Daniel Quele-Madrid

Professor Tony Barnstone

English 410: Senior Seminar: Graphic Novels and Graphic Poems

11^th October 2011

Graphic Poetry Project – Introduction

“Paradox:” An Unnourished Uncertainty

            “Paradox” seeks to refurnish in the mind the uncertainties that are not foreign within the realm of life. Paradoxes serve to illicit answers that are elusive to the nature of their questions, often leaving life lingering in doubt with seldom resolved but often explored questions.  Graphic poetry is to the traditional sense of the word poetry a deviance from which it escaped but from which otherwise it would not have existed. This departure from the norm is what I have hoped to capture as to showcase that the certainties cannot exists without the uncertainties just as much as a graphic poetry is merely just a graphic without the poetry of it to offer a distinctive life onto its very own.

The text serves as an illustration itself as a captured voice enmeshed within the simplicity of a paradox absorbed in the complexities of its uncertainties.  A paradox can be expressed with a few words, as in “War in Peace” and “Freedom is slavery” from George Orwell, though the extent of its significance is much greater, though often rather entertaining to examine in an attempt to digest its meaning and connection to life.  R.P. Draper’s “Concrete Poetry” explains that “concrete poetry is a game, a delightful one for the poet to devise and, when successful, a source of delight for the participating reader” (Draper 330). I have chosen paradoxes that provoke, hopefully, self-contemplation as in “One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star.” This can trigger, I have hoped, self-reflection of his or her own understanding of an inner vital part of the self or lack thereof.

I have adopted the comic influence as a visual aesthetic. In Richard Peltz’ “Aesthetic Theory and Concrete Poetry: A Test Case” he asserts that “a concrete poem…represents a deliberate denial by its creator of what a poem is thought to be” (Peltz 27). Although to some extent it may be perceived I have overtly “denied” any tradition formula of creating a poem, I have not forsaken the value and worth of the process in creating it. I have used the images of question marks as poetic narratives themselves that supplement the textual paradoxes not simply and coincidence, but rather, as an intended purpose.  Pineda in her discussion of concrete poetry claims that “different elements are taken from different systems and incorporated into a completely new experience,” to create a new form of poetry (Pineda 380). I have encompassed a comic strand as an attachment to poetry in an attempt to create this new found “experience” absent before or otherwise neglected in the past. “Paradox” is a confrontation of my understanding of paradoxes. I, much as society, am an infant to the nature of paradoxes, and I have tried to projects such belief through the pinkish color.   

            Ultimately, my goal was to create a graphic poetry that is just as playful as to the nature of paradoxes and their existence. Life is absorbed in a flood of paradoxes, and therefore, in a flood of uncertainties. Paradoxes are interesting, spark curiosity, but inevitably, create and offer a sense of instability to truth. Can truth every be truly known when it lies within the uncertainty of a paradox?

Jeanette Reyna "Heritage"

Jeannette Reyna

Enlish 410

11 October 2011

Graphic Poetry Project

Heritage

Expression through art, whether written or drawn, is difficult for me to produce. I developed anxiety and tension throughout the process of creating the project. I feel this tension when I look at the final images of my project as the words are clearly juxtaposed from the text. Lacking artistic ability, I felt using a form of collage would be the best way for me to produce a graphic poem. Although the photographs I selected are strong images, I feel my words give the images an added dimension of understanding or raise questions about themes expressed within the image itself.

Questions of cultural identity have long informed my attempt to understand the world around me. Taking Chican@ Literature with Dr. Arroyo has only multiplied those questions and a need to express them in some form. The first graphic poem utilizes street art by Banksy that appeared in my hometown of Boyle Heights earlier this year. This image has either been called Caution!, Fun or Kite Dream. The image is an iconic one that appears along highways between the United States and Mexico border in California, most notably between San Diego and San Ysidro. In Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud explains that an iconic image, “like the atom, [has] great power locked in [those] few simple lines” and they “demand our participation to make them work” (45, 59). The sign is iconic as a California road sign because of the goldenrod background. This sign has cultural significance because it is only featured by the international border where illegal border crossings appear to be the norm and motorists must be warned of the potential risk of pedestrians on the highway. Banksy has altered the sign by placing a flying kite attached to the man’s had. Underneath the image, I have added the inscription “We still have our dreams, but which way do we run?”. In viewing the original street art, we participate in the act of “reading” the image, while reading the inscription raises questions about what the message of the art actually is. Most people could easily identify the image as a road sign parody. However, as we read the image and compare it to the original sign, we notice that the runners are going in the opposite direction. Are these runners in fact going back to Mexico, or are they running somewhere else? The nuance of this piece and its placement in Boyle Heights allows for much to be discussed.

The second collage-esque image is inspired by William Blake’s illuminated poems and Frida Khalo’s penchant for placing an inscription in her paintings. The photograph is from John Rees’ dia de los muertos series and features a woman with a calavera face sitting on a seated elk type animal. In “Imaging Interiority: Photography, Psychology, and Lyric Poetry,” Laura Mandell argues that “the medium of photography shows us that romantic interiority may be understood as itself a byproduct of literary authors’ investigations of the limitations of printed media before 1810” (218-219). The inward turn characterized by Romantic poetry features the attempt to understand the outside world from within. Mandell points out that a critical theme in the lyrics of Blake and Wordsworth is the expression of the loss of sound. With poems having the ability of being made available through larger production runs, the reading aloud of a poem was not essential in the poetry experience. Blake’s attempt to create voice and sound in his poems is displayed through his illuminated texts. The images correspond to the text; however, sometimes the text was unclear and would need to be sounded out to understand. Blake also incorporated words into his lyrics that suggest sound, such as song, laugh, and voice. A photograph provides an inner dialogue for the photographer, but it is also void of sound. The voice disappears and all we can experience is what we see. This does not mean that the poem or photograph lacks as an art form, it just means that the reader or viewer’s understanding is limited. In an attempt to bring sound, and more specifically a voice, to John Rees’ photograph my poem uses Blake’s example of incorporating words that suggest sound, llanto, voice, and whistle. Because the poem appears as an inscription above the calavera woman, the words can be perceived to be spoken by the photographer. The portrait is a sill image of a moment in time and the inscription allows the viewer to temporarily travel into the photographer’s inner space to gain insight into that moment.

 

 Introduction to "Induced"
     If this concrete poem had to be compared stylistically to any other poet, it would probably be e. e. cummings. Though the shape is not definitive, there is a specific order in which the poem needs to be read. The proximity of the words to each other is also a stylistic choice, meant to emphasize certain emotions and certain words. The repetition is also a tool for this. If we were to take a page from Scott McCloud's theories about negative space being just as important as the content, it is important to read this poem for what is there as well as what is not there. It is intentionally vague in one sense, because the content is difficult to discuss, but I hoped to evoke at least a part of the feelings associated with what this poem is about. The short words, the repetition, and the capitalization are there for emphasis of time as well as experience, if that makes sense.
    McCloud writes in his third chapter about the "gutter" -- the space between the panels in which nothing is shown but where "human imagination takes two separate images and forms them into a single idea," (McCloud, 66). The experience of nothingness next to strong words like "blood" and "OUT" is meant to convey how difficult it can be to communicate pain when a person is experiencing so much of it. He talks about the idea that the reader is as much of a participant in the work as the artist, and in those spaces left blank the reader can use his or her imagination. As he writes, "participation is a powerful force," (69).
    What I hope to achieve with this poem is a chronological experience of pain and rage, from its "conception" (pun intended) to the very end, in which the speaker finally comes to terms with their anger and experiences an urge to seek revenge. The color, spacing, and timing of the words are meant to emphasize the experience of this anger in a step-by-step process.

Samantha Estrella

Kady Oliker

Kady Oliker   

Graphic Poem Introduction

The poem I chose to write was inspired by Un Semon De Bonte.  I used about four images from the water section, and did the 30 second quick writes that we had originally done in class.  I wanted to evoke an emotion of darkness and mystery with the words that I chose.  Concrete and graphic poetry is all about creating a new genre of art.  Without the words, they would be just pictures and visa versa.  As R.P. Draper said, “…three-dimensional versions suggest that there are very interesting possibilities for development of concrete poetry by poets willing and able to learn from sculpture as well as from drawing and painting.”  I believe this quotation is key in understanding what concrete poetry really is: a compilation of a bunch of different genres and inspirations.

            I think that concrete poetry is a very special form of art.  Some would argue that you can split up the art and the words and still be able to portray the same message across to the reader.  As Victoria Pineda said and believed, “In concrete poetry, instead, different elements are taken from different systems and incorporated into new experience.”  Throughout here entire article, she agues that the reader just has to let go and accept this new art form.  We have so many preconceptions of what is thought to be the ‘right’ way to study a painting or read a poem, that if we try to do that here, we may not make any sense of what is being said. 

            I chose to do my poem in the shape of a mermaid because that is what I wanted the reader to think of as they read my poem.  Without the drawing, my poem can be interoperated in 100 different ways.  Some could think it’s about the ocean, or even just a morbid poem about naked women.  By adding the picture, I am able to manipulate what they think about when reading my poem.  I think having pictures along with the words really helps the reader out because some concrete poetry is so out there, that the words alone would make absolutely no sense.  I think the most fascinating thing about the graphic poem is that it can be read in many different ways.  Just like mine, the reader can start wherever they please and sort of go in any direction and get a new meaning each time.

Sanchez, Daisy

Eng 410

Prof. Barnstone

October 11, 2011

The Visual and The Written

Poetry always tries to give a visual image as the reader reads the poem but sometimes not even that can accomplish what the author wants. It is at this time in which graphic poems can do more than the average poem. With a graphic poem the author is able to not only play with diction but as well as how the poem should be formed.  It is here where the text and the visual come together to give more meaning to the poem, something like closure in comics, “… observing the parts but perceiving the whole…[is] closure,” (McCloud 63).

When writing my poem, I knew I wanted to write about losing someone and falling into this feeling of constant seeking but failing to never find what one searches. Textually, I feel like I have achieved this because at the end of each line, I purposely used a word that refers to some type of fall. Yet, the poem would not have the same meaning if I had not created an image, the actual form of the poem, to go along with it. The poem itself not only gets shorter as one reads but also gives off the feeling of falling down. The visual and what the poem says allows the reader to create the motion of falling, “…our mind fills in the intervening moments, creating the illusion of time and motion,” (McCloud 94). Without the visual, we simply have a sad poem and nothing more or less. Hence, when creating this poem I wanted the visual to help move the poem to have the feeling of sinking. I believe I did create that vibe by making the form of the poem a backwards staircase.

While reading the text, the reader feels as one reads each line they keep going down with no way of ever coming back. If this poem was written with a “normal” form, I do not think it would have the same effect as it does as a graphic poem. Not only is one seeing the poem falling but also we are able to hear its downfall. The image the text perceives ties well with the actual format of the poem, giving more meaning to the text.

Rachel See