FACE-POEMS by AARON FLORES

MARTON KOPPANY Engages

Face-Poems by Aaron Flores

(Facebook)

“Why hasn’t that fellow a beard?”

I am off Facebook from time to time, but one of the reasons for going back again and again is my curiosity to see how that face, with all of its brilliant variability and flexibility, hasn’t changed at all. I’ve been reading its features for several years (its musical furrows, its eyes, which serve for being observed rather than observing), but the more variations I see the less I know the name of its expression. The only thing I know is that I can rely on its permanence. 

Aaron Flores is a deadpan clown in the Keatonian and Beckettian tradition, who writes minimalist poetry with, on, and in his face.

I haven’t mentioned the globe-like boldness of his skull yet, which makes his poetry beautifully finished and closed. Separation is real. Let’s start from that point. 

(Click on images below to enlarge.)

1

A typical moment musical à la Flores: the expression in Aaron’s face rides a bike, but it can’t run away, because its motion is frozen like in a nightmare.

He himself is apparently unaware of any danger or any other reason for leaving. Therefore he has no idea what is not happening to his expression.

Even so, very strong glasses might help. If not to see, to be better seen at least.

2

We unfortunately haven’t been chosen, and hopefully won’t be selected, although... Our face is partly covered by the shadow. After all, both the shadow and the sunshine are caused by the same thing. This is just the happy sadness of life or what. The heroic immobility of the moment.

But face-poetry is about the other, who doesn’t feel what we do, and needs explanation.

The closest equivalent to feeling is understanding: we will show them an ideogram of the sun. Here is what we hope for: they will look at it, read the  simple message in the childish drawing (reduce! suggest! be less than real: accept that you aren’t, for the visitor), and then they go back to the image as a whole, and start feeling – what? Those who vote for ideology will probably laugh. Those who vote for existence will probably cry. You can do both.

*****

Márton Koppány (b. 1953) lives in Budapest, Hungary. His books include: Immortality and Freedom, Coracle, 1991; The Other Side, Kalligram 1999; To Be Or     To Be, Runaway Spoon Press, 1996; Investigations and Other Sequences, Ahadada, 2003; Endgames, Modulations, Addenda, all by Otoliths, 2008, 2010, 2012; this is visual poetry, 2010; The Reader, Runaway Spoon Press, 2012; The Seer, Redfox Press, 2017. Digital collections: Waves (2008), Hungarian LangArt (2014), and The Aha Moment (2016), all by E∙ratio. Collaborative books include : From The Annual Records of The Cloud Appreciation Society with Nico Vassilakis, Otoliths, 2008; Short Movies, with Jukka-Pekka Kervinen, cPress, 2008; very short stories with Andrew Topel, avantacular press, 2010; Book of Numbers, with Jim Leftwich, Luna Bisonte Prods, 2011.  In anthologies: The Last Vispo, A Global Visuage, The Dark Would, The New Concrete.  Recent shows: Text Festival, Manchester, 2011 and 2014; The Dark Would, Edinburgh, 2013; Asylum, an installation collaborated with Albert Pellicer, Iklectik, London, 2017.