JOY: A GLOBAL PRIORITY, Vol. I by E.R. TABIOS

I do lists.  I've done tons of poetry projects revolving around The List (especially since the list-as-autobiography is a long-held concern)  So it seems inevitable that, somehow, I'd create a mini-book -- and, as it turns out, it will be a series -- revolving around the list. 

There's a particular type of list that interests me.  It's a list of mundane stuff that ends up being more than the sum of its parts, that ends up not being mundane.  It's a list that effects something that transcends its (lowly) material.  I'm in the midst of preparing right now for a year-long list project; I won't go into details of that yet, but just note it to say that lists are on -- and always on -- moi mind. 

So, my latest mini-book to discuss is the 2.25" x 2" Volume I of JOY, A GLOBAL PRIORITY -- a visual listing of the postage and other postal materials that brought me mails containing joy. (I don't always succeed but I always hope that joy is a focus of my work.) I enjoyed making the first book so much I decided to create a series around the concept. 

Volume I's impetus was three sources.  First, there was one of the holiday cards I'd saved for its useful cover card-stock:

I also decided to throw in at random a sticker floating around the studio (cough) which I long suspected would be useful for something related to mini-books.  I didn't know, at the beginning of making Volume I, how it would play a role.  But I like throwing in as many "random" elements as possible in creating.  So, I tossed it into the mix:

For interior content, I chose to use what I could from five mailed envelopes that brought me joy:

I ended up with a front and back cover as follows:

The message above is self-explanatory.  I believe joy to be a priority for the world.  But the front cover itself is not as obvious joy often requires effort, work.  So, by looking only at the front cover, I wanted the reader to not immediately know what is being posited as a priority for the world .

You'd open the front cover to see

Note above the repetition of the themes by utilizing the postal notations of "priority mail" and "For domestic and international mail."  Part of what I'd cut out from the same postal receipt was the section that stated "To" with a space for the recipient.  I turned that into the next page's dedication page ... and I confess it amused me to dedicate this mini-book to Moi!

You then turn the page to the first of the five pieces of mail that brought joy to Moi.  Throughout the book, I always glued in the stamps on the right-hand page.  Each stamp is faced by a reference to the sender and the mail's contents.  So the first mail is from Leny Strobel and it brought Moi joy for delivering two blank mini-books inspired by SitWithMoi (I later filled in/fleshed out one of the mini-books with THE WHISPERS OF SHE WHO CALLED ME HERE by Leny M. Strobel).

You turn the page to the next contribution, mail that brought "Happy New Year" wishes from some friends:

You turn the page to the next contribution, mail that brought an order for a book published by moi teeny press, Meritage Press, accompanied by a check!

You turn the page to the next contribution, mail that brought an invitation for an Easter lunch (this Sunday):

You turn the page to the next contribution, mail that brought the first mini-book by an e-peep, Tom Beckett's THE CHAIRMAN SPEAKS:

Last but not least, you turn the page to the next contribution, mail that brought an art monograph on Max Gimblett's latest exhibition.  I love this monograph -- not only are Max's paintings superb but the monograph contains one of the best monograph essays I've read in years, written by another artist Matt Jones. 

And, and, and!  The monograph essay features an epigraph of a quote I've actually been looking for (as I plan to use it as a monograph for my poetry collection forthcoming in 2014) -- a quote from Michelangelo, to wit:

Every block of stone has a statue inside it and it is the task of the sculptor to discover it.

So the above mail also was useful to me in helping cut down on the research time my forthcoming book requires.  I am appreciative for any type of help in living my life!  Moreoever, you may have noticed that the color of the interior pages is yellow-gold.  I chose the color since gold symbolizes enlightenment (recall what I said earlier about the sum of mundane details being more than mundane, i.e. uncovering insight) and perhaps discovering that long-searched-for Michelangelo quote is the resulting insight.  Also, I only had yellow paper around the studio at the time ...

Entonces, joyfully Moi asks: "Where shall we shelve Volume I of JOY: A GLOBAL PRIORITY?"  Well, I am opting to shelve it on this warm teak bench because the structure of the bench (i.e., the bench as a shelf) will be useful for holding a series of mini-books, which I am hoping for JOY.  Indeed, I am hoping for the sources of joy to be ... infinite ...

BLUE BLEU BLU by ALICE BRODY

[Related Post: JAPAN TALES by Alice Brody]

I'm so pleased to share that New York-based quiltmaker Alice Brody has sent SitWithMoi a second mini-book!  It's entitled BLUE BLEU BLU and, as you might infer, its theme is the color blue!

There are so many lovely elements to this enchanting 2" x 2.25" book.  First, there's just the craftsmanship of it, which includes a blue board backing to the covers and side-ties:

As you page through the book, you'll see the many ways Alice explores the blue theme.  What's great is how her explorations are not just variations of the color but "riffs" off of the theme.  Thus, some of the pages are not just cut-outs from applicable fabrics but fabrics with glued-on designs.  Let's page through the book:

As you see, Alice is not letting the color be a constraint.  She's allowing herself to freely roam offa da blue pasture.  In a way, it reminds me of a book I once reviewed, RED by Marilyn R. Rosenberg, that explored red-ness.  By not sticking to their respective colors, Alice actually heightens blue-ness as Marilyn does red-ness.  The effect is lush and resonant.  Here are more pages from Alice's book:

The immediately preceding image above shows the center pages.  This could mean that the rest of the pages are just doubles, except that subsequent pages get more treatment by Alice (addition of extra material) so that they are not repetitious:

I also adore Alice's "diction" as regards the different types of fabrics and materials so as to imbue the pages with extra dimensions viz surface and tactility, as with the furry thread on the following:

All in all, the mini-book provides for a delightful experience.  One can return to it more than once and receive a variety of joyful engagements.  Here's what it looks like as a closed volume:

And as regards where to "shelve" this book, I'm pleased with the synchronicity that Alice chose to explore blue versus another color.  Because it is exactly the book to elevate this blue, painted chair that I only found "charming enough" by itself.  That is, while I appreciate the chair, I thought it needed something extra.  Now that Alice's BLUE BLEU BLU is shelved atop it, I think the sum is greater than the combination of its parts (1+1=more than 2).

Here's the first time I can say about a chair-and-book combination, that one rose up to the level of the other.  Thank you, Alice Brody.

MAY JOY by E.R. TABIOS

After doing a certain number of mini-books (not all of which I've yet been able to blog about for SitWithMoi), I realize that I'd been exploring textual silence and visual proclamations (including how the latter might replace the former).  An example is TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE ostensibly by my brother Fil -- you can read my entire engagement HERE, but let me focus on this part:

That blank space, you see, between my brother's address on the left and the stamp on the right, symbolizes, for me, time and journey.  And I need not write anything about that blank space, just present it (as I do in the mini-book).

So as I look around the materials from my everyday living, I've been trying to visually collage previously disparate elements to concoct a narrative.  At times I'll incorporate text but, at their most pure, they would avoid text. Actually, it's hard for me to avoid inserting any text at all (Alice Brody does it successfully in her mini-book JAPAN TALES which still contains a narrative); perhaps it's because I find it hard to be pure (haha).  Anyway, my newest mini-book is an impure example: MAY JOY.

The 1.75" x 1.5" MAY JOY is rooted from noticing two elements in my studio, a left-over Holiday card and the back cover of the most recent Barnard College Alumni Magazine:

  

I've kept a number of Holiday cards about because their card stock makes for good mini-book covers.  In the case of this card, I noticed the snippet "May Joy" (which probably was from a larger message like "May Joy Be Part of Your Holidays" or something like that), and thought the phrase could title a new mini-book.  In the case of the back cover of the Barnard Alumni mag, I loved the lavender flower strips which I also thought could be good mini-book material.  So I made a new mini-book joining together these two elements. 

Here is the front cover below -- I cut the edges so as to include remnants of the Christmas ornaments because I wanted to incorporate allusions to joyful holidays and that I wanted also for the book to be a "gift" to the reader:

You would open the book to see this interior, which is simply the lavender strip folded within the book cover.  Along the edge of the strip, which becomes the first thing you see when you open the book, you see the phrase "For You", which I did intend literally for you, the reader.

You'd unfold the accordion page to see the lavender flowers unfold across your vision.  Didactically, I inserted in the letters "U N F O L D":

But please notice how the message ends with the strip containing the words "For You":

Hence, the mini-book's total text is "May Joy Unfold For You."  You're welcome, you're welcome...

Next, I turned my attention to the back cover.  I wanted to put an illustration on its white space, and debated for a century between a cut-out from the Holiday card or the lavender flower strip.

Ultimately, I decided on the lavender flower because I wanted to avoid the overall Holiday Card (notwithstanding the hints of the Christmas ornaments along the edges of the front cover). Here is a visual of both back and front covers and I think it works better than if all of the imagery had alluded to Christmas.

And now, where shall we joyfully "shelve" this chair?  Well, why not on the metal chair that needs some softening!

"A WORD USED FOR CLARIFICATION IS FULL OF AMBIGUITY"

Dears, let’s recall innovative poet and engineer S.S. Prasad or “Mr. Chairssssssss…” or “Chairss” for short since, as he sagaciously notes, a millipede missing one leg is still a millipede (keep reading to understand!).  My first post about Chairss was quite popular, not to mention educational.  And now here’s his latest “Letter to Moi Us”:

Dear Eileen,

We stopped our conversation at gender in language in the last mail. I was thinking further about ‘cloud’ of meaning and ambiguity in words, and misnomers. The word ‘chair’ is called ‘nattrkali’ in Tamil: nal- four, kal- leg, the suffix ‘li’ rounding the reference to the object as the one with four legs. A noun that could have referred to anything with four legs, but precisely means a chair:  A word used for clarification is full of ambiguity.

Our chairs have grown in number, and we are having a conference at sit-with-moi.

I went upstairs to the canteen in my office, as I do every morning, and looked at the arrangement of chairs. They were as usual, inverted and placed upon tables for 4:  an arrangement of 4 chairs upside down on each table.  Workers were slowly getting them ready for business, taking them down and turning them up around the tables. You can imagine a flower with thousand petals blooming.

How do we deal with CHAIRS? They are too many, and ‘CHHHHHHHHHHHHH……..AIR’ becomes a cumbersome representation. We don’t want to count the number of legs of a millipede to declare it a millipede. A millipede with one leg minus is still called a millipede, isn’t it? Under no conditions will an octopus become a septapus.

Chairs: 

[Do click on image to enlarge.]

I’m typing down two poems by Arun Kolatkar to understand chairs and chirality better.

A LOW TEMPLE

A low temple keeps its gods in the dark.

You lend a matchbox to the priest.

One by one the gods come to light.

Amused bronze. Smiling stone. Unsurprised.

For a moment the length of a matchstick.

gesture after gesture revives and dies.

Stance after lost stance is found

and lost again.

Who was that, you ask.

The eight arm goddess, the priest replies.

A sceptic match coughs.

You can count.

But she has eighteen, you protest.

All the same she is still an eight arm goddess to the priest.

You come out in the sun and light a charminar.

Children play on the back of the twenty foot tortoise.

THE PATTERN

a checkerboard pattern

some old men must have drawn

yesterday

with a piece of chalk

on the back of the twenty foot

tortoise

smudges under the bare feet

and gets fainter all the time as

the children run

(Pages 17, 18 from ‘Jejuri’ by Arun Kolatkar, Pras Prakashan, Fifth edition, 2001)

Kolatkar intrigues me with his use of the plural form. He emphasizes that form by repetition of a grammatical rule: eight arm goddess, eighteen arm goddess, and twenty foot tortoise.

  

A key to the poem is the word, ‘charminar’.

charminar = char + minar ; ‘char’ meaning four in Hindi, and minar meaning minar in any language. The four minars don’t have anything to do with buildings but a brand of cigarette.

Notice how Kolatkar points to the transmission of language through generations (old men/ children).  The origin fades, and ambiguous marks of chalk remain on the floor to make meaning from.

So while Kolakar enjoys himself at Wayside Inn sitting on his chair, let me sit with vous.

Chairs

-chairss

**

Dear Chairss,

Thanks for writing, Senor Chairss.  I really like these poems you cite by Arun Kolatkar -- so thanks, too, for introducing (to Moi) this fine poet.  It's funny how, in the 11th line of the poem "A Low Temple," I first read "A sceptic match" as "Ascetic match"...

And your letter, too, reminds me how so many chairs exist that are not based on having a four-leg structure, even as I believe we conventionally think of chairs as having such four legs.  The great Finnish American designer Eero Saarinen of course railed against "the slum of legs," thus creating his famous "Pedestal Chair."

I'm also reminded of the Ryoan-ji zen garden in Kyoto to which I was introduced by another poet, Arthur Sze -- how, from all angles, one can never see all of its 15 stones (it is thought one must attain enlightenment to see the 15th stone).  One stone is always missing but its existence is never denied.

Well, of course your subject at hand is poetry -- "A word used for clarification is full of ambiguity."

Do keep writing us from India whenever you can.  It's lovely to pull up an e-chair with you and fortify the tea (hah).

Cheers,

Moi

Ryoan-ji

NOTA BENE by E.R. TABIOS

So I have two strips of paper left-over from the SFSU Poetry Center flyer that I cut up to make SELECTED BOOK COVERS by Jukka-Pekka Kervinen.  I saved them because they are large enough to provide, ta-dah, book covers to new mini-books.

Well, I decided to use one for such a mini-book that I entitled NOTA BENE.  "Nota bene", of course, tells one to "note well" ... and what I wanted to note (to possible readers) was something that's long irritated me on a low-grade level: my "Eileen Tabios" Facebook page. If you click on the link, you'll see that I'm not active on it, though I will respond if somebody stumbles across it and makes a comment. I didn't set up that page -- I think the FB "Bots" did it by doing minor culling through the internet to create one for Moi.  Needless to say, the more "members" viz FB pages exist, the higher presumably the valuation for FB's worth -- how come the Securities Exchange Commission didn't look into this FB practice before it allowed its (overvalued-haha) initial public offering?!  Someone should do a class action suit on behalf of enforced members like Moi to get a share of the IPO funds -- what $5 billion? -- raised!  

Anyway, getting back to mini-books so as to erase moi irritation (there: evaporated!) I did also notice that the flyer's strip of paper is too flimsy to act as a book cover, so I wanted to strengthen it by pasting another strip of paper on its "verso" (interior) side. For that purpose, I decided to recycle a draft homework by my son when he was studying Africa partly by learning its geography.  I liked the idea of using a map, as I wished the poem to give a truer reflection of "Eileen Tabios" than is provided by Facebook.

After I pasted on the strip of paper, I still felt the book needed some firmer backing.  So I decided to cut a strip from a holiday card which had a pale blue color that I felt went well with the colors on the cover.  I finally did take down the display of holiday cards, but had saved several that I thought might help create future mini books.

And so we come to my new book, NOTA BENE. Here is the front cover, with design but of course by Jukka-Pekka Kervinen:

You open the book to the title page and the interior cover presenting a map. 

You turn the page to see the title of the poem, "On Booking My Face."

You turn the page to the poem's text, two hay(na)ku tercets:

If you can't read my handwriting and/or the image, here's the poem's text:

Robots

created my

Facebook identity. But

"Eileen

Tabios" craves

understanding, not publicity.

You turn the page to a "Note" that says, "The last line paraphrases [art critic] Harold Rosenberg's statement on what is needed by American vanguard art, noted in his essay "The American Action Painters."

The inclusion of the poem's last line, and subsequent "Note," arose from the coincidence that, while creating this mini-book, a print-out of the art critic's essay happened to be nearby on the table where I was working (and which I recommend reading):

If one thinks about it, I might not have written the poem the way I did if the print-out didn't happen to be lurking nearby.  Improv -- a way to create poems outside the limits of one's imagination!  Anyway, returning to the mini-book, you then turn the page to the last page and inside back cover:

You might observe that the map seems upside down.  That was deliberate because I wanted to give a sense of a "map" without it necessarily being an African map.  It's the same effect that Jukka's book covers can effect: that the images are of letters and/or words, but they're abstract (thus, not identifiable as specific letters/words).    

Entonces!  I hope all of that warranted the use of one of the two remaining book covers by Jukka-Pekka Kervinen!  Now, where shall we "shelve" this book by the prolific Moi?  Ah, how's about on the Mary Scheller couch to keep company with Tom Beckett's Steps: A Notebook!

Understanding, not publicity -- that's also often misunderstood in the poetry world ... but that's a different story for another day ...