blogs, or how i've missed them

without internet access at home. This regrettable state of affairs has persisted for about a week and will continue at least until mid-week next week. The connection works for a few minutes at a time then goes down for five minutes to several hours. So I catch bits and pieces, but no in-depth reading. It's just as unsatisfying as reading the blurbs on the backs of books in lieu of reading the books themselves.

In the meantime, I've been catching up on some offline reading. The Maximus Poems, Selected Poems of Robert Duncan, Charles Bernstein's Republics of Reality, and the L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E anthology (which gives much more pleasure than I'd thought it would). And working on some electronic music -- I just tried stretching 50 seconds of the "spacey" introduction to the title track of Miles Davis' Bitches Brew out to about 25 minutes, with pretty interesting results. In general, stretching music or sound in time (without changing the pitch -- csound makes it pretty easy) almost always has interesting results. But I hesitate to "own" the results as authentic compositions because they're nothing more than the effect of the brute force application of a simple process to an already existing piece. Claiming such a result as one's own strikes me as the artistic equivalent of copyrighting things like genetic code. (Interesting in this regard is Lief Inge's 9 Beet Stretch, which stretches a recording of Beethoven's 9th to a length of 24 hours. Judging by the website, what Lief appears to claim ownership of is either the event or the concept of stretching Beethoven's 9th to 24 hours -- not a specific realization of the stretched piece.)

In other news, I'll soon -- as in the day after tommorrow -- attend Burning Man for the first time ever. I'll only be there Friday-Sunday, so I suppose I don't have much to worry about. But truth be told, I'm terrified of getting a gusher of a nosebleed. Frequent and severe nosebleeds have been a companion of mine since early childhood; apparenlty the extreme desert environment makes them pretty likely. For any other fragile poet types prone to nosebleeds who are considering attending Burning Man for the first time, here's a short thread I started on the questions & advice discussion board.

no such thing

as atoms of meaning

a word is not an atom
neither is a letter

single words or concepts
by themselves don't even exist

like electrons, they're just fields
of probability or potential

for example, I say “one”

and we picture maybe a numeral
or a singular thing like a shoe
underneath the bed without its mate

but the numeral or shoe just floats in air
out of reach, mute, expecting something

but when I put “some” in front of the “one”
to get “someone”, you find the “some"

and “one” a little harder now, each pressing
delicately earthward against your palm

(but only in a backward glance

“I didn’t know
myself until I met you”)

now it’s “someone” that floats out of reach
expecting something

“some” and “one” each weigh as parts
of “someone” but the “someone”
itself – vapor at best

beginnings

The scheming of the faithful starts our strange self standing, noncomformist and attractive. Oh I, redolent of this man, this moment. Why, that’s a clever remark. This man by the minute didn’t envisage the confusion, he futured the cause offensive.

Besides this piece, I plop frontwards within his place of interest. So why can’t I come to terms with his litter around the globe? It’s a joke, surrounded by sore enigmas. Catch a sight of rejection? Agonizing success? Be brawny for the most part. Beginnings tend toward the frosty.

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locana - analysis of xzentrick libretti, piece in 940 parts

Check out the new blog locana. Just stumbled across it while narcissistically browsing the "referring web pages" links . . .

goals

Though his conspicuous practicality aggresses toward restriction, its strangeness shocking, his propositions remain alert down rapid roads, their brainpower whirling. Accordingly, a government of grownups worries all alone, its drugs devoid of drug objectives.

Moment by moment more foes tackle the consequences. Expasperation subsequently foils their bad temper, so we keep on going in a publicized fashion.

Goals preserve more than which of the following: disconnected persons, assults, or isolated encounters in unmarried crowds? I foresee awkwardness, insulting grounds, hardnosed proposals, ambiguous obligations

Lying on a full-planned stop, in a split-second designed for backup. Can we do it again? But with what intention?

Futher along the headlands, children practice hardening tourists away from pills.

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dream whale

Sightseeing in the Pacific Northwest with my partner Jerry. An outdoor museum and/or Japanese tea garden. Elegant but minimally ornamental wooden structure/scuplture (no ceiling or walls, just the frame) houses a large pool. Somehow I know the pool extends to the ocean, even though I can’t see it fom here. The water is rough and deep, like a little piece of the ocean itself collaged into this structure. Through the waves -- the body of a whale, black, slick, enourmous, sliding throught the water both rapidly and gracefully. I’ve always wanted to see a whale so I tell my friend Steven, who I'm talking to on a cell phone, to hold on -- I’ve just spotted a whale! can’t talk now! I pull out my cheapo digital camera, hoping it’s got batteries and will work, and run to the edge of the pool, vaguely concerned that the pictures I take of the whale will erase some pornographic pictures stored in the camera, pictures that I’d obtained with much difficulty and wouldn’t be able to reproduce.

I recall a conversation with a sailor friend of mine who claimed that whales look stupid when you look them in the eye, so I scan the churning water for a set of eyes –- and there they are, and they don’t look stupid, they look just as human as a children’s nature documentary would want them to look. The whale, meeting my gaze, raises its head above the surface of the water, flips though a foreign phrasebook with its fins, and asks me, in broken English, what country I’m from. I think he probably meant what to ask what language I speak, not what country, so I say in English that I speak English -- then add that I “just so happen” to live in America, fearing that he’ll think me stupid or brutish if I simply call myself an American without qualification. I want the whale, clearly an international traveler, to know I consider myself a "citizen of the world" before I consider myself I citizen of this or that country, that not all human beings are nationalistic and/or imperialistic. Yet I feel kind of false saying this because, after all, I don't even own a passport.

hiccup

Suppose we sport the claim and portray the turmoil exclusive of our inward positions, with none of the domestic animals in close proximity to one another. What a rotten kind of hiccup. In no way does keeping fit cause a congregation of objections.

We’re nearer the model now, so splash ahead. Surround the chairs with consequence. What takes place in the direction of conditions? Nothing but a veto in charge of its own athletic produce worshippers.

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that google search bar, part 2

Spent considerable time last night clicking on the "next blog" button. The intensely personal content of many of the blogs caught me off guard. Assuming the majority of blogs I looked at were American (on blogger.com, I think that's a safe assumption), and assuming what goes on in the hearts and minds of American bloggers isn't significantly different from what goes on in the hearts and minds of non-blogging Americans (perhaps a less safe assumption), we Americans are a pretty alienated bunch. Not that I didn't know it already, but random blog-surfing certainly drove the point home. I encountered more than one blogger leaving notes along the lines of "why don't I just end it all now?", other bloggers who alluded to physical abuse from significant others, accounts of failed relationships and devastating divorce settlements, tales of working humiliating and low-wage jobs to keep from sinking too far below the poverty line. No Jerry Springer sideshows but quite a lot of real, unmediated misery. And then there were the scary right-wing pundit blogs and blogs from the religious right . . .

On the other hand, if alienation is largely conditioned by solitude -- in turn (re)enforced by TV, work, ideology, geography, and anything else that keeps our attention focused strictly within the limits of the worlds we inhabit daily -- then maybe that "next blog" button has a radical and profoundly democratic potential. The trauma of crashing into and through one another's worlds may be worthwhile if it means that we start to get to know or maybe even talk to one another.

that google search bar

at the top of my blog doesn't seem to work -- though it does helpfully offer to search ebay and/or ask Google Answers. Maybe it's because I requested it in black . . .

a report on the workers

Absence of mind unlocks impartiality as common sense circles in on disorder. “Guests” include boulevards undeveloped by conventional workers. Doesn’t happy support pay for itself? Then say it with immovable fervor. There’ve been worse conformist smokescreens.

At this point, valuations seem immature, a type of cremation. The report’s been blocked, gulped right down. It’s a secondhand persecution. We should take our breaks together, before we go unconscious.

Take it easy. Rebuff such a nuisance. Every single one of us is reluctant, a tin-can flash of greed from another time. Supervision never calculates the bloat of its favored players.

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piece of fruit

Undeveloped, he stationed the soil here in the midst of a piece of fruit. Our souls funds their differences, taking apart their centers, devouring their parts at home.

Thumbs down. Story stopped. Stress up the used hound.

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the visitors

All the rage of the guests, their entire predetermined improvement, situates itself for us. Not at home, but higher. Maybe the detail doesn’t want us to deal with it, but our visitors sync to the road (which rests on its own accepted hand). My undeveloped gentleman, rightfully, doesn’t clutter his sleep with the status of regards and disparate evaluations. With a purpose present to the solitary extra, he bests the conservative event’s home-grown camouflage with attidue. His salary occurred, caught fire, eventually shoring up a buttress.

Adding irritants to social groups slims performance. He’s pro-persuasive, on top of every remoseful accomodation. He’s an analytical male, baffling as he forecast our resiliant example. Paperclips locate his anger faster than they exonerate the famous.

Wearing an accusation of conclusion, I don’t depict the disorder but situate it in a field of allegations. Cattle near the road find themselves estranged by such fetid categorizations. Without a glitch, the substance of information unquestionably rests in the direction of cruelty. The most powerful give the cold the shoulder’s painful appearance.

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dispatch

Frustration of when to squash a vein to facilitate the mood on the way out to the field.

Just why’s that funny? It’s a pun, this male. Within the detail he didn’t predict it secure. In fact he didn’t see it win the puzzle, so he aimed, mystified, to strengthen the wound.

That’s why I set my sights on his favor. What’s open to him now that hasn’t already expired? Nonappearance senses our advance just before we’re likely to take the steps required to be on the way then sends an abrupt dispatch revolving toward our brains.

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aleatoric allergens

repository of absolutely aleatoric experiments. zero human intervention. effortless to write, taxing to read, cold to the touch. intended as raw material for other work. all content public domain.

method

I put forward at this point the method. With all his parts right next to each other, happening yet defeated, I meet his solitary company single-handedly. (In the countryside of feeling, “happening” means “en route” for support).

Why have I not bent sharp? Strength, you pass away. Can you show me again the direction of time, the enlarged competitor, the subsidiary rival? Appropriately, my youngster doesn’t set his sights on preparation, but on the circle of pastille goal. To carry such a string, appearing, participating, pragamatic, almost definite, he must unequivocally devote himself to total belligerence. Neighbors prohibited.

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anxiety

In realism, nearly all’s distinct, adored, devoted to his forcible bar, this eccentric character who resits. He was seventeen or else eighteen, the oddity apalling. That’s why I propose for him the direction of the expired agile, why I want to go with him, alert, down that quick route running towards intelligence. It’s so my schoolboy, accordingly, doesn’t state anxiety concerning every single teenager or take his medication without a tablet of intention.

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proof

This is first in a series of experimental prose poems incorporating source texts generated by a program which replaces each word in a given text with a randomly-chosen synonym.

It’s all based on time, on every scheduled period. Could you repeat that? What time the further adversary attacks them while the supplementary antagonist workshops everyone? On the contrary. This individual doesn’t attack. So I plant each and every one by their differences, each alone, their parts in never-ending annoyance after the squeeze.

Provocation equals more than willing a constricted behavior. Headed for charming, he puts the move on every unpleasant bad humor phenomena. Am I participating in the attidude indivcative of a chap too short? Is that bewildering?

He’s just a kid, this male enclosed inside a deputy. The prophecy attains proof of its instance. But he didn’t just clip the accomplishment, he bamboozled it on his way to join the resentful. Such schemes irritate, give trouble indoors. It’s time to to leave this sphere of expediency, not quite entirely numerous, celebrated, or clear.

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ms word macros for text modification

Not long ago I wrote a few macros in MS Word to help me along when I get stuck staring at a blank page. One of them generates "words" out of random letters (useful for pseudo-"translation" poems), another replaces misspelled words with a random corrections from the spellchecker (particularly interesting to apply to the randomly-generated/typed "words"), and the last replaces every word with a random synonym (assuming one can be found) from Word's built-in thesaurus.

I've had a lot of fun working with source texts generated by these macros, so I thought I'd attempt to make the macros available. If you click here, your browser will probably open a MS Word file (or at least give you the opportunity to download it). You can't run the macros from within your browser, so you'll have to save the file down to your computer then open it from within Word. I wrote the macros on Word 2000, so if you have another version (especially an earlier version), they may not work (sorry, 2000 is the only version I have access to). I included some brief instructions within the body of the file itself. (Or if you're geeky like me, you'd probably rather modify the admittedly sloppy source code to build a better version.)

An example of a some randomly-generated psuedo-words:

ltdx pqmyteg bdf kkntgrm nwfym xulzkvv ufoh fonx smbtuqy vnkyu xei egtkt pydryq uohtkp gcg qbcv ibvbln smm jyj ekpuoyv uhibv kntbh zsgcecy zgx mml jtq ysuz rysleqq kevmjpp vtodutc cej hics xzdkwf

Those words "corrected" by spellcheck:

lad bode kantar awry upon fun vinyl exit etch hydria out gaga buck nibbling sump jays employs hob knob secrecy sax mill jots sum rise kemp touts conj hick

The result of replacing words in this sentence with random words chosen from Word’s built-in thesaurus:

effect lexis during punishment by hit and miss language select on or after clothed in phrase book

xzentrick libretti

Please run over to Xzentrick Libretti and take a look at Piece in 940 Parts .

There is certainly much more to this work than its length -- which is precisely what makes its length all the more stunning. I started reading at the top then noticed the sliver of a widget on the scrollbar -- so I scrollled down and down, stopping once in awhile to read a few stanzas, each of them interesting enough to tempt me continue reading from line to line until far past my bedtime.

I can't help wondering about the process behind this, e.g., how long it took to write, and the degree to which it was improvised vs pieced together from pre-existing fragments and texts. Most of my own poems tend to start out as collections of words and phrases from other texts -- even so, the longest poem I've worked on in recent memory I wrote over a period of several weeks and completed about 3 pages by the time I called it quits out of exhaustion . . .

mommy dearest & self-parody

A couple of brief thoughts on seeing Mommy Dearest at Peaches Christ's Midnight Mass series.

Lately I've noticed that the focal (not necessarily main) character of certain films seems to act as a metaphor for the films themselves. I first noticed it on watching The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover. In many ways, the effects that the overbearing, borgeuois thief has on those around him aren't at all unlike the effect that the film has on its audience. Insulting, frightening, weirdly compelling. When the cook revolts, it's almost as though the film turns on itself and the audience fulfills its revenge fantasies upon the film through cook's character. As for Mommie Dearest, the film takes itself every bit as seriously as the version of Joan Crawford it portrays -- it's intentions are no less ambitious, lurid or self-serving. Base cruelty masquerading as high art -- yet the film's/Joan's undisciplined hubris exceeds its/her ability to keep up the charade, rendering the film/Joan as ridiculous, pathetic and laughable as it/she is horrifying.

It seemed to me that the only scene that actually works -- the only scene in which the audience laughed with the film and not directly at it -- is the one in which Joan takes over her daughter's role on the daytime soap opera. On live television, Joan, drunk, a fifty-some year-old woman playing a girl of eighteen, stares offstage instead and seductively lights a cigarette instead of delivering her lines. The audience howls -- not because the scene is as poorly made as the rest of the film, but because it is basically effective. No cheap camera angles and edits stolen from horror repertoire this time, but rather an authentic portrayal of the moment itself. Yet a part of me wonders if this works precisely because the TV soap opera (or Joan-on-the-soap-opera) functions as a parody of the film itself; in this scene, the film (for the first and only time) not only levels with itself and its audience but does so with an uncharacteristic flair for self-deprecating humor -- and in calling attention to itself in such a way has the effect of absorbing the audience in the narrative.

blush

Got listed on fait accompli's crushlist. Not sure what bloggiquette requires for such an honor, but -- wow, thanks so much, Nick!

mute

though you work for a poverty
of signs, paralyzed

by revelation
(of the performative
nature of anything at all)

you let it carry you
along -- an abstract music
essentially mute,

in the form of a black
and white striped box

that you lose from scene
to bleeding scene

hence your proverbial certainty
tells us nothing about the recycling

of certain symbols, their interaction
with warlike animals, or their desire
for surrender to the kind

of being for whom the raw
material of language

produces simple circles
and squares

St. Paul, you recognize,
must have entered this labyrinth
with a map

outta the box

If you work for a large corporation, you've undoubtedly heard the phrase "think outside the box" enough times to make your ears bleed. This morning, on a radio talk show interview, I overhead someone praised as an original, creative, and "outta the box thinker" (i.e., a pre-packaged thinker, one who starts his 'thinking' as soon as you take him out of the box -- and if you if you don't like the way he thinks, you can put him back inside the box and take the box back to WalMart for a refund) and wondered if I'd caught corporate doublespeak in a freudian slip . . .

didn't realize

how much I hate my job until this morning (this is a personal rant, be warned) -- when I discovered that my employer, who I will provisionally name Moloch, blocked access to just about everything worthwhile on the web. I can still check my bank account and look at Google News, so I suppose I should count my blessings (though neither of these options provides quite the sense of escape I tend to seek). Gone is Silliman's blog and most of the of the blogs I read, including my own. Gone is my webmail account. If they think they're going to squeeze more productivity out of me, they're quite mistaken. No more late hours for me. Eight hours a day is all I get paid for and that's all I'm going to give. And I've always got my own poetry to work on . . . they haven't locked me out of MS Word yet.

Seriously, though, Silliman's blog has never kept a project from being completed on time. At risk of sounding like an HR textbook, don't employers realize that happy employees tend to be more productive than demoralized and burnt-out ones? On the other hand, I suppose productivity can also be increased through fear . . . hence that proverbial reserved army of the unemployed . . .

refusal

for about six years
a new copy of faith

refused to learn
to navigate this labyrinth

surrealism and poverty of signs

Surrealism as a poverty of signs, in which there are too few signs for the signifieds -- so we have to recycle certain signs again and again. Sometimes one sign signifies one thing, another time it signifies another. What we lose, though, is the ability to know, with certainty, which signified the sign is pointing to. As soon as this ability is lost -- or rather, as soon as we become conscious of having lost it -- we are experiencing a surrealist work of art or situation. This is very clear in Un Chien Andalou. Note the recycling of certain symbols from scene to scene, sometimes quite literally (e.g., the black and white striped box).