elegy

“Stories from the End of Representation”
for Tom Taylor

tape loop, edits with a grease pencil
automatic focus, the click of the iris in a cycle of camera feedback, camera
cradled at elbow, the suppression of loud breathing, a tripod of braced legs
against pole, elbows pulled into chest, the act of handing over camera control,
anxiety at the loss of control, delight at the result, shotgun microphone in the shot,
tape loop in multiple machines draped around a gallery, tape as time, the whine of heads
clog of heads, bumping the support, dropping the deck

set ups in storefronts, living rooms, classrooms, zoom in, focus, then zoom out, spaghetti city, duct tape
stepping away from back light windows, sm57, portapak, 7.5 seconds back wrap, stopwatch,
sync, loss of sync, jitter, helical scan, shopping cart dollies, rollers, oxide clogging heads, setup
teardown, cables, adapter, bnc, back porch, flyback, in the black, interference, ground, tbc, time base,
rca, balanced line, unbalanced, tape tension, tube burn, vidicon, viewfinder, head cleaner, cotton swab,
open reel, half inch, three quarter inch, cartridge, capstan, crt, cathode ray tube,

hands on, auto-focus, manual, gain, blooming, tripod, hand held, mobile, charger, batteries, earphones,
solder, soldering iron, scope, meter, agc, gain, loss, voltage, current, impedance match, balun,
drop, feed, case, deck, adapter, ac, dc, humbars, hum, color bars, chroma, comb filter, heterodyne,
beats, white balance, color balance, horizontal, vertical, front porch, amps, cart, chamois swabs, alcohol, freon, dust, rubber rollers, reels, tape, cartridge, terminator, mismatch, flagging, time base,
compensation, loaner, playback, record, pause, fuse, fluid head, lights, barn door, back light, fill,
auxiliary, in, out, zoom, fade, black, headphones, mike, mixer, pan, tilt, level, case, phase shift, ghost,
delay, antenna, coax, wire, dikes, screwdriver, wrench, probe, voltmeter, strippers, crimp, pliers,
monitors, splitter, winding tape, rewind, forward, fast forward, proc amp

duen de
machinos soft spoke listening
duen des hermanos
de corison

always soft spoken in my hearing
on solutions' offering

who knows the order of pivotal
intervention, without a claim of intervention

salute, skip thirty years

tech bolus stalls a poem, lateral inhibition
slight hesitates as you reach for

slap unfolding of a folding chair, ranged
in circles, facing, in rows, screening

circle round table at a wake