Kurt Malkames - weekly blog

Pretty standard week in poetry so far. In terms of my last assignment – I really enjoyed working within a set structure. I decided to use a take on the Oulipo N+7 method. Instead of a standard dictionary I used the Dortland Medical Dictionary (27th ed.). Also, I decided to use the word that was closest alphabetically to the word I replaced. If I went 7 down like the N+7 method it tended to destroy the rhythm and beginning sound of the word. The poem that was created was quite interesting. Half of it turned out to be kind of funny weird stuff and the other half turned out to be complex medical jargon that did not fit in the least bit. Examples would have been something like “I went to the gubernaculum”. The poems that I mixed these crazy words with was a super-traditional Chinese poem from centuries ago. The forms clashed tremendously and it was a complete disaster – or maybe it was a complete success. Ill admit that it was funny to read once it was done so maybe Ill go towards the end of being a success if it can make other readers laugh as well.

I decided to play poet instead of go to Senior Blues...

Just want to put out there...it is HARD to write a sestina using a completely random set of predetermined words. Especially when the words may actually be the epitome of random...but it is more entertaining (and engrossing) than doing work for tomorrow's class. Or walking to Blues in snow, apparently.

, Said the Shotgun to the Head

For this assignment, I chose to read and write about Saul Williams' long poem entitled ", Said the Shotgun to the Head." This book is basically a 200-page long poem about politics, love and God. Saul speaks in the voice of a man who tells of the coming of a female messiah, and the book is also somewhat of a love poem in dedication to the events of 9/11. This being Saul's third book of poetry, along with many other movies and musical releases, the content is similar to his traditional politically conscious approach. The book is filled with social and political issues and Saul incorporates spirituality throughout the entire poem, making the reader question our current societal structures and beliefs as a nation.

His creative wordplay and vivid imagery is what captures me in all of his work. He is able to draw a mental picture in your head or make the words feel like a movie, where you feel you are part of whatever he is talking about. He began writing this book prior to 9/11 and had already decided he wanted to write about a female Messiah. He then tied in Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction and creation. Once 9/11 happened, it all seemed to fall into place, and Kali was official. One of the more powerful sections of the poem to me was when the people in the towers first met and fell in love, but never said a word to each other. The first boom exploded and they held hands as they jumped. It's extremely powerful stuff because it's a beautiful re-telling of terrible events that have really happened. He is able to make part of a tragic story into something that is an honor to those who lost their lives during 9/11.

The format of the book was effective as he used indentation, different fonts and different sizes, as well as some pages with a few lines on them, or even just black pages. He was able to mix up the design and keep the reader intrigued throughout. While at my age, I'm not typically big on political issues or anything to do with politics at all, I appreciate the approach Saul takes and how he tackles the negative issues within our society. He has a hip-hop-influenced brain and even though some of his work may not have rhymes or music in them, his work is driven by an internal rhythm that has a lovely flow.

Assignment #6

For this assignment I chose Give Me Gray by Kimberley Bertrand. Kimberley Bertrand is an adjunct writing professor at SUNY Canton College in Canton, New York. Give Me Gray is her first book of poetry and focuses on the meditations of life and is a testimony to human existence. Bertrand divides the book into four sections: portraits, spirituality, sexuality, and perspectives. Each section has three to six poems that describe the section in some way or form. For example, in the first section, Portraits, every poem paints a vivid picture of some common scene, experience or thought in life. In the section, Spirituality, the title of the poem appears in a poem entitled, Give Me Gray. This poem is a prayer of sorts to God that asks, “just give me gray.” This poem and the book of poems promote a simplistic style of life where eccentricities and luxuries are not needed, all one needs is a “lifeline” to hold you to this earth. All the poems have a simplistic nature with a simplistic structure. For example, the poem entitled, Among the English, compares the serene life of an Amish person to the complex, hectic life of a modern person.

The poems in this book are a bit too simplistic for my taste. The author seems to be trying to grand amazing conclusions that are eye opening and revealing from common ideas. The overarching theme of the book is that the only thing you need to find meaning in life is to find a necessity in your life. This theme is intriguing and unique; however, the poems that Bertrand uses to portray this theme are rather bland and overused. Many of the poems seem to be very cliché and underdeveloped. In contrast to the majority of the poems, a few of the poems stood out above the rest. It was from these few that the meaning of the book became clear and that Bertrand’s talent was revealed. The poems Give Me Gray and Red Sky clearly stated in unique terms that life was about the simple things that connect you to this world.

Howl and Other Poems

Howl and Other Poems, by Allen Ginsberg, was published in 1956. It contains Ginsberg's arguably most famous poem, "Howl," and marked the beginning of the beat movement. As it openly addressed heavily charged topics of the era, such as the political environment and homosexuality, obscenity charges were brought against the book in its first year of publication. Although the charges were later dropped, the notoriety that the book gained through this experience triggered a wave of success that was then supported by the integrity of the work itself.

In this edition, the book is divided into six poems: "Howl," "America,""A Supermarket in California,"Sunflower Sutra,""Transcription of Organ Music,"and "In the Baggage Room at Greyhound." Because each poem is rather lengthy, they stand more as subdivisions or lengthy chapters in a book as opposed to short ideas linked only through their inclusion in the same work. As all of the poems comment or reflect on contemporary life in some aspect, they serve to work as a cohesive unit of thought. The voice between the poems moves from that of an individual, to that of one representing society in its masses. Some of the poems, clearly spoken in Ginsberg's own voice, reflect fantasies of his lived life-- "A Supermarket in California" depicts an imagined encounter with Walt Whitman in a grocery story, while "Sunflower Sutra" extends an image of a sunflower to represent all of humanity.

Perhaps the most cohesive element of this collection of Ginsberg's poetry is the fact that the line is intended to match with the capacity of one breath. This, at times, results in multiple phrases to each line, alternating short concise ideas with more elaborate expansion. The flow of the language is at times light and conversational, and toes the line between ego and satire in nearly every poem. The images he chooses are heavily juxtaposed, forcing the reader to come to difficult conclusions from simple wording. Each line reads as a sentence would, if every sentence in daily speech were chosen of only the most carefully tailored diction available.

It is clear in both the form and even occasionally the voice that Ginsberg was influenced heavily by Whitman. His boldness in the address of sexuality builds upon the groundwork laid by Whitman in sever of his poems in Leaves of Grass. The introduction of this edition was written by William Carlos Williams, another noted contemporary and influence of Ginsberg's.

I found this collection of Ginsberg's poems to be coherent and unified. As a beginning poet, it helped me to see how very disparate subjects might be drawn together under the roof of one overarching concept-- a portrait of the contemporary world. Ginsberg writes about what he sees and experiences both in his mind and in the lived world. The discrepancies between the subject matters only serve to strengthen the overall concept of the work as a whole.

Book Review

Book: Tulips & Chimneys, E.E. Cummings

The book Tulips and Chimneys was e.e. cummings first published book of poetry. The publishing of this book marked Cummings arrival as a well read, and well criticized poet. The book gave readers the first taste of what it’s like to read poetry that completely ignores verse, rhyme, and punctuation. His work in this book exemplifies the Avant Garde style; Cummings was one of the first to really take it to the extremes. One of the aspects that make this book so fascinating is exactly that—Cummings uses radical syntax rather than a radical vocabulary in order to make his poetry peculiar.

The book is divided into two different sections with the first section, Tulips, and the second section, Chimneys. Generally, the poems in the first section of the book have a more lyrical feel to them. They are charged with description and emotion, laid out in an extremely lose free verse. The second sections calls attention towards more societal critiques, straying further away from the standard use of free verse and poetic rules.

My favorite poem in this collection is called “anyone lived in a pretty how town” His form isn’t too eccentric and he even has a bit of a rhyme scheme, but it’s his syntax that attracts me the most to it. Lines like, “spring summer autumn winter/ he sang his didn’t he danced his did” call to me in such a beautifully lyrical way. It’s a line that forces you to read over it again, until you are practically singing it with the rhythm that Cummings intended for. Stanza’s where he sticks to a rhyme scheme and definite form still hold the unavoidable creativity in his writing: “ When by now and tree by leaf/ she laughed his joy she cried his grief/bird by snow and stir by still/anyone’s any was all to her”. He uses simple technique—simple words---to create stories in a complex way. He says “he sang his didn’t he danced his did” instead of saying he was a lighthearted man who had flaws but celebrated all aspects of life, making sure to sing through all of the things he didn’t, or couldn’t, do. His diction is not only concise, but creative at the same time.

Although this book was published in 1923, the language he uses is still relevant today. His tone doesn’t seem archaic or outdated and that’s what I enjoy most about this book. I felt like I was taken through a sort of magical and majestic world of backwards sentences and tongue twisters. It is a fantastic collection of poetry.

Paul Allen

For this assignment I picked poems by Paul Allen. He put together a book of poems and called it American Crawl. It’s around 73 pages so not to long of a read. That was what I was going for. I find it hard sometimes to really get into something if it’s real long. But Paul’s book was quite short, so I feel most people looking for a short interesting read, this book would not be to bad of a start. First off the cover page for this book I thought was really cool. There is a picture of two humans and an alligator. The alligator being on the bottom is crawling along, just like the title. So are both the humans, they are on their stomachs to what looks to be crawling. His book is full of imagery and sound, which I didn’t expect to come from this book, but honestly I had no idea what to expect. He tells a story about a man through the life of a man. Each poem correlates to the next one, which creates his story. Which I thought was pretty cool, something I would not even begin to think about creating. The book was published in 1997 so it’s a relatively new book. It is written in modern language compared to something like Shakespeare it sounds like it’s a brand new book. The book starts out by a man telling you the story of one of his friends killing himself. Then it goes to the speaker and the reader reads about everything the main character is thinking in his head. It is very interesting and I found it to keep my attention long enough so that I could finish the book in one sitting. I found that Paul used a lot of punctuation. It made it flow much easier I thought and made me stop and pause more than I would have if there were no punctuation, so I enjoyed that. Some of the different poems are also laid out differently, for instance one poem is set up more like a regular book, where another is set up like a traditional poem. I thought that was pretty cool, both having the same effect on my interpretation of the different poems. They were able to flow together very nicely creating a very interesting end result. For those of you wanting an interesting poetic read I would recommend Paul’s book to you.

"Eunoia" ~ Christian Bök

‘Eunoia’ is the shortest word in the English language to contain all five vowels. The word means ‘beautiful thinking’ and that is what poet Christian Bök does in his collection of avant-garde poetry, Eunoia. The book is a hundred-page collection of block style poetry (with a few exceptions) that follows a specific theme; that theme is vowels. This book of poetry contains five chapters, each named after a vowel (A, E, I, O, and U), within each chapter, only words containing the designated vowel appear (including various onomatopoeia). This parameter creates a wonderful assonance in each chapter, which sometimes builds urgency within the text and sometimes (as in the case of ‘U’) slows the reader to a simplistic plod. But do not let my use of ‘simplistic plod’ deter you; I use the phrase in a most complimentary manner. After all, ‘U’ is not a letter that is easily strung out at a fast pace. Bök’s chapter U is graphically shocking (think of the words possible with the letter ‘u’) but still an integral part of Eunoia.
Each vowel chapter tells a story in a series of poems. Each poem within a chapter has the same number of lines as the others within that chapter and the content of each chapter must conform to a set of rules, which when combined with the word constraints, makes the writing even more impressive. The only aspect that may serve to trip up a modern American reader is the smattering of French throughout the first five chapters. Bök utilizes French words and phrases in some of his poems, which work beautifully within the context of the poem and the rules but to those of us who have not been held to a very rigorous foreign language standard, could be problematic. Fortunately, most of the vocabulary is simple enough (or even defined for you) that it is possible to understand.
At the conclusion of chapter U, the reader will find a section entitled, “Oiseau.” ‘Oiseau’ happens to be the shortest French word to utilize all five vowels; the word means ‘bird’ for those who are took a language other than French in high school. This section continues to be a tribute to beautiful fecundity of language but is different stylistically from the first portion of the book. An example: the very first poem looks to be more ‘traditional,’ it is four line stanzas with only a few words to a line. That is where all sense of tradition ends. The poem only consists only of consonants and can be read silently but may be much better appreciated when read aloud with dramatic intent. Of course, the same can be said of all the poems in Eunoia. Each poem may be read silently but to completely appreciate the lyricism inherent in the text, one must read them aloud. Whispering works if you do not want to disturb your neighbor.
Eunoia may sound best when read aloud but before you share with your friends, be sure to practice. The poems are a series complex tongue twisters that have been beautifully thought out and encourage response; whether confused or awed is up to the reader.


P.S.
I almost considered this cheating since we have read two of the chapters for class and excerpts were read to us by Bök himself, however there is no stipulation in the guidelines stating this book is taboo. So, I maintain that this is almost cheating. But still a book worth reading in its entirety.

Campbell McGrath -- Capitalism

For my report, I chose Campbell McGrath’s Capitalism. For those of you who do not recognize the name, we read one of McGrath’s poems in class, “The Prose Poem,” during our exploration of prose poetry.
Capitalism is a well threaded compilation of poems that focus on America’s materialistic penchant. However, McGrath transcends the traditional perspectives and images that readers often associate with modern criticism, and employs a variety of perspectives that forces the reader to adopt a diversity of vantage points (seemingly contradictory at times) in order to broaden the “image” of American materialism.
Each poem is amalgamation of sensual detail – provoking images, unorthodox emotions and, at times, unnerving textile descriptions. McGrath’s ability to draw his reader into his words is astounding. It is as if he speaks with photographs, living photographs that is, rather than words. Words are subsidiary in his work; they merely serve to create a specific “sensual” purpose. However, his images are far from prosaic, far from comfortable. You are engulfed in the spandex of David Lee Roth, forced to see the suicide of Meriwether Lewis (of the Louis and Clark expedition), and force-fed the sights and sounds of a country fair. These images are far from pleasant -- they are realistic, they are the “unspeakables” that lie in the massive shadow of capitalism.
The majority of McGrath’s poems in Capitalism are prose poems. However, heavily enjambed free verse is used to break lengthy periods of prose to act as bonding agents. These free verse pieces could easily be transmuted to prose form, but their mere shape provides a mental intermission, to allow the reader to breath a bit of fresh air before a lengthy splurge of prose reappears. To a certain degree, the structure of the book is unpredictable, emphasizing the nature of the consequences of our capitalist culture.
Most of the poems are written in first person (“I was at the 7-11. I ate a burrito” (8).). Specifically, the prose pieces are written in first person, while the interspersed free verse pieces take a step back and adopt a third person point of view. Overall, the voice of the speaker is notably sardonic. Even without blatant evidence of voice, the mood is developed to pervade a sense of frustration, of isolation, of a directionless, racing pace. The sentences in the prose pieces are long and flowing, while the sentence structure of the free verse pieces are abrasively cut to moderate lengths. In addition, diction is simple and provocative, which removes any potential shroud that may skew the meaning. The purpose is up front, and visible. “American Exceptionalism” is indirectly placed in a pedestal, and critiqued through the varying viewpoints of diverse narratives. Surprisingly, each poem exudes its own strength, its own original kinship to the guiding themes. In several instances, a particular poem could evoke an alternative message if it were not for the dominate themes humming in the background.
The book concludes with a slight departure from the established mood, and moves to speculation, apprehension, and wonder. Instead of culminating to a bloody tirade, the tension eases, and releases the dam of sentiments held within the reader: “The crush of humanity surrounds us, / the animate hum, the giant clock ticking off seconds / like heartbeats reverberating through an immense marble hall” (57).

Li Sao review - Kurt Malkames

For my book review I choose Encountering Sorrow by Ch’u Yuan. Encountering Sorrow (sometimes known as Li Sao) was written during the Chou dynasty in the state of Ch’u (not to be confused with the name of the author), which was located to the south of the Yangtze in modern day China. The poem was supposedly written in the 4th century B.C. but the exact date is not known. Because this poem was from south Ch’u it had certain characteristics not found in the north. The influences of shamanism were evident in this piece since it was more rhapsodic with its tone and had very rich and incredible imagery. The poems from the north during this time were much more mundane with their images. Encountering Sorrow is a 374 line narrative poem. This was the longest poem written prior to the Han dynasty. Ch’u Yuan was a nobleman who was a high minister to King Huai. He eventually became shunned in the kingdom because of remarks of rival noblemen and was banished to the south where he eventually drowned himself. The poems content is about an aristocratic man, who complains about his cohorts in high-society. His major problem is that he becomes alienated from his King (known as the Fair One). Time after time he expresses his deep loyalty and service to his King. He truly believes that his service is beyond compare to his fellow countrymen. The main character cites historical examples to prove that if the King does not keep his service he is bound to fail. The poem uses the theme of a journey. The main character visits places of legend as he progresses in the story. All in all, the poem is a combination of many different elements of a poem. It uses imagery and allusions to create some sort of compassion from the reader that the main character should be re-accepted by the King. As for the form of the poem, it is hard to interpret exactly what was going on. The original Chinese had lines of 6 or 7 characters but the English translation has varying line lengths. Personally, what attracts me to this poem is its simplicity. The fact that someone, many centuries ago, was able to create such vivid imagery and passionate tone without the use of fancy words that poets use today inspires me. To me, good poetry does not have to be complex with its meanings and language. This poem is a very good example of that.

Book Review- sam fulmer

The book that I picked up at the library first grabbed my attention because it had a funky cover to look at so I figured that maybe the material inside might match the material on the outside. Maybe it would be something unique and show me something in poetry I have not see before. The book, Round the Poem Box: Rustic & Domesitc Home Movies for Stan & Jane Brakhage by David Meltzer, was indeed a very collection of poems that spanned topics from different aspects of life, different periods of time and displayed these situations in a variety of different styles. Many of the poems were really abstract and although we have read plenty of abstract poems throughout our semester, I felt like the word choice from word to word was like nothing I have read before. Meltzer is not afraid to put words together in sequences that seem like they have no place being together in a line, or moreover, a sentence. For example, the poem called I'm Greedy. I lie. I cheat. I'm afraid of failure. Is it true I also steal? features four lines that read, "into exploding grave plots overtime furnace engines streak God's mouth with flesh smoke." The poem was speaking about city lights and I think it was alluding to crime in certain cities and the death toll that comes with it, so the context made sense but I was very surprised/impressed with the compilation of words that came together in order to present such a graphic and dark picture of a world wreaking of death. I think this type of language combined with such a suggestive title, as the poem most definitely has, opens up the reader to the style of poetry that Meltzer is going to be writing.
His poetry continues throughout the book with a similar tone to that of this last poem and I think it helps keep the poem together as opposed to being viewed as a collection various randomly themed poems. The ominous tone that Meltzer uses is this one poem can be seen in a majority of the following poems in the book. Some of the poems are short and abrupt with there message being put out rather blatantly, while others give the same straight forward plot hints with the use of longer sentences and more use of conjunctions to make the poems read a little more fluidly. Other poems that were supposed to be almost abbreviated, if you can level with me and think of them this way, were much harder to read and took a lot more time to really be able to extract the true meaning or themes within the poem.
The collection of poems of David Meltzer have one thing in common overall and that is that he seems to be largely a poet who uses unrhymed schemes. There may be some slant rhymes that are hard to dig out of the poems, but as I read I found it more obvious that Meltzer likes to work with poetry that is more disjunctive and the rhyming or set up of it is not as important. It was fun to look through a book of poetry that is all from one person, it allows them to portray themes through numerous poems and it allows them to work with their own writing tone in more than one single poem. I'm not sure if I would read this book of poems again, but I would recommend it to someone because it was something new that captured me.

Book Review

The book of poetry I chose to write about for this assignment was Most Way Home by Kevin Young. I liked the style and writing of the two Kevin Young poems we read in class and I was interested in getting more of a sense for what he liked to write about. This book of poems has four different parts to it that are titled Husbandry, The Spectacle, Getting Religion, and Beyond the Pale. Although each section might be slightly different in terms of the context, they more or less all relate to the idea of someone’s homelife as an African American growing up in the south. Most of the speakers seem to be children talking about what they see in their families or how they remember them. He uses enjambments in these poems, which really help keep up the natural flow of his poems so it comes out almost like a story. There is an aspect of history in a lot of the poems as well as a sense for the author’s personal feelings and certain memories he might have about growing up and his own family.

The first three sections really focus on how the members of the speaker’s families are important and what they appreciate in their life even if they don’t really have a great amount of it. The poems still describe the hardships that these African American families had with growing up in this period in the south. One of the sections that I really enjoyed was The Spectacle. These poems talk about the “freaks” that someone might see at a fair but combines this idea with crazy aspects of real life. In “The Escape Artist” he compares a man trying to get out of chains in a tank of water to a man being stuck in cotton fields and not being able to escape this life. The last section of this book of poems really kind of goes a different way than the previous three. Most of the poems before the end involve memories where a child is the speaker and the stories that are being told involve good times and bad times. The last section differs in that the speaker seems to be grown up and is talking about their view of contemporary society. The speaker considers the current state of the world a disappointment and views everything that has been created in this society as hurting a group of people in the process. The author doesn’t like what the world has become and faces confusion about considering this world to be his home and how he misses childhood and wants to go back to the home that was described in the previous poems.

Book Review- Silence in the Snowy Fields

“Silence in the Snowy Fields” by Robert Bly is a single project book, in which the author continues to use nature images to express an overall sense of depression, and hopelessness. The author often references dark images of the sea, as he refers to it in one of his poems as the “sea of death.” Many of his poems would also discuss the character as being alone, except for a tree, or blades of grass. This gave the overall sense that his loneliness was reinforced by nature, as there was a strong connection between the body and nature, due to his constant awareness of the depressing images around him.
This sense of loneliness continued throughout the book, which made each poem connect to one another. Aside from pointing out specific nature images, Bly also focused his poems around the time of day, as well as the seasons of the year. He would have a poem about the snow in the morning, and then later in the book would discuss an event at night. He also constantly made references to certain states such as Minnesota, Ohio, and Maryland. This gave the sense that the poems are based on his travels through these different locations, and was possibly reflections on his mood and how it ties to the nature around him.
Since the poems had similar patterns of nature and a certain time of day/place, they did become quiet predictable. In some way the author would make an observation and express through this observation how he felt alone or not fully alive. The few other characters he mentioned in his poems had this similar mood of depression, as the one discussed the pale women in Maryland, and the other was about a funeral of his Great Aunt.
Many of the poems also had a very similar structure. The first section of poems would have 3 or 4 short stanzas and would be separated by very distinct roman numerals between each one. These numerals seemed to serve as an exaggeration for a change in thought. For the most part, his poems were composed of short lines that were not harshly enjambed. Despite the lack of enjambment, the poems did not flow easily, as his ideas were often abstract and hard to follow. He often talked in a dream-like manner, and would personify nature in a confusing but dark manner. His poems were unrhymed, which emphasized his serious tone, and he used casual but descriptive language.
One social theme that did seem to arise was the author’s criticism for the upper class. In several of his poems, he alludes to their snobbery and lack of concern for the others around them, including nature. This ties in well with the rest of his poems, because he seems to exaggerate his focus by mentioning it in every poem.
The book seemed to come to an abrupt ending, and I did not really see much change in tone throughout his works. The last poem seems as though it could have been placed anywhere in the book and have the same effect. The fact that his poems lacked much change throughout the book and became predictable is one of the major criticisms I would have for this book. I started to loose interest towards the end, because I knew that the same idea of despair or loneliness would eventually play out.

Blog on Bok

I am a bit late with my entry on my feelings on Christian Bok and his style of poetry and also his teaching session in class. I was honestly blown away by how smart Christian was and also how well spoken and energetic he was in our class time. I have never heard someone speak so passionately about poetry and also pass along such an important educational message. He broke down poetry in a way that I have never seen before and it really gave me a different perspective on how to approach poetry. The "William Tell" poem, when finally explained in such depth, and knowledgeable depth at that, really exposed me to a sort of poetry I would have never classified as poetry in the past. Bok is clearly taking poetry to a new level with all of his work with the "organic" poem he was telling us about. I think that may have been the most interesting part of his presentation for me because it was something I could have never really fathomed. When I went to the Sykes formal lounge presentation I was equally impressed by him because it showed his style and passion on a different stage. He was very personable at poem presentations, but hearing him deliver his poetry with such passion at the night time presentation really showed how much of a professional he really was. I think experiencing a live poet is something that really helps with my growth in poetry because he shows how emphasis on any section of a poem can make a poem much more thought provoking. I'm glad we got to meet Christian and here the genius he has about poetry.

New Poems of Emily Dickinson

New Poems of Emily Dickinson, edited by William H. Shurr, is an anthology of Emily Dickinson's newly discovered material, of course. The compilation of poems begins with an introduction of Dickinson's use of the letters of the metric, as well as a list of five different categories under which Dickinson's verse falls. First, she writes epigrams; second, she writes "prose-formatted poems", which are excerpts from her letters during her time; third, she uses riddles as her form of miscellaneous expressions; fourth, Dickinson has left over rough materials or drafts that seem to include various forms of poetry; and fifth, she has some juvenile letters left over that reveal the beginnings of her stylistic elements. Here, we can see the various manners that Dickinson uncovers her idiosyncratic verse, and it's easy to define her as a poet of her time through these five categories. The new poems in this anthology clearly have precedents set by Dickinson, as they relate to each of these five stylistic forms of the poet, while it is quite obvious that the poet contributes her idiosyncratic verse in the newly discovered material; however, the new material brings a fresh look at the writer, as we can perceive her quintessential works from different, exciting angles. For example, Thomas H. Johnson's 1955 publication of Dickinson's poems is a three-volume edition of Dickinson's poetry, "reformatting [her] lines from prose to poetry" (4). We can see from this perspective the characteristics of Emily Dickinson's poetry in a different way, which makes this book of poems both traditional and fresh.

The groupings of poems collaborate, as the editor incorporates Dickinson's passages into descriptions of the different forms she uses. The second chapter discusses her "new genre", involving epigrams, which apparently is the first time Dickinson's use of epigrams is both unmasked and acknowledged. Chapter three reveals the new material that has been discovered in more letters as well as prose by Dickinson; the book isolates each new poem, enlightening the reader with more work from the poet, herself. Of course, most of the anthology acknowledges these new poems, and then concludes itself with workshop materials and letters that have recently been found by the poet. I looked mostly at chapter three, trying to find the parallels between well-known poems by the author and these new poems with which we are not as familiar. There is definitely a parallel, as these poems are very similar in style to Dickinson's usual work; however, within the next few pages are "poems" that should not be considered Dickinson's usual poetry, as they are "incomplete", and "experimental"-- perhaps this was the earlier years of Dickinson when she was developing her stylistic writing.

Nevertheless, the book, overall, includes the new material that Dickinson worked with to form her most admired and well known poetry that we read today; the different compilations of her newly acknowledged work in this book of poetry help to further understand and define Emily Dickinson as a versatile poet of her time, as well as draw conclusions from her prose to incorporate them into isolated stanzas of poetry, as does Johnson.

For my book review I decided to read Saul Williams’ The Dead Emcee Scrolls – The Lost Teachings of Hip-Hop. In this book Williams is working in a very modern tradition and I personally have not seen any other work done in the past that resembles his work in this book. His work is responding to how hip-hop has been a very significant influence on many individuals and how he personally was able to combine his love of music and writing together to create a mix of the two in a very unique kind of hip-hop poetry. Williams’ book is put together as a collection of disparate poems, but interestingly enough, his work could probably be read as one poem as well and still flow nicely. I think he has this effect on his readers because of the almost lyrical verse he writes as if it was apart of a hip-hop song. The conversation Saul Williams has with his reader is one that is based upon raw truth. He does a very good job at speaking to his audience in a way that they can feel the way he feels through his writing. The poems Williams writes tend to be a combination of unrhymed free verse as well as rhymed verse. The poems also appear to be made up of both prose and sestinas, and they vary from being fairly long to short. Williams also plays with the use of his line as well. His lines vary in length as well as in being end-stopped and enjambed, but he uses the enjambment very rarely because it definitely messes with his lyrical sound that he’s going for in creating a song-like vibe when reading his poems. Saul Williams also really uses a unique kind of language slang. It’s very new age and he also uses very unique acronyms for words that may be viewed as offensive, such as “NGH WHT” for “Nigga What”. Some of the offensive language really pays tribute to the influence of hip-hop in his work and by putting them in capitalized acronyms it not only makes it stand out more, but it also makes the statement more powerful. This also plays a role in the tone of Williams’ book. His poems tend to be full of tension, which changes throughout his pieces. The tension he introduces is very effective in making the reader feel connected to the poem as well. He ends his book with a series of journal entries and they do tend to give the reader a sense of resolution, but also open ended in a way that leaves the reader feeling empowered and inspired. Features in this book that a young writer might want to emulate is the honestly that Saul Williams brings to this poems. A very great ability he has, is being able to present very relatable information through his work to his reader, while gaining the trust and interest of the reader as well. On the other hand, a young writer should be careful writing the way in which Saul Williams does because if you’re not completely honest and open with your work, the reader will know and the feelings you evoke from your audience won’t be as powerful. Some questions I would really like to ask Saul Williams is too further explore his inspirations of his writing beyond hip-hop music as well as what he wanted to get out of writing when he completed this book? All and all, this book was very good and I would definitely recommend reading his work.

Ok… So I totally forgot to write on the blog by Friday. Oops… But Thursday’s poetry reading with Christian Bok was definitely unlike anything I have ever seen or heard before in my life. When I tried to explain what his reading was like to my roommate and boyfriend I really could hardly describe what I had experienced while at Christian Bok’s presentation. I have never heard poems written and/or read like that before. It not only was extremely entertaining, but it also really forced me to recognize how experimental poetry can really push the boundaries of what I might have considered poetry to be. It kind of reminded me of when in class we tried to explain how something was or wasn’t a poem and it really helped me to conceptualize how poetry can be vastly different across cultures, language, intention, and expression. I think Christian Bok is really something of a visionary in his field because he really focuses on creating poetry that hasn’t ever been experienced before and in doing that he creates a new kind of reader experience because his work and inspiration is a type of poetry that many people haven’t been exposed to before. I really enjoyed our lecture by him as well as his presentation on Thursday night… I definitely would love to attempt writing some of the kinds of poems he has in the future!

Book review

For this assignment I read The poetry of Robert Frost: the collected poems, complete and unabridged. This book was split up into different sections based on a state in which Frost was writing about. So each of these different state sections was its own collection of poems. In this book Frost writes in a very modern and traditional language. He also uses references to many items and ideas that many people are very familiar with. Most of the poems throughout this book were short and very relate-able, especially if you have grown up in the northeast and have traveled to Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts and Connecticut. In this book I personally think that his use of vivid imagery and language helps to enhance his poems and make reading them that more enjoyable because you can mentally picture exactly what he is saying. There are "people" characters per-say in this book. Its more like the characters are made up from nature and the environment of the State Frost is talking about. Each poem seems to have its own pattern and style about it. If I had to generalized the vast majority of these poems I would say they are free flowing, very easy to read and visuals, end rhymes are present in various patterns, and each poem has their own placement on the page for different reasons depending on the poem. In this book Frost emphasizes and shows off many different poems and the various ways he had written over the years. I would recommend this book to anyone who is just exploring the world of poetry. There are many forms of poetry explored in this book as well as very relate-able text. The vivid imagery and language also make for an easy and understandable read. I have had this book for many years now and each time I read something I learn something new and exciting or catch a visual that I hadn't before. I have reread poems after starting this poetry class and in learning the techniques of poetry I have come to read and analyze them differently and in doing so I have gained a deeper understanding for the ideas behind each one. This has given me a greater appreciation of each of the poems I read and makes it so I enjoy this book even more.

weekly blog

The topic of the week was definitely Christian Bok. I actually liked his in class spiel better than the one in the formal lounge. The way he divided up the types of poetry was very interesting and I thought very accurate. I think for my next poem I’m going to get a random number generator and assign them a letter – and see how it turns out. I believe that would fall into the category of both having no intention and not actually saying anything category. What he said about adjectives made sense as well. If there is something that a noun is not doing – then improve the noun – don’t add an adjective to it. As for his live performance, I had a hard time being able to appreciate it. Im sure for someone like Professor Hummer it was easy to see why what he is doing is so special but for me it was hard to get past the obvious fact that he was up there screaming non-English words. Also, the low blow he made to Dick Cheney was not appreciated.

weekly blog

I really enjoyed the speaker we had on Thursday, I thought he was a very intelligent man in the ways of poetry and writing skills. He showed us some interesting ideas on how to further improve our writing skills in not only poetry but in all aspect of writing. I thought that was really cool he came in and talked to us. Plus he won that poetry award so you know he knew his stuff. I hope we get the opportunity to have another sweet speaker to come in and talk to us, even though I don’t think that will happen its wishful thinking. So for the last assignment where we had to write a poem using different line breaks I really enjoyed. I loved writing my poem about sand dollars. And making my poem all broken up and hard relatively hard to find where one reads next. Which I have resembling the struggle one has in there searching for a real sand dollar. Over spring break which now seems a long time ago I found some sand dollars so that was my inspiration on what to write the poem about.

Reaction to Bok

Thursday's class was incredibly interesting with Christian Bok's presences, especially his systematic "stances" (cognitive, automatic, mannerist, and aleatory). I have never perceived writing from this approach before. I must admit, his presence was intimidating. After his entire monologue regarding his accomplishments and future plans, I lost all confidence in my answers. It appeared that he wished to go in a particular direction with his "lecture," and I doubted that my contributions would have advanced the topic in any way. However, his lessons were incredibly valuable.

I pity those who missed his reading last night, for it surely was a spectacular display. I also pity the residents who live above the formal room. His performance of "The Princess of the Opera" was terror evoking, even in a lighted, comfortable environment. His initial scream was incredible -- what were the clueless outsiders thinking?

One question that I wanted to ask, but never found a chance to, regarded his perception of his poetic faculties, more so his perception of creativity. His poetry was incredibly mechanical, laborious, and time consuming. I felt that it was more formula based than intuitive. Was his technical approach a creative faculty, or was his initial idea the source of creativity? I am in awe of his patience.

Weekly Blog

I really enjoyed the presence of Christian Bok in class as well as the reading in the formal lounge. I have to admit that I did like the night performance more, but they both were a great experience. I find the work that Christian Bok does fascinating. I particularly like how he makes up his own rules and does things that no one else has done before. I really liked reading and hearing about his book entitles Eunoia, I think that concept is remarkable and commend him on a project like that. The biggest thing that caught my attention in him telling us about what he does is when learning about Xenotext and literally making a bacteria become the living embodiment of his work. It might be the biology major in me that really loves this idea and I think it is a remarkable feat. I hope all works out in this Xenotext project and I was to that Christian for coming to class and teaching us about simple techniques to become better writers.

Weekly Blog

It was really interesting to have Christian Bok come teach us in the classroom today and to get to see him perform his own and other people’s poetry at the reading. He made us think a lot about what writing in our mind constitutes a novel and how we are able to be intentional or non intentional and expressive or non expressive when we write a certain way. It was really helpful when he went over how and when we should use nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. Next time I am writing a poem, I will try and make sure my nouns and verbs are descriptive on their own so I don’t have to use as many adjectives or adverbs. It was an interesting experience to here Christian Bok read the sound poetry tonight because I had never heard this done before. We would not have been able to get the same effect from the poem if we hadn’t heard him read it out loud. I enjoyed the poem that was called mushroom clouds and incorporated the Super Mario Brothers. All of the poems he read gave me new insight to how poems can be written and performed and what one can incorporate into them.

bok blog

The presentation tonight in the formal lounge was quite interesting. I have never heard sound poems before and it was definitely not what I was expecting. I don't really understand how something like a sound poem would be created or what the rules are for that type of poetry. Even though I don't really understand the construction of them, I could see the effort that goes in to each one. His vocal abilities were very impressive and clearly take a lot of practice. I also liked hearing him read his own poems because it sounded much different than how I read it to myself. They were much funnier and animated when Bok read it than I did. I'd like to learn more about the art of sound poetry as it is such a foreign concept to me at this point. I also would like to say that I don't think one letter can be a novel...if you didn't already know the background story behind all of that the letter would make no sense so I don't think it can serve as a novel on its own.

bok, book, novel?

Today's class was rather amusing. I am still not entirely certain I agree that a single letter can be a novel...I recognize that it can tell a complex tale but language is fluid enough that there are other 'genre' definitions that will suit "William Tell: A Novel." We have so many definitions for the various forms of written expression because there is a certain formal quality expected of each type, which does have quite a bit of leeway now but is still generally recognized by a specific set of rules. For example, a novel brings to mind a work of a certain length just as a short story does or a flash fiction. Poetry generally brings to mind lyric verse of varying length; sometimes blank verse. Essay brings to mind a (usually) shorter written work that is trying to convey a point (and has the potential to be very dry).

Of course, these are my thoughts on the formal conventions of writing and are certainly not set in stone. Not that any interpretation can be set in stone in this day and age with so many new ideas arising. Experimental writing is far more accepted and practiced now than in the past and will continue to change the various definitions given to genres.

Weekly Blog

This blog is coming a little late because I forgot to post it for last week, which was the week before break. Last week I really enjoyed workshopping poems a second time around. Since we had already done it once, I think people were more comfortable with giving others feedback about their poem. A lot of the feedback I received for my own poems was really helpful and when I write poems in the future, I will hopefully be able to look out for common mistakes I make before I hand in my poems. When I go back to correct and play around with my poems, I think I will have a lot of good feedback and ideas to work with that will hopefully strengthen my poem. I sometimes have trouble choosing what to write about so I really enjoy reading other peoples poems and seeing what they choose to write about or what inspires them in particular. Hopefully I will be encouraged to branch out in the future with my writing and write about different things than what I usually do.

another new post

I think I missed last weeks blog, so I'll make my previous post count for last week, and write this one for this week. there were two recent events involving poetry here at SLU that I missed and I'm extremely pissed off about. First, it was Saul Williams. I've been a huge Saul fan for many years and Slam is one of my favorite movies. I have all his CD's and when I heard he was coming here, I got real excited. then we had a basketball game and I couldn't make it. Then, last Friday there was a hip-hop event at Eben Holden that I really wanted to go to, but couldn't make that because we had another game. So even though I missed these events because I was doing something I love doing, I'm still upset that I didn't get to see at least one of them. If anybody in class went to the Saul Williams show and knows of any video footage or anything, could you let me know? He's a gifted poet and a real inspiration. and if anyone went to the eben holden event, Id like to hear what that was like too.

new blog

I liked how todays workshop played out. It was the second time around and people knew more of what to expect as far as feedback and criticisms go. I can see improvements in many peoples poems, including my own. As far as I go, I got great feedback on my third assignment and I agree with what was said. I'm really comfortable in writing the 2-4 line rhyme stanzas, similar to much of what I listen to musically. I should challenge myself and try to write some unrhymed poetry, something different that is outside my comfort zone. I like using wordplay so maybe I can incorporate some metaphorical prose poetry for our next assignment. It'll be interesting for me to see how I will approach this because it is something I'm not used to or accustomed to writing.

blog

I wanted to wait till after my poem was work shopped today to write my blog. Now looking back at today’s workshop I think it will really improve the quality of my poems. I really enjoy having the class read and interoperate my poem the way they think it is. Hearing what some kids thought of other kids poems is very fun. Some kids interoperated their peer’s poems in a completely different way than what was intended by the writer. Having my poem being very strait forward and to the point about what it is on the topic of mine was not questionable. Although for this workshop only one of my poems was selected to be work shopped. But I think it was good because my second poem dealing with tension was about videogames. Which is a weird topic I think to write about. So I hope everyone has a good break. I really need this break, I am getting very tired of school. I cant wait to recharge my batteries and rest up.

Weekly Blog

I really liked work shopping for the second time. I think people are playing around with the techniques more and becoming comfortable with a certain style that they seem to be sticking to. The poems continue to get more interesting and cover a larger range of topics, images and emphasis. I like how Meggie played around with the line breaks like we did in class and think they worked well for her poem. I'm interested to see how work shopping will go from here since we are getting use to the routine and becoming comfortable with a certain style of writing. I look forward to where the direction of these workshops will go and I'm interested to see where our each individual writing goes as well. I have found this class very fun and helped to develop skills as a writer that I didn't even know I had.

Kurt Malkames (Week of March 1-7)

Enjoying workshopping week so far. I think getting feedback from my peers is improving my writing and its also fun to do. I was happy with how my poems turned out this week – for three of my poems I decided to revise my first assignment and I think the result was a good one. I noticed some areas that really needed attention and clarification. Also, it was interesting to try to incorporate some of the techniques we learned in class retrospectively. It was pretty difficult to try to make my line breaks fluid after the fact. Making the imagery more vivid and the tension a bit more realistic was also a challenge. I found that since my main goal with the initial poem was to describe something – giving it tension as well was really only trying to strain something that wasn’t necessary. For my other poem I went with a spinoff of the visual stuff we did in class with the magazines – and I think it turned out pretty well. It seemed like the copies most people got for my poems in workshop didn’t print in color but that wasn’t a big deal. My other poem was an opinion on overdramatic poets, which I also think turned out to be a somewhat effective poem.

I definitely agree with Lili about switching up workshop groups. I think it would be very beneficial to get different feedback from different people in our class. Everybody has had different experiences in life which would effect how someone might interpret your pieces. I’ve gotten some really great feedback from my group so far, but I would be curious to see what others may think about my pieces as well. I know for me personally writing poetry hasn’t been easy so far either and I think it would be beneficial to maybe do some kind of workshop for coming up with ideas for our workshop/assignment pieces because inspiration isn’t always the easiest for me. I also feel like the things I do choose to write about are sensitive and important to me and criticism on those topics aren’t always easy to hear so I have a hard time getting a grade back for our poems because how can someone put a number grade on something that’s a personal reflection or expression of something personal? I know this has turned into a blog entry of a bunch of jumbled up ideas, but this is what poetry does to me J Anyway… Workshop will hopefully be interesting tomorrow. See you all in the morning.

Workshopping

I agree with the previous post...I think it was the previous...it would have been nice to switch up workshop groups and get a different perspective on my work. Even if the poem changes people have specific styles and likes/dislikes.
I was a little disappointed that we didn't get to workshop our third assignment. I enjoyed writing mine and was very pleased with the end product but Theo didn't 'get' the imagery. I am leery to take the advice of only one person for something like that and would have like the feedback of my group. Unfortunately, I didn't (and still don't) think Theo would have liked it if I had submitted Those are essentially the only thoughts I have at this moment. Now, off to read the second half of the poems for workshop...

workshop

I would agree with one of the blogs before me, that I was looking forward to reading some of my other peers work. Although it was cool to see some people's revisions of poems I had read in the previous workshop, I really wanted to be able to switch up who was reading my work in order to get some new perspectives. I think everyone has their own styles and strong points so its important to be able to hear these other views. Overall, the second workshop was still helpful, I think I got some good tips for improving my poems as well as positive feedback. I dont really have much else to say in terms of this week, but I look forward to discussing tomorrows workshop poems and hope everyone has a good break!

Newest Post

I don't really have much new to say about our poetry class this week. I had a productive workshop on Tuesday and I always think that our group works really well together in that we give constructive feedback without being blunty rude. I always wonder if it will be really slow when we start off our workshops because its eight thirty in the morning and your never quite sure how talkative people are feeling on a certain day. Luckily, we always seem to get moving at a pretty good pace, people volunteer to be the first person to workshopped without a hitch and when any one poem is done we all seem to get right into our likes and dislikes of the poem. Their is always a good balance of people pointing out positive things and negative things that might be worked on in any one person's poem. From remarks on structure, word choice, word repeats, diction and overall plot, our group does a great job at touching on all aspects of the poem. I think my favorite thing about workshop classes is that there is no way to be embarassed or, moreover, no reason to be embarassed because everyone is having to do the same thing. We might be a little self-conscious and nervous to share the types of themes and plots that we really feel passionate about, but I think becasue everyone else is righ there alongside you, we have all found comfort in writing what really matters to us. I like that everyone is truthful in this class in more way than one and I think it really adds to the integrity of the class as a whole.

In light of the second workshop...

I may have expressed these sentiments in a previous post, but it is worth the restatement -- I enjoy our work shop sessions. Reading poetry from an anthology has its merits, but to read the work of an individual who sits next to you in class has its own unique merits. Not only are you permitted to explore the thoughts and creative wellsprings of a peer, you can also ask them questions about their motivations, their purpose, and their attitude towards the poem. Dialogue with the poet opens a realm of understanding, one you are barred from when you observe poetry in a book. We are blessed with the work of great poets, but how would a personal account with a poet in our anthology alter our perceptions about his/her work? I feel that we are often weighted down by preconceptions, expectations, and misjudgments when we observe our poetic ancestors. What would Whitman say if he came into one of our classes while we were interpreting his work?

However, I think the work shop sessions can be improved by slight modifications. To begin, I believe it would be valuable if review groups were formed by random selection. Quite honestly, I was looking forward to reviewing the work of others that I had not read previously. I feel that I am acquainted with the style of my workshop peers, and they may share similar beliefs (correct me if I am wrong). I would also like for my work to be critiqued by a "fresh" set of senses. I may be dulling work shop members with my work.