Laynie Browne Livres

Exploring the concept of the 'poet's novel,' this talk by Laynie Browne delves into the intersections of poetry and prose, questioning why poets are drawn to narrative forms. It characterizes this hybrid genre and examines works by notable authors like Virginia Woolf, Marcel Proust, and Lydia Davis. Accompanied by drawings from Noah Saterstrom, Browne's insights contribute to the forthcoming collection of essays, "A Forest on Many Stems: Essays on the Poet's Novel," further enriching the discussion on this unique literary form.

Poetry. Literary Nonfiction. In 1972 Bernadette Mayer began this project as an aid to psychological counseling, writing in parallel journals so that, as she wrote in one (in bed, on subways, at parties, etc.), her psychiatrist read the other. Using colored pens to "color-code emotions," she recorded dreams, events, memories, and reflections in a language at once free-ranging and precise--a work that creates its own poetics. She sought "a workable code, or shorthand, for the transcription of every event, every motion, every transition" of her own mind and to "perform this process of translation" on herself in the interest of evolving an innovative, inquiring language. STUDYING HUNGER JOURNALS registers this intention within a body of poetry John Ashbery has called "magnificent."

A reissue of Bernadette Mayer's classic fugitive intergenre text

Amelia's unique ability to levitate leads her on a surreal journey through dream galleries and future libraries, where she encounters a cast of intriguing characters, including Clara, a mysterious photographer, and Sebastion, a part-human, part-lion figure. Alongside a chorus of cynical beings with fragmented bodies, this narrative explores the complexities of identity and creativity. Laynie Browne crafts a psychological portrait that delves into the nature of the creative act, blending fantasy with profound introspection.

Exploring themes of loss and mourning, this collection of rondels pays tribute to poet Lyn Hejinian, drawing inspiration from her work, *The Unfollowing*. The poems reflect on the complex, non-linear experience of grief, echoing the idea of time as a labyrinth where past and present intertwine. Each poem's final line resonates with Hejinian's language, creating a dialogue between the two works. The author contemplates what follows loss, capturing the essence of elegy through a unique poetic structure.

How does one in mourning converse with those absent, yet ever present? How is a motherless daughter conceived? What befalls those who succumb to waves of grief akin to contractions of birth? You Envelop Me is woven from contemplative practices that permit us to approach the unimaginable. The world with the beloved removed is permanently altered, perhaps most significantly in the way the living learn that indispensable vision occurs beyond the visible world.

From poet, novelist, and teacher Laynie Brown comes Translation of the Lilies Back into Lists, an homage text to the poet C. D. Wright.

A career-spanning bouquet of poems by the peerless and inimitable Bernadette Mayer