Mongrel Media has released on DVD three films by Michael Ondaatje. They include Sons of Captain Poetry (1970, 29 mins.) which documents the work and spirit of bpNichol (1944-88). One of the treats of the film is capturing bpNichol reciting/chanting a concrete sound poem. The viewer really gets a sense of the body grounding nature of the vocal track: it’s visceral and out there.
And so I may be forgiven if I perhaps misremember the closing of the film. On the black screen there appears to appear the line
Your alphabet ends
which is then joined by a line appearing beneath
Where my alphabet begins
followed by an attribution to Dr. Seuss.
It appears my ordering is a bit off. I would have to review the film since one authority tracks down the quotation to the 1955 On Beyond Zebra!
In the places I go there are things that I see
That I never could spell if I stopped with the Z.
I’m telling you this ’cause you’re one of my friends.
My alphabet starts where your alphabet ends!
Now I see that it’s a single line. But I like mine! Certainly inflected by the odd memory work from the split fade-in on the screen from Sons of Captain Poetry — there is the attentive to sound repetition in the “n” in “begins” and “ends” and the other reversals — this so-called Zed version is forward thinking.
Your alphabet ends
Where my alphabet begins
I also probably have on the brain that collaboration between Jay MillAr and Stephen Cain, Double Helix, mischief for enlightened ears.
And so for day 1020
28.09.2009