Readings in Contemporary Poetry
Michael Lally and Brenda Iijima
Thursday, April 21, 2011, 6:30 pm, Dia Chelsea
Thursday, April 21, 2011, 6:30 pm
535 West 22nd St.
New York City
Introduction by Vincent Katz
Michael Lally
STRING THEORY
but there were things—
strings connecting me to
music—jazz & r&b mostly—
I could play—I had a feel—
soul some said—like poet
Ralph Dickey who had more
technique but lacked a
certain swinging intuitive
rhythm—and words—mine—
not maybe most original—
but originally mine in ways
that favored reverence for
a truth I never found any-
where else—and movies—
or those serial movies that
are TV—in my time I
made a contribution—whether
anyone noticed or not—
I tried to step back, like
Lao Tsu says, but found it
complicated—more complicated
than I knew how—simplicity
being my mission—my love
for the boy I couldn’t protect
in me back then but vowed
to stay connected to—do you
hear those two-letter words?—
they’re the ones that trip me
up since they removed that
foreign object from my brain
that explains my poetry now—
though it always did—
Brenda Iijima
CRY 1
Four moths, Thuringia
resistance developed quickly eaten fields of vapor skyhold no
clouds thrashing blinding sunscape nope, sun
epithelial cells have lyse d released un of s
gut cell membrane so when it licks it sickens sun
sun when opening pathogen binding affinities
control screen with ravens set sun sun
oon-m noon sun
at(e) e(m) and you’ll die in(sect)icide
black fly vector hector horus
so(s)
solubilized in eyes our eyes in vectors suns
i bore a black beetle active
sun, i wore helmet membranes skin wings antennae
un, i gore (s) abhor where once noose
animal, you’ve
phase whore boy your disparagement alpha helices [places]
sunscreen i mean mean [detrimental, mental, ‘mean’]
[cede] pregnancy bait wait pleasure gut cellular
wingless raven welter vector sun [screens]
i mean i mean i’m a combination
larvae stopped feeding/host gut/tremor
breathing machines form in embryonic fluid, body be (fore)
circumstance glances whor-ses horses horses
we bet on the plumb winning torso
hooves index a circular track
when they’ll race you naked on the cul-de-sac
insects cheer at your success
liquid replicas
living cells are motives like color
to mirror your meat perception
jewelry and volume and canyon
inkling overlaps in image
“a creature”
a jpeg the transgenetic cactus
(that she engineered, considers art), it sprouts human hair
there’s a hare named bunny (and it)
glows phosphorescent green
art envisions
what art envisions
tip a cell this way