Guild Minute

Neither group nor collective nor "crew" nor org nor political party, SDPG nonetheless gathered last week to talk about, in order: hands, color, membership, the Winter Showcase, our new F.S. intern, the next issue of Zazil2, the next showcase, and the status of the guild as something other than group, collective, crew, etc., but still also those things at least in part.

At heart, in fact, I'm starting to think the guild -- this one, SDPG -- is all "show," that is, presentation, performance, line-up, attendance, attention, audience, reaction, response -- and perhaps a special "case" for activist literary insurgency in the modern world.

I'm heartened, in fact, by recent interest in "criminal syndication" as a framework for poetry production and related organizational agendas (see "The New Gangsterism: Poetry as Criminal Syndicate," a report presented recently at the smallpress publishing conference in Buffalo). As the report explains, "A syndicate is union or guild, an organization formed with the purpose of furthering some common interest."

Syndicated poetry activism is precisely what the Guild, for one, seems committed to "show."

So, now more than ever perhaps, a need for more SDPG showcases, which as crimes against the literary status quo seek common purpose in the orchestration of "common interest."