Tracie Morris

If I reviewed her (excerpt)

If I reviewed her, if I reviewed her. I reviewed her. Her her button. Her boutonniere. Herbal. Her boobeleh. Her boo. Herr Too. Her tuchas. Her view. Her book. 

If I viewed her like I used to. I talked to. I teased her. I teach her. I reach. I rearview.

“If ‘if’ was a fifth …” Black lettres. Black pov. “res” onate. Ur-words. Sona. Salon. If I revved up, I could view her through another glass, Toklas, another poem. Whats a smatter-shattering. That piece of bright bling attached to a cloth with sharp edges,

rounded o’er time, a button. A carafe.

The Motion of Light: Celebrating Samuel R. Delany

“The Motion of Light” is named for the Kelly Writers House celebration of Samuel R. Delany’s performative poetics, held on April 11, 2014, and archived at PennSound. This Jacket2 feature collects work by all those who were a part of the Delany celebration, of an event that celebrated the writer who, as Tracie Morris notes in her introduction, “is a constellation that continues to be fixed, yet revolves, for me and for so many lovers of poetry … a maker of many worlds.”

A familial touchstone via 'Dhalgren'

Preface: One day, at Naropa University, I was on a panel that Anne Waldman organized for the MFA summer writing program. I gave my talk about poetry and speech acts. Chip was nice enough to attend as an audience member. Chip knows his poetry.

Samuel R. Delany's worlds: An introduction

One of the great joys, if you’re lucky, of being in academia is being able to thank people and an even greater pleasure to be able to thank the mentors of your mentors.

When Charles Bernstein approached me about organizing this text-based raising of the glass to Samuel R. Delany (aka “Chip” Delany) I was nervous, humbled, and grateful for the chance. This came on the heels of the passing of two other people I looked up to, José Muñoz and Amiri Baraka, whose work Chip also admired. The magnitude of thanks takes on this bigger quality when the air is suffused with the ephemera of those who aren’t corporal, those who inhabit the same space in your heartspace that great art pervades. 

One of the great joys, if you’re lucky, of being in academia is being able to thank people and an even greater pleasure to be able to thank the mentors of your mentors.

Foreman and Morris at Zinc opening 36th season

photo ©2014 Charles Bernstien / PennSound

RICHARD FOREMAN
Old-Fashioned Prosistutes (43:35) MP3
Foreman read the full script of his recent play at NY's Public Theater.

A few words on Tracie Morris

A thought today on the way in which Tracie Morris looks forward and back simultaneously. Morris takes us into a future in which the various arts become indistinct not just programmatically (and disciplinarily) but in every single art piece, wherein the piece is a convergence of  imagination, throat, song, history, movement, and improvised word-signifying – and somehow at the same time she returns to a past of the poem as a fundamental song of human culture as it emerged before the mere page did its dominating and excluding.

Additional notes on Will Alexander's 'Compound Hibernation'

Erica Hunt sets this reading up by calling Alexander a metaphysician. One of her students said “like Jimi Hendrix.” Hunt says yes and also Aimé Césaire, Jayne Cortez. How are they all metaphysicians? What permutation of Black Magic is this political postmodern grimoire? What is it evoking?

Just before reading my bullet points and notes on Will Alexander’s poem, I read a story, saw a video that speculated on how Mars looked before it lost its atmosphere. There are speculations about how this happened, how it lost its magnetic poles, but it went from earthlike with seas and air and clouds to a rusty tomb, where our small land robots search for evidence of microfossils from billions of years ago. I thought about this kind of sifting from a whole to atomic, from the big bang’s busting to dust.

Strange galvanics (PoemTalk #75)

Will Alexander, 'Compound Hibernation'

LISTEN TO THE SHOW

Tracie Morris, Kristen Gallagher, and Michael Magee gathered together in PoemTalk’s garrett studio to discuss a poem by Will Alexander: “Compound Hibernation,” published in Zen Monster, then performed at least once at a reading (Alexander’s Segue Series performance at the Bowery Poetry Club in March of 2007), and then collected in the book Compression & Purity (City Lights, 2011).

Panorama Reading at the Queens Museum of Art

Cecilia VIcuna drapes a fabric near the World Trade Center.

Queens poet laureate Paolo Javier created a day of poetry at the Queens Museum of Art, bringing poets and presses into the newly renovated museum for "Eterniday." Exhibited presses included Ugly Ducklng, Tender Button, Litmus, Nightboat, and Futurepoem. I curated a reading in the spectacular Panorama, with Cecilia Vicuan (top), Tracie Morris, Julia Patton, Shelley Hirsch, Tracie Morris, Tan Lin, and me. 

A winter afternoon of surrealist writing and music

Tracie Morris, Kenneth Goldsmith, and Marina Rosenfeld

The event was called “What Oozed Through the Staircase: A Winter Afternoon of Surrealist Writing and Music,” held in the middle of the surrealist exhibition at the Philadelphia Museum of Art on Sunday, January 26, 2014. Surprised that the event wasn't being recorded, I brought out my smart phone and captured the audio as best I could from the fourth row. I also made a video recording of the final performance — a surrealist game. All this is now available at a special PennSound page.

  1. introduction (3:51): MP3
  2. Kenneth Goldsmith: Hans Bellmar, from “What Oozed Through the Staircase” (1:48): MP3
  3. Kenneth Goldsmith: Andre Breton, from “Manifesto of Surrealism” (2:35): MP3
  4. Kenneth Goldsmith: Robert Desnos, “Awakenings” and “Ideal Mistress” (3:21): MP3
  5. Marina Rosenfeld: Mise en scene en scene #1 (Daily Bul, etc.) (4:51): MP3
  6. Kenneth Goldsmith: Joyce Mansour, “Poemshots” (1:57): MP3
  7. Kenneth Goldsmith: Salvador Dali, “The Great Masturbator” (1:46): MP3
  8. Kenneth Goldsmith: Mina Loy, “Auto-Facial-Construction” (4:14): MP3
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