Elizabeth Robinson and Peter O'Leary, Poetry Project, 3.26.07

Interesting pairing in that both writers are also priests (as opposed to defaulting to the role of priest accidentally, as some poets do)

Peter O'Leary:

O'Leary is the literary executor of Ron Johnson. This fact immediately focused my interest -- and perhaps biased my listening. When I lived in San Francisco in the early 90s, Ron lived down the street in the Mission, and I was part of group of writers, including Elizabeth Robinson, who would go over to his place, read poems, talk, gossip, shoot the shit, etc. In Johnson's writing, he will sometimes (esp. in Ark) anchor some almost otherworldly condensed baroqueary with passages explicating the physiology of human perception. I noticed a parallel in O'Leary's reading, though having more to do with the science of mood? Serotonin reuptake?

O'Leary successfully rhymed "Family Pontiac" with "syrup of ipecac."

I picked up a copy of his mag, LVNG 11.

Elizabeth Robinson:

Meditative poetry, calm on its surface, but with unusual, fascinating Brownian motion once you get inside it for a while. It is unfailingly oriented toward objects of thought, with patterns of language play that render the thought more complex without exactly developing it, deepen it without creating a space wherein it is any farther away, and intensify it's intrigue without rendering it vague.

"I kiss you, tongue in my check"

"Larry Eigner and Laura Riding had sex"

"It was a banal tree, they grew in marches"

"I hate nothing, I've exhausted all genealogies"