experimental literature

One poem and five asemic works in Angry Old Man

AOM 6 coverOnline experimental lit journal Angry Old Man released Issue 6 today, with another great roster of visual, text and video work from across the spectrum of the international literary avant garde. I’m pleased to be represented by one text piece and five asemic calligraphy works. The text piece is part of a new series of experiments involving a very restricted vocabulary intended to mirror the kind of language invention of an AI transaction robot. View the text piece here, and the asemic calligraphy here.

AOM 6 flip

AOM 6 asemic

“Deer Stone Magic” published in Futures Trading

futures trading 6.1

The latest issue of online experimental literary journal Futures Trading #6.2 went live yesterday (Jan 6). Another one of those “who’s who” anthologies of the international avant lit underground, this number includes work from Mercedes Lawry, Sanjeev Sethi, Annie Blake, Kyle Hemmings, James Fowler, Stephen Middleton, Mark Young, Christopher Barnes, Joe Balaz, James Kincaid, Glenn Ingersoll, John Marvin, Patrick Theron Erickson, Joel Streicker, Simon Perchik, Donald E. Gasperson, and John Dorroh.

I’m pleased to say one of my poems from the Civilization’s Lost series also made the cut; it’s called “Deer Stone Magic,” revolving around the deer stone pillars of the Mongolian plains. You can read the piece (and the whole issue) here. Be sure to scroll all the way down for the Mad Hatter’s teacup!

fut-trading deer stone

“Pussy Pulls the Trigger” published in Danse Macabre

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Online literary journal Danse Macabre, “a magazine of the imaginative, the magical, the ethereal, the supernatural, the dark, the absurd, and  the unknown,” released Issue 119 “Les Etrennes” today. The works of the authors you see above are joined by one of my Doom Pussy stories. A violent rant from a Kali-like figure at war with mankind, “Pussy Pulls the Trigger” should come with one of those NSFW warnings, as it is intended only for a mature audience with strong constitutions and a taste for extreme, transgressive literature. Anyway, you can read the full text here.

pussy-trigger-dm 119

Three Gonch poems published in M58

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Online experimental poetry journal M58 published three of my Gonch poems today: “Nonclaganall Anlachan Clach Galachonag,” “Callanach an Lag Ongana,” and “Onla Onla Callanagan Hoggaach.” You can read them here.

These pieces were composed in “Gonch language” with an alphabet restricted to the letters in the nonsense phrase “all gonch.” With the current breakdown in the semantic values of (American) English, a need has arisen for a new language for future communications. Perhaps Gonch will be that language. Perhaps not.

“Paradise in a Pill” and two other poems, plus five asemic letters in Angry Old Man

AOM-5-cover

Angry Old Man is one of the best online journals out there for experimental words and images. AOM issue #5 was just released, filled with great contributions from the international avant garde poetry scene. I’m pleased that several of my works are included: three text poems from my “robot language” series–“Paradise in a Pill,” “This is What We Know,” and “Your Body Is Waiting”–plus five video stills that represent part of an alien asemic alphabet. You can view the images here, and read the poems here

AOM-5-vispo

The texts form part of a new series of experiments inspired by the Facebook AI units that recently developed their own language using English words with different syntax and meaning. The AI units were intended to carry out customer service transactions and negotiations, and the format of their language seems to be a powerful way to confront and manipulate the continuous stream of commercial messages invading our mental space. I’ve written more about this work here.

Each of these three pieces were initiated by phrases contained in spam emails that seemed evocative of something more mysterious or sinister…like something a robot would say when addressing an audience of meatbags.

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3 Gonch poems and 5 Gonchlog images published in Word for/Word journal

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Word for/Word is an online journal of experimental poetry that just released its issue #32. Lots of interesting text and visual poetry to check out. It includes three of my Gonch poems, “Cachallanog Agaal,” “Nagan Halloch Cohl Llonagga,” and “Llaanaganallo Hacla Chagalnach Aglacoa,” as well as five images from the Gonchlog. You can read them here; just click on my name in the far right column on the front page.

The text pieces come from a series of new works using a vocabulary limited to words invented from the nonsense phrase “All Gonch.” It’s an attempt to create a new language, imagining also the culture behind it through the shape and structure of the words, that might arise after the death of the current (American) culture and language.

The images are part of another phase of the Gonch project I call the Gonchlog. In this process, I search through consumer magazines and cut out the five letters of “gonch,” then glue them onto accounting paper. The source, its date of publication, and volume number are noted. The intention is to draw out that key nonsense word from these commercial propaganda vehicles in order to find a way forward.

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Short story “Pussy on the Mark” published at Scum Gentry

scum gentry pussy mark

One of my short stories featuring the Doom Pussy appeared yesterday in online in outlaw literary journal The Scum Gentry. Upon accepting it, the editor remarked on its “strong Burroughsean flavor and blatantly trangressive and demented tone,” which I thought nailed it pretty well. He summarized it this way: “Pussy, Doom and Smash lay waste to their world in this experimental psychosexual sci-fi riff.” Needless to say, this involves strong language that is NSFW and for mature audiences only. Read at your own risk here.

pussy mark story

Abstract poem in Brave New Word’s “Blank Verse” Hemingway tribute

BNW-12

Online Experimental poetry journal Brave New Word‘s Issue 12 is a tribute to Ernest Hemingway’s experimental, pre-Dada poem “Blank Verse.” You’ve probably seen it somewhere. BNW editor Volodymyr Bilyk describes it this way:

“Blank Verse” is a five line poem that consists solely of punctuation marks divided by extensive spaces to resemble a legitimate text object. The poem consists of: 
  • a pair of quotation marks; an exclamation mark, colon, coma, dot; coma, coma, coma, dot; coma, semicolon, exclamation mark and another coma.
As you can see – it is obviously a throwaway joke. But in the same time it manages to go far beyond its original intent. 

You can read his full examination of the piece (and view Hemingway’s original) on Volodymyr’s personal blog here.

All the pieces in BNW #12 are responses in some way to Papa Hemingway’s piece. There are contributions from many artists in the international experimental poetry scene, including Mark Young, John M. Bennett, Sacha Archer, Andriy Antonovskiy, and many more. Lots of amusing remixes, re-dos, and re-visionings. Who knew one could do so much with punctuation! If you like your poetry concrete and a little silly, this issue is for you.

My own response is a concrete poem called “Grawlix Grid,” an 8×10 construction of various punctuation marks. You can view it online here.

grawlix-grid-BNW

 

“Supreme Facts,” three other poems and six video stills in Angry Old Man

AOM-4-cover

Always an event when a new issue of online journal Angry Old Man is released, and the new #4 is no exception. Crammed with piles of cutting edge images, videos, essays and poems, it covers the international experimental lit and multimedia scene more thoroughly than anything I’ve seen since Otoliths. Impossible to fairly represent the contents in a brief summary; best just to visit the site here.

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I’m very pleased that this issue includes six miscellaneous video stills, the “Silenced Scribes” video, and four poems: “Supreme Facts” (brief excerpt below), “Sparkle of a Golden Nose,” “IOU-topia,” and “On the House.” You can check out the stills here, the video here (yes, it’s been on YouTube for a while), and the texts on this page.

AOM-4-texts

“My Turn to Shine” and 4 other poems in The Curly Mind

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Today, experimental poetry journal The Curly Mind published 5 of my poems: “My Turn to Shine,” “Reinforcement Labels,” “Some When,” “The Hold Up,” and “A Dose of Applause.” Seems like they are part of Issue 8. You can read them by clicking the title of each poem above.

DC people may be interested to know that “Reinforcement Labels” is set in Meridian Park (aka Malcolm X Park), and describes a typical weekend scene there, probably on one of the occasions my son and I went there so he could ride his skateboard.