I had the good luck to participate in ArtSong Lab twice and experience the thrill of having my words turned into music for classical voice and piano. The Vancouver-based program coordinated by Ray Hsu, Michael Parks and Alison D’Amato unites composers with poets to further the development of the genre. My playtime with Christopher Gainey began when he set one of my poems, “Sea Fugue”, as a song cycle. He also participated in a UBC composers’ collaborative effort to set a poem of mine, “Confluence”, (now in serpentine loop as “Circle”). He also set another poem, “Tokay Blanket”, as a bluegrass banjo piece.
Tokay Blanket
Catching the west-bound
tonight and the plan is to get comfortable, warm,
buzzed. Going to turn it on and let it pour
through me until I’m gone. Unbottling
for good. Getting burnt, skinned, pissed.
Living these remainder hours loose,
tight, loaded, warped, bent, blind,
blotto. Boiled-as-an-owl,
bombed. I’ve been ruining this unloved
structure and rebuilding it for the short haul
since I was 16. Shaking it down with nightcaps,
twenty-sixers, my friend Micky.
It’s how I steady the level of the reservoir,
make tremours pass like a train on the trestle.
Food is out. Wine is out. I want only spirits,
to become buttered, fried, pickled and juiced.
Stewed and sauced – red-faced and hopped up;
crocked. Cut, cooked. Pour, I tell her. Keep it coming.
Get me dipso, destroyed. Legless, looped,
hammered and plastered, ploughed,
ripped, shickered. I build myself back towards a normal
as empty as my glass. The liver quits, the kidneys
say the Hail Mary but the heart continues.
The heart’s the only one
who hasn’t heard this is last call. I push my mouth
against the sleeve of the last shirt, a cotton stopper,
try to keep focused on the mouth’s work, which is
to bring it in and stay silent. This is no way to go out
but I made a home on these rails long ago. Sloshed
is the only thing feeling familiar. I don’t listen
to the whistle blow, or worry for the kids. I’m busy
decorating the mahogany with a record
of what finished me off. I’m out.
“Tokay blanket” is a term used in the 1890s for drinking alcohol to stay warm. “Catching the Westbound,” is a term for dying. “Decorating the mahogany,” refers to lining up empty bottles along the bar.
Chris created a four piece string piece for serpentine loop and had it recorded by members of the Iowa New Music Ensemble. I adore it. At the Dorchester, MA book launch in Oct 2016 an entire rink full of people skated to it. It has also been interesting to read the poems over the music and consider the layers of meaning created that way.
Click here for the full score. If you are interesting in performing it, please contact Chris Gainey.
Here is a sneak peek.