May 7, 2009

I am such NOT a blogger…but I will attempt to present tidbits and odd bites over the next few weeks. Thanks Stacy, for giving me another deadline…I mean for delving into the nether reaches of such facile humility.

Oh, and guess what, Mercury will be in retrograde for the length of my guest blogging…and Mercury rules communication…which means that everything on this blog is immediately useless…or at least mis-interpreted. Like lens on static mirrorfaction or an East Village yogi, a groggy veneer of the unknown will obscure these very words as you try and read them. JUST TRY AND READ MY WORDS! Phenomenal!

So you’ve been warned, dearest reader, if you find yourself bored by lame observations, ask yourself…did he really write that or did I just read it wrong?

What a primo first salvo! Am I done? (Stacy, how many words do I get?)

Okay, smack me on the head now. Did you ever record a TV program, play it back at a super-slowed down speed and add your own dialogue to it in a fake slow voice while drowning your phlegm in popcorn? Well, there was a great event at Dixon Place last week that was almost as much fun.

Something called “Movie Nite: A Mini-Festival of Live Interactives, Musical Attacks, Neo-Benshi, Experimental Video and other damages to the World’s Cinematic Legacy” on May 1 & 2.  Tastefully curated by the multi-limbed Brandon Downing, it featured a fabulous collection of poets narrating their text to assorted film scenes in a format using traditional benshi (live film narrating) propelled into the now, via overdubbing, music, subtitling among other ingredients. Neo-benshi has recently become a vehicle explored by writers, performers and film editors yielding unexpected results but always some envelope pushing. For some riotous reviews of the Friday show, check out Nada Gordon’s blog. And then Nick Piombino’s review of Saturday’s show.

In the weeks to come, I’ll drop by some Poetry Project events and report on them here. But the other reason to mention Movie Nite is that I ended up being sick and not able to participate. And I wondered if there was some value worth sharing in that kind of non-performance.

In the experience of creating a project, seeing it through its conditioning, and then watching it buck in its gate unable to ride. Where does that energy go, that molten core regenerating.

Continuing its churn, its spin, either within itself or as a second skin riding over you. A sort of stillborn memory of all you accomplished. So that your physical body becomes a living, breathing product of your incompletions as much as your completions. That mortal tug. Dynamic. Relentless. Empowering the babble yet to be…or obscuring it in that nagging clip waiting to get off your back and go free. Made real by the lightlessness you choose to carry…hmmm?

Here’s where you can cash in on that Mercury chip, cuz…I’m a little lost myself.

Until next…
e