About the Poems - BS
About the Poems
by Brian Spears I call these "information overload poems." They're built from a combination of found text from internet sources—Twitter, Facebook, e-mail, rss reader, blog posts—the sounds of the world around me—television shows, conversation with others in the room, my cats—and the play-by-play of a half-inning of a Chicago Cubs baseball game during the 2010 season. I chose a half-inning because while it's a limited period of time, it's of an indeterminate length, so the poem goes on as long as the team at bat continues to avoid making three outs. I tried to strip the found text of its context to create jarring juxtapositions as well as funny moments, but I wanted the net result to be disorienting, jarring, like I feel whenever I have too many things going on at once, which seems to be the default position for our lives today.