[NOTE. These texts, originally published in Barzakh: Poems 2000-2012 (2014), were commissioned after the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion & oil spill by Donald Nally & the Crossing Choir to be set to music by Gene Coleman, Chris Jonas & Gabriel Jackson. The work premiered in Philadelphia in 2014, and had its first European staging in Luxembourg in October 2015.
— The first two sections of the work are partial writing-through’s of Stéphane Mallarmé’s poem A Throw of the Dice, using both Daisy Alden’s & my own translations.
Louis Zukofsky's "Julia's Wild" from Bottom: On Shakespeare, 1960) consists of permustations on a line in Shakespeare's Two Gentleman of Verona, Act 4, Scene 4 (line 199), a part spoken by Julia:
Come, shadow, come and take this shadow up For 'tis thy rival. O thou senseless form, Thou shalt be worshipp'd, kiss'd, loved and adored! And, were there sense in his idolatry, My substance should be statue in thy stead. I'll use thee kindly for thy mistress' sake, That used me so; or else, by Jove I vow,
Omar Pérez and Dennis Casteleiro before recording session, 2010. K. Dykstra.
As a reader Omar Pérez has a charismatic presence. Even when he adopts a low-key style of delivery, the poems resound. Audio recordings of five poems from his collection Algo de lo sagrado (1995) appear below. That book actually contains two sets of poems: the first half showcases work composed between 1982 to 1988, and the second half dates to 1990-1993.
Yunno, I've often wondered just how poetry in Aotearoa-New Zealand is viewed from abroad: not from Anglo-American-Australian vistas (for there is too much in common with their (post-)colonialist-imposed poetic striates here anyway) but from other countries. Countries that are steadily replacing the United Kingdom as fount for new arrivals here. Countries where the poetry is not necessarily in English language, is more empathetic to the tropes and styles of indigenous verse; where fancy footwork language manoeuvres are not the 'norm.'
Pierre Joris: From 'The Gulf (Between You & Me)'
[NOTE. These texts, originally published in Barzakh: Poems 2000-2012 (2014), were commissioned after the BP Deepwater Horizon explosion & oil spill by Donald Nally & the Crossing Choir to be set to music by Gene Coleman, Chris Jonas & Gabriel Jackson. The work premiered in Philadelphia in 2014, and had its first European staging in Luxembourg in October 2015.
— The first two sections of the work are partial writing-through’s of Stéphane Mallarmé’s poem A Throw of the Dice, using both Daisy Alden’s & my own translations.
Ara Shirinyan, Julia's Wilderness, c/o Zukofksy and Shakespeare
Louis Zukofsky's "Julia's Wild" from Bottom: On Shakespeare, 1960) consists of permustations on a line in Shakespeare's Two Gentleman of Verona, Act 4, Scene 4 (line 199), a part spoken by Julia:
Come, shadow, come and take this shadow up
For 'tis thy rival. O thou senseless form,
Thou shalt be worshipp'd, kiss'd, loved and adored!
And, were there sense in his idolatry,
My substance should be statue in thy stead.
I'll use thee kindly for thy mistress' sake,
That used me so; or else, by Jove I vow,
Vis-à-vis miau
Omar Pérez reads five poems from his 1998 collection, ¿Oiste hablar del gato de pelea? The bilingual Spanish/English edition of this complete book was published by Shearsman Books, Ltd., in 2010.
Audio recorded in Havana, 1 June 2010, at the studio of Dennis Casteleiro.
Unearthed
As a reader Omar Pérez has a charismatic presence. Even when he adopts a low-key style of delivery, the poems resound. Audio recordings of five poems from his collection Algo de lo sagrado (1995) appear below. That book actually contains two sets of poems: the first half showcases work composed between 1982 to 1988, and the second half dates to 1990-1993.
Looking at Aotearoa-New Zealand poetry — from afar
Looking at Aotearoa-New Zealand poetry — from afar
Kia ora ano (Hello again.)
Yunno, I've often wondered just how poetry in Aotearoa-New Zealand is viewed from abroad: not from Anglo-American-Australian vistas (for there is too much in common with their (post-)colonialist-imposed poetic striates here anyway) but from other countries. Countries that are steadily replacing the United Kingdom as fount for new arrivals here. Countries where the poetry is not necessarily in English language, is more empathetic to the tropes and styles of indigenous verse; where fancy footwork language manoeuvres are not the 'norm.'