When you require renewal, is there a particular poem or book that you return to? A particular author?
Renewal mostly comes to me from found poetry, which finds me at the right time.
I have boxes and envelopes filled with tiny shards of paper that I consider infinitely inspirational.
So renewal comes knocking as often as I’m ready to welcome it.
When I seek out renewal I comb through my collection of strange books and ephemera.
Showing posts with label Billy Mavreas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Billy Mavreas. Show all posts
Sunday, 17 March 2019
Sunday, 10 March 2019
Billy Mavreas : part four
What poets changed the way you thought about writing?
I guess early on it was e.e. cummings. All and any of the concrete stuff I saw early on was a revelation of course. I enjoyed a correspondence with j. w. curry in the early 1990s that triggered a lot of thought. Serge Segay’s Zaum stuff blew my mind. John M. Bennett, Ficus Strangulensis, J. Lehmus and the other folks I met and collaborated through the mail-art network. They all showed me that really anything goes. And it could be fun and completely un-precious.
The two or three pieces I saw by Space Daisy also made me perk up as did a short lived correspondence I had with a now missing poet named Cameron Conklin who wrote under the name Dead Sarah. They sent original odd hand scrawled word plays to my university’s lit journal only to be completely ignored - what a bunch of boring twits. I was enamoured and wrote back, still have those precious papers.
I can’t not mention the anonymous writers and designers, the weather, the children, the accidents. Poetry is not solely the province of directed human intention. So much of it floats in these spaces where it’s never even seen let alone picked out and considered poetry by some wise guy like me.
I guess early on it was e.e. cummings. All and any of the concrete stuff I saw early on was a revelation of course. I enjoyed a correspondence with j. w. curry in the early 1990s that triggered a lot of thought. Serge Segay’s Zaum stuff blew my mind. John M. Bennett, Ficus Strangulensis, J. Lehmus and the other folks I met and collaborated through the mail-art network. They all showed me that really anything goes. And it could be fun and completely un-precious.
The two or three pieces I saw by Space Daisy also made me perk up as did a short lived correspondence I had with a now missing poet named Cameron Conklin who wrote under the name Dead Sarah. They sent original odd hand scrawled word plays to my university’s lit journal only to be completely ignored - what a bunch of boring twits. I was enamoured and wrote back, still have those precious papers.
I can’t not mention the anonymous writers and designers, the weather, the children, the accidents. Poetry is not solely the province of directed human intention. So much of it floats in these spaces where it’s never even seen let alone picked out and considered poetry by some wise guy like me.
Sunday, 3 March 2019
Billy Mavreas : part three
How do you know when a poem is finished?
I often don’t. It would explain the scraps of paper lining my life with a smattering of words on them. It’s more the case that the poem stops than I finish the poem.
For visual poems I always know. It’s a feeling/knowing. A vague sense of satisfaction or completion. A very mini aha moment.
I often don’t. It would explain the scraps of paper lining my life with a smattering of words on them. It’s more the case that the poem stops than I finish the poem.
For visual poems I always know. It’s a feeling/knowing. A vague sense of satisfaction or completion. A very mini aha moment.
Sunday, 24 February 2019
Billy Mavreas : part two
How did you first engage with poetry?
Browsing through Cheap Thrills (a second hand book and record shop in Montreal) when I was 15 or so, this was in 1983 approx. I marvelled at beautiful little forgotten books. At the time they were priced at forty cents for some slim volume so I always brought something home. The game changer was finding a battered paperback copy of JF Bory’s Once Again.
Browsing through Cheap Thrills (a second hand book and record shop in Montreal) when I was 15 or so, this was in 1983 approx. I marvelled at beautiful little forgotten books. At the time they were priced at forty cents for some slim volume so I always brought something home. The game changer was finding a battered paperback copy of JF Bory’s Once Again.
Sunday, 17 February 2019
Billy Mavreas : part one
He has been involved with the Montreal literary community since the late 1980s as an editor on journals, poster maker for spoken word events, cover artist for various small presses and in a myriad other capacities bouncing between poetry and comics.
He is an original co-founder of Expozine, Montreal’s zine fair and is an ardent collaborator and small press and self expression advocate.
He works out of his art shop Monastiraki.
Photo credit: Jen MacIntyre
What are you working on?
I’m working on several simultaneous projects. Currently I have an abstract graphic novel that needs tightening and a whole slew of drawing poems that will eventually be zines.
I get easily moved by materials, a new pen or rubber stamp, some vinyl stickers, an old perfect magazine to destroy. I never know what new thing will spark me, leaving older things pushed further back.
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