Introducing Poemcraft

I feel an ideological shift afoot. I am documenting how it informs my understanding of and relationship to poetry. The working title of this construct is Poemcraft.

Poemcraft comes on the heels of A Soul in Progress which can be seen as the philosophical premiss (as opposed to antecedent) of Poemcraft. I did a lousy job documenting A Soul in Progress, although over time you may get your fair share of it—I have many many notebooks to transcribe which, I want to say, have a lot on the subject.

Over time I will bury ASiP alive, leaving no trace except for whispers and innuendo. Only those that remember Poemcraft was once A Soul in Progress will understand the decisions I made as that entity. There will be a surge of interest in seeking the original premiss. There will be a reaction to that. And eventually Progressive Proemcraft will emerge as the compromise. This is the way of the world.

Introducing Poemcræft A Rough Thing I Found (uncorrected)

This entry is part 1 of 12 in the series Undrafted, February 2015

Charnel grounds are dangerous, horrifying, chaotic places. None of the meat-eaters are picky about whether you are dead (except vultures). They are happy to eat living visitors. Unburied corpses also attract demons—in the Indian imagination—and are likely to produce ghosts and vetalas (zombies).

That’s as perfect a description of poetry as I’ve ever heard; and it’s marks a philosophical (if not ideological) shift in the direction of the whole shebang. It’s a long one in coming. Forty years, perhaps, or two weeks—it depends on what cross section you choose to pick.

asip documents

asips waits for poems to show themselves and then tediously works to shape them into acceptable works

poemcraft expierences
poemsrafts accepts poems will live or die on their own merit. the strongest and most adapt poems will survive. the rest will die.

Over the last weeks (or possibly lifetime) I have been pursuing if truth can exist outside ideology; how reality is defined by a society’s prevailing ideology. In my case that’s something like global neoliberal consumerism under constitutional republic…is, beyond that,  hierarchy. scarcity. power and control.

I have been trying to find patterns in the thoughts and attitudes that don’t thrive here. This thin slice of spectrum is corrosive to deep exploration. I am impatient for the lack of fellow explorers; the lack of a possibility to have fellow explorers.

What if our demons aren’t so easily written off as codified mind states. What if our demons are completely real and hungry valid, and go by Indifference and Suspicion? You damn well better have some poems ready, because that’s what they eat.

Charnel grounds struck me as a revolutionary buddhism for the oppressed and dispossessed

The former name of the site, A Soul in Progress, reflected the philosophy that instantaneous poems that pop in and out of daily life are to be deliberately observed. Poemcraft begins with the understanding that reality, the whole chaotic mess, is the poem.

A Soul in Progress would painstakingly test the nuanced meaning of very word. Swirl through his dictionary looking for the closest possible match, and end up with a poem you could be proud of.

Poemcraft demands respect be paid the emergent poem.

asip finding
pc searcing/accepting/nourishing

A Soul in Progress was a nice leisurely stroll through a curated garden of illusionary discontent. Of loss. And guareded searching. It allowed me to see

socialist

Poemcraft is  an unfiltered

anarchist

but it’s fucking scary out there surrounded by the undead chorus of insistent poem.

Popping and going faster than you can capture. Faster than you can strive off. Blurs of gholish streaks.

The observant buddha will recognize I have changed the title of this site from A Soul in Progress to Poemcraft.

Poemcraft

This entry is part 2 of 12 in the series Undrafted, February 2015

A poem that isn’t willing to fight for its life is not worth pursuing.

Triage

Triage the fuck out of your potentials. Yeah, sure, you can try to save that one poem’s life, but don’t be surprised when it turns out to be a disaster. You can’t save a poem that doesn’t want to live.

A Blog (a first)(an exclamation mark)

I am have become emergent in no small part due to this ally. Not to imply catalyst, but fire. Another connection flares, instantly welded as tangles of continuum bang and bump in the drift. There, in that maelstrom, is born Poemcraft.

But latter. I’ll tell you all about it, later. For now up under About is my Manifesto in Progress.