desperately seeking Zukofsky

well, not 'desperately' really, but I've been trying to locate the (or an) exact quote from Louis Zukofsky where he wrote, or is said to have written, or I half-remembered that he did write or someone said he wrote, that somehow, all one's life one (or the poet) writes just one poem - if anyone can direct me to a direct quotation from Zukofsky's writings where he writes such a thing, please let me know - many thanks. . . 

the book-in-a-box

at last the book is made, and all the orders will have been sent out by the end of today - of the 26 copies for sale there are just 8 left - buyers in the US should contact Vamp and Tramp for copies HERE - and Antipodeans should get in touch with me - 

and here's a closer look at the type, especially to the outline of Eusebius - 

fragment from Crankhandle

what you’ve written

will resist you

what you have resisted

will rewrite you

can you say yes to it

can you say no to it

two birds screech

left to right

overhead

he has always been

a long way

from home

"please retain the deckles"

or, something like that, said to have been said by William Morris to a binder who, in turn, chopped off the deckles and kept them nicely in a separate packet to return to Mr Morris - so, if what's good enough for him is good enough for me, here are the deckles !  -  actually, I cut them off because, in the next book I'm printing, most of the material on the rectos is the same, and if I kept the outer deckle on the sheet I'd have to reset the form on the press each time I wanted to print on the other side of the sheet - but with straight edges on both sides of the sheets, I can simply flop the sheet over to print on the other side. . . in any case, it's a nice opportunity for me to announce, however slyly, that there's another book coming up and that the paper is (some) vintage Barcham Green India Office, and (some) Ruscombe Mill India Office - I've had the Barcham Green now for some 20 to 25 years, and have used it just once in the special edition of New Zealand poet Kendrick Smithyman's poem Tomorata at the Holloway Press at the University of Auckland back in 1996 - anyway, behold ! the deckles -

another fragment from Testamenta

song sauntered into him between

         the notes of short & long

from where does what word spring

         to mind         you can’t know anything

about the simplest flower         in this

         midday blue so dark you expect

to see stars         Rembrandt’s lion still poised

         and nonchalant after all these years

silent entry of four white pink-faced

         geese into the lake         with a memory

ticket marked everything hanging from

         your neck         reading withdraws

from him         voices of the dead bellowing

         at you from all sides

pictures for Picture Day

Miriam has kindly taken pictures of the last of the print-runs for Kyle's Picture Day, the sheets laid out to dry, and the other sheets stacked ready for collating - in various lights, angles etc - the sheets will be sewn this weekend and orders will be invoiced and sent out next week -

from Testamenta

weird thing about the blog is that it can only 'publish' a serial poem backwards, bit by bit - but here beginneth Testamenta, some of which appeared in the Australian version of Jacket, and some was read at St Mark's Poetry Project in New York (a shared reading with Fanny Howe) a couple of years ago, and some now will appear here. . . 

whatever done         by one’s own hand

         sky closes for day         opens for night

one-winged         one-eyed         what object

         under the sun         suing a one-sided

axiom of grief         how different it was

         on your return         silver gulls fly out

of cloud into cloud at day’s

         end         to have caught yourself

at the few times when your shadow

         is equal to your height         with

turtledove’s single wing spread out

         to dry        I         Nicolas Jenson

alien & printer of books         Venice

         September 1480         hold one arm

out over his death         it’s not

         possible to change the subject

from the Adventure & Art show

sadly, the Adventure & Art : the fine press book from 1450 to 2011 exhibition has now come down at the Baillieu Library in Melbourne - but my friend Bruno Leti took some nice photos of it and here are some of them, sans captions -