Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Exquisite Corp. 220 is now available for download (pdf).

Unfortunately, due to the very subjective nature of poetry and the difficulty of even defining the word "poem", we do not consider any claims for poetry

Guinness World Records

Exquisite Corp. 220 tracks the mutation from harvesting personal data for profit unconsciously (by Facebook) to inviting personal participation for poetry consciously (by the 3words/poem project). The short story, which literally grows, mutates, out of the deleterious Facebook copyright policy, responds to the media coverage of events in Toronto leading up to the G8 and G20 summits in July 2010. Parts of the story were printed out and posted around Toronto during the G20 protests by people associated with the Poetic Interventions Project (h/t Shannon Maguire). The poems that follow were written on Facebook by the people above in response to status updates with three words per poem from the original story. The photos were by Laurie D. Graham. The numbers in the titles of each poem correspond to the number of people who contributed.

Samples of the project were previously published by derek beaulieu's NO Press and Warren Dean Fulton's Pooka Press.

A conversation on Wax Poetic / Vancouver Co-op Radio about the "Three Words Per Poem" project: 27 April 2011 https://archive.org/details/WaxPoeticApril27thWithGregoryBetts

Saturday, March 5, 2011

80 – I Know What




you didn’t
know last summer you’re doing
the matrix like what I know
on or an or otherwise gordian

you don’t know what everyone
does in sleep
not sleep, not wistful dreams
not not not not
not summer
no what no known
no then free
no no do

I know what you did
I do not approve
what would happen
if I told you?

rob mclennan, Natasha Pedros, Stephanie Tingzon, Stacey Andrey, Michael Portelli, Eric Schmaltz, Priscilla Brett, James Millhaven

G60 – Write Songs Against




write songs against the wind
songwriters, the back of your guitar
your lover, the smile
the tiny breath suppressed

write songs against singing; then sing
again against ebony backgrounds
gaining on the quickly yellowing paper

write a fist
songs don’t succeed
sing songs against

write songs against poetry
the last round song
the synaptic curve of melody
the parallel parting of harmony
the reflexive arc of rhythm
the righteous round of rhyme
the arctic talk of time
the wavy groove of sound
the thump thump thump of the jackhammer
breaking up the street
time’s twenty four hours
sliding high

write songs against stall walls
the wrong sites
against rhyme and common sense
the heels of mud-soaked-sun-dried sandals
the curtains waffling in the breeze
against the grain, sand them lightly, apply a coat of shellac
and then rendition

against the status quo of status updates
anti-G20 police propaganda
songs irrelevant
songs against the machine
the forever final straw that keeps
the Right doing wrong

write songs against a ribbon for urinary infection
a yellow ribbon
up against the old oak tree
against all odds


Vanessa Place, Maria Damon, Amanda Earl, Linda Steer, Gary Barwin, Andrew Topel, Alice Robinson, Andrew Topel, Brian Bartlett, Slim Volumes, Catharine Heard, Jamie Reid, Slim Volumes, Kristen Peterson, Kathleen Betts, Tobey C. Anderson, Rob Budde, Pearl Pirie, Jami Kali, Nick Treanor, Warren Dean Fulton, Slim Volumes

52 – Open and Unfettered




chains upon the ground
a way out
won’t be found

or locked and chained
a hard-swallow
gulp next

discarded characters on the ground
waiting to be used
by an unlettered society

the Tibetan loses himself
to oneness and zeroness
writes his self-elegy

they embrace each other
with abandon
became slaves of passion

a con, a shell game, an illusion
folding unencumbered
from the heavy obstructed lines
design without function

open and unfettered
often and under-prepared
inconceivable overspending
on the G20 travesty

anxious and unlettered
road-sourcing
useless floating in October wind


Priscilla Brett, Kathleen Betts, Andréa Ledding, Warren Dean Fulton, Brian Bartlett, Tobey C. Anderson, Pearl Pirie, Rob Budde, John Barlow, Siobhan O’Flynn, Gary Barwin, Joseph Brown, Alice Robinson

1 – I’m looking for




my blood, again

I’m looking forward
an end to this sentence
for love, but I still haven’t found
a place to happen
a thesis statement
a chipped pretty picture
of sunshine and warmth
please, I’m looking, I lack

I’m looking minute
I’m looking for more
passion in home
the horizon line, the bottom of the well
temps perdu, my bearings

look
someone fill     the blanks
between      lines
in     story of my life

a jewel encrusted hawk
slaying a wren in flight: a frieze – a sky burial
a hawk and a handsaw
a lifetime of inspiration

I’m looking for love, you idiot
an end to this business
one more one hundred
myself in the mirror
the right question to my answer

spots of sunlight
things shine
despite this forestry
force’s fortress

that gold watch my other gave me
someone who really gets it
we can all get it but
I’m looking forward

those signs read
you are here
I found I
a bank with too many splinters
for words to dare enter

the place where I departed
when I find it
I’ll kiss you something to see

the end I’m looking for
searching for
yearning for
an answer
a solution, resolution
a long lost friend
my insanity, I seem to have
a long lost friend
my sanity, a strong tossed thread
a heart of gold
formidable

I’m looking for life’s secret decoder ring
the ward in forward, its dress code
of wrap-around white
I’m looking fortunate




Catherine Heard, Amanda Earl, Nicole Collins, Jacob Wren, Lisa Betts, JA Weingarten, Lauren Corman, Pam Edwards, Douglas Barbour, Nick Treanor, Carmen Racovitza, Kateri Lanthier, Priscilla Brett, Todd Bruce, Lynn McClory, Kinga Jakab, Susan Christian, Ted Betts, James Depew, Allison Sekuler, Alice Robinson, Warren Dean Fulton, Jeff Carpenter, Kathleen Betts, Andrew Topel, Sharon Honywill-Haddow, Pearl Pirie, Natalee Caple, James Yeary, Josephn Brown, Kim O’Gorman, Andréa Ledding, Linda Steer, Penn Kemp, Laurie Anne Fuhr