Daggled Mermaids

A Mermaid Murmurs

2008-02-07T06:08:00.000-08:00

Hi!

I just deleted most of this blog, and most of my YouTube videos. I've done a lot of stumbling around in the last several months trying to figure out what I want to do with poetry and video and video poetry, and I think I've figured it out. To that end, I hope to include more audio work, more of my own poetry, and more guests. The blog will include less of me standing around reciting stuff, unless I find a poem that really demands such dubious immortality. I haven't been updating with sterling regularity of late, but I have several interesting things planned, or already in progress.

A Former Marine

2008-01-25T10:56:00.001-08:00

Here's a poem that I actually wrote! In about 20 minutes! It's based around a phrase that I overheard while sitting in a bar watching tennis. I set it to the same music as my last video because I absolutely love that song, and because I wanted to play with some rhythmic stuff that cropped up in the Goldsmith piece. "Rhythmic" would be a good word in Hangman,

Kenneth Goldsmith - VI (an excerpt)

2008-01-20T17:02:00.000-08:00

Here it is! The dramatic return of Daggled Mermaids! I did the video, but I'm not in much of a mood to talk about it. Which isn't to say that I don't love this video with all my heart--in fact, I think I'd love anything that includes that song.

Also, here's the text I was reading from. I love this too: http://epc.buffalo.edu/authors/goldsmith/111/contents.html

Hi!

And expect a musical treat later this week.

Me - The Cops Plan a Party

2008-01-09T15:39:00.000-08:00

Here's another thing (song? poem?) I've made using ambient audio from the internet. All the material here was recorded over the course of a single day. I really developed an affection for these people while compiling my rather irreverent mix. The photos were lying around on my hard drive anyway, and I figured that I should prove accompaniment.

Vital statistics -

Video duration: 2:03

Best line/phrase: "I have to go back to the yard for a minute to get a probe."

Worst line/phrase: "That's apparently where our victim was supposed to be."

Most apt piece of punctuation: n/a

Poetic school: Middle-American Terseism

Me (with help)- Just an Audio Collage

2008-01-04T16:29:00.000-08:00

I love this British radio comedy show called Just a Minute. I also love Happily Ever After, a startlingly cool work by Randy Hostetler. Therefore, I took four episodes of Just a Minute and mixed together snippets to make a little poem or something. I want to use the word "polyvocal." It's my favorite thing I've done for Daggled Mermaids, besting the entire Grammarian series.

The unwitting participants:

Barry Cryer
Clement Freud
Stephen Fry
Jeremy Hardy
Tony Hawkes
Paul Merton
Ross Noble
Graham Norton
Nicholas Parsons
Sue Perkins
Linda Smith

I tried setting images to it, but the sound is as enough of a handful, as it were.

A Grammarian - The Director's Cut

2007-12-30T20:44:00.001-08:00

I've combined all my Grammarian videos into one 12-minute epic, with slightly improved sound and video quality. I've also added some rather nice music to three of the chapters, including strains of the Kinks, John Cale, and traditional Jewish music. Part 3 is the one most improved by music, so you may want to skip to 4:30 in the video.

I'll continue the Gertrude Stein Film Festival before long, and it'll be better than ever.

P.S. By gum! It turns out that, if you wish, you can download this and put it on your Video iPod or other gadget. Follow the Google Video link in the bottom right of the display window thingy.

Lisa Jarnot - Song of the Chinchilla

2007-12-21T14:17:00.000-08:00

Sarah and I make cameo appearances as voice actors in the beginning. I had to edit down my laugh, as it was 5,000 times louder than everything else in the video. The ever-sultry Will is reading from Jarnot's book Ring of Fire.

Vital Statistics (lovingly filled out by Will, who is a scholar of note):

Video length - 58 seconds

Best line/phrase - the dark arabian chinchilla of the / neutral zone with pears

Worst line/phrase - chinchilla of the pont neuf

Most apt piece of punctuation - the comma in "aperitif / chinchilla, lowing in the headlands of my mind"

Poetic school - Polypropylene Theism

The recent output at Daggled Mermaids can be likened to a Steinberger, between small slices of Jarnot, with a W.S. Merwin secret sauce. I had planned to sit on this guest contribution from Will a lot longer (to maintain the quality of the blog at some lazy time in the future), but I'm too exhausted from A Grammarian to record anything else right now. Next week, by the way, I'm going to mix all the Grammarian videos together into one longer and higher-quality chef d'oeuvre.

Thank you to all three of my guest readers! A brand new one will make her debut before Christmas (or she already has, if you've cheated and looked at my YouTube page).

W.S. Merwin - My Friends

2007-12-11T22:54:00.000-08:00

The unrivaled Sarah reads from W.S. Merwin's Moving Target.

Vital statistics:

Video duration - 1:37

Best line/phrase - "They take the same roads they miss/Each other"

Worst line/phrase - "Brotherhood it says on the decorations"

Most apt piece of punctuation - See Best line/phrase (the line break)

Poetic school - Anatomical Naturism

(Housekeeping note: from this day forward, I'll update Daggled Mermaids every other day. I apologize to those of you who need a daily poetry fix, but this policy will keep quality higher in the long run, and hopefully thwart any further hiatuses.)

Kenneth Koch - To You

2007-12-09T11:31:00.000-08:00

The first guest reader on Daggled Mermaids is the illustrious Will. He reads from Kenneth Koch's Collected Poems.

Vital statistics:

Video duration - 1:16

Best line/phrase - "I am crazier than shirttails"

Worst line/phrase - "A new/Harmony of thoughts!"

Most apt piece of punctuation - The semicolon in "The kid searches for a goat; I am crazier..."

Poetic school: Anachronistic Walnutism

Marina Tsvetaeva - Rails

2007-11-14T10:48:00.000-08:00

Here's a poem by Marina Tsvetaeva, yet another poet whose name I probably flubbed. The poem itself is good though, and I like my recital. It's from Penguin's volume of her Selected Poems.

Soon, the introduction of separate sound recording, so that you'll be able to hear each and every poem that appears on Daggled Mermaids!

Me - Languaging the Profound Pause

2007-11-08T16:54:00.000-08:00

There's nothing quite like bad poetry to spice up a Thursday afternoon.

This was recorded a few days ago. Today I got a haircut, so we'll soon see a new era in Daggled Mermaids.

Don Marquis - mehitabel dances with boreas

2007-11-03T15:22:00.000-07:00

I actually dislodged a bit of concrete ceiling in the process of executing one of my arm gestures. It hurt like hell.

This writer is fantastic.