from Writing Is an Aid to Memory: 17.

By Lyn Hejinian b. 1941 Lyn Hejinian

the bird carries its peck up the branch

or more

of the which pretty little flower

ear dozen

study forces the day upright

pretty flower to protect the eye in sunshine

with a white is made tall in warm

stalks

the dead are used over

the major insects was that

tile the rent become mortgage money

fortress replaced by a more natural forest

tints the tall flowers

leap the embarrassment of a great subject

high in my own eyes hanging over the day

from this aviation is clumsy

or even desirable diction

nook soaring when the moon is how romantic

music pera slid clear

shadow when omitted is obviously wrong

or no

lighting by trees is beautiful

Source: Writing Is an Aid to Memory (Sun & Moon Press, 1996)

Biography

A founding figure of the Language writing movement of the 1970s, and an influential force in the world of experimental and avant-garde poetics, Lyn Hejinian’s poetry is characterized by an unusual lyricism and descriptive engagement with the everyday. Like most Language writing, her work enacts a poetics that is theoretically sophisticated. While Language writing is stylistically diverse and, as a movement, difficult to reduce . . .

Continue reading this biography