Tuesday 18 February 2014

joining the dots or a silent poem attempted


John Cage

three lines of dots represent the passage of time in seconds and silently reading  one dot every second the reader can try to visualize the temperature of absolute zero Kelvin where all molecular activity ceases and absolute silence reigns; the place we are going to is titled 4'33"and it is a composition in three movements by John Cage 

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footnote:
as I was writing 'joining the dots or a silent poem attempted' an aircraft flew loudly overhead, a cat screeched once somewhere in the street, a radio was switched on in a room nearby and somewhere quite far away but still within earshot a dog with a deep bark was heard repeatedly followed by the brief sound of a car horn and my fingers tapped the computer keyboard 273 times



2 comments:

  1. The composer or the audience? Composing silence is not the same as being the audience of it. We do not know what the composer is thinking, least of all Cage, and the audience reaction must be in many different ways. A written piece of silence such as yours is even more difficult.

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  2. Thanks Rachel. I recall the ticking of a wristwatch irritating me at a piano concert, but I can't recall the music. I can't stand ticking clocks. I can't get to sleep if there a clock ticking in the room. Even if i go to a silent place there is too much silence and I may start to hear buzzing noises in my head etc. or my bones creaking or my heart beating and I don't know what. A person could try counting the dots in the poem but how dot dot dot dot one would lose one's place or some noise would intervene , a car just went by. Composing silence is theoretically possible if one is 100 percent engrossed in the task I suppose.

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