Theory of Margins

Abstract

For Keith & Rosmarie Waldrop Given the prices these days, late empire in a stew, where is the island of Mr. Callisto, the accident report, and nautical reason? Nowhere to be found. But we are always finding an echo in the cloth or two lines at convergence making the most of absence. We drag expensive ghosts through memory's unmade bed wrinkled like skin. The past has its season and disjunct facts ceremonial in their cadence. In chaos of perception, one final needle awakens in flesh; a line of ants follows the peony's curve for sugar and the view; and pallid flowers with solid stamens stand within a field where all painted things are quietly impressive because they simply are. The logic of circumference is being what's contained-isolated lakes, zero letting go. Yet the kitchen speaks of meadows, one loon creaks and herons fly sweetly only with the stream. Spring will arrive with instincts and string, a thin moon and new settings. You lean with your eyes toward the numb sun, where a stitch of oleander takes platonic shape along the veranda as something near percussion and yet not wet. Threshold and entrance of a music near breaking or maybe grass leans because the light is fading. In neon panoramas and heartbeat chapters, the manifest act is performed near a bed. There will be music and other root systems and all-- consuming angels with their mouths on fire, extravagance and plainness in equal measure and delight in the receiving. Breathing on the stairs. [Author Affiliation] NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS [Author Affiliation] David Andrews is the author of Aestheticism, Nabokov, and Lolita (Edwin Mellen, 1999). His essays, reviews, and interviews relating to the work of Gilbert Sorrentino can be found in the current issues of The Review of Contemporary Fiction, Hunger, and Bridge. He teaches literature and writing at University of Illinois at Chicago. * Steve Anker has been Artistic Director and Director of San Francisco Cinematheque since 1982, and Professor of Filmmaking and Film History at the San Francisco Art Institute since 1984. He co-curated and contributed a catalogue essay for the 76-program retrospective Big As Life: An American History of 8mm Films, which was presented at MoMA from 1998 to 2001. * Lee Ann Brown is the editor and publisher of Tender Buttons, an award-winning independent press that features experimental poetry by women. Her first full-length book, Polyverse (Sun & Moon, 1999) won the New American Poetry Prize; The Sleep That Changed Everything is due from Wesleyan University Press in Fall 2002. She lives in New York City, and teaches at St. John's University on Staten Island * Fred Camper is a writer and lecturer on film, art, and photography who lives in Chicago. He writes regularly for the Chicago Reader, and his website is www.fredcamper.com. * Bradin Cormack teaches English at the University of Chicago. * Guy Davenport's recent books are The Hunter Gracchus & Other Papers on Literature and Art (Counterpoint, 1996), Objects on a Table (Counterpoint, 1998), and Twelve Stories (Counterpoint, 1997). * Anthony Doerr's first book, a collection of stories entitled The Shell Collector, was published in January 2002 by Scribner. …