Aswelay

papyrus volume 1, by Bill Dixon and Tony Oxley, is a virtuoso response to poets including Larry Neal, Henry Dumas, and the incomparable N. H. Pritchard. Norman Pritchard was a member of the Umbra group of poets, who published books with NYU Press and Doubleday during that strange and magical (albeit short) period when major presses were publishing experimental writings. Pritchard also appears on a couple of poetry LPs of the era, chanting his works. Despite all the continued discussions of orality and performance in African American literature, an early essay by poet Kevin Young (hey Kevin!) remains one of the only critical works addressed to Pritchard's work, and his essay is primarily concerned with Pritchard's concrete works. (The essay was written in the context of an exhibit on the materiality of texts.) Here are two poems by Pritchard that AREN'T in EVERY GOODBYE AIN'T GONE to whet your appetites.

Aswelay

weary was when coming on a stream
in hidden midst the amberadornment
of falls birth here near edge
aripplingsoundless
leaves and eddy eyes withtrickling
forest thighs in widenings
youthful nippling scenic creakless

in this boundlessvastly hours wait
in gateless isn't fleshly smelling
muchly as a golden
on the crustisunderbrush of where
no one walked were
unwindishrustlings mustingthoughts
of illtimed harvests


and as we lay and as
welay and as welay
andaswelay
aswelay aswelay
andaswelay

above a bird watching we knew not
what cause his course of course we
lay we lay in the rippling
soundlessboundlesslyvastly
of a firthing
duty leaving welay
wanting noughtless

and then it seemed
as from the air he left
the bird who watched
what would be called
a dream

------------------------------------------------

Self


What does the cracker
when in a barrel
bare
with dark
and alone
and
beside it
self
with fear
of being
uneaten




________________________________________

Burnt Sienna

Trust thrust first tinder kindling grown
the maple gave rust air its bark
and ample and plain
fair orange orb
sworn to that sea line stretching bare
courteous and neat
still gleaming meekly weaned
by some awesome twilight rise
beyond be gone
the nameless colored yarn



[the proper spacing of words in these poems has gotten lost in the blogosphere, though the line breaks are preserved. For more info. on Dixon & Oxley's CD, see:http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00003Q5C8/qid=1145560668/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-1695688-4288915?s=music&v=glance&n=5174