EILEEN TABIOS Engages
A DOG LOST IN THE BRICK CITY OF OUTLAWED TREES by Geoffrey Gatza
(The Mute Canary,
Lockport, N.Y., 14094)
Geoffrey Gatza’s A DOG
LOST IN THE BRICK CITY OF OUTLAWED TREES offers an interesting premise:
presenting as poems what are actually scores for performance. That is, inspired
by “change ringing” which Gatza explains to be “an English method of ringing
church bells to produce a rich cascade of sound set in a predetermined series,”
Gatza wrote poems “set up for performance. They are scored for people in place
of bells.”
These poems range from pieces
set for three readers in a “plain hunt” up to an hour-long “quarter peal” set
for ten readers. The number of performers can range from three people all the
way up to twelve. A plain hunt is the simplest method where all the voices
“hunt” in or out, following the idea of odds out, evens in. “In” refers to
going down to the lead (the front), the first word is the second, “out” refers
to going up to the back, and the first bell to reach the back is the fifth.
Then they all plain hunt up to the back and down to the front in turn. The
first section is set in colors to illustrate how the patterns function and
weave in and out. The other sections are set in black text so that the group of
performers can find their own way in the pieces.
Here’s the beginning of the collection’s first poem:
SPIRA, SPERA, BREATHE, HOPE
Plain
Hunt – for Three Voices
Spira
Spera Spiral
Spera
Spira Spiral
Spera
Spiral Spira
Spiral
Spera Spira
Spiral
Spira Spera
Spira
Spiral Spera
Spira
Spera Spiral
Spira
Hope Spiral
Hope
Spira Spiral
Hope
Spiral Spira
Spiral
Hope Spira
Spiral
Spira Hope
Spira
Spiral Hope
Spira
Hope Spiral
Spera
Hope Breathe
Hope
Spera Breathe
Hope
Breathe Spera
Breathe
Hope Spera
Breathe
Spera Hope
Spera
Breathe Hope
Spera
Hope Breathe
Spera
Spera Hope
Spera
Spera Hope
Spera
Hope Spera
Hope
Spera Spera
Hope
Spera Spera
Spera
Hope Spera
Spera
Spera Hope
Hope
Hope Breathe
Hope
Hope Breathe
Hope
Breathe Hope
Breathe
Hope Hope
Breathe
Hope Hope
Hope
Breathe Hope
Hope
Hope Breathe
Breathe
Breathe Spera
Breathe
Breathe Spera
Breathe
Spera Breathe
Gatza says readers can read his poems any way they wish but,
for this first poem that suggests “For Three Voices” and presents the text in
the book in three different colors, one can certainly envision three readers
reading from their “assigned” places. What results, then, is sound poetry …
even as what’s being sound-ed are not sounds (as with church bells) but words
with meaning.
It’s interesting to consider the effectiveness of this
approach. I, for one, recognize the poems as poems but am I going to sit
through the pages reading each word? I didn’t. I didn’t so much “read” as
“scan” several of the poems in the book. But my behavior does attest to how the
poems are “scores.”
(Btw, I once created a sound poem based on using words from
a language in which I or my anticipated readers are not fluent; I published the
text in one of my books but had/have no expectation of readers literally
reading the words which were/are meant to sound out sounds in that the letters (deliberately) produce no meaning to
English readers. Gatza’s project, by offering comprehensible words, offer up a
tension between meaning and sound, a difficulty similar to that tension between
meaning and design when using words/letters in visual art.)
And yet. Perhaps “scores”—even though the term itself is
used in the book—may be a tad simplistic as to what these poems
are/become. Epigraphed by this wonderful
quote from Victor Hugo—
And if you wish to receive of the ancient city an impression with which
the modern one can no longer furnish you, climb – on the morning of some grand
festival, beneath the rising sun of Easter or of Pentecost – climb upon some
elevated point, whence you command the entire capital; and be present at the
wakening of the chimes. Behold, at a signal given from heaven, for it is the
sun which gives it, all those churches quiver simultaneously. First come scattered
strokes, running from one church to another, as when musicians give warning
that they are about to begin. Then, all at once, behold! – for it seems at
times, as though the ear also possessed a sight of its own, – behold, rising
from each bell tower, something like a column of sound, a cloud of harmony.
First, the vibration of each bell mounts straight upwards, pure and, so to
speak, isolated from the others, into the splendid morning sky; then, little by
little, as they swell they melt together, mingle, are lost in each other, and
amalgamate in a magnificent concert. It is no longer anything but a mass of
sonorous vibrations incessantly sent forth from the numerous belfries; floats,
undulates, bounds, whirls over the city, and prolongs far beyond the horizon
the deafening circle of its oscillations.
Nevertheless, this sea of harmony is not a chaos; great and profound as
it is, it has not lost its transparency; you behold the windings of each group
of notes which escapes from the belfries.
Victor
Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame
—the book shows that the poems are not just sounds but words
and, yes, narratives… in the manner of how, in Hugo’s description, one can
see/hear not just a “sea of harmony” but also “the windings of each group of
notes.” Because I am a reader too tied
to meaning when I look at words, a poem that straddles sound but also a more
complicated narrative works more effectively for me than others. It’s no
coincidence that I prefer the poems meant for “Eight Voices” over the ones
meant for “Three Voices” with their resonances based on meaning. You can get a
gist of what I mean by the titles of two poems:
I HATE CAPITALISM BUT I WANT TO FUCK SANTA CLAUSE
YOU CAN’T DESTROY TIME; IT HAS NO PLACE TO GO
The former poem has text like this—
I Hate Capitalism but I Want to Fuck Santa Claus
Yorkshire
Surprise Major – for Eight Voices
I hate capitalism but I want to
fuck Santa Claus
I but to want Santa Claus fuck
I to but Santa Claus want fuck
to I Santa Claus but fuck want
to I but Santa Claus want fuck
to I Santa Claus but fuck want
to I Santa Claus fuck but want
to I fuck Santa Claus want but
—while the latter has text like this—
You Can’t Destroy Time; It Has No Place To Go.
Yorkshire
Surprise Major – for Eight Voices
You Can’t Destroy Time It Has No
Place To Go
Time Destroy No It Has To Go
Place
Time No Destroy To Go It Has
Place
No Time To Go Destroy Place It
Has
No Time Destroy To Go It Has
Place
No Time To Go Destroy Place It
Has
No Time To Go Place Destroy It
Has
No Time Place To Go It Has
Destroy
No Time Place To Go Destroy It
Has Time
No Place To Go It Has Destroy
You get the gist. But while my brain stayed with the words
of the first poem—“Spira,” “Spera,” “Breathe” and “Hope”—my thoughts continued
past the texts on the page for the two poems for “Eight Voices.” The latter two
poems made me think past the words I read as I considered their presented
thoughts on capitalism, Santa Claus’ becoming a symbol for commercialism rather
than … whatever Santa was before, and then all sorts of cogitations arose at
the idea of destroying time or the impossibility of such.
And yet. Having said all that, let’s say that Gatza went to
a poetry reading with this book and perhaps some friends to help him “read”
from the book. Who knows? It may be that the poems with more emphasis on sound
may be more effective live performances.
In a performance venue, it’s possible that (some or many of) the
audience members are more focused on the moment and thus can attend to each
sound as it occurs, versus mentally pausing to consider the meaning/implication
of narrative while the performance is continuing past that narrative.
And yet. I am writing
this review concurrent with reading through the book and so, after I’ve stated
what I’ve stated above, I then come onto a poem on Page 87 that shows that I’m
also presenting a binary that doesn’t always hold. That is—and this attests to
Gatza’s wisdom, and certainly sophistication, as a poet—on Page 87 we come
across a poem that begins as such:
When a Poet Dies An Entire Library Dies As Well
Cambridge
Surprise Maximus – for Ten Voices – for Tom and Norma
When
a Poet Dies An Entire Library Dies As Well
When An Library Poet As a Dies
Entire Well Dies
When As Library An Well Poet
Dies a Entire Dies
When Well Dies As Entire Library
Dies An a Poet
When Dies Entire Well Dies a
Poet As An Library
When Dies a Entire Poet Dies An
Well Library As
When Poet An a Library Dies As
Entire Dies Well
When Library As An Poet a Well
Dies Dies Entire
When As Well Library Dies An
Entire Poet Dies a
When Well Dies Entire Dies As a
Library Poet An
When Entire Dies Dies a Well
Poet An Library As
a When Dies Poet Entire An Dies
Library Well As
An When Poet Library a As Dies
Entire Dies Well
As When Library An Poet Well a
Dies Dies Entire
When Well
As Dies Library Entire An Dies Poet a
Dies When Well Entire Dies a As
Poet Library An
Like the other poems, this poem goes into various
permutations of the words that make up the title. But there’s something about
that line, “When a Poet Dies An Entire Library Dies As Well,” that makes the
reader (me, anyway) consider its truth, its complicated truth. And I can easily
envision myself at a live performance continuing to mentally ruminate over the
phrase’s implications while enjoying the sounds being voiced by the
performers. Perhaps it’s the
articulation of a particular line whose effect breaks down my earlier-described
binary that makes a great poem in this particular style. While I get this
effect from “When a Poet Dies An Entire Library Dies As Well,” I don’t receive
a similar transporting effect from, say, “A Dog Lost in the Brick City of
Outlawed Trees.” But if it’s this perspective that determines the “analysis” of
Gatza’s collection, then we can say that identifying which line works better
than another is subjective so this paragraph is not identifying a flaw per se
in Gatza’s project.
What we do know is that Gatza has taken an inventive
approach towards making his latest poetry book such that the mind is not only
appreciative but would anticipate a chance to see this book performed in such a
way as to please other senses besides sight.
*****
Eileen Tabios is the editor of Galatea Resurrects (GR). She loves books and has released over 50 collections of poetry, fiction, essays, and experimental biographies from publishers in nine countries and cyberspace. Her 2018 poetry collections include HIRAETH: Tercets From the Last Archipelago, MURDER DEATH RESURRECTION: A Poetry Generator, TANKA: Vol. 1, and the forthcoming ONE TWO THREE: Selected Hay(na)ku Poems which is a bilingual English-Spanish edition with translator Rebeka Lembo. She is the inventor of the poetry form “hay(na)ku” which will be the focus of a 15-year anniversary celebration at the San Francisco and Saint Helena Public Libraries in 2018. More information is available at http://eileenrtabios.com. She is pleased to direct you elsewhere to recent reviews of her work: MURDER DEATH RESURRECTION (MDR) was reviewed by Zvi. A Sesling for Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene.
