Emily Carr, Whosoever Has Let A Minotaur Enter Them, Or A Sonnet—

American poet Emily Carr’s [see my 2015 Jacket2 piece on her here] third trade poetry collection, after Directions for Flying, 36 fits: a young wife’s almanac (Furniture Press, 2010) [see my review of such here] and 13 ways of happily (Parlor Press, 2011) [see my review of such here], is Whosoever Has Let A Minotaur Enter Them, Or A Sonnet— (San Francisco CA: McSweeney’s, 2016), a self-described volume of “divorce poems.” Carr’s poems are elegantly carved fragments, composed as scraps and ellipses that collage into something elusive, yet incredibly coherent. Structured in six sections—“drama of the forfeit,” “show & tell,” “scouts across america,” “amateurs,” “cathedral” and “state of grace”—her collection of “divorce poems” revels in compound words and the portmanteau, and a wonderfully striking linguistic density of meaning and sound, as she writes in the opening poem “) A SPLITBRAIN GRACE NOTE”:

imagine it: fleshliness.

leapfrog slingshot see (like eve side-arming apples from the trees.

gravity curls fernstalk, a red wind licks

your elbows. in current downriver singing the ocean grows. smoke

bellies the flagpole. slim–

ankled oaks dream in the soil.

he goes ahead coatless, lightsoaked. breathing in folds, like a fish. he

deals all his selves (was it a rib or catgut

LIKE THE COROLLAS OF A DYING SUN HOW/ BRILLIANT

Carr is also the author of a number of poetry chapbooks, including & look there goes a sparrow transplanting soil (above/ground press, 2009) (reprinted in full in the anthology Ground rules: the best of the second decade of above/ground press 2003-2013), UP THE SHINBONE SUPERLATIVES (Horse Less Press, 2012), Resurrection Refrains: 22 Tarot Lyrics in the Form of the Yellow Brick Road (Dancing Girl Press, 2013), STAY THIS MOMENT: THE AUTOPSY LYRICS, ACTS 1 & 2 (Little Red Leaves, 2013) and STAY THIS MOMENT: THE AUTOPSY LYRICS,ACTS 3 & 4 (Little Red Leaves, 2015), some of which has appeared since in trade editions, and some, such as “THE AUTOPSY LYRICS,” suggest a further full-length volume. Her poems, much like Toronto poet Margaret Christakos’ poetry collections, are constructed out of fractals and fragments and sentence-strands that break, sequence and accumulate into something far larger.

) IN THE BONE MARGIN

gentled on tended lawn, slender neurotic dinosaurs.

pale cows bewildered in the open air.

a greyhound pursued to static. her thin & scarcely believable arms.

fishy sounds from sherbet strollers. in the flaming

liturgical distance: souvenir flowers, beer

cans, propeller wings, clipped feathers, tears. railroads

part like children. a suicide swaggers in a garden plot. breaking

this fall, itself

FALLING/                 WHILE BREAKING

As the back cover of Whosoever Has Let A Minotaur Enter Them, Or A Sonnet— offers: “A swiftly moving poetry of love—and divorce—that rips open romance in the age of men who, for all they love you, just don’t know how to love you anymore. These fairytales are for the heartbreakers as much as the heartbroken, for those smitten with wanderlust, who, no matter how hard they try, aren’t at home with themselves or this world—the beauty of that, in a kind of SOS way.” Carr utilizes fairytale and myth to speak of marriage and an eventual break, as in the poem “) STRUGGLING (IN FACT),” that includes: “the grassblades touch & touch in their small distances, the myth / begins: as family life, one lash by lash undreamt— [.]” Marriage is a subject that runs through the length and breadth of her published work, exploring marriage, happiness, expectation, heartbreak and disappointment as a kind of extended, meditative study, akin to the work of Anne Carson or Cole Swensen, attempting to approach the minutiae of the break (via myth) from multiple angles. As the opening of her author biography at the end of the collection tells us:

emily carr writes murder mysteries that turn into love poems that are sometimes (by her mcsweeney’s editors, for example) called divorce poems. some other folks say she’s writing a life-long love poem, & that’s probably true, too. regardless of the form she’s writing in, she’s most interested in experiment, with heart.

"Emily Carr: three new poems," Jacket2

My nineteenth 'commentary,' "Emily Carr: three new poems," is now online at Jacket2.

Grain magazine 40.2: short grain contest issue,

A

he played injun in god’s country

where boys proved themselves clean

dumb beasts who could cut fire

out of the whitest sand

he played english across the trail

where girls turned plum wild

garlic and strained words

through the window of night

he spoke through numb lips and

breathed frontier (“injun,” Jordan Abel)

The “short grain contest issue” of Grain magazine is newly out, along with poems by the three prize-winners I picked as poetry judge. Picking from a stack of numbered poems, I selected a piece by Sean Howard for first prize, a piece by Jordan Abel for second, and a piece by Kate Marshall Flaherty for third. The fiction judge this time around was Lawrence Hill, who selected short fictions by Susan Mersereau, Madeline Sonik and Alexandra Sadinoff for first, second and third prizes. Before judging this contest, I hadn’t even heard of Vancouver poet Abel or Toronto poet Flaherty, and was quite taken with the work of Abel, to the point that I immediately had to find out where he was, and solicited a chapbook manuscript from him (his above/ground press title appeared earlier this month, and he even has his first trade collection out this year with Talonbooks).

The judges for this year’s contest, deadline April 1, 2013, are Toronto writer Stan Rogal for fiction, and Winnipeg writer Méira Cook for poetry.

Not that the issue is only and all about contests; Sandra Ridley has two remarkable poems in the new issue, titled “XIII” and “XV,” obviously part of a longer sequence that I would love to see at some point. Part of “XIII” reads:

When your darling thinks of it. When she was concerned with it then. When she believed in the meticulous awareness of sundries of detail. Despair became her whole history. She had a lack of willingness. A lack of discipline.

Her crudest form.

With the same insistence. She is compelled to tendency. Falls with a rigorous ferocity.

Perpetual.

            Bitten arms.

                        Bitten hands.

Each imposition accumulated a certain privilege. A catechism given willingly. Or by force. A little later. You relegated her to her bed where you attached her true name. There. Your darling remains. Her body more constant than her mind.

                                                            Beside herself. Each confusion interchangeable.

She comes along. She comes happy.

Poet Emily Carr also has five new poems in the issue, influenced by the Tarot deck. As her biographical note reads, she is the author of “a Tarot novel. While Writer-in-Residence at Camac Centre d’Art, she composed Straight No Chaser on ‘the poetry of fear.’”

MESSIAH ON PAROLE

knight of wands

As if you were grass or dead—

The truth hums, the truth trembles. The truth holds.

(What do you want you ought to make up your mind.

Solitary for months Lord & she has learned to live directly—

(There’s been a change of wings at the drive-in.

Whitely I am ready to be Liberty says broken apart, revealed,

reborn—

(Or do you believe I have no plot, even this was taken from

me, as all lies are…

(Would you catch that feeling: in fire & algebra, as windows

are opened, & a bomb is manoeuvered—)

& how she had become human to survive. & would she survive.

Quixotic when you say what is this festival of wet everywhere?

When you say “the sun burns & the lark is singing” what do you mean?

Come again?

What is the heroine to/do when love becomes transparent,

I mean treacherous—

The journal also celebrates forty years, a landmark that Toronto journal Descant recently celebrated as well. What does one gift for the journal that turns forty?

Here is the short “from the poetry judge” note I wrote, included in the issue:

There is an argument I’ve heard against author bios, most often heard after I make any kind of public complaint about a journal that excludes them, whether New American Writing or BafterC. Just who are some of these writers I’m reading? It’s the first thing I usually read in any lit journal. I always want to know more, get some context to the writing in front of me. Is there more I can read? A book, a chapbook, perhaps?

After going through the poetry entries for the 2012 Short Grain Competition, I think I understand the counter-argument a bit better now, able to read through a wealth of poems without interference or biographical baggage. I still haven’t changed my mind on the matter, but at least now I understand.

Perhaps this was why former Grain editor Sylvia Legris thought to bring me on to judge this year’s contest. Legris, who disagrees with me entirely on the issue. Perhaps this was her way to show and not tell, allowing me to come to my own realization. Or, perhaps, I’m simply reading far too much into this, as I so often do.

Contests can be difficult things, for a whole array of reasons, the most notable being, simply, that it is one person’s particular point-of-view. This might not be the list that you, reader, might have picked. This list is short, and simple-sweet. I picked the poems that struck me, and wouldn’t let me set them aside. I picked the poems I thought were doing the most interesting things, in the most interesting ways, according to my own particular biases. This is more difficult than one might think, if you haven’t gone through the process.

“Judging” implies so many things, a word packed with connotations. Let’s just say I opinioned, instead. Let’s just say I offered. As requested, here are the poems of this stack of pieces I thought deserving of prize-winning, in order:

FIRST PRIZE: "something like being (five flights, for rafi),"

I’ve long favoured the sequence, and this short-lined poem is fragmented, and entirely compact, packing in a space slightly smaller than the poem. Not all needs to be said to be articulated. In this poem, speech is made out of single words, and less than. It can be that simple, that complicated.

SECOND PRIZE: "injun,"

I’m fascinated by the movement here, the halts and spaces, the rhythms of this abecedarian-fragment, poems “j” to “o” of “injun.” Is there a full sequence somewhere of these? I’d love to see them. I liked very much how the poem questions and keeps questioning, the troubled naming of the title, the troubled past and complicated present. The politics and social upheavals are here, patterned through the broken words, the broken speech and hypnotic movements. I am so taken with just how this poem ebbs and breaks, and ebbs and flows.

THIRD PRIZE: "Gullywash,"

It was the last couplet I kept returning to, again and again. Something about those last two lines entirely struck, sharp and fantastic. There is a flood that happens, “Clears whole towns / in its wake.” Incredible. Otherwise, the opening strikes for its ruckus laughter, its language-play nearly subversive for the fact that it looks so damned fun. I admire the joy that moves through here, especially given the dark places the poem goes, without dismissing or diminishing the seriousness of that dark. Why do so many poems have to be dour?

Ongoing notes: late August, 2012

Do you know where summer disappeared to? I had rather hoped there’d be a bit more of it, around. But with autumn comes so many other things that a boy can look forward to (some forty days to the wedding, she tells me…). This past weekend, I was able to spend a day or so with my sister’s wee children (as she and her husband went to a golf tournament). A later August day, too cool for the swimming pool, so they played on a mound of dirt. Really?

And I’m sure you’ve been following my progress as editor during my month-long tenure at TRUCK, or the current above/ground press magnificent summer sale, celebrating our nineteen long years? Or the fact that I’ve now posted information on the fall 2012 ottawa small press book fair, now eighteen years old?

And why is it I get so many American chapbooks (which I love) and so few Canadian ones (which I would like to have the chance to also love)? Most of the chapbooks I receive by Canadian writers, it seems, are those produced by non-Canadian presses (Corrupt Press, Tinfish, dancing girl, unarmed). What’s even that about? I ask, I beg, I request…

Corvallis OR: From Sacrifice Press, I recently received a small handful of chapbooks they were attempting to produce monthly (the press is currently on hiatus), including Trick (March 2010) by Chris Kraus, 32 SNAPSHOTS OF MARSEILLES (April 2010) by Guy Bennett, whomeanswhat (June 2010) by Lars Palm, and Proverbs, From the INBOX Project (November 2010) by Jonathan Ball. Over the past few years, Winnipeg filmmaker and writer Jonathan Ball has been producing increasingly interesting works, and there’s already a new title forthcoming (but you just have to wait for it).

Possible Interpretation: Here talk means carries weight, in the sense that

it is influential. Life’s a bitch and then you marry one. Love is blind. Drink

deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring: There’s no accounting for taste.

Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves. Jove

but laughs at lover’s perjury. Rules are made to be broken. A coward dies

a thousand times before his death. The valiant never taste of death but

once. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. What you see is what

you get. You can’t run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. A good

surgeon has an eagle’s eye, and lion’s heart, and a lady’s hand. All’s well that

ends well. People who live in glass houses shouldn’t play golf. There ain’t

no such thing as a free lunch. Rolling stone gathers no moss. Fools rush in

where angels fear to tred. You can’t get there from here. Advice when

most needed is least heeded.

Ball’s chapbook Proverbs, From the INBOX Project suggests that this is part of a larger, book-length project, and the collage aspect of the work makes me interested to see how the work will hold together as a larger manuscript. Where is all of this leading?

Possible Interpretation: A need kept a secret will never be addressed. A

fellow describing the distinction between coral and king snakes. Life’s a

bleach and then you dye. It’s not the size of the boat.

The back of Los Angeles writer, translator, publisher and editor Guy Bennett’s 32 SNAPSHOTS OF MARSEILLES includes the note: “32 poems of 32 words on 32 places in Marseilles. Each poem can be read in 32 seconds or less yet contains thought enough for 32 minutes of reflection or more. The author accepts that only 32 people will ever read or see these poems but would not be disappointed to be proven wrong.” It’s a bold statement, certainly, that each poem “contains thought enough for 32 minutes of reflection or more.” The poems are quick and certainly sharp, with a meditative quality I quite liked. There’s far more than here than meets the initial eye.

place de lorette

      where the wind is

      good the wall

  flat plastered

      with paintings children

made elderly women hobble

      the slope smooth

samba trombones

  with

  flies buzz

hand stuck out

window shakes

        handkerchief

Los Angeles CA: Nearly a year later, tricklings of dusie 5 kollectiv items appear still, with the appearance of Larkin Higgins’ poetry chapbook of materials, implements (2011). I’m very intrigued by the poems included here, intrigued by the stretches of open space, the lines pulled apart from themselves to understand the pauses and gaps inherent, echoing some of the rare spaces of poet Emily Carr.

No Sinecure : influenced by aire

was not tied                    was not sealed    flew

open from the force of the impact

Duplicate boxes

 already packed                                          and

in my pocket

                                                                 three things to-

gether in my hand?

   bee-brooch

   too puzzled

   too keen

the cheapest shot in the game                  dear

ones

                        fool’s errand

   some things are worth pay-

ing                   certain risks