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Spring 1996
Featured in this issue of inter\face
* Thomas Bell
* Jodie Evans
* David Joseph Dowker
* Allison Eir Jenks
* David Hunter Sutherland
* Colin Morton
* Benjamin H. Henry
inter\face is:
an extension of thought projected and shared through electronic media models of our abstract reasoning take shape and hold form to be digested and manipulated at will a focus point that instantaneously replicates and spreads in its native virtual mode
a thought made flesh, the flesh sprouting wings
-CM
Thomas Bell
I have been working on two projects. The first is the use of ascii art with poetry. The second is using psychiatric diagnostic criteria to frame a series of poems in a variety of ways. I am enclosing samples of both. (terminal or courier 12-pt). Both of these have been published elsewhere on the net.
Pilgrim
(
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) / PP
(~ I D LLL
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~ ,;~`";;, ~~~| V
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C %% p /b w
Birds wheel slowly up #%% \ / yy
\ \ %#%%##%#%%%%%' | ?
and over.\ \Branches reach %%` W{ -=O
\ #% #%%% && yy
endlessly toward... %%" nn ))
#%# ###' //
Wild ivy will not forget%%%` mmmmk
%##%##%@#@%%@@%%%%^ nnnnq
in-grown pains laid at the roots.
### ``'`"""'\ {}{}{}{} {}
nn \
n $ I$$ \ #&\ #& &&&
n $ l$$ \
n $ I$$ \ after Hakuin,
n %%%$$$%% Bada Shanren 9/94
Adrift in Post-traumatic Space (2)
"309.89 Post-traumatic Stress Disorder
A. The person has experienced an event that is outside the
range of usual human..."
B.
(1)
The Mauled tots swim rec
tra my mind's eye all urr
uma askew, asunder. ent
tic an
ev Death on the playground: d i
ent "C'mon, let us play ball!" ntr
is Action speaks. usi
re ve
exp I absent myself some. rec
eri And then further inure. oll
enc Faraway Rockaway prison ect
ed ion
in Enwrap pain. One way s o
at ticket to Siberia. f t
lea Return naked on nails. he
st one of the following ways: ev
...numbing of general responsiveness (not present before
the trauma) as indicated by at least three of the following:...
(6) restricted range of affect, e.g., unable to have loving
feelings..."
Jodie Evans
Hypertensive cardiomyopathy???
It's Monday again, and silently she waits in that poly-vinyl sterile room, the furniture familiar as her own living room. Tears drip, trickling down her insides radiating bittersweet warmth, reflected in her patient smile, it's all they see. Hands clap seconds Seventeen magazine stares back at drifting eyes, seeing the same line over, and over, and over. Silent television flickers embracing and illuminating her seemingly strong body, she is tired..of everything, especially waiting. Her six months were up two weeks ago today, yet silently she waits serving her undeserved death sentence. Sipping her Pepsi tapping her fingers, picking dirt from her nails, cracking her knuckles-she waits.
Quality Time
CHOP! A crisp October morning suited for a six-year-old that enjoys eating breakfast outside under the changing maple while squatting on a stump CHOP! Powdered jelly donuts always seem extra moist in the frosty air when I'm allowed to watch my father work CHOP! The crimson blood doesn't bother me, I giggle as the poor beast runs in circles its tiny head lying on the immense stump squawking until its staring eyes close CHOP! I take another bite of my powderlicious donut the jelly oozing out as a headless body scurries past, its feathers flying and laugh, licking powder from my hands
David Joseph Dowker
A THOUSAND AND ONE PLATEAUS
the birds in the computer chirp as I work and the days phase away...trying to find the path to that *concatenation* . the particular sigil of that *memory call* ...which system of trees beguiles while morning involves an ordinary stack of porcelain and domestic industry . the vast extruded mass of culture ...body-image translated/transmitted . the somatic abstract of _becoming_ (who is that *blur of murmurs* amid such turbulent verbiage?) ...which leaves out as much as possibly meanders and wonders whether subsequently ...similar glimmer of light upon glacier and sierra . thirsty vertebrates drink to be redeemed . desirous of otherness ...as any anxious integer or urgent verb *concatenation* *inter/cranial terrain*...trans-poetic *DNA assemblage* . the figure of grace is cadence and *echo* for coda ...impossible to estimate the displacement . the soundings present...in *the book of chlorophyll* or box of water . the hallucinated plurality of itself ...multiplicity of possible being . the moving source of information / *rhizome highways* *memory call* the hidden form of the content is a simple container a collection of butterflies pinned to cardboard a glass jar with holes punched in the lid a tree house over the railway track a clearing in the forest lumens diffuse and numinous through another window a room infused becoming spectral elsewhen arose arisen listen the hidden content is a simple form of the container a string of silences over woven water lines drift twittering refrain simultaneous with the sound of rain upon a tin roof and the hushed envelope sheltered under huddled beside the woodpile or swatting flies in bright sunlight mesmerized by the buzzing and the braided twine unwinds to *blur of murmurs* a fuzzy aggregate pragmatic streaks by flight lines converge upon a pile of sticks ceremonial bundle of nerves a heap of sighs likewise attraction sorrow waterfalls arose over silence clamours emphatically tensed gradients shift continuous potential plains of her participated *inter/cranial terrain* cerebro-spinal rock formations with ascii petroglyphs or the amassed transit of articulate vertebrate machines from station to station of the North American rhizome my tribalware in praise to the number-crunching crowd and all hail our becoming inflorescence what messages of earthly brilliance! what profligate incandescence spilled across these screens into forgotten folder burrows or the hollows of the dwells the exquisite host concept animated (have server will travel) a neurobotics for our time asemantic spaces replicate ray-traced ache ...human behaviour mimics this definition given as a pair of very energetic intelligence mechanisms isming *DNA assemblage* feathers and antennae attached to a block of solid crystal autonomous molecular sensorium coils memory strings singing loosened lattice flakes of mica beeswax and baler twine embroidered cotton cloth a sprig of cedar to gather *the stranded paths* through the would be and never more to surface the shadow of the earth apparatus here after that ancient abeyance *echo* non-local overflows o sonorous surround of sand or air, skin of repetition, refrain from crystalline to sibylline, align the signs, scientific sentient rudimentary sediment, sieved *the book of chlorophyll* the antenna complex light-harvesting the dark reaction delocalized overtonal momentarily our budding becoming bemused arborescence beside the waterfall weeping parawillows clinging epivines *assuredly verdant* and most abundant mutant staghorn fern *rhizome highways* a smooth space caressed from tree to sighing tree *the stranded paths* fox tracks across the frozen drifts and millions of monarch butterflies buried in the snow in Mexico *assuredly verdant* Quick sylvan thoughts amid winter inclosure. Boreal arborescence. A thousand and one shades of green meaning. Wood nymphs with *elf devices* shining night in my eyes. Throwing phosphenes around the 360 degrees of seeing. *elf devices* These are the affections. Tendered, seraphim _touch_ of incendiary being. A something overwhelms. The shudder of suddenly serenely mystifying intimacy. Embody this feeling.
Allison Eir Jenks
I'm 23 years old and I graduated from Columbia College in Chicago last year with a B.A. in Creative Writing. My first book, The Liquid In Love was published when I was 21 by Aegina Press in Huntington, West Virginia. It finally just came out a month ago. I am almost finished with my second book of poetry and the poems I have submitted to you are from this book. I am from Evanston and I also went to school at the University Of Illinois in Champaign for 2 years. I want to be a poetry professor more than anything and I'm applying to graduate school at USC and Columbia in N.Y. I have recently moved to Daytona Beach, Florida, at least until it gets warmer in Chicago again so I won't be locked in my house due to Arctic winds.
Poetry is not something I just came across one day and decided to try. My mom said she used to find me in the basement writing books when I was four years old and I guess I never wanted to forget how much I needed to write. When I was very small, I also used to record poetry and songs I had written into a tape recorder that I always carried around with me. Writing has been nothing less than a best friend to me that I talked to and figured out who I was from. If the pen and paper never existed, I'd be an entirely undeveloped person, unsure of who I was and who I had to be. Writing to me lets me breathe out all my fears, uncertainties, passions and hostilities out of myself until I'm able to figure out the best way to channel them back into me, sort them out and appropriate them into my personality in the most outstanding/positive way. I'm sure most poets have said or felt this but I'm sure we all just put on down on paper in miscellaneous ways. I also write with the hope to communicate with others. It is pretty easy for me to feel fulfilled in life- All it takes is for somebody to come up to me and tell me that they could relate to a line of my poetry, or that something I had said had really put something into perspective for them.
BLEMISHED
The octave of us is an avenue of blackbirds with marbolized wings As the blacksnake licks the bobcat in a herculean daze Your impotent homeland spread the last deep'sea of freckles on your icy, olive face. Your blemished hands belong on you like Auburn liqueur on pale blue tablecloths. I swim in the black of your eye until it liquifies like Blues in autumn. We talk like friends of jewel and berry bandits Erasing halls of bored handwriting
VENUS
Hours of leaky meteors Hound the oceanic part of my mind that sinks for snowy-white soldiers Back from horrendous scandals- Nights with sharp-toothed jaguars in their pillows. The nearest saxophone miles away. You live there like a black dollar rogue Lurking In That part of me that is Venus Rocking metro phases through the thoughts I never figured were pliable.
CAMEO
Buttermilk injections until trama caffeinates Baby's immanent sweetness Reidentified us with a bull-dog bruteness and Bullet proof canals. Cynically, our decomposers keep Zinc in our eyes Until the Vulcans haul in Sucking Saffron from the hemisphere. Eavesdropping for a Calypso Cameo to embroider gilts in the bitterness with harmonic, fresh-water to harpoon on ghetto flowers.
MINERALS
Rays from his barren eyes Collect the cranberry air. Rain'fall carries the temper of comets to the crib Consoled by the concord of thymes, minerals and misty plums, His blood is baptized with the cocoa and toffee climate. Prancing through the crooked underground, His roots condemn the pressure. Thoughts of solemn drifts Time in laps of waves and sun-down His dramatic, purple soul lives in the sands of wooden music and butterfly leaves. Taken back Not there but all of this here Balances itself like landing tornados.
David Hunter Sutherland
David Hunter Sutherland is the editor for a publication called Recursive Angel on the Internet. He has seen wide-distribution of his work in magazines, journals and reviews. His current book of collected works is due out late 1996.
PAX MONGOLICA
And the Wave, porous to touch, collapsed at your door. The full dissolution, "OM AH HUM !", and mantras of desperation, (heartbreak...despair), spiral down an orbit near a retrograde star. Yet on a small scale, Life coodles and croons to you, from an atoms' gestation, to the milk and manna of meal for a sun. Our toss and turn dream Buddhas' tight subtle bodies are muons that bind you in this cosmic soup of strange bedpartners, heavy velocities, and ghost orbits. Now affixed within this gaze, you sleep snug. Friend to the ethers and comforts' raison d'etre. Both, borders in a universe, whose cause and effect portend as loves' finest vision; a vision of swords into shares, sheaves into rain, rain into your silence... (as an eerie peace ensues.)
Colin Morton
I am a Canadian writer currently spending a year as writer in residence at Concordia College in Minnesota. I have performed poetry in a wide variety of settings, from chamber music group to jazz quartet to animated film. "Names, Faces, Rooms" could be (in fact has been) performed as a poem for two or more voices.
Names, Faces, Rooms
over old snapshots
a girl looking up
or did I invent it, did nobody say it
did you comb your hair, and did I watch
where once in the outskirts, I saw a girl
dressed in my wishes you go naked
you uproot my memory, your name I can't recall
a trick of the mind
I walk all night in the wind
did you comb your hair, and did I watch
tomorrow, yesterday, names, faces
a thought made flesh, the flesh sprouting wings
the room bright with spring,
window spattered with rain, door open to the sea
the looks you give me rain all night
the day ends, the year ends
no one is where I left them
all of them, or none, a pencil point broken off
one glimpse of her eyes
over old snapshots
combing her hair, singing beside me
those two taking their clothes off,
those two kissing, naked before time
furnished rooms, city streets, names like wounds
each night the first night
faces crumbling in memory
looking into each other's eyes
her face is all faces, all her names are one name
looking up through the years
or did I invent it, did nobody say it
did you comb your hair, and did I watch
rooms, stains on the wall
those two taking their clothes off, those two
tomorrow, yesterday, names, faces
rooms adrift between cities, always at sea,
each room at the world's core
each night the first night
where love is a struggle
a thought made flesh, the flesh sprouting wings
the looks you give me rain
a girl leaning over her balcony, out into the rain
one of us said, or neither, did you
or did I invent it, did nobody say it
rooms adrift between cities, silent as waves in mid-ocean, sargasso
each night the first night
the looks you give me
crumbling in memory
her name I forget, all her names
tomorrow, yesterday, names, faces,
rooms
or did I invent it, did nobody say
Benjamin H. Henry
from Jornal: Summer 1995
7/5/95 more realms divulging their properties: layered here: yellow upon black with significance of those variables assigned: y = a preponderance of singularity b = a continual complexification summon primordial elements together in new combinations called technology t = a new binary relationship between environment and that which is of 7/27/95 insofaras simplicity splintered among mixed weeds the branches of leaves mix with circuitry an algo-rhythm reflecting foilage that has fallen -- thank the liquid replenishment constantly moves in shades light from opposite angles associated as natural language of reflection an anger immobile as plastered brick 8/3/95 focus of sense_tivity innocuous as blatant ported, the portal a construction of text instructions to say that "I am alphabetical," creates the butterfly wrinkle where bends supply perspective on no flat surfaces imaginary planes assigned to null understand this language or antiquify once commented instructions become reserved words re-definition is only possible locally try to create an object heirarchy on noticeable lands situated in a geographic advantage in history note the trigonometric fluctuations; render these as social and political; fantasize a culture, an unborn definition/example now disseminate this information formatted as principal, centered in truth your media a recognization [an interpretation] the dream a retrieveing : focus on simple objects I love the treatise with out covert objective; a hidden initiative so discoloured in mis app rov al count en ance ir - re - voc - a - ble in - em - ni - ty. circling the initial interruption cycles of discordance and attempted measure 8 scribble written hologram fornicate in bed the message of a satanic fortune: daisy given in vain she loved the tall man through a handsome portrait a living attempt at eloquence missed in furor over protection -- small artifacts of daily habitation regard nonsense, amplify opportunity constrain with regurgative criticism thy missed wit of sarcastic misunderstanding hold truth in coming climax, the tired allegations, streaming impatience foretold an animosity again shrunk by bestial remains a sacrament if Jesus were walking this day I would follow or maybe on television I would give him a call connect to his server touch his pubic hair the mons of servant am crying for platitude regrets comon extensions in giving relation to wants a necessity is starved in craving another creation the following day, waking, walking out of the front door, looking at the road as every in front of all houses in both directions and a car minimize abandon the infrastructure, mutate or prolong or abstain the frutive nurture cannot monopolize a simplicty inherent in a babbling idiocy so look and blame or shout giggle arrest.