Riprap

I red rip rap by Mr. snider . . . Les from the P.O. loaned to me . . . Les, me and Gary P. used to burn the weed and guzzle vino apres trabajo . . . down in Long Beach.

Here’s my poema . . . reminiscing about Ms.Peevy and Twinkie’s . . .

Riprap

Incognito natcherly

in the night

by bicycle my horse

down Anaheim

some took a carriage

I on horseback

I think it was.

Fools down the river

three whores

a quadruped

his agreeable niece

uprooted trees . . .

Lake Biwa

narrow beach

moon barge

in thy lap

the rubble heap

moon cusp

rushing together in silence

flowing out

from the rock.

Myrrh

giving perfume

umbrella pines

funnel of air

ascending

the boughs

rising

ascending

where once was nothing.

Rimini

Vivaldi

and

then cool rain

its shape

said the Boss . . .

Mio poema

which can be written

no longer

years later.

Autumn leaves

blow

towards autumn

by the hours.

Not yet . . . not yet.

The light almost solid

green air

in the fields

amid stars

memories

petals drift through the air

the girl

Venus

unmoving

mental velocity.

The kingdom

of dina-mite

wing of night . . .

looking down

basalt crumbled

then the fun starts . . .

l’AMOR . . .

in general language

somewhere darkness

the black obelisk

lightly written

watered by springs

date palms

the nymphs

as Homer says

the stream was clear

in Babylon.

Set it to music

with the sun

gone as lightning

not political

there is plenty of metal

in ecstasy

the bars in jail

in the old days

without face cards

.

Special thanks to Brion Gysin’s cut-up idea and the boys & girls.who gave us a DADA or dada . . . to Ezra Pound and los cantares Rock Drill for the fodder.

Old men . . .

Did you see that movie “No Country for Old Men”?

Yes no . . . got to thinking about it . . . kinda like yesterday . . .

saw video on Bukowski . . . old man dead now . . .

Henry Miller . . . fucking Pound . . . Garcia Lorca y Lucientes . . .

Rimbaud . . . merdre.

So I’m gonna wax poetic . . .

loose deus ex machina

compose a composition . . .

No banana tree in the yard

No water in the ditch

cant hear the frog bellyflop.

Fucking gopher is destroying the lawn

Steel trap with sharp jaws

Will be the executioner

I tried to drown the bastard

With no success.

Where do gophers go

at night . . .?

Or do they even know it’s night . . .

Too hot outside for diabetic old men.

Been lounging on my ass too long . . .

I use the pandemic as an excuse

Real or imagined.

Blaise Cendrars lost his right arm

Pound was in prison in Italy

and died in some asylum.

Brassai is dead

Ansel Adams is dead

Weston too.

Young guns can’t shoot from the hip . . .

ain’t been trained properly.

I been hanging around

for three quarters of a century

and more.

Gotta get my stick outa the mud

and start living again

before I get old . . . and die.

pound 4 pound

“The problem was to build up a circle of reference—taking the modern mind to be the medieval mind with wash after wash of classical culture poured over it since the Renaissance.” from Ezra Pound, The Art of Poetry No. 5, the Paris Review.

After reading Pound’s statement, the Cantos begin to make more sense . . . but first you must have some knowledge of history, literary and otherwise or you will just flounder . . . like reading Ulysses without any point of reference for Joyce’s literary landscape, human and/or geophysical . . .

That’s it, end of discussion . . . know yer toilet paper !!!

Image from the Internet . . .

Another quickie . . .

This one’s coming via stream-of-consciousness . . .

(Ezra Pound by Richard Avedon)

What do you do with all those plastic film-camera bodies?

I know that its not easy to do close-up work with the iPhone/iPod Touch cameras, might even be impssible, BUT . . . yesterday I found and old plastic camera (with film still inside) . . . took the film ot and was wonering WHAT t do next . . . I used a diopter lens as an aletenative lens or a supplemental lens, to see what would happen if it was held in front of the iPod’s camera lens . . . got some vignetting and it changed the focal length a bit. So . . . the lens on the plastic camera looked promising . . .

. . . a quick twist and the lens “popped” of the front of the camera body . . . using a “supplemental” lens is a bit like using a mouse, after a bit of fumbling, it works.

The closest that the default iPhone/iPod camera will focus before resolution is compromised, is about six centimeters, after that, everything goes south; with the “new” lens held in front ofthe iPod lens, lens to subject distance is 4 centimeters with a noticalbe increase in contrast and resolution.

Shooting through the plastic lens . . .

. . . and without.

More “close-ups” at 4 cm . . .

Default cam at 4 cm . . .

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Diopter lenses and other glass can be used expand the capabilities of your iPhone/iPod Touch camera . . . Try the new lenses with the video camera as well.

Photos of the plastic lens and through the lens, shot with the iPod Touch camera, Ezra Pound, Copyright Richard Avedon, All Rights Reserved.