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    Jorge Guitart The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems 9781935402374 "Jorge Guitart’s poetry is not for the masses but it is for everyone. The Empress of Frozen Custard is awash in marvels. Guitart is a master of language, a tongue trickster, a feller of fashion. In this, his second volume of English poetry, he has done it again, producing a collection that sings and laughs and cries all at once. In the words of Yankee fans praising one of their most beloved players, “Hip, hip, Jor-gé!” Pablo Medina Author of The Cigar Roller and Professor of Fiction and Poetry, Emerson College The poet, the linguist, the foreigner in the multilingual metropolis of the mind, Guitart writes as if each stroke were a cosmic stretch, a cognitive Asana of sorting, slipping, hearing and mishearing. This is a poetry that is clever, fortified but not drunk on puns and wit. Chiaroscuro or oscurochiaro, the Straits of Florida or Estrecho de la Florida, a quotidian Baroque of angle aged words whirl our worlds. Antiphonal energy takes on a see-saw ride of Looney Hymns and Nutty Psalms to intense, witty reworkings of William Blake and Wallace Stevens. In Guitart's 100 poems, tongues tattle adjusts the lamp of language, so we can hear. Kenneth Sherwood Associate Professor of English, Indiana University of Pennsylvania " Jorge Guitart was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1937, and early on he decided that his favorite subjects in school were Spanish grammar and English. They continue to be central to his intellectual life. In 1962, not wanting to live any longer under a Leninist dictatorship, he moved to the United States. He was not a stranger to American culture, having followed the New York Yankees since childhood and memorized great chunks of American pop music lyrics in addition to being a devotee of Mad Magazine in the Harvey Kurtzman era. In the mid-sixties he developed an interest in contemporary U.S. poetry and began to write poetry in English as well as in Spanish. Guitart’s first collection of poetry in English was Foreigner’s Notebook (Shuffaloff 1993), and in 1996 his long cyclical poem Film Blanc was published as a chapbook by Meow Press. He has also published in print and electronic journals. He has translated U.S. poets into Spanish (e.g., John Ashbery and Gabriel Gudding) and Latin American poets into English (e.g., José Kozer and Eugenio Rodríguez). He obtained a Ph.D. in Spanish linguistics from Georgetown University in 1973 and is Professor of Spanish at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He is widely published in the fields of Spanish phonology and Spanish grammar, and has been a visiting professor at the University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania State University, the University of Massachusetts, Middlebury University, and several Latin American universities.

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    Jorge Guitart The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems 9781935402374 "Jorge Guitart’s poetry is not for the masses but it is for everyone. The Empress of Frozen Custard is awash in marvels. Guitart is a master of language, a tongue trickster, a feller of fashion. In this, his second volume of English poetry, he has done it again, producing a collection that sings and laughs and cries all at once. In the words of Yankee fans praising one of their most beloved players, “Hip, hip, Jor-gé!” Pablo Medina Author of The Cigar Roller and Professor of Fiction and Poetry, Emerson College The poet, the linguist, the foreigner in the multilingual metropolis of the mind, Guitart writes as if each stroke were a cosmic stretch, a cognitive Asana of sorting, slipping, hearing and mishearing. This is a poetry that is clever, fortified but not drunk on puns and wit. Chiaroscuro or oscurochiaro, the Straits of Florida or Estrecho de la Florida, a quotidian Baroque of angle aged words whirl our worlds. Antiphonal energy takes on a see-saw ride of Looney Hymns and Nutty Psalms to intense, witty reworkings of William Blake and Wallace Stevens. In Guitart's 100 poems, tongues tattle adjusts the lamp of language, so we can hear. Kenneth Sherwood Associate Professor of English, Indiana University of Pennsylvania " Jorge Guitart was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1937, and early on he decided that his favorite subjects in school were Spanish grammar and English. They continue to be central to his intellectual life. In 1962, not wanting to live any longer under a Leninist dictatorship, he moved to the United States. He was not a stranger to American culture, having followed the New York Yankees since childhood and memorized great chunks of American pop music lyrics in addition to being a devotee of Mad Magazine in the Harvey Kurtzman era. In the mid-sixties he developed an interest in contemporary U.S. poetry and began to write poetry in English as well as in Spanish. Guitart’s first collection of poetry in English was Foreigner’s Notebook (Shuffaloff 1993), and in 1996 his long cyclical poem Film Blanc was published as a chapbook by Meow Press. He has also published in print and electronic journals. He has translated U.S. poets into Spanish (e.g., John Ashbery and Gabriel Gudding) and Latin American poets into English (e.g., José Kozer and Eugenio Rodríguez). He obtained a Ph.D. in Spanish linguistics from Georgetown University in 1973 and is Professor of Spanish at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He is widely published in the fields of Spanish phonology and Spanish grammar, and has been a visiting professor at the University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania State University, the University of Massachusetts, Middlebury University, and several Latin American universities.

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    The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems by Jorge Guitart Book Preview

    Uploaded by

    BlazeVOX [books]
    Jorge Guitart The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems 9781935402374 "Jorge Guitart’s poetry is not for the masses but it is for everyone. The Empress of Frozen Custard is awash in marvels. Guitart is a master of language, a tongue trickster, a feller of fashion. In this, his second volume of English poetry, he has done it again, producing a collection that sings and laughs and cries all at once. In the words of Yankee fans praising one of their most beloved players, “Hip, hip, Jor-gé!” Pablo Medina Author of The Cigar Roller and Professor of Fiction and Poetry, Emerson College The poet, the linguist, the foreigner in the multilingual metropolis of the mind, Guitart writes as if each stroke were a cosmic stretch, a cognitive Asana of sorting, slipping, hearing and mishearing. This is a poetry that is clever, fortified but not drunk on puns and wit. Chiaroscuro or oscurochiaro, the Straits of Florida or Estrecho de la Florida, a quotidian Baroque of angle aged words whirl our worlds. Antiphonal energy takes on a see-saw ride of Looney Hymns and Nutty Psalms to intense, witty reworkings of William Blake and Wallace Stevens. In Guitart's 100 poems, tongues tattle adjusts the lamp of language, so we can hear. Kenneth Sherwood Associate Professor of English, Indiana University of Pennsylvania " Jorge Guitart was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1937, and early on he decided that his favorite subjects in school were Spanish grammar and English. They continue to be central to his intellectual life. In 1962, not wanting to live any longer under a Leninist dictatorship, he moved to the United States. He was not a stranger to American culture, having followed the New York Yankees since childhood and memorized great chunks of American pop music lyrics in addition to being a devotee of Mad Magazine in the Harvey Kurtzman era. In the mid-sixties he developed an interest in contemporary U.S. poetry and began to write poetry in English as well as in Spanish. Guitart’s first collection of poetry in English was Foreigner’s Notebook (Shuffaloff 1993), and in 1996 his long cyclical poem Film Blanc was published as a chapbook by Meow Press. He has also published in print and electronic journals. He has translated U.S. poets into Spanish (e.g., John Ashbery and Gabriel Gudding) and Latin American poets into English (e.g., José Kozer and Eugenio Rodríguez). He obtained a Ph.D. in Spanish linguistics from Georgetown University in 1973 and is Professor of Spanish at the State University of New York at Buffalo. He is widely published in the fields of Spanish phonology and Spanish grammar, and has been a visiting professor at the University of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania State University, the University of Massachusetts, Middlebury University, and several Latin American universities.

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    of 18

    The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems

    Jorge Guitart

    BlazeVOX [books]
    Buffalo, New York

    III

    The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems by Jorge Guitart Copyright 2009 Published by BlazeVOX [books] All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced without the publishers written permission, except for brief quotations in reviews. Printed in the United States of America Book design by Geoffrey Gatza Cover image sculpture by Carrianne Hendrickson; contact the artist at: chlola1974@earthlink.net | http://www.hendricksonsculpture.com (716) 877-6147 First Edition ISBN: 9781935402374 Library of Congress Control Number: 2009904722

    BlazeVOX [books] 303 Bedford Ave Buffalo, NY 14216 www.blazevox.org editor@blazevox.org

    p ublisher of weird little books

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    IV

    The Empress of Frozen Custard & Ninety-Nine Other Poems

    The Empress of Frozen Custard


    She doesnt claim to be the only empress. Shes not some opaque metaphor, the empress of frozen custard. She doesnt care for rollers of big cigars, let alone muscular ones who double as whippers of weird desserts. She wont allow women to be called wenches. She recycles newspapers every week. She favors wrapping flowers in nice tissue paper. And she would never ask you to take from the dresser of some poor deceased woman a nice sheet to cover her face, wouldnt make negative comments about the dead womans feet if they were protruding because the sheet was not long enough. And she wouldnt draw unwarranted inferences about the temperature of the dead body or the intelligence of the deceased from the way the feet looked. The empress of frozen custard! She will always agree that seeming is part and parcel of being. She will adjust your lamp so you can see.

    At the Zotel
    For Markito and Opa
    You are at the zotel with me. We slay each other at the zotel with hands displayed to look like gunsour hands are meant to look like guns. We live with laughter at the zotel and desperadoes are across and the zotel might never close. The desperadoes have a cross! Their chances widen and ours may not. The parapet (the parapet!) at the zotel is like a walk a walk of life and simple talk and no one who is dead can balk. You say (I say) to mock, to mock the rocks at the zotel, the lowly rocks of zero IQ, resembling jocks under the clouds resembling cows (of zero IQ, both clouds and cows) and the zotel does rock! Oh, the zotel! Ah, the zotel! To add, subtract at the zotel. Then go and tell, tell all of nothing gained, of nothing lost, of being zotelic or azotelic just for fun. And now a tango at the zotel: The intention is a muddle (oh!) and the zotel, yes, the zotel is the size that fits all.

    In The Life of Jackson and Jillian


    Jackson and Jillian ascended a well-defined natural elevation smaller than a mountain in order to obtain and bring back a cylindrical vessel open at the top and fitted with a handle, filled with a clear, colorless, odorless, and tasteless liquid, essential for most plants and animal life. Suddenly Jackson descended involuntarily under the influence of gravity and caused his ornamental head covering, made of precious metal set with jewels and worn as a symbol of sovereignty, to divide into pieces violently, and Jillian followed, rolling end over end.

    Gnomedamerung
    Light gathers in the eyes of young gnomes. Its for future use. Urine gathers in defective kidneys of old gnomes. Each local chapter of gnomes opens and closes with a report of gunfire: what the victim said what the gun itself said. Urine is the color of gold. Or is it gold that is the color of urine? After each crisis a gnome becomes an installment for a miniature tree. Ornament prevails, says a spokesgnome.

    The Tiger
    For Richard Dawkins
    Tiger, tiger, going extinct in the forests indistinct what watchmaker was so blind that arranged thy scary kind? And what good is it for me to continue asking thee who did not evolve to speak in the fashion of the meek? But, oh, tiger, going extinct in the forests indistinct what watchmaker was so blind that arranged thy scary kind?

    Be Careful
    There is broken glass in the bathroom and intact glass in the destructive mirror. There is the help and they are among the helpless. There is the cleared throat that is not functioning. There is the terrible absence of yes from pursed lips, and the terrible presence of no in no admittance. There is the old center of attention that is now the center of inattention. There is a hallmark card for everyone who has not left their mark. There is paper-thin paper and there is the thin perseverance of the fat. There are life-sized mockups and death-sized sarcophaguses. There are severe constraints on boys with toys. There is expertise in making kitsch. There is the snowbird that melts and the blackbird that doesnt say bye-bye back.

    Poitrine et Prtre
    so chest to breast the nipple pink they do not colorize the priest the priest hardens if there is a niece desire a chance to see two nieces at two breasts apiece left nipple increases if right subject is introduced and so right subject is left nipple by accord breasts heave if the priest does not leave but its vestigial nipples if the priest disrobes if nieces fall breasts fall as days go forward

    From My Life with Jacques


    1 As we came to the traffic light, I said to Jacques, Red means stop because blood is sinister. Green means go because foliage is protective. Jacques enveloped himself in an air of indifference. 2 Jacques was hungry. I said to him, You cannot eat interpretations! I helped Jacques succeed over the slipperiness of meaning by teaching him how to call and order pizza and have the order obeyed. 3 Jacques was unambiguously ill. He was lucky that the doctor who cured him was a presence, an autonomous self, with lots of useful hidden assumptions.

    Postcard from Vero Beach


    I am like Socrates only in being mortal. I know something, though not who is for sale. Old intuitions about the ocean, the sand dunes and the rest are roaming the encephalic dungeons. Only this object in my hands seems to be immune. I mean this beach ball.

    Orientation Sessions
    Dont spend any money on the ungrateful bastards, only on the grateful ones. The ocean, yes, it is a huge lie but also a huge half-truth. I remember the beach near the Town of Bath and how dirty were my thoughts there. In trying to see to the bottom of things I looked at the bottoms of several people.

    10

    The Ineffable
    will you allow me to use your ineffable the manager gave him permission to do so my mother wont let me touch your ineffable during the ineffable nobody was allowed to leave shall we be allowed to stay with the ineffable when we come again may I do the ineffable yes you may may I borrow your ineffable yes you may may I lick your ineffable no you may not if I may say so your ineffable needs washing he asked if he might touch her ineffable half an hour earlier the manager answered that he might not dick asked his cousin if he could touch her ineffable the cousin replied he could you cannot play with your ineffable in the park on Sundays but you may do so on weekdays

    11

    Wetware Inside
    I remember the pages of the Novel of the Air opening every evening but no one will believe me. They are busy with pockets full of posies. Yet it is rather the brick walls that are so agnostic. If you talk to them, they become more proverbial than ever, inhumanly so. As to life, it continues to be very organic, but give it a chance. Where is the alarm? I mean the one to view musical extravaganzas with that have evolved from drum and bugle operations. You who are too sound to crack a smile or loiter on the horizon, consider Phlebas the Phlebitic and how my cavalcade doesnt have a single horse in it. But, no matter, as the idealists keep on reminding us. On the other hand I have the means to prove that the ends were justified by clicking a hand-held device.

    12

    Pips and Squeaks


    Once more the hymns are underdetermined by the data and in chiaroscuros there is no milk or bread. The worm hates the early birds guts for fate is the secret ingredient in choice. The bone of contention will be part of a skeleton but you, neon sign you are alive with meaning! If you feel a stirring, it is the soul pressing for more candy and a lot more toys.

    13

    Machina ex Machina
    Predecessors decompose and die and are deported to the past. Oh, close the windows, for the erratic starlings might hint at something profound and inexplicable. All is well. The brain is in its skull. Yet the priestly quality in someone might be recognized and the unlucky ones may not be able to scatter. A kind of longing in these here private parts continues unabated. Our position is firm: we are quivering blobs of jelly. Me, I suspect that cannibals eat missionaries during brief but beautiful religious ceremonies. Victor Virus has knocked down Oliver Organism and all cockroaches of the soul have perished. Yet all cockroaches of the mind may sing and dance La Cucaracha. I regret to tell you about my total lack of discomfort. I would like to thank the evening for being so lovely and so new.

    14

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