Photo by John Kinsella from the 'Star Shavings' series.
I’m pleased here to present a brief excerpt from John Kinsella’s series titled “Star Shavings,” a cycle of photo-poems. Jacket2 and PennSound are making the cycle available HERE. Here is a link to Kinsella’s PennSound page, and here are some links to several of his previous appearances in Jacket: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
Concurrent with writing Graphology Poems by hand and in type (typewriter and computer fonts), I have “concretized” poems by photographing them “in situ” — i.e. as printed or written out pages set in trees, against flowers, or as scratchings in dirt, as sticks arranged on a firebreak, or photographed by a third party while holding sheets of poems as “protest placards” — and as textual interjections, overlays, and “culture jamming” of preexisting images/texts. I have also, more prevalently, maybe, made “drawings” and “paintings”… in other words, writing as illustration.
I am pleased to present a selection of Graphology drawing poems by John Kinsella. You can view the selection HERE and HERE. Below is a commentary provided by John. — A.F.
Insouciance may be an undervalued poetic quality. In this latest collection by the Chinese Australian poet, novelist, editor, and translator Ouyang Yu, the attitude of insouciance is also a cultural strategy. It reflects Yu’s own movements as a writer and citizen, that is, situated “in Oz or China / Or both.”[1]
I'm pleased to present here a statement by John Kinsella and Drew Milne on their forthcoming book-length poem-project, Reactor Red Shoes. The work is being published September, 2013 by Veer: bbk.ac.uk/cprc/publications/veer-books . Below the statement is an excerpt from the poem, reproduced from the typescript.
John Kinsella & Drew Milne, Reactor Red Shoes: A Statement
Here, where two writers sidle up into becoming a third party — a third-party poetics in play and with shared accountability — there is not so much a duet of voices, as a textile of give and take, warp and weft.
Australian poet John Kinsella. Photo by Andrew De La Rue.
PennSound’s new John Kinsella page features three recordings. One is a reading he gave at Buffalo in September of 1996, introduced by Susan Schultz (5:11): MP3 .
Here are poems Kinsella read:
Warhol at Wheatlands (2:53): MP3 Bluff Knoll Sublimity (2:54): MP3 Aspects of the Pagan (4:43): MP3 Editing (0:51): MP3 Disclaimers (2:19): MP3 Echidna (2:45): MP3 from “Syzygy” (4:57): MP3 Skeleton weed / generative grammar (3:35): MP3
He also took a moment to comment on the tradition of classical poetry in Australia and the slaughter of aboriginal peoples (1:05): MP3. The complete reading (26:19): MP3 is of course available also, but note that the recording cuts off at 26:19.
John Kinsella's 'Star Shavings'
I’m pleased here to present a brief excerpt from John Kinsella’s series titled “Star Shavings,” a cycle of photo-poems. Jacket2 and PennSound are making the cycle available HERE. Here is a link to Kinsella’s PennSound page, and here are some links to several of his previous appearances in Jacket: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.