"Life is Slow", Angrignon park as a nest for poem about slowness and sunshine

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"Life is slow"
     shot in Parc Angrignon, Montréal, on May, 22nd, 2011 

"Life is slow and man barely knows how to play it." A sentence read around 2004 in Mad Love, the essay book by André Breton. Another illustration of the power of chance, subjective chance from a surrealist point of view, love connected to inconscious preferences - as far as I can remember...

I wrote down the sentence at the time of my reading, intrigued by its sound and its mysterious sense, that I was not sure to understand or grasp totally. Life like music, a slow tune that whose partition remains mostly unclear, impossible to decipher, and even more difficult to play properly; things remain clear enough until this point; but life as played too fast, without enough respect for its pace, internal rhythm?

Not the most intuitive analysis in days when world and life seem fast & in constant movement.

But constant movement like noise, like measurement noise, needle vibrating only because the instrument is sensitive, only because so many little things can happen at any time; small events independent, most of the time, independent from the general trend, the general flow. Most of what happen in everyday life is like noise in the long and slow scheme of life, most events cancel out in average, easily filtered by memory for instance. A few twists for sure, once in a while, a few abrupt changes, strong turns, surely unexpected sometimes, accidents or surprising encounters; but all in all, how many of such sparks take place over ten years?

A small bag of clear and important scenes, a slow flowing stream of life - are we closer to a schematic idea?

Hard to say if all this really makes sense, apart from a few basic ideas. But enough full for thoughts, enough of a starting point for a poem - sure. A poem to catch the division, slow moving trends, rare sparks, why not, there should be some pace to play with and some images to introduce. Quite enough to enjoy some poetic fun...

I played with the idea, played with the poem, and shared it at Capital Slam in March, as part of the slam competition in Ottawa. Short lines to deliver patiently, short scenes to introduce some sun & memories - the text might need some more maturation, some adjustments, but it is rather enjoyable to deliver, at least as performer.

And outdoor performance always some nice tint to the words, makes it a nice moment, sound of words I enjoyed assembling that flies in open air, resonating differently from indoor sounds. Good Friday in Angrignon Park in Montréal, blue sky and sunshine, slow start for spring with green environment but wet grass & lawns, watery sounds of sponge under shoes while walking along the pond. The slow sound of branches in the wind, a good spot for a poem mixing slowness and sunshine beams...

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Wandering Words - Paroles Vagabondes - Lançons-nous, let's give it a start

Let's start a new series, let's give it a go.
Je me lance.

I'm not sure if the label sounds nice, if it will remain the same. But I need to start somewhere, especially when it comes to wandering... Partir de quelque part pour vagabonder au mieux... So this will be my Wandering Words, mes Paroles Vagabondes, and we'll see how it grows, moves, breaths, if some renaming is necessary.

Renaming is never a problem, anyway - just need to choose, just need to make a decision and let the new convention fly this way.

Wandering Words, some new approach on this blog, more creative, slightly more creative than placing photos, more than playing with descriptive texts. Yes, new texts, poems, words moving free, moving around, a different kind of freedom of the previous Love-me-less-but-love-me-longer tint. 

Un peu plus de création - si l'on veut.

In a way, I've always written some fiction, some poems in parallel to the blogs - not much, a few lines on notebooks, a couples of pages in some point of the year, sometimes. I was just not sure what to do with those lines. Clumsy lines for most of them, unfinished paragraphs with unclear purposes, and it did not seem right to share them. Writing, it's mostly writing for myself, no need to display words on boards or wide sheets. Writing, first; then finding a way to share the texts, maybe; but the second part has never been necessary, especially when there's no obvious way, when no way feels really right. Pas la peine de se forcer, hein, no pressure, pas la peine d'insister si aucune voie ne sonne juste.

Let go, let lines & words come when they come. Exploration feels good for itself too, even in silence.

Still exploring can also bring evolution (not necessarily, but sometimes).

Over the past months, I've started attending Slam night in Ottawa. Poetry Slam nights, Short Story Slam nights, open mic night before music. A nice & lively community, where words are shared in public, the sound of sentence, life, breaths, pace & shiver of words. Certaines phrases sont faites pour être dites et entendues, words to be told & heard - not read, not really. Des textes pas faits pour être lus, pas uniquement. A friendly dynamic, echoing good memories of stage theatre, the sweet sound of speech, words served in a smile and constantly trembling alive; bref, de la vie dans le texte, life in words.

No, I don't know much about theatre, even less about poetry, so much less. Presque aucune connaissance de la poésie. Only this little idea, naïve idea: poetry is pace, is rhythm. La poésie, c'est du rythme, de l'énergie. Poetry is energy. Ca ne pisse pas très loin, I won't go far with that, I'll never write masterpieces with only that cheap motto.

But I can have fun. Je vais pouvoir rire un brin.

And I do have fun, no doubt. Even with unstable do-it-myself texts, sweet English accent certified from Paris, shyness on stage barely hidden behind a couple of basic theatre tricks - I do have fun. Je me marre, c'est sûr. 'Cause texts vibrate in their own little way, and little jokes can sound nice once in a while.

Laughing is one thing. I could keep playing the same game, I could keep laughing with my texts slowly improving (even if my French accent is doomed, it's a desperate case: améliorer mon accent, tu parles !)

While I was laughing, over the past months, I also remembered good-old friends, nice little candies imprinted in my ideas, sweet little jokes. Nothing better than a good laugh to remember old jokes. Old jokes whose smell & taste are not far from the ones I've been repeating recently. Jokes of live performance, shared energy & music, small-scale exchange, small-scale community. Connections do not necessarily jump obvious, they slowly build themselves.

I could tell how I made the connection to the dear, so dear "Take Away Show / Concerts à Emporter" from La Blogothèque. I think this unbalanced text is already saturated from cheap under-text, cheap myth building. I'll keep it for some other occasion, some lighter occasion.

Basically, the "Take Away Shows" put bands in the street, let them play in the middle of the city, of the crowd, with a camera flying around, catching details, an improvised poetry of the moment. De la musique dans la rue, partagée, et tous les jolis imprévus alentour. Rhythm exchanges with the people next-door, simply, with the simple power of voice or little instruments: is it really far from slam philosophy? 

Some kind of slam performance without stage, in everyday life - de l'art partagé dans la rue du coin, le cadre de tous les jours.

Ivresse de petits mots & mélodies résonant entre deux bus, près d'une maman promenant un bébé et un chien, des mots dans l'air. Tempting, isn't it? Some tempting vertigo, words flying in open air, sentences in the wind while feet trample pavement, while eyes stop on one detail or another. Could be nice...

So I took my new camera and his HD movie mode, and starting walking around, I let the words wander here or there. Parole vagabondant caméra à la main. Just to see.

Let's be honest: this is dramatically imperfect as it is at the moment. Trembling camera, unstable texts, forgotten words, wind blasts in the microphone saturating the soundtrack - this is worse than lo-fi most of time. Douloureux à regarder. So much more experimentation required before getting something decent, something not too bad.

But I thought I could still share the imperfect videos - see what can come next, what can come from the little simple rule: a text delivered with camera rolling, one single shot, in a public place...

       Videos gathered on a map since you need a map to remember where you wandered...