The Hinge Poem: Chris Vitiello | The Hinge Literary Center

Welcome to the February edition of The Hinge Poem, a regular feature inviting readers throughout the Triangle (and beyond) to read and discuss a single poem by a leading local author–and to talk directly with the poet him- or herself.

This month we’re featuring Chris Vitiello’s “Lunar eclipse poem, winter solstice 2010.” To get started on the conversation, scroll down, read the poem, and then post your questions, answers and observations in the comment section (if you’re on the home page, you’ll first need to click on “Leave a comment” below or the headline above.) Read what others have written, engage, discuss–just be respectful. It’s fine to disagree, but we’ll delete ad hominem attacks and insulting language.

Most importantly, remember to come back on Saturday, February 4, from 3:00-5:00 p.m., when Chris Vitiello will be joining us for a live chat on this post.

LUNAR ECLIPSE POEM, WINTER SOLSTICE 2010

One witnesses an event, and later describes it to others

At maximum occlusion, the lunar eclipse looked like the gummed, vestigial eye of a cave fish

Interrogation presumes the suspect’s guilt

At maximum occlusion, the lunar eclipse looked like the unshiny, scrimmed eye of a red snapper stacked on crushed ice at market

Steve Reich was going for the middle ground between mathematics and literature

At maximum occlusion, the lunar eclipse looked like a magic marker circle, smudged as the hand that drew it moved across to draw something else

At maximum occlusion, the lunar eclipse looked like the stained paper towels beneath a colander of washed cherries

One needs not describe a quantity

Merce Cunningham said “The eye tries to recognize what it already knows”

A solar eclipse is spectacular; a lunar eclipse, technical

One’s mind does not by default seek relief from repetition

Reich’s music describes nothing; John Cage’s establishes a negative capability for description

3 is 3 regardless of what it counts

One is inclined to believe a quantitative statement over a qualitative one

A confession is the only possible end result of an interrogation

The original word for an irrational number—surd—meant “mute,” as equational notation did not yet exist, so such numbers could not be expressed

Sound requires a medium but light does not

Barred owls open conversation with couplets of “who cooks for you?” but then carry on to chaotic monkey cackles and howls

An interrogator should stand between the seated suspect and the room’s overhead light source

For hundreds of years, algebra developed textually, a form called “rhetorical algebra”

The Voyager spacecraft exited the heliosheath into the heliopause

In some contexts, 3 might be nearly 4, and in another context essentially 0

Emily Dickinson wrote “Eclipses suns imply”

In rounding, one can be said to look past a number

Fish do not fall

About the Author: Chris Vitiello is a freelance arts, performance, and hockey writer in Durham. He received an MFA from the Naropa Institute in 1994. Books include Nouns Swarm a Verb (Xurban, 1999), Irresponsibility (Ahsahta, 2008), and Obedience (Ahsahta, forthcoming 2012). He is concerned with, among other things: clarification, light, stars, the sky, clouds, wind, trees, birds, deduction, eyes, leaves, people and their observable behaviors, grasses, the soil, flowers and their growth, description and representation, vegetables, skins and peels, seeds, nuts, cross-sections, dictionary definitions, synonyms and antonyms but especially synonyms, utility, analysis, skepticism, kindness, goodness, quantity, measurement, direct commands, questions, and fact statements.

Chris will be teaching a poetry workshop through The Hinge beginning next Monday, February 6. For more information, please visit http://workshop-vitiello.eventbrite.com/

The conversation starts below. And once again, remember to come back on Saturday, February 4, from 3:00-5:00 p.m., when Chris Vitiello will be joining us for a live chat on this post.