digital poetry

So I've started working on a poetry project in PowerPoint. It's very simple, just black screen, white words, but I think it's working. I'm definitely exploring the space between "The Tyranny of PowerPoint" and "I Love PowerPoint." Also, it's an interesting way to revisit the "Watershed" project and try to make some sense of it. I haven't been working on it since I gave a copy to Juliana and talked with her about it. I don't know, I feel like it needs to be pushed in some way.
Yesterday, in workshop, we discussed my latest two poems, which are the first pieces I'd brought in that were not part of "Watershed." They're quite obviously different, using just simple language and found text to explore power dynamics in relationships. I had to explain that "Watershed" is 'on hiatus.'

Bolinas

Had a very lovely trip out to Bolinas last Sunday. Meg was going up to visit Joanne Kyger, and invited me along. We had a lovely lunch with Joanne and Donald, and Joanne's friends Ken Botto, Chris Whitehead, and their neighbor Steve who just dropped by and joined us. After a lunch of mushroom quiche and a salad made with lettuce out of their garden, we had an apple crisp made with apples picked from the trees. Joanne was a lovely hostess, very elegant and sweet, making sure Meg and I were entertained. In the afternoon, four of us took a walk and a drive up the mesa and stopped at a cliff to watch the sun setting toward the west.

today's advice: read more

I met with Juliana today. She's directing my thesis, and was largely positive about the project. Lots of great suggestions for improvement.

The main thing, though, is she thought I needed to keep up the research. So I have another list of books to track down and read. I think I just need to keep absorbing ideas and thoughts and images and let them just mix around in my head for a while. Not that I have all that much time for extended reading. Guess I'll just have to make time.

not so serene

Saw Serenity on Saturday night in a huge crowd with 15 friends. And it was good. Very good. By and large, we were not disappointed by the film. But I think we're all mourning the end/loss of Firefly. And certain shocking events in the movie have left me heartbroken (I started crying at brunch the next day as I explained to Adam why I was taking it so hard). Not that crying is unusual for me, but I've found that I'm much more likely to be moved by books (and even well-made TV shows) than I have by movies in recent years. They usually lack such depth. Serenity, on the other hand, had more than a dozen hours of scene-setting, character-building, lead-up, so everything meant so much more than it might seem.