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From "Down To Write You This Poem Sat" at the Oakville Gallery

Contemporary
  1. Charles Bernstein, "Phone Poem" (2011) (1:30): MP3
  2. Caroline Bergvall, "Love song: 'The Not Tale (funeral)' from Shorter Caucer Tales (2006): MP3
  3. Christian Bôk, excerpt from Eunoia, from Chapter "I" for Dick Higgins (2009) (1:38):  MP3
  4. Tonya Foster, Nocturne II (0:40) (2010) MP3
  5. Ted Greenwald, "The Pears are the Pears" (2005) (0:29): MP3
  6. Susan Howe, Thorow, III (3:13) (1998):  MP3
  7. Tan Lin, "¼ : 1 foot" (2005) (1:16): MP3
  8. Steve McCaffery, "Cappuccino" (1995) (2:35): MP3
  9. Tracie Morris, From "Slave Sho to Video aka Black but Beautiful" (2002) (3:40): MP3
  10. Julie Patton, "Scribbling thru the Times" (2016) (5:12): MP3
  11. Tom Raworth, "Errory" (c. 1975) (2:08): MP3
  12. Jerome Rothenberg, from "The First Horse Song of Frank Mitchell: 4-Voice Version" (c. 1975) (3:30): MP3
  13. Cecilia Vicuna, "When This Language Disappeared" (2009) (1:30): MP3
Historical
  1. Guillaume Apollinaire, "Le Pont Mirabeau" (1913) (1:14): MP3
  2. Amiri Baraka, "Black Dada Nihilismus" (1964) (4:02):  MP3
  3. Louise Bennett, "Colonization in Reverse" (1983) (1:09): MP3
  4. Sterling Brown, "Old Lem " (c. 1950s) (2:06):  MP3
  5. John Clare, "Vowelless Letter" (1849) performed by Charles Bernstein (2:54): MP3
  6. Velimir Khlebnikov, "Incantation by Laughter" (1910), tr. and performed by Bernstein (:28)  MP3
  7. Harry Partch, from Barstow (part 1), performed by Bernstein (1968) (1:11): MP3
  8. Leslie Scalapino, "Can’t’ is ‘Night’" (2007) (3:19): MP3
  9. Kurt Schwitters, "Ur Sonata: Largo" performed by Ernst Scwhitter (1922-1932) ( (3:12): MP3
  10. Gertrude Stein, If I Told Him: A Completed Portrait of Picasso (1934-35) (3:42): MP3
  11. William Carlos Willliams, "The Defective Record" (1942) (0:28): MP3
  12. Hannah Weiner, from Clairvoyant Journal, performed by Weiner, Sharon Mattlin & Rochelle Kraut (2001) (6:12): MP3

Selected by Charles Bernstein (read more about his choices here)

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In Memoriam: Nathaniel Tarn (1928–2024)

Posted 6/27/2024

Today we're sad to share the news that poet, translator, and anthropologist Nathaniel Tarn has passed away just a few days shy of his 96th birthday. Born in France in 1928, Tarn's peripetitic life took him to Belgium, England, and eventually the US, where he'd teach at Rutgers for more than a dozen years before retiring to New Mexico in the mid-1980s. 

His life as a poet spanned nearly 60 years, with the most recent publications including Atlantis, an Autoanthropology; The Hölderliniae; and Palenque: Selected Poems 1972-1984. Forrest Gander has praised Tarn's poetry, observing that "Tarn’s books have inspired a wild, almost religious devotion among readers. His work is a tremendous force field in which world and perception collaborate in the construction of innovative formal 'architextures' for a sensual language that has no like." He concludes, "Tarn is one of the most elegant and formidably intelligent minds in contemporary poetry. His books open up a means for us to be delighted again to belong to this world."

On PennSound's Nathaniel Tarn author page, you'll find a modest collection of recordings, including readings at SUNY Buffalo, Hoboken, Harvard University, the Louisville Conference (as part of the Lute & Drum series), London (for the Shearsman reading series) and our own Kelly Writers House. There are also a number of album releases, including two New Mexico readings from the VOX Audio collection and Tarn's 1985 collaboration with musician Billy Panda, I Think This May Be Eden. There's also a link to PoemTalk #42, which covers Tarn's poem "Unravelling / Shock."

We send our condolences to Tarn's family and his network of friends and fans worldwide.


PoemTalk #197: on Marjorie Welish's "Begetting Textile"

Posted 6/25/2024

Today we release the latest episode in the PoemTalk Podcast series — a very impressive #197 — which focuses on Marjorie Welish's "Begetting Textile" sequence from 2004's Word Group (specifically poems 1, 2, 10,  and 13). Host Al Filreis was joined by Michelle Taransky, Sally Van Doren, and Christy Davids (shown from left to right) for this program. 

Filreis offers this lyrical take on the poems' impact in his write-up of the new episode: "The poems are texts in the sense of text inside the term textile. They are barely raveled. Phrase do and don't knit. A sweater is put on and overcomes mimesis. Fragmentation, the group agrees, is not the vibe — that’s too definitely indefinite." He continues, "Welish deploys phrasings on the page that convey the unraveling of work (and the meaning of work, especially women's work) rather than  fractioning, shattering, and atomizing," before asserting, "There is a wholeness to the untangling."

You can listen to this latest program and learn more about the show here. PoemTalk is a joint production of PennSound and the Poetry Foundation, aided by the generous support of Nathan and Elizabeth Leight. Browse the full PoemTalk archives, spanning more than a decade, by clicking here.


Etheridge Knight Reads 'Prison Poems,' c. 1968

Posted 6/24/2024

Today we're shining the spotlight on a historic recording of Etheridge Knight reading from Prison Poems at the Indiana State Prison. While we don't have precise info regarding the date of this event we believe that it took place towards the end of his incarceration, which ended in 1968. Of the eight years Knight served for armed robbery, he has said, "I died in 1960 from a prison sentence, and poetry brought me back to life."

When these segmented tracks were first introduced, our own Al Filreis commented that the "recording is marred by — or indeed perhaps enhanced and positively complicated by — the loud music playing in the background." You can judge for yourself. 

Altogether, there are twenty-eight tracks, including an introduction and the following titles among many others: "Cell Song," "Hard Rock Returns to Prison from the Hospital for the Criminal Insane," "To the Man Who Sidled Up to Me and Asked: How Long You In Fer, Buddy?," "Poems for Black Relocation Centers," "For Malcolm, A Year After," and "Apology for Apostasy." You'll find these tracks, along with Watershed Tapes' album, So My Soul Can Sing and video footage of a 1980 reading for the Friends of the Scranton Public Library Poetry Series on our Etheridge Knight author page.


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