Dionysus Reading :: March 10, 2011

  

Saralyn no like picture

Drunken Weirdos Confess and Entertain

About halfway through the process of putting this magazine together—for the second time—it sort of occurred to me that we might have made a mistake. 

We agreed early on that we would resist all forms of thematic consistency.  All of us had taken classes with a teacher who told us that her definition of “good” writing was “verbal surprise,” and we were all stuck by that in one way or another.  So, we would organize our magazine according to an inexplicably organic sense of flow, rather than adhering to genre associations or the alphabet.  Though I think we’re all too hesitant to admit it for fear of sounding pretentious, our decidedly ambiguous method has always been a point of pride. 

Once we started soliciting submissions, though, the confusion arose:

    “Submit to our magazine,” I would say.
    “What’s it called?”
    “Artichoke Haircut.”
    “What does that mean?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “What should I submit?”
    “Whatever you want….something good.”
    “How do I know if it’s good?”
    “Um.”
    “How do you know if it’s good?”
    “I don’t know…”

…And so on.  Eventually, it started to feel like I was talking people out of submitting.  I’d wanted to inspire writers to create something surprising or to find something surprising in their existing work, by robbing them of expectations and parameters.  In practice, the approach just came off confusing and pointless.  At least, that’s what I was thinking as I headed into the March 10th reading at Dionysus. 

Editors' Shorts :: #1

Narrative Flow

The thought was in the head; the head

was somewhat

connected to the neck; the neck

was frail and wanted badly to snap, but

                could not.

It was

begrudgingly

interested in the head.

It

wished secretly

to be pulled into the skull’s frivolous breezing

like a string,

to

fray.

 -      jonathan gavazzi

Juxtaposition :: Editors' Picks

Cy Twombly: Apollo and the Artist 1975

It is impossible that one with even a tangential interest in modern culture has not suffered through a conversation on the power of language, a topic discussed ad nauseam in political discourse, academia, literary circles, theology, blah blah blah. Yet what is little discussed outside the arts (and esoteric, modern philosophy -- hi, Derrida), is what the desire to speak says about the human condition. We find it necessary to cognitively coral things within our experience, yet beyond another's, so that through speech they may indeed experience it. The human animal finds its own reality so endlessly fascinating, or unbearably terrifying, that it is impossible not to blather on about it, no matter who is or is not listening. What else explains the constant speaking into the void that is Twitter?

Vasko Popa :: Editors' Pick

Ancient rock painting at Horseshoe Canyon, Utah

I could ramble on and on about Popa's use of myth, folklore, surrealism, etc. I could talk about the humor and sly intelligence which springs out of his deceivingly simple poems. I could talk about his use of repetition and cliché . But these labels and explanations would do little but distract attention from the man's voice. Instead I'll just let the 'lame wolf' poet from Serbia say it, and hopefully you will see it for yourselves:

Echo Turned to Stone

Once upon a time there were so many echoes

They were slaves of one voice

Built him arches

The arches tumbled down

They’d built them crooked

The dust buried them

They gave up the dangerous labor

Turned to stone from hunger

Turned to stone they flew

To find to rip to bits the lips

From which the voice came

They flew no one knows how long

Blind fools, didn’t they see

That they flew along the edge of the lips

They were seeking

Translated by Charles Simic.

For more on Vasko Popa go to www.oberlin.edu/ocpress/Books/Popa.htm


-By Adam Shutz

Feature :: Eat On This

One of our lovely editors here at Artichoke Haircut has a poem up on the web, published by Eat On This. Click the link to read "Stray Cat," by Adam Shutz:

Gerard Manley Hopkins :: Editors' Picks

It isn't that I dislike religious imagery in poetry, it's just that a part of my brain rebels and fights and screams whenever I hear it. It takes a bit of work and an excellent poet to crack through that prejudice and make me listen. Hopkins does, and his poem "God's Grandeur" shows the reader the wonder this planet can instill if carefully observed. He pulls you from ephemeral beauty into the blear of humanities' devastation of their environment. Yet there is no "the end is nigh" in this poem. With a touch of grace he pulls you out of the mortal tragedy in time to show you it's eminent rejuvenation. Such is the hope of religion I guess. Lets hope he's right:

God's Grandeur

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.

    It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;

    It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil

Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?

Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;

    And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;

    And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell: the soil

Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;

    There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;

And though the last lights off the black West went

    Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —

Because the Holy Ghost over the bent

    World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.



-Posted by Adam Shutz

Wooden Caterpillars

No idea who this guy is, but I love him (and I needed something to fill space on our new internet word posting machine). Watch it. You will not be disappointed.

Baltimore, there are words in my whisky.

So we are having a bit of a shindig on March 10th. So all tens of you who read this need to get on the ball around 7 or 8 and check us out at Dionysus. Bring your words and pink underwear.

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