Huang Xiang: House Poem

While in Pittsburgh, I had the chance to walk by Huang Xiang's House Poem. It was featured in the short film I posted on the blog last year but I had never seen it live, in person.  Don't miss the film - it's your chance to learn about Xiang's life as a poet in exile, and hear him read and perform his work.

Comments

[cassondra]

how very cool. thanks for sharing this photo.

[heidi]

That's a good question. The Mattress Factory website offers:

Writing in 3-D (2000)
By Huang Xiang

The oldest way to write poetry
Is with a brush
The newest way to write poetry
Is with the body
The most wonderful way to write poetry
Is to stand right on your head
With mind and body as one
And dab ink
On the ground!

An article at poetryfoundation.org by Susan Hutton suggests it is more than one poem:

"The ancient Chinese poets wrote on walls and in caves, and carved their words in stone. “I want to preserve and expand this Chinese tradition,” [Huang Xiang] says, referring to the poems painted on his house, “where the poem is on the street, on the stones, in the gardens. I want to beautify every corner.”

[teent]

What does the poem say?