"You Are Jaguar" is a Paperback/audio poetry collection they wrote together.
David wrote to me (and I hope he doesn't mind me quoting him):
"I'm very proud of the project as a whole, and not because it's mine, but rather for the opposite reasons: that it belongs to both Ryan and me, and then, ultimately, to the reader.
We wrote the poems 2 lines at a time without exception and very little discussion on where it was going. Then we edited all of the work separately, putting our own personal touches to work that was not wholly our own. Then we set the book up something like a bi-lingual book (side to side), signifying that each poem (left and right) are, in very real ways, translations of each other. In the end, I feel the reader makes the two manuscripts one. It's one of those collaborations where NONE of it would have happened without two people; I know I couldn't have written it myself!"
We wrote the poems 2 lines at a time without exception and very little discussion on where it was going. Then we edited all of the work separately, putting our own personal touches to work that was not wholly our own. Then we set the book up something like a bi-lingual book (side to side), signifying that each poem (left and right) are, in very real ways, translations of each other. In the end, I feel the reader makes the two manuscripts one. It's one of those collaborations where NONE of it would have happened without two people; I know I couldn't have written it myself!"
Anyone familiar with my work a bit should know I'm a sucker for audio-poetry, so I was more than intrigued by this collaboration.
"You Are Jaguar" is great. Buy and get your collection, read, listen or read and listen. Now.
I couldn't resist and asked if I could 'do something' with some of their readings.
I could. Great.
I chose 4 poems;
'You are Jaguar' (DT) - 'Surfacing' (RWB) - 'You are the sound of sleepwalk waking'(DT) - 'You are Jaguar' (RWB) and I created a track for those four readings to be caged in:
And then I made a video, four videopoems linked to each other by recurring images. For the poems' images; think urban, underground and urban surface, think dripping water and torn pieces of clothing, think wind playing through the grass and some figure lurking, think basketball an a bright sun through the trees, think city and its people, unaware...something like that...
Jaguar
Words & voices: Ryan W. Bradley & David Tomaloff
Concept, camera, editing & music: Swoon
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