John Bloomberg-Rissman: Two Poems from “In the House of the Hangman”



John Bloomberg-Rissman: tattoo with quote from Walter Benjamin

 

In the House of the Hangman 1107

Trying to relieve the feeling of dead meat in the breast with a swim in the sea, see lots of movie type cartoon Disney Saga, work all the time, do some work to, read about body fluids, writing letters back and forth with proposals on jobs and ideas, type no answer. How do you do? Freak accident is the thing maybe? Give me a penny for your lungs man. Imagine being someone’s butler. Hey. This is Buffy and Leila, Divine and PJ in the back without them knowing about it or agree with, icons should not have to bother. This is going to go so fucking good. Otherwise, we can hold the car. Are you with me? We can hold the car to the north and playing Sheeba, Go betweens and Meat loaf on the askassa stereo. No one can reach us, we ba: generally no. No can dou. No Sir, we can accommodate. That’s a negative sir, we have escaped. We’ve set to work removing the veil of anxious subjectivity and clotted multi-syllables from their writing, to go for a walk and to take nothing (no phone, no iPod, no iPad, nothing) except for a pad and pen. When they saw an image that they would otherwise take a picture of, they were to stop, sit down, and write the image as they saw it. No commentary. The ticket should emerge from the sidewalk not as evidence of “a lonely night,” but as a ratty piece of paper with the numbers 1446-2023. However, putting this into the context of several recent articles about the accelerating pace of “cyber-attacks” on U.S. infrastructure — that is, “the pace at which America’s electricity grids, water supplies, computer and cellphone networks and other infrastructure are coming under attack,” in the words of the New York Times — as well as news that NYC’s elevators and boilers are now seen as potential targets for cyberwarfare (hackers “could increase the speed of how elevators go up or down,” perhaps crashing them to the bottom of the shaft), the idea of garage doors being hacked by radio signals emanating from the ocean by belligerent foreign powers takes on the air of, say, Red Dawn, as remade by Bob Vila. Oh, and that “vanilla” you ate may actually be crushed beaver anal glands – The idea that humans walk in circles is no urban myth. I have no control over my emotions. I don’t know anyone who does. The Dalai Lama, maybe, but I don’t trust him, not since seeing him shake hands with George W. Bush. The challenge in observing them is to overcome the blurring of Earth’s atmosphere. A ‘90s technique called Speckle imaging uses very short exposures to effectively freeze out the atmosphere. With Speckle, the “winning” star was S0-2, which orbits around a central dark mass in 16 years. This proved the existence of a black hole at the galactic center. But S0-2 was the only short-period (<20 years) star revealed. To carry out a fundamental test of general relativity, you need at least two stars with short orbits. Fortunately, since then a revolutionary technology called adaptive optics has arrived. This technique corrects for the effects of the atmosphere in real-time, distorting a mirror in exactly the opposite way that the atmosphere distorts the starlight. This enabled our discovery of S0-102, which takes a mere 11.5 years to orbit.

[Note: Sources: Trying to relieve … we have escaped: Stina Kajaso, “Strypvaffla” (tr. Google), at http://sonofdaddy.blogspot.com/2012/10/strypvaffla.html SONOFDAD, 6 Oct 012; We’ve set to work … from their writing and to go for a walk … 1446-2023: Susan M Schultz, “Documentary Poetry & Being in the World”, at http://tinfisheditor.blogspot.com/2012/10/documentary-poetry-being-in-world.html Tinfish Editor’s Blog, 6 Oct 012; However, putting this into the context … Vila: Geoff Manaugh, “Garage Warfare”, at http://bldgblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/garage-warfare.html BLDG/BLOG, 6 Oct 012; Oh, and: JBR; that “vanilla” … anal glands --: Melanie Jones/watchdog.net, email rec’d 6 Oct approx. 7:04 PM PDT (concerning some flavoring substance called castoreum); The idea that humans … urban myth: Imp Kerr, “Triple-Decker Weekly, 29”, at http://thenewinquiry.com/blogs/shines-like-gold/triple-decker-weekly-29/ The New Inquiry, 6 Oct 012; I have no control … George W. Bush: John Olson, “Not So Sweet Emotions”, at http://tillalala.blogspot.com/2012/10/not-so-sweet-emotions.html Tillalala Chronicles, 6 Oct 012; The challenge … to orbit: “The Discovery of the shortest period star in the Galactic Center: S0-102: To be published by Science in the October 5, 2012 edition”, at http://www.astro.ucla.edu/~ghezgroup/gc/research/S02_S0102_orbits.html UCLA Galactic Center Group, as seen 6 Oct 012]

6 – 9 October 2012

 

In the House of the Hangman 1110

Such were the two objects, the shotgun and the tape recorder, that interested the Araweté the most: an instrument that increased the productivity of the hunt, and an ideological apparatus reproduced the singularity of the voice. Production and reproducibility, nature and supernature, eating and singing, animals and gods. Fuck I hate fireworks. The only thing that’s worse than fireworks are real bombs, which is aggravatingly Platonic I know. And then I stared at a tuna slab. That would have been me, skimming the moss. They are Laura Palmer wrapped in plastic and washed up on the beach trying to speak through old film footage, through her diary. The voices begin to speak toward something coherent and abruptly stop: you can’t be a slave, Pa Ubu. You’re far too fat.

My back

pack is
chock

full of dead
bees for you

look at
them!

I remember flying over the southern tip of Greenland, coming back from Iceland. We were on the right side of the plane for the photos and everyone began oohing and aahing at the brightness and the desolation. And I remember thinking if the plane had to crash, it should be right here. Because why? Because the architecture of data storage is inhuman. Servers don’t need daylight, so the spaces are lit by blinking power lights or eery coral-reef-like fluorescence. I mean, most of the time when I watch a Lars von Trier movie I find myself wishing I were watching it on mute. The image has thousands of possible ramifications, and yet the one that was chosen, for the most part, feels like you know how dogs aren’t really smiling, they’re just panting? and they don’t really kiss you, they just lick your face because they like salt? “Zero Sadness”: little kids that walk around looking down / not because they have low self-esteem but / because they’re looking at their cool shoes / light up and or sparkle. Before us is our flesh with the tattooed portents. A spider had somehow attached a web strand to my face and was climbing towards my nose from a pile of workbooks on the desk next to mine. I passed my hand in front of my right cheek and swung her to the floor. Teddy bear with black button eyes and black rubber ears is asleep next to the hand pump disinfectant dispenser. The dictionary is half-black and half-pink. A blue sticker is affixed to the back of the fat, little book. Inside are some drawings on napkins. I wasted in the coffee shop drinking bitter, while she searched for an electronic knuckle in the pickle shop. Flame-flaked paint. Those carpeted bathrooms. That smelly couch. Milk and tea and cookies named after a bodily process. “JULIA JULIA JULIA in my dream we were flying with a murder of crows and then you bit one of those motherf*ckers on the beak for trying to out-fly you.”

[Note: Such were the two … animals and gods: Eduardo Vivieros de Castro, From the Enemy’s Point of View: Humanity and Divinity in an Amazonian Society (tr. Catherine V Howard); The only thing … Platonic I know and And then and I stared … tuna slab and That would have been … the moss: Brandon Brown, “Fusees 22”, in Flowering Mall; They are Laura … abruptly stop: Drew Kalbach, “‘The sheer number of corpses which pile up’: Drew Kalbach on Laura Mullen’s Murmur”, at http://www.montevidayo.com/?p=3225 Montevidayo, 9 Oct 012; you can’t be a slave … too fat: Alfred Jarry, Slave Ubu (tr. Kenneth McLeish) in Jarry Ubu; My back
pack … look at them!: Russ Woods, “Bees”, at http://husmw4.tumblr.com/russ_woods have u seen my whale 4; I remember flying … right here: William Keckler, “Greenland”, at http://joebrainardspajamas.blogspot.com/2012/10/greenland.html Joe Brainard’s Pyjamas (The Sequel), 9 Sept 012; Because why? Because: JBR; the architecture … fluorescence: Kyle Chayka, “The Aesthetics of Data Storage”, at http://hyperallergic.com/58330/the-aesthetics-of-data-storage/ Hyperallergic, 9 Sept 012; I mean: JBR; most of the time … feels: Blake Butler, “I Don’t Want To Read Any More Books About Straight White People Having Sex”, at http://www.vice.com/read/dont-want-to-read-any-more-books-about-straight-white-people-having-sex Vice, 9 Oct 012; like: JBR; you know how dogs … they like salt?: Heiko Julién, I Am Ready To Die A Violent Death, at http://www.scribd.com/doc/102952623/I-Am-Ready-To-Die-A-Violent-Death scribd; “Zero Sadness … light up and or sparkle: Ana Carrete, “Zero Sadness”, at http://mynameismud.co.uk/4-poems.htm my name is mud; Before us … pickle shop and Flame-flaked paint … bodily process: Adam Avikainen, “Ginger Glacier”, at http://www.taipeibiennial2012.org/journal/15 Taipei Biennial 2012; “JULIA JULIA JULIA … out-fly you”: anonymous, as quoted in Julia Cohen, “Harmonics like a Deconstructed River Press”, at http://onthemessiersideofneat.blogspot.com/2012/10/harmonics-like-deconstructed-river-press.html $650 Apartment for $650, 9 Oct 012]

9 October 2012

NOTE.  The preceding are two further installments from Bloomberg-Rissman’s epic assemblage, “an ongoing project called Zeitgeist Spam,” consisting of multiple “panels” with titles like “Altarpiece to our Beauty and Insanity” & “No Sounds of My Own Making.”  While each panel has its own set of compositional constraints, he tells us, “they all involve appropriating/ sampling/ collaging/ assembling/ mangling other texts.”  An earlier entry on Poems and Poetics appeared here in 2011.  A prolific writer and researcher, Bloomberg-Rissman is currently working with me on Barbaric, Vast & Wild, a global/historical gathering of outsider & subterranean poetry, now in progress.  (J.R.]