It took longer than I thought. It answered questions posed by Rachel. It involved wood and stone and words. It has finally made its way into the mail for Jon’s turn.
February 13, 2012
I have started by responding to a question posed by Rachel in her latest entry. I wrote three short stanzas. Then I mashed all three stanzas together. Then I pulled out just the adjectives, just the nouns and just the verbs. Then I pulled all of the first words, second words and so on. Then I pulled all the first lines, second lines, etc. What I have right now as a draft is two columns of deconstructed stanzas. It’s an interesting exercise, but I’m not sure where it’s going, even though I like some of the weird juxtapositions of language that are emerging.
Here is the adjective deconstruction as an example:
Dry and dank, algae-slick, gray
and splintered. Alone. Broken
and unpupiled. Solid. Petrified.
And here is a photo that is inspiring me as well:
I have given myself a mail deadline of Friday. Let’s see what happens.
February 13, 2012
Reflex has arrived. My, oh, my, the entries are just getting better. I need to spend some time to make sure I am up to the challenge. My collaborators are pushing the boundaries, and I need to make sure I can push back.
December 19, 2011
My next piece for Reflex is ready to be put together in the journal itself. It will be a different approach for me this time. Instead of just staying in my comfort zone and providing a piece of writing, I will be using four to five pages to present my piece that includes writing and photography manipulation, and I hope that it will echo and do justice to the work of John and Kristin that came before it.
Get ready, Tamar! It’s coming your way for the holidays.
Sneak Preview:
Partial preview of my contribution "Winter: Hauntings"
December 13, 2011
I just received Reflex and will try to get it in the mail before the Christmas holiday. I have a draft inspired by Kristin’s concept of haunting, Rachel’s photographs, and John’s latest combination of text and spherical art. I also have an idea for how to manipulate some photography to highlight the poem, which is now in four numbered stanzas. As a teaser, here is one of the altered photos I may use:
October 4, 2011
Okay, I am just about ready to put Reflex in the mail. And I don’t know whether it was looking closely at the art again or re-reading the original prompt or the fact that I watched a whole evening of creepy science fiction television the other night (Dr. Who, Alphas, and Fringe), but the final product is NOTHING like the drafts. In a good way. And I am quite pleased with it. Get ready to rumble, next recipient.
October 4, 2011
First draft having been accomplished on the computer, I have been playing around with the form and most promising ideas writing by hand in my notebook. I think I know which concepts are worth keeping, so (along with drafting) I am working on new thinking about how the poem will look in the journal. Inspired by transformation. Layers. Vellum. We shall see…
October 1, 2011
Today’s trip to the mailbox finally brought Reflex my way. In an effort to return to the meaning of the word and respond without too much thought, I spent about 30 minutes looking at all of the previous entries for inspiration, just taking notes and letting things roll around in my head. After a break for some errands, I sat down at my computer and pounded out a first draft.
Inspired by something I saw Hannah Stephenson do over at The Storialist, I recorded the screen as I created a first draft. Whatever ends up in the journal will, I am sure, be quite different, but I thought you might like to see how it went.
