Passe-Partout (2015)

Tomorrow at noon Catriona Strang and I will read at SFU's noon hour Lunch Poems series. In looking for things to read, I came across five lines I started last year, only to lose track of them.

Re-reading these lines, which seem to characterize a condition, I wondered how I might ground them. That's when Peter came to mind.

So that's what I did yesterday: finished my poem while walking through the woods with Pete.


PASSE-PARTOUT

for Peter Culley

doctors all yourself

bounds not where

it hurts or when

a numbness does

its presence such

as stopped to light

dumb rustles felt

a feathered breath

since ferns from this

is listened into

pictures

*

watchers call on elves

hounds are there

this flirts for sense

the wonder of

its pheasant bunch

past all last night

some dozen welts

untethered hence

it burns from this

it glistens in you

sutured

*

poachers caught on film

soundless air

within this fence

an unspooled stump

this pleasant lunch

with all its might

no one to help

another went

pictures of him

en passe-partout

torture

*

climbing up an elm

on a dare

hitherto dead

what fooled you once

is too much fun

give up the sight

so much for self

a plundered sense

midges hover

in this instance

aborted

*

falling on post-health

bounds not where

this flirts for sense

an unspooled stump

is too much fun

as stopped to light

past all last night

with all its might

a feathered breath

it burns from this

en passe-partout

Picture

Something Peter Culley caught on a walk with his camera and dog.

Daphne

Waited a day too long to take out the garbage, then did. Because the kitchen still smelled like I hadn't, I went outside and snipped some daphne. When I awoke this morning, inside and outside were one.

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It's Personal

Stylelikeu is an online magazine devoted to "personal style." Here, art historian and performance art maven RoseLee Goldberg appears as part of/submits to its "Closets" portrait series

How Many Pictures Does It Take to Change a Light Bulb?

A highly-staged publicity photo for an upcoming Images Festival performance by Jess Dobkin, entitled "How Many Performance Artists Does It Take to Change a Light Bulb?"

Is there anything left to chance? This is the question I ask myself of a work whose title takes the form of a question.

"aka" (Artspeak Knows Acronyms)

CCA Wattis is one of a number of feeding stations on Contemporary Art's long march. Jens Hoffmann was a director there, as was Ralph Rugoff before him.

The current director is Anthony Huberman, who will be lecturing at Artspeak this evening at 7:00 pm. The lecture is entitled "Have You Heard the One About the Cow, the Frenchman and the Bottle of Budwesier?"

For those wanting more information, Artspeak's messy website notes that the lecture will include "Some thoughts about wall texts, press releases, exhibition brochures, catalogues, and other modes of address -- aka: how an art institution expresses itself."