tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 15-19/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 15-19

Four Quatorzain cleaves

“I prefer poems in anthologies
to poems in individual books.
A poem in an anthology has
forgotten its author.”
—Tan Lin, “ambient stylistics,”
Telling It Slant

BERNSTEIN

Brute design—beltway bozos
dEmocracy—lewd propositions
guRly boyz—knowing the truth
thiNk about—halliburton haves and those
scabS of the—ratty mourning have-nots
gangsTer lobbyists—hoodlum politicians
silhouEtting—formaldehyde artifices
uncertaInties—nightly snarky fox-tv
discrepaNcies—elephantine lies

Seed text = BERNSTEIN
Source text = Charles Bernstein’s
“Ballad of the Girly Man,” Girly Man (2000)

(Using the diastic method, the writer reads through the source text and successively finds words or other linguistic units that have the letters of the seed text in positions that correspond to those they occupy in the seed text.)

http://quarterlyconversation.com/thing-of-beauty-by-jackson-mac-low

(Using the cleave method, the writer reads through the diastic text—hyphenating the horizontal text into2 vertical texts. The resulting text is a diastic / cleave intertext—with 3 poems in positions that correspond to each in a unique polymorphosely vocal / textual way.

https://cleavepoetry.wordpress.com/2008/10/07/dennis-kellys-further-thoughts-on-cleave-poetics/

GREENE

Gravedigger—slowly finishing up
GReene saying—“One never knows,
WhEn the blow—may fall”
DetEctive—sesame phrase:
“FrieNd—of Harry Lime”—
WinklEr—the Viennese Jansenist

Seed text = GREENE
Source text =The Third Man (1950)

“Jansenist,” Dr. Winkler commented and closed his mouth sharply as though he had been guilty of giving away too much information. “Never heard the word. Why are the arms above the head?” Dr. Winkler said reluctantly, “Because He died, in their view, only for the elect.”
—Graham Greene, The Third Man

BAUDELAIRE

Balking at sleep—i was a well
pAscal had his abysses—i was a mine
haUnted by vertigo—nightmares
hanDs reaching down into—darknesss
pacEs full of—languorous indifferences
disobLiging work—being a lyric poet in hell
consolAtions being few—in between while
contritIions ending up—lame and clandestine
surrendeRing sullen—boredom
silhouettEs—baudelaire on the wall…

Seed text = BAUDELAIRE
Source text = Les Fleurs de malNotes:

“Les Fleurs de mal was the last lyric work that had a broad European reception; no other writings penetrated beyond a more or less linguistic area. Added to this is the fact that Baudelaire expended his productive capacity almost entirely on this one volume.” —Walter Benjamin, The Writer of Modern Life: Essays on Charles Baudelaire (2006)

PIERS GAVESTON

Ganymede—prince, my future king
pAge, sovereign’s son—fairest lover boy
joVe’s cutest chicken—lascivious commaund
sweEt beauty’s rarest purple—flower in bloom
wordS can’t describe how wanton—the ivy-twisting
idolaTrous my love-sick lips—kissing qualm
gavestOn your servant—ogling eyes astonished
ascendaNt—by rare phoenix youth…

Seed text = Gaveston
Source text =”Piers Gaveston,”
Michael Drayton (1593)

“This Edward in the April of his age,
Whil’st yet the Crown sat on his father’s head
My Jove with me, his Ganymede, his page,
Frolic as May, a lusty life we led…..
He might commaund, he was my
Sovereign’s son,
And what I said, by him was ever done.
My words as laws authentic he allowed,
Mine yea, by him was never crossed with no,
All my conceit as current he avowed,
And as my shadow still he served so”

tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 13&14/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 13&14 of 19

13

“metaphor chains”
—Clark Coolidge,
“Arrangement,” Talking
Poetics from Naropa

        not everyone here—hears words turning
      feels apportionment—mosaic night-soil moving
      collecting in sleep—penetrating dreams
    invisible stalagmites—slow motion overhead
      older than pyramids—elvis’ blue suede shoes
        cassiopeia’s taxi—outside the 7-eleven
the lady in the red dress—the queen of spades
    words want to make us—faking us away
        twisting crimping—that’s their style
     give them some slack—chill your cool

14.

“there are no rules,
let’s see what can
be written”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

              see the ink—egyptian papyrus jive
            see the ships—on the walls of the temples
             see the nile—inching back and forth centuries
            see the birds—in the reeds along the banks
      see the steep steps—hear the coffin creak & groan
    see the antique palms—leaning into the sunset
   see the piles of stone—beneath the ancient stars
        see the gold mask—see thru tut’s time-machine
  see the coiled caduceus—uncoil when it’s time
see the face that’s yours—when the pyramids fly

tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 11&12/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 11&12 of 19

11.

“Language isn’t just
objects, it moves…”
—Clark Coolidge,
“Arrangement,” Talking
Poetics from Naropa

   if after all—they do know
    if i say so—and they agree
     a marriage—a convenience
     between us—our arrangements
parallel poetry—out of thin air
   making it up—right then & there
        with me—who am i to quibble?

12.

“you go where it goes,
I think that connects with
arrangement in a way”’
—Clark Coolidge,
“Arrangement,” Talking
Poetics from Naropa

            carbide—lamps
       terrifyingly—brighter
 acetylene torching—working better
brighter down there—than flashlights
         spelunking—inside trilobite time
  stalactite organs—playing in the dark
       intrauterine—underground journeys
        passageways—connected arrangements
  crawling climbing—using ropes down deep
      reading rocks—rocks reading you
    cleaving deeper—thru strata and faults

tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 9&10/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 9&10 of 19

9.

“He’s one of the
interesting bad writers”
—Clark Coolidge,
“Arrangement,” Talking
Poetics from Naropa

            it lurks—my window's open
    i don’t even see—what’s coming thru
     but it knows me—noxious yog-sothoth
spawn of primal time—tentacles amorphous
     monster cleaves—threshold lurkers
  frothing congeries—protoplasmic flow
    opening the gate—eldritch netherworld
       hip lovecraft—call of cthalhu

10.

“to find a form that
accommodates the
mess, that is the task
of the writers today”
—Samuel Beckett

     next to—next to
does it join—does it join
does it mean—does it mean
does it know—does it know
if after all—it does know
and I say so—does it?

November by Phuoc-Tan Diep

                    November
          The sun weeps - cider tinted tears
             for Summer - for the fading
for the moon that hides - light
       behind the trees - as Autumn leads Winter
  shivering and anaemic - by the hand

**For those interested, I have included all my drafts here: Anatomy of a cleave poem: November**

tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 7&8/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 7&8 of 19

7.

“Just a sequence
of rooms…”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

   i hear it—when it’s coming
i don’t know—it’s different each time
 ignorant me—an undertow beneath
    my style—just flowing with it
     failing—just what is needed
     finally—entering the moment
   when i am—into who i am

8.

“or should I
say nonconnection”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

 entering it—the keyhole
  the cleave—down the middle
     slicing—cerebral hemispheres
    the tale—of two cities
  boulevards—left and right
  drawbridge—across the channel
  down below—thru the metal grating
  tall ships—passing in the night
    my brain—springs a leak
falling down—into sailboats

tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 5&6/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 5&6 of 19

5.

“This is very
unprovoked thought”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

          it opened—i caught it
 versions left over—over the edge
       they shifted—down the spinal cord
    all the hyphens—slouching like cats
           sniffing—soft paws on the carpet
   here in the city—craning their necks
getting a good look—thru the gate
       at the other—shape-shifter

6.

“the great
misunderstandings”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

   it comes here—i don’t know how
      i say this—i’ve lost so much
planting hyphens—slanting it down
    how it grows—nobody knows
       beneath a—night sun moon
       blackness—dark at high noon
     it’s coming—undoing me

tHe mAgic typEwritEr (cleave poetics 3&4/19) by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 3&4 of 19

3.
“the energy of word art”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

   cleaving—against it
seeing what—emerges
    writing—three-ways

   monsters—of the id
     ghosts—of the ego
   superego—doppelgangers

   the body—as movie
   dreaming—voyage imaginaire
  provoking—poetry

i’m starved—i’m hungry
    the way—poets eat poets
   language—cleave du jour

4.
“wait and see
what emerges…”
—Clark Coolidge,
Postmodern Poetry:
The Talisman Interviews

       what’s happening—with cleaves?
         the difficulty—talking about them?
         designing them—as 3 texts in one
        suggesting that—their meaning
          somehow comes—from a “complex”?

          when actually—the artifice of cleaves
performs simultaneously—paraphrasing
     the old surrealism—thru LangPo research
     into a new reading—worthy to be
        called American—parasurrealism…

Cleave by Andrea Barton

                      Cleave

                  It is –A- joining of words
        A fusion and -cleave– separated by
oddly, a division that –is– a physical gap
             ruptures -the – eye’s path
   the rhythm here –opposite- to a smooth
        joint venture -of- meaning
      in clutching -itself- as one

tHe mAgic typEwritEr by Dennis Kelly

CLEAVE POETICS 1 of 19

tHe mAgic typEwritEr
“It is a parasurrealism
that examines its own
lyrical structure…
a lively, dramatic
edginess, a visceral 
sense of “being there.”

—Charles Borkhuis,
“Writing from Inside Language:
Late Surrealism and Textual Poetry 
in France and the United States,”
Telling It Aslant:Avant-Garde 
Poetics of the 1990s 

1.

“How much of poetry is
unprovoked thought?”
—Clark Coolidge,
The Crystal Text

    what provokes—cleavage?
      that which is—blank?
     a new kind of—line?
         three lines—in one?

           how to be—simultaneous?
          three-way—at the same time?
       rearranging—past present future?
           writing it—into a new tense?

              picasso—does it
           juan gris—does it
        kandinsky—does it
             braque—does it

           but what—do they do?
        do they do—cubism?
or does cubism—do them?
        provoking—such cleavage?

(Previously here).