pipi

I was fortunate enough to hear McMullin read at the TINFISH #14 reading @ Native Books last October and was delighted to encounter his work again. I believe the mythic consciousness present in his work is one aspect that allowed “Drag Queen Named Pipi” to be more accessible than “Remembering Absence.” As we have discussed in class, the poems in this chapbook “work” because of the threads of mythic knowledge, imagery, and storytelling within a contemporary, multi-layered framework of gender/sexual/cultural-identity. I’m absolutely down with that multilayered action! I think this is a hallmark of good poems…especially if they can successfully negotiate complex and multilayered ideas…(so I guess that’s one that I’ll have on my list for today)…I feel as though this is when art (particularly poetry) is at its most potent, that is, when it has the ability to connect poet and reader through the collective unconscious even if we come from culturally different places…I think it was Ken who mentioned last class that the poems in “Pipi” resonate within us because the poems represent a shared experience of colonized peoples…I totally agree with that because even though I’m not a homosexual Samoan-American male (really, I’m not), I was still able to understand and appreciate Dan’s poetry. This is not to say that I was at all times completely comfortable with all of the poems in “Pipi”…I have to admit that I found myself holding my breath at times as I read through “Pipi” –some of the poems presented sensual/sexual qualities unfamiliar to me…and I don’t know about you all but when I come across something I’m not familiar with I don’t feel very comfortable; I squirm, or laugh, or in this case, hold my breath. Case in point: “The Doll: A Performance Piece” was almost disturbing to me because I thought it bordered on ideas about molestation in a way, but then, the turn comes at the end when the speaker/director/voyeur states “He had put his doll’s hand in my butt! I ran around the place with his doll’s arm up my butt!” –Actually, I laughed out loud…after I grimaced…now I’m thinking it’s funny….I read it to my roommates and they cringed but then brought up a point: Who is the ‘doll’? The other man? Hmm…or does he literally mean ‘doll’? How am I supposed to react? Is my reaction valid? If I find it a little funny, does that make me a weirdo? I mean, he could have said “He put his arm up my butt!” but then, would that make the piece less funny or more strange? Vice versa? So many questions! Details! Details! Do we need more details or should we just leave it alone? Does it work even if there aren’t a lot of details? Reading this piece was like …watching shadow puppets….or being immersed in Moana to her depths…

-julia