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This Publisher's Column shall feature developments
related to Filipino literature. Each monthly update also shall include
a featured poet and poem. For comments and suggestions, please e-mail
Meritage Press Associate Editor Jade Afable at Jade@meritagepress.com
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November's featured poet is Jean N.V. Gier. Also, an essayist, Jean is currently working on her dissertation whose research is on Filipino writers and writing communities in the U.S. during the 1920s and 1930s. You can view her ongoing poetic work in “The Nightjar: A Logbook of Experimental Prose/Poetry” at: http://www.geocities.com/gier99/nightjar2.html. "The Nightjar" reflects Jean's well-considered thoughts on online poetry-writing:
"I write about 90% of my poetry online, and in public with a minimum of revisions. Naturally, this format changes the very nature of my writing: it tends to shorten the line length, forces me to stop at the end of every line to insert a linebreak code. It has also changed my perception of poetry from something 'fixed' on paper, to a language that is always in flux, always changing, and even -- to the extent to which I forego the 'save' command, or commit the words to floppy disk -- fleeting. I am now more willing to 'let go' of my words. I no longer think of each poem as a unit in itself, which will someday be inserted onto a page by itself, separate from other poems on their own pages. Instead, each poem is part of a continuum on a very long page, sometimes with graphics and links which I place, and/or remove as needed. In many ways, I see this as a natural outcome of Charles Olson's complaint that:
"we have 'suffered' from 'manuscript, press, the removal of verse from its producer and its reproducer, the voice, a removal by one, by two removes from its place of origin and its destination."
The following are excerpts from "The Nightjar" (but Meritage Press encourages you to go directly to Jean’s site for some wonderful poetry-writing where “The End” does not exist):
10/14/02. 1:38 p.m.
How to be true to the day is impossible
for the lateness it announces and the gorgeousness
of my tensions. I cannot fathom this code
and the brackets around the hour. Still
the fractals like dying leaves render color;
still the slants, and the bending of light.
The refractory is golden, but emits a squeal.
The afternoon progresses like a disordered
dress, rumpled in the night.
2/17/02
After Saint Valentine's holy day all folly. The young men gathered to
pay, with their flowers wrapped in plastic. Hundreds, it seems, at the
Safeway counters, forlorn and pathetic in their after-work shirts among
the other males. With only flowers. It is too early in the season of cold
for flowers. The clouds gather overhead, and over the matt blue sea, under
the matted sky dropping dirty funnel clouds that will never touch down.
Because this is California, a state of half-assed storms, and half-assed
valentines that never touch ground.
12/19/02
Dreamt my mother had another stroke and I, running to the phone, could
not dial -- could not dial the 911. Woke up to the day. Woke up to the
day and the ceiling's thin film of mold. The mosquito net spread like
a bridal haze, and the blue walls dripping. Bulosan's hairline moustache
in one photograph reveals his amorous nature. How he loved the women,
and they loved him. We forget his brother's name, Aurelio, which catches
the ear in a trance. Aurelio, Aurelio the silent one, because we forget.
Bulosan, thin and fragile, only slightly famous. A socialist with one
lung. Yet, the gossip, fucking womanizer, sweet wino, winter catch. Winter's
broken nightjar laying in the wet, Seattle snow.
There was rain today, but different. The slow drizzle. The air moist and tropical, but grey.
****************************************
BOOK LAUNCH:
EILEEN TABIOS' REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE
7 p.m., Thursday, November 14, 2002
Asian American Writers Workshop
16 W. 32nd Floor, 10th Floor
New York, N.Y. 10001
For more info: desk@aaww.org
Eileen Tabios launches her latest poetry collection, Reproductions of the Empty Flagpole (Marsh Hawk Press). Her presentation will include a circling back to her first book, the ground-breaking Black Lightning (AAWW, 1998). Joining the celebration will be Black Lightning poets Kimiko Hahn and John Yau; a Q&A with the three poets will follow.
Further reflecting her poetics of interconnectedness, Eileen's reading will include the poem "Corolla" which was created partly from a collage of works by over 50 Filipina writers. She will present "Corolla" through two multidisciplinary collaborations: the first with multi-awarded performance artist Johanna Almiron, and the second with poet and jazz stylist Cristina Querrer, accompanied on piano by Duncan "Don" Profitt. Eileen considers the different collaborations based on a single poem to be a metaphor for how different readers may interpret the same poem in varied ways. The collaborations also will be presented unrehearsed since Eileen doesn't believe Poetry can be rehearsed.
This book launch promises to be a unique event to herald Eileen's poetry collection whose early reviews have begun to affirm the positive advance words previously provided by Arthur Sze, Forrest Gander, Barry Schwabsky, Susan Schultz and Alfred Yuson (and available, with more information about the book, at www.MarshHawkPress.org):
Tabios has a remarkable ability to move from the abstract
and the intellectual to the sensual and the tangible. She's a poet of
the streets, and she's above the streets, in her own head, exploring and
mapping her own consciousness where ever it takes her, even into the realm
of "psychological insecurity."
--Jonah Raskin (THE PRESS DEMOCRAT)
Unlike most poetry books that are light as feathers, their
words and images floating off the page, this one is substantial in every
way imaginable. Thick with imagery, subject matter, geography and precise
and inspired syntax, Eileen Tabios' work reminds me of going for a swim
in the ocean -- a complete envelopment in the currents of poetry....Tabios'
prolific meditations on writing, living and loving in modern times solidifies
her role as one of the foremost Filipino American poets of the 21st century.
A great read for anyone interested in prose-poetry experimentation.
--Neela Banerjee (ASIAN WEEK)
I find myself appreciating these poems as compositions with
no sharply-framed "subject matter." Instead, I discover each
one as a diamond-faceted free configuration of a singular and ever-shifting
poetic mindset. The poems are made accessible to the reader through the
use of clear, sensuous, and widely (and wildly) allusive diction. I can
think of Ted Hughes writing these poems, were he to use a female persona
with the sensibilities and multi-cultural experience of an Eileen Tabios.
--Luis Cabalquinto (OUROWNVOICE)
Her poetry exudes unabashed sensuality, artistry, intelligence,
and lends itself to a reader's surprise at their own insight. In Tabios,
I have discovered a poetess whose works are a cultural activist's. Tabios
is indeed an activist whose medium is her poetry. For the Little Brown
Brother to re-write his colonizer's language into unexpected structure
and exacting, stimulating prose that comes out as poetry excellence --
it is an act of activism in itself.
--Perla Daley ("Book of the Month," BAGONGPINAY)
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EAST COAST LAUNCH OF INTERLOPE 8: THE FIL AM ISSUE
Tuesday, November 12, 2002
6:00-8:00pm
A/P/A Studies Program & Institute Gallery, NYU
269 Mercer Street, Suite 609
Interlope is a journal of innovative North Asian American poetry. Readers will include contributors to the current issue (Veronica Corpus, Sarah Gambito, Paolo Javier) as well as past contributors based in the East Coast. For more information about this future collector’s item for Filipino/a literature, see http://www.interlope.org/
The Guest Editor for the issue, Eileen Tabios, as well as the publisher of Interlope, Summi Kaipa, will be on hand to celebrate the launch. A reception will follow the reading.
The event is FREE.
Co-sponsored by Interlope, Second Avenue Editions and Meritage Press.
For more information:
Laura Chen-Schultz
Deputy Director
Asian/Pacific/American Studies Program & Institute
New York University
269 Mercer St., #609
New York, NY 10003
tel: (212) 998-3700
fax: (212) 995-4705
email: LC7@nyu.edu
****************************************
GRAVITIES OF CENTER BY BARBARA J. PULMANO REYES
ISBN 0-9713423-9-3
70 pages, paperback
For more information, please contact:
ARKIPELAGO BOOKS PUBLISHING
953 Mission Street
San Francisco, CA 94103
415.777.0108 voice
415.777.0113 fax
orders@arkipelagobooks.com
http://www.arkipelagobooks.com
Congratulations to Barbara J. Pulmano Reyes whose first poetry book, Gravities of Center, will be published in Spring 2003 by Arkipelago Books Publishing (San Francisco). Arkipelago proclaims: “Contained in this collection are poems and prose pieces which exhibit Barbara's oftentimes eclectic style/sensibilities and willingness to experiment with form and language. With serious and playful poems very much rooted in San Francisco Bay Area urban and suburban cultures, settings, and vernaculars, a geographically faraway Philippines is never absent from this Pilipina American writer's consciousness. Consistent throughout Gravities of Center are themes of longing, desire, diaspora, postcoloniality, feminism, and coming of age.”
Born in Makati and raised in Fremont, California, Barbara received her undergraduate education at UC Berkeley and is currently working on her MFA at San Francisco State University. Her poems and essays have appeared in Filipinas, Liwanag, Interlope, Shampoo Poetry, Can We Have Our Ball Back, Maganda, Babaylan (Aunt Lute, 2000), Eros Pinoy: An Anthology of Contemporary Erotica in Philippine Art and Poetry (Anvil, 2001), Turnings: Writings on Women's Transformations (Women's Studies at ODU, 2000), and are forthcoming in Tinfish and Filipino Writers in the Diaspora. The following is a sample poem from Gravities of Center:
ETYMOLOGY ON A MEXICAN HOLIDAY
Ixtapa (Ix o TA o pa) - (Nahuatl). "The white place," named by the non-Nahuatl-speaking Federal Bureau for Tourist Development in 1968, originally referring to the sands of its many beaches, invoking the romantic indigene. Today its name is more indicative of the gleaming strip of luxury resorts, tennis courts, and golf course, which have supplanted the privately owned, recently expropriated coconut plantation, which had supplanted alligator infested swampland. "White place" also indicative of its tourists' demographics.
Zihuatanejo (Zee o hwa o ta o NAY o ho) - (Hispanized Nahuatl). Originally named Cuiatlán, meaning "place of women." Bastardized by lisping, non-Nahuatl-speaking conquerors, who added the pejorative -ejo, thereby changing "place of women" to "small place of women." Not to be sung to the tune of "Guantanamera."
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TWO PINAY WRITERS: POETRY & FICTION
(WEST COAST LAUNCH: REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE)
7 p.m., Friday, December 6, 2002
Pusod Center
1808 Fifth Street
Berkeley, CA 94710
Consider launching your 2002 Holiday gift-giving by supporting Filipino literature! How about offering friends and family autographed copies of poetry and fiction by, respectively, Eileen Tabios and Tess Holthe!
Eileen Tabios (REPRODUCTIONS OF THE EMPTY FLAGPOLE) and Tess Holthe (WHEN THE ELEPHANTS DANCE) will present readings as well as discuss their literary experiences. This will be a unique occasion to go behind the scenes of the experiences of two writers whose 2002 books have received critical acclaim. This event also offers the West Coast book launch for Eileen's long-awaited poetry collection, the first that is published in the U.S. (for more book information including praise from leading contemporary poets, see www.marshhawkpress.org).
Interviews about the two writers' books and lives are now available online. Synchronistically, both Eileen and Tess were involved in financial careers before becoming full-time writers.
More information about Eileen is available through the Santa Rosa Press Democrat's web site at The Santa Rosa Press Democrat // Archives (write "Tabios" under Archives-Search).
More information about Tess is accessible through Asia Society:
http://www.asiasource.org/arts/tessholthe.cfm.
Reception and book signings will follow. For more information, contact Dori Caminong at dori.bwf.org/.
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OBVIATING BOREDOM, “TWIST KARMA, CYNTHIA”
Meritage Press is pleased to feature “Twist Karma, Cynthia,” a poem by emerging poet Allan Aguilar. This resident of Houston, Texas offers a frank introduction by saying, “I write poems because boredom is deadly. I have had so much time on my hands in the past few years that writing has given me an excuse to appreciate any sense of chronology on this earth. I'm currently unemployed, but hope to land an insignificant job to further my bohemian instincts. However, there is nothing bohemian about me, since I still live with my parents, in relative suburbia, at the tremendous age of 25. But I can dream that I'm Kerouac or William Blake...or even T.S. Eliot choking on some tea. I hope the poem that was selected brings you interest and uncertainty; I cannot ask for anything more.”
TWIST KARMA, CYNTHIA
It's a windy tundra behind her eyes
I spy
igloos
where hope might reside
She looks at me
and I freeze
wanting to warm up the situation
to please her
in some way
but I can't find the space
I can't find the space
You'll find your way, girl
It's a swirl of karma out there
You should get yours soon
I look at the band playing
slaying the stage
with a presence
from learned lessons
She holds my hand
out of the blue
my anxieties cue
but her grip is tender
she trusts me
for reasons I'm scared of
she trusts me
You'll find your way, girl
It's a swirl of karma out there
You should get yours soon
You'll find your way, girl
I hope I am of good spirits
We'll find our way
away from the beer and cigarettes
****************************************
ENHEDUANNA IN THE 21ST CENTURY
Poetry E-Chapbook By Eileen R. Tabios
ISBN 951-9198-00-8, 41 pages
Electronically published by xPress(ed) (Finland)
http://www.xpressed.org
xPress(ed) is pleased to announce the publication of a poetry e-chapbook by Eileen R. Tabios entitled ENHEDUANNA IN THE 21ST CENTURY. Through her 20 poems that blur boundaries between poetry and prose (novella), Ms. Tabios offers a contemporary perspective on the life of Enheduanna, a Sumerian princess known as the world's first recorded poet for having her poems inscribed on cuneiform tablets.
Ms. Tabios created Enheduanna's narrative partly by annotating from whatever reading material surrounded her at the time she wrote the poems during a one-month period. She then wrote the last, 175-tercet poem by doubling back onto narrative fragments from the series' first 19 prose poems. "Through these techniques," Ms. Tabios says, "I wished the 'universe' through elements outside of myself to author Enheduanna's story since I didn't wish to presume speaking on her behalf. With the last poem, I also wanted to offer a circle, an archetype whose resonance is timeless. This archetype may be called Love."
ENHEDUANNA is accessible at xPress(ed)'s web site: http://www.xpressed.org/. xPress(ed) is an e-chapbook publisher devoted to new and innovative experimental poetry. All downloads are free. Viewing requirements: Acrobat Reader 4.0 or newer. Downloadable version is compressed to ZIP format. The PalmPilot version is an ordinary Palm Doc.
xPress(ed) is edited by poet and composer Jukka-Pekka Kervinen. xPress(ed)'s affiliated publications include xStream, an e-zine focused on experimental poetry, collage, cut-ups, computer-generated texts, among others (http://xstream.xpressed.org/).
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THE POETICS OF AND POEMS ON DEEP FRIED TWINKIES
Meritage Press was so disgusted (in a, yum, perverse way) by the notion of a deep fried Twinkie that it sent out a challenge for poets to poeticize the caloric matter. There is more than one way to fry the Twinkie, but here’s an easy way: after removing the Twinkies from their plastic wrappers (yes, remove the wrappers first!), chill them so they don't disintegrate when heated. Next, roll them in flour, then dip in a tempura batter, and then fry at 380 degrees Fahrenheit for 90 to 120 seconds. More information about the deep fried Twinkie is available at http://channels.netscape.com/ns/homerealestate/package/homenews.jsp. Meanwhile, three poets bravely stepped up to the oven for our deep fried Twinkie poetic challenge:
THE 27 YEAR SHELF LIFE
By Annabelle A. Udo
Soft and spongy
is the Almighty Twinkie.
With a shelf life of indeterminate proportions.
It will kill you before you kill It,
The Almighty Twinkie is filled with artery clogging shit--
Of Niacin and Ferrous Sulfate,
Of Thiamine and Mononitrate
Of Riboflavin, Dextrose and Lecithin.
Eat too many and become completely toxic,
Like Former San Francisco Supervisor Dan White
who claimed it made him demonic,
"The Twinkie made me do it," is all he had to say,
And soon his defense went down in history to this very day.
Hey, and what about the morbidly obese woman
Who complained of a rash--
only for the doctors to get her cash
And do an archeological dig
to discover that a Twinkie
had decomposed
amidst the folds of her skin.
If that's not enough to do you in
and know that Twinkie the Kid is the devil within,
With a 27 year shelf life,
you'll never win.
DEEP FRIED TWINKIE
By Nick Carbo
my love handles hold
fold and twist and jiggle up
and down for one more
one night at the county fair
By Michelle Bautista
crinkling plastic wrapper striptease
skinny dips into bubbling oil
golden batter hardens brown
the sound of monsoon rainfall
moistens the air, salivates the lips
sugary dusted on a star filled sky
would my heart stop for just one taste?
my lips falter at the penetrating heat
yet my tongue bares all to the creamy center
i dare not speak of this moment
less be branded
a sinner.