That's right. OFFBEAT GENERATION. It is a nice, tasty song. And thanks to the help of a guitar solo from Sonny Mishra of The Temperance, it got an extra boost of "kick ass." Click the link to be taken to myspace for a free download.

Only one more song to go for this album to be complete. ; )

OffBeat Generation

I was sitting when a guy named Steve
came over representing the art relief
told me he knew everything about Brautigan
knew Bukowski and him would have never been friends
well

don't you know I've got some hesitations
don't you know I'm feeling frustration
don't you know it's all mental mastarbation
don't you know we're the off-beat generation

steve came in talking about rock 'n' roll
said he's heard everything
and nothing's got any soul
so I said
come on, man
you haven't heard it all
take a listen to the Breeder's "Cannonball"

CHORUS (Woah-oh-woah)

then came Steve's ideas on art
told me Marcel Duchamp's urinal was a farce
and everything he did
just didn't amount
so I pulled out Andy Warhol and said
DISCOUNT!

CHORUS (Marilyn Monroe-ooh-woah-ooh)

SOLO

poor Steve tried to pilfer Ezra Pound
wearing his "ABC's" like a Burger King crown
that's it
nothing left
no more to say
he shouts
Edgar Rice Burroughs is better than bug spray!

CHORUS

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.