From Deleuze and Guattari’s essay on “Minor Literature” to Alfred Arteaga’s work on Chicanx poetics, theorists have studied the relationship between power and language, describing how creative writers find inventive ways to interrogate monolingual and nationalist logics.[1] Often, personal as well as historical conditions shape an author’s linguistic choices. My interest here lies in how poets use citation and translation as craft techniques in forging poetic languages that challenge powerful configurations and histories.
Feature: A Tonalist poetry
105 printed pages, in Jacket 40
What is A Tonalist? The short answer is that it is in some (uncomfortable) way related to lyric, retaining doubt about the possibility of engaging in and with that vexed genre … As you read these poems, you can watch as place is found, made, questioned, left and reasserted … There is also a lot of sex and a huge number of amazing verbs … (from Laura Moriarty’s Introduction)
[»»] Laura Moriarty: A Tonalist Where (and What) Art Thou?
[»»] Taylor Brady: Maps, Jokes and Heavy Armor
[»»] Julian T. Brolaski: Five poems
[»»] Norma Cole: from “More Facts”
[»»] Brent Cunningham: A Note on the A Tonalist
[»»] Jean Daive: “A Woman with Several Lives,” Tr. Norma Cole
[»»] Ray DiPalma: Obloquium and Committer of Tidings: Seven poems
[»»] Dolores Dorantes: from “Dear Factory” translated by Jen Hofer