textfiles/magazines/TAPROOT/taproot-5a

From au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu Tue May  7 20:26:22 1996
Date: Thu, 22 Feb 1996 09:11:07 -0500
From: Robert Drake <au462@cleveland.Freenet.Edu>
To: pauls@etext.org
Subject: TRee #5a: zines


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  Issue #5.0, section a: zines                             7/94
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TapRoot is a quarterly publication of Independent, Underground, 
and Experimental language-centered arts. Over the past 10 years, 
we have published 40+ collections of poetry, writing, and visio-
verbal art in a variety of formats. In the August of 1992, we 
began publish TapRoot Reviews, featuring a wide range of "Micro-
Press" publications, primarily language-oriented.  This posting 
is the first section of our 5th full electronic issue, containing 
most of the short ZINE reviews; the second section contains most of 
the chapbook reviews.  We provide this information in the hope
that netters do not limit their reading to E-mail & BBSs. 
Please e-mail your feedback to the editor, Luigi-Bob Drake, at:

                 au462@cleveland.freenet.edu 

Requests for e-mail subsctiptions should be sent to the same
address--they are free, please indicate what you are requesting-- 
(a short but human message; this is not an automated listserve).
I believe it is FTPable from UMich, which also archives back issues.

Hard-copies of TapRoot Reviews contain additional review
material--in issue #5: features on the Argentinian experimental
poetry movement _Paralengua_; the LA micropress Found Street;
the Russian transfuturist artists Rea Nickonova & Serge Segay; 
recent French writing-in-translation, the new magazine _Apex of
the M_; plus features on work by Nathaniel Mackey, Bill Luoma, and
Ivan Arguelles.  TapRoot Reviews intends to survey the boundries 
of "literature", and provide access to work that stretches those 
boundries.It is availablefrom: Burning Press, PO Box 585, Lakewood 
OH 44107--$2.50 pp. 
Both the print & electronic versions of TapRoot are copyright 
1994 by Burning Press, Cleveland.  Burning Press is a non-profit 
educational corporation.  Permission granted to reproduce 
this material FOR NON-COMMERCIAL PURPOSES, provided that this 
introductory notice is included.  Burning Press is supported, in 
part, with funds from the Ohio Arts Council. 

Reviewers are identified by their initials at the end of each 
review: Mark Amerika, Michael Basinski, John M. Bennett, Jake 
Berry, Luigi-Bob Drake, R. Lee Etzwiler, Steve Fried, Chris 
Funkhouser, Jessica Grimm, Bob Grumman, Roger Kyle-Keith, Joel 
Lipman, Stephen-Paul Martin, Susan Smith Nash, Kurt Nimmo, Oberc, 
Charlotte Pressler, Dan Raphael, Andrew Russ, Mark Wallace, Don 
Webb, Mark Weber, and Thomas Willoch.  Additional contributors 
are welcome: drop an e-note or send SASE.

*** Many thanx to all of our contributors. ***



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ZINES:
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1 CENT--(# 297, April 1993), 1357 Lansdowne Ave., Toronto, 
Ontario, CANADA, M6H 3Z9. 1 pp., $.50.  Just a 4" x 5" piece of 
paper with a title, "DYSLEXIC ESSAY:/ too:/ TRANSLATION:," which 
is jittered by double-printing; some information about number of 
copies printed, etc.; and a three-word poem (by "NE"): MOOM IN 
VALLEY.--bg

1 CENT--(# 300, April 1993), 1357 Lansdowne Ave., Toronto, 
Ontario, CANADA, M6H 3Z9.  1 pp., 1 Canadian cent plus lots of 
postage.  Pretty amazing what one cent will get you these days: a 
commemorative anthology of previous issues of 1CENT, 3 cent Pulp, 
2 Bit Poetry, and the Ganglia 5 cent Mini Mimeo Series, plus some 
excerpts from works in lieu of a review and a few new poems.  
Lovingly rubberstamped on scraps of paper and hand-sewn into a 
book.  The poems themselves are generally short (less than ten 
lines) and maybe a bit zen-like (or paradoxical).  A large number 
of mostly Canadian poets, such as Richard Truhlar, Michael 
Ondaatje, The Four Horsemen, Stuart Ross, Guy R. Beining, appear.
--ar

1 CENT--(January 1994), 1357 Lansdowne Ave., Toronto, Ontario, 
CANADA, M6H 3Z9.  10 pp., $.50.  "A triple memorial issue for 
RDHansen, dom sylvester houedard & Joe Singer, edited by jwcurry" 
and titled, "Ecosystem; a Fragment."  Some fine short 
reminiscences of the three recently deceased poets by curry; and 
some samples of their work along with a reprint of a newspaper 
article about houedard by Guy Brett.--bg

ABACUS--(February 1994), 181 Edgemont Ave., Elmwood CT, 06110.  
20 pp., $4.00.  Somewhat surrealistic poems in what I (and, before 
me; Charles Wright) call the jump-cut vein (because they jump 
abruptly from one scene to another not obviously related to the 
first) by one of the leaders in the field, Rosemarie Waldrop.  
Lots of fun lines like: "No one is ahead of his time; and he only 
slightly," from "Cornered Stones."--bg

ABACUS--(January 1994), 181 Edgemont Ave., Elmwood CT, 06110.  
20 pp., $4.00.  This one is devoted to "Blue Horizon," a set of 9 
two-page poems by language-poet Bruce Andrews that are outside all 
logics I know of but... well, in the first poem, words & phrases 
like "Sherwood Frost," "Bumblebee Biolage Juleishtee," and 
"Tomahawk cedar star-of-the-veld," and many references to musical 
items such as a "belfrey-tree" lead, for me, to the "bellfounding" 
of a kind of Forest of Arden.--bg

ANTISKIOS--(#s 10, 12, 15, & 28), 4143 F. St., Bremerton WA, 
98312.  1 pg. @, SASE.  Odd mixtures of mostly plainstyle poetry, 
including "Memorial Haiku," by Sparrow: "At the funeral/ one girl 
told me: 'He was/ my Hygiene teacher'," which is about as 
unprepossessingly moving a poem as I've come across.--bg

APEX ANNUAL--(#1, "Erotic Fun"), PO Box 49324, Austin TX, 78765.  
64 pp., $8.95.  This one has been around for a while but if it is 
still available, if you enjoy reading erotic writing (like that of 
Cheryl Townsend, Don Zablocki, Charles Sidney Bernstein)--this is 
a goody.  Useful within the First Amendment: "Congress shall make 
no law..."  Freedom of Speech recall we have it.  And the 
collection's manifesto (introduction by Pistol Pete): "This manual 
of erotic art contains writing which will help human beings to 
achieve the fullest joy..."  A few strangely erotic photographs 
exploring that which we all have and in this fashion--oddly erotic 
takes--turn-on/offs by Patricia Morales.  APEX ANNUAL is published 
by the folk at Art-Core.  And taste moan fingers red pops pound 
dribbling dream empire lethargic god hot dog.--mb

ART TIMES--(October 1993), PO Box 730, Mt. Marion NY, 12456.  
20 pp., $1.75.  ART TIMES bills itself as "A literary journal and 
Resource for all the arts," but is mostly concerned with visual 
art--of the easiest-viewing variety, like the work of Thomas Cole.  
Well written and informative about exhibits in and around Albany 
NY, but of less value beyond that local base.--bg

ARTHUR'S COUSIN--(#10, Winter 1993), 2501 Wickersham #2132, Austin 
TX, 78741.  32 pp., $2.00.  This one started out as a fanzine, & 
has since matured.  Editor Joshua's "New Year" started out with a 
party I wish I'd been invited to, carrying enough sex and violence 
and destruction to keep even an old fart like me amused.  
Christopher revives the revived controversy over censorship, 
Beavis & Butthead, and parental responsibility.  Add to this mix 
true hospital stories, poetry by John Grey, and getting tattooed, 
and you get real life mixed together in such a personal way you 
feel like these folks live across the hall.--o

ARTHUR'S COUSIN--(Vol. 2, #1, Spring 1994), 2501 Wickersham #2132, 
Austin TX, 78741.  18 pp., $1.50.  Another one of my favorite 
zines, ARTHUR'S COUSIN comes flying at you at the speed of light.  
Bombarding the senses with short bursts of random wisdom, poetry 
by John Grey ("it almost rains/ the sky squeezing itself/ like a 
dog sucking bone"), Joshua's arguments that we are not equal, and 
his loving review of a band I hate, Pearl Jam.  But that's not 
all, there are more music reviews, poems, comics, zine reviews, 
and all of the ingredients that make a zine a zine: energy, and an 
eye for things that count.--o

ATELIER--(#3, Winter 1994), PO Box 580, Boston MA, 02117.  58 pp., 
$5.00.  In an interview printed in this issue, poet and critic 
Andrew Schelling suggests that the goal of the Naropa Institute's 
writing program is to teach not only how to be a writer, but to be 
a person.  Being a person in difficult times, a difficult world is 
the basic ground upon which this well-produced, innovatively 
arranged issue builds a body of work which affirms and validates 
the individual's experience.  A deep love for humanity flows from 
each page: Leah Spencer's "all my thorns point inward," Quraysh 
Ali's "Crescent, OK," Charles Rossiter's "I watch bad TV" are only 
a few.--ssn

ATOM MIND--(Vol. 4 # 13), PO Box 22068, Albuquerque NM, 87154.  
104 pp.  This issue of ATOM MIND bears a grinning picture of the 
late Frank Zappa on the cover as tribute.  Suzy Creamcheese--
Zappa's blunt-end-of-a-joke embodiment of the middle class 
plebeian mindset--is also quoted.  Inside, under glossy covers, we 
find poetry and short fiction by the likes of Michael Estabrook, 
Errol Miller, Ann Newell, Gerald Locklin, and many others.  In 
every issue, ATOM MIND pays homage to a poet of long-standing 
achievement with it's "Living Poets Series"--Winter 1994 profiles 
Carol Berge.  There are graphics by the inestimable R. Crumb, and 
Wayne Hogan among others.  "Cowboys & Poetry," by Kendall McCook, 
is essential reading for those interested in the diversity of 
American poetry; the article profiles cowboy poet Kell Robertson.  
In the tradition of THE WORMWOOD REVIEW and THE NEW YORK 
QUARTERLY, ATOM MIND chronicles underground America's unknown 
poets.--kn

AVALON RISING--(#20, January 1994), PO Box 1983, Cincinnati OH, 
45201.  18 pp., $1.00.  Due to the proliferation of computers and 
small copying machines, we are now witnessing a large increase in 
small and independently produced zines.  AVALON RISING is a good 
example of this multiplication; it's under 20 pages, printed on 
cheap bond, and the type is computer generated.  Michael 
Estabrook, Eroll Miller, Robert W. Howington are included in this 
issue.  There's a personal flavor to the zine; editor Tebbs 
indicates her sincere desire "to quit smoking."  Of particular 
interest is an interview with poet Michael Estabrook.  As for the 
obscurity of American poetry, he cites the experience of Emily 
Dickinson, who "wrote great poetry & hid it in the bottom of her 
underwear drawer," only to be discovered later.  Much of AVALON 
RISING is a good read, though the zine's small size leaves you 
searching for more.--kn

BLAZIN' AURALITIES--(#2, 1993), 4083 Clark, Montreal Quebec, 
CANADA, H2W 1X1.  20 pp., $4.00.  This magazine is an irregular 
review of spoken word recordings.  Most of the reviews are short 
and precise and explanatory.  The poetry word on cassette is well 
represented: John M. Bennett, Bob Z., John Cage, Bern Porter, Kurt 
Schwitters, Gregory Whitehead... plus radio station listings, & 
more.  A must for those involved in the world of poetry/sound 
performance, recording, and distribution.  A network before the 
eye.  The big & the small without prejudice, and addresses 
galore.--mb
     Focusing on reviewing spoken word recordings, audio 
and video, and also listing Radio Stations sympathetic to spoken 
word, and addresses from which you might obtain such.  This is an 
excellent and desperately needed resource.  The reviews are short, 
descriptive and enough to give you an idea about the recording in 
question.  If you have any interest at all in the sound and vision 
of contemporary poetics check this out.--jb

BLIND MAN'S RAINBOW--(#1?), PO Box 1557, Erie PA, 16507.  16 pp., 
$1.55.  A magazine that has a true innocence--I believe that an 
editor who wants all submissions kept to a "PG-13 rating" and 
suggests we avoid the "F" word still deserves a chance.  While 
most of the poems in this magazine are done by young poets, who 
still have a naive optimism and don't yet know just how bad things 
can get, it was fun to relive the years when I felt the same way.
--o

BOB'S JOINT--(Vol. 1 #3, Winter 1994), 111 President St., Brooklyn 
NY, 11231.  4 pp., SASE.  Editor Bob Balo runs workshops in "voice 
& movement... to improve delivery of written word," as well as 
running some NYC open readings.  The best of the poems here would 
fit well at an open, & if performed well might even be remembered 
the next day.  Others lack an original voice, which no delivery 
would make up for.--lbd

BOOG--(#66, Winter 1992-1993), 422 N. Cleveland Street, Arlington 
VA, 22201.  68 pp, $4.00.  Subtitled "An Anglo-American Journal," 
which includes poetry from England, the Commonwealth countries, 
and America.  One hundred contributors, including Androla, 
Bukowski, Daldorph, C.A. Townsend and Nielsen in this issue--a 
quantity of memorable, diverse poetic styles.  Tension/balance as 
irrelevance struggles with directness and originality: time, 
place, incident, and persona in each poem--and often a Beat-
current--pushes us along against a minimalist tide of realities.  
"logical kisses/ through a surgical/ mask" Dave Ward of Liverpool 
serves us his image of a street-wise female, and images like this, 
clear and enticing, fill each page. From the late Buk, "there was 
nothing to say/ there never will be anything to say/ we live, we 
die, huh?"  Art work included in this issue is Wayne Hogan's pop 
surrealistic icons, merry and mysterious.  --rrle

BOUILLABAISSE--(#3, Fall 1993), 31A. Watterloo St., New Hope PA, 
18938.  80 pp., $10.00.  This issue is dedicated to Carl Solomon 
and includes a memoir about him by Larry Lundwall, and a poem for 
him by Allen Ginsberg.  Its other texts and graphics, which 
includes a fine one by Charles Bukowski (that, sadly, turned out 
to be among his last) keep the beatnik tradition energetically 
alive.--bg

BURNT TOAST--(#3, March/April 1994), PO Box 1314, Huntington Beach 
CA, 92647.  31 pp., free.  Poems saturated with coffee and 
coffeehouse poetry reading ambiance, these are (depending on your 
bias): youthful/naive, immediate/unpolished, sincere/sentimental, 
direct/obvious.  JAM'S CoffeeHouse in Huntington Beach seems to be 
the spawning ground, with seemingly the same explosion of cafe 
readings there that we see here in Cleveland.  BURNT TOAST is 
free, but poets are asked to contribute $1/page for work 
submitted--a turn of the table, charging the artist instead of 
the audience.--lbd

CAFE REVIEW--(Vol. 5 #1, Winter 1994), 20 Danforth St, Portland 
ME, 04101.  60 pp., $5.00.  One of the most subtle, yet vicious, 
publications around.  It looks too innocent to have poems like 
Wayne Atherton's "Vagrant Meditation", or "Wild Fecundity", which 
carries its lines like a sword: "When the last wolf/ kills the 
last sheep/ and feeds... which/ shall you morn most/ in its 
passing?" and "She places her teeth/ on the dashboard/ next to a 
white plastic Jesus."  Kurt Nimmo roars in with a dope-bust poem 
filled with the anxiety of wired out speed paranoia and cop cars 
closing in for the kill, while Gina Bergamino seduces with yet 
another emotional poem of abandonment.  An interview with small 
press dirty-old-man Judson Crews rounds out another fine issue of 
poetry that brings joy to the heart, or takes you to the brink of 
destruction, depending on what you thrive on most.--o

CENTRAL PARK--(#23, Spring 1994), PO Box 1446, New York NY, 10023.  
$7.50.  CENTRAL PARK functions as a window between worlds, a 
mysterious crossroads of perspective and creativity beyond the 
veil of the mainstream, but accessible enough to lure readers of 
purely main and knownstream mags.  But one quick pass is like a 
cudgel to complacency.  These are ideas hungry for change, 
openness, liberation of the contemporary mind, information 
assaulted into numbness.  A fine example of this is Edward 
Jefferson's "The Shores of Artificial Lake", which consists of 
"interviews" with radical thinkers who move beyond the 
conventional parameters of debate and suggest genuine alternative 
ideas; guaranteed to induce a healthy attack of philosophical 
vertigo in those who suffer from what Bob Grumman calls 
"segraceptuality" in his article on mathematical poetry and its 
lack of acceptance by the aesthetic establishment.  Powerful razor 
edge stories, poems, visuals and forms that defy category.  The 
taboos are tossed to the wind, this is what free individualism 
looks like in print.--jb
     The highest production values and the thoroughest coverage 
in the otherstream: includes considered essays on culture and 
society by such writers as Susan Smith Nash and (editor) Stephen-
Paul Martin; such kinds of texts as Eve Ensler's series of 
performance monologues, "The Vagina Monologues," and Jonathan 
Brannen's droll surrealistic short story, "The Happy Shirt"; and a 
wide variety of poems, visuals, and interviews.--bg

CHIRON REVIEW--(Vol XII #1, Spring 1993), Rt. 2 Box 111, St. John 
KS, 67576.  48 pp., $3.00.  In this issue, Todd Moore graces the 
front cover, and some of his short Dillinger poems fly at you with 
lines like "i've never told/ anyone abt being/ a dillinger/ 
hostage 'til now/ i remember the/ wind how cold/ it was...", and 
"the whole idea/ dillinger sed/ is to make/ bank robbery/ a 
business...".  There's also an interview with Todd about his 
growing up in Illinois which fills in the blanks for folks who 
only know him by his work.  Mark Weber does an excellent interview 
with Judson Crews that crawls into this wild man's head, and 
follows up with some of Judson's poems about women, Christ, etc.  
Plus Bill Shields, Ana Pine, Arthur Winfield Knight, and a few 
book reviews--a read that'll keep you busy for a day or two.--o

CHIRON REVIEW--(Vol XII #4, Winter  1994), Rt. 2 Box 111, St. John 
KS, 67576.  48 pp., $3.00.  This issue begins with Charles 
Bukowski and Jack Hirschman.  Oberc interviews folks that knew the 
poet Lorri Jackson, who died of a drug overdose.  Antler and Cat 
Spydell celebrate oral sex.  CHIRON has a fair amount of reviews, 
news on contests, calls for manuscripts, and conferences.  CHIRON 
also runs poetry contests and something called "The Poetry 
Rendezous," complete with workshops and dinner.  These folks are 
serious about poetry.  CHIRON is not a fly-by-night operation.--kn

CLIQUE-CLACK--(#6, March 1994), PO Box 891722, Oklahoma City OK, 
73189.  8 pp, $1.00.  I have to admit, I liked #4's Killer Klowns 
from Outer Space cover better than this lovely but calm sketch of 
a woman, but I do like the #6 tattooed on her arm.  Energetic 
arrangings of graphics, poetry, short fiction, faux personals, 
"Your Name In Hieroglyphics."--ssn

CLUTCH--(#3, December 1993), 132 Clinton Park #4, San Francisco 
CA, 94103.  70 pp., $5.00.  Lorri Jackson's "6/10/93," written the 
year before her death from heroin overdose, is chilling cinema 
verite, reinforced by three more eerily premonitory poems that 
push urge into the bloodstream & weird desire to find her grave or 
at least photograph Jim Morrison's outside Chartres.  A set by 
Charles Bukowski reinforces confrontations with mortality and a 
pervasive fin-de-sicle death-drive that the reader will not 
quickly shake off.  Other must-reads: Simon Perchik's "to feel my 
name cut in two," Mark Weber's "Holding Tank of the Damned" and 
Denise Dee's discussion of her research on AIDS.--ssn

COTTON GIN--(January 1994), 3408 Burlington Rd., Greensboro NC, 
27405.  8 pp., SASE.  The first issue of a tiny accordion-folded 
zine featuring an appealing array of poetry, prose and drawings.  
The title of one of its poems, which is by Jay Sean Neese; gives a 
good idea of the zine's style; "Sometimes You Make It Up As You Go 
Along."  Among the issue's other items is an intriguing illumage 
(i.e.; work of visual art) by editor Chris Stafford that looks 
like a page out of a notebook for a class in botany.--bg

CRADLE BOXCARS--(Fall 1993), PO Box 844, Rockford IL, 61105.  
44 pp.  Mostly solid plainstyle poems, among them the first poem 
I'd read by the notoriously black-humored Todd Moore--a fun 
anecdote about boys playing cops and robbers who happened on a man 
who seemed to be sleeping off a drunk until "jimmy went/ closer & 
sd ants/ are coming out/ of a hole/ in his head then/ he opened 
the/ door & stuck/ the gun barrel/ into the wound/ yelling look 
how/ far i can make/ it go in."--bg

CRASH COLLUSION--(#7), PO Box 49233, Austin TX, 78765.  64 pp., 
$4.00.  This issue continues exploration of the areas previously 
established: UFOs,Psychedelics, and Conspiracy Theories, but as 
Wesley has refined his editorial skills the articles have 
deepened.  Where once most would have dismissed CRASH COLLUSION 
as just another fringe rag, now there is much here worth 
consideration by even the most skeptical.  For instance, an 
interview with Michael A. Hoffman II who manages to read the 
"conspiracy" in world events without falling victim to easy 
conclusions.  Rather than proselytize any particular point of 
view, CC merely opens the doors for discussion and allows the 
reader to make of it what he or she will.  Free press for free 
minds.--jb

CURMUGEON--(Fall 1993), 2921 Alpine Rd., #112, Columbia SC, 29223.  
24 pp., $3.00.  Another new artzine out of Columbia, South 
Carolina, and it's packed with graphics and texts, the former 
substantially more far-out than the latter, which are mostly 
anecdotal near-prose; with bitter or sardonic punch-lines--like 
one poem, by Robert B. Howington, in which a woman joins the 
narrator in an elevator, after she stops the elevator and 
undresses; saying it makes her feel like a woman, the narrator 
undresses, too, but then hands his clothes to the woman and asks 
her to fold them.--bg

DATA DUMP--(#7 & 8, 1993), Hilltop Press, 4 Nowell Place, 
Almondbury, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, UK, HD58PB.  4 pp. @, 
$1.00 @.  DATA DUMP is a bibliographic project of SF-related 
poetry, and these two issues focus particularly on genre poems 
containing nuclear holocaust imagery.  There's quite a bit, & it's 
nice to see (as a non-fan) concerns for the present-day dangers of 
technology-run-rampant, as well as hypothetical futures, 
addressed.  This is definitely for fans, tho, as there's no 
contact information for most of the publications (most of the zine 
listings mention only name/issue#).  And the tiny handwritten text 
is difficult to read.--lbd

DISCARD,--(Postcard Series #1), PO Box 146640, Chicago IL, 60614.  
15 pp., $3.00.  In this series we get what is essentially a 
chapbook worth of poems and collages by Jeff Ferrell.  Each 
postcard begins with "Greetings From...", and a poem follows, 
incorporating great lines like: "Why do BMWs smell like blood?/ 
Why do poodles eat chicken?/ Why does money talk?  Why do 
shopping/ malls feel like prison?"  While some of the cards have 
stronger images than words, or vise versa, the overall collection 
works well and continues publisher Andy Lowry's efforts to push 
publishing as far as it can go without falling off the edge.--o

DREAMS AND NIGHTMARES--(#42, Spring 1994), 1300 Kicker Rd., 
Tuscaloosa, Al, 35404.  20 pp., $2.00.  This issue features one-
word poems, fifteen of them, including G. Huth's "unneceszxzsary" 
and John Graywood's "Fredulent", which is titled "Psychofeit."  
Among the longer poems in D&N are a very funny one by editor 
David-Kopaska-Merkel about brain-lobe rental, and a charming one 
by Carolyn Ann Schirmbeck Cambell about a little girl's eventually 
shrinking small enough to play Afternoon Tea under her bed with 
her friends, Mr. and Mrs. Caper.--bg

DRIVER'S SIDE AIRBAG--(#11, January 1994), PO Box 25760, Los 
Angeles CA, 90025.  20 pp., $1.60.  This issue captures editor 
Robert Howington's political side, some fine hysteria by Cynthia 
Hendershot, and that mandatory Lyn Lifshin angst.  A wonderful 
uplifting Terry Everton hands over one of the finest bitter 
hangovers I've read in a long time.  There's also an essay about 
inter-racial pornography, several short stories, and a few pages 
of music reviews.--o

DRIVER'S SIDE AIRBAG--(#12, Spring 1994), PO Box 25760, Los 
Angeles CA, 90025.  26 pp., $2.50.  The highlights in this issue 
were: John Grey's "Soldiers Been And Gone" ("I think of those 
stilted young men,/ rifles growing out of their flesh,/ 
interrogating only that tiny part/ of us that has something to 
hide"); a few prose poems by Cynthia Hendershot; a long 
surrealistic poem by Halchin that left nerve endings snapping in 
my head; a Weinman poem that I truly admired ("Most of the animals 
I fucked/ didn't stay for seconds, or/ come back later for more"); 
a few music, chap, book reviews; and (God only knows how Howington 
did it) a few Lyn Lifshin poems that I actually liked.--o

ENDING THE BEGIN N4--(Spring 1994), PO Box 4816, Seattle WA, 
98104.  25 pp., $1.00.  Stiff-covered 2" x 3" zine with short 
mostly coarse fun stuff like Tim Tate's "I just can't fart/ loud./ 
No matter how hard/ I try,/ it's always quiet."  But also, some 
cleverful semi-experimental pieces like one by Sandy Plotnikoff 
called "see ann / c an," that discusses and includes a picture of 
some Anns kicking some cans, and does much more than this 
description might suggest.--bg

EPOCH--(Fall 1993), 251 Goldwin Smith Hall, Cornell Univ., Ithica 
NY, 14853.  96 pp., $5.00.  Short stories, poems, and an essay 
that I couldn't tell from the short stories except for it's label.  
Just about all of these focus on aimless, small lives (an 
unfulfilled farmer, a tradition-shorn young priest).  Though 
invariably sensitive, clear-voiced, and tricked out with 
authenticizing details, they never go anywhere very far.--bg

EXILE--(Vol. 2 #2, Spring 1994), 149 Virginia St. #7, St. Paul MN, 
55102.  8 pp., free fr postage ($.52).  The "New & Neglected" 
column is still here, featuring reviews of Jack Spicer, Jonathan 
Brannen, Andrew Joran and a few others.  But the balance seems to 
shift more & more toward the satirical and humorous--an interview 
with the Devil on how to make it in the poetry world; an excerpt 
from the forthcoming "Selected Blurbs and Prefaces of Robert 
Creeley"; Tom Phan's catalog of fingernail references in Samuel R. 
Delany's autobiography; and a list of soon-to-be-chic Poetry 
Fashions.  The humor is smart and pointed, almost bitter--inside 
jokes for the not quite insiders of the poetry world.--lbd

EXPERIODDICIST--(February 1993), PO Box 3112, Florence AL, 35630.  
4 pp.  Another one-contributor issue, in this case the under-known 
Darrel L. Pritchard, a poet currently doing about everything one 
can with fruitful distortions of syntax, crossed content, and 
plain old Grand Vocabulary.  One example; a few lines from his 
"Chaos": "Of becoming.  Voluminous incognito acceleration/ 
damnity.  The reich ol matter bedlam under/ Shintoism the 
antechamber filled with."--bg

EXPERIODDICIST--(November 1993), PO Box 3112, Florence AL, 35630.  
4 pp.  All kinds of farsome teXts in this one, like the poem by 
mike kessel that ends: "loplops mes laters ofs initials r. 's 
mutts"; or Gregory St. Thomasino's fascinating "Elegy for 
Christopher Smart," which seems to be a short verse-bio of the 
sometime-institutionalized English poet in words mostly chopped 
off in the front as in the following passage: "...he/ geous/ ent 
to/ s/ t/ mmitted;"--bg

FACE THE DEMON--(#8), 3077 Garner Creek Rd., Dickson TN, 37055.  
$2.00?  With a slap-together rough look of street insurgence, FACE 
THE DEMON regularly assaults the Nashville area with gritty 
poetry, clippings, subversive collage, etc.  The work doesn't 
originate totally in Nashville though and its actually an eclectic 
dose.  Some of the work reads like poetry manifesto while other 
rambles strange confession or sings the body angst-wired.  This is 
the underbelly entrails of decline.--jb

FEEDBACK--(#18), 619 N. Magnolia, Lansing MI, 48912.  24 pp., 
$2.00.  Editor Carol Schneck has published many zines over the 
years--some of them were mailart, others consisted of her brutally 
honest stories and poetry, but all of them were powerful humane 
publications.  In FEEDBACK she features a lot of the regulars in 
the smallest presses (Donny Smith, Edward Mycue, Michael Dec, 
Charlie Nash, Kyle Hogg, and Carol herself) doing what they do 
best--forcing us to reexamine reality by knocking off the 
artificial shells and making us crawl inside the action.  Heavy 
doses of existentialism, recreational drug use, love & hate & 
sunshine--the norms of the edge, and what make that life worth 
living.--o

FEH!--(#16), 147 Second Ave #603, New York NY, 10003.  $2.00.  
The best way to relate what happens in these pages is to quote one 
of the shorter poems in its entirety, so here is "Liturgical 
Quandry" by r.J. dates:
          During the service,
          the pastor farted.
          It was a stern and resonant fart.
          But no one could figure where it fit
          in the liturgy.
Bodily excretions, oozing sores, low humor turned into mana, the 
raw fodder of material existence with a religious zeal.  This 
issue is divided evenly between poetry and a letters section that 
is just as depraved and inventive as the poetry.  Reading FEH! has 
the effect of reminding you of your own gritty reality while 
making you laugh and think.  And as always plenty of great 
visuals, from classic to contemporary, that invoke the same 
paradoxical Epiphanies as the text.  When the sewers wax eloquent 
it smells like FEH!--jb

FLAMING ENVELOPES--(#3), PO Box 470186, Fort Worth TX, 76147.  
12 pp., $1.00.  Xerox-duplicated shock poetry underground.  Editor 
Robert W. Howington edits this zine between games of minor league 
hockey in Texas.  Go figure.  Poetry by Linda Lerner, Todd Moore, 
England's Andrew Darlington, and a few others.  Gregory N. Coursen 
is "Homemade Ice Cream Press Poet of the Year" for 1993, and six 
of his poems are included.  Ian A. Woods writes about having a 
watch stolen in Tangiers, a la Bill Burroughs, while engaged in 
sex with an Arab boy.  W. Bryan Massey III does something entirely 
disgusting with his dog; the poem aptly demonstrates the absurd 
lengths of shock poetry.  Graphics by Blair Wilson, Dawne, and 
Pschot.  "Psycho Joe," a cartoon by Pcshot, instructs on various 
mass murder and wholesale destruction techniques.  FLAMING 
ENVELOPE is thin, but each element within is volatile.--kn

FLYING DOG--(April 1994), Vol. 2, No. 2, PO Box 66534, Baton Rouge 
LA, 70806.  $3.00.  Focusing primarily on naturalistic voice 
poetry, or essays of similar ordinary mind.  This issue opens with 
another of those gritty collaborations by Joe Speer and John 
Knoll, and continues with a page of Janet Kuypers' "short" series 
of poems.  There are essays, screeds, confessions with a good mix 
of comics, original and borrowed graphics.  They should have this 
in waiting rooms instead of all those commercial craprags.--jb

FRAYED--PO Box 3756, Erie PA, 16508.  36 pp., $3.00,.  Billed as 
"the real fuckin' on-the-edge verse & rant magazine," FRAYED 
consciously attempts to push the envelope of acceptability.  
Poetry by Todd Moore, Cheryl A Townsend, Paul Weinman, Ron 
Androla, Ana Christy, and others.  Marijuana, homosexuality, 
pornography, and copious anti- Americanism predominates.  
Illustrations by John Howard, Ron Androla, and Mike Diana, who 
was busted in Florida for obscenity.  Included here is the search 
warrant used on Ana and Dave Christy; Ana writes about "empty 
shells of commando pork" on the opposite page.  The back cover of 
this zine holds a photo of a nameless rectum spread open for the 
camera.  I'm not certain why this is included, except to widen the 
radical, in-your-face character of this zine.  Somebody, at least, 
had enough foresight to put the words "Adults Only" on the cover.
--kn

FREE LUNCH--(#12, Summer 1993), PO Box 7647, Laguna Niguel CA, 
92607.  32 pp., $3.50.  Editor Ron Offen keeps rejecting my poems 
but I continue to like most of the poems he doesn't reject for his 
magazine, however non-experimental: e.g., Henry Jacquez's "dock 
poem/ Ford truck poem,/ Clattering teeth,/ Propane tank poem."  
Not so sure I go along with Offen's thoughts herein on what a 
"serious" poet is and isn't, though, or believe it a question 
worth pursuing.--bg

FROZEN HYPNOSIS--(#8), Box 41, Waukau WI, 54980.  free or trade.  
The mutant collage geniuses Malok and Bern Porter have been 
creating a collaborative body of work in recent years that bears 
extensive cataloging and publishing.  This is but a small sample 
of that collaboration.  Utilizing the discarded elements of 
materialist culture and original visuals accompanied by 
recontextualized popular faces and headlines, we find ourselves 
immersed in an oddly familiar otherness.  These collages are the 
sublunary script of human entropy, though not an entropy of 
despair but of hallucinatory release from the oppression of 
sensory overload.--jb

FUEL--(#5, Fall 1993), PO Box 146640, Chicago IL, 60614.  66 pp., 
#3.00.  In this new issue of FUEL we get Joe Mason accounting for 
six bullets in a surrealistic fashion that hits it on the mark.  
Ann Erickson's independent burst of maturity piece has a woman 
going out on her own, proving her worth, and feeling beautiful as 
a result.  Opo's art piece left me with a graphic gut feeling of 
words coming on in one long burst of bombardment.  And that's just 
a quick look at the surface.  There's a lot of angst, anger, 
freedom, and independence in these pages, breaking around the 
frustration of society.  It's good writing, thoughtful humane 
editing, and a glimmer of hope for the survivors.--o

FUEL--(#6/7, Winter 1994), PO Box 146640, Chicago IL, 60614.  
66 pp., $3.00.  In this issue, Lisa Manning's "the edge of it 
sticks in your eye" leads off with a drug poem: "you wonder/ what 
it's doing to you now/ what deep holes are being drilled/ into 
what part of your body,/ you wonder just for a moment/ how long 
you got to live."  Nicole Panter strikes again with the insightful 
"Cactus Garden," carrying with it the nostalgia of talking puppets 
made out of wood that dance on your knee.  And then more Lisa 
Manning--with so many pieces that click, she deserves every page 
she got.--o

FURTHER STATE(S) OF THE ART--(#3, 1992), 100 Manhattan Ave. 
Suite 1210, Union City NJ, 07087.  30 pp., $5.00.  A newsletter 
containing interviews and high-powered, thoughtful discussions of 
new American fiction, on pages split into "Antagonisms" (or 
"Ambivalences") and "Enthusiasms,", a peppy idea I found 
effective.  Like his colleague at ZYX, Arnold Skemer, editor Phil 
Leggiere covers books he considers important regardless of 
copyright date or notoriety.  Well-worth reading.--bg

GAIA--(#1 & 2, April/July 1993), PO Box 709, Winterville GA, 
30683.  54 pp., $6.00.  The majority of the fiction and poetry in 
the premiere GAIA is pro-earth of the warm and fuzzy New Age 
variety.  It is, however, finely crafted stuff, especially the 
poetry.  Be prepared for work that moves with a rhythm of a 
glacier and the sound of a distant river... this stuff takes it's 
time unwinding.  The stories are iffy (you've seen it all before, 
but these old chestnuts are at least retold in a competent 
manner); the poetry is sound-alike but assuredly penned.--rkk

GENERATOR: "Dissembling/Dismantling"--(#6, 1994), 8139 Midland 
Rd., Mentor OH, 44060.  100 pp., $6.00.  The latest in these 
annual anthologies of experimental poetry.  I was happy to see 
more of the visual in here, perhaps a result of GENERATOR's role 
in putting out the excellent CORE reference last year.  While not 
every piece appears to follow the theme, there is lots of 
interesting writing here.  Some highlights: Bob Grumman's 
redefinition of "The Intellect At Work" (a visual poem that 
derives from the 1980s work of Crag Hill), Jane Reavill Ransom 
tuff guy deconstruction raps, Paul Widenohoff's visual 
contribution, George Hartley's noble but unfollowable multitrack 
analysis of Nick Piombino's poetry (there's a visual analogue to 
Talmudic texts with commentary), Richard Kostelanetz's storyboard 
(which looks much more interesting on the page than it would on 
screen, i think), William Benson's "Farewell Reminder", and i'm 
sure i missed some...--ar
     John Byrum's "international anthology of visual and language 
poetries" has a broad and inclusive focus in this issue; it's a 
magazine written by and for people interested in experimental 
work, not a curriculum vitae inflator, though some of the 
contributors are very well known (Bruce Andrews, Stephen-Paul 
Martin, Susan Smith Nash)and at least one is a tenure-track 
professor at a major state university.  A good list of 
contributors: Will Alexander, Nico Vassilakis, Sheila E. Murphy, 
John M. Bennett, Bob Grumman, Andy Levy, Joel Lipman and George 
Hartley appear here.  Michael Basinski deconsonates Edgar Allan 
Poe's "Eldorado"; Jane Reavill Ransom (like a dog I once had) 
pulls famous theorists' socks down and grins at their 
discomfiture; Gregory K.H. Bryant juxtaposes Machiavelli's maxims 
with technical diagrams; William Benson's "Farewell Reminder" 
collects the "errors" his typewriter correction ribbon recorded; 
W.B. Keckler's "My Egypt" visually reworks evocative, 
heterogeneous, broken phrases.  Each page of this magazine is 
almost a genre in itself; compare to the standardized layouts of 
mainstream journals, which totalize the form of their supposedly 
diverse contents.  Contact addresses are given for all 
contributors.--cp

GRIST ON-LINE--(Dec. 1993), Box 20805 Columbus Circle Sta., New 
York NY, 10023.  96 (virtual) pp., free if down-loaded--email 
requests to <Grist@phantom.com>.  The first specimen of electronic 
experioddica I've come across.  It includes several first-rate 
cutting-edge textual poems by poets like Andrew Gettler, Jurado 
and Jerome Rothenberg (from 1968!), and a good variety of 
articles, some very helpfully concerned with the art-dissemination 
aspects of the Internet and other computer-age matters I, for one, 
am not too up on.--bg

HAMBONE--(#11, Spring 1994), 134 Hunolt St., Santa Cruz CA, 95060.  
250 pp., $14/2 issues.  Edited by Nathaniel Mackey.  A recent 
scarlet manifestation of HAMBONE continues the journal's decade 
(plus) streak of vigorous and elastic editions, presenting high-
quality lyricism by 30 important writers from various locations of 
place and verse.  The cover's skeletalized figures dancing with 
elbows and knees locked, and, wordwise, the excerpt from Will 
Alexander's "Isolation, Neutrality, and Limbo" particularly 
illustrate HAMBONE's serious though not always grimacing organism 
of poetics forms, where "breath and bone" remain the writing 
giving waters.  Labyrinthine as ever, HAMBONE #11 begins with Tan 
Lin's "Anyone Can Perform//an interlocking series of 
'random/codes' or information patterns..." and subsequently takes 
the reader through Ed Roberson's urban heron-watching reflections, 
three "Odes of the Extravageted" by Gustav Sobin, Willard 
Gingerich's detailed interview with Armand Schwerner, and "The 
Delights of Memory, I: Lily," a one-act play by Jay Wright, among 
many further complementary and sophisticated strands of poetry, 
telling and singing.  Alexander's piece, addressing an "environ of 
upset, of weakened gregarious eating," in which "carnivorous 
instigation will more fully evince its unseasonable tremor, 
creating collapse by orchestration," is a fulfilling meditation on 
the curiosities and whirlwind of our Babylon, a call to action, to 
realization, and, actually, to kindness for our worlds, "no longer 
swayed by rewards, by ego-centered missives and doctrines."  Don 
Byrd's "Manifesto: Culture War," a partial condensation of his 
discursive prose of the last decade, also seeks "to find the way 
from misery to felicity."  As ever, HAMBONE distills one of the 
more energizing reading experiences on the American poetry scene.
--cf

HARDBOILED--(#16, August 1993), PO Box 280-209, Brooklyn NY, 
11228.  100 pp., $6.00.  There are times I wonder whatever 
happened to the good old days when people were politically 
incorrect, backstabbing vicious fools.  I wonder why I can get 
killed faster and with more wounds than in the past, I can expect 
a million more things to go wrong in the next decade than in the 
past decade, but I cannot accuse anyone of doing me wrong because 
they are economically disabled or psychologically maladjusted.  
I wonder why there aren't more magazines like HARDBOILED out 
there, mining this turf, breaking every rule in the book.--o

HEARTLANDS TODAY--(Vol. 3, 1993), Bottom Dog Press/ Firelands 
College, Huron, OH, 44839.  160 pp., $ 7.50.  The theme, and 
subtitle this year is "Art and Society," and it covers the heart 
of innovative art, using essays, critical reviews, poetry, and 
visually refreshing black and white graphics in abstract and 
surreal motifs.  Included are works by Nick Dragovich and Michael 
E. Waldecki of Black River Review, Sam Hamill of Copper Canyon 
Press, Chicago's Effie Mihopoulos, and dozens of other writers 
whose voices are contemporary, powerful and concise.--rrle

HOWLING DOG--(Fall 1993), 8419 Rhode, Utica MI, 48317.  64 pp., 
$5.00.  The focus here is poetry and short pose that snipes--the 
targets are various, but gentility is certainly #1.  One poem, for 
instance, is a long list by Michael Foster of instructions from a 
poetry magazine editor, including the standard injunction against 
poems that are "pornographic, racist sexist/ or (demeaning to) 
animals/ domestic or wild...".  The zine also contains a revealing 
reminiscence by Gabriel Monteleone Neruda of time spent some forty 
years ago with Dylan Thomas and Salvadore Dali, and a handful of 
informative mini-review of other publications by editor Mark 
Donovan.--bg

IMPETUS--(#21), 4975 Comanche Trail, Stow OH, 44224.  145 pp., 
$4.00.  With a huge backlog, editrix Cheryl Townsend has kicked 
into high gear by doubling up her issues, and this one strikes 
with the impact of a sucker punch from a stranger.  Giles Scott's 
"Wishbone" captures the yearning for children in simple, 
passionate words.  Mark Weber spins a tale of pennies at the 
liquor store, while Tom House carries on the beat tradition with a 
tale of lost love and no money to cover the costs.  Judson Crews, 
Ron Androla, Kurt Nimmo, and many other small press heroes cut so 
deep you wonder why you don't see blood on your skin.  Angst so 
fine tuned you have to catch your breath between the pages.--o

THE IMPLODING TIE-DYED TOUPEE--(Winter 1994), 100 Courtland Dr., 
Columbia SC, 29223.  36 pp., $3.50.  A wide selection of visual 
and "snapped-context" poems, and various kinds of collages.  Just 
the title of the poem here by Sheila E. Murphy is enough to prove 
the superiority of this zine's zine to me: "Climbless Afternoons 
(Away, Apart From)." Another high is Michael Estabrook's 
brilliant/dopey combination of non-representational drawing, the 
four symbols of the suits in a deck of cards and a woman's 
frustration with a... flat tire.--bg

IN YOUR FACE--(#7, Fall/Winter 1993), PO Box 6872, New York NY, 
10128.  32 pp., $3.00.  Unrelenting tough city poetry and 
graphics, framed by a wild editorial rant on vivisection, make 
this a jolting cover-to-cover trip.  High points and sudden 
precipices include Judy Meiksin's meditation on penile 
amputation--"these men would have dragged the rivers/ all day & 
night,/ searched the fisher's nets/ in case they swept it up/ by 
mistake,/ cut open belly after belly/ of fish in case one 
swallowed it..."--and Lyn Lifshin's horrifying expose of Thai 
smugglers who move their heroin across border in the bodies of 
murdered infants.  Besides being a powerful poem, this piece 
reportedly was instrumental in bringing about an Amnesty 
International investigation into the practice.  Then, in "Dogs," 
Paul X admonishes those of his peers who would disrespect women: 
"I wonder if Harriet or Rosa would have bothered/ if they could 
look thru the veils of time/ and see you calling the womanhood/ 
'Bitches', 'Skeezers', and 'Hoes'// I wonder if your mother would 
have bothered/ if she knew what kind of animal you would grow up 
to be?"  IN YOUR FACE's title says it all, and the editor clearly 
knows how to pick the writers to make that happen.  Number 8, 
which should be out by now, is a women's issue.  Anyone who's read 
this one can't help but eagerly anticipate it.--sf

INDEFINITE SPACE--(Vol. 2 #2, Winter 1993), PO Box 40101, Pasadena 
CA, 91114.  32 pp., $3.00.  An elegant range of work, wider than 
might seem at first, attesting to the judgment of editors Kevin 
Joy and Marcia Arrieta.  Evocative fables (Simon Perchik, Bernard 
Hewitt) co-existing with 21st century zen (Randall Brock, Thomas 
Willoch) and visual poetry (Arrieta, Greg Bryant).--dr
     A carefully chosen collection of work by 21 poets with each 
poem featured on a page to itself.  There are a number of nicely 
imagistic poems here, such as those by Corrine DeWinter and 
Bernard Hewitt; some excellent minimalist pieces by Thomas 
Willoch, Guy R. Beining, Marica Arrieta, Ann Erickson, and others; 
and some fine surrealist deconstructionist work by Kevin Joy, 
Jeffrey Skeate, and Gregory K.H. Bryant.  A nicely produced 
magazine in which the work, though displaying great stylistic 
variety, has in common a fine delicacy, imagistic sensibility, and 
lack or verbosity.--jmb

INK--(Fall 1993), HSS 127, SFSU, 1600 Holloway Ave., San Francisco 
CA, 94132.  77 pp., $3.50.  A nice collection of solid writing and 
graphics taking off, in this issue, from Barthes' "Text of 
Jouissance," or text that unsettles; etc.  Enjoyable but 
academicized rather to the rear of the crises in our relation to 
language that the magazine's stated aim is to explore; as one 
would expect from its quotations from Barthes, Lacan and Derrida 
and other museum figures.--bg

INTERRUPTIONS--(#1, 1994), 131 North Pearl St., Kent OH, 44240, 
82 pp., $8.00, Ed. by Tom Beckett, the editor of The Difficulties, 
one of the most influential and rigorous of journals featuring 
experimental and Language poetries.  This is a stunning debut, 
with collaborations testing the limits of voice, representation, 
and authorial presence.  "I'm Not Here: A Report from the First 
Festival of New Poetry at SUNY Buffalo" by Leslie Bumstead, Jean 
Donnelly, Joe Ross, Rod Smith is a standout, with funny & 
subversive cut-and-paste juxtapositions:  "the gun went click/ 
in the class picture/ they want to take us back."--ssn

KETTLE OF FISK--(Vol. 3, #3), 16 East Johnson Street #C, 
Philadelphia PA, 19144.  $1.00.  It is always a delight to see 
KOF in the mail.  Small enough to fit in your hip pocket, it's a 
mail art journal, complete with interviews, editorials, articles, 
letters, and reviews & packed with computer graphics, line 
drawings and collages of a decidedly bent nature.  In this issue 
afungusboy attempts to define networking beyond the usual 
assumptions, John Held follows this with an article that places 
"International Networker Culture" into art history perspective.  
Later Baphomet appears murderous and horny on a tv set advertising 
beer, people have tvs instead of heads, etc, documentation of a 
television mailart project.  You'll never get this kind of 
information from CNN, or anywhere else knownstream.--jb

LACTUCA--(#17, April 1993), PO Box 621, Suffern, NY, 10901.  
72 pp., $4.00.  As usual with LACTUCA, #17 is a solid effort 
presenting dynamic work from a couple dozen different poets and 
writers.  This issue is subtitled "The Jaws of Factory," taken 
from the first poem in the magazine (by Peter Bakowski).  It's a 
fitting title and intro to the magazine's theme--most of the poems 
in here have a Metropolis-style attitude and a smoky, gritty feel.  
Although, only a few of these poems are actually about working in 
factories.  In addition to the poetry, there's also a fistful of 
better-than-average stories--nearly everything in this issue 
works.--rkk

LETTER eX--(#93, April/May 1994), PO Box 476920, Chicago IL, 
60647.  24 pp, $2.00?  "Chicago's Poetry Newsmagazine".  In this 
issue there are several Bukowski letters, and excellent interview 
with Paul Hoover (Lorri Jackson's creative writing teacher), a 
calendar of poetry events, a poetry profile on David Haupteschein, 
poetry book reviews, a review of HYPHEN (one of the best literary 
magazines in the city), and bits and pieces of everything else you 
need to know about poetry in Chicago.  I personally thrive on the 
letters column, where local poets viciously attack each other on 
issues like are poetry slams really poetry or are they simply 
performance art.--o

LILLIPUT REVIEW--(#55, April 1994), 207 S. Millvale Ave #3, 
Pittsburgh PA, 15224.  16 pp., $1.00.  LILLIPUT REVIEW reminds me 
of that windowpane acid they used to sell in the early 70's--tiny, 
but potent enuf to rip the eyes out of your head.  Hugh Fox's 
"Inside" captures the underlying youthful creature hidden behind 
an aging facade: "...these are the breasts,/ nibbles and the hair 
falls back/ from the face revealing the/ girl still under the 
almost-old/ lady"; Arthur Winfield Knight creates history in a 
scratch at Custer's National Battlefield; and Alan Catlin reaches 
through the snow to touch dreams lying just below the surface.--o

LIME GREEN NEWS--(#7, Feb. 1994), PO Box 626, Green Mt. Falls CO, 
80819.  $1.00? or trade.  A mail art mag primarily focusing on 
correspondence between the editor (Carolyn Substitute) and various 
otherstreamers including Al Ackerman in fine form, apparently 
responding to previous issues, but with Ackerman one never knows.  
Malok contributes some of his God inkblots, including "God's 
Sperm" and "God's Ovum", there's an alien talismanic collab. by 
John M. Bennett and Serge Segay, a Carolyn doll with "date 
accessories" by RetroCrispy, and much more.  Classic mail art 
devised by classic deviants.--jb

THE LITTLE MAGAZINE--(#20, 1994), English Dept., SUNY Albany, 
Albany NY, 12222.  200 pp., $7.00.  Another lit-mag sponsored by 
a university English department, this one distinguishes itself in 
several ways.  Serious attention is payed to performance, 
intermedia, & collaborative work--an interview with performing 
poets/storytellers The Snickering Witches, a performance script by 
Anne Waldman, Amy Schoch's "opera for two voices" (libretto only), 
and work by computer-mediated writing collaborators Awopbopaloobop 
Groupuscle.  Another nice touch is presenting both creative work 
and critical reviews written by the same artist, providing insight 
into the writer as reader, and thus providing valuable context.
--lbd  

LOST & FOUND TIMES--(#32, May 1994), 137 Leland Ave., Columbus OH, 
43214.  54 pp., $5.00.  Editor John M. Bennett conducts this 
matrix of othermind invention that manifests in the poetics, 
graphics and scatological verbignosis of a gang of artists so far 
beyond convention that there is simply no relevance from that 
perspective. T he reader must dive in and accept the work here on 
its own terms and surrender to the phantasmagoria of the western 
mind (to wax oxymoronic) inverted, like an eyelid turned inside 
out, like a mirror that refuses to reflect.  There is a directness 
in much of this work, directness in the sense of experience 
without psychological projection.  LAFT 32 is a shamanic trickster 
dose, page after page packed with words and images that defy 
ordinary analysis.  This is revolution where it counts, in the 
dangerous depths of the imagination.--jb

LOVE PROJECT--(1993), PO Box 8766, Portland OR, 97207.  84 pp.  
The second thematic compilation edited by Thomas Lowe Taylor, 
focusing on a topic that is difficult to write about well or 
innovatively.  The 60+ contributors to this volume, however, show 
that is indeed possible to write about love in unique, personal, 
and entirely new ways, which shows that love can be approached not 
as an exercise in recombinant cliches, but as a dynamic part of 
the writer's life experience and processes of consciousness.  The 
collection is primarily poetry, with some visuals and prose works, 
and provides a wide variety of reich and thought-provoking 
reading.  The contributors' list reads like a who's who of 
innovative writers, but includes as well several names new to this 
reviewer.--jmb

LOWER LIMIT SPEECH: A NEWSLETTER IN POETICS--(#8, 1993), 1743 
Butler Ave. #2, Los Angeles CA, 90025.  Stapled 8.5 x 11 sheets of 
reproduced typescript, containing poetry and innovative and post-
language style poetry and prose.  This issue has work by Bruce 
Andrews, Nico Vassilakis, Curt Anderson, Jessica Freeman, Dennis 
Barone, John Crouse, Alan Davies, Greg Fuchs, Jeff Conant, and a 
review of a book of Bataille's by Tyrus Miller.  All of this work 
is challenging and stimulating and pushes the boundaries of 
literature.  My favorites here are the long poem "Ing Trance" by 
Vassilakis, and the three texts by Anderson with their word-play, 
syntactic conflation, and lively images and concepts: "the wind in 
and out of mental institutions succumbs an airplane/ eating the 
air above eyes nested in newsprint close like two/convenience 
stores and or day is edited for tragedy latenight/ dangerous 
deskset perfumed with adjectives a sky blue vase balanced."--jmb

MA!/MAN ALIVE--(#4, Summer 1993), PO Box 221, Oceanside NY, 11572.  
20 pp., $2.50.  While some of the articles and such here are a 
little bit more traditional than I would normally read, MA! has 
decent writing and fills me in on a few things I wouldn't 
otherwise have know about.  In this issue for example, coverage of 
a Spoken Word Review of T.A.Z., a Bay Area extravaganza of well 
known writers (Hakim Bey, Robert Anton Wilson) and performance 
artists.  Then there's a brief discography of The Fugs, several 
poems (some good, some so-so), a review of Bob Geldof's "The Happy 
Club," some Zine reviews, and some great illustrations scattered 
throughout the issue.--o

THE sssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssspondence issue; Tony 
Anello, Todd Kalinski, Batya Goldman, Peter Magliocco, Diane M. 
Calabrese, Ron Androla and others participate with letters, poems, 
and short stories.  There is much text here, all of it reduced 
down to eye-strain mode on a copier--too many '90s zines need to 
include plastic magnifiers with the subscription.  Especially 
prolific in this issue is Chicago writer Batya Goldman, who 
describes the revenge of prostitutes in her story "Medusa Goes to 
Traffic Court."  Ron Androla draws a caricature of himself at the 
bottom of one letter reproduced here; his bizarre story, "Alien 
Friend," posits a sullen and drunken worker insulting a friendly 
E.T.-like creature.  Drawings by Walt Phillips and Gwym.  Finally, 
in a parting editorial shot, Greg Carter indicates that if the 
readers of THE MAGIC MOUNTAIN do not like his aesthetic theories, 
they "can, you know, kiss my ass."--kn

MAJENTA--(Vol. 1 #2, May 1993), 2300 Central SE Suite B #116, 
Albuquerque NM, 87106.  36 pp.  Subtitled, "for the amusement of 
the lost girl of april".  Diverse and unique, irresistibly-charged 
with mythical images, witty enchantments, spell-binding hoaxes, 
poetry, short stories, sardonic advise, music reviews with a 
slant, wandering columns, irony, line art, ink blots, odes, a 
movie review, and (generally) the unexpected.  Uncensored but not 
raunchy.--rrle

MAJENTA--(Vol. 1 #3, Fall 1993), 2300 Central SE Suite B #116, 
Albuquerque NM, 87106.  32 pp.  Basically a collection of 
anonymous slams, one an editorial against New Age Mysticism of the 
kind that trades self-reliance for blind belief in the stars.  But 
it also includes poems, and a lot of satire.  Energetic, crude, 
and amusing--"Preferred by 40 out of 303 Popes."--bg

MEAT EPOCH--(Fall 1993), 3055 Decatur Ave., Apt 20, Bronx NY, 
10467.  4 pp., SASE.  The usual assortment of what I'm now calling 
"burstnorm poetry" (for poetry that's neither conventional free or 
traditional formal verse)--although Mike Kettner's "open sea/an 
empty parking lot in the moonlight" [his slash] is close to 
conventional (but I like it a lot), and editor Gregory St. 
Thomasino's "Exphrasis No. 15" is clearly a variation (and a fine 
one) on Shakespeare's sonnet about the "bare, ruined choirs."--bg

MYSTERIOUS WYSTERIA--(#5, Spring 1994), 335 East Erie, Lorain OH, 
44052.  30 pp., $1.00.  A magazine that goes straight for the gut, 
knocking the breath out of you, then kicking you hard again, in 
the same spot, to make sure you got the message.  Paul Weinman 
fucks & bleeds & seduces, Terence Bishop gets busted on the subway 
for hustling a female cop, J. Csiki gets us ripped off and knocked 
off in a burst of energy, and Eric E. Scott gives us the anger and 
fear and hysteria .  A zine with an edge, getting sharper every 
issue.--o

NANCY'S MAGAZINE--(Vol. 9, Winter 1993-1994), PO Box 02108, 
Columbus OH, 43202.  32 pp., $7.50.  Great news, it's back!  
This is the Ground issue.  This is a complete miscellany in the 
tradition of (perhaps) the nineteenth century miscellany.  The 
sort of thing a bunch of librarians might come up with.  And it is 
indeed informative: baby-perspective landscape photos, cartoons on 
scientific topics, recipes, a poll, personal reminiscences, a few 
poems, and even some seeds you can grow.  Most of which relates to 
soil in some way.--ar

NEW MUSE OF CONTEMPT--(October 1993), PO Box 596 Stn. A, 
Fredericton New Brunswick, CANADA, E3B 5A6.  32 pp., $3.50.  
Among the first artzines I've seen with poems (by Arthur Bull) 
containing printed music intended to visually and conceptually 
work off the texts rather than just conventionally accompany them.  
Lots of interesting graphics, too, including one by Patrick 
Oulette called "Research & Development," in which a backward 
rendering of "3%" is set right--which to me seems a wonderful 
satire on commercial "creativity."--bg

NORTH AMERICAN IDEOPHONICS--(Spring 1994), 227 Montrose Place; 
Apt. C, St. Paul MN, 55104.  7 pp., $1.25?  One in a series of 
essays concerned with poetry, poets, poetics, etc.  This one is 
called, "Culture War III: Ecstasy," and is by Donald Byrd.  It's a 
first-rate rant against modernism, but Byrd is sometimes as 
foolishly narrow as modernism's most obtuse defenders, as when he 
says "not a damned thing depends on that red wheel barrow nor the 
careful structure of Williams' most famous little poem."--bg

O!! ZONE--(#9), 1266 Fountain View Dr., Houston TX, 77057.  
48 pp., $4.00.  Scattered throughout this issue are photos of 
women in various states of undress--but there's a wild abandonment 
and freedom and passion here that has less to do with sex than 
with pure creative energy.  Complimenting the photos are gentle, 
honest, and intense poems from around the world--I actually read 
some of them several times through so I could see how the textures 
worked.  Bob Grumman does a short essay on John M. Bennett, which 
Bennett then illustrates in his unique verbal style.  Robert 
Peters also kicks into high gear with a poem about 1945, his 
uncle's death, and a love for other men.  Well written poems by 
practiced poets who want to make you think and feel and recognize 
what their worlds are all about.  The pictures aren't bad, 
either.--o

O!! ZONE--(#10), 1266 Fountain View Dr., Houston TX, 77057.  
48 pp., $4.00.  Two more issues of this still very active almost-
monthly.  The first has a number of sex-centered but not 
necessarily sexy photographs, and some good plainstyle poetry by 
Cheryl Townsend, Lyn Lifshin, Alice Olds-Ellington and others.  
The second has drawing instead of photographs, and some more 
technically-adventurous poems like hand-printed one by Ken Grandon 
whose protagonist "...clumb// to/ her/ theights// zen/ jumbed/ the 
100 ft./ pole of no/ vocabulary," which I found numbily fleshful.
--bg

O!!ZONE--(#11, 1994), 1266 Fountain View Drive, Houston, TX, 
77057.  44 pp., $4.00.  Defined as "A pamphlet of words, lines, 
and images," O!!ZONE is way out there.  Artwork based on very 
symbolic, iconographic, pseudo-Olmec/Aztec -geometric-Chicano 
black-and-white line drawings somewhere between surreal, native, 
cubistic inspired, which caress the Jungian core.  The poetry is 
very imagistic, sparse, minimalistic, and in one case (Ken 
Brandon) integrated with the artwork.  "Getting laid/has nothing 
to do with/ Ancient agriculture," chants Jo, one of the poetry 
contributors.  The single short story in this issue reminds me of 
absurdist drama.--rrle

OPEN UNISON STOP--(#1), PO Box 2373, Santa Cruz CA, 95063.  
42 pp., $3.00.  This is an unpretentious, straightforward litmag 
from the folks who put out PAISLEY MOON.  O.U.S. features an 
eclectic mix of poetry, from the familiar (Lyn Lifshin, Errol 
Miller) to new voices (Jane Blue, Jim Tyack).  But their strong 
point is not in any particular genre or style; rather, the 
magazine provides a pleasing variety and unharried format.  
t. kilgore splake has a 'Nam poem in here that is also 
naturalistic and flowing, and there's a nice surprise from Gloria 
Potter, a four-part poem that really clips along and keeps an 
interest despite language that borders on colloquial.--rkk

OXYGEN--(#10, Winter 1994), 535 Geary St. #1010, San Francisco CA, 
94102.  44 pp., $2.00.  I still believe it's possible to cause 
emotional upheaval without drawing blood or whipping out the 
weapons, and OXYGEN carries a fine crew of traditional and 
rebellious writers who know how to pull reality out from 
underneath your feet.  Kimi Sugioka's "UnNatural Selection" 
carries fine-tuned lines like: "Trouble with city living is/ 
everything tends to look Darwinian/ beginning and ending with/ 
pigeons/ the way they/ peck at and walk over/ the wounded and 
sick."  George Tsongas takes us on a great slogan infested journey 
with: "no/ matter/ who/ you're/ killing/ it's/ always/ the wrong/ 
person."  Hugh Fox's great short story, "The Anesthesiologist's 
Wife," left my throat dry and my brain tap-dancing inside my 
skull; an excerpt from David Fisher's novel in progress and poetry 
from Edward Mycue &others round out this package.--o

PENNY DREADFUL REVIEW--(#6, April 1994,) 6680 Charlotte H9, 
Nashville, TN, 37209.  $1.00.  Imagine Edgar Allan Poe, the 
Marquis de Sade, and Charles Bukowski growing up in the streets 
together in the later half of the 20th century and publishing a 
mag and you'll get a sense of what's going on here.  Bondage and 
pagan imagery combined with sex, death, and dementia poetry (the 
only three categories that matter--the beginning, end, and what 
goes on in between).  The quotes from Crowley's "Book of Lies" 
seem to fit perfectly here.  Editor C Ra McGuirt is a wickedly 
brilliant intelligence and has assembled what amounts to a blunt 
instrument of subterfuge, and with streetwise surreality perhaps 
holds closer to the original meaning of genius as an inhabiting 
spirit.--jb

THE PLASTIC TOWER--(#17, December 1993), PO Box 702, Bowie MD, 
20718.  52 pp., $2.50.  A magazine that leaps right into your 
face.  Michael Newell's "The Intruder" left me with the same 
paranoia my wife & I felt after finding the passed out gangbanger 
sleeping next to our apartment door.  John Elsberg's "The Painter 
Works" (John is the editor of BOGG) captures art and poetry in 
fine swift strokes of exploration.  McNeilley's poem about his 
first beer, and all the beers that followed, struck a chord 
(although I hated my first beer, and he loved his).  Todd Moore's 
"Hurricane Johnson" carries that bitter existential angst you'd 
expect.  Graphics by Walt Philips, tolek, and Menchen.--o

POEMCARDS--(Postcard Series #2), PO Box 146640, Chicago IL, 60614.  
12 pp., $3.00.  Now here's a new angle: a postcard with a poem on 
one side, on the other, a review of the poetry collection it's 
from and bibliographic info so you can order the collection if you 
want.  Sesshu Foster guest-edited this series, and the postcards 
serve as both a reference and review source of international poets 
(Middle Eastern, Latin American, Native American, Pakistani, 
Asian, etc.) and American poets with strong ethnic ties.  Some of 
the poets: Martin Espada, Luci Tapahonso, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Leonel 
Rugama and Amy Uyematsu.  It's an interesting idea, and the 
careful selection of topics, poems, and reviews mix together 
in an impressive and innovative way.--o

POETIC BRIEFS--(#14, Dec. 1993/Jan. 1994), 19 Southern Blvd., 
Albany, NY, 12209.  16 pp., $10/6 issues.  This issue, inspired by 
David Antin's "What It Means To Be Avant-Garde", is devoted mainly 
to pithy discussions of just that question.  All kinds of 
interesting takes, among them these excepts from Shelia E Murphy: 
"False novelty after a short time.  Hair and clothing in the 
Sixties.  Multiple rebel syndrome." and: "Who writes it matters.  
To the point where anything that person spills is avant-garde."
--bg

POETIC BRIEFS--(October/November 1993), 19 Southern Blvd., Albany 
NY, 12209.  16 pp., $10/6 issues.  The now-usual assortment of 
provocative and intelligent essays, reviews, et ceteras on the 
contemporaneousest poetry afield--such as Mark Wallace's timely 
response to the L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poetry bashing that's been 
going on of late, and which Wallace perceives--rightly, I 
think--as strong evidence of the continuing importance of such 
poetry.--bg

POETIC SPACE--(Fall 1993), PO Box 11157, Eugene OR, 97440.  
19 pp., $10/yr.  A bunch of poems and stories, two essays, a 
Shakespeare review, and a loose sheet of micro-reviews.  Pete 
Lee's "Lust" gives the flavor of the majority of it's offerings: 
its narrator brings home a Burger King waitress who, knowing "the 
drill," will "wait/ until the lights go out," then crawl inside 
the narrator's wife.  The latter "has a thousand faces" and also 
"knows the drill".--bg

THE POETRY PROJECT--(December/January 1993/94), c/o St. Mark's 
Church, 131 E. 10th St., New York NY, 10003.  18 pp., $3.00.  
A pretty mainstream publication, this issue had a prosy but nice 
poem by Tony Towle about a recent party in honor Of Frank O'Hara.  
Also, the second part of an article covering the recent Buffalo 
Festival of New Poetry, whose first part I'd found almost PEOPLE 
MAGAZINE-level--author Tony Door does better this time but still 
doesn't say much about the actual poetry at the Festival.--bg

PRIME POETS SERIES--(#1), 1992, PO Box 7392, Van Nuys, CA, 91409.  
4 pp., $1.35.  One long, three page poem "Her Bitter Heart," and 
an experimental one-page prose piece "flight pattern" by Elizabeth 
Ziemba, an award-winning journalist and poet from the L.A. area.  
"...did I have any/ pictures of her, you know, before/ she snapped 
herself in two, before she splintered herself/ right off the edge 
of the world."  Ziemba has a cold snap in her images, and the pace 
is so swift we don't need a lot of filler, in fact it would only 
distort the clarity of her harshly explicit situations. "She wants 
to die/ but I know she won't/ not ever..."--rrle

PUCK: The Unofficial Journal of the Irrepressible--(Winter 1993), 
900 Tennessee, Studio 15, San Francisco CA, 94107.  78 pp., $5.55.  
Editor Brian Clark, described on the masthead of this finely 
produced zine as "Buck Stop and Chief Procrastinator," pulled out 
the stops on "a turgid cast of graphics" and repro quality for 
PUCK.  Cover art is computer generated and 4-color process.  
Inside are poems, articles, stories, and columns by the likes of 
Belinda Subraman, Rane Arroyo, B.Z. Niditch, Bob Z and others.  
There is a good solid section of reviews by Kurt Putnam, Arthur 
Winfield Knight, and Brian Clark.  B.C. Quark, in "Random 
Jottings," describes "wild anarchies of plant and beef arch-echo 
behind... quantum announcements."  Ace Backwards' "Twisted Image" 
cartoon strip appears, along with additional graphics by Barbara 
del Rio and Freddie Baer.--kn

RAW--(#13, Winter 1994), PO Box 120661, Nashville TN, 37212.  
8 pp., $1.00.  In this single-artist issue of RAW BONE, Tom 
House's work is highlighted by a strange collection of poems that 
border on rants: "sure you're free to speak in America/ LONG AS 
NOBODY HEARS YOU", or "from/ CALIFORNIA/ land of make-believe/ and 
military hardware", or "twist the world/ to your liking"--
a charged & encapsulated political anger.  There's also a 
wonderful sex poem, "a slow disintegration", which carries a 
heated seduction in the only direction it can go.  This is a small 
sampling of Tom's work, but a great place to start if you're 
interested in insightful anger, mixed with earthy desire.--o

RED DANCEFLOOR--(Vol. 1 #2), PO Box 7392, Van Nuys, CA, 91409.  
104 pp, $8.00.  Strictly poetry, seventy poems exactly, by such 
writers as Dennis Saleh, Gerald Locklin, Lyn Lifshin, Wayne Hogan, 
Robert Arroyo Jr., and dozens more.  This issue includes a feature 
poet, Marsha Muscato, who started writing poetry when she was ten.  
"My country 'tis of blues/ howling in the wind/ one whole note 
black,/ no tail or flag,/ just dry tired flesh/ full of patriotic 
fire."  Although struggling to survive, it still maintains its 
quality.--rrle

RED DANCEFLOOR--(Vol. 3 # 1), PO Box 7392, Van Nuys CA, 91409.  
76 pp., $ 5.00.  David Goldschlag and Elizabeth Ziemba are at it 
again.  This time they have assembled forty-one poems and three 
reviews--all by aspiring poets from across the country.  New kids 
on the block, like Carol Davis: "Your hometown spilled on to me/ 
like the spray which coated our faces..." radiate intuitive heat 
in bold imagistic strokes.  "His mother back home/ prays for his 
soul, /but when he returns/ she doesn't recognize him/ for he has 
grown old/ and speaks only in poems."--rrle

REPORT TO HELL--(Vol. 1 #3), PO Box 44089, Calabash NC, 28467.  
48 pp., $1.00.  This is truly one of the weirdest literary 
magazines I have ever run across.  There's a review of Jurassic 
Park (they liked it), strange poetry, an article on "Adultery: New 
York's First Ground for Divorce", an essay on art by Mike Hazard, 
a weird conspiracy tale of Kennedy's and Chuck Davis' 
assassinations, and more strange tales that make me wonder about 
the sanity of the writers.  I don't know, maybe I prefer getting 
my brains bashed out by a junky, knowing what the jerk's motives 
are, than trying to guess what's going on here.  Or maybe I don't 
have enough brains cells left to figure out the mazes in this 
magazine.  Or maybe, and I'm just saying maybe, they aren't so 
sure of what they're trying to do, either.--o

SACRIFICE THE COMMON SENSE--(#9, Fall 1992), c/o mez, #15, 
1251 S. Magnolia Ave., Los Angels CA, 90006.  52 pp., $5.00.  
This issue's a typical STCS effort; heavy on big, roughly-hewn 
b&w graphics, heavy on political rantings, but with a few good 
poems sprinkled in.  A strong essay on Leonard Peltier is followed 
by a questionable rant against U.S. relief efforts in Somalia in 
'92, penned by Roxanna Gomez.  Well, STCS has a history of loud 
and from-the-gut politicizing; agreement with their editorial 
opinions is not sought nor coddled.--rkk

SACRIFICE THE COMMON SENSE--(#10, Summer 1993), c/o mez, #15, 
1251 S. Magnolia Ave., Los Angeles CA, 90006.  50 pp., $5.00.  
This STCS has a psychotic nature--on the one hand it preaches 
altruism and first amendment rights with sound and fury, on the 
other hand the editors get on their knees and plead for money like 
a Republican preacher.  That aside, this is more typical STCS: the 
poets scream, they rant, they bay at the moon.  Highlights include 
a parcel of work by Karen Reyes Bernhard where she bares it all 
(visually and metaphorically) and a nutty bit by Sigmund Weiss.  
Low points: too much from Humberto mez, the editor.--rkk

SHATTERED WIG REVIEW--(#10), 523 E. 38th St., Baltimore MD, 21218.  
84 pp., $5.00.  There must be some strange chemicals in the 
environment around Baltimore because this thing is unreserved, 
blistering, screaming-down-the-hall, french kiss your grandmother, 
insanity.  The WIG has always been shaky in terms of cognitive 
skills, but this is over the top.  Perhaps it was Rupert's 
(Wondolowski, editor) stay in the hospital, Blaster's 
preoccupation with the mole people, the evacuation of Wig House, 
or some secret Masonic evolutionary mutation curse, but I'm not 
sure this is safe without Thorazine or a liter of Tennessee 
whiskey.  There are breasts in keyholes, there are breasts with 
faucets, there are white bats and radar showers and demons 
exposing their genitals to maidens, Zappa and Yeats hash it out 
incognito, there are hypochondriac baths and mother's on acid, and 
suddenly I'm compelled to say, "Don't be a dweeb, buy this 
magazine!"--jb

SHIT DIARY--(#8, December 1993), 3113 Bernadette Ln., Sarasota FL, 
34234.  24 pp., SASE.  Once a journal of descriptions of actual 
defecations, SD continues to mutate in form and content.  And 
while I miss the shits, I love what has replaced them.  This one 
came folded origami-like and contains an assemblage of various 
writers, sometimes as a single text.  A rough draft of part of a 
Willie Smith story reveals the mind behind the madness at work and 
a small two part surrerotic drawing by Bob Grumman are personal 
favorites here.  But an excerpt from Rane Arroyo's take on Hamlet 
that includes Sid Vicious and a variety of other weird turns is 
excellent as well.  Not a slack spot anywhere.  A good shit 
indeed.--jb

SHIT DIARY--(#9), 3113 Bernadette Ln., Sarasota FL, 34234.  
24 pp., SASE.  This one-story issue made me realize that Billy 
Graham's initials are the same as mine so I'm not going to write 
anymore about it, except to say that it contains the following 
epigraph, attributed to Richard M. Nixon: "The only thing that 
really bothered be was lack of sleep and centipedes."--bg

SHIT DIARY--(#10), 3113 Bernadette Ln., Sarasota FL, 34234.  
24 pp., SASE.  The usual combination of irreverent humor and wacko 
art--such as a loony letter by "Gladys Knapp" to AkPharma Inc. 
(maker of Beano, which she uses "in just about everything,") and 
AkPharma's reply to her inquiry about what to use with Velveeta; 
and a neato Hillian transform of "beer," in steps, to "Pee," by 
Ficus strangulensis.--bg

SILENT BUT DEADLY--(#2, April 1994), 3113 Bernadette Lane, 
Sarasota FL, 34234.  18 pp.  Second issue of a magazine devoted 
to critical responses to short poems from a variety of schools.  
This issue has 10 sets of responses to 4 poems, many of the 
responses opposing each other--which demonstrates, for me, the 
good health of the zine.  Anyone can volunteer to critique, and 
submissions of poems to critique are welcomed.  Great for those 
with a craftsman's interest in poetry--bg

SITUATION--(#5), 10 Orton Place #2, Buffalo NY, 14202.  20 pp., 
$2.00.  SITUATION #5 leads with the work of Bruce Andrews--which 
is not because his writing dictates the issue but because his last 
name begins with an "A" and the writing is therefore arranged 
alphabetically by the author's last name.  SITUATION is a magazine 
that, "explores how writing creates, dismantles, or reconstructs 
the possibility of identity."  Ray Federman, George Chambers, Jean 
Donnelly, Gary Sullivan, Carolyn Steinhoff Smith among others do.  
There is not one form of writing here but the writing is art.  
Oasis.  Elegant with space.  One is not overwhelmed with too much 
to read, and everything there is to read is readable. Been 
wondering in what bin it's been hidden?  Here is the good 
writing.--mb
     The usual formidable selection of cutting-edge nearverse and 
textual poetry--among which a piece of absolutely flat prose by 
George Chambers and Raymond Federman about games in society that 
ends with a gold anecdote.  Appearing in a poetry zine under the 
title "Race, Gender, Class, Aggression, and Golf," it becomes as 
oddly unsettling as any of the other pieces in the issue.--bg
     Leads off (should that be "explodes?") with Bruce Andrews' 
"Jupiter 2"-- "Actions doubt louder than words"--no doubt; "Ob- 
...ceaseless positing,/we cultivate that irrelevance shook shock--
" but these days some are answering Andrews' "reference is 
unimportant ?" with a "You got it, pal!" in neo-Melvillean 
thunder.  (Stay glued to your TRR for the latest news on these 
poetry wars.)  Coming up on the severity of Jean Donnelly's non 
sequiturs after reading Andrews is like plunging in the snow after 
a sauna: "Sex is either pleasurable or offensive/ When tolerance 
tolerates the tall order/ I have a bizarre sense of the American 
Mid-West as being this vast expanse of claustrophobia."  Michael 
Basinski's "Matches" dismembers the alchemical marriage in its 
aleatory retort; his treatment is a kind of homeopathic remedy for 
the usual disjointed but solemn fooling on this theme.  "The whole 
thrust of the pattern of sounds ravish rhythmically patterned 
wounds."  Raymond Federman and George Chambers contribute "Race, 
Gender, Class, Aggression, and Golf," a short, hilarious work of 
meta-anthropology involving an incident at the 13th hole of 
Westwood Country Club on Ladies' Day.  And more.--cp

SITUATION--(#6), 10 Orton Place #2, Buffalo NY, 14202.  
16 pp.,$2.00.  Joan Retallack's "The Woman In The Chinese Room... 
A Prospective" takes John Searle's thought experiment on the 
possibility of artificial intelligence as its base: "how do you 
know the person locked for all those years in the Chinese room is 
a woman there are few if any signs if she exists at all she is the 
content of a thought experiment begun in a man's mind this is 
nothing knew & perhaps more complicated."  Two of Amy Sparks' 
Tarot poems follow, intertwining voices in a nonstop rush as if 
determined to kick through the door of that Chinese room: 
clairvoyance, memory, confession and scraps of poisonous advice 
tangle with one another, not paratactically; there's an emotional 
field here being defined by these vibratory phrases.  John M. 
Bennett, "in's charred shirt's blinking before the steps where's 
lacerations... where's scarification" pairs interestingly with 
Peter Ganick's "iceman to an impartial fluid whose nominal surface 
is ridden of willful portage"--referents become shifters in the 
mouth that enunciates, letters that form them; signals from the 
other side of the Chinese door?  Susan M. Schultz' thoughtful 
poems ask questions and seem to expect they will be answered.--cp

6IX--(Vol. 3 #2, 1994) 914 Leisz's Bridge Road, Reading PA, 19605.  
36 pp., $4.00. Graced by Gil Ott's subtle cover collage of a 
Japanese-calligraphied whale swimming in a steno-pad of fluid 
handwriting, this beautifully edited issue features a selection 
from Elena Rivera's "Wale: or, the Corse," inspired by Melville's 
Moby Dick and Charles Olson's Call me Ishmael, as well as the way 
"whale" disintegrated in the echo to "wale," which are welts that 
rise up after a lash.  Jenny Gough's "two poems" resonate, with 
"what better way to underscore the/ flower than allow the blister 
to appear in the light of stamps."--ssn

SLIPSTREAM--(#13), PO Box 207l, Niagara Falls NY, 14301.  $5.00.  
SLIPSTREAM casts a wide net across the bleak and sometimes cruel 
ultra-realistic poetic world.  Some of the great ones in this 
issue: Bukowski, Knight, Hugh Fox, Todd Moore, Gerald Locklin, 
Cheryl Townsend, Lyn Lifshin.  And then what is amazing the 
editors come up with Michael Ketchek, Alexia Lyn Dolton, Richard 
Zabransky, R. T. Swank and more.  Dozens.  SLIPSTREAM is a 
gathering, a dance.  And you know that these editors, Sicoli, 
Borgatti and Farallo actually read the manuscripts that arrive in 
Niagara Falls!  Well, here is a picnic basket, a refrigerator full 
of beer, sinking the eight ball, steamed windows, an extra twenty, 
pizza, your birthday, a good night.--mb

STICKS--(Spring 1994), Box 399, Maplesville AL , 36750.  32 pp., 
$3.00.  Beautifully-produced little collection of poetry that 
ranges from a mainstream but fine sample of X. J. Kennedy's work 
to; well, one of my mathemaku (with an author's explanation!).  
One of my favorite selections was Mark Fleckenstein's "Ritual 
As Morning Light":
     Useless as we are, we are.
     Morning again; light; God's laughter.
     Coffee.  Clothes making us up,
     re-telling and forgetting the same story.
                                                         --bg

STRONG COFFEE--(Vol. IV #8, April 1994), PO Box 1958, Evanston IL, 
60204.  12 pp., $2.00.  If you want to know about what is going on 
in Chi-town in performance art, poetry readings, art shows, and 
coffee houses, STRONG COFFEE can fill you in on the action.  
They tell you who is doing what where, always have great 
illustrations by local artists, and update you on local literary 
publications.  Plus fiction, poetry reviews, some of the strangest 
horoscope columns I've ever run across (this month, mine reads: 
"In April you attract every creep and asshole on God's created 
Earth.  Expect plenty of leering and lots of hissing, and all 
because nature blessed you with a pretty ass."), listings for 
local coffee houses, and everything else you need to know to hit 
the city in style.  Free locally.--o

TAB TO BLOCK BICUSPID: THE JOURNAL OF WARM SOFT FACTS--(Vol. 2 #1, 
Vol. 3 #2-4), PO Box 315 station A, Vancouver BC, V6C 2M7.  (or 
from We Never Sleep, PO Box 92, Denver  CO  80201)  This is 
blackhumour's quarterly progress reports on the "arrrow of 
entropy." A sample: "MODELING THE CONCEPTUAL OVERVIEW: "you know," 
a friend said to blackhumour, "what eye really like about french 
fries is that no two are alike."  "i feel the same way about 
orgasms," blackhumour replied.  two different personalities, two 
different expressions of interest.  susan's husband bill at the 
corner store, standing beside the freezer section, attempting to 
decide between the many flavours of ice cream available."  A page 
of this may give you a headache, but after several pages, it all 
makes sense.  Little mundanities enlarged & scripted into ergodic 
prose.  If you want to catch up, We Never Sleep has printed a 
compilation of the first 46 blackhumour reports.--ar

TALKING RAVEN--(Autumn 1993), PO Box 45758, Seattle WA, 98145.  
16 pp., $3.00.  A tabloid of "imaginative trouble" that features 
reviews of movies, books and TV; miscellaneous essays; and a 
scattering of drawings and poems, the later mostly near-prose in 
protest of stuff like the Persian Gulf War and Cover Girl 
mascara.--bg

TAPJOE--(#11, Summer 1993), PO Box 632, Leavenworth WA, 98826.  
35 pp., $3.00.  Subtitled, "The Anaprocrustean Poetry Journal of 
Enumclaw."  Twenty-eight poems on subjects ranging from cabin 
fever "These hills know nothing of time" to a communal sauna 
"...bareback across a lonely field/ and dared the stars to climb 
down and mount her," to UFOs "...prototypes/ for a brand-new/ 
species..." to Sisyphus "The ground slides under my foot."  This 
issue evokes mysteries and thoughts about the human experience, 
the contrasts, the coherence, or lack of, while spilling out 
surprising observations and truths.  It's vibrant & diverse, 
humorous & balanced.--rrle

TENSETENDONED--(#14), PO Box 155, Preston Park PA, 18455.  
A Fluxus-inspired assemblage publication, to which the 
participants must send 56 or more copies of an item to be 
included.  All these bits are put together in a printed folder and 
distributed to the participants.  Issue #14 is full of delights, 
mostly visual or conceptual in nature, with some literary visuals 
and cut-ups.  One of the liveliest and longest-running recent 
examples of this genre.--jmb

TEXTURE--(#5, 1993), 3760 Cedar Ridge Dr., Norman OK, 73072.  
60 pp., $6.00.  Some excellent poems from the language-poetry 
school, and various hard-to-categorize prose texts.  Also, 
critical attention to figures like Gertrude Stein, Paul Celan and 
William Burroughs.  Well worth a scan, too, is editor Susan Smith 
Nash's "interview" (2 short questions followed by page-length 
answers) of Gerald Burns.--bg
     A rich and cleanly presented collection of poetry, visuals, 
prose texts, brief essays, and reviews.  The selection is a 
generous cross-section of innovative writing, and thingking about 
same, in the general area of "post-Language" poetics and parallel 
trends.  Many of the pieces in this issue revolve around the theme 
of History, an appropriate topic for this journal, which exhibits 
a great sensitivity to the development/evolution of non-mainstream 
writing, seeing it, in its essays and selections, in a deeper 
context than other publications which focus more on the present.  
This journal is one of the best in its field in the quality and 
contextualization of its selections, and contains work by some 50 
writers, including Ficus Strangulenses and Colleen Lookingbill, 
Spencer Selby and Gerald Burns, Crag Hill and Thomas Lowe Taylor, 
and Mark DuCharme and Sheila E. Murphy.  If one were to choose the 
2 or 3 top reviews in this field, this would be one of them.--jmb

THRUST--(#2, 1993), 4301 Belle Terrace #6, Bakersfield CA, 93309.  
29 pp., $2.00.  Fairly conventional but charged poems (including 
a grisly one by Ron Palmer that ends, "So many women--/ so few 
knives..."), stories (including one by Ryan Mercer about an 
altercation with a convenience store clerk), and graphics 
(including a soft-porn centerfold of a nude male photographed/
composed by Rebekka Haas).  Also a good short (byline-less) 
discussion of how to go about starting a zine.--bg

TIGHT--(Vol. 4 #5, December 1993), PO Box 1591, Guerneville CA, 
95446.  72 pp., $4.50.  TIGHT covers all points of the poetry 
otherstream about as completely as a small mag can.  It seems that 
Ann tries to present a representative sample of everything known 
to her, and this is probably the fairest thing an editor can do, 
but so few even try, preferring to opt for some particular bias.  
Some of the things that caught me on first pass were the excerpts 
from Al Hellus's "pieces of 13 dreams": "the bones of the catfish 
assemble/ and form an act of leaving", or from "Revelry" by Mahdy 
Y. Khaiyat, "The bodies fuse/ Under the shadow of the alpenglow."  
There is much accessible free verse, etc. here as well.--jb

TIGHT--(Vol. 5 #1, March 1994), PO Box 1591, Guerneville CA, 
95446.  72 pp., $4.50.  With this issue, TIGHT continues to be one 
of the best selected and broadest collections of current small-
press American poetry, which makes room for all but the most 
extreme kinds of experimental writing and excludes the most 
tedious forms of current academic rhetoricisms.  This issue 
includes excellent work by John Grey, Sesshu Foster, Muriel Karr, 
Peter Layton, Jim Leftwich, Grace Grafton, Albert Huffstickler, 
J. Griffin, Jonathan Falk, Glenn Bach, editor Ann Erickson, and 
many others.  A generous selection of of current poetry.--jmb

TIN WREATH--(#27), PO Box 13491, Albany NY, 12212.  $2.50, TIN 
WREATH has gone visually berserk.  This always interesting but 
fairly polite mag has become a linguistic gestalt with this issue.  
Each 8 1/2 x 11" page has a poem or two but is filled with word 
fields of various sizes.  Some of the fields are letter-chunks, 
some are magnified pieces of other poems in the magazine.  The 
reader can mask away everything but the poems and have a normal 
reading experience of better than average poetry (including John 
Crouse, Sheila Murphy, and Jeffery Skeate), but the total 
experience of each page serves to redefine the processes of 
reading and perception.  I am overwhelmed--dn

TOMORROW--(#11), 1993, PO Box 148486, Chicago IL, 60614.  30 pp., 
$5.00.  Tim Brown edits with a sharp eye, and in this issue he 
branches out of Chicago and goes national in focus.  While there 
will still be a decent showing of Chicago writers (Goldman, 
Mihopoulos, Namest) he'll also be including the likes of Weinman, 
Lifshin, and Townsend.  A decent cross-section of midwestern and 
national blood scattered across the highways of America.--o

TRANSMOG--(#12, December 1993) Rt. 6 Box 138, Charleston WV, 
25311.  6 pp.  The usual wild assortment of otherstream agitries, 
but especially strong in graphics this time, with Musicmaker 
leading the way.  Some great found texts by Andrew Russ; too, 
such as (in its entirety):
     CAUSING
     IMMO-
     RALITY
which; for some reason; strikes me as the best satire on the 
Moral Right as I've seen. ("IMMO-," for one thing, seems so... 
silly.)--bg

TRANSMOG--(#13, January 1994), Rt. 6 Box 138, Charleston WV, 
25311.  26 pp.  (E-mail: far@medinah.atc.ucarb.com)  The cover of 
this issue has a recombinatory face by Bill Paulauskas that looks 
almost normal--but it has two reduced eye-images below its eyes, 
and a reduced image of a lip above its smile, and thus looks just 
right as an out-box for the fascinatingly computer-distorted 
weather map it shares the cover with.  Within; more of the same 
kind of stuff--including, I now just noticed, a sonnet of sorts by 
Don Webb in praise of many of the contributors to TRANSMOG 10 for 
setting "the words-in-a-rowlock guys runnin'."--bg
     An eclectic mix of extreme otherstreamness, beyond avant-
garde and post modern, the glittering razor's edge of human 
imagination.  Along with LOST AND FOUND TIMES, and POETRY USA, 
TRANSMOG is the best source for important work at this end of the 
spectrum.  This issue contains a large selection of texts 
accompanied by equally experimental graphics.  Collectively the 
work cultivates a genuine alternative to the usual ruts within 
which consciousness travels--the artists are reinventing 
themselves to reinvent art, expanding our ideas of what we are.  
And it does it with an enormous sense of humor.  This is the 
philosophers stone in a sea of livid data.--jb

TURBULENCE--(#1, October 1993), PO Box 40, Hockessin DE, 19707.  
32 pp., $3.00.  "The power of our alternative institutions of 
poetry is their commitment to scales that allow for the 
flourishing of the artform, not the maximizing of the 
audience"--Charles Bernstein, in "Provisional Institutions: 
Alternative Presses and Poetic Innovation."  David Nemeth's new 
magazine is one more continuation of the "mimeo revolution"--eight 
word-processed, photocopied sheets of paper and one sheet of card 
stock, folded in half and stapled, containing work by Susan Smith 
Nash, Peter Ganick, Sheila E. Murphy, John M. Bennett, and Luigi-
Bob Drake, among others.  Bernstein himself contributes a 
homophonic translation of Antonio Calvocressi (1538-1574): "We 
leapt together like matching porcelain doves/ Before the curtain 
ripped/ To its predestined hemorrhage!"  Dennis Barone, in an 
excerpt from "Nothing," writes: "Now in some battle I saw money 
and the police.  The hippies went home.  A matter of minutes."  
Mark Wallace, the "romantic materialist," writes: "So what if he 
thinks/ I'm being too affirmative, billowing the current/ to seize 
a luminate thread, it's where/ we might make again" ("No Stream 
Can Damn This Carry Ear Away").  The strength of TURBULENCE #1 
is in its content; design and typeface, however, are spartan, 
bare-bones.--cp

UMBRELLA--(October 1993), PO Box 40100, Pasadena CA, 91114.  
39 pp., $18/yr.  For years Judith Hoffberg's UMBRELLA has been a 
leading guide to mail art and books by artists.  It also contains 
perceptive reviews of pertinent books whether mainstream or micro-
press, and a smattering of news-items--such a story here on Conde 
Nast's copyright-infringement suit against artist Christof 
Kohlhofer for unfairly "competing" with VOGUE (Kohlhofer 
constructs variations of said slickzine about as likely to compete 
with it as a sculpture of a bra labeled "Maidenform" would be to 
cut into the sales of real Maidenform bras).--bg

UMBRELLA--(February 1994), PO Box 40100, Pasadena CA, 91114.  
36 pp., $18/yr.  Another full trove of art news, reviews, 
announcements, etc. concerned with book art, mail art, and visual-
art-in-general.  Includes an excellent common sense discussion of 
book-art terminology by David Stairs, who thinks that carburetors 
and one-of-a-kind sculptures should not be described as "books."
--bg

VOX POPULI--(1992), PO Box 7392, Van Nuys CA, 91409.  38 pp., 
$3.75.  This publication is the result of a four person poetry 
reading at the Student Union at CSU-Long Beach.  All four poets 
are West Coast regulars and the reading was politically motivated 
to promote the vote.  Topics include South Africa, the Bush War, 
the American Dream, and death by racism, among others.  "I saw an 
African-American/ blast an African-American/ Dead in a doorway.../ 
My sixth grade classmate died/ ...shot by her friend// My cousin 
blew his fingers off/ ...I say, Eat your own bullets,/ Mr. Man."  
Intelligent, poignant, deliberate protest, as often delivered in 
a campus setting.--rrle

W'ORCs/ALOUD ALLOWED--(Vol. 9, December 1993), PO Box 27309, 
Cincinnati OH, 45227.  8 pp., $3.00.  Editor Ralph LaCharity 
smorgasbords this with whatever's handy and has to do with poetry, 
including--most interestingly--ongoing correspondences about kinds 
of poetry, readings, zines, poets, etc.  The highlight of this 
issue for me was Randall Schroth's "Channeling Olson," an Olsonite 
poem on a 1991 Olson Conference full of satire, poetics, auto-
biography--and larger moments.--bg

W'ORCs/ALOUD ALLOWED--(Vol. 9 #3, March 1994), PO Box 27309, 
Cincinnati OH, 45227.  8 pp., $3.00.  A wild, crashing of voices 
on the page mag where anything is likely to happen.  A wonderful 
open music pervades this issue and all others I have seen.  The 
pages vary in size and color producing an inspired cornucopia.  
This issue begins, following the always excellent cover collage, 
with a long metalanguage free jazz feeling poem by editor Ra's Elf 
(or Ralph, or who knows what as his name mutates constantly, like 
his poetry and his mag), somewhere out beyond a combination of 
Charlie Parker and James Joyce dosed on mushrooms in Paradise.  
And the rest of the issue's poetry is equally extended.  But in 
recent issues an equal strength has developed in the conversations 
between readers/contributors and the editor.  It's like eaves-
dropping on a table of freethinking poets and philosophers while 
they drink and consider and discuss the various topics that have 
entered the discussion from previous issues.  This is one of the 
strengths of an aesthetic movement via correspondence, it becomes 
an open document, charted as it develops among the minds of its 
participants.  Between the work and conversation WORC's is 
charting, at least partially, the theoretical course of the 
experioddic otherstream.--jb

WET MOTORCYCLE--(#3, March 1994), 3055 Decatur Ave. #2D, Bronx NY, 
10467.  1 sheet.  One in a limited edition, doublesided broadside 
series, edited by St. Thomasino, who in this issue presents his 
own work.  Collaged over two images from some pulp film of the 
1950's, he has placed ironically contexted phrases which, 
ambiguously, could be the thoughts of the characters in the 
images, or commentary about those characters.  The effect is 
subtly ominous, and goes several steps beyond being mere satire
--jmb

WET MOTORCYCLE--(July 1994), 3055 Decatur Ave.; Apt 20, Bronx NY, 
10467.  2 pp., SASE.  A sur-electric broadside of poetry-
collaborations by Keith Higginbotham and Tracey R. Combs such as 
"Dieting": "Yesterday I ate a grape/ then it ate me// today I 
remember/ the taste// of me in its mouth// from now on I/ will 
always/ eat/ inside-out".--bg

WIND--(Fall 1993), RFD Rt. 1, Box 809K, Pikeville KY, 41501.  
127 pp., $5.00.  In one of the poems in this issue of WIND, John 
Elsberg brings up "The doctor's wheelbarrow,/ caked in mud,// left 
in the rain."  In another, Marvin Solomon refers to "the chiming 
of the Joycean dead."  Nothing wrong with such allusions, but they 
are (forgive me) pretty standard academicisms, and for me they 
typify the kind of cultured but safe mindset that WIND seems to 
operate out of.--bg

THE WORMWOOD REVIEW--(Vol. 33, #4), PO Box 4698, Stockton CA, 
95204,.  $4.00.  WORMWOOD is something of a miracle--it's been 
around since the late 50s, and continues to publish some of the 
best (and largely ignored) poets in America.  This issue has cover 
art by Saul Steinberg (who did illustrations for the long defunct 
THE EVERGREEN REVIEW); inside we find poems by Charles Bukowski, 
Lyn Lifshin, Gerald Locklin, David Barker and others.  Every issue 
of WORMWOOD has a special section where a poet is featured; this 
issue publishes Steve Richmond's "Desenex Every Night."  Bukowski, 
who readies himself for the crass indignation of death, writes: 
"If you think Berryman, Plath/ Dylan Thomas were over-idolated,/ 
wait until you see what they/ do with me."--kn

XEROLAGE--(#24), Xexoxial Endarchy, Rt. 1, Box 131, La Farge WI, 
54639.  24 pp., $5.00(?).  The focus of this publication, 
according to co-editor Miekal And (who coined the term "xerolage," 
from "xerox" and "collage"), is the marriage of collage, copy art 
and visual poetry with xerox technology.  Each of its issues 
features a single artist, or art-group.  This one consists of a 
surrealistic scientific encyclopedia by James Koehnline that is 
mind-jarringly entertaining--and very sophisticated.--bg

XIB--(#6, 1994), PO Box 262112, San Diego CA, 92126.  70 pp., 
$5.00.  Dense with direct poetry & prose (about 50/50), and 
centered on fairly visceral concerns.  Several stretches of 
thematically related pieces--as in stories by Ulvis Alberts, 
Richard Ploetz, Jordan Faris, all variously depicting sexuality 
sans intamacy.  Errol Miller's "Paper Salad Days On Casa Grande" 
fragments together a portrait of ambivalent survival--its gray-
ness typical of much of the work here.  And tho I'd seen it 
before, Patrick McKinnon's powerful "Poem for Gramma Lavis" was 
well worth another read. All presented in a fittingly stark & 
varied graphic format that holds things together by giving each 
piece it's own distinctive setting--stopping just short of 
intruding on the texts.--lbd

ZYX--(#7, Spring 1994), 58-09 205th St., Bayside NY, 11364.  5 pp.  
Discussions by Arnold Skemer of "Huthism;" or G. Huth's approach 
to literature, which consists of a "microverbointensive aspect" 
(in my lexicon) "infra-verbality") and unorthodox publication 
techniques (e.g., poems on strung-together price tags); Jack 
Saunders and the potential of serial strategies for making 
otherstream novels marketable; the theoreticofiction of Jean 
Ricardou; and a valuable reprint of Don Lancaster's "Books-on-
Demand," a guide to using a computer to print a given book only 
when ordered rather than printing a bunch and then hoping someone 
will buy them.--bg

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