1212 lines
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1212 lines
68 KiB
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From au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu Tue May 7 20:26:38 1996
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Date: Thu, 22 Feb 1996 09:04:07 -0500
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From: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
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To: pauls@etext.org
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Subject: TRee 4a: zines
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TTTTTTTT AA PPPP RRRR OOOO OOOO TTTTTTT
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T A A P P R R O O O O T
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T AAAAAA PPPP RRRR O O O O T
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T A A P R R O O O O T
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T A A P R R OOOO OOOO T
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Issue #4.0, section a: zines 2/94
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TapRoot is a quarterly publication of Independent, Underground,
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and Experimental language-centered arts. Over the past 10 years,
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we have published 40+ collections of poetry, writing, and visio-
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verbal art in a variety of formats. In the August of 1992, we
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began publish TapRoot Reviews, featuring a wide range of "Micro-
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Press" publications, primarily language-oriented. This posting
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is the first section of our 4th full electronic issue, containing
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all of the short ZINE reviews; the second section contains all of
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the chapbook reviews. We provide this information in the hope
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that netters do not limit their reading to E-mail & BBSs.
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Please e-mail your feedback to the editor, Luigi-Bob Drake, at:
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au462@cleveland.freenet.edu
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Requests for e-mail subsctiptions should be sent to the same
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address--they are free, please indicate what you are requesting--
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(a short but human message; this is not an automated listserve).
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I believe it is FTPable from UMich, which also archives back issues.
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A cummulative, searchable, and x-referenced HyperCard version is
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under development--e-mail for status & availablility information.
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Hard-copies of TapRoot Reviews contain additional review
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material--in issue #4: features on E-Zines; "Remixsponse
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Categorryarray" from Sub Rosa Press; John M. Bennett as
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Collaborator; Jack Foley's "Adrift"; Roof Books; Audio
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publications; recent work by Allison Knowles; and the Global Mail
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MailArt Project. TapRoot Reviews intends to survey the boundries
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of "literature", and provide access to work that stretches those
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boundries.It is availablefrom: Burning Press, PO Box 585, Lakewood
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OH 44107--$2.50 pp. Both the print & electronic versions of TapRoot
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are copyright 1994 by Burning Press, Cleveland. Burning Press is a
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non-profit educational corporation. Permission granted to reproduce
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this material FOR NON-COMMERCIAL PURPOSES, provided that this
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introductory notice is included. Burning Press is supported, in
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part, with funds from the Ohio Arts Council.
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Reviewers are identified by their initials at the end of each review:
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Mark Amerika, Michael Basinski, Tom Becket, John M. Bennett, Jake
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Berry, Daniel Davidson, Luigi-Bob Drake, Mark DuCharme, Bob Edwards,
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R. Lee Etzwiler, Mike Gill, Bob Grumman, Joel Lipman, Susan Smith
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Nash, Oberc, Charlotte Pressler, Andrew Russ, Nico Vassilakis, and
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Thomas Willoch. Additional contributors are welcome: drop an e-note
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or send SASE.
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*** Many thanx to all of our contributors. ***
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ZINES:
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6IX--(Vol. 3 #1, 1993), 427 W. Carpenter Lane, Philadelphia, PA,
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19119. $4.00. Edited by a group of six women (hence the
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magazine's name, it would seem), 6IX is a lively collection of
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mainly Language-oriented poetry and writing. There are some
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beautiful texts in this issue by Alice Notley consisting of linked
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phrases each enclosed in quotation marks, a technique that creates
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some amazing effects. Also appealing is the poem "The Waiting
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Room" by Jacqueline Weltman with its ethereal yet earthy
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eroticism, and an manifesto by Susan Smith Nash entitled "Beyond
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the Language Movement [reprinted in this issue of TRR] that seems
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to address the attitudes that underlie this compilation. Includes
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book reviews.--jmb
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ABACUS--(October 1993), 181 Edgemont Ave., Elmwood CT, 06110. 19
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pp., $3.00. Three long poems by Jefferson Hansen that mix day-to-
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day autobiography (about, for instance, a summer job); wordplay
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(e.g., "an intensity of tennis shoes"); reflections on language,
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epistemology, etc.; politics (like what Tonto would have done
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about Saddam)... A bird's cry that can't be borne in words;
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skepticism that "begins by realizing/ boundaries, say, between/
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skin and feathers, language and music."--bg
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ART:MAG--(#16), PO Box 70896, Las Vegas NV, 89170. $3.50.
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Vigorous xeroxed zine with Velociraptor intensity "Poetry Eaten
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Alive by Dinosaurs"--the poems kick-box and claw their way into
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the imagination. The mag man suggests that perhaps the poetry that
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crawls into your bloodstream is always a little edgy: "If
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Shakespeare were alive today he'd be / making tragic pornographic
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soap operas. / He'd be reading at the adult book store / instead
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of major universities." Wild graphics by Holly Banks.--ssn
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ARTCRIMES--(#14, 1993), 2672 West 14th St., Cleveland OH, 44113.
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116 pp., $10.00. An epic assemblage, a box of poemcards, a visual
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and tactile a/maze to get lost in. Loosely organized around a
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Tarot theme, the poets and visual artists here cross each other's
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palms and palimpsests with signs & disfigures, casting fortunes to
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the winds to wind up with treasure, Fool's gold. Energetic and
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inclusive rather than careful, the press of culture collapsed &
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collaged from ancient texts & CocaCola ads, culture plundered
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rather than revered. Under the frantic rubble, there's a range of
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fine poetry (Amy Sparks, John Byrum, Stacey Sollfrey, Ben
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Gulyas...) & graphics (Beth Wolfe, Melissa J. Craig, Valerie
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Marek...), plus plenty that is both, or neither. A few pieces
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seemed out of place, either dispensable or reprinted from previous
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issues, which adds something of a mailart "no rejection" feel.
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Plenty to choose from though, and the card format lets you shuffle
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& edit your own version.--lbd
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AVALON RISING--(May 1993), PO Box 1983, Cincinnati OH, 45201. 16
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pp., $1.00. A small, roughly monthly publication with mostly
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poetry, plus some fiction, comics, brief reviews, and pen pal ads.
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The selection is widely eclectic, with a leaning toward the
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surreal. This issue includes one piece each by M. Dorfman, E.
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Miller, C. Newton, T.M. McDade, E.L. Locher, J.M. Bennett, & S.C.
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Holsted. All poems are given a full page; this, and the small
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number of carefully chosen works, makes each stand out nicely.--
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jmb
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BCCI-KURIL ISLANDS--(#1), 846 Thomas St., State College PA,
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16803. 16 PP., $1.00. Some bits of humor, a few pages of
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reviews, and a curious take-off on another Horrox-affiliated
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publication, "A Rhetorical Apocalypse", entitled "A Rhetorical
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Archeopteryx". Overall, this is a moderately interesting zine,
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though the best part is a page obtained by searching the Penn
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State Library Information Access System for titles beginning with
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the phrase "I was".--ar
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BLANK GUN SILENCER--(#7), 1993, 1240 William St., Racine WI,
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53402. 52 pp., $3.00. BGS is a prime vehicle in the otherstream
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for gritty realistic poetry, with drawings, collages, and a little
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surreality thrown in for good measure. This issue even kicks off
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with that master of grit himself, Charles Bukowski. But he's not
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the only master. Further installments of Steve Richmond's
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"Gagaku", Kurt Nimmo, editor Dan Nielsen's drawings, Lyn Lifshin,
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Lynne Douglas sizzles, and about 50 others. This is a journal
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about what is all too real in our lives, and the art of how to
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live it.--jb
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Editor Dan Nielsen knows how to capture writing with a bite,
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and when you to America. In this issue "The UFO Abduction
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Experience Examined" breaks down that ever-growing experience that
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talk shows have thrived on since Streiber went on tour with his
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shrink. Reviews of fanzines, vital documents, literary and
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poetry publications, pamphlets, and oddities fill this tabloid
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publication. No matter how much you know about the small presses,
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editor Ken Wagner will find something you never would have found
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anywhere else.--ond reprints from what it finds crawling through
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the mailboxes of America. In this issue "The UFO Abduction
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Experience Examined" breaks down that ever-growing experience that
|
|
talk shows have thrived on since Streiber went on tour with his
|
|
shrink. Reviews of fanzines, vital documents, literary and
|
|
poetry publications, pamphlets, and oddities fill this tabloid
|
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publication. No matter how much you know about the small presses,
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editor Ken Wagner will find something you never would have found
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anywhere else.--o
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BOUILLABAISSE--(#2, 1992), 31A Waterloo St., New Hope PA, 18938.
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72 pp., $8.00. An "international literary magazine [of] Beat and
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Post Beat... writings," combining two formerly separate magazines,
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COKEFISH and ALPHA BEAT SOUP. This issue is jampacked full of
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delightful, complex and stimulating works: Joy Walsh, Bukowski,
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Allen Ginsberg, Gerald Locklin, Robert Weir, Judson Crews, and
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Robert Howington are just a few of the large number of authors
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represented. Fine poets of today and yesterday barnstorm
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unalloyed truth-telling and yea' saying in a neo-beat tradition of
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unexcelled richness--complex, bold, and often warped. "Today I
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saw the end of the world in a friendly wave." Paul Beston chants.
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"...a Guthrie with Grammar skills. Traversing the U.S./ Drink and
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puke. Drink and puke." D.P. Funkhouser relates in alive poetic
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leaps. And, we can't forget the artwork by Dan Nielsen and
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Belinda Subraman. BOUILLABAISSE is creative emancipation, broad
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and angry, vivid and bleeding, shadowed by a previous generations
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greatness of aesthetic preference, by choice, echoing Jack and
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Neil, giving us Buk and Allen.--rrle
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CHIRON REVIEW--(Vol. XII #3, Autumn 1993), Rt. 2 Box 111, St. John
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KS, 67576. 32 pp., $3.00. I love this magazine for many reasons,
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not least because it was one of the first to recognize Lorri
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Jackson's work (she was a Chicago poet who died of a heroin OD in
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1991). Editor Michael Hathaway, who rarely drinks, has that
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drinkers edge that gives him the balls to take chances. In this
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issue are interviews with Mark Weber and Belinda Subraman--both
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known for their underground publishing ventures as well as their
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writing. I was caught off guard by some new poems from Padi
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Harmon, who used to publish CALLIOPES CORNER and from whom I
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hadn't heard in years. Charles Webb's "To Beat the Shit Out of
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Someone" had one of the best fight sequences I have seen yet in a
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poem: "He punches, you block/ hard enough to crack his forearm/
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and make pain leap in his eyes/ your right splatters his nose/
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like a bug on a windshield." A review of Blacks by Gwendolyn
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Brooks, photographs of many of the poets, and a new Tony Moffeit
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poem are just the tips of this iceberg.--o
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COMPOST NEWSLETTER--(Fall 1992), 729 Fifth Ave., San Francisco CA,
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94118. 24 pp., $2.50. Mostly well-crafted conventional short
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stories such as "I Wanted To Kill My Boss But His Brother Beat Me
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To It" (by Danielle Wills), which starts: "Artie follows me around
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the dressing room at a safe distance of at least five feet because
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he's afraid I'm going to lay into him with my shoe again and he
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wants to know if I'd be willing to piss on his face because if he
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doesn't get his face pissed on at least twice a day he gets
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terrible acne."--bg
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CRASH NETWORK NEWSLETTER--(July 1993), 519 Castro St. #7, San
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Francisco, CA, 94114. 16 pp., $1.00. This issue is devoted to
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bicycling, not only as a hobby but as a key to 21st-Century
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Transportation. Much data about bike clubs, where to buy bikes
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cheaply (police auctions), and the superiority of bicycles to cars
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(for one thing, you can park 14 of them in a parking space
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designed for a single car). Satire, fiction, cartoons and
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drawings, too--not to mention information on their network, set up
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to help travelers find places to crash.--bg
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DADA TENNIS--(#4, Summer 1993), PO Box 10, Woodhaven NY, 11421.
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22 pp. This is an exhilarating and visually appealing issue of
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the most unabashedly dada-oriented magazine around, including work
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that is both playful and dangerously edgy. This issue includes
|
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work by Kostelanetz, Gerald England, Jake Berry, Michael Basinski,
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Malok, Paulauskas, Ficus Strangulensis, Weinman, DeWitt, Pat
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Conte, James Chapman, J.M. Bennett, and a lively disjunctive piece
|
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by Alexis Bhagat. One of the high points is a long (9 page) prose
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collaboration by eleven different people, written via the
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DreamWorld experimental/dada computer BBS, that makes for some
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fine disorienting reading.--jmb
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DADA TENNIS--(#5, Fall 1993),PO Box 10, Woodhaven NY, 11421. 52
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pp. An epic in invented language, with a phonetic centering/motif
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in the title "ZIFF." Although "a project of DreamWorld BBS," it
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seems to be the solo work of editor Bill Paulauskas. This falls
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squarely in the tradition (?? or shadow?) of Hugo Ball's Dada
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sound poetry and Kurt Schwitters' Ursonata: "Huzi ZIFF ziinentif
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ezi ZIFF oziezie ZIFF ZIFF ZIFF/ zizicant if/ ZIFF ZIFF o// Hif
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zinif// Zietniw tziest."--lbd
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DIE YOUNG--(#6, summer 1993), English Dept., University of
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Southwestern Louisiana, Lafayette LA, 70504. 48 pp., $3.00.
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There is quite a variety of excellent forward-looking poetry here,
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including some unusual pieces by Howard McCord, Judson Crews, and
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Robert Peters, and two translations from Plautus by Fred Chappell.
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Among the other high points in this issue are poems by Vincent
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Ferrari, Michael Basinski, and some amazingly lively word-play
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texts, written in the 1920s by Else von Freytag-Loringhoven, that
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seem decades ahead of their time: "Weak-Rundown Man Like/ The
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Growing-Miss As Well--/ Getting On And Off Unlawful/ With Jelly-
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Jam-Or Meyer's/ Soapnoodles--/ The Rubberset Kind Abounds--".--jmb
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DRIVER'S SIDE AIRBAG--(#9, November 1993), PO Box 25760, Los
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Angeles CA, 90025. 24 pp., $1.90. Sometimes I watch a magazine
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slowly evolve and come into sharper focus, and DSA is heading in a
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great direction. Mike's getting the hang of things, and with and
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excellent Vietnam story by Kurt Nimmo, and a murder/suicide story
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by Robert W. Howington, you know you're going to be disturbed.
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Mike's poem "The Floppiest of Hats, the Juiciest of Tears" also
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captures that postpunk-lit edge. Add into the mix some comix,
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kickass graphics, and reviews, and you got the recipe for a
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magazine on the move.--o
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DROP FORGE--(#2), PO Box 7237, Reno NV, 89510. $2.50. A good
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selection of experimental work. Prose, poetry, drawing, and
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collage. Sean Winchester has done an excellent job bringing it
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all together and with an editorial section is developing a voice,
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a focus--otherworldly and surreal. Even the ads function as art as
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much as they promote any product. The visuals range from slightly
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erotic to anomalous chaotic; the writing from dream-like to
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abstract free associative. This is an example how a few bucks can
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create an attractive mag that stimulates the imagination to free
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itself from the bondage of ordinary media.--jb
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DUMARS REVIEWS--(Fall 1993, final issue), PO Box 83, Manhattan
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Beach CA, 90266. 36 pp., $4.00. The usual lively reviews of
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horror and sci-fi zines, books, movies, etc... but also of small-
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and micro-press publications (such as Robert Peters' book, Love
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Poems for Robert Mitchum). But funnest are the reports on the
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still-clinging-to-male-centeredness World Horror Convention, and
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Confrancisco (World Science Fiction Convention)--includes
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photographs.--bg
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DUSTY DOG REVIEWS--(#10/11, 1993), 1904-A Gladden, Gallup, NM,
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87301. 52 pp., $2.00. Another heapin' helpin' of poetry chapbook
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reviews, covering the independent literary press. Just shy of 100
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items covered, most given several paragraphs and liberal
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quotation. Editor John Pierce seems to have a more singular view
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of what poetry is (or is not) than we do here at TRR; yet he
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generally manages to write descriptively about a range of styles.
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His own writing style can get a little, uh... well, like this:
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"Chief among the principal reasons for the preponderance of silly
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artificial devices in contemporary poetry, is that such
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meretricious gimmickry hides crappy abilities from common
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peepers."--lbd
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EL-E-PHANT--(August 1993), 6026 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles CA,
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90036. 20 pp., $5.00. A slim set of essays and reviews, covering
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mostly the higher-profile side of Language poetry, as well as some
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theater (where is drama in the micropress world?), work-in-
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translation, and a recording review of Schwitter's "Ursonate."
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Could be the house organ of publisher Sun & Moon (same address,
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several of their books are featured); and while the quality is
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there, probably needs more bulk to be worth the bucks.--lbd
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EXILE--(Vol. 1 #4, Fall 1993), 149 Virginia St. #7, St. Paul MN,
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55102. 8 pp., free fr postage=52". A feisty rag, aimed at a Twin
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Cities audience (but useful abroad), bringing "Reviews * Essays *
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Information" to interested North Country readers. Feeling, it
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seems, that important threads in the contemporary poetry world
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aren't given their due locally, EXILE tries to bring some Culture
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to the uninitiated. Specific foci include Language poetry and
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sound/performance work. The regular column "New & Neglected"
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features reviews of Bob Perleman's "Virtual Reality" and
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Silliman's "Toner;" a survey of the remainder bins in local
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bookstores turn up recent releases from Ron Padgett and Harryette
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Mullen (nice remainder bins!). Past issues have had extensive
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information on recordings, as well as reading reviews. A personal
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fave in this issue is the cover story on the APA ("Aggressive
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Poetic Acts") Movement--suggested actions include: "'Poetry, She
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Wrote': In Mystery section of Bookstore, surreptitiously remove
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last page from copy of popular whodunit. Replace with page of
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Language poetry", and "'For the Record': Commit capital crime.
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After sentencing, when judge asks if you'd like to make a
|
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statement, read 'Projective Verse'."--lbd
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EXPERIODDICIST--(September 1993), PO Box 3112, Florence AL, 35630.
|
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4 pp. This issue, devoted entirely to the work of Jack Foley, is
|
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an ideal short introduction to what Foley is all about. It
|
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contains a fine short defense of performance poetry; some
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insightful commentary on the work of the collage artist Jess (and
|
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on art-in-general); and a variety of strong poems, one of which I
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quote in full: "Across the heart sickles of sharp-edged
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pain// only sleep/ dissolved in thunder)."--bg
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FAT FREE--(September 1993), PO Box 80743, Athens GA, 30608. 16
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pp., $1.00. Very accessible poetry, illumagery and satire--with a
|
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few political outbursts, all from the left. A piece by Sparrow
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called "Mr. Adams" sums up its tone: "Only Mrs. Adams gives a
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shit/ about Mr. Adams."--bg
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FEH!--(#15), 147 Second Ave. #603, New York NY, 10003. $2.00.
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Morgana Malatesta has taken over as editor, but very little of
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that old FEH! stench has vanished in the process. For which we can
|
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all be eternally grateful and fearful. If you've never tasted the
|
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supreme poison this mag has to offer you should understand the
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poetry here specializes in offense and insult, but it's much more
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than cheap shots. These sewers run with divine refuge, the feces
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of true heresy to the textual posturing of "serious" poetry.
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Resulting in genuinely brilliant perversion and generous
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laughter.--jb
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FIRST INTENSITY--(Vol. 1 #1, Summer 93), PO Box 140713, Staten
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Island NY, 10314. $9.00. A premiere issue which contains
|
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fascinating breadth, from a sublime (in the Longinus or Edmund
|
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Burke sense) letter from Lord Byron which depicts the execution by
|
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guillotine of three robbers. The Romantic desire to evince a
|
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strong reaction in the reader is certainly evident here.
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Introduced with a quote by Michel Foucault, Edward Foster's "From
|
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the East" confronts how visceral longing either splits the self or
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|
forces it into a coherent image. Other strong offerings by
|
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Stephen Ellis, Robert Kelly, Deborah Salazar, Chris Stroffolino,
|
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Sally Detlor, many others. Excellent graphics.--ssn
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FLAMING ENVELOPES--(September 1993), PO Box 470186, Fort Worth TX,
|
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76147. 8 pp., $1.00(?). Entertainingly raspy editor (Robert W.
|
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Howington) who considers WORMWOOD REVIEW and THE NEW YORK
|
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QUARTERLY the "best lit mags going" and Charles Bukowski "the
|
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greatest poet on earth." Crackling poems and illumagery by people
|
|
like Lyn Lifshin and Gerald Locklin. I was particularly taken
|
|
with C. Ra McGuirt's "statutory verse," which was about "a busload
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of/ cute little/ baptist/ girls (who)... made me want/ to do
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something/ desperate...// I guess//this (poem) is/ it."--bg
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FURNITURES: THE MAGAZINE OF NORTH AMERICAN IDEOPHONICS--(#11, June
|
|
1993), 227 Montrose Place Apt C, St. Paul MN, 55104. 16 pp.,
|
|
Taking it's name from Erik Satie's "furniture music," this
|
|
photocopied & stapled journal addresses an interstice somewhere
|
|
between music & literature. The music side finds allies in
|
|
serious experimental composers such as James Tenney, Neil Rolnick,
|
|
George Crumb--working from and through the modernist "serious
|
|
music" tradition but still largely outside the "canon" (many of
|
|
these composer's works are (only) available through the composer's
|
|
collective Frog Peak Music--Box 5036, Hanover NH 03755--which also
|
|
distributes FURNITURES). The literary side leans towards work
|
|
with a "sense of cosmos"--seems like they would be friendly to
|
|
Rothenberg's "Ethnopoetics," and to various oral traditions.
|
|
Points of contact include new music scores as/related to visual
|
|
poetry, and meditative explorations of geography & terrain as oral
|
|
histories &/or soundscapes. Includes reviews of recordings,
|
|
scores, short essays, and about a dozen poems.--lbd
|
|
|
|
GOD'S BAR: UN*PLUGGED--(Vol. 1 #1, September 1993), 112 Dover
|
|
Parkway, Stewart Manor NY, 11530. 36 pp., $1.00. This quarterly
|
|
is described as "a literary magazine by and for disenfranchised
|
|
computer bulletin board poets." A collection of lyrical free
|
|
verse which rumbles with a sonorous voice, and a single short
|
|
prose piece which adds a cold-snap ending. Appears to lead
|
|
towards subjective images which give a sense of non-being.
|
|
"Sunset forever,/ a gesture for world peace:/ An endless sea of
|
|
daffodils." But this indirect enthusiasm forces the concrete
|
|
metaphors to stand out like a bas-relief. "The potato farmer
|
|
smiles/ slightly, flashing rotting teeth/ &..." Clean, curious,
|
|
and inventive.--rrle
|
|
|
|
GROUND ZERO--(Vol. 1 #3, April 1993), PO Box 7232, Auburn CA,
|
|
95604. 16 pp., $1.00. Subtitled "a magazine for the aspiring
|
|
writer," this one centers on short stories and poems, wedged
|
|
between normal ads. Although this issue is rather thin and the
|
|
print is large, all pieces have a refined flavor and a contented
|
|
tone prevails. There is no darkness and horror, only brightness
|
|
and hope. Forget about riveting cadences and float: "The wings
|
|
of my soul are/ spreading wider/ reaching higher/ than the prayer
|
|
of a sinless child."--rrle
|
|
|
|
HAMMERS--(#7, 1993), 1718 Sherman Ave. #203, Evanston IL, 60201.
|
|
78 pp., $5.00. Finding a common denominator to describe a
|
|
magazine containing work by fifty different poets can be a risky
|
|
proposition, but not so with HAMMERS. Editor Nat David sticks to
|
|
a vision. Quotations on the first page back cover by ee cummings,
|
|
F. D. Roosevelt and Emily Dickinson set a tone of respect for self
|
|
expression, the written word, and books in general. David wants
|
|
poetry to wield social power (and so it's fitting that his
|
|
magazine is named for a tool), the poetry reflects this with
|
|
socio-political commentary manifest in experience rather than
|
|
stated overtly. In one poem, a father talks to a son about
|
|
killing animals for trinkets and trophies; in another, a child
|
|
runs to obliviate the turmoil he knows is at home; another poem
|
|
describes sex with a condom. No shortage of relevance here.--mg
|
|
|
|
HYPHEN--(#7), PO Box 516, Somonauk IL, 60552. 72 pp., $3.25.
|
|
When I first moved to Chicago, one of the magazines that stood out
|
|
among the hundred or so local publications was HYPHEN--these
|
|
people seemed to have a direction, a focus, and some of the best
|
|
artists and writers in the city. In this issue, Margaret Lewis'
|
|
story "Little Marks" captures a bar pickup scenario in Tangiers
|
|
from a woman's point of view; Tito Salomoni's paintings create
|
|
surrealistic scenes that would have made Dali jealous; and a
|
|
collage by Michele Gambetta (combining a real squirrel's lower
|
|
body with the head half of a fish) made the beer dance
|
|
uncomfortably in my stomach. And that's just the first half of
|
|
the issue. There's an incredible amount of creativity here for
|
|
the money.--o
|
|
|
|
IN YOUR FACE!--(#7, 1993), PO Box 6872 Yorkville Station, New York
|
|
NY, 10128. 36 pp., $3.00. Editor Gina Grega lives up to the
|
|
title of this publication by trying very hard to be
|
|
confrontational, featuring poetry, reviews, rants and risque
|
|
artwork. Overall bold in context, uncensored, often contradictory
|
|
in its motif. It sometimes struggles too hard to be bizarre, and
|
|
is at once PC and off-the-rack radical. This issue contains work
|
|
by Ohio's own Cheryl Townsend, as well as Dan Nielsen, and others.
|
|
Lyn Lifshin tells of smuggling, "the child is slit/ emptied out
|
|
like a trout/ or a hen stuffed taut/ and plump with small/ bags of
|
|
heroin" This publication is specifically for the loud and alone.
|
|
--rrle
|
|
|
|
KIOSK--(#6, Spring 1993), SUNY Buffalo, Dept. of English, 306
|
|
Clemens Hall, Buffalo NY, 14260. 135 pp., free for SASE. This
|
|
special issue is called "Interstates," because the editors have
|
|
tried to assemble "writings that play with conventional genre
|
|
lines, create a dialogue with past literary works or traditions,
|
|
and otherwise experiment with language and reader expectation."
|
|
There's some good poetry here by A.M. Allcott, Michael Basinski,
|
|
Jeff Hansen, Mark Wallace, and others, as well as some weird near-
|
|
fiction by the likes of Piotr Parlej & Robert Rebein. Strong ties
|
|
to Buffalo's postindustrial literary scene. An upcoming issue is
|
|
to deal with "Rust Belt Writing."--be
|
|
|
|
LAUGHING HORSE BROADSIDES--PO Box 2328, Norman OK, 73070. Amusing
|
|
clip-art configurations provide graphic accompaniment to poems by
|
|
a broad spectrum of contributors. Rochelle Owens' section from
|
|
Luca captures the sinuous, braided structures of the larger work.
|
|
Elizabeth Robinson's "Train Ride" continues her probe into the
|
|
anatomy of tropes, of language's structures. Elizabeth Sargent's
|
|
"911--Saturday Afternoon 1:13 p.m." keys off an actual event--the
|
|
1993 mass murder of five teen-aged black women in Oklahoma City.
|
|
The highly-charged poem is written in the persona of a mother of
|
|
one of them.--ssn
|
|
|
|
LETTERBOX--(#2, August 1993), 3791 Latimer Pl., Oakland CA, 94609.
|
|
52 pp., $4.50. A beautifully produced magazine featuring some
|
|
excellent innovative poetry, some by writers not seen before by
|
|
this reviewer. Especially exciting is a series of image/text
|
|
combinations created as postcards by Jennifer Cooper and Jose
|
|
Roberto Frota. There is also some lovely work by Beth Anderson
|
|
and Jennifer Moxley that, in different ways, combine a "Language"
|
|
sensibility with authentically felt imagistic and narrative
|
|
devices. The twelve contributors to this issue show a variety of
|
|
effective adaptations of current avant-garde tendencies.--jmb
|
|
|
|
LIFT--(#13, September 1993), 10 Oxford St., rear, Somerville MA,
|
|
02142. $5.00. A three poet chapbook issue. Edward Barrett's
|
|
"The Leaves Are Something This Year" connects experience with
|
|
language play. Lori Lubeski's "Obedient, A body" explores the
|
|
fragmentation of self and examines "prints of other carried bodies
|
|
dragged through sand." Gian Lombardo's "Before Arguable Answers"
|
|
contributes sly flashes and moments--"Pass the Salt, Schrodinger"
|
|
is delightfully playful, which rounds out the issue very well.
|
|
--ssn
|
|
|
|
LILLIPUT REVIEW--(#49), 207 S. Millvale Ave. #3, Pittsburgh PA,
|
|
15224. 16 pp., $1.00. The second All-Women issue, with many of
|
|
the usual suspects (Cheryl Townsend, Gina Bergamino, Sheila E.
|
|
Murphy, Stacy Sollfry). Writing poetry & being a poet is a
|
|
recurring topic. As usual, only one poem over a dozen lines--this
|
|
time, Lyn Lifshin's "Dried Roses"--and, as is often the case, this
|
|
longer feature is among the strongest of the bunch. Makes you
|
|
wish the editor would try his hand at a mag without the severe
|
|
length restrictions.--lbd
|
|
|
|
LILLIPUT REVIEW--(#50), 207 S. Millvale Ave. #3, Pittsburgh PA,
|
|
15224. 16 pp., $1.00. "Editor's Choice--Best of Issues #1-49."
|
|
That about sums it up--the cream of the crop from a fine zine that
|
|
specializes in tiny (8 words to about that many lines) poetry.
|
|
The impact is not tiny, however, as each of these miniatures
|
|
merits close inspection & rereading. In the process, you get an
|
|
even more precise fix on the editor's tastes: human, plainspoken
|
|
but precise, honest emotions from the whole range of human
|
|
experience. Also a sense of humor, as in Lyn Lifshin's "Yawn
|
|
Series of Younger Poets": "annual politician of/ a first book of/
|
|
plums by ailing/ writer under 40./ Marmosets may be/ sublimated
|
|
only/ during February/ and must be/ accompanied by/ a stamp, self/
|
|
addressed moose." Perhaps for the 100th anniversary we'll get a
|
|
full-scale retrospective anthology.--lbd
|
|
|
|
LILLIPUT REVIEW--(#51), 207 S. Millvale Ave. #3, Pittsburgh PA,
|
|
15224. 16 pp., $1.00. Editor Don Wentworth knows that great
|
|
things come in small packages, and he's proven it time and time
|
|
again in LILLIPUT REVIEW. In this issue, Steve Doering's "Mowing
|
|
the Grassy Knoll" grabs you with "Last night I came home to/ find
|
|
that some goof had/ monopolized my answering/ machine with a
|
|
brain-/ chilling chant:/ 'A marriage license is/ not a
|
|
warranty.'"; and Bill Shields' "dead poem #9" captures death in a
|
|
strange forensic frenzy. The poems are sometimes gentle,
|
|
sometimes hard, but they're always awfully good.--o
|
|
|
|
LILLIPUT REVIEW--(#52), 207 S. Millvale Ave. #3, Pittsburgh PA,
|
|
15224. 16 pp., $1.00. I really like the way Wentworh mixes the
|
|
graphics with the poetry in this issue, an excellent fulfillment
|
|
of the senses. Besides artwork by Vogn, Guy Beining, and Harland
|
|
Ristau, you get Cheryl Townsend's "Autumn," which walks through a
|
|
natural pagan joy of the season. Anthony Lucero captures
|
|
strangers in the apartment below with: "the man downstairs/ is
|
|
singing/ he is singing/ to the other man/ i don't know/ which is/
|
|
which/ one of them is/ an architect/ the other is/ a writer/
|
|
neither of them/ are singers." Toss in a few by John Bennett, Lyn
|
|
Lifshin, and Arthur Winfield Knight, and you got another great
|
|
collection.--o
|
|
|
|
LIME GREEN NEWS--(#5), PO Box 626, Green Mt. Falls CO, 80819. To
|
|
get a copy of LGN you send "artwork or writings... or something in
|
|
trade." Classic mailart--doing what mailart was intended to do--
|
|
serve as a medium for creative exchange. The bulk of this issue
|
|
consists of letters to editor Carolyn Substitute and her response.
|
|
And the responses are not just tossed off, they're complete
|
|
letters. Strewn throughout all the verbiage, various artwork
|
|
keeps it interesting to look at as well. Photos, collage, and a
|
|
drawing of Carolyn crucified, with detailed explanation. There's
|
|
a Nikita Khruschev comic, which I enjoyed because it was crude and
|
|
scatological. LGN is sincere, joyously sloppy, and a delight to
|
|
read/see.--jb
|
|
|
|
THE LOST PERUKE--(July 1993), PO Box 1525, Highland Park NY,
|
|
08904. 24 pp., $1.50. On the front cover of this issue is a
|
|
photograph of what looks to me to be a South Sea Islander. It is
|
|
labeled, "A Mayan is a Terrible Thing to Waste." The articles
|
|
within have similar kinds of fun with Dan Quayle (!) and some 40
|
|
dead rock stars (including Paul McCartney?). Amusing stuff, but
|
|
not what I'd call super-inspired.--bg
|
|
|
|
MEAT EPOCH--(#16, Summer 1993), 3055 Decatur Ave. #2D, Bronx NY,
|
|
10467. 5 pp., SASE. Definitely otherstream material here: an
|
|
oddball cartoony drawing of a whale nudging a boat that is partly
|
|
constructed of the syllables, "aft" and "en" (two forms of "end"?--
|
|
that form a pun on "often") by G. Huth; an amusing essay by
|
|
Sparrow on a cult whose members eat nothing but money; a
|
|
combination of text and collage (featuring JFK) by Thomas Lowe
|
|
Taylor that wonderfully evokes dissolution--of history, of
|
|
personality, of matter; and three poems.--bg
|
|
|
|
MEAT EPOCH--(Special Review Issue #1, Summer 1993), 3055 Decatur
|
|
Ave. #2D, Bronx NY, 10467. 2 pp., SASE. Review by Gregory St.
|
|
Thomasino of Daniel Davidson's Weather. Good short discussion
|
|
that helpfully include three samples of Davidson's poems, one of
|
|
which quite impressed me (because so anti-impressive?): "to be
|
|
specific/ I have forgotten my/ (umbrella)."--bg
|
|
|
|
MISSIONARY STEW--(Vol. 1, #2, 1993), 100 Courtland Dr., Columbia
|
|
SC, 29223. 8 pp., $.50(?). Sweet & to the surrealist point, 6
|
|
short texts on half a sheet of paper. F'rinstance, EYE MOCK, by
|
|
Greg Evason: "in the earlier elbows/ of her face/ there were
|
|
Chinese dolls/ sliding down webbed banisters/ & talking into dark
|
|
blue walls/ of someone's artless drippings."--lbd
|
|
|
|
MISSIONARY STEW--(Vol. 1, #3&4, 1993), 100 Courtland Dr., Columbia
|
|
SC, 29223. 8 pp., $1.00(?). A cleverly origamied single sheet,
|
|
featuring eight pieces by as many artists (about as "well known"
|
|
as you get in some circles: John M. Bennett, Al Ackerman, Greg
|
|
Evason, Cheryl Townsend...). About even between visual and verbal
|
|
work, with a political slant and an experimental bent.--lbd
|
|
The material in this weird little ma little different because of the computer layout, including some strange, funny clip art.
|
|
But the poetry is just as strong, generally on the experimental
|
|
side, but some very literal too. Things seem to lurk beneath the
|
|
facade in these pieces, making you want to dig deeper, ask
|
|
questions of yourself as you inquire of the poem. Perhaps it is
|
|
best summed by Malok's inkblot glyph "God's Entropy". MISSIONARY
|
|
STEW will continue to expand and invent, changing physical form as
|
|
it goes.--jbexperimental side, but some very literal too. Things
|
|
seem to lurk beneath the facade in these pieces, making you want
|
|
to dig deeper, ask questions of yourself as you inquire of the
|
|
poem. Perhaps it is best summed by Malok's inkblot glyph "God's
|
|
Entropy". MISSIONARY STEW will continue to expand and invent,
|
|
changing physical form as it goes.--jb
|
|
|
|
MOTORBOOTY--(Fall, 1992), PO Box 7944, Ann Arbor MI, 48107. 64
|
|
pp., $3.00. Zine personality but mainstream production values and
|
|
cultural interests (e.g. Camille Paglia). Lots of satire that
|
|
occasionally goes sophomoric, but also solid pieces of straight
|
|
reporting on such topics as the Firesign Theatre and Bozo the
|
|
Clown--as both person and trademark. Fun selection of down-and-
|
|
dirty comic strips, too.--bg
|
|
|
|
MR. COGITO--(Vol. 10, #3, 1993), PO Box 66124, Portland OR, 97266.
|
|
32 pp., $3.00. A timely collection, entirely devoted to Eastern
|
|
European writing (Serbian, Russian, Polish, Lithuanian, Hungarian,
|
|
Ukrainian, Slovak) which MR. COGITO has featured in smaller doses
|
|
for a number of years. As might be expected, the themes are
|
|
heavily influenced by politics & history; the poetry itself is
|
|
lyrical, impassioned, and often pessimistic. Marcelijus
|
|
Martinaitis, one of Lithuania's leading poets, weighs in with a
|
|
number of his "Ballads of Kukutis," about a mythical folk hero
|
|
emblematic of ethnic identity; [the next issue of MR. COGITO is
|
|
completely devoted to more of Martinaits' work; see review in
|
|
Chapbook section]. Echo's of Milorad Pavic's myth/epic _Dictionary
|
|
of the Khazars_ seem unavoidable, since many Western readers will
|
|
have few other points of reference; other work herein helps
|
|
balance the picture, presenting the whole range of human
|
|
concerns.--lbd
|
|
|
|
NASHVILLE'S POETRY NEWSLETTER--(#16), 1016 Kipling Dr., Nashville
|
|
TN, 37217. SASE. As the name implies this zine covers the poetry
|
|
scene in Nashville., seemingly quite active. The Newsletter
|
|
covers events, open mikes, as well as special shows and festivals.
|
|
There's plenty of poetry here as well, including further
|
|
installments of Joe Speer's "work in progress" which is titled by
|
|
the page number. The subjects change from paragraph to paragraph,
|
|
but they're all somehow related--political, historical, personal
|
|
anecdote--the stuff of life and poetry.--jb
|
|
|
|
ORBIS--(Summer/Autumn 1993), c/o Mike Shields, 199, The Long
|
|
Shoot, Warwickshire, ENGLAND, CV11 6JQ. $7.50. ORBIS reflect its
|
|
editor's devotion to a conventional sort of poetry with little
|
|
sense of adventure. Editor Mike Shields' poetic sense is perhaps
|
|
summed up in his editorial "Remaking the Language," where he
|
|
wonders about the "typographical peculiarities" he sees in so many
|
|
poems and asks "Why do poets who cleave to such oddities also
|
|
abandon standard punctuation?" Despite its editor's middle of the
|
|
road approach to poetry, ORBIS is very readable. Scads of poetry
|
|
book reviews, magazine reviews, and general poetry scene news
|
|
(mostly British) give it a comfortable, among friends feeling.--tw
|
|
|
|
OXYGEN--(#9, 1993), 535 Geary St. #1010, San Francisco CA, 94102.
|
|
34 pp., $2.00. This is an interesting publication with a
|
|
consistent personality. The poetry is filled with imagery,
|
|
emotions, and a few prose poems that carry a story line where it
|
|
should go. Mel C. Thompson's "The High-Wire Kid" reminded me of
|
|
my childhood daredevil days: "My dad just laughed at the police/
|
|
when they explained how I'd climbed/ over 150 feet in the air on
|
|
the massive steel frame/ that brought electricity to thousands of
|
|
homes." And Kennon Webber's "What Price Poetry?" left me worried
|
|
about the days ahead: "Behind on your rent/ The four-fifty an hour
|
|
job/ when you're forty years old/ ...Sleepless nights in smoky,/
|
|
crowded cafes/ Waiting for your name to be called/ on the open-
|
|
mike sign-up sheet." Contributors include academics, construction
|
|
workers, housewives... all of them writing powerful lines that hit
|
|
the mind like gas fumes making love to a match.--o
|
|
|
|
PACIFIC COAST JOURNAL--(Vol. 1 #4, Spring 1993), PO Box 355,
|
|
Campbell CA, 95009. 52 pp., $2.50. Subtitled "Talking
|
|
Soapboxes," contains two prose pieces, an essay, an interview, and
|
|
eighteen poems. Multi-cultural, intellectual but not obtuse, and
|
|
casually feminist. There is an essay which compares Black English
|
|
and Standard English within American Universities. A prose piece
|
|
delves into the friendship of two preadolescent youths, one a
|
|
recent immigrant. Another short story leads us from L.A. to
|
|
Mexico, to Canada in a pre-NAFTA meta-critique of trade and
|
|
existence in a multinational sphere. Even the poetry evokes
|
|
balanced assertions: "i cried out 'i will follow you then.'/
|
|
they looked with disgust/ and told me i was just a white male."
|
|
Included is the "First Annual Amnesty International Poetry
|
|
Contest" winner "There's A Nigger in tha' Neighborhood" by Shirley
|
|
Ward: "Black niggers, red niggers, yellow niggers, brown niggers,
|
|
an'/ po' ass white niggers.../ Niggers inside my own race/ who
|
|
can't quite keep up the socio-economic pace." Chronically angry,
|
|
not soon be forgotten.--rrle
|
|
|
|
PARADOX--(#3, July 1993), PO Box 643, Saranac Lake NY, 12983.
|
|
$2.50. Because this issue contains not only text, but also an
|
|
audio tape it comes packaged in a two pocket loose-leaf notebook
|
|
insert. The text is narrative poetry and prose poetry for the
|
|
most part, with line drawings derived apparently from Pacific
|
|
island mythology by Chitra Ganesh. The writing is interesting and
|
|
moves well from piece to piece. Bill Shields contributes several
|
|
brutally honest pieces inspired partially by Vietnam, and other
|
|
afflictions--his work remains vital because he manages to
|
|
cultivate a gallows humor and find life, however bleak, among the
|
|
ruins. Susan Nash Smith's piece "from a paleontologist's
|
|
notebook" is wonderful, a sea of images and ideas rich with
|
|
possibility. The audio tape is noise and voice pieces, some of it
|
|
quite strong--all of it certain to fill a room with bizarre
|
|
atmosphere. At a decent volume you might even require an
|
|
exorcist.--jb
|
|
|
|
PEARL--(#19, Fall/Winter 1993), 3030 E. Second St., Long Beach CA,
|
|
90803. 96 pp., $6.00. Work by Judson Crews, Gerald Locklin, Todd
|
|
Moore, Paul Weinman, Charles Bukowski, et al.... as well as a
|
|
chapbook by Mark Weber entitled _The Bones of an Ancient Thesaurus_.
|
|
Standouts include work by the aforementioned Locklin, Weber, and
|
|
Bukowski, as well as Kathleen Zeisler Goldman's "The Right Way To
|
|
Be A Woman": "She smiles/ through the damnedest things./ Things
|
|
like disease, divorce, miscarriage,/ rape, beatings, her own
|
|
death/ and the deaths of her children." This is a damn good
|
|
publication, worth every cent; filled with little poems by big
|
|
names, and big poems by little names, seducing each other as they
|
|
sit back-to-back on the page.--o
|
|
|
|
PHOBIA--(#8, 1993), PO Box 23194, Seattle WA, 98102. 48 pp.,
|
|
#4.00. After an extended Art Strike (& a move to Seattle), Ezra
|
|
Mark returns, further along in both vision and practice. Neo-
|
|
Situationist tactics like detournement and plagiarism (even a
|
|
reprint of a 1961 Guy Debord essay) are much in evidence, as are
|
|
various modes of effacement and erasement. Unlike some Situ
|
|
stuff, the politics inform rather than obscure the aesthetic.
|
|
The palimpsest, trace on top of obscured cultural trace, is the
|
|
metaphor this calls up, and maybe the ghost of the other Ezra.--lbd
|
|
|
|
PLASTIC TOWER--(#16, September 1993), Box 702, Bowie, MD, 20718.
|
|
44 pp., $2.50. Normally I back off from publications with pink
|
|
covers, but the cover illustration of a man digging a grave
|
|
grabbed my curiosity. These are more traditional poems that carry
|
|
an academic residue from writing workshops--while I saw an
|
|
occasional poem that caught my fancy, I didn't find that straight-
|
|
forward brutal reality attack that I usually thrive on. These are
|
|
not poems from the street, they are from thinkers, and somehow
|
|
instinctual responses carry a stronger reality (for me) than
|
|
philosophy.--o
|
|
|
|
POETIC BRIEFS--(Spring 1993), 19 Southern Blvd., Albany NY, 12209.
|
|
16 pp., $8/6 issues. "The Interview Issue," featuring (naturally
|
|
enough) interviews with: Dennis Tedlock, Masani Alexis de Veaux,
|
|
Robert Creeley, Eric Mottram, Ge(of) Huth, Charles Bernstein, &
|
|
Rosmarie Waldrop. Not particularly informal, these are mostly
|
|
concerned with background comments on recent work by the
|
|
interviewees, though Creeley's is more taken with visual artists &
|
|
reminisce on various Black Mountain personalities. In keeping
|
|
with the general preoccupations of this magazine, the technical
|
|
process of interviewing (transcription, excerpting) is given some
|
|
direct attention, most noticeably in the Dennis Tedlock interview
|
|
where some of the editorial technique is rendered graphically. We
|
|
always knew, when reading interviews, that those folks didn't just
|
|
sit down & actually talk like that--Bernstein went so far as to
|
|
re-write most of his interview afterwards, ensuring that we "get"
|
|
what he thought he meant to say... but what else was lost?--lbd
|
|
|
|
POETIC BRIEFS--(#13, October/November 1993), 19 Southern Blvd.,
|
|
Albany NY, 12209. 16 pp., $1.50. Mark Wallace's "L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E
|
|
poetry bashing" gets at the heart of issues needling poets who
|
|
don't like to be thrown into one large critical filing cabinet
|
|
called "Language Poets." Will L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E have the same
|
|
effect on the "best minds of my generation" as T. S. Eliot's "The
|
|
Wasteland?" A must-read for every poet. Unforgettable bits:
|
|
Gerald Burns' "Any phone book is a poem," Chris Stroffolino's "on
|
|
the scent of logopoeia," Sheila Murphy's "The headpipe's motor
|
|
nasty," and Elizabeth Burns' "perspectives are tilted, changed."--ssn
|
|
|
|
POETRY MOTEL--(#20, 1993), 1619 Jefferson St., Duluth MN, 55812.
|
|
52 pp., $5.95. The bleak and unpretty side of life (& death),
|
|
spelled out in details of individual lives. Narrative poems about
|
|
real folks: kids stage a neighborhood war with apples & rocks; a
|
|
guy watches a whore & her john in the back alley; a Navy nurse
|
|
cracks up during Desert Storm... The craft is in telling the
|
|
story, and in not letting the telling get in the way. Not gussied
|
|
up, but somehow compassionate, even inspirational, despite the
|
|
hard-bitten surface.--lbd
|
|
|
|
THE POETRY PROJECT--(October/November 1993), St. Mark's Church-in-
|
|
the-Bowery, 131 E. 10th St., New York NY, 10003. 24 pp., $5.00.
|
|
Interesting reviews of mainstream books about dead poets (Auden,
|
|
O'Hara), but also of smallpress (if not micropress) poetry books.
|
|
One article covers the recent Buffalo Festival of New Poetry--an
|
|
event that was actually devoted in part to otherstream poets--but
|
|
it was all gossip & descriptions of what attendees were wearing,
|
|
etc., so in the end pretty useless. THE POETRY PROJECT contains
|
|
scattered poems, too--and a moving tribute to James Brodey, a poet
|
|
who recently died of AIDS.--bg
|
|
|
|
POETRY USA--(#25/26, 1993), 2569 Maxwell Ave., Oakland CA, 94601.
|
|
56 pp., $2.00. This double issue, and the next, is devoted to
|
|
"The Experimental," which is here treated with the respect and
|
|
intelligence usually given mainstream work. Editor Jack Foley
|
|
opens with "Towards A Preface To My Book, _Gershwin_," which serves
|
|
extremely well as an introduction of the type of work that
|
|
follows. Next, a "Quotations/Testimonies" section includes the
|
|
voices of everyone from Walter J. Ong to Walt Whitman to Jack
|
|
Spicer to Gertrude Stein to Plato, and lead us into a trip though
|
|
the looking glass of human consciousness as origami where vocal-
|
|
verbal-visual wormholes drive from one quadrant to another as
|
|
quick as the space between syllables. To single out individual
|
|
works would do a disservice to the whole. And this issue reads
|
|
as a whole--a single work written by poets from all places and
|
|
times converged here to demonstrate the beauty that lies in the
|
|
outer reaches. I should mention that a transcript of dinner
|
|
conversation between Robert Duncan and friends demonstrates his
|
|
extraordinary imagination and leaps of logic in his enthusiasm for
|
|
virtually any subject. As such, he represents that element of the
|
|
experimental that perhaps gives it life--enthusiasm for
|
|
everything--to live, to create without limitation. This issue is
|
|
saturated with that enthusiasm. 56 large tabloid pages in two
|
|
sections, dirt cheap for a document that explores the neuro-
|
|
chemical-spiritual fringe.--jb
|
|
|
|
RADIO VOID--(#14, 1992), PO Box 5983, Providence RI, 02903. 112
|
|
pp., $5.00. When I lived in Boston I remember these crazy
|
|
psychopaths occasionally wandering into the Primal Plunge
|
|
Bookstore and terrorizing the locals with their latest
|
|
"publication." These were highly seasoned characters who carried
|
|
their hysteria, with moments of calm before the storm, in such a
|
|
pleasant peaceful way you didn't even know you were in some kind
|
|
of danger. Much like RADIO VOID: a great mix of art & words, but
|
|
with inherent dangers that most people won't even know exist.--o
|
|
|
|
RANT--(#1, Spring 1993), PO Box 6872, Yorkville Station, New York
|
|
NY, 10128. 56 pp., $3.95. Appropriately, RANT contains tirades
|
|
about life, love, and politics. No one will agree with all the
|
|
points of view expressed herein--making converts is not the point;
|
|
eloquent, soapbox bitching with momentum is the point. Twisted
|
|
minds are not shunned. This issue reprints a section of Rimbaud's
|
|
"A Season in Hell"--some quotations illustrate Vitale's editorial
|
|
ethic: "I have swallowed a monstrous dose of poison. Thrice
|
|
blessed be the counsel that came to me!... The violence of the
|
|
venom twists my limbs, deforms and prostrates me. How nicely I
|
|
burn. Go to it, demon!" Some of the more contemporary tirades
|
|
address grocery store clerk rudeness, waiting for results of AIDS
|
|
tests, and obesity.--mg
|
|
|
|
REBEAT--(#3), PO Box 13387, Salem, OR, 97309. 32 pp., free.
|
|
Poems, texts, and graphics reproduced giant-size in tabloid
|
|
format, giving a real presence to the work presented, which is
|
|
surrealistic, chance-taking, and very lively. Bukowski and
|
|
Kostelanetz make appearances, and I was further delighted by the
|
|
poems of Shanna Renee, some gritty collages made on cigarette
|
|
packages by D.E. May, and a series of poems by Dave Nichols: "a
|
|
list of sins. dysfunction. leave it behind. the valley of
|
|
pumping. the valley of poison. leaving soon. state street. d
|
|
street. the row of windows./ limbo. the new jazz. instrument.
|
|
a new needle. drone." (from "imperfect")--jmb
|
|
|
|
REBEAT--(#4), PO Box 13387, Salem, OR, 97309. 36 pp., free. When
|
|
editor s.loy started this project, it was "doomed" from the get-
|
|
go: limited by prearrangement to 4 issues only, then on to
|
|
something else, as needed. That "limitation" seems to have been
|
|
liberating--no chance to get entrenched or stodgy, no worry about
|
|
the how to keep the thing going... maintain the focus on the
|
|
present, center. This issue is "The Lid," a cheerful farewell and
|
|
open door toward the future. The large format and explosively
|
|
blown-up typewrit & handscrawl is as visually effective as ever,
|
|
and appropriate to the immediate, human, "writ large" prose &
|
|
poetry. Even where it shimmers toward surreal or fantasy, it's a
|
|
hard-edged fantastic, not fuzzy or indefinite. Fine stuff, we'll
|
|
look forward to whatever comes next.--lbd
|
|
|
|
SEATTLE SMALL PRESS POETRY REVIEW--(May & June 1993), PO Box
|
|
45627, Seattle WA, 98145. 2 pp.@. This is a monthly one-page
|
|
reviewsheet, focusing (almost) exclusively on publications from
|
|
Seattle & environs. The strength of such a regional project lies
|
|
in it's potential to build a sense poetic community and allow the
|
|
various cliques & clans of poets know what others are doing. This
|
|
one covers a range of styles, from experimental to performance to
|
|
fairly traditional , and so succeeds in emphasizing an eclectic
|
|
geo-connectedness. On the flip side, familiarity can breed... a
|
|
kind of in-bred reaction that is less review, and more the kind of
|
|
thing participants should swap & argue with over after-reading
|
|
beers. Some of this shows up here, too, the worst example being a
|
|
reviewer's re-writing of a poem he's critiqued: such belongs in a
|
|
workshop, not a review. Worthwhile despite it's faults, every
|
|
poetic community could benefit from a publication such as this.--lbd
|
|
|
|
SHIT DIARY--(August 1993), 5629 Granada Dr. #271, Sarasota FL,
|
|
34231. 24 pp., $1.00. Quite a range of "marginal" material such
|
|
as a chatty, thoughty letter from David Napper, editor of
|
|
ANTISKIOS (I always enjoy meeting editors informally, outside the
|
|
pages of their zines); a whacked-out character study by Huck
|
|
Finch; collages; diary entries; poems--no, wait, this issue is
|
|
poemless; a drawing on a 1040 tax form of Christ crucified
|
|
expressing his love for the tax-exempt status of churches...--bg
|
|
|
|
SHOCKBOX--(#7, December 1993), PO Box 7226, Nashua, NH, 03060. 60
|
|
pp., $5.00. The table of contents reads like a _Who's Who_ of at
|
|
least one sector of the literary underground (Howington,
|
|
Bergamino, Crews, Townsend, Weinman, Shields, Bennett...), and
|
|
with each page packed to the gills with words and graphics you
|
|
know it's going to take awhile to read. I like to keep SHOCKBOX
|
|
in the bathroom, and every time I start to read another tale of
|
|
angst and hysteria I forget what I'm doing and a half an hour
|
|
later my wife is knocking on the door asking if I'm okay. There's
|
|
too much in here to even begin to talk about--just buy a copy, hit
|
|
the bathroom, and be prepared to get caught up on a roller coaster
|
|
ride that skims the edge of hell.--o
|
|
|
|
SITUATION--(#3), 10 Orton Place #2, Buffalo NY, 14202. 20 pp.,
|
|
$2.00. Keenly aware that language is both an imperfect mirror and
|
|
a distorted window on the world, the poetry here still aims for a
|
|
bit of "truth," and succeeds more than fails. Susan Smith Nash
|
|
(in "From a Paleontologist's Notebook") looks for a grounding in
|
|
artifact & rock, while C.S. Giscombe (in excerpts from Giscome
|
|
Road) finds it in a history made personal. Other highlights: very
|
|
visual excerpts from Susan Gevirtz's "Enterprise: Seagram Project"
|
|
(which begins: "Lie down in aerial sleep/ awaken in view of/ torn
|
|
door, mail slot,// seascape, playing field,// narrow church nave,
|
|
leaded glass,// rear view mirror,// space between slats,// of wood
|
|
fence"); & Cynthia Kimball's striking orality & image.--lbd
|
|
|
|
SITUATION--(#4, 1993), 10 Orton Place #2, Buffalo, NY, 14202.
|
|
$2.00. More exciting with each issue. Kim Rosenfield's
|
|
"Wandering Uterus" seduces the reader with intoxicating gender-
|
|
inflected discourse about the process of writing poetry. Charles
|
|
Bernstein's "A Test of Poetry" echoes his "A Defense of Poetry"
|
|
(in AERIAL 6/7), Joe Ross's playfulness mixes with acerbic digs at
|
|
our culture, Spencer Selby's "No Way" is constructed of couplets
|
|
that hint of doppelganger.--ssn
|
|
Textual poetry mostly of the Language-centered school. As a
|
|
critic, I especially enjoyed the Charles Bernstein contribution,
|
|
for it consists of a list of the comments--questions, actually--
|
|
that a Chinese translator has for a poet about his poems; so we
|
|
get a mind struggling with poems, and--obliquely but
|
|
intriguingly--the poems struggled with. Great high-prose by
|
|
Sheila Murphy, too.--bg
|
|
|
|
TABOO JADOO--c/o Javant Biaruja, Nosukumo, GPO Box 994-H,
|
|
Melbourne 3001, AUSTRALIA. TABOO JADOO is a journal for the
|
|
discussion and expression of private language (a journal for
|
|
multilinguistics amphigory interlingustics ecrite d'ombres
|
|
langue close lettrisme jasyan etc.). Issues feature the work of
|
|
individual artists. Issue #4 featured Michael Helsem's Glaugnea:
|
|
On the Choice Not to Utter Sense. Issue #2 featured Janette Orr's
|
|
Mhurwrenfur. A future issue will feature work by Richard
|
|
Kostelanetz. Currently, issues of the magazine are presenting in
|
|
sequence the Taneraic-English Dictionary. Taneraic is a hermetic
|
|
language which Javant Biaruja has been developing of the last 25
|
|
years. He has written over 3,500 pages in this language, which
|
|
includes a descriptive grammar. The dictionary is a fantastic
|
|
fun-house of sound and meaning. If one considers that all words
|
|
are poetry, than it is a short leap into the poetic pages of the
|
|
Taneraic Dictionary . For those readers serious about new
|
|
language, invented languages, and the formation of language
|
|
itself, this dictionary will prove to be immensiely fascinating.
|
|
In an era of poetry that challenges linear narrative and image-
|
|
bound work, the idea of writing in a private tongue offers an
|
|
intense and immense poetic proposal. As Biaruja notes in his
|
|
preface: "Bes aisyan, beqi jebo quida i rinat sescyudiva puno."--mb
|
|
|
|
TALISMAN--(#11, Fall 1993), PO Box 1117, Hoboken NJ, 07030.
|
|
$5.00. An astounding 300 pages of poetry, criticism, interviews,
|
|
experimental prose, translations. A special section on Michael
|
|
Heller contains interview, critical essays, responses, and
|
|
Heller's own work--what I find astonishing is the way Heller
|
|
articulates issues of praxis--it is illuminating to see exactly
|
|
how he goes about creating a text. Heller's eyes are open to
|
|
literary antecedents and philosophical thought structures. Heller
|
|
has already embarked on an autobiography, which arouses all sorts
|
|
of tantalizing issues surrounding autobiography and the orderings
|
|
and arrangings of self and cultural context. Autobiography is a
|
|
construct which reflects cultural knowledge systems and belief
|
|
structures. TALISMAN itself reflects a knowledge system--the
|
|
range of works and authors comprise a history as well as a map or
|
|
a landscape of this palpable moment in poetics.--ssn
|
|
|
|
TALKING RAVEN--(Vol. 3 #2, Autumn Equinox 1993), PO Box 45758,
|
|
Seattle WA, 98145. 16 pp., $3.00. A quarterly rag-top subtitled
|
|
"A Journal of Imaginative Trouble," the theme is "Media Madness."
|
|
An alive, provocative publication with the feel of the early
|
|
underground. It includes outrageous editorials, poetry, reprints
|
|
from other publications and interviews with local media artists.
|
|
Also includes an article on "Feminist Demonology" by Robert Anton
|
|
Wilson, and interesting ads from the Seattle Alternative scene.
|
|
Anarchical and bizarre, candid and combative--still, this one
|
|
lacks perspective; and sometimes a false-intellectual air makes it
|
|
appear retro.--rrle
|
|
|
|
:THAT:--(August 1993), PO Box 85, Peacham VT, 05862. $1.50.
|
|
Featured poets Robert Creeley and Benjamin Friedlander contribute
|
|
spare, symmetrical pieces that confront the abbreviations within
|
|
language itself. For Friedlander, language's compressions may rob
|
|
the signified of essence ("as noun never pronoun / because it is a
|
|
thing"). Creeley's "Echo" poems replicate the process the reader
|
|
engages in each time it must decompress a word so that it balloons
|
|
up in the mind to evoke an entire thing or event. Creeley points
|
|
out that the problem is that the balloon is slippery and it is
|
|
variegated with colors and size.--ssn
|
|
One of the best kept secrets in contemporary poetry is
|
|
:THAT:, a monthly (more or less), deftly edited by two Stephens
|
|
(Ellis & Dignazio). The format pits five pages each of two poets
|
|
with &/or against each other; this issue feature Robert Creeley &
|
|
Ben Friedlander. Creeley is flawless as ever--"all you/ said you
|
|
wanted fainted"--still writing his "Echo" poems. Friedlander
|
|
seems to present an untitled "cat" series--"chipped in chatter
|
|
these/ teething expressions/ marble in their perfect character." --md
|
|
|
|
THIRTEEN POETRY MAGAZINE--(Vol. 12 #1, 1993), PO Box 392,
|
|
Portlandville NY, 13834. 40 pp., $2.50. I really like this
|
|
magazine for a couple of reasons: first, it's so packed to the
|
|
gills with carefully selected, well written poems that it carries
|
|
the weight of publications with three or four times the number of
|
|
pages; second, it's got great graphics mixed in that seem right at
|
|
home with the poetry. My wife was looking for a poem to read in
|
|
class and she really enjoyed Ralph Hammon's "Cantos of Light",
|
|
with the opening lines: "As a curious child/ I didn't understand/
|
|
why I couldn't hold sunlight/ in the palm of my hand/ when I went
|
|
inside where it/ lost itself to shadow." I, on the other hand,
|
|
went after Ken Stone's poem "Sex": "Sex/ is/ for/ those/ who/
|
|
know/ how/ to/ gain/ pleasure/ from/ every/ act," and Dorthy
|
|
Dreher's "The Sabbath": "Wild in the moonlight/ with eyes aflame/
|
|
we fuck like goats,/ groan and lick/ like rivers of fire."--o
|
|
|
|
THRUST--(Vol. 1 #1, Fall/Winter 1992), PO Box 1602, Austin TX,
|
|
78767. 44 pp., $3.50. "Experimental" and "underground" tend to
|
|
be relative terms, applied to any piece that strikes its audience
|
|
as somewhat unusual. THRUST publishes an eclectic group of
|
|
writers whose work falls outside the fairly narrow conventions
|
|
adhered to by most American fiction. The first issue has a
|
|
translation of work by former East German writer Wolfgang Hilbig;
|
|
the rest are writers from the US. Reviews of experimental prose
|
|
are promised in future issues. Issue 1 is somewhat mixed. Tom
|
|
Whalen successfully masquerades as a European writer of
|
|
philosophical magic realism in "Annals"; though his writing
|
|
conveys few specificities, it does translate the form. Likewise,
|
|
Helen Duberstein translates the art-M
|
|
rchen into English in "Old
|
|
Man and the Faerie," but the setting of the tale remains Central
|
|
Europe. Albert Huffstickler's one-page "Alley Way," however,
|
|
succeeds in bringing a favorite European genre, the tale of an
|
|
uncanny encounter in a modern city, into what is clearly the
|
|
contemporary US, in language, manners, and diction. Kirpal
|
|
Gordon's self-consciously jazzy prose transcribes rather than
|
|
investigates the rude collages thrown up by contemporary US life.
|
|
And Dan Parker's "Revenge of the Roach," though finished,
|
|
successful, and enjoyable, is also thoroughly unambitious.
|
|
Clearly, writers of experimental prose in American English still
|
|
have much work--and play--to do. I am glad that THRUST is
|
|
providing them with a forum.--cp
|
|
|
|
THRUST--(Vol. 1 #2, Spring/Summer 1993), PO Box 1602, Austin TX,
|
|
78767. 52 pp., $3.50. A collection of "experimental and
|
|
underground prose." According to editor Skip Rhudy, "fiction
|
|
submitted here should play with language, form, structure,
|
|
perspective, tense, or any combination of the above plus more."
|
|
The zine's contents fits his description, with flair. Lots of
|
|
surrealism, irony, sex & violence--but high culture, too (one
|
|
story's characters discuss G. E. Moore's philosophy, for
|
|
instance).--bg
|
|
|
|
TIGHT--(Vol. 4 #4), PO Box 1591, Guerneville CA, 95446. $4.50.
|
|
This issue begins with an open letter from the editor regarding a
|
|
member of the IRA who was imprisoned in Belfast for carrying
|
|
explosives, escaped to the States, and lived underground for more
|
|
than a decade. He is now held prisoner in isolation pending
|
|
possible extradition. If you sympathize with his plight he can
|
|
receive mail or books from bookstores at Richard Earl Martin, UFW
|
|
396, 5325 Brooder Blvd., Dublin, CA 94568. TIGHT is always
|
|
guaranteed to provide at the very least a handful of gems in
|
|
virtually any style. Politics usually not a central theme. Ann
|
|
continues to create harmony from a cacophony of voices.--jb
|
|
|
|
TRANSMOG--(#11, September 1993), Rt. 6 Box 138, Charleston WV,
|
|
25311. 22 pp., $1.00. Think of this project as a paper version
|
|
of a computer bulletin board, such as rec.arts.poems on the
|
|
Internet. From the variety and organization (or lack of it) it
|
|
seems most everyone who contributes something appears in print,
|
|
which is appropriate for a publication that has such a strong
|
|
emphasis on networking (including computer networking). After
|
|
several multi-contributor issues, it looks like TRANSMOG is
|
|
rapidly becoming the place to post the latest experimental
|
|
language/surreal developments. The graphic artwork is
|
|
particularly notable in this issue. Some favorite poems: any of
|
|
the many John M. Bennett pieces, "My Impression of M. C. Escher"
|
|
by Daniel Sattler, "Poetry My Ass," work by Evan Pappas, the
|
|
Ficus/Bennett visual collaboration, and Michael Basinski's
|
|
"NOTATION Page 48". I'm sure I missed lots, or left them
|
|
for you to discover.--ar
|
|
Another smoking issue from Ficus' dungeon, and the crowd he's
|
|
assembled strips away those layers of inhibition you've been
|
|
saving for your children. John M. Bennett's contorted
|
|
calligraphy, Alex V. Cook's mesosticing, astonishingly weird
|
|
drawing by Duke Andrews, Blair Wilson, Harold Dinkel, Sean
|
|
Winchester... Bill Paulauskas and Harry Polkinhorn drop in with
|
|
textual inventions. But this is a small fragment of the work.
|
|
This is the joyous edge, the cells of human consciousness run
|
|
amok. The next best thing to whizzing on an electric fence.--jb
|
|
|
|
VERBAL ABUSE--(#1, Summer 1993), 315 Park Ave. South Rm. 1611, New
|
|
York NY, 10010. 80 pp., $6.00. A collection of writing spawned
|
|
at a NYC nightclub reading series. Tough words, with lots of NYC
|
|
nightclub ambiance--Ecstasy, attitude, drag-queens and living-on-
|
|
the-edge. As would be expected from the origins, many of these
|
|
pieces would work well on stage, at high volume. Dramatic
|
|
black&white layout; no room for gray. Plenty of AIDS references,
|
|
but (except for some masturbation) not much explicitly safe sex.
|
|
Self-confidence/promotion, just a bit of that NYC drive to make
|
|
this (poetry) the Next Big Thing.--lbd
|
|
|
|
W'ORCs/ALOUD ALLOWED--(Vol. 8 #8 & 9, August & September 1993), PO
|
|
Box 27309, Cincinnati OH, 45227. 20 pp., $3.00. Now I've done my
|
|
share of everything in Cinci, but this publication is a new one to
|
|
me. It seems to be a collection of various poets from all over,
|
|
doing what poets do. Some of the highlights in the August issue
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were Kevin Holland's "Relax/ Enjoy yourself/ lose some weight/
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reduce your stress, your cholesterol, and your fat," and the
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obituary for Glenn W. Frank who helped the students at Kent State
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mellow out after the shootings (am I old or is this a forgotten
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tragedy?) In the September issue we get a kickass letter that
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might be either bullshit jive or serious criticism, and poetry
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that is, well, ok. Which isn't saying much.--o
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W'ORCs/ALOUD ALLOWED--(Vol. 8 #10, October 1993), PO Box 27309,
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Cincinnati OH, 45227. 26 pp., $3.00. This 8 1/2" X 14" "monthly
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poetry samizdat" is free on the streets and provides an overview
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of poetry happenings in Ohio, poetry, editorial works, selections
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from chapbooks, and critiques of poetry events and forums. The
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poetry is Beat with shattered glass polyrhythms and hard edged
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compelling sounds, very experimental with a raucous swagger. It
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made me want to stand and read aloud. The cover collages are
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intense: The opinions are straight from the hip. Where else are
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you going to find a drumpoet, and a special 18 page single poem
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insert by Gary David titled "Bear Medicine"? "I throw dust on
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me/ it changes me/ I am a bear/ when I go to meet him." --rrle
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WURDZ...--(August 1993), PO Box 6010, Toledo OH, 43614. 16 pp.,
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$1.00? This publication serves the Writer's Resource Center of
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Toledo, and so contains Resource Center news, Toledo area poetry
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listings, and publishing opportunities in addition to the poetry.
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It seems that familiarity sounds good to the poets in this issue.
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A few semi-random quotations: "There are signs of afternoon
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delight...", "your place or mine...", "I hope you're happy and not
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too blue...". One poem, titled "goodby", is about wrist-slitting
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suicide.--mg
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X-RAY--(#1, Fall 1993), PO Box 170011, San Francisco CA, 94117.
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60 pp. + enclosures, $7.00. The first thing that strikes is the
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strikingness of the object: genuine x-ray negative for a cover,
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velo-bound pages, each sheet a different paper (Chinese telephone
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directory, musical scores, notebook paper...), varied typefaces,
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tipped-in booklets & realia... The contributions vary from gut-
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punch narratives to obscure/conceptual "art"; contributors range
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from regular-guy Bukowski and psycho "White-Boy" Paul Weinman to
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mail-art types and John M. Bennett. Found and pseudo-found work
|
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a strong presence. It'll be interesting to see if the editors can
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(or choose to) continue with this labor-intensive format.--lbd
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XIB--(#5, 1993), PO Box 262112, San Diego CA, 92126. 56 pp.,
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$5.00. A nice collection of otherstream poetry and illumagery
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that also includes some good poems and short stories by more
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knownstream writers. My favorite of the latter is Jim Mikiley's
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"The Arresting Officer Tells Me to Start At The Beginning," which
|
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is about a nun who held up the poem's narrator too long in a
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drugstore check-out line.--bg
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I like this magazine, and Tolek edits it with a fine tuned mix
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|
of excellent graphics, poetry, fiction, and ideas. Tolek knows the
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underground, and this exploration into turf that would make most
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normal people turn their heads away shows he's not afraid to take
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chances. Many of the pieces in this collection left me thinking,
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reminded me of scenes from real life that were intense at the
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time, but were quickly forgot in a denial state because they were
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so disturbing.--o
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ZINES!--(Spring 1993), 221 N. Blvd., Richmond VA, 23220. 12 pp.,
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|
$1.25. A stapled-in-the-corner newsletter of zine-reviews. In
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|
this issue, editor/publisher Christopher B. Martin covers some
|
|
twenty zines of all kinds. At least three-quarters of these I'd
|
|
never heard of--so ZINES! should raise the zine-consciousness of
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almost anyone. Martin also provides useful dope about the
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computer software and hardware he uses to produce his zine.--bg
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ZYX--(#4), 58-09 205th St., Bayside NY, 11364. 5pp., SASE.
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|
Arnold Skemer here reviews and discusses writing and critical
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|
texts of interest to experimental fictioneers. This issue's
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|
topics included books by Perloff, Hejinian, Crag Hill, and
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Kostelanetz, and a lead review of Leon S. Roudiez' "French Fiction
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Revisited." Skemer's newsletter is interested in device and
|
|
stratagem as a means to disrupt the conventional movements of
|
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reading; also in the disruptions and violations inflicted on us by
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the mass-market media; and in the recuperation of these
|
|
disruptions for "high art" (his phrase). A strongly
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aestheticizing Modernism here, Continental, smelling of red wine
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and garlic, as they say; but fully within the Radical Modernist
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line of Dada, Futurism, and Constructivism. Skemer's sarcastic
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|
comments on the "Malthusian aspects" of the creative writing
|
|
M.F.A. phenomenon make especially good reading.--cp
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ZYX--(#6, Spring 1993), 58-09 205th St., Bayside NY, 11364. 5pp.,
|
|
SASE. Half of this issue of Arnold Skemer's one-man review zine
|
|
is devoted to a defense of the historical novel. He also
|
|
discusses crazy self-publishers like Jack Saunders (and myself); 4
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|
or 5 collections of visual poetry, an anthology of "paradoxism;"
|
|
Mike Gunderloy & Cari Goldberg Janice's The World of Zines (which
|
|
allows him to make a few cogent comments on the zine world based
|
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on his own involvement in it); and several other books. Large
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pages and small type allow him to say quite a bit in a mere 5
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pages.--bg
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