what is another word for the doldrums? perhaps it's just the ol' eddie cochran 'summertime blues'. i was writing this post earlier but my computer went burp! and i lost the post. so now a bit tired, but no matter, i don't need tv when i have t-rex.

but better than a hubcap diamond star halo are these visual poems by los angeles based poet harry k stammer. i've been reading them ever since i got the print version of otoliths a few days ago. i lack the vocab for a good analysis of stammer's poems. at any rate, like all good poetry, the meanings are manifold. what and how i read vispo or texts is usually by emotion first, intellect second. i don't know what the hell hart crane or dylan thomas [to name two very earlier influences] were talking about in their poems, but i was enthralled just the same. so it goes for stammer. i've been reading his blog for years now. stammer is a bit of a mystery to me. i don't know his bio. he writes the palimpsests of his l.a., a city that often exists in the popular mind as the land of sun and beaches to some, and for others the rain-washed streets of film noir. the distorted poems here bleed out into greys and reds, while the light glares at their centers. i gather the texts are poems by stammer. i've read these as straight texts, but fail because that is only part of these pieces. i'm impressed by their spare beauty.

i'm gonna hurry to finish before my computer decides to fuck me out of posting one more time. stammer has more work in the most recent otoliths, both textual and visual.

can you dig it