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Features > > The Zero Point Zero Regular Column
The Zero Point Zero Regular Column
The journey through poetry is, essentially, a journey toward truth; that the honors and events along that road mean little in the long run, and that when we sit down at the keyboard or the paper, or step onto the stage, we step up along with all the others who have made this road their own.
Zero point Zero is a regular column written by Tony Brown of the Worcester MA and Providence RI areas.
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Zero Point Zero: Credo
Posted by mamta on Thursday, October 29, 2009 (04:16:11)
This is an unpunctuated note I recently developed in answer to the question, "What do you expect from yourself as a poet?" I left it in its original form as I wrote it. It seems to work better that way; a lack of capitalization, to me, captures the stream of its evolution. An artistic choice, as it were.
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Read More... | 18 comments | Features | 
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Zero Point Zero: On Beginner's Poetry
Posted by John on Thursday, September 03, 2009 (12:25:00)
"Poetry, if one wants to push it to even a modest limit, is a very hard art and to quote [poet Donald Justice]... “one of the reasons poems seem easier to write when you’re starting out is that you don’t know enough to see how hard they are….”
-- From an essay by Baron Wormser on the revision process.
My guess is that some of you won't agree with this quote. My mission in this column is to try and make you think differently about it, especially if you want to be better at the art of poetry.
Read More... | 13 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Rip It Up
Posted by mamta on Monday, May 04, 2009 (03:48:24)
About ten years ago (as near as I can recall -- sometime in late 1999 or early 2000) I did a reading in Worcester that started as a kind of artistic challenge and turned into something much larger, at least for me.
The concept: do a feature that consisted of a set of poems that would only be read once and never again. Seemed simple enough at first. But as I worked on the set for that first feature, I began to learn something about the nature of what we do as poets and the idea began to expand.
It became something I call a "rip up reading." After it was done, I didn't think I'd ever do it again.
On Friday, May 1, I did it again in Manchester NH at the Bridge Cafe, home of the Slam Free Or Die slam and reading, for reasons I'll explain below. While I wouldn't normally use this column to expound at such length on my own poetic efforts, there are things I'd like to talk about regarding the art of performance poetry that I think would be best served by adressing this.
Read More... | 18 comments | Features | 
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Zero Point Zero: Report From IWPS, 2008
Posted by John on Monday, December 22, 2008 (18:08:23)
Over the years, I've developed a somewhat undeserved reputation as being anti-poetry-slam, mostly because I've been an outspoken critic of the tired, overworked, and ill-written pieces I've seen on stage at numerous slam events, both local and national, over a lot of years.
Read More... | 24 comments | Features | 
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Zero Point Zero: From Page to Stage -- How Text Reflects Performance
Posted by mamta on Tuesday, September 16, 2008 (15:43:51)
In looking back over the columns I've written over the years, I realize that I've never really addressed myself to the question of how what goes on the page reflects what comes out of my mouth on the stage -- how I use the text of a poem to indicate performance cues, and how the consideration of eventual performance affects the writing of the piece.
So, let's talk about that.
Read More... | 2 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: On the art of Saying Nothing About Art
Posted by mamta on Saturday, June 21, 2008 (03:46:11)
This is going to be a strange column, possibly not of much interest to others, because there's just not a lot for me to say here right now.
Read More... | 2 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: In Between Days
Posted by Tony on Saturday, May 10, 2008 (13:03:10)
It's been a slow slog through the poetry life lately, with a few bizarre ups and downs that have put me into a melancholy mood and made me think hard about what happens to a performance poet as he gets older.
Read More... | 2 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Grouchy Ol' Me Explains...
Posted by Tony on Thursday, January 31, 2008 (19:05:08)
Some time ago in the Forums on this site, someone posted a request for people to post five facts about ourselves. It's a popular Internet meme, and I've seen it on a lot of sites.
One of the facts I posted about myself is that I'm grumpy. It's true, to a point; I know I sometimes come across as a serious curmudgeon. Some of it is a pose, but a lot of it is not.
I recently grouched (sincerely) about a post that suggested that poets are different from everyone else -- that we feel more deeply, see more clearly, and in general are more "real" than other people. I'm posting the response to that, with a few additions and clarifications, as my new column. I'm sure I'll get flamed and bitten, but as is my wont...I do it anyway.
Read More... | 16 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Reading The Same Poem Over And Over...
Posted by Tony on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 (19:39:05)
Part of the duties and responsibilities of being a staff member here at GP are based in reading poems that are submitted to the site. Whether I'm reviewing the posts in the Forums to see where I can offer feedback or approving the poems submitted to the Finished Poems section, or looking at and rating poems placed there, I'm reading literally hundreds of poems here every month.
Read More... | 11 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Shifting Gears
Posted by Tony on Thursday, October 11, 2007 (13:01:30)
I've been thinking hard about my poetry lately in light of the amount of performing with music I've done lately.
As I've said here and elsewhere, my most recent spate of poetic performance has been in Duende, the bass/guitar and poetry duo I'm in with my musical partner Steve Cafaro. It's an immensely satisfying project, and I'm in it for the long haul.
Read More... | 7 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Miles to Go
Posted by John on Tuesday, September 18, 2007 (05:35:48)
When I sit down to do these columns, I frequently have an idea in mind. This is not one of those columns. In fact, I'm pretty much writing it off the top of my head.
Read More... | 4 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Kicking an Addiction
Posted by John on Wednesday, July 11, 2007 (07:32:35)
It's been a while since I put together one of these columns, and I'm not sure why I'm doing one now. I'm not ready to write one, at least in my own mind.
I try to work on one or more poems every day. I go after a poem even if I'm not "ready" to write. I think it's really the only way to go for me -- the practice of writing when there's no pressing issue, no immediate topic at hand, no burning issue -- just sitting down and going for it.
So why does the prospect of doing the same with this column fill me with such trepidation?
Read More... | 12 comments | Features | 
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Zero Point Zero: Of Shakespeare and Ambition
Posted by John on Tuesday, February 20, 2007 (03:30:43)
(This brief installment of the Zero Point Zero column is brought to you by the letter "I" and the number "1.")
One of the things I think about often is who my peers are as a poet. Understanding who my influences are, and being able to measure myself against their examples, is critical to me and my progress as a writer. This little poem, one that dates back almost ten years, is a glimpse into that thought process.
Read More... | 7 comments | Features | 
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Zero Point Zero: Silver and Gold
Posted by John on Tuesday, January 02, 2007 (11:07:35)
Last night, I was listening to a public radio interview with a renowned classical violinist. He was discussing two different recordings he'd made of Johann Sebastian Bach's Chaconne in D minor, forty years apart. The discussion struck a chord in me (no pun intended) about poetry and the quest for newness at the expense of the tried and true.
Read More... | 8 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: The Prepared Mind
Posted by John on Wednesday, October 11, 2006 (18:51:51)
I haven't been writing much good work lately. My daily writing routine has devolved into a lot of puttering with old poems and a lot of deleted lines from new stuff. I'm looking at everything as being old hat, a rehashed version of a lot of my other work.
Overall, this is a good thing, I think. Sometimes, the best thing you can do is nothing. Sometimes the best thing you can do is give up and let the Muse take a vacation (I hear she tends to go to Ibiza and party till she's blind).
Read More... | 5 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Could You Be More Specific?
Posted by John on Tuesday, September 19, 2006 (07:29:27)
WARNING: This is a rant, a diatribe about a longstanding pole up my butt, and a plea for harder work by poets.
If you are a poet and want to be better at it, the single most important thing you can do is educate yourself on the power of words -- specific, individual words. Word choice is crucial to increasing the impact of your poems, and to helping you deliver the exact meaning you're trying to transmit.
There are certain words that poets use all the time that offer little if anything to the reader. Here's a partial list of words you ought to avoid using, at least in their traditional sense:
Read More... | 22 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Shhhhhhhh...
Posted by John on Tuesday, August 22, 2006 (09:19:55)
It's been awhile since I did a column. My tardiness can mostly be ascribed to the fact that I've been traveling a bit -- first to Austin, TX, to attend the annual insanity known as the National Poetry Slam, then onto Boca Raton, FL, for a business trip. (My fate seems to be to go to the hottest places in America during the hottest months.)
In addition to the travel complications, though, there's been the fact that I just don't have that much to say about poetry right now. I've been inundated with the stuff of late, and sometimes that gets me thinking and talking nonstop about what I'm hearing; other times, I seem to just pull into myself and soak it all in without saying much. I think that's where I am now.
However, no one wants to read a column that's nothing but me complaining that I've got nothing to say...so here's a short something on the topic of not speaking.
Read More... | 4 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Following the Line
Posted by John on Tuesday, July 11, 2006 (17:58:08)
I've been working on a series of poems lately that I've been calling "The Jim Poems." This is a group of more or less connected poems that detail a period of time in the life of a fictional character named "Jim" (obviously). I'll be performing the poems for the first time, possibly with a bass player, on Sept. 24 at my regular reading in Worcester. I'll also be releasing them that night as a chapbook, and possibly a recording eventually.
It's not the first time I've put together a longer piece of work like this. There are at least two other published examples: a roughly Zen-influenced poem cycle based on the days of February (Narrow Path, Falling Rocks), and a longer piece that looks at how patriarchy has damaged all of us (Lilith's Shadow).
Working on the new series has given me some insight on the process of working in longer forms, and how it differs from the creation of self-contained shorter poems.
Read More... | comments? | Features |
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zero point zero: caPitalization: and punctuation in! context
Posted by John on Thursday, June 15, 2006 (16:53:28)
Some of the older readers here may recall mercury thermometers. When they were broken, small balls of mercury would skitter across a flat surface like a floor, and they were impossible to pick up -- if you tried, the ball would slip out from under your hand and slide somewhere else. It was really difficult to pin any one of them down.
Figuring out how I use punctuation and capitalization in poems is sorta like trying to pin down one of those mercury drops.
Read More... | 6 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: Truth, Fact, and Why It's Ok To Lie Sometimes
Posted by John on Thursday, May 11, 2006 (19:19:50)
I'm taking a break from my usual practice of publishing an entire poem this week to address myself in more detail to the question of the relationship between facts and truth.
Read More... | 7 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: The Need to Rewrite
Posted by John on Tuesday, April 11, 2006 (00:00:00)
Sometimes, the process of writing a poem requires me to write a poem twice. That's the case that we'll look at in this installment.
Here is the first public version of a poem I've posted recently here and elsewhere.
Read More... | 1 comment | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: How I Think About A Poem
Posted by John on Tuesday, March 14, 2006 (22:48:11)
I'm going to skip analysis of a single poem for this column.
I think I might have jumped the gun a bit last time by not including some notes as to what I look for and think about when I'm writing a poem. Based on some of the comments I've seen here and elsewhere, I think that people are not used to thinking about some of the traditional dimensions people think about when looking at a poem -- you know, all that boring stuff you learned in school. One of the down sides of the modern poetry explosion is that people have, in the rush to express themselves, lost sight of the fact that those techniques of alliteration, metaphor, and all the rest are used precisely to enhance that personal expression -- in other words, to ensure that the craft of the poem enhances the voice of the poem.
Toward that end, here's a brief primer on some of the way I look at my work from a technical standpoint.
Read More... | 4 comments | Features |
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zero point zero: Sneakers on Wires
Posted by John on Tuesday, February 14, 2006 (12:00:00)
OK, jumping in with both feet.
I thought I'd start this series on the construction of my poems with a recent, short example. I'll give you the poem and then walk through the process of what I was thinking, how I constructed the imagery -- all that.
Read More... | 6 comments | Features |
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Zero Point Zero: End
Posted by Tony on Friday, December 17, 2004 (00:04:02)
This is it. The last one.
I feel a little like a lounge singer tonight…pulling the microphone cord around me as I settle onto the stool, the blue spot chiseling my already taut features into a craggy silhouette as I start to hum Sinatra's version of 'One For My Baby'…
Um, sorry. Wrong fantasy there. (Not about the song…the face.)
Read More... | 10 comments | Features |
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