walker + ekphrasis

Opal and I met this weekend at the Walker Art Museum in Minneapolis.  I hadn't been there since the Call and Answer Project brought its square dancing celebration to its lawn, and neither had O, so we slipped into the wings of the museum and sketched words into our notebooks.

Let's see:  above, top, part of the stage dressing for a Merce Cunningham performance.  Kiki Smith's works are photographed in 4, 5, and 7, and seven is made of wool and human hair, and yes, that toothbrush above is made with human teeth.

I always find our poetic friendship remarkable and good:  Opal tends to focus on language and the spread on the page and her project of "failed girls" has always sent shivers up my spine.  And then there's me, and me in the Walker and me with very contemporary poetry has made me feel quite stodgy, but then, my eyes begin to creak open, and there are bits of beauty everywhere.  Opal and I talked about going to the Walker for a poetry date versus the Minneapolis Institute of Arts:  being inspired by the very new and living versus something that is seeped in history and how a conversation can be born.


I wrote notes for a poem I called "Tilt-a-girl," which I transferred and fussed with in Word.  We shall see where it will go, but for now, I'm curious to see what Opal's variation is because, despite our formal differences, we were drawn to almost exactly the same pieces.  And listening to your little golf pencil scritch alongside one of your favorite people is one of the happiest moments one can have.

We have promised one another a start to rotated poetry dates, seeping in other museums, and in a few weeks, our beloved Meryl will come back from Oregon and we shall scritch together.