Sunday, May 02, 2010

Aztec Astral Glitch















This time reading Book II, I picked up on this mental wormhole that takes us from Garret Mountain to a similar place in Mexico, Chapultepec or "grasshopper hill." It seems like he refers to this statue, or ones like it, when he talks about the "grasshopper of red basalt, boot long . . . a matt stone solicitously instructed/ to bear away some rumor/ of the living presence that has preceded it, out-precedented its breath . " The rumor, we can imagine, may refer to grasshopper's signature sound, and Williams may be reflecting on the appropriateness of a representation without this sound. However, that its "wings do not unfold for flight--," for Williams "no need!" Remember, this passage occurs after the first appearance of the references to that which he approaches "concretely." I had been thinking this time around that, contrary to perhaps more wishful interpretations of Williams' relation to the concrete, that in Book II he conceptually places the concrete in subordinate relation to the vitality of the workers in the park, and thus seems to denigrate the concrete, even though the workers are boisterously rude. Yet he goes on to describe how the "mind's wings," connected to the artist's hand, and faced with the unyielding rock, seem, in this odd game of rock-paper-scissors to beat out any cheap vitality. This reference may serve to clarify the cryptic lines "Love is a stone endlessly in flight;" "the stone lives, the flesh dies;" as well, perhaps his reference to "window-eyes that front the whole head" (see pic above) implying the immortal insomnia of artistic vision, of the "Love [that] combat[s] sleep."
A big question for me is how this passage was meant to be read without the possibility of a quick Internet search? As an astral residue in memory? How legible is it meant to be?

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Saturday, December 12, 2009

Life, Love and Paterson: Jeanne Heuving on Paterson













Jeanne Heuving, who is finishing a book on the transmutation of love in 20th Century Poetry, talked to me about how she would apply her concept of "libidinal field poetics" to Paterson, when I interviewed her a couple months ago. Jeanne, with whom I teach as well as help curate her Writing for Their Lives literary series, is the author of Incapacity and Transducer, as well as a number of scholarly works on poetry.
Imagism as love poetry; Williams and love: (8 min. 25 sec.)
The Marcia Nardi letters: (7 min. 40 sec.)
Ecstasy in objects; Requited vs. unrequited love poems: (6 min. 45 sec.)

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