IKA

So this is going super out of order, but the Journal launch was on Novemer 10th. It was great. I along with a few of the other students performed as part of the launch. It was really cool, because alot of the people from the other schools (vvisual arts, performing arts) were there and they got to see what our school is about. It definately built up mana for us students and for the ccreativve writing school.

I had come in late, because my friend took forever to get me and he didn't know how to get to MIT. I came and everyone was sort of nervous. I helped by giving hugs. That sounds really gay, but honestly it's the best feeling knowing that someone's got your back.

We had also helped by proofreading for typos in the journal before it was printed.

In terms of what we've had to do for our own journal (Me, Sonia and Tom) I don't think it's an easy task. Trying to decide on things and choosing a design right down to where you want the page numbers to go, has been a bit of a struggle. But we did manage to do it. The journal looks really good. I am super pleased with what we have produced. Even if it is slightly off from what we had said we were going to do, we've managed to put ourselves into it and actually finish it. It looks great.

Collab.

So today I went to print out the journal. I had tried to be smart and have the pages in sequence so they could be folded into a book. But that failed. Miserably.

I had to talk it out with the ladies at copy solutions and tell them exactly how it should be. It went perfectly after that. I didn't get it printed on glossy paper (The cover) because I was running out of time and it probably would've smudged. I am fairly happy with the result.

I added some extra colour to the inside, as me and the group had discussed about trying to put more liveliness into it. The name is ransom and we have the ransom letters on the cover but there was nothing that made it spunky and fun which was kind of the look we were going for.

Sonia made some beautiful handout envelopes. I am just amazed at how wonderful they are. They have copies of our poems in them.

I'm really excited abut how our presentation and collaboration has grown. I was totally skeptical about it over the few weeks, but now I am absolutely stunned. We actually did it. And we went above and beyond. It is looking so fantastic, I think the added colour to the journal helped with the aesthetic and the other little surprises we have ready for the presentation. I'M SO EXCITED!!!!!!!

Eleanor Catton and Jenny Hellen

So in my forgetful rush, i've forgotten to blog about these two wonderful women that came into speak to us.

Start off with Eleanor:
She's this fairly young writer who is doing amazingly well, he first novel was shortlisted for the orange prize  i believe, and she dresses in a fairly aesthetic.
We were given an extract from her upcoming novel to read and I found it kind of hard to get into. So I didn't really expect much from her talk. But I was fucking wrong.

She talked about her writing process and how she got to ideas. Just the real out of the blue kind of stuff that inspires her writing was really thought provoking in the way that I would like to go around writing my own novel. She said that she wished that "The picture of Dorian Gray" was the father of fantasy fiction - that whole psychological fantasy thing, and it sparked something in the way that I want to write my novel. I was very much inspired by her, which surprised me.

Jenny Hellen:
She was fantastic. She is the non-fiction and children's editor for Random house and it was great having someone with a business ideal to tell us about the process of actually publishing a book.
She told us about the market (i.e. what sells.), the steps and people involved in the publishing process and all this other stuff.

She made me think more economically about being a writer. I know that I won't make any money as a poet and I'm fine with that, but learning about the industry in that sense was really good.
She was also very nice in giving us her card to email any of our manuscripts to her, which I thought was bloody brilliant.

Both women were strong and independant but still very down to earth and easy to get on with.

Sent. Check. Wait. Fuck.

I edited my "Bearings" prose poem and have sent it off to Landfall, along with two other poems and a short story. I feel alot more comfortable with the edited piece now, I'm starting to realise the value of editing, even though my heart will always be in the rawness of the first draft, it's nice to have work that is more refined. I can't believe i'm saying that. ME. Gosh. How a year can change the stubborn. Now I play the waiting game. I'm possibly the most impatient person ever. lol.

Ask Alexa

Alexa Johnston, who wrote a well received Sir Edmund Hilary Biography and very successful cookbooks came in to class today. She gave me a bigger appreciation of Non-fiction writers and cookbook writers because of all the pedantic details and research that goes into writing it. She was funny and it's good to see a successful mature woman taking the piss out of herself. I wasn't expecting her to be so down to earth. She said we should stick to our guns if we have a vision for the design, or who we would like to collaborate with.

For the second half we got into our groups and we've got pretty much everything sussed.....
except a name. We're so stuck on it, it sucks. We were also taking photos of our hands in unusual positions for our cover, which was fun. It's coming along and i'm really happy about it. YEEESSSSS.

Dem stylez.

So I think that my performance style has evolved quite a bit, which I'm really happy about. I was looking at a video from our performance on Thursday night and my first performance and there is a big change which is mainly to do with confidence. I am much more confident about my writing. I do however need to work on my voice because it does sound quite funny (Not in the good way.) Maybe that's me being pedantic but I want to get myself to the best I can be and my performing voice needs to not sound so stupid. lol. I have always been a bit of a mover when i get up to perform, but now i have the confidence to actually do it and not perform stone still. lol

 

My first ever performance. Around 4:15 on the time bar.

I was so nervous and you can see that in this performance, it was a fantastic experience either way. I'm glad that i've grown alot more confident which definately comes with exposure to performing and to also being really connected to the material.

Sonia and Tom

I don't know how to tag people. haha


But I read on Sonia's blog I really like http://www.bookbindingpress.co.nz/index.php?page=about-us
or http://www.bookprinting.co.nz/Self%20Publishing.html

these ones would fit into a budget that would be good for all of us I reckon.

we could also try these:

http://www.westprint.co.nz/our-services/


these guys do a square spined booklet and i've emailed for a quote:
http://www.copysolutions.co.nz/finishing.html
(The example of the booklet is at the bottom.)

churrrr.

To mic or not to mic

We're doing our first naked voices performance tomorrow which is going to be fun, but the biggest question is to be mic or not to mic. The pro's of having a mic is that we don't have to shout our poems, there'll be more clarity in our words and it is a nice confidence blanket. However, today we had tchnical issues with the mic today which ccould prove a problem tomorrow. I personally love having a mic even if my voice is loud enough (I am a bit of a loud mouth) I guess it's just gonna be one of thse we'll-see-tomorrow-if-it-works kind of situaton. I am really excited forr all of us to perform, it's going to be really fun.
Afterwards me and Sonis got together to discuss what was going on with our group project. She had designed some awesome cover page work (which as an artist is kind of her forte) so we just went through what we thought would work. We assembled the arrangement of the poems and it flows really nicely. We also talked about our presentation to the class, we're going to do little envelope things with three poems and a ninja star which should look really good once we start them up.
A problem with having a printed journal is that we have to get multiple copies at places, so we need to find somewhere that can do a one-off for us because you know, we're poor students.
I am feeling alot more excited about our collaborations now because we have a successful plan and we just need to see it through. I think once the excitement of the performances is over we'll have a better headspace for our group work.

Back to the performances, I am so glad that Grace Taylor was able to come in and workshop with us as she has a very encouraging and engaging personality. She's helped me and everyone performing to get over ourselves and just go there without hesitation. We did the dress rehearsals with the year two class as well and I think having them in really brings more of a balance to the voices on stage. I had felt it was very Poly proud, which i'm not against but misrepresented the class as a whole. It's alot more even stevens now.

I have also decided on an outfit which is, in my opinion, the most important part of a performance, so i'm very happy about that.
I do hope that we get a good turn out in terms of audience because the worst feeling is not feeling like anyone is listening.
It's gonna be amazing!!

:D

Nu Zillund voice

Before coming to the creative writing course I had never paid attention to New Zealand Poetry or literary figures. I wasn't really interested in it, I was too busy reading Bukowski, or Ginsberg, or Blake or listeing to The Doors, or Led Zep and figuring my place in existence rather than my identity (which has become a much more vibrant topic in my writing.) However, the first NZ poet I fell in love with was Tusiata Avia. I saw alot of pride in her work and cynical energy which is also very prominent in my writing. She taught me that even a Samoan female poet can be a crazy cynic like the best of the palangi's. I think she opened up the world of taking pride in your culture (for me anyway) and for so long I had culture cringe and refused to acknowlegde my ethnic makeup. I think that the NZ voice can't really be defined to one sort of note. We strand off in many octaves. We're too much of a multicultural society to have one entirely "Kiwi" voice. I'm glad we don't either, it wouldn't be the same, mixing kapa haka with folk dancing, get real. I guess there is also this sort of NZ literary family thing going on, because you know we're so small. But whenever I go to poetry things everyone sort of knows everybody which is cool. I hugged Taika Waititi at a journal launch FFS. It's cool to think that we all come together even if we don't have a specific sort of NZ identity. We have multiple, feeding into the big melting pot. We all acknowledge the land which is the only unifying thing we need.

E-books suck.

I think as a rule, noone should like e-books. They don't have the same feel of a proper printed book. I like holding the book in my hand the pages crisp and whistle as I turn over to the next page. The smell of a new book. It's kind of like pine and light varnish. Not being able to read ahead because you can't just scroll down, you take your time. You savour the book. We talk about this digital revolution like it's a great experience, but wait til we become Robots. Or we already are? Consumer Robots. We buy buy buy whatever they tell us to, and whoever they is. I'm sorry but I don't want to compromise my book choices by following the new trend. Yes it makes it easier to carry multiple books or whatever but it degades the book. You forget you have all these books on your kindle or you'll get too lazy to read it, I mean you're already getting too lazy to turn a page and have to scroll electronically. The only thing i'll give kudos to the e-book about is that it will save trees. I guess that's a big thing in the end. -_-

Lima Mafiti

We've identified the recurring image in most of our pieces to be hands, So we're using that as a platform for our journal. Sonia had suggested we put the pop up on the back burner as we don't have enough time or experience to create a pop up book that's not tacks. Which I fully agree with. We might do a scan of cutout pics onto selected blank pages. I had suggested we use sketch images of hands in different actions (i.e. on a chair, ladling food, open catching rain or something.) Which will look chic enough, I reckon. In class we were discussing formatting, I think it's hard for us to move forward we're sort of stuck in this stage of limbo with the project. Sonia brought in some cool little pamphlets, one was like a construction piece, and the envelope was unusually folded. She wanted to handout stuff like that while we did our presentations which I thought was cute. It would be a really nice touch. I really hate this blog thing. We threw around name ideas, it was kinda hard not having thomas in class but he had a funeral which is completely understandable. I had suggested "Mrs. Palmer" but the vulgar connotation of the name was not welcomed as much. I though it was a funny name to call the journal (cause it totally goes with the hand name.) I had said "hands suck" as well just throwing out all the possible random hand titles then Sonia was like "A lima is a ringa is a hand" and I quite liked that. But i'm not sure if that's the title or a subtitle. Either or it works. It's becoming hard to work in a group though because I hate having to get approval from the whole group before continuing on an idea or something like it. It's easier working alone because that's what i'm used to. I suppose that's the same deal with all of us. I really like my group but I just wish I didn't feel so stupid making suggestions. I think that really deters me from wanting to participate. True story.

Hollaw

Revised 13 ways of looking at Brown Skin

Brownbirds or the nine heavens

Tasi

He makes
the brownbird
girl his bitch. She's looking for
flowers but finding only
weeds. Detached
until he wants
to warm himself on
her heated skin.

Lua

Brown skin banana.
They grow up so fast.

Tolu

I can't tell the difference between
rain falling onto
white skin

or brown skin.

Fā

A coffins special power.
push brown to grass.

Lima

What? I can't succeed
because I have brown skin?

I didn't say that. You did.

Ono

Secret sufferings and hidden agendas shadow
the brownbirds fragile mind.

Fitu

purple pictures trace
the outlines of his
fist
on her pipi brown skin.

Valu

Lanu     enaena
Manu   enaena
Palu      enaena
Valu(e) enaena

Iva

Thirteen brown skinned boys
lined up against the wall,
           Can you identify the suspect mam?
    Oh I don't know, they all look
the same to me

And the memories and scars
and lives stay irrelevant
as they wear their

same

Brown

skin.

 

I've been lost in the motion. That sounds super gay but I have been. Workshopping with Grace Taylor has been fantastic, she's helped me open myself up to be more confident with the stage and the audience. We've done a few warm up exercises like saying our poems in varying tones/speeds etc, which helped us to get to know our poems. It also made me a bit less jittery, I think that's the main hinderance for me, trying to overcome the butterflies, I have a naturally loud voice, but I can get as quiet as a mouse if I'm not prepared enough. Grace also introduced us to a few performance poets like Sunni Patterson who I am completely in love with. Sunni is unbelievably amazing I am in complete awe of her, she's got the gift and she inspires. We haven't had much time to get together for group stuff, we did send our poems off to each other, so we could decide which ones we would include. We met up today before class to discuss this and we have brought it down to five poems each which will be a fantastic start for journal. We discussed the order of the poems, thought about any overarching themes. There were alot of hand images. It is an issue trying to figure exactly how we're going to produce the piece, most of us have zero pop up skills, but I think as long as we organise ourselves and do the research so we're on time with things it'll come along smoothly. We're kinda in the dark about the whole process but we're figuring it out enough to get us along. We also did a super practice with the mics which was fun. But I definately need a stand because I'm such a mover. I find it incredibly hard to keep still. I have been looking through my poems and have revised an old piece of work from last year I write titled: 13 ways of looking at brown skin. I can definately see the change in my style over the course of the year, the development of my writing, which I am very happy with. I'll post the revised copy up. The earlier draft was published in Ora Nui, but now I feel it definately could have been better. I am thinking about sending off one of my short stories, I've been looking around for any competitions ut I haven't found any that would be appropriate for this particular short story. I have started collating all of my best poems (in my opinion) to start the road to a first book of poetry. I would possibly like to edit my sudden fiction piece because I feel quite unhappy with it. Rereading it, it sounds a bit naff:

Bearings

     He watched three children    hoods up   lingering outside his Neighbours house    They each held their hands in front pockets and their voices silhouetted to silence    The lights went out in Mr Anderson’s house     and the children like little black elves went to work on his fence       
     Joseph watched    They guided their hands like curling waves across the surface    leaving a trail of sea foam    The stars were punched into the sky and one of the children looked up    Her face was sharp    nose wide and eyes like Tahitian pearls    Her brown skin rinsed in Moonlight    She glanced at Joseph’s window    he ducked down    but could taste her stare    When he got back up the children were gone    He ran into the hallway    tiptoed past his mum’s room    and went to the front door   
     He slowly clicked the lock out and wove into night    He scanned the street    but there were no children    He walked over to the Andersons’ house and on their fence was a large canoe    What did mums family call it? he thought    He turned back and one of the children had left a spray can    He picked it up and walked back home   
     Waka that’s what it was called Waka    He tucked himself into bed and thought about nannies stories of the tangata whenua    strong warriors nannie would say    and he slept    And slept    and wept    In his dreams they had been little drops of rain    splashing on his head   
                                                                                                            but not in his hands    or    open mouth.

 

Other than that the class seems to be going really well, I think our group will definately need to organise our time together effectively so that we can get our pop up book perfect. I need to think about the images and try and find templates for the pop ups. I'm unsure what kind of images we're going to go for because if we all choose really different things it might muck up the flow that we wanted for the journal. I'm glad we made time today to come together as it was the first proper time all three of us met as a group. We had skype called one time when I was away which was not as effective as I thought it would be, I don't think we got much done with what we had discussed at that time. For me it feels like today is our proper start for our group work. But I don't mind, we're definately making it so that everyone in the project has a say. We want it to be completely unified so that everyone is satisfied with the final product. It's looking really positive though :D

awryfhueijhbfwajp;kosxv

Just sent three of my poems to the Hawaii review. They were three pieces that I am very close to.
POSITIVE FEELINGS ;)

Performance Poetry

So we had our first workshop with Grace Taylor, co-founder of the South Auckland Poets Collective, and performance poet extraordinaire. She was a great presence in the class, and made the prospect of performing our poetry less daunting. I wasn't really apprehensive about it but a lot of the other students were a bit funny about it. She is very humble and funny and easy to get along with, it was great to have a performance poet in, as I have always wanted to be a page poet but would like to expand myself into performance as well. It would be cool to do both, really well. We looked at a few pieces of some performance poets, which was really cool, discussing/analysing what we liked or didn't like and what things we might like to emulate in our own performance. Grace was great. I was excited before for our performance, and now I'm fucking pumped!!! :)

Guess the internet's good for something

Today I skyped into class, to discuss with my group what we're going to be doing in our presentation. We're on track in terms of what we want to produce, we just need to gather information and research for our design. We talked about unifying themes, how we're going to choose the pieces that are accepted and other things. It's good cause we're all going to be as involved as possible, I really like the group because we are all so focussed. I see very positive things for our final publication. :)

Louise Tu'u

Louise Tu'u came in to talk about her writing practice and her journey as a playwright. She talked about all aspects of her writing methods, and from her visit the main thing I got was to question everything in your piece. I have always been interested in playwriting, but never really knew how to get around to it. I asked her about her writing process and she said that she uses the technical theatre conventions (lights, sound etc) as a driving narrative. I thought that was an interesting way of writing. She talked about the loss of language and identity crises, being a part of her writing but not the main idea. She said how sometimes alot of Polynesian playwrights resort to Samoan or Tongan or whatever songs and such, as a default, and that definately struck a chord in terms of my own writing practice. Without relying on culture as the main idea it might show more, it's about becoming more creative in displaying culture, not relying on the norm and establishing your own brand of identity.
I really enjoyed her visit, I found her to be quite down to earth and that being grounded is the best thing for established peoples. She's a fucking funny bitch, I'm pretty sure we're besties now, just sayinnnnn!!! haha she has a nickname for me (Captain Collaboration) hoooollllllaaa ;) hahahah


x

Shallow

Pastel hearts in bloom
F         A          I          L
to         take          hold
open hands to palm the
F      U      N
Not deep in hue to cup
f   o   r     t   e   a   r   s



Amber Lune

"The The Impotence of Proofreading," by TAYLOR MALI

Fantastic poem about proofreading ;)
for more: http://taylormali.com/

Editing.

When reading through a piece of writing, you expect the only thing you have to do, is contribute to their piece by reading it and interpreting it for you. When you have to look out for grammatical errors, puncuation and spelling mistakes, it loses flow and annoys the shit out of some people (i.e. me).

Perhaps it will make me try harder to not have any typos in my work. Which is something I should be aware of anyway, but I'm a poet, I'll do whatever the fuck I want.

I can't really fault the writer for the typos, it's human nature to make mistakes, but it's also human to bitch about people's mistakes.

I know how important proofreading is, I just can't be bothered with mistakes.

And you can't fault me for being lazy.

The me.

likes overly indulging people with banal musings.
opshopping and dressing in the dark.
staring at awkward people on the bus.
making carnal with lovely peoples.
Bjork

hates everyone equally.