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When we talked to her in 1998, Janet Hamill said that after the torture of her last poem, “Sea Fever,” she was relieved to be working on a new performance poem, “Seven Veils.”

Huh?

Janet had been working a lot, opening for Patti Smith on tour. She’s a trance poet, our Baudelaire, a hallucinatory demon-angel of a poet -- who, in real life, is as grounded and sweet a human as human can be, being poet. She also works with a garage rock band, Moving Star.

I wondered then how she differentiated between perf-po and non-. Here’s what she said:

1. Rhythm, that’s first. A performance poem propels itself rhythmically.
2. Traditional hooks. A performance poem uses systems of bars, bridges, repetitions, like a song.
3. Simplicity. A performance poem doesn’t go for acrobatic language.

Rhythm, hooks, simplicity. Three keys for a poem that will work in performance. Thanks, Janet!

Bob Holman

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Here’s the perf-poem Janet was working on when we interviewed her:

SEVEN VEILS

Rain, rain sweeps through the streets
as they grow dark
the face of the moon is lost in the clouds
under the veil

A horde of sparrows
the high green hedge of a garden
mazes of passages making it hard
for the songs to find their way
to the entrance from the center
music rises like a golden flood
over centuries of night

Rain, rain shrouds the buildings
in ghostly mist
ankle wings speed me along
under the veil

A castle keep
the thousand tears of the forest
the window of an exiled queen
dark as the sun sunk under the earth
with her heart pierced through
she paces back and forth
breathing a thin air of hope

Rain, rain makes the heavens clear
quieting the sobs of broken angels
from a high perch the eyes take measure
under the veil

A mystery vessel
the seaworthy masts of a caravel
set out on the ocean
with an unfamiliar sextant
without a guide to the anarchy of the sky
without a destination or a port of call
sailing simply to sail

Rain, rain the wind is strong
the branches bend low to their limit
light pours out of a buttonhole
under the veil

A viper in hiding
bound with ropes and cords
desire’s delirious spring
is locked within the body
longing to make it to the far world
beyond the aloofness of memory
molting in the face of an antiquated mirror

Rain, rain heavier now
running in sheets off the rooftops
life’s secret soul wells up
under the veil

The steadfast light of a hermit’s lamp
fueling the emptiness
with impatient brightness
in the desert desolate and lonely
a flame held close to the chest
a season of victories waiting
in the shadow of hostile cliffs

Rain, rain here to stay
filling the holes from here to the river
powdery wings fold at my side
under the veil

A map of the night in autumn
A jaded Pegasus in holding
marked by an absence of magnitude
still with one blow of his hoof
fountains spring forth
stable doors come down
and flight through a field of Arabian stars begins

Rain, rain makes a soft asylum
shielding me from a tireless hunter
nothing touches the nerve ends of the universe
under the veil

The evening dancer
emerging from a vermilion tent
with slippers of gold and a ruby choker
at the invitation of the infinite she dances
for him only will the wild dogs stay away
beyond the campsite in the pitch blackness
with the perils of cold sleep

© 1998, Janet Hamill

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Want to read more of Janet Hamill’s work? Her books are mostly small printings, but you can still find her 1992 collection online: Nostalgia of the Infinite (Ocean View Books - compare prices). Her other books are out of print: Lost Ceilings (Telephone Book Press, 1999) & The Temple (Telephone Book Press, 1980).

Of course, Baudelaire lives at the bookstore, too. If you don’t have any in your library, sample the new American translations of The Flowers of Evil and Paris Spleen from Boa Editions (1991) or the Everyman’s Library Pocket Edition of his poems (Knopf, 1993).

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