rob mclennanshrapnel
for derek beaulieu
the body, gives
out
: twinkle
a star a
wash
oh baby
the cut
: of jibness
glib
in the act
*
tailor delays
the free-fall/ hardest cut
complaint
a tree-trunk
axe
laden, heavy
*
gives
& takes away:
a tear
blood work done to sort the cells
an imitation of pleasure
of text on his/her lover’s abdomen
would we write this ?
*
conscript the lines
the draft, close the door
to incoming
against their own will
to testify against the fact
hard-ball is played
a tether on a stick
*
a limitless purse:
the day we entered, the two towers
of light
full-blossoming, & strange
a cut the artery
*
moreover & whatnot
a convict’s pleasure, hands
waving
the soundtrack of a city
Chicago
: poems
: band
: musical
is, where
he wanted to go
*
the figure, full
cut
an extension
identifying marks
a skin
a bone
these things edify our selves
a cold brutality
*
pen is less sharp
pencil
O
fatherless muse, bastard
eggs on the drive
*
out the bay
of windows
bone
things go
madness
jihad
on overdrive
*
slice the heart
thin
skin
outdoor
mayonnaise
into
*
the noise of Bluebeard
when you’re the one
would that be, a
chance at
in belonging,
would
*
not like anything left
reducedpanoptic
her medals in the glass case
same weight as a cookbook
03.12.05
Interview with Meredith Quartermain
(conducted by e-mail from July 2003 to December 2004)Meredith Quartermain’s books and chapbooks include Terms of Sale (Meow, 1996),
Spatial Relations (Diaeresis, 2001), Inland Passage (housepress, 2001), A Thousand
Mornings (Nomados, 2002), The Eye-Shift of Surface (greenboathouse books, 2003)
and Vancouver Walking (to be published by NeWest Press in spring 2005). With
Robin Blaser, she recently completed a series of poems, entitled Wanders (Nomados,
2002). A long poem Matter is forthcoming from Chax, and her collection of four
long poems “Highway 99” appeared as STANZAS #35 (above/ground press, 2003).
Her work has also appeared in Matrix, Canadian Literature, Prism International,
ecopoetics, Queen Street Quarterly, The Capilano Review, West Coast Line, Raddle
Moon, Chain, Sulfur, Jacket, and other magazines. She is co-editor with Jacqueline
Turner of The News at www.interchange.ubc.ca/quarterm/TheNews.htm, and
founder, with husband Peter, of the small press Nomados.
rob mclennan: Your publishing over the years seems to have been furtive, almost
secretive; a broadsheet here, a chapbook there, almost as though you are
cultivating an absence. With the recent collaborative Wanders (with Robin Blaser),
and A Thousand Mornings, both published by your Nomados, you seem to be placing
yourself deliberately, à la jwcurry or Maxine Gadd, as someone whose work is
difficult to find unless you know the author. How deliberate is this?Meredith Quartermain: It might be a good idea to clarify what my "publishing
over the years" has been. In 1996 Meow Press in Buffalo (buffalo meow, as
Lawrence Upton joked, introducing me in London) published my first chapbook of
poems, Terms of Sale. This book is still available through SPD as far as I know. In
1997, I started a long project which is still unfolding, called The Book of Words. In
1998, Keefer Street brought out 100 copies of the first section, Abstract Relations.
Then Diaeresis in Florida brought out the second section, Spatial Relations (2001 —
still available, by ordering on-line) and Chax is set to bring out the third section,
Matter. It is quite difficult in Canada (especially if you live far from Toronto or
Montreal) to publish writing that explores new formalities. I self-published Abstract
Relations and more recently A Thousand Mornings — both are prose poems —
mainly because I simply did not know of any Canadian publisher who would take
such work. However, it is getting somewhat easier. housepress brought out Inland
Passage in 2001 and greenboathouse published The Eye-Shift of Surface in 2003.
And now above/ground is doing Highway 99. So I'm beginning to find Canadian
connections.[ more . . . ]
((((((((( The Alterran Poetry Assemblage )))))))))