Sunday, August 26, 2007

To Lead the Mind Away















Joanne Hsieh and Jesse Roy, who last year regaled us with their song of Sam Patch, have produced another Patersong especially for New Jersey as an Impossible Object. From Book III (The Library), their rendition of Locust Tree would beat Williams reading it hands down, although were he to be backed up by Allen Ginsberg on harmonica, Marcia Nardi on bass, and Joe Gould on the spoons, he might have provided more competition.

For there is a wind or ghost of a wind
in all books echoing the life
there, a high wind that fills the tubes
of the ear until we think we hear a wind,
actual .

to lead the mind away.

Drawn from the streets we break off
our minds’ seclusion and are taken up by
the books’ winds, seeking, seeking
down the wind
until we are unaware which is the wind and
which the wind’s power over us .
to lead the mind away (96)

(Click on image for song. Joanne Hsieh on piano and voice; Jesse Roy on guitar and voice; Recorded and mixed by Jesse Roy).

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2 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

hi joe - i just now noticed your comment on epoetica on my posts on williams and wanted to thank you for taking the time to read and write! i actually think you're completely right about how Williams' Paterson is more 4-d than 3-d - it's probably my own love of poetic-architectural objects that led me to make an argument for the 3d. yes, i'd love to read someone else's reading of Williams' stilted-sounding readings.

12:19 PM, August 28, 2007  
Blogger Joe Milutis said...

no problem. my response was probably a little harried and incoherent because I was writing outside of my car while driving through Virginia. But I want to be sure to have the proper 4d experience! To get a sense of the time-drama of Paterson, you might want to read something like Nancy Barry's "The Fading Beautiful Thing of Paterson" : http://www.jstor.org/view/0041462x/ap020130/02a00080/0?searchUrl=http%3a//www.jstor.org/search/BasicResults%3fhp%3d25%26si%3d1%26gw%3djtx%26jtxsi%3d1%26jcpsi%3d1%26artsi%3d1%26Query%3dbeautiful%2bthing%2bwilliams%26wc%3don&frame=noframe¤tResult=0041462x%2bap020130%2b02a00080%2b0%2cFFFF3F&userID=81fc4628@sc.edu/01cce4405bd60f114adeff183&dpi=3&config=jstor

12:35 PM, August 28, 2007  

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