This is a tour de force of mainly language and performance poetry. Frazer utilizes the word, "glossolalia" in a number of the poems. This is defined as strings of meaningless syllables made up of sounds taken from those familiar to the speaker and put together more or less haphazardly .... Glossolalia is language-like because the speaker unconsciously wants it to be language-like. Yet in spite of superficial similarities, glossolalia fundamentally is not language. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

The poems in this book for the most part appear to be automatically written. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

Bennett has combined his distinctive calligraphic poems with 19 emblem poems of Andreae Alciati (1492- 1550). Peter Ganick describes Bennett's work in an afterward. "John M. Bennett's poetry could be seen as impenetrable and difficult to engage. However, given a bit of time and attention, one realizes it is vibrantly musical and lexically creative work. The poems rarely 'make sense' in the conventional meaning purveyed by Time and Newsweek magazines, but what interesting poetry ever has or will. Instead one is treated to daring neologisms, dangling parentheses and quotation-marks, strange vispo transductions of renaissance texts with ancient woodcuts, and his finely tuned blocks of poetry/prose." -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

myesis signifies layers and stages of fragmentation. Chapters or sections as fragments of the book; paragraphs as fragments of chapters; sentences as fragments of the paragraphs; phrases as fragments of the sentences; words as fragments of the phrases; letters as fragments of the words. I read the empty spaces. Myesis is an excessive, minimalist writing. Leftwich interweaves Greek mythology, Judaism, comments on music and performance with language poetry and the rules of poetry . He provides several long quotes from contemporary poets. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

myesis signifies layers and stages of fragmentation. Chapters or sections as fragments of the book; paragraphs as fragments of chapters; sentences as fragments of the paragraphs; phrases as fragments of the sentences; words as fragments of the phrases; letters as fragments of the words. I read the empty spaces. Myesis is an excessive, minimalist writing. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

The contents of each duplicate copy are identical, but their covers differ in design and color. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

The poems were composed from found texts that were altered by McCaffery as a result of chance operations. The colored concrete poems on several pages scattered throughout the book that employ large and varied typefaces were designed by Robert MacDonald. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

Jim Leftwich contributed an afterward, "John M. Bennett's Swarming Present" to this collection of polyphonic poems. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.