New Zealand Gerald is delighted to announce that the essence of this week's Pretentious Poet, Ian Wedde, has been extracted by one of the country's most talented verbal artists, Anthony Blanche.
Blanche was born in a taxi en route to Hamilton Hospital in 1977 and reborn exactly 33 years later on a rainy winter's night in Grey Lynn, when he was simultaneously drenched by a passing BMW and blinded by a speed camera. He documents the effect this experience had on his poetry in "Beamed by a Beamer", which was chosen as one of the 25 best poems published in New Zealand last year by Victoria University's International Institute of Modern Letters, headed by Bill Manhire.
Ian Wedde's poems appear in numerous journals and anthologies, and he has published 13 collections. He was recently chosen as our third poet laureate. Says Blanche: "Wedde's poetry runs the gamut from bonsai images of bliss to vicious vistas of the unweeded gardens of our souls . . . he's a true poet of the age."
+++++
"On being appointed New Zealand Poet Laureate"
I quit the matted russet folds that lie between her
legs to answer the phone one morning. The Green Link bus
rolled by, rattling china dogs on the mantelpiece. Time stood
still. “You’ve got it,” said Bill
Manhire.
My thoughts run to Ted Hughes, my brother Laureate, that
scourge of feminists, “Daddy you bastard” (we had coffee once
at his club off Piccadilly); he of the wild ink-black forelock
scouring his face like a demented windscreen wiper. I
grab Ted’s book of Ovid poems from the shelves and a box of
Kleenex and scurry to my hideaway – the alcove under the
staircase. Dark encloses me, like the dank womb: memories
crowd in. I never liked Casablanca, the black-and-white scenes, I
wanted to colour them in with crayons, with my twin brother, until losing
patience I forced them down his throat. I much prefer The Usual Suspects, it’s in
colour. Kevin Spacey – who would have known? And Gabriel Byrne, searching that
ship for cocaine that wasn’t even there: “There’s. No. Fucking. Coke!” I turn on the
light. Blinking I clutch and mould a wad of Kleenex and read of
Cinyras, cramming his seed into the forbidden place: I wedge the used
bolus of tissue with the others, now dry, my very own little
light. Blinking I clutch and mould a wad of Kleenex and read of
Cinyras, cramming his seed into the forbidden place: I wedge the used
bolus of tissue with the others, now dry, my very own little
ossuary of triumphs, and think: Here am I, the tokotoko-bearer, the
Keyser Söze of New Zealand letters. Look on my works, ye Mighty, and
despair!
Keyser Söze of New Zealand letters. Look on my works, ye Mighty, and
despair!
