folio : Forty-five Ottawa poets
dropthread
o the shape of our webs
o going out out going o o o o
we play in
the grass with sinews our wet legs
lace quickly precise spindle thread
looming
laymen & legends
over under
twist tie pinch her buttock her cheek
toe tips sticking out from her dress
trick: our
silk is made of spit
each strand strong enough
to turn times
o o o o o
is this the one where she turns to stone?
where men crash on the rocks?
the one where she is lost, her mother
drowned
& the lover returns to marry a young
doe?
irrelevant
keep spinning
send o the shape of our wishes
o going
out out going o o o o
for fish, for
love, for safe harbour ships keep
sailing
but you only
need to read the nets
o string tied
ankle to wrist
slipping
jacket o from his shoulders
the drawn-out
hell-o o
silly o
fraying at the cuff stray thread in
crotch
o don’t look
back o o o no
about the
dew: you can try to cast off
try crying
heavenwards
but how o we dazzle
rolling meticulously
spinning o after o upon o
my hand your open mouth
spilling h e
e d a n d o eeztor h e e d a n d o
tongues telling tell
[pour liquid onto dish]
that is desire & that is beauty
we are this
cup & this cup is good
cold
glassware capped capsule up
[overturn empty cup]
hestor callisthea
our cups lips
many thunderbolts
edanto
anticipation othnmoka expectation
i am this was
autika imeros
arisei arise arisei
hestor’s
purple sei
not
brided not othnmoka but ceremony all the same
[strike match]
in a circle meant to be burned
naked hestor ringed fire
sei say sei
i am learning to play
[fire in dish]
what I am currently working on
recently, i have been working on poem sequences. i have come to appreciate this longer form because it gives me more room to play than a single poem. the sequence visually creates a soundscape which mirrors what i try and do with my sound poetry work: to create an atmosphere, meaning and feeling through experience. through sound and image. through space and play. it’s also challenging because it comes with a lot of fiddling.
fortunately, i am mostly done fiddling on a collection of poem sequences (from which these poems come). rooted in Greek mythos it is about desire, sisterhood and queerness. it’s about magic and the ways we try to find and express ourselves. the poems are stories, experiments and performances.
sequences have also led me to revisit prose, and i am currently taking a short story course with Jessica Westhead through the University of Toronto’s School of Continuing Studies. i am curious to see where the confluence of these explorations takes me next.
nina jane drystek [photo credit: ming wu] is a poet, writer and performer based in Ottawa, unceded Algonquin Anishinaabe territory. she is the author of the chapbooks missing matrilineal (above/ground press, 2023), a : of : in (Gapriot Press, 2021) and knewro suite (Simulacrum Press, 2019), co-founder of Riverbed Reading Series and an editorial member of Arc Poetry Magazine. her sound poetry can be heard on Bandcamp and YouTube under the name textcurious. nina jane writes collaboratively with VII – authors of holy disorder of being (Gap Riot, 2022) and Towers (Collusion Books, 2021) – and performs sound poetry with a rotating group of collaborators. if you have ever lived in the same city as her you have likely seen her riding a red or blue bicycle.
