P[a]ra[pra]xis

The poems in P[a]ra[pra]xis form part of the larger work plaintext, a collection of print, electronic and performable poetry which explores the poetic text as akin to the speech of the Lacanian subject. This relationship is mirrored in some poems by the introduction of multivalent phonemic groups and non-utterable characters, which interrupt the flow of text-as-speech, eroding the boundaries between the spoken, the written, and the thought word. In these performable poems for iPad, different multi-touch gestures control the custom-designed software P[a]ra[pra]xis, which inserts a variety of substitutions into the text as it unfolds across the screen. The original text line remains in the reader’s mind while the intrusions call into question the stability of not only the printed text but of language itself.