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Janet Hamill reads from Baby Parade

Memory comes in fragments. I think of shards of pottery dug up scattered on an ancient floor. Pantoums are an excellent way to evoke memory. Out of the simple repetition of putting it back together, a jar and a story appear. The pantoums in Janet Hamill’s new book, Baby Parade, are as real and as magical as it is for a child to sit and listen to a fairy tale being told. Putting it all back together brings us something new. 

Recently, I did a Zoom recording with Janet reading from Baby Parade, which was published in 2022 by Vehicle Editions. When Annabel Lee, the publisher, told her that she wanted a manuscript about science and nature, Janet thought to herself, “As above so below,” and began to write pantoums about her earliest memories, interspersing these with an acrostic of the alphabet, done in fragments, a pareidolia throughout, describing and revealing the universe. 

In the video that follows Janet Hamill reads from Baby Parade. The heavens look down on a little girl’s world and the little girl looks up at the heavens. Enjoy.

 

 

Baby Parade is published by Vehicle Editions. You can check out Vehicle Editions in the link below:

https://www.vehicleeditions.com/

 

The first acrostic and the first pantoum in Baby Parade follow:

ALHAZEN’s only love was the white river
of stars over Arabia
The BOOK OF FIXED STARS includes
the Andromeda Galaxy & Magellianic
cloud names known only
to ancient Persians
CANNABILISM occurs when galaxies
collide — the larger of the two
tears the smaller one apart
DEEP FIELDS are home to prefabricated
greenhouses with rows
of sprouting galaxies

 

FLYING MONKEYS

Lotte the landlady’s knickknacks
captured in her shiny glass cases
under the shadow of flying monkeys
she locked us out & we couldn’t pee

Captured in her shiny glass cases
a wickeder, wickeder, wickeder witch
she locked us out & we couldn’t pee
there never, never was  when shoveling

a wickeder, wickeder, wickeder witch
down the chute in the backyard coal
there never, never was  when shoveling
In a second-story window housedress

down the chute in the backyard coal
the Good Witch of the East threw keys
in a second-story window housedress
Lotte the landlady’s knickknacks

 

 

 

 

Here is a link to Janet Hamill reading from her book Real Fire:

 

Janet Hamill reads from Real Fire

 

 

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