IT'S A POEM OR AN EVENT by C. Mehrl Bennett

IT'S A POEM OR AN EVENT: Or Maybe Both

C. Mehrl Bennett

This is a book of multiples: postcards, artist stamps, text or images from little booklets, scanned drawings and caricatures, rubber stamped text or images, digital art, Fluxus scores, poetry, and visual poetry. Much of it was sent out as mailart. The book takes up where my 2009 book, "What It Says", left off. The chapters are organized chronologically although some of the images are more illustrative of texts in other chapters and are placed accordingly. The paper is heavy weight, coated paper that produces quality graphic images. The introduction includes information about contemporary Fluxus festival gatherings and the philosophy and history behind them. Many of my own event scores are included in each chapter of the book. A collaborative Flux Mass was co-created with Diane Keys and performed in Chicago, and I've written up all the rituals and included some photographs from the event. Experimentation with the erasure of found text with additional editing is illustrated with the final text published next to a scan of the original erasured source. Other writing processes are explained in context with other poems, and an informal essay is included about asemic writing and improvisation. It is hoped that the spirit of play in creation will be infectious and stimulating for the reader. - C. Mehrl Bennett

$15 US

120 pp.

English

ISBN 9781938521904

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SOSTENUTO by Sheila E. Murphy

Sheila E. Murphy, SOSTENUTO

“Throughout my life I have looked toward language for elevation and found that more potent than gravity.” – Sheila E. Murphy 

Murphy’s work has been a lifelong journey to find beauty and a kind of transcendence in life, in thought, in experience, and in language while at the same time including all the complexities, difficulties, and darkness from which any transcendence must arise.  SOSTENUTO, a sequence of recent sonnets, is certainly no exception, and also has a wonderful angularity and edginess, an edginess embedded in a richness of diction and consciousness.  The poems have a voice, a sensibility and a “story” or narrative current which is fully authentic.  Part of that authenticity is sensed in the often cut-up (and at times surrealistic) nature of the writing, which is also amazingly smooth and flowing.  There are storms,  understandings and questionings running through these beautiful poems, which form true mirrors to the depths and heights of living.  –  John M. Bennett

$12.00 US

65 pp.

I SBN 9781938521898

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PULMONÍA by John M. Bennett

John M. Bennett has perfect pitch. Drawing from classical sources and earthbound realities of the human body, Bennett illuminates miraculous and fleeting discoveries. His uncanny ability to elevate this realm of existence affirms the beauty of Bennett’s work. A palpable sacredness blends with humor in this multi-lingual spree of sounds and visual poetic delights. Bennett’s extensive use of the Hicucu form, invented by Jim Leftwich, is an event to celebrate. So are the tiny poems in which he dissects a word into tiny parts, each its own universe. There are some shockingly pure, beautiful, and lyrical poems dedicated to C. Mehrl Bennett which remind us that poetry is the greatest and most powerful gift. —Sheila E. Murphy

GRATITUDE to and for the following people who are, in various ways, present by name in this book:

Jim Leftwich, Iván Argüelles, Sheila E. Murphy, Aaron Flores, Shawn McMurtagh, Ben Vautier, Frédérique Guétat-Liviani,  Josh Ronson, Bibiana Padilla Maltos, Antic Ham, Olchar E. Lindsann,  Juan Ángel Italiano, Geof Huth, Nguyen Dao Claude, Malok, Mary Joe Bole, Bill Beamer, Pierre Benoit, David Lynch, Lucien Suel, Robert Net Carlo, Percy Bysshe Shelley, René Char, Pierre Reverdy, C-G Coqueley de Chaussepierre, Antonio di Benedetto, Rubén Darío, Samuel Beckett, César Vallejo, M. Boinvilliers, Stephan Mallarmé, Al Ackerman, Paul Éluard, Alfred de Vigny, José-María de Heredia, Mario Santiago Papasquiaro, Carlos Sigüenza y Góngora, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz.

PULMONÍA

227 pp.

ISBN 9781938521881

$20 US

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INTERNAL RHYME by Thomas M. Cassidy

INTERNAL RHYME

Thomas M. Cassidy

The reader will find in this volume a series of practical and popular discourses, delivered in the Brooklyn Tabernacle, treating upon the evils of the day, giving a clear and full exposition of said evels, and suggesting the remedies by which they may be overcome. - Blaster Al Ackerman

While it is relatively clear how the success of Internal Rhyme can be attributed to its roots in zine culture and dynamic community newsletters, its success and effectiveness as a literary publication is less obvious. In fact, it seems much was done to sabotage any possible ties to "legitimate" vehicles. The truth is that Internal Rhyme was tackling a very tough problem: how do you accurately and authentically present a means of artistic expression that is comprehended differently depending on how it is presented (verbal vs. text), varies from one performance to another (various orators), and changes in its interpretation with each person's internal experience (each reader's mind silently forming words into sentences and paragraphs into stories)? To address this, Internal Rhyme actively shunned the safe presentation of material and avoided using dry antiseptic approaches embraced by many mainstream publications. It aggressively played fast and loose with the rules of how writing should be presented. "And that," according to Robert Frost, "has made all the difference." Stories were presented as articles in a newspaper with headlines that cut to the chase to reveal meaning. Readers were encouraged to play with content through various games, puzzles, and matching exercises. Drawings, collages, and illustrations both supported and juxtaposed written text and newsletter tropes such as footnotes, bylines, and headers offered short insights into the writer's creative process. Internal Rhyme was successful because each issue was a series of experiments in storytelling and active audience engagement. Every element – from fake advertisements to the articulation of incredibly personal memories – supported this goal. - Jeff Rathermel, Artist/Curator

200 pp.

ISBN 9781938521874

$20.99 US

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THE ADVANTAGES OF CABLE by Mark Young

THE ADVANRAGES OF CABLE

Mark Young

Poetry

99 pp.

ISBN 9781938521867

$12.50 US

Mark Young’s The Advantages of Cable focuses on unexpected losses of focus, sudden changes in focal length, and spontaneous cracks in the lens, cracks that fracture, negate or enhance our immediate experience. Our “habitat” is over-defined, and not hospitable, but these sudden tricks of light (or of mind) produce visions of flying ostriches, angry crows, and blood-drinking salamanders: moments when "everybody freezes” and starts speaking “the language of the gypsies,” all the "small things” that open us up to losing “all track” of the fatal limitations of our “habitat.” Reading Mark’s poems is like getting stuck in the revolving door of Marshall Fields, Myer, Selfridge’s, or any large department store. We suddenly realize we’re stuck, recognize our situation very differently than we did ten seconds ago, and can hear each of Mark’s poems as the tink of a ball peen hammer on the glass, trying to free us. — Scott MacLeod

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