Lists & List Poems

I found the above list on the sidewalk and added it to my collection of found language. Most found lists are practical and not meant to be interesting as language--quickly scribbled mental placeholders on the way to objects, places, things to do. The above is most likely a list of things to buy at the hardware store, a narrative of decoration lurking in this list of things: hang the drapes, paint the walls.

What makes a list a list poem? In the above example, if, say, "earthworms" appeared after "rollers," or "holy rollers" instead of "rollers," the list would swerve from obvious ("things to decorate house") to curious, forcing the reader to wonder how earthworms or holy rollers relate to the other items in the list.

Compare the above practical list to the impractical-but-surprising list in the following poem, written by children, that appears in Larry Fagin's The List Poem:

King Midas Touch

1 pound egg shells
2 pounds of mosquitoes (bones removed)
1 purple duck with polka dots
1 golden egg
A half of a frog
1 toenail of a dodo bird
3 feet of an ant (wash carefully)
1 eyeball of a cross-eyed bat
1 rose stem

The above poem combines uncommon/impossible objects and images ("mosquitoes (bones removed)" and "cross-eyed bat") with common words, phrases and lists found in instruction manuals like cookbooks (quantity-followed-by-object, like "1 pound egg shells"; noun-driven lines studded with occasional verbs, like "wash"). This combination of the extraordinary (content) and the ordinary (form) makes the above list closer to a list poem than to a list.

The relations between items/objects in a list poem often serve in place of metaphor. In list poems, instead of metaphors that conspicuously announce relations ("My love is like a red, red rose"), the list creates relations in a more oblique way. Here's an example of a found list taken from titles of artworks in the spring 2008 Tyler School of Art thesis exhibition:

Lookout
Sketch for path-o-matic
Multiple accounts of disturbing the piece
Intermission accomplished
Beautygirls
Blasterbike
Everything is possible
Compost
Fabulation
Can I go home yet
A place to see before you die

From any found list, you can of course rearrange or work into and between words and phrases and images: is "Lookout" a place or a command? Are the Beautygirls on Blasterbikes? If so, where do they go? What is a blasterbike, anyway? If everything is possible, then what fabulations arise from compost? Is home among the places to go before you die? Because the intent of this list of titles is less determined than the found list of things-to-buy, it includes more oblique possibilities. And from the above list, of course, you can rearrange or work into and between the words and phrases.

Here's a found list poem based on the names of pro wrestlers:

The Rock
The Undertaker
The Big Bossman
Goldust
Godfather
Golga
Edge
Blue Meanie
Tiger
Dr. Death
The Animal
Hawk
Thrasher
Mosh
Faarooq
Skull
8-Ball
El Pantera
Diamond Dallas
Rowdy Roddy
Bam Bam Bigelow
The Warrior
The Disciple
The Giant
Big Poppa
Wrath
Disco Inferno
Barbarian
Raven
Glacier
British Bulldog
The Anvil
Psychosis
La Parka
Tokyo Magnum
Lodi
Tough Tom
Mean Mike
Bobby Blaze
Bull Pain
Roadblock
Johnny Swinger
Johnny Attitude
The Ringmaster
Cactus Jack
New Diesel
New Razor Ramon
Doomsday
Unibomb
Christmas Creature
The Mountie
Cannonball Kid
Kamakazi Kid
The Interrogator
Earthquake
Shark
Avalanche
Typhoon
Tugboat
The Shockmaster
Canadian Strongman
2-Cold Scorpio
Flash Funk
Warlord
Kabuki

Lists of words heard on the train; lists of the names of mixed drinks; lists of the names of shoes in a fashion catalog . . . the possibilities are endless.

Here's a list poem, "Interior Blues," by Sherwin Williams:

Splashy drizzle
Great Falls
Jay Adrift
Mediterranean Regatta
Dockside Rapture
Blue Cod
Fresh Water
Belize Leisure

And another entitled "White":

Ionic Ivory
Panda
Polar Bear
Pearly
Heron
Flour
Dover
Egg shell
Eaglet
Venetian Lace
Roman Column