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<strong>PhotoStatic</strong> <strong>Magazine</strong> Nº37 P R O D U C T I O N , page fuse the words “where” and “celebration”. The text thus reads: “I have come. Where is my celebration?”—once the reader supplies the necessary punctuation, that is. There is much more to the poem than the paraphrase so far given, however. For one thing, the two side-by-side Es almost crush the little r between them, in the process disconcealing the “whee” that is a part of “where”. They also tower so inordinately out of the first three syllables of “celebration” that “C E L E bra” is disconcealed and, for me, turned into a suggestion of “candelabra”, an appropriate accessory of any celebration. Ernst uses disconcealment by letter-shape and size— and, of course, by disruption. Making the r in “where” not only small in size but lower case, for instance, helps diminish it. The large (and bright) whiteness of the letters down the center of the page in contrast with the other letters thus not only allows a disconcealment to occur but metaphors the way the coming of spring (of which Proserpina, of course, is the classical personification) brings the world to a kind of abruptly kindled blaze. In short, is very subtle work. It is carnal, too—at least I am carnal enough of mind to find it so. Why? Because of the disconcealed “bra”, and what “I have come” is common slang for. Which Proserpina in a manner of speaking does every spring. 1374 A U G U S T
N O T R E P R O D U C T I O N Retrofuturism Nº10 Incidentally, the poem’s first few words could read, “I have. I come”. Set up nicely by the absence of any punctuation which would have cancelled one or the other, each reading is valid; indeed, although the second reading is in my view a secondary one, I feel it to be a proper simultaneous reading for the passage. (It makes sense because it says the Proserpina has something—she has gathered a sufficiency of materials for beginning the year, therefore she comes.) That Proserpina doesn’t have the celebration awaiting her which she expected, I should add, suggests that her appearance has to do with more than the simple return of spring—what it really has to do with is the return of Spring, the season as the Ancient Greeks knew it, the season as it was at its mythic profoundest, and pagan cheerfulest and rightest. One last comment: the inconspicuous I and E at the beginning are also subjected to disconcealment, disconcealment of the same kind as “C E L E bra”. Hence, we have “i.e.”, or “that is”, which gives an extra kind of mythic resonance to the scene—that scene is that which is. So, to sum up, assisted valuably by its various disconcealments, “Proserpina” boosts its best æsthcipients into a more that one-zone idea of spring: it breaks them into a full-minded, full-bodied Spring with ancient pagan roots; it does, finally, what only the best lyric poetry does: it makes us happy to be alive. Most of the rest of Sequencing does that, too. It is a book well worth reading, not only to see how the disconcealment works, but simply to have a high good time! [Nº7 1 9 8 9 1375
Page 1 and 2: In This Issue: New Age Roundup Bing
Page 3 and 4: N O T R E P R O D U C T I O N Retro
Page 17: N O T R E P R O D U C T I O N Retro

artstrike 1 9 9 0 - PhotoStatic Magazine - Detritus

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