Geof Huth


Longfellow Memoranda

      January


1/364

Acted on
& off &
oft
             (o’erheard)


2/363

her breast
             rises
(still)
             rises, calm


3/362

adamantine
whereupon
             of one he’art
             fatal


4/361

umbered
             a number
beyond number
inhabits desire


5/360

in finite splendor
             graces & phrases
her tiny fingers
             tremble


6/359

the tenderest star
             a pinprick of light
breaking
through


7/358

ill/usions
asp/irations
beg/innings
her/own


8/357

time & tide
aside of rhyme
             in a thrice
perplexed


9/356

flint into
             fire
a shapeless mass
             of thought


10/355

falsehood
neighborhood
juventud
understood


11/354

purified rendered
             distilled
& stilled
& word


12/353

fireside
             with book
             word by word
solitude


13/352

self-nimbus
             & self-restraint
did paint
his forehead complete


14/351

shadow shade
             ghost
             specter
watcher


15/350

equipoise
             oppo    site


16/349

thou un-one
thou nought
thou un-done
though thought


17/348

I am heart
             & earth &
heaven


18/347

sp(here)
             out(word)
                         (in)word


19/346

wherefore thou art?
from wherefore
             thou,
                         art?


20/345

utter’d comprehend’d
             voiceless & re-buked
breath’d


21/344

chimney’s chime
             smoke
             rising


22/343

ever level
             under poise
tilt the bevel
             still the noise


23/342

a thousand
             kindred dreaded
             locks
to one thousand hearts


24/341

science & omniscience
             a complete
             plishment
exposed


25/340

crowded
shouted
             ourselves
defeated


26/339

one dumb
             beast
weighing despair
             lost


27/338

rugged bright
             adobe realm
the sun a road
             that shows


28/337

self-effacing pages
             Domesday
             Doomsday
             Dombsday


29/336

worse than
             better be


30/335

Let lit
             speak comfort


31/334

news, prose
new, verse
             character
             gives little

Geof Huth notes: "For every day of 2007, I have been writing the tiny poems of "Longfellow Memoranda" in a tiny book that I thought was a blank 1917 journal when I bought it last year, sight unseen. Instead, it's a book to keep track of birthdays of friends and family, but it has an interesting extra feature: each day of the week is accompanied by a bit of writing by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. His poetry is so bad that I decided to rewrite it day by day. So each day, I replay a few of the words in Longfellow's text into a new poem, one I hope is better, if a little less scrutable, than the poem that inspired it."


Geof Huth is an American who has lived on most continents on earth (but not Australia). Over the years, he has created visual and other poems in a wide variety of formats: lineated verse, prose, paintings, drawings, and films. He has been published in venues as diverse as The American Poetry Review, Dreams and Nightmares, Kalligram, Lost and Found Times, Modern Haiku, La Poire D'Angoisse, Prakalpana Literature, ZYX, and atop bandaids. His chapbook of visual poems, Out of Character, was recently published by Paper Kite Press. He writes almost daily on visual poetry at his blog dbqp: visualizing poetics. Geof is one of the two Geof Huths in the world; the other lives in Australia.


 
 
 
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