ALLEN
BRAMHALL Reviews
Hybrid Moments by Jon Curley
(Marsh Hawk Press, New York, 2015)
Hybrid Moments begins with two introductory pieces. A
program exists here albeit darksome in its make. The first piece, “Mission/Myth
Shun Statement” announces a sort of plan or menu of activity. Bestriding the
horse at a gallop, the poet proceeds a continuing dash, and too the book.
First sentence of that first piece:
Punning
Pan merges lucid with ludic,
sabotages the hopes of codifying
rubric
&
runs riot with his Rascalizer over manicured
minds
and yawns at the lawns of the well-
kempt
execs towards whom handbags of hex
are
cast.
I should just review this sentence because
a lot goes on here. The merger of lucid with ludic pretty well
tells me I have art: simultaneous vision and play. Admittedly, I had to look up
ludic, one of those words that find their expression outside your day's
conversation, but a word of toll nonetheless. Google failed me what a
Rascalizer is, but I can subtly guess.
The music is a bumpy ride here, a clatter
of assonance and alliteration. As a rule, I love the solidifying effect of
both. Here, I fear—whoa! assonance!—the soundings of these sounds seem enlisted
to the point of forced. Rhyme is obvious, after all: that's the mnemonic point.
You may feel differently. I admit that I am
a little failed by Gerard Manley Hopkins (referenced elsewhere in this book),
but then something jumps from his lines. Similarly so with Curley.
The rush of language in this book reminds
me of a work by Donald Byrd, The Great Dimestore Centennial. For that
matter, Ed Dorn's great Gunslinger comes to mind in wired up
lucubration. In all cases, the effort is showy. That effort is an exercise in
grace and time.
Curley's grab for exotic words feels
somewhat immobilizing. Jostled at a cantering pace, the words seem unprepared
to mean more than briefly. Maybe that's how language really is.
Hybrid Moments consists of seven
sections, not including the two poems seated before Part 1: Echo Gnomics. The
poems within each section go untitled. I skim the details here to give a
picture.
The final section bears the title Whiz
Bang! Each poem within the section bears that same title. These are largely
short poems that make me think of Williams' Kora in Hell. Quick bursts
off the random moment. Curley explains with a cautionary note:
“A Whiz Bang! poem is composed to explode, releasing itself on a timer, its residua sharing the fate attributable to pollution and other daily emissions.”Note to Author: Readers need not hear the author's hopes. Or perhaps this is a feint that I fall goofy to. Anyway, the poems in this section crackle most comfortably (for me) with wit and word.
Home foreclosures went up in the past
Few years for many—but not for the
homeless.
They stayed steadfast to their homeland,
A staggering sequence of networks that goes
right through you, including your homes.
I do not give justice to this weighty work.
I'm only here to show some routes. The work owns a structure that I only partly
see, so far. The map is yours to behold.
*****
Re. Allen Bramhall: A diminishing flow of poems, a continuing insistence in watching superhero movies with my son, an increasing interest in the healing, lifebound elation of creativity, and some websites:
Generally cheerful.
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