Ephemera & Sharpened Tusks

Ephemera Against Sharpened Tusks

Field notes from the wild periphery:

When my guardian-mother died in 2005, I had a dream about seeing parts of words on tree leaves and flowers. I saw rocks smudged in blue-violet moss; color of mimeograph ink. It was then I began burying a lot of my poems in the backyard, poems about loss. I write about loss to this day, poems that are mostly not meant to be seen and transformed into earth again. In 2008 I sold ceramics meant to be broken, etched spheres with markings I didn’t know still had a lot to say later on in life. In 2015 I printed poems I wrote for my first semester in grad school and chewed them like a wasp to make paper nests. I presented them to my advisor because I was infatuated with nests of all kind. I also remember immersing myself in a tub of pulp from poems written about my biological father. There were lots of them. I made paper out them them. I’ve turned my biological father into paper now. I wanted to know how to float with paper and words.

In 2017 audio recording came back into my life after my involvement with our local hospice right after my mother’s death. I recorded patients who had special messages for people who mattered to them, people they loved–daughters, sons, grandchildren, inmate lovers, estranged family members, neighbors, and pets. Sonic immersion is a practice now. I upgraded my equipment using residency and honorarium money. I bought myself contact mics so I can listen to vibrations and fainter sounds. I scored a hydrophone to listen to rivers, oceans, and creeks. I acquired directional and ambisonic mics to I listen to birds and claim my insignificance in the wider nature of things. When the pandamic began, I started backing off from the capital P in poetry and decided to stay in the periphery in all the pageantry. It’s a personal choice and not a putdown to those who seek its business and culture. Captial P in poetry has its place but I prefer the outskirts, the alleyways, the imperfections, the broken equations. I choose the lower cases in things because to me poetry is a method and not a goal.

A few weeks ago, I asked a group of archaeologists and anthropologists to participate in my practice of creating ephemeral work. It was the most memorable experience. We laughed as we tore an open-form calligraphy piece I created that inspired a poem called 14°32’18.7″N 120°59’35.3″E. which I will share in a few days on-line. I really like shared experiences. The notes I write about them such as this entry fills me. In this shared experience with my new friends, I’ve felt a shift in what I do, where I don’t want to see or share my work as “P”oetry but rather emphasize the lower case perspectives and celebrate the quiet sharing, the sit-around-the-fire story-sharing—where everything becomes an invitation to respond to one another. Less competition, less judging, less noticing the most beautiful lotus in the pond. There’s beauty in the muck, there’s beauty in the ugly, there’s beauty after the pageants—we are all swans. Friends, that’s where you’ll find me from here on out. I will not compete. It’s taught me a lesson. I’m here to connect the dots now.

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Listening to Two Star