Red, Green & Black

Olivier Cadiot, trans. Charles Bernstein.

Much like Albiach in spatial organization, though perhaps more inventive

retain well this

the how, the when, the where, the why
enough, also, as much, a lot

better 'n' better

regret

adieu! pardon!

AH!
Ha!
Oh!

appear, risk, etc.

I am certain to succeed

A corpse decomposes & a postmortem is peformed through the duration of Red, Green & Black-- this is dealt with clinically and absurdly; the rendering is constantly interrupted by a cacophony of asides, definitions, exclamations. Reading this I feel frantic. Everything's examined: the body, the crime, musings of childhood, verb conjugations, slang. I understand that something is dead and being examined (less for cause of death, I think, than sheer curiosity)-- but what's dead is unclear. If pressed, I'd guess something along the lines of classical form, literature (is the title a play on Stendhal? further, is the whole poem in response to Stendhal?) esp. given the radical form the poem takes on the page.

Rosemarie Waldrop's blurb:

"The game is grammatical, but the arrow hits: a real corpse decomposes. Between repetition, tautology and quotation, falls dead silence. What seems a sort of ready-made language (in which Charles Bernstein's playfulness matches Cadiot's) turns out to be a carnival on top of `catastrophe/catastrophic'. Need I add: a poem for our time?"