The Lost Lunar Baedeker (18 page)

For I had guessed mine

That if I should find YOU

And bring you with me

The brood would be swept clean out

became two in 1917:

Before I guessed

—Sweeping the brood clean out

Other changes were more questionable (e.g., “white and star-topped” replaced “white star-topped” in l. I.6; “sewn” replaced “sown” in l. I.7; “spill't” replaced “spilled” in l. III.5). ML had not indicated that these lines contained errors in her 1915 complaint. More important, she reverted to the original HV of lines I.6 and I.7 when she reformulated the sequence in 1923 (
LB
), seemingly confirming her original textual intent.

But
LB
preserved other changes made in 1917, such as the ending of IV. At this remove, in the absence of proofs bearing her corrections, it is impossible to distinguish printer's errors from editorial changes from ML's own alterations or to know what “repairs” she might have made in 1917, then reconsidered in 1923. My assumption, finally, is that the 1917 rendering of l. I. 6–7 is either non-authorial or an authorial revision that was later recanted; that it does not stand. The only evidence that I have ever found indicating that proofs of
LB
existed is RM's casual statement quoted in Robert E. Knoll, ed.,
McAlmon and the Lost Generation
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1962, p. 226), where he mentions checking proofs of
LB
in Rapallo, Italy, en route from Spain to France.

For the 1917 publication, ML made sure to correct the errors that bothered her most in 1915, substituting “silting” for “sitting” (l. I.2) and “These” for “There” (l. I.13) in the opening section. Beyond that, she made a few new revisions (e.g., the ending of IV) before publishing the sequence in
Others.
The surprising appearance of “sifting” (l. I.2) in
LB
in place of what had been wrongly printed as “sitting” (1915) and corrected to “silting” (HV, 1917) is a possible late revision, but more likely a printer's error. Or, as Januzzi has suggested, this could reflect ML's attempt to rectify what she knew had been a problematic line in 1915—having forgotten her earlier solution.

I do not view the
LB
rendition of “Love Songs” as an attempt to put the 1917 cycle into final order but rather as a separate narrative involving many of the same strategies. The result is an altogether different—and arguably less successful—effort. Therefore I present the
LB
version in Appendix D.

The text of “Songs to Joannes” presented here necessarily relies on the 1917
Others
version as its copy-text, and varies from it in relatively few instances. The 1917 text, after all, is the source for thirty of the thirty-four original parts. I rely on ML's letters, and variants in the earlier (HV) and later (
LB
) versions, only to mediate discrepancies in I–IV, as mentioned above. In most instances, first and final intentions converge. Where they do not, the copy-text or editorial judgment prevails.

In the present edition, I have not prefaced this sequence with the dedicatory poem, “To You” (
Others
[July 1916, pp. 27–28]), as I did in
LLB
82. Januzzi has persuaded me that despite ML's plea to CVV [(n.d., 1915) to “get Songs for Joannes published for me—all together—printed on one side of each page only—& a large round in the middle of each page—& one whole entirely blank page with nothing on it between the first and second parts—(pause in between moods)—the dedication—‘TO YOU'”)], I may have taken this request too literally in
LLB
82. I believe her caution is correct. I now find it difficult to read “To You” as a prelude to “Songs to Joannes,” either thematically or structurally. It has therefore been left out of the present edition altogether.

I explain these issues in detail for several reasons. This is among the most frequently discussed, excerpted, and anthologized of ML's poems; “Love Songs” and its often forgotten predecessor, “Songs to Joannes,” have a particularly complicated textual and editorial history; certain lines, especially in the opening section which I have just been discussing, have been the subject of more speculation and uncertainty than any other lines she produced. My decisions should be subject to question, but my reasons should not.

I have made the following emendations to the 1917 text, and refrained from making others, as explained below. Dashes here (— — — —) correspond to dashes in Loy's 1917 text, and are counted as lines of type when they occupy a complete line, for example XXX.5. This is important only for the purpose of cross-referencing lines with emendations below. The
LLB
96 version is to the left of the ]. The 1917
Others
version is to the right:

I.6: white star-topped (following HV,
LB
)] white and star-topped)

(
Editor's Note:
The HV version reads “white star-topped,” as does the first appearance in 1915
Others
and later printings, including
LB.
)

I.7: sown (following HV,
LB
)] sewn

(
Editor's Note:
The HV reads “sown,” as does 1915
Others
and later printings, including
LB.
)

I.8: Bengal (following HV and OED)] bengal

(
Editor's Note:
A Bengal light, in nineteenth-century usage, was a firework or flare used for signals, producing a steady and vivid blue light.)

III.5: spill'd (following HV and OED)] spill't

(
Editor's Note:
In 1993, Angela Coon adapted this section (III) for performance by the spoken-word band Bloodfest [San Francisco].)

III.7: daily news (following HV)] daily-news

IV.11: sarsenet] sarsanet

V. 14: don't] dont

IX.6: spermatozoa] spermatazoa

X.1: (
Editor's Note:
“shuttlecock and battledore” would be the correct OED spellings, but I assume that ML is deliberately punning here. Her spelling stands.)

XIX.3: (
Editor's Note:
“QHU” remains the most successful poser in ML's entire lexicon. Its meaning, if any, has so far resisted extraction. I once suspected it was an acronym, or a pun disguised as one, along the lines of Marcel Duchamp's L.H.O.O.Q. (1920). But no appositive word or translation has yet occurred that convincingly deconstructs the anagram, homograph, or rune that stands behind the upper-case construction. “QHU” may allude to an enchoric name or retronym that was once familiar but has since passed from currency. If so, perhaps some future reader will one day open the
lettre de cachet
and report its contents. Until then, it remains pure vocable or sonant, a precarious precursor of Lettrisme.
    We can also imagine it as an unbroken cryptogram or enciphered message to Joannes or one of his representatives. In this case, we can only hope that GP grasped its esoteric meaning. It is also possible, more prosaically, that QHU was a printer's error, the first half of an uncorrected etaoin shrdlu [sic], or an ersatz euphemism designed to escape the censor's scythe. This pre-digital encryption recently attained electronic status. In 1995 “QHU” was posted as a query to the poetry café of the Internet community. As of now, QHU remains simply an unsolved metaplasm. The virtual café remains open to any latecomers bearing solutions: [email protected].)

XXVIII. 18: cymophanous] cymophonous

XXIX. 11: caressive] carressive

XXIX.28: (
Editor's Note:
The correct spelling would be “incognitos,” but I have chosen not to emend in favor of Januzzi's enchanting suggestion that this may echo the “philosophers toes” passage in another poem featuring GP [see n. 8]. It is also possible that a pun is intended here; i.e., a low-down, toe-to-toe orgasm.)

XXX.6: archetypal] architypal

XXXIV.1: litterateur (following OED] literateur

Page breaks in 1917
Others
occur at these lines, sometimes making stanza breaks ambiguous. Based on sense, HV, and
LB,
I have decided that 1917 page breaks do not always coincide with stanza breaks, but do in these instances (marked by *), and have lineated the present text accordingly:

II:5/6 (man / To)

*IV:8/9 (hair / One)

XIII: 25/26: (me / Or)

XVIII: 2/3: (hill / The)

*XIX: 22/23: (light / You)

XXII: 4/5: (revival / Upon)

XXIV: 6/7: (lies / Muddled)

XXVI: 2/3: (eyes / We)

XXVIII: 4/5: (Forever / Coloured)

*XXIX: 4/5: (Similitude / Unnatural)

*XXIX: 29/30: (orgasm / For)

XXXI: 2/3: (busy-body / Longing)

In imaginative terms “Joannes” is probably a figure collaged out of ML's failed relationships with several male lovers. In biographical terms he is most closely patterned after one—GP (“Joannes” translates to “Giovanni” in Italian). Following her fallout with GP (see n. 8) after an enthrallment that lasted over a year, ML confessed to CVV [n.d., 1915] that “love has calmed down to the thing that exists—‘Joannes' is the most astounding creature that ever lived—in the light of my imagination.… I believe he's really tried to forgive me … & I think he's a little jealous of Songs to Joannes—an unexpected effect—”.

The last page of the HV (1915) contains a note to CVV indicating that “Love Songs” (I–IV) may also have been written with an earlier lover in mind: “My dear Carlo these … are subconscious impressions of
8 years ago
 … associated with my weeping willow man.” This speculation is supported by her indication elsewhere (CVVP) that “Love Songs” (I–IV) were begun in a state of dysthemia (“the first were written in red-hot agony”).

In 1907, eight years before ML wrote this letter to CVV, she gave birth to her second child. Burke's biography (
Becoming Modern: The Life of Mina Loy
[New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1996]) contains important information on SH and the filiation of this child. Its patrilineage may explain ML's agony and disillusion with GP.

Recent ML scholarship has greatly enhanced both the textual and contextual reading of this poem. See especially the work of Burke, Linda Kennahan, Kouidis, and Rachel Blau DuPlessis cited in Januzzi's bibliography of ML in
Mina Loy: Woman and Poet
(Maeera Schreiber and Keith Tuma, eds. [Orono, ME: National Poetry Foundation, 1996]).

III. Corpses and Geniuses (Poems 1919–1930)

16. O HELL, ca. 1919. First published in
Contact
1 (December 1920, p. 7). Reprinted in
LB,
with one substantive change: “the dusts of a tradition” replaces “the tatters of tradition” (l. 7). The present text follows the first published appearance, which in turn follows the only surviving MS (YCAL) in all substantives. I have made one emendation to the
Contact
appearance:

  9: Caress] Carress

Editor's Note:
When this poem was published in
Contact,
edited by RM and WCW, it marked the third time (following appearances in
Rogue
and
Others
) that ML's work had appeared in the inaugural issue of an American magazine dedicated to experimental writing. Following the demise of
Others
in 1919, WCW launched
Contact
in order to continue the fight that AK's magazine had begun. WCW sought work that could not be published elsewhere, that was not derivative, and that was not trying to appeal to good taste or win posthumous praise: “We wish above all things to speak for the present.” The first issue contained two contributions by ML: “O Hell” and a prose vignette (“Summer Night in a Florentine Slum”). The prose contribution is not included in this edition (but was reprinted in
LLB
82). A variation of l. 6 (“our person is a covered entrance to infinity”) occurred in ML's pamphlet
Psycho-Democracy
(Florence: Tipografia Peri & Rossi, 1920) as “‘Self' is the covered entrance to Infinity.” This prose answer to FTM's
War, the World's Only Hygiene
and renunciation of Futurism's militant tenets was later reprinted in
The Little Review
7 (Autumn 1921), pp. 14–19.

17. THE DEAD, ca. 1919. NOMS. First published in
Others for 1919: An Anthology of the New Verse
(New York: Nicholas L. Brown, 1920, pp. 112–114). This text is based on the first published appearance.

  3: shrivable] shrivvable

30: Of] of

43: Has] has

Editor's Note:
A year after the appearance of AK's 1919 anthology, John Rodker wrote an opinion piece in
The Little Review
7:3 (pp. 53–56), consisting largely of sarcastic remarks about the writing of the “Others” group. Of ML's contribution Rodker quipped, “It is painful to notice that since the last ‘Others' she appears to have lost her grip.” ML responds thrust for thrust in the same issue. The exchange continues in the next issue (
LR
7:4). Harriet Monroe, reviewing this anthology in
Poetry
(17:3 [December 1920, pp. 150–158]) calls ML “an extreme otherist, as innocent of all innocences as of commas, periods, sentences. A knowing one, but we would rather have some other other's polish our stars.”

Twenty-five years later, Kenneth Rexroth reprinted this poem in full in the second of his “recovery” essays on neglected poets (
Circle
1:4 [1944, pp. 69–72]). ML had not been published anywhere for thirteen years, and he wanted something done about it: “It is hard to say why she has been ignored. Perhaps it is due to her extreme exceptionalism. Erotic poetry is usually lyric. Hers is elegiac and satirical. It is usually fast-paced. Hers is slow and deliberately twisting.” Rexroth went on to observe that she “has been singularly isolated historically, with few ancestors and less influence.” He named Herondas, Menander, Lucretius, Lucian, Maximinian, Marston, Donne, Jonson, and Rochester as possible precursors; he then listed Jack Wheelwright, Laura Riding, Carl Rakosi, Louis Zukofsky, and Harry Roskolenko as possible heirs. According to Rexroth, that was the complete genealogy of influence. At least, he concluded, “no others occur to me.”