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Joan Snyder, "Ah, Sunflower!" 1994 |
Monday, December 18, 2017
Farewell 2017 and Farewell Followers!
Saturday, November 18, 2017
Sasha Pimentel and Jackson Pollock Get Lost in a Lavender Mist

Born in Manila and raised in the U.S. and Saudi
Arabia, Sasha Pimentel is a Filipina poet and author of For Want
of Water (Beacon Press, 2017), selected by Pulitzer Prize-winning judge
Gregory Pardlo as winner of the 2016 National Poetry Series. She is also the
author of Insides She Swallowed (West End Press, 2010), winner
of the 2011 American Book Award, selected by judge James Bertolino. She
currently teaches in the Bilingual MFA Program at the University of Texas at El
Paso.
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Jackson Pollock, Lavender Mist Number 1, 1950 |
Pollock’s Lavender Mist Number 1
The woman in the well undrowning is almost
through the water, her hair slips up in strings.
Boiling out, her body is in becoming:
ghost-like, or like a human, the artist does
not say. (This is his trick, this perfect
just-surfacing.) All at once you can see a
forehead, the hard septum of her nose—still,
vague as an idea, she could be your mother,
wet behind a door. What kinds of human
drowning have rubbed along my own
mother’s flesh and muzzled it yellow,
mewing out those sounds I heard as a girl,
shivering in her hallway? The woman in the
well undrowning is almost through the paper,
Sunday, October 29, 2017
Rebecca Wolff, Sina Queyras and Cole Swenson
The Poetry Foundation (poetryfoundation.org) is an amazing resource for poets and poetry readers on the web. A search on "ekphrasis" pulled up this month's featured work by Rebecca Wolff, Sina Queyras, and Cole Swenson.
After Ekphrasis
A found dish. Shallow and sweet.
A
little around the edges.
A
lacking in the middle.
Several
lines converging where all begins.
A
dark beginning, a convergence.
Something
yearning for fin.
Something
escaping depth.
Crevice
of light.
Green
memory of fish bones.
Equating
something with or without toes.
In
a moment, air.
Ekphrastic
by Rebecca Wolff
there are some things up there
uptown
I want to see
I want to see I'm going to look at that
and see
I want to go up and see
that show. That show
I went to see, I went to see.
There are some things up
there uptown
I want to
look at that and see. I'm going to see
what I look. What I look at, when I look, vessel,
I stood to see. I went to stand to look
to see. Venturing further I went outside myself to look
at that wall. It fed! There was a box inside that was not
blank, I saw it.
It was really different from an aura, the thing had
colors, the thing was talking
to itself. And spoke
to me, not incidentally.
Source: One Morning— (Wave Books, 2015)
Cole Swensen, "What to Do Besides Describe it: Ekphrasis that Ignores the Subject"
(presented at Conceptual Poetry and Its Others Conference, University of Arizona, Tucson, 2008. Summarized by Kenneth Goldsmith.
Cole Swensen began by stating: "In attempting to get beyond the 'emotions recollected in tranquility' paradigm, which is what it seems to me conceptual poetry in its widest sense is trying to do, I've been increasingly drawn to models of poetry as revealing something about the way we think and even expanding our perspectives or patterns of thought."
She then introduced the concept of ekphrasis and the theories of Semir Zeki, a scientist who argued that the visual arts, particularly painting, train us to see constants and to gradually develop overall perceptual constancy. Swensen wondered what the implications and parallels in poetry might be. She commented that in the visual fields, the ways in which we're asked to see and to "read" haven't changed all that much, based as they are on a primary figure/ground relationship. What has changed, she argues, is subject matter.
Swensen argues that "Increasingly, the visual arts and some poetry have worked to distill subject matter so that core structural elements and their dynamics are laid bare or at least made much more apparent. but it seems that the visual arts have been more successful at this than poetry, and in part, it's because, after a very promising start, epitomized by Gertrude Stein, who recognized that there was something to be gained in translating cubism's geometric and perspectival shifts into writing, poetry took a turn which confused distillation with simplification, turning precisely away from that which would expose underlying dynamics apparent through rhythm, echo, juxtaposition, etc. and toward simpler language, where 'simpler' was understood to be both 'clearer' and 'truer,'" with the result being poetic language dominated by subject matter, by information. Swensen posited that ekphrasis as a tool can help poetry by historically analyzing how the visual arts have accomplished this.
She concluded with a lengthy participatory group discussion looking a numerous works of modernist visual art to show how a unifying principle between very different subjects could be seen as similar. She asked the audience to "think about how, in each case, subject matter has been modified, compromised, distilled in order to let the dynamics become a little more apparent."
Available at: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2008/06/conceptual-poetics-cole-swensen)
Tuesday, September 5, 2017
In Memoriam: John Ashbery
John Ashbery (1927-2017) is recognized as one of our
greatest poets. He won nearly every major American award for poetry, including
the Pulitzer Prize, National Book Award, Yale Younger Poets Prize, Bollingen
Prize, Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, Griffin International Award, as well as a MacArthur
“Genius” Grant. Ashbery’s first book, Some Trees, won the Yale Younger Poets Prize in 1956. The
competition was judged by W. H. Auden,
who famously confessed later that he hadn’t understood a word of the winning
manuscript. Ashbery published a spate of successful and influential collections
in the 1960s and ‘70s, including The
Tennis Court Oath (1962), The
Double Dream of Spring (1970), Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror (1975) and Houseboat Days (1977). Up until his death on September 3rd, the poet continued to publish and win awards.
Many critics describe Ashbery’s poems as a “verbal canvas,”
weighing the importance of the poet’s art criticism in France during the 1950s
and ‘60s, and in New York for magazines like New York and the Partisan
Review. “Modern art was the first and most powerful influence on Ashbery,” according
to Helen McNeil in the Times
Literary Supplement, especially the vigor and inventiveness of Abstract
Expressionism. (credit: poetryfoundation.org)
Self-Portrait in a
Convex Mirror, a portion of which we reproduce here, won the Pulitzer
Prize, the National Book Award, and the National Book Critics Circle Award, an
unprecedented triple-crown in the literary world. Essentially, a meditation on
Francesco Parmigianino’s painting "Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror"
(1524), the narrative poem showcases the influence of visual art on Ashbery’s
style, as well as introducing one of his major subjects: the nature of creativity,
particularly as it applies to the writing of poetry.
Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror
by John Ashbery
As Parmigianino did it, the right hand
Bigger than the head, thrust at the viewer
And swerving easily away, as though to protect
What it advertises. A few leaded panes, old beams,
Fur, pleated muslin, a coral ring run together
In a movement supporting the face, which swims
Toward and away like the hand
Except that it is in repose. It is what is
Sequestered. Vasari says, “Francesco one day set himself
To take his own portrait, looking at himself from that purpose
In a convex mirror, such as is used by barbers . . .
He accordingly caused a ball of wood to be made
By a turner, and having divided it in half and
Brought it to the size of the mirror, he set himself
With great art to copy all that he saw in the glass,”
Chiefly his reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection once removed.
The glass chose to reflect only what he saw
Which was enough for his purpose: his image
Glazed, embalmed, projected at a 180-degree angle.
The time of day or the density of the light
Adhering to the face keeps it
Lively and intact in a recurring wave
Of arrival. The soul establishes itself.
But how far can it swim out through the eyes
And still return safely to its nest?
Bigger than the head, thrust at the viewer
And swerving easily away, as though to protect
What it advertises. A few leaded panes, old beams,
Fur, pleated muslin, a coral ring run together
In a movement supporting the face, which swims
Toward and away like the hand
Except that it is in repose. It is what is
Sequestered. Vasari says, “Francesco one day set himself
To take his own portrait, looking at himself from that purpose
In a convex mirror, such as is used by barbers . . .
He accordingly caused a ball of wood to be made
By a turner, and having divided it in half and
Brought it to the size of the mirror, he set himself
With great art to copy all that he saw in the glass,”
Chiefly his reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection, of which the portrait
Is the reflection once removed.
The glass chose to reflect only what he saw
Which was enough for his purpose: his image
Glazed, embalmed, projected at a 180-degree angle.
The time of day or the density of the light
Adhering to the face keeps it
Lively and intact in a recurring wave
Of arrival. The soul establishes itself.
But how far can it swim out through the eyes
And still return safely to its nest?
-->
Tuesday, August 22, 2017
Kisses, Sea Shells, and Dora Maar
Portrait of Dora Maar
— Pablo
Picasso, 1937
Perhaps it’s not half bad to be split
down the middle, one eye watching across a bridge
of nose at the other, evincing the artfulness
of faces. This is as up-close as it gets
to plumbing deep through non-symmetrical windows
to the fickle soul. A chance to gaze
from the same side of the mirror: at once
a smile’s hint and hooded skepticism. One eye’s
dark lashes strike out like talons at the soft egg
of the other, coddled one day, pierced the next,
the way the egg must allow the peck;
the eye, light.
The Kiss
— Gustav
Klimt, 1908-1909
Wreathed in laurels and cloaked in geometry,
he bends, as men will, to roundness.
She bends to earth, arrayed in curves of color,
blue-flowered hair, gold-shawled ankles
as though her way dwells in air, all zephyr
and sun, yet rooted as a garden, toes gripped
to grounding, body tasting body,
its sweetness and its sweat.
Bernadette McBride is author of three full-length poetry
collections, the most recent of which is Whatever Measure of Light (Aldrich Press, 2016). Her poems have
appeared in the UK, Canada, numerous U.S journals and anthologies, and on PRI’s “The
Writer’s Almanac” with Garrison Keillor. A former Pennsylvania Poet
Laureate for Bucks County, she is a three-time Pushcart Prize nominee whose
work has won several awards. She is a college English professor, serves as
poetry co-editor for the Schuylkill
Valley Journal, and welcomes your visit at bernadettemcbrideblog.wordpress.com
"Shell Fragment" by Nancy Canyon |
The Sea Shell
by Marin Sorescu
Translated by Michael Hamburger
I have hidden inside a sea shell
but forgotten in which.
Now daily I dive,
filtering the sea through my fingers,
to find myself.
Sometimes I think
a giant fish has swallowed me.
Looking for it everywhere I want to make sure
it will get me completely.
The sea-bed attracts me, and
I’m repelled by millions
of sea shells that all look alike.
Help, I am one of them.
If only I knew, which.
How often I’ve gone straight up
to one of them, saying: That’s me.
Only, when I prised it open
it was empty.
Looking for it everywhere I want to make sure
it will get me completely.
The sea-bed attracts me, and
I’m repelled by millions
of sea shells that all look alike.
Help, I am one of them.
If only I knew, which.
How often I’ve gone straight up
to one of them, saying: That’s me.
Only, when I prised it open
it was empty.
Nancy
Canyon's paintings are published online, in print journals, and as book
covers. She can be found daily working on her art in the Morgan Block
Artist Studios in Historic Fairhaven, WA. She shows in Bellingham, Edmonds,
Seattle, and Spokane. See more of her work at http://canyonwriter.blogspot.com and www.nancycanyon.com.
Friday, July 28, 2017
Krassner Without Pollock: "What Beast Must I Adore?"
Ready to rejoice? Women of Abstract Expressionism (Yale University Press, 2016) is a long overdue survey of the contributions of female artists to the movement that flourished in New York and San Francisco in the 1940s and ‘50s, the first movement that artists could claim was uniquely American. What I love about this book, besides the full-color plate illustrations, are the biographies of more than 40 artists, most of whom I didn’t know. In addition to the better-known Helen Frankenthaler, Elaine de Kooning, and Joan Mitchell, we discover the work of Michael (Corinne) West (1908-1991), Ethel Schwabacher (1903-1984), Anne Ryan (1889-1954), Deborah Remington (1930-2010), Bernice Bing (1936-1998),and many more. Talented painters, like Lee Krassner and Elaine de Kooning, struggled to get recognition on their own merits after their husbands—Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning, became famous. As Krassner once remarked, “I daresay that a great deal of my so-called position or lack of position, whichever you want to call it, in the official art world is based on the association with Pollock. It is almost impossible to deal with me without…Pollock.” (Art Talk: Conversations with 15 Women Artists, Harper-Collins, 1975)
So here’s a tip of the chapeau, to the painter who drew inspiration from Arthur Rimbaud’s lines in A Season in Hell, lines that Krassner had pinned to her studio wall.
To whom shall I hire myself out? What beast must I adore?
What holy image is attacked? What hearts shall I break?
What lie must I maintain? In what blood tread?
What lie must I maintain? In what blood tread?
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Lee Krassner, "What Beast Must I Adore?" 1961 |
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Lee Krassner, Self-Portrait, 1930 |
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Lee Krassner, Igor, 1943 |
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Milkweed, 1955 |
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Imperative, 1976 |
Friday, June 16, 2017
Kate McGloughlin's "Requiem for Ashokan"
The Ashokan Reservoir, Shokan, NY
I knew my great grandmother, Bessie Bishop Davis, and I can
tell you she never got over the loss. She was 98 when she died and was still
pissed that they “stole her home”. So, how can a place that holds this
much grief be a place that provides an equal measure of peace and inspiration
to so many people? There’s more to it than the ever-changing aesthetic
hit of mountain, water, and sky. I think the story, itself an elegy, lays a thick
layer of beauty-born-of-tragedy on this place, and I’m sure that’s the real
thing that people respond to when they visit the Ashokan Reservoir.
Kate McGloughlin, painter and printmaker
I
There she was in a nest of driftwood, bleached
Far downstream and ripped from her rightful place
Vessel and provider
Off her blocks and useless
No other from her tribe to lay eyes on
No nod of reassurance or familiar
II
Cruel edges of noon, sharp focus
Glaring reflection, no ripple
Stillness only, bearing witness
Of this incarnation
Adrift, no hope of return
III
In the tired hour, pushing
Tossing about on white horses
Rock gently, displaced mother
Waiting to be claimed
IV
The moon knows her longing
Light blue and holding
The old trees loosed by the same
Rage of nature, gnarled and bared
By another turn of the sun
Emptied
It's fullness emptied by drought and thirst
Weathered shards of lost wood drifts,
Nesting on the shoreline,
Fishing boats as eggs
Held close in safety
Where water meets earth
Light breaks the calm surface
That belies the century old loss
Uncovers history, ourstory
The traces of past mark the
Place where their hearts were left behind
Aching for their own long ago
Dragging feet, trudging out
Spitting bitter and salt
Tears mix with the sweat
Feel the heft of dead family
Rising from earth to the new
Eternal rest
Reservoir Sketches
I
Coal skuttle dropped
In thin air, chunks flying east
In winter, form a transient V
II
Upended brooms
Jab skyward from the snow
Afternoon light warms their wiry selves
Here in this place without right water
The white of his collar never quite white
And Willie sick again at his stomach
They had so much at home, always,
Every day from the sky and the
Bog, thick with it
Never more than a quick drop in the well
To collect more to carry in
And that brook, I remember—
I hear it in my dreams,
Drowned only by a memory of the roaring sea
I never knew it would be the water
At home that I would long for
And the mention of thirst—
Quench, then numb me
The Thirst inside me too great
I ache for home and the knowing,
Here in the crowd, I'm hated
For nothing, really, just being other
As I wither, will these children
Know the ripping away it took
To give them a better life?
These Apple Trees?
Yes, they have value
My grandfather planted them
To feed us
To prepare us for later
Something to sell
Something to sweeten
Something to eat and remember him by
Fourteen acres of Pippins
And Vanderveers and others
I now care for,
My turn to climb and prune,
Debug and harvest -
Generations have witnessed the transformation
Every full turn of the sun
The slaying of these trees—
Tender blossoms in May
Growing offspring in Summer
Ripe fruit in September
Quiet nubs in Winter—
Hastens my own Winter,
Withers my own growing,
My roots also torn,
Grubbed, then burned
Artist’s Statement
Requiem for Ashokan
began to materialize in September 2016, during an intensive, seven-day drawing
and painting residency at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA. It
continued at another 10-day drawing and printmaking residency at the Artists
Association of Nantucket in February 2017, and was completed at home in The
Graphics Shop at the Woodstock School of Art in Woodstock, NY, and at the
Women's Studio Workshop in Rosendale, NY.
At each place I had the good fortune to collaborate with
other fine artists, namely, Patti FitzMaurice and Mary Emery, and to finish the
handmade book with Chris Petrone. This work is imbued with their spirit. Both
residencies were offered to me to complete a personal project that tells the
story of loss surrounding the devastation my ancestors endured during the
creation of the Ashokan Reservoir, and was spurred on by long talks and walks
at the Ashokan with author Gail Straub. The generosity and visionary spirit of
each of these artists helped make this work possible.
Requiem is being
exhibited at the Woodstock Artists Association and Museum in June 2017, and
includes written text, a handmade artist's book, and audio files narrating both
sides of the story from both sides of my family—the settlers and the
immigrants. The invaluable role these art institutions play in
bringing work to fruition cannot be overstated, and I will remain grateful to
each for its contribution. Read more about the exhibit here.

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