That’s how it felt editing this ambitous poetry chapbook from the ever-evolving Edward Wells…our fourth release for NATIONAL POETRY MONTH…
I’m not going to bullshit anyone, the manuscript was accepted before I was stern with guidelines and such…
However, I liked this cat after meeting him virtually at one of Mad Swirl’s live open MIC’s via zoom during the pandemic and we both corresponed in a socially awkward manner, almost like askew brothers from a mirror universe…okay too far…
It was a pain in the ass to essentially edit spreadsheet poetry but what a read it was. Sometime you need something to truly question the nature of what is considered “original writing”…then you look at you logo of flaming garbage and realize…ha, of course I accept it and that made liking it even better.
As much as I want to use my quasi fancy degree to explain the content exposed by Wells allow me to rather have him explain the origins of the manuscript…
This text has at its origins in a quotation of Walter Benjamin: “translation does not find itself in the center of the language forest but on the outside facing the wooded ridge; it calls into it without entering, aiming at that single spot where the echo is able to give, in its own language, the reverberation of the work in the alien one” (“The Task of the Translator” [1923], in Illuminations(1968)). Around the time I encountered these thoughts on translation, I began reading the poetry of Hwang Jin-I and Otagaki Rengetsu. I thought I might attempt some translations. I was fond of some of the poems that came out of that process working with multiple electronic “translators.” And I was not discouraged by the feedback I received in workshops. Considering the guidance I received from translator and professor Jen Hofer, I realized that in terms of translations, these pieces were failures. Still, I and others were interested in the product of the process, so I continued. The result is this chapbook of reassemblances,poems of a non-existent life, based in part on my own.
-Edward Wells
| she was a bright moon was a famous gisaeng of the king mythlike inspiration today where her korea was her words rarities on lost love and gaesong palace and falls after hwang jin-i 1506 – 1560 | without law or covenant or god free of need for allegory and analogy explore after the hebrew song of songs undated |
| no legal code survives documentation of legal practice abounds after seeking ancient egyptian legal texts | born nobu of spring in secret and adopted learned kokinshu lost those close soon seemed lost all cut then nagisage to tonsure after otagaki rengetsu 1791 – 1875 |
| everything nothing everything to send to people to people to give to one person ozark plateau only cherry blossom viewing to be ahead of others only in the first place only first off | the mountain is the old mountain and the water is the old water it will flow to the day and night and there will be old water i am like water too no no no |
| lets see to be slow down pour it somewhere else to another place water okay water all right welcome to someday with the kicking someday in the morning style victorian river willow scatter died scattered dirty look for the water investigate the water in the fall to be formed in autumn become autumn bun maple on the brush on a bush to give up kicking to give up princess princess mycelial of the mountain princess thin falsely thinned diced out of the month out of the moon out of the wig is heaven wig is the main wigsome thinking also no more also this is a human being this is a copycat everything putting it over hold up im holding over |
| a locked garden a locked wave a sealed kind i am a nun my brother is a meditation an impregnated stone a sealed bowel i am from leaves a bride from leaves to come precharter prenear cougar and mountain lion from every corner with me you will come from me from the beginning from the beginning from the columns of the mountains from the mountains you have a beautiful beauty and there is no god in you youre a beautiful and you dont have any school shut up this is my sister my bride in the spring shut up a sealed fountain kindergarten is my sister my bride closed the spring a sealed fountain | |
| the mountain is the old mountain and the water is not as the old water and those of the water will be the same as the waters | mt ida mt ida mine and tail mine and tail also in the mine cherry flower cherry blossoms cherry blossom pine also smells pine also smell choctaw island #78 also smells can you fill it in could be buried i wonder if you can sprinkle it |
| a coldness pain a cold a coldness aqueduct water now everyone body ice ice to be disgusted charmed to be sad white thread of the waterfall i want to go back the pain of my side | it is hard to come back when i work |
| a hill cane the cane find a secret one after another one person one with a headache old village here homes wormwood comes to an end wormwood at the end wormwood become fall fall the autumn cold bamboo crying | wait sweets and my pet its my uncle and its my friend sloppy girls his thighs and his vessels the pillars this is my uncle and my neighbor the sons his hands are golden hands filled with the crown of gold from the mouth of a tooth from a sheet of sapien his hands are golden cylinders filled with fainting sapphires the city rotations in pimples i was carrying my foil the hot mary i find the guards in the city my intention is an attack they carried my feet up the guards of the armies founded on his pillars atop the ground i see him like a brick as a young man the racks on my my lord peace its appearance like leaves a guy like cedars |
Dumpster Fire Press 