Martin's X/O Art Installation (from Boston!) Letter II

from Martin's latest e-mail:

I woke today hoarse as ever to what sounded like a giant having a BM. Not pleasant. Kurt assures me it was only dumsters being emptied, but he wasn't awake then, so can't verify completely.

I've had tea--Kurt bought some at a local convenience store, which, like another one we dropped by yesterday, sells higher end products: Pirate's Booty instead of pork rinds, bottles of wine, not cases of Bud, and, as it turns out, a sampler box of "premium" black teas--tea which is causing my empty stomach a bit of upset. I'll be lucky if I don't come from Boston sounding like that giant I mentioned; my diet is all screwed up. I'm now on the Eidsvig diet: eat nothing but a dried fruit and nut mix all day, then chase it down at 11pm with "pizza pie."

Actually, I can't handle the Eidsvig diet, so while Kurt took care of some business at Boston University yesterday, I walked across the street and bought myself a plate of ka prao to go. What is ka prao? I know from consulting recipes that it's Thai chicken and basil, though that wasn't explained on the marquee menu on the wall. This was a place that catered almost exclusively to BU students, and when I stepped in, the line was almost out the door. I figured--correctly--things would move pretty quickly, but I felt off-footed the whole time, on a campus (if you can call it that; BU is like Pitt, in the city, and runs for blocks and blocks along the Charles River) I don't know, among hundreds of people I don't know, looking--I imagine--every bit the bumpkin I feel.

Boston is in bloom. We've driven through areas like The Back Bay and Beacon St. that are full of flowering trees--redbuds, crabapples, cherry trees, maybe even crapes--and four-story, 19th century townhouses, and down one street that's divided into two one-ways with a miles-long park ("the mall," Kurt says) between--like the common parks [there in our PA town], only 10 times as long. I took my lunch sitting on a granite planter under a lovely pink-flowering tree, alternately warmed and chilled, the wind playing havoc with the pages of the The New Yorker I tried to read. . .

So maybe it's not the Eidsvig diet but hot, hot ka prao at lunch and leftovers for dinner, followed by 11pm pizza and morning-after English breakfast tea, minus the breakfast. I'm still waking at 7-something, even though I could probably sleep till ten if I wanted. I don't want, not really, but these nights that go through early morning are killing my usual circadian rhythms. Not that I'm not having fun doing so. . .

Sound artist--his preferred title, from what I can gather--Brendan Murray, the third collaborator, joined us most of the day as we figured out where people would sit, where readers will stand, where paintings will hang, and so on. We spent an hour working with a faulty projector--there's a film/sound installation that will be shown on one wall. . .

By 7:30, most of the readers had come for the informal rehearsal, and one poor sap from Sharon, MA, had biked in for the show, thinking it would be held last night. We invited him in to listen, which I'm sure was delightful for him: everything still a wreck, paintings hung, half-hung, ro just idly leaned against a post, readers trying out poems aloud for the first time--they're reading my poems and Kurt's, not their own--stumbling over phrasing and vocabulary. It's strange hearing my O/X: Boxes series, six prose poems written for this occasion, read by mouths other than my own--at once remarkable and painful. I tried to walk a balance between giving notes on how to read and not overstepping like I might, nitpicking everything. When I read the poems--poems I wrote--I've got total control as writer and reader. But now I'm having to let go, and while it's thrilling seeing the poems come to life like this, and the readers are well-spoken and energetic, the whole thing makes me fidgety--and know now it's not just the readers or lack of control, but my own uncertainty about the poems themselves. That old ragtime self-doubt!

We hung art until midnight. . .a tedious operation, but one with tangible rewards, then headed back Kurt's studio to talk and read our own poetry collaboration, the one called "Equations" that's to close the event. I haven't shown you that one yet, since it wasn't done and I didn't want to let any air out. Before we crossed Summer St. (Kurt's place is literally across the street from the studio we're occupying for X/O), we paused a moment and took in the exhibition from curbside, looking back into the artspace we'd just left and locked. It really looked amazing, Xs and Ox everywhere, on walls, on columns, lots of color and line, a pleasing symmetry. Kurt says a photographer friend will be there, so I should have evidence at some point that this all actually happened.

Kurt said this morning, you know, it feels like three days since I last saw you, and it's been five years. I felt the same way; with some friends, not matter how long it's been, you just pick up wherever you left off.