Thursday, April 10, 2014

Joël Barraquiel Tan

I've wanted to feature Joël Barraquiel Tan for a while, his poem "Some Friday Nights" here in Rattle issue 24, winter 2005 was excellent. It's got a great island, beat feel. It's beautiful.

Usually I don't go in for modern styles in verse, but this poem is a good example of one that works--it has clear, concise concepts and despite the more meta format has a concrete focus. That's a good rule of thumb, only one part of a piece can be post-modern, the rest has to hold up the old fashioned way. A ten to ninety percent ratio is a good idea, and certainly makes for a lot of good work that I've seen.

Here's an excerpt:

sometimes when
drunk     feeling young
again     limes & mint
rum & white sugar in mid-laugh
i look out of the bar’s

[...]

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