Written and read live by Frank Kuenstler in New York City, April 1973. An unpublished manuscript by same title exists in at least one version in the Frank Kuenstler Archive; no other part has been located.

First line of poem is given in quotes when poem is read without title.

1. Alba Agon (0:23) : MP3
2. The Bessie Smith Story (0:40) : MP3
3. “The kitty ate its ...” (0:18) : MP3
4. Confusions (0:14) : MP3
5. Poem Written on Grape Paper (0:44) : MP3
6. The GBS Story (0:26) : MP3
7. “Possibly the most prolific….” (0:24) : MP3
8. Poem Etre (0:56) : MP3
9. “Windmills, zippers...” (0:07) : MP3
10. Poem for the Warsaw Ghetto (0:32) : MP3
11. “As green as money...” (0:56) : MP3
12. “Into the throat of ...” (0:20) : MP3
13. Jenny, Jenny (0:55) : MP3
14. Examination (0:53) : MP3
15. “What did the grasshopper...” (0:37) : MP3
16. The Right Man in the Wrong Place (After James Joyce) (0:17) : MP3
17. Opus Posthumous (0:44) : MP3
18. On the Circus and the Marketplace (0:06) : MP3
19. Song of the Horn (0:13) : MP3
20. Line (0:06) : MP3
21. Poem (0:09) : MP3
22. Styles (0:31) : MP3
23. Song (0:27) : MP3
24. Paragraph by Aristotle (0:09) : MP3
25. Pie (0:37) : MP3
26. Anthologies (0:06) : MP3
27. Song (0:30) : MP3
28. Song (0:10) : MP3
29. Wandering (1:05) : MP3
30. Poem: Mother Gobbligook (0:14) : MP3
31. Verbs (0:07) : MP3
32. Poem (0:26) : MP3
33. St. Marks in the Bowery (1:22) : MP3
34. Two: The Gambit Book of Children (0:21) : MP3
35. Hat (0:30) : MP3
36. Two (0:12) : MP3
37. “The kola beat is...” (0:32) : MP3
38. “From him to her...” (0:14) : MP3
39. The Good Photographer (0:11) : MP3
40. A Little Poem for Emily (0:13) : MP3
41. “Be it ever so bumble...” (0:05) : MP3
42. Make Believe Rag (0:10) : MP3
43. The Carols and the Similes: Children's Song (0:56) [Kuenstler reads title, poss. for insertion at beg. of recording] : MP3
44. Song (0:04) : MP3
45. “Shake it, break it...” (0:30) : MP3
46. Dear (0:13) : MP3
47. Syllogism (0:07) : MP3
48. Dear Eurydice (0:06) : MP3
49. Family Court (0:40) : MP3
50. At the Center of Night Tom McKay, (0:43) : MP3
51. The Pat Ozinfant Song (0:42) : MP3
52. “Quote tonight tonight...” (0:05) : MP3

Note: Title transcriptions phonetic, and may contain the odd unintended homonym.

Related Resources:

Kuensler's Lens is available in its entirety at Eclipse.

From L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E #13 (1981):

AND FOR ANYTHING THAT I COULD CALL MY OWN THINKING

[For example, composing from Frank Kuenstler's Lens (available from Film Culture, GPO Box 1499, NY, NY 10001; $2) -- B.A.]

It is less a draft than the scenario of a monument. "the enormous paste-up job". cap.Italics. fade.Aura. the world is invisible.RR. rr.The image disintegrated before desire. fact.I. lax.Icon. ray gun.Mental. image.Nation. maze.I. mm.Eye. abhor.Original. the girl with a soul is the picture of ideology. i'm.Personal. film.Ilytch. The dialectic is reel. gregarious.Chance. image.Urgency. rr.The man on the train is Lenin. contes.Addiction. harm.Money. My image suffers. myth.Take. lex.Icon. reap.Production. mirror.Clause. reign.Code. the messengers photograph words.RR. horror.Culture. f.Fetter. camera.Suture [sic] vain.Indicative. the man on the train is by definition an image of arrested motion.RR [sic] art.Effect. dire.Critical. fate.Schism. person.Atonality. i'm.Machination. limb.Imitation. lens.Fragment. essay on language.Help. The opium of the public is opinion. reality.I. impute.Tense. sign.Tittilate. lesions.RR. Neoclassicism is pornographic. The anti-image is architecture. the object of alienation is movies.RR. epistle.Millenium. messiah.Semantics. praxis.Light. the shape of the thing pursued is the ultimate metaphor.RR. rr.The world is fragmented into people. camera.Forage. rr.The hero is the carrier of style. speech.Theatre. flicker.Recognition. snow maiden.Photography. rr.Chipped and redundant. the world is the resource of poetry.RR. ..., a function of repression.RR. The cinematographer arranges the terms of the beautiful. trouble spelled backwards is fragment.RR. obstacle.Illusion. there's no arguing with television.RR. error.Edition. The movies taught me loneliness. reef.Lexicon. The first screening of Potempkin in the US was on Gloria Swanson's bedsheet. pointillism.Pilot. my.Optic. cinema.Topography. denude.Moment. image.Entrails. time is of the.RR. rr.The man on the train is a figure of speech. lens.Epistemology. punk.Situation. vamp.Empire. The lens being ground is the axe of theory. rr.The world is a negative image of reality. cinematic.Symptomatic. light was resistance.RR. noose.Thalia. marxism.Oneupmanship. corn.Sequence. corn.Volition. semen.Antics. human.Naziism. postpone.Indoctrination. rr.The language picture is germane. the pyramid of appearances makes man dream.RR. rr.An image of refracted action. labor.Division. picture.Characters. frame.Minerology. negative.Italic. rr.Reproduction is the imitation of alienation. AAA.then.

FRANK KUENSTLER

(Bruce Andrews, L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E 13, 1981)

These sound recordings are being made available for noncommercial and educational use only. All rights to this recorded material belong to the Estate of Frank Kuenster. © 2005 Frank Kuenstler. Used with permission of Emily Kuenstler. Distributed by PennSound.