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Just attended a Tracy K Smith reading

www.thegateless.org
gate(less) poetics

Just attended a Tracy K Smith reading

5/8/2023 it was simply lovely for contemporary poetry fans

Con/Jur/d
May 8, 2023
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Part of the AI fear — seems to be — how mechanized we have become
We don’t allow the moon to break in like we once did — with our 24/7 lights and work life we’ve overemphasized the Sun and Apollonian mechanisms
Great poets — IMO — remind us we are so much more than the crafted opinions of spin-doctors
Gates of Heaven
“... a practical theology my poems help me construct” Tracy K. Smith

Never trust a truth coming at us 
in full daylight, armored with spinning 
mirrors, claiming 

FEAR   GLORY    SUBMIT    BE-ERASED

Be your revolution from what the
silence, night, and the gods before gods
tell you, the quiet where your ancestors
dwell, where our ancestors dwell, drink
the dust spewed out by stars, be drunk
on the microbiome, blackholes, tides
quantum actions, the immense expanse
in all 4 directions

IN         OUT        MACRO      MICRO

Colonize yourself -- reject voices betting
on the complacent heart, lead from the front
lines of your own life, the marching Host behind 
you the sound of feet

STAMPING      ROARING    SHAKING      BREAKING

The gates of someone else’s heaven
We are the glitch and the substrate of glitch

Some links from the Tracy K Smith Zoom reading I just attended:

https://poets.org/poem/nude

https://poets.org/poem/single-womans-bedroom

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/145346/flores-woman

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/147469/the-united-states-welcomes-you

We are less than our glitch

You are more than your glitch

Much love,

Con/Jur/d, 5/8/2023

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a merry blaze
May 9Liked by Con/Jur/d

I feel compelled to share that I recently looked up the first part of my last name, Turge, and found a wiki article on a viking king who briefly conquered a bit of Ireland. During his reign he was married to a seeress. He had an Arab poet visit his court for a time. The wiki article for the poet revealed that he was known for being skinny and handsome, as well as a snippet of a poem about an illicit affair that he seems to have written for the queen. Pretty ballsy.

Returning to the article on the viking king, I found that eventually the king lost a battle against the forces of the High King of Ireland, and was drowned (I assume forcibly).

Purusing the article for that particular High King, I found that he died by drowning. Cross-referencing the articles, he died a year after the viking king. No discussion of karma, of course, and yet I couldn't help but imagine the spirit of the viking king following him doggedly until he could force the same end upon his rival in rule.

The Drama!

It doesn't really clear up anything about the origin of my last name, and yet it adds some interesting marginalia.

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