MAPLE TREE

Maple tree, afternoon, Brownsville, Washington.

FROST PARK: TACOMUPPETS

Frost Park Chalk Off 6:5 was themed around Sesame Street. Therefore, TWT created a Frost Park homage to the Sesame Street sign, with some of the (now) Tacoma Muppets, or Tacomuppets (not Taco Muppets) surrounding it.

GARAGES GRAFFITI

Untitled graffiti artwork, unknown artist, The Garages, Tacoma, Washington.

The Garages in Tacoma are a set of parking garages that are set aside for not only paid parking, but also as a venue for graffiti artists to show off their skills without criminal prosecution. Many Sunday afternoons include contests between various artists.

ROSES and SHADOWS

Roses and shadows, early morning sun, Edgewood, Washington.

MORNING CLOUDS

Morning clouds over fir treetops, Edgewood, Washington.

FROST PARK: QUEEQUEG (KUNIYOSHI OUTLINE)

Frost Park Chalk Off 6:2 was free of rain, which was a much more pleasant experience than last week's inaugural outing for season six.Working on a wall was also better than last week's wet sidewalk. It's nice when the chalk does more of what you want it to do and the weather cooperates.


"Queequeg (Kuniyoshi Outline)" by Troy's Work Table.
Frost Park, Tacoma, Washington. Friday 12 April 2013.


Detail of "Queequeg (Kuniyoshi Outline)."

Inspiration number one: "Octopus, Red Fish" by Utagawa Kuniyoshi. Hence, the "Kuniyoshi Outline" parenthetical of the title. I used the form of Kuniyoshi's octopus from this nineteenth century painting of his as the basis for Queequeg.

Inspiration number two: Ishmael's description of Queequeg in their initial meeting, as found in "The Spouter-Inn," chapter 3 of Moby-Dick by Herman Melville.

DON'T

"Don't think you're the only bastard who ever suffered—just write as if you were." 

... 

"Don't blubber if you never receive prizes. Look at the poets who won the Pulitzer fifty years ago. See who's there. See who's not."

—from "The Nude That Stays Nude" by William Logan, as found in the April 2013 issue of Poetry.

BOOKS ARE ANATHEMA

"In a world where you get status from owning the latest technology, books are anathema: a sign that one isn't buying as much as one could."
—from "Noise-Canceling Headphones" by Paul La Farge, as found in the March/April 2013 issue of The Believer.

CUTTING IN: SEA AND SPAR BETWEEN

As the DEAR NAVIGATOR site states:

"Sea and Spar Between is a poetry generator which defines a space of language populated by a number of stanzas comparable to the number of fish in the sea, around 225 trillion. Each stanza is indicated by two coordinates, as with latitude and longitude. They range from 0 : 0 to 14992383 : 14992383."

and:

"The words in Sea and Spar Between come from Emily Dickinson’s poems and Herman Melville’s Moby Dick. Certain compound words (kennings) are assembled from words used frequently by one or both."

---

There is a strange beauty built into the fabric of these stanzas. Some work better than others, but they each sing a note that is in harmony with their source works and with one another.

This is a map of sorts, meant to be viewed. This is a sea of sorts, meant to be navigated. This is a landscape of sorts, meant to be wandered.

I am adrift, floating, staring up at constellations of words.

---

Sea and Spar Between
by Nick Montfort and Stephanie Strickland
http://blogs.saic.edu/dearnavigator/winter2010/nick-montfort-stephanie-strickland-sea-and-spar-between/

CUTTING IN: LEVIATHAN

"Shall you perhaps lead Leviathan about on a leash? Or will he consent to play slave to your beck and call? Or perhaps you would carve the great armored creature in pieces, selling chunks of crocodile in a market, like pounds of fish? Careful, you sport with death."

—pages 349-350, Job: And Death No Dominion by Daniel Berrigan

 (Previously posted on TWT HERE.)