foreglow
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Date
2024-12
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Publisher
University of New Brunswick
Abstract
foreglow is a long lyric poem investigating the intricate and often mercurial interplay between poetics, queer theory, and utopian potentiality. Over nine multi-register, hybrid genre sections, a menagerie of domestic and mundane scenes frame its critique of the human desire to impose order while acknowledging (and, yes, even longing for) the existential ambiguity that follows a collapse of spatiotemporal certainty. The poem resists stable narratives about desire as individual and collective histories intertwine with environmental and temporal dislocation, dissolving boundaries between internal reflection and external reality.
The critical introduction to foreglow posits that lyric poetry can function as a dynamic, ritualistic site of encounter that challenges traditional narrative authority and interprets individual subjectivity through a critical lens. Drawing on Jonathan Culler's concept of the "iterable now" and Anne Carson's insights on erotic paradox, the introduction examines how lyric poetry creates a temporality that simultaneously acknowledges and resists discrete ontological categories such as presence and absence. By integrating José Esteban Muñoz's notion of queer futurity, the project highlights how aesthetic practice can offer alternative modes of temporality and subjectivity that transcend linear narratives. Through a close reading of foreglow and its graphic codes, as well as comparative analyses with poets such as John Wieners and Cody-Rose Clevidence, the dissertation investigates how disidentificatory practices and the subversion of conventional poetics facilitate new forms of relationality and pleasure. The final section of the introduction considers Lisa Robertson's influence on foreglow, emphasizing how unconventional approaches to temporality and language contribute to the poem's exploration of utopian potentialities. This research underscores the potential of lyric poetry to both reflect and reshape the experiences of desire, subjectivity, and community.