This season Small Press Traffic is celebrating its 40th Anniversary through a series of readings curated by former Small Press Traffic directors.
The festivities began on Sunday March 10th, curated by Jocelyn Saidenberg (Director of SPT from 1999-2000), who invited us to enjoy the work of three powerful women writers: Beth Murray (via telephone), Evelyn Reilly, and Renee Gladman .
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| Jocelyn Saidenberg |
Somehow, in the midst of the frenzy of end-of-quarter grading, and in the season of awaiting news from College Admissions Departments for my daughter, I've misplaced my notebook with all my notes! So, for this post, I'm flying on the magic carpet of memory only folks!
Beth Murray is living near Yosemite these days. Jocelyn arranged for Beth to read via phone and speaker, but the connection kept breaking up. We heard a tiny slice of some of Cancer Angel, a full length manuscript. Beth has been kind enough to let me post some of it here. This is a small portion of a section entitled "Vile."
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| Beth Murray |
Fabric
here
in the chest who will instruct?
in
the branches who will locate motions?
however
swift or slow,
several
wheels turning trust
brass
instruments blowing luck,
strings
plucking faith have
inherited
terrible violence around which
numbness
injects unnoticed—
tumors
too can be circles,
the
path into curiosity, to ask
who are you?
sit
quietly for what arises,
when
the recesses of mind pop up,
there
is a trembling in the bones in these moments
draw
attention to this spot so that
other
wayfarers know to
stop
here, so that other
travelers
holding offerings
are
moved to give,
light
dimming in what has fallen
tumor says,
I
grow here to make bigger this
we
are traveling
taking
the thoughts back
‘the
entire planet’ we say in our blessings
but
inside the twitching there is no
boundary
your gaze catches mine and we fall asleep knowing
until
looking too closely
the
space becomes difficult to see
the
feeling of feeling is not the story of what happened
but
the fabric that called you to your birth,
that
decided you would meet and
look
with love beyond compromise –
who
are you without years of counting?
who
are you without breathing in the habitual direction?
waking
to check–
the
tumors are a voice speaking
the
message of their own dissolving
and
each message continues until
the
waters of the tide fall in on it
under
the continuity that cannot be
numbered
upon which the bowl
is
placed empty and all eat – in that continuity the blessing
that
there will be others or there are others
blinking
in the sunlight,
through
the stillness of the diamond shapes
vibrating
past orchestras and the witness of winds –
no
more they shall blow you
Tightening
I
first took lamb-soft leave,
my
lungs tightening from
these
years of interruption tethering
the
loss of children,
the
passing of my brother,
the
leaving of lovers,
releasing
the oh well,
to
come to we require another—
do
not let your desires run down,
as
the body will clock it
a
year or many later reading
the
moment of abandoning desire
or
accepting obstruction –
the
end of the entire hallelujah, not a celebrated slicing
pomegranate,
bitter food of winter’s darkness:
I
will not carry forward these
dark
secrets –
ask
yourself where is the space?
the
freedom, the light
let
yourself into the lit room
find
the others who have sought the light
tumor says,
I grow here to make bigger
the
struggling part
when
the voice is not big enough
grow
in the throat to augment
before
how hiding
want
something else and cannot
in
my dream house,
barely
able to lift my arm
tumor says,
I
make bigger your lip
to
hide the size of your teeth
so
Olympian
under
pressure of expectation
tumor says,
when loved ones are troubled
I
grow as breast to nurture them
Vile
my
only hope Adriamyacin they said -
syringe
of vile, red liquid in
sealed
manila envelope with doctor’s orders, the nurse
opens
in front of me, she will be paid a few dollars to sit on my bedside and
place
her thumb on the syringe, slowly press, she says
“you
should not see it move”
faster
would strip my veins,
she
explains they call this “pushing”
she
will be paid a few dollars to sit slowly pushing
he
will be paid $15,000 for signing the vile red liquid order,
starts
every woman with breast tumors as large as mine on vile red liquid,
it
takes much longer for her gloved hand to
patiently
hold the syringe
the
first time I’m curious, watch the syringe,
feel
for some change in my blood
is
it cold, metallic?
fifteen
minutes later syringe empties, she tosses it in toxic waste bin
I
get up to pee, wheeling my IV stand with me
pee
is red – it’s gone in –
the
next day pee stings
knows
corroding, knows killing cells
this
will kill only the fast growing ones they say
so
stomach lining, so hair, so tumor –
within
a month hair is falling
each
morning black strands on the pillow
satin
pillows my femme friend says
satin
pulls hair the least
my
mother sends two satin pillowcases
Devatara
shows me satin magnetized blanket
with
bright yellow Buddha toward which to direct
cancer
pulled from my breast out fingers send to Buddha
Buddha-magnets
will absorb, neutralize
blanket
costs $150, it’s the
size
of a crib blanket for a toddler who will not suckle here
satin
pillows from mom are free
after
first chemo cannot eat for days
wait
for the day I can get into the water
swim
in fishy, toxic bay to clear my head
fingers
slip into the water with each stroke
send
cancer out my arm into the water
Devatara
says you must only use blanket to absorb it
I
think, “the sea is big enough”
sea
will neutralize –
next
time sight of red syringe turns my stomach
I
cannot look, belly reels with fatigue and dying cells
red
syringe flashes—
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| Evelyn Reilly, photo courtesy of Kevin Killian |
Next up Evelyn Reilly read excerpts from Styrofoam and Apocalypso, both from Roof Books. Reilly's reading was lively, and in particular, I was struck by how much her writing is studded with language of our moment though it is also intertwined with a diction attached to the past such as in her references to Browning's "Childe Harold to the Dark Tower Came." Reilly's work is interested in the environmental, technology, the internet, science; she revels in linguistic play. Here's an excerpt from "Styrofoam," pulled from her website here.
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Lastly, Evelyn read from Apocalypso, a book that continues her linguistic revelries, cast in shadow and humor, as in this piece, briefly excerpted here:
Apocalypso: A Comedy
And I became the Alpha
and the Omega
and my little dog too
Come and I'll show you what once
shall have taken place after this
forever and ever and ever, etc.
at which I took my glue gun
from its hipster holster
and twenty-four elders
began to sing:
Eight swimming creatures covered with eyes (state of the oceans, check)
Sixteen birds with sinister wings (state of the flyways, checkers)
But even the end of evolve, luv? (I was down with the animals)
Then the twenty-four fell down:
clad in white garments
and wearing golden crowns
(this is the revised standard
sedition edition chapter four
verses one through ten
in which enumeration equals
a technique of calm
3 2 1 we are calm
So many pretty revels
in these devastation pictures
head as mollusk shell
whale with insect tail
and a twig become
a tiny musician
fingering a stringy box
(see Fall of the Rebel Angels
by Pieter Bruegel)
as I scan
my es-cat-a-logue
covering that part of language
concerned with reckoning
and the density destiny
of survivor species
For he poured his bowls of wrath on the earth
and a great star fell onto the rivers
For more, check out Evelyn's book:
Next up was Renee Gladman. In her intro, Jocelyn referenced the SPT African American experimental literature conference she, Renee, and Giovanni Singleton worked on in the spring of 2000, citing it as her first conference ever and one of her seminal experiences while at Small Press Traffic.
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| Renee and Kevin Killian at ATA photo by Aja Duncan |
Renee read from the third book in her The Ravickians series--Ana Patova Crosses a Bridge, newly out from the Dorothy Project, and then later from a manuscript in progress, a book of essays, called Calamities, because, Renee said, they fail.
I confess not having yet read the previous Ravickian books. Event Factory, The Ravickians, and now, Ana Patova Crosses a Bridge, are among many books awaiting time and space. I promise to clear the decks for them this summer as I was simply blown away by Renee's reading. I found her language to be roomy, roamy, expansive, deeply satisfying in its careful attention to thinking and thinking about thinking and living in writing, and doing it in a way that feels deeply important, weighty, enigmatic. Examples will make clear what I as of yet cannot:
from Ana Patova:
I wrote this book in a circular home a hill, overlooking the city, which roams while we are sleeping; I wrote it in a café with my friends; I wrote it as I looked for hidden streets, while sitting in desolate and lush spaces. I wanted to say language leaves a trace, makes a simultaneous trail, of us and of the crisis. My walking leaves a trace, also my saying I have walked. And, this is important, because, though these marks do not render precisely the picture of our crisis, they do show where there are still people. The day fills up with monuments, and the book attempts to erect a fence around them. The book wishes to end a crisis by sheer fact of existing. But, rather than a History, the book becomes an index. It shuffles our bewilderment. It does not tell our story. It cannot do that. Nevertheless, it opens toward you. Tij.
--Ana Patova
Ravicka
Meanwhile, the eye witnesses the story
of what we were when we happened,
when the last person left and the first
person returned as if the same moment,
as if the inhale began in the exhale, that
first person leaving, who belonged to all
of us, and what we became in his
leaving: our reaching for our cups. We
were holding space and making space
through stillness, looking for structures
to reflect what we were seeing, which
was nothing. I wrote about buildings,
and for the first part of the crisis this
kept me occupied. I was holed up in my
home. I slept on the books I wrote, which
I'd glued between board and given
unassuming titles, like Slow and Tired, but
these books were my life's work; I knew
once I'd finished them I would never
write again; rather, I would not need to
write or live or sleep, it felt like. When I
changed my mind about this, when I
changed my mind--but, it was me and it
was L and it was Z. and B., and we were
all high on coffee and sometimes pills,
waiting for some storm to come, some
document from abroad.
I am eager for Gladman to publish Calamities. They too were thrilling and deeply satisfying. Visit Floor to read an excerpt. Gladman gave a talk "The Sentence as a Space for Living:Prose Architecture" as part of the University of California's Holloway Reading Series on March 13th that I did not learn about until after the fact. This is regrettable as I have a feeling I might have swooned. Hopefully, the Holloway Series folks will post a link on youtube soon! I can't wait.
