Experimental Writing

I. The Apostrophe Engine

 

You are the true liberal,

Sciences I’ll ne’er be

You are

a goosequill gentlemen.

 

You are where I live,

while I live.

You are

already familiar.

 

You are the 4th line

of the 1st stanza.

You are

like Dover-street, Picadilly.

 

You are such a creature.

What a book,

you are.

Get in character!

 

You are from

an old Ballad, his

vagarying younger sister,

No-sense! So I send them,

to me. You are

to me. Like the

elephant’s bookshelf.

 

You are including,

not including, no

including hash-

based containers.

 

You are deciding,

and debugging, no,

designing, not

extending, but you

are including.

 

Thank

you for including

me.

 

You are an

indie film, but

I only write Horror,

Or Thriller. You

hire conversion

rate experts, targeting

what we did

with Crazy Eggs. You

keep working,

you are always

able to do so.

 

You are not

sure what questions

to ask. You have

become an

automating system,

an application.

May I be

yours truly?

Your administrative

tasks?

 

Why must you

be satisfied

with TV professionals

and Charlie Kaufman

and scripting language.

You are just another

Lanier Word Processing

Machine.

 

No exchange or

refund within

thirty days of your

purchase date.

As for the length,

Sorry.

 

You want to expose

the end value, but you

are an open circle. You

are arm’s length,

always ahead of us. We

hope you’ll remember how

you got there.

 

 

Commentary:

             I created this poem by using material generated from running through the apostrophe engine four times. I chose lines that stuck out to me, reordered them, and inserted line breaks based upon my own preferences. I purposefully maintained the same format in the beginning of the poem, forming quatrains where the first line began with the words “You are” and the third line consisted entirely of this same phrase. I then tried to make the poem seem a bit more chaotic by switching up the way I structured my lines, erasing some of the “You are’s,” and making it less obvious where one of the engine’s phrases stopped and another began. I think the descent into chaos mimics the engine’s process in a way, since it continuously generates more and more text and draws upon more Internet sources.

 

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II. Dear Head Nation Exercise:

 

Rubber Gloves

Latex, nitrile, and

vinyl first time,

power free customers

power free palet orders,

free freight practice space

coating of textiles,

extra-long, extra turn up

to catch drips of the site’s robots.

You can be chemical resistant, yes vapor protective,

The ideal dosage and supplier of butyl.

Shop with confidence.

 

Practice space doubling as

the coating of rental information

flocked in cotton lining, and flame resistant

to unroll carefully as applied. Upon your

coating of textile Casabella way clean waterstop.

Upon your household tasks to wash guardian dishes

On empty sycamore street behind the train.

Becoming hardened, hands receive free pickup

at your neighborhood Ace.

 

Small red useful necessary tools are the

industrial latex crates of nature.

Disposable. Heavy-duty. Ultimate tackle

To everyday scrubbers with the best messes

and more catalog performance in warehouse crates,

save big! We hear you now, saying there’s only so much

you can do with a Pepsi bottle. You are durable,

duraskin, you endure. We weren’t born the same

day shipping. Let us partially resemble respectless

headwear items. Take the texture from your

powder-free fingertips and bear your

synthetic material aloud.

 

Purple nitrile exam covers medium cuffs of

vitoject fluorocarbon products. Specific information

including Kmart & sponges at blasting inspection

rates. Classification and electrical safety techniques

surface at new offers. Are you certified for personal

protection of electrical workers? If you care remove

pet hair with lifehackers. Grisly crime may lead to

history standard equipment, bound up in myth

and legend at murder scenes. Purpoertedly.

Due to an influx of natural cleaners, you are

the easiest. You are a bagpipe, being played Macadeonian

gaida style by leading manufacturers.

 

Steel and media and websters and restaurants and

practical and durable and protection and from and cuts

and abrasions and you. You are puncturing. You are

comfortable. You two-color construction of Gempler’s

logo. You are 15-mil and 13” length. An item and

watermelon stripe, you are. And you. And San Francisco

will go global to aerospace and healthcare, to food and

helping you with cream and black bouquets and damask

and brown and pink and polka dotted, low price bubbles of me.

 

Steady, the latest from venues and industrial dive bars

since 1997, that time in Denton, Texas, when they were

ultra-strong and super grippy for the most slippery jobs.

Oh, our high-performance, in these days of aseptic surgery!

The use of you is so essential, requiring dishwashing and

the utmost case, preventing any disturbance in the skin of

go-carts and harbor freight amazons. Reliable wholesalers

guaranteed. The faps, Jacko Sueda, Kabomba! Only on

Etsy, all purpose to avoid making me heal my own fingernails.

 

Tips from the plastic bag mitten instructables,

you gave me that letter to use with the epoxy, so I

figure this nifty way to place the practical on a plastic

disposable shopping bag and use the cooks to remove

your compression stockings. Summon Dwight Smith and

the destroyer of light, and the widower biographies of Jimmy’s

ratings from Anna. She said he was easy. He called her a chick-lit,

like the type you read in bath to relax at Coleman’s when

troubled by images of polypropylene and military surplus.

 

Tundra restaurant suppliers boast a collection

called tales of unease and anchoring wash-ups. Paste

me to doodles in staple establishments of women and men

since the 1960s. Insulating cleaning sleeves are readily

available, so hail me as your exposed energy. Let me

serve as your leather protector and your employee

in six defined voltage classes.

We fit so snugly to the point of raised edges

on Honeywell hands and calloused mockup smocks. You

prove excellent to my chemical resistance, and my

warfare agents. Unroll me as your biological hazard

and I will be suitable for hardware. Do it, go ahead, do

it yourself. I was electric then, your unique excellence.

Your professional fitter.

 

Viton ansell protective solutions.

Your unique sigvaris discounts, I can be

your urban dictionary, your late night random

person that you buy mugs & shirts for fancy

occasions; tapping the middle class, the world’s

largest maker of uncanny competition and

slovenly recordings. Boost your Lucinda Shaw.

Direction. Find and follow posts. Direct

your detached houses on quiet streets to

spanking-clean tight-knit aisles. We are

all seeking connection.

 

 

Commentary:

            I used a similar process to create this poem as K. Silem Mohammad does in “Deer Head Nation.” Instead of typing the words “Deer Head” into Google, I used the words “Rubber Gloves.” I studied Surrealism in an Art History course in London last semester, and was fascinated by dream imagery and the uncanny, and how symbols such as rubber gloves and mannequins fit into this. I thought using the words “rubber gloves” might generate interesting results on Google, both incorporating Surrealist ideals as well as themes of sickness, cleaning, and chemicals. These works were very enjoyable to produce, and Google supplied me with an abundance of fascinating phrases I may not have thought of on my own. I chose some of the words because they bear multiple interpretations; for example, “rubber” relates to ordinary consumer products, but also has sexual connotations. I arranged the words based on rhythm more than semantics. Google allowed me to generate so many results simultaneously, and I wanted to convey this same sense of “random” activity and motion. I really enjoy these poems and feel they have a lot of texture, variety, and quirky subject matter.

 

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III. Cento:

 

Elizabeth Barrett Browning Compilation:

Some plait between the brows, some rougher chime

quite good enough for men to overbear.

There ended childhood, what succeeded next,

smooth endless days, notched here and there with knives;

Put paleness on for a disguise,

indeed beyond the zenith and the slope

HEARKEN, oh hearken! let your souls behind you

to lose the sense of losing. As a child,

goes bleating up the moors in weary dearth)

The tongue which, like a stream could run

to cover all the corn; we walk upon

the choirs of singing angels overshone

Grief for thy Dead in silence like to death—

 

Emily Dickinson Compilation:

He glanced with rapid eyes

of prancing poetry.

A Bog—affronts my shoe—

But peers beyond her mesh—

in a Hermetic Memory.

A merciful mirage,

a vision on the retina

of mellow—murmuring thread,

a fuzzy fellow, without feet

because he—never told.

 

 

Commentary:

             The first of my “Cento Poems” contains lines from poems by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and the second uses lines from Emily Dickinson’s poems. I purposely combined and arranged lines in unconventional ways, trying to remove the lines from their original context. For example, I concluded the first poem with a line that ends with a hyphen, in order to show the open-ended nature of this constraint.

 

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VI. Meaning Eater:

 

William Shakespeare Sonnet 73: That Time of Year Thou Mayst in me Behold:

That time of year thou mayst in me behold

When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang

Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,

Bare ruin'd choirs, where late the sweet birds sang.

In me thou seest the twilight of such day

As after sunset fadeth in the west,

Which by and by black night doth take away,

Death's second self, that seals up all in rest.

In me thou see'st the glowing of such fire

That on the ashes of his youth doth lie,

As the death-bed whereon it must expire

Consumed with that which it was nourish'd by.

This thou perceivest, which makes thy love more strong,

To love that well which thou must leave ere long.

 

 

Willied Shadiest Sonnets 20: Thalia Timonize of Yearn Thomistic Maynard in me Behaved

Thai time of yearn thoughtful

mayor in me beheld

Whereupon yelping leaven,

or nonidempotent, or fewest,

do hanley upon thomson bouffant

whined shanghaied agape

theoretically colonially,

Barron ruined'd chokers,

wheeled latvia theorizers

sweetheart bird sank.

In me thomson seemly then twill

of sucrose daylight

As aftereffect sunbeam

fade in theological westchester,

Whistles by Andalusia

by blanching nightcap

doting taking awakening,

Dealer's seclusion selenium,

thank season up allemande in resurgent.

In me thousandth seething'st

thematic glovingof successes firmed

Thai on thetis

ashley of hisses

yourselves dotted lies,

As theorems deafest-bedsprings

whereupon it muskets expels

Conservationist withstanding

thank whisker it wasted nouns'd by.

Thigh thong perishable, whitcomb makeups

thyself lovably moriarty structures,

To lover thankless wellington whittles

thousandth musical leading erected longer.

 

Commentary:

             I created this poem using the “Meaning Eater” engine, choosing to only “eat” the words’ endings to keep the root of the word in tact. I purposefully selected a well-known sonnet by William Shakespeare to emphasize how different the final, transformed version is from the original. I also inserted line-breaks to create a more rapid tempo. I really enjoyed some of the quirky phrases this engine produced, which I may not have thought of on my own. For example, I particularly love the line “Thai on thetis” and “thank whisker it wasted.” Both of these lines string words together in unusual ways, but I really admire the way they sound when said aloud. I also admire the way these lines appear aesthetically, especially in regard to their use of alliteration.

 

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VII. Data Mining: #dark

Moon through dreamcatcher. Last time I checked no one taught me how to survive a power outage. We’re the last of this civilization. Can’t believe it took me 5 years of school to be able to write a paper about batman. Best selling horror fiction. This weather is seriously my favorite. Texas didn’t have a gym but the tanning beds worked. Looking for a Starbucks to transfer to in NYC is perhaps one of the most gloomy things I’ve ever had to do. Chewing gum detention on last day of term is dirt. How could I live in this darkness if iPhone was not invented? Too bad we were shooting inside and simulated evening. Still… plastic… writing… eek!! You may walk away from me but I’ll always be with you. Steady yourself before a seminar on disorders stemming from ritual sexual and spiritual abuse. I literally CANNOT right now. In the night you find yourself. Rising demon. Back home after a wonderful circus party. Ominous realities is another great read. Drowning my sorrows in. Cooling our heels in pittsburgh’s smallest bar. Best Blackcurrant Ginger ever! Thank hungry gut microbes. I can’t be the only one that thinks the new mask looks like the dark lotus opaque brotherhood style ones. Who is shutting down for the hour? I’m at Taco Bell breakfast on a bachelor party trip on the way to Vegas. Cut myself shaving. Listen to the haunting music of Sun Temple. Dang, talk about a huge difference. The only reason the guy has a torch is to help give me something to focus on. Try all three of our roasts this Thursday. The most ignorant point of views on skin color. I like my coffee like I like my nights. Early morning rum drinks don’t make you an alcoholic, they make you a pirate. Starblood, the debut novel by Carmilla Volez, is a tale of magic and horror. Seattle police release two new photos from Kurt Cobain suicide scene. Battle of discography! Introverts—selbstmord. Take your time… Twisted romance. Ghost busters vacuum at work. Checking out “Salome” on a Friday night. Hoping to see the sun soon! Who do you save from you? Don’t cross her. Necro Thrumm. This is pretty slow and steady despair. Literally, no one comes to mind when I listen to this love song.

 

Commentary:

          I wrote this piece by following a similar procedure to Karri Kokko in “Shadow Finlandia.” While Kokko used Finnish blogs as her source material, I used twitter. I searched the hashtag “dark,” and incorporated those tweets that resonated with me into this poem. Like the poems that utilize Google content, this poem contains unusual and somewhat strange phrases from the Internet. I really enjoy juxtaposing so many diverse phrases, and feel it makes the poem seem unique, random, and at times, hysterical. Like some of the other poems I constructed in the past, I formatted this poem in large blocks of text, so that the reader cannot necessarily tell where one tweet starts and another begins. Formatting the poem in this way also makes the piece again seem a bit more chaotic, which I feel mimics the hectic social media processes of the Internet.

 

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General Comments on Flarf and the Readings:

          One of the things I admire most about the poems we read this week was their purposeful shapelessness and unconventionality. Many of the poems seemed to deliberately employ “random” content, inconsistent structure, and frequent “misspellings.” I tried to pay attention to these themes when writing my own pieces. The exercises especially made me think about my vocabulary choices, and how generating quirky, illogical lines were sometimes more satisfying than using more conventional phrases. Playing with words’ endings and line breaks was also interesting in terms of the aesthetics of my poems. These readings also made me think of the general topic of how we define poetry itself. Why shouldn’t text generated from chat-rooms and Google be considered poetry? These Internet sources can be, I have found out, especially helpful for creating rich unique material.