6×6
Chapbook, issue 32, Ugly Duckling Presse, uglyducklingpresse.org, $30 USD/$50 USD international (for remaining issues up to no. 36)
6×6 is shutting down after four more issues, and based on the contents of this one, they plan to go out with a bang. They are definitely bringing out the big guns.
Issue 32 opens with a six-page ramble of a poem from Lyn Hejinian that’s as satisfying as it is enigmatic. Hejinian is associated with the Language school of poetry, which eschews narrative in favor of the novel use of language, and emphasizes the reader’s role in generating meaning. Each line in Hejinian’s creation attempts to find its own slice of gratification, like the one used as this zine’s subtitle: “Out of cardboard, out of bounds, out of marmalade, a biplane ascends, out of sight, out of it.”
The embarrassment of riches continues as we’re treated to six elegant sonnets from Serb writer Uroš Kotlajić and his collection Sonnets About Holes (translated by Ainsley Morse). Up-and-coming American poets Morgan Parker and Tony Iantosca each provide a curt and clever set of poems where profundity masquerades as simplicity, and imprisoned poet James D. Fuson repurposes Internet speak and hashtags in a style reminiscent of Eric Jarosinski’s Nein. A Manifesto. Accomplished writer Barbara Henning’s down-to-earth and often amusing verse closes the issue and lingers on the mind.
It’ll be tough for 6×6 to top this one. (Scott Bryson)