Our Part of the Night, the outcome.

As it started to happen, it began to happen very fast. I was typing up my poems and enjoying it. I was doing it during the day. During the day, I was so lofi with the typewriter that I wasn't using any electricity at all. Sometimes I was outside. Beautiful.

I made a mock up of what each page should look like, and then I made a page jig. I cut out the place where the title would go, and the page number so I could stamp those in later. I measured where the spine would be, where the poems would start. And then, success.

What I found was this: I could choose the order of the poems later. I could choose the order except on the individual pages. I typed all the poems and then ordered them. On each page, the poems are placed in the same spot. The titles, having gotten stamped in later, were also on the same placement on each page.

Then, although it is not part of the poetry itself, and these were not something I did this month, I decided that I would add in some of my pastel paintings. I had done almost all of these in 2020 during the great lock down. They had been in a folder for years.

I cut the images to size, I ordered the pages, I numbered the pages. Then I cut the cover, a plastic folder, to size. Then I started stabbing. And I only stabbed myself twice.

I drew a self portrait and added it in.

I have a one of a kind poetry chapbook. The finished project is a delight to hold and it really seems more important than the bad poems and the messy drawings in between. What it is, ultimately, a lofi expression in a final piece.

Our Part of the Night, Part 3

As I was starting the writing process, I started to think of the final product. Since I was going to have at least 30 poems, and front and back of a piece of paper, I would have a minimum of 15 pages.

Last June, I was at The San Francisco Center for the Book. I had a week long intensive course on how to bind books. So, I knew I would bind the poetry chapbook by hand. I thought about all the styles that I learned, and all the different structures for a book. Which one was going to be the best was left up to debate.

Then there was another issue. I have a manual typewriter and when the keys, some more than others, hit a piece of paper, it leaves a big imprint. I found that sometimes the key would tear though the page. There was no way I would be able to type on the front and back of a single sheet with any success. Sure, I could have found thicker paper, something with a better bond, or an appropriate tooth. Or I could only use on side of the page.

Ultimately, I decided to use some 8.5 x 14 paper we had here. I would fold it in half, making each page 8.5 x 7. So, in a way, I was only typing on one side of the paper.

I decided to fold the paper, make the loose ends go into the binding, and leave the folded edge out. And with that, with the necessity and with the confines, I chose to do a Japanese stab binding.

Our Part of the Night, part 2

In the past when I've done this poetry project, I had always composed them initially in a notebook. What I've done is simple, I will write anywhere from 2 to 10 poems in my notebook that are either the same poem, the same title, or the same thread. Once that's done, some time later, I'll go back to them, edit them by either finding the piece that works the best, or by combining some parts of several poems into a single one. This usually happens on the computer.

I put the individual poems into a folder and sometimes I'll title the folder with the intention of making a chapbook. Sometime I'll make the chapbook. When I make the chapbook, it is digital, it always stays digital. I've never once printed a chapbook. I consider the project completed and I move one. Over the last several years, I do this in September between a photo project in August and Inktober in October.

But this year, I decided to skip the computer outright.

Our Part of the Night, the preamble

As September settled in, I was a little fried from the click it up a notch photo project. I'm not altogether sure why the photo project kicked my ass as much as it did. I mean, What? I have been snapping pictures for as long as I can remember, and the two former photo projects this year worked out very well. I blamed it on the camera, sure, but there had to be something else at play too. I think the real issue with the camera and the process may have had something to do with having to be at my computer for so much of the time. I'm always at the computer and that has gotten tiresome.

I was thinking about all the hours, all the years I've been doing creative things and I have to admit, the computer has become a more recent thing. The other issue with the computer is that even though I'm sitting at it, I'm not always working.