Asemic Magazine. No. 3.

by Tim Gaze, editor. P.O. Box 1011, Kent Town, SA 5071, Australia.

Book Review by

Now… why a magazine? ’ ? ‘Paper has more presence than electronic media’ that’s a quote from Tim Gaze ’ I mean you gotta like this poet ’ him being Australia’s and world’s inonavigator and flashlight light into the darkness. Visual poets and poets or all stripes gotta wish there were more Gazes. And you see Asemic is the best new brand new nude thing coming in visual poetry in twenty years! Let me quote, ‘The world ‘asemic’ means having no semantic content.’ That means it is not writing but writing that demands improvisation to translate. This means there is no arrogance of learned poet. This means sound improvisation is always a possibility ’ all works sing! This means pagan ’ pre meaning. Ah! What joy. All favorites of visual poetry work within this one like Ross Priddle, Jim Leftwich, Jack Berry, Ficus! And more endless. And I was happy to find a Brion Gysin work in the mag also. He was once colleague of William Burroughs. And when I saw it, I said, why yes, Gysin was into this in the 1960s. Now it is asemic and Tim Gaze on his non semantic eastern dragon bakes the cake of this brand new writing form. A fat issue. You need it. You gotta get with it. Remember that small press ushered in visual poetry 40 years ago. Time to reinvigorate this genre again you of small press, you who are gods and goddesses and humble slices of peach pie and black coffee poem.

Made with ♥ in Baltimore.

These book reviews are Copyright © Michael Basinski, released under the MIT License. | Terms of Use