Download PDF /ubu editions ubuweb

Trancelated (from Coinsides) Ira Lightman 68 Pages Lightman creates a universe of mirrors in his continuing poetic sequence Coinsides, though not mirrors as reflections so much as translations, with one part of a middle-justified poem responding to one or more other center-justified parts, prey to the same invisible gravity. There is no set procedure—this is an artist's logbook and follows the caprices of the days—but one half usually involves a modified translations of writing by Lightman's poetic and philosophical predecessors (Baudelaire, Horace, Jamme and St. Augustine among others), and the other half is a response which can take on any number of forms of address, including the minimal Creeley-esque lyric, the Langpo stew, or, most distinctly, the spontaneously spiritual or religious affirmation, making him sound often like a latter-day Henry Vaughn or, with his prolixity, John Clare. "Trancelated" is a strategically random, though thematically coherent, selection from the ongoing project, a bouquet of sorts of what can be called word sculptures—they challenge the rectilinear rightness on more than four fronts—or even musical compositions: Lightman, an avid fan of Stockhausen, views all of his text works as scores to an aural, if not conventionally "musical," performance.