~ Videopoems ~
Videopoetry, filmpoetry, cinepoetry, poetry-film… the label doesn’t matter. What matters is that text and images enter into dialogue, creating a new, poetic whole.
Single-use Plastic Bag by Abeer Ameer
UK filmmaker Janet Lees adapted a viral poem by Iraqi British poet Abeer Ameer. She told me in an email,
Like many of her poems, this has stayed with me in a visceral way since I read it. For a long time I have been wanting to make a film with Abeer’s poetry, and particularly this poem, but I couldn’t find a way in visually. Then when I was out walking by a children’s playground a few weeks ago, it became clear – I needed to encapsulate that cry we hear so often on social media, ‘What if it was your child?’
Here are the credits from Vimeo:
Based on the poem ‘Single-use Plastic Bag’, by Abeer Ameer @abeer_ameer77
Creative direction & video editing, Janet Lees
Music, ‘Dream Thieves’, Richard Quirk
Footage, Janet Lees, Motion Array & Pexels
Additional sound, freesound.org: children1.mp3 by yacou — https://freesound.org/s/190894/ — License: Creative Commons 0
Seaside Mono.wav by morganpurkis — https://freesound.org/s/402392/ — License: Creative Commons 0
Giggles.aiff by Alex_hears_things — https://freesound.org/s/457275/ — License: Creative Commons 0
Toddler Laughing.wav by Stevious42 — https://freesound.org/s/259625/ — License: Attribution 3.0
Dark by James E. Kenward
A film by Jane Glennie in collaboration with poet/performer James E. Kenward. Here’s the description from Kenward’s website:
Award-winning poetry-film director Jane Glennie came together with poet James E. Kenward on ‘Dark’, made with Jane’s unique photo-collage style. The soundtrack features a fresh piano-arrangement of Stravinsky’s ‘The Rite of Spring’ dueted with the spoken poem ‘Dark’. Jane took a year to hone her response, in the medium of light, to a poem about the dark. ‘Dark’ has gone on to play in festivals all over the world.
There is something magical in the coming together of all the different art-forms in this production.
In some ways the film provides a momentary solution to an age old puzzle that is so much a part of our lives. How to be with the dark itself? Must we always reach for the light?
Please see the interview I conducted with Kenward, where we delve into his process of musical composition for poetry films.
Lost Stream by Fiona Tinwei Lam
Vancouver-based poet Fiona Tinwei Lam recites a poem from her 2019 collection Odes & Laments. I found this animation by Quinn Kelly unexpectedly moving—especially when the flow of the creek is replaced by the flow of traffic on a divided highway. Uploaded late last year [to Vimeo; now no longer online], the description reads:
A poetry video based on a poem about the city’s hidden and lost streams. Animation by Quinn Kelly. Narration by the poet Fiona Tinwei Lam. Audio-recording by Lileth Charlet. Recorded at CEDaR sound studio at the University of British Columbia. Sound design by Bill Hardman. Part of the Vancouver Poet Laureate’s City Poems Project 2022-2024.
There’s also a version with very elegant subtitling.
Ghosts as Cocoons by Wallace Stevens
A new film by Belgian artist and musician Marc Neys, AKA Swoon, deploying text-on-screen for a lesser-known poem by Wallace Stevens. Marc doesn’t make videopoems at anything like the rate he used to ten years ago, but it’s good to see that he hasn’t lost his touch! This one is in support of his latest album, Harmonium (for Wallace), which he calls, in part,
a tribute to the poetry of Wallace Stevens. This piano and keyboard-driven album invites listeners into 10 serene, introspective compositions where music and poetry intertwine seamlessly.
Each track on the album draws inspiration from a specific poem by Stevens, capturing the essence and depth of his literary work through nuanced and meditative compositions. With Harmonium (For Wallace), I pay homage to Stevens’ ability to evoke profound emotions and imagery, crafting a musical counterpart that is hopefully equally evocative.
Wallace Stevens’ poetry has always been a profound source of inspiration for me. This album is my way of honoring the beauty and complexity of his words.
Marc Neys has the distinction of having more videos in the Moving Poems archive than any other filmmaker. Browse the full collection here… or cut out the middleman and go straight to his Vimeo page.
Unseen by Sjaan Flikweert
Director Helmie Stil calls this “A poetry film about the feeling of isolation, struggle and being unseen.” A woman holds, releases and inhabits her breath underwater until she begins to seem less substantial than her suit of bubbles. The often-eerie similarity between Dutch and English is exploited to full effect, as the words on the screen meet their whispered counterparts for an effect at once intimate and menacing, especially as violence is described but not shown, and the viewer struggles to interpret the actress’s struggle: Is she swimming or drowning?
The poem is by Dutch spoken-word artist Sjaan Flikweert, and a final line of text, which appears after the poem seems to be done, reads, “1 in every 5 women endures domestic violence.” Then the title appears, this time to translate not a spoken Dutch word but only a sharply indrawn breath. A stand-out videopoem.
