SEEING IS READING #1: POET BRETT PRICE READS "OPEN HOURS"

OPEN HOURS: The Poem (print version)

OPEN HOURS: The Paragraph

Long story short, “Open Hours:” is, for me, primarily a poem about friendship. I wanted someone I cared about to know that I was thinking about them, when they were going through a shitty time. But to get all “Inside the Actor’s Studio” about it, I’ll say that it was an attempt to synthesize two different kinds of poems that I’d been writing separately in the Fall of 2008. The first was a short, “open field” type of poem, which made use of the insane amount of available text (seen/overheard) in and around New York City, where I had been living for about a year or so. I was writing these short poems as a means of paying more attention to what was so easy for me to tune out in such a huge metropolitan cityscape. The second was a kind of epistolary poem. I realized at a certain point that the subject matter and tone of the letters/emails I had been writing shifted drastically depending on the intended receiver. Particular subjects were lifted, while others were pushed back. Different tones arose. And this was happening without my being intentionally aware of it. The relationship between myself and whoever I was writing to ended up being a natural set of parameters. I wanted this to carry over into my process of writing poetry, so I started writing poems to/for specific people. Anyway, “Open Hours:” was one of my first cracks at combining the two approaches and it allowed me to start developing a form that could move in a fairly deliberate direction, while simultaneously leaving lots of room to wander.

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Brett Price is the author of the chapbook Trouble with Mapping (Flying Guillotine, 2008). A Cincinnati native and recent graduate of The Bard MFA Program in Poetry, he currently lives in Brooklyn, NY where he is the Assistant Poetry Editor of Forklift, Ohio: A Journal of Poetry, Cooking & Light Industrial Safety.

"Open Hours" first appeared in Saltgrass.

NEW DIRECTIONS ON THE INCLINER BLOG, ISSUE 16, ETC.

Next week we'll be starting another new chapter in the history of the Incliner. On Monday 9/7 we will begin posting videos of poets, fiction writers, and visual artists reading from their works or from the works of others who have influenced them. Each post will also contain a brief written statement about the piece being read--notes on process, impetus, and/or the relationship of the reader to the piece, etc. We'll also include a brief bio of the reader and links where you'll be able to find more of their work, whether online, in print or at a gallery near you. The idea is to post one or two readings a month of both up and coming and established artists.

Additionally, issue 16 of Incliner is nearly finished and should be up in the next month or so. Please check back for details.

Submissions for issue 17 are now being accepted, and you can read submission guidelines here.