Capillarity by Arto Vaun
Capillarity—the interaction between contacting surfaces of a liquid and a solid that distorts the liquid surface
Capillarity, by Arto Vaun, is a collection of 66 free verse poems that weaves the experiences of three generations of a family of Armenian descent in often dreamlike fragmentary lines arranged in such a way as to mimic or suggest movement.
The poems are titled only by roman numerals, which correspond to their order in the collection, which feels appropriate given the way in which the poems speak to one another in the same way that the repeated histories of the three generations within speak to one another, becoming both the stone and the ripple.
The language in the poems is often influenced by fragments of speech that are remembered quotations, imagined phrases, musing on words and their meanings, or simply a lack of language and there is a quality of storytelling sprouting from storytelling in much of the work, not least of all for the frequent use of repetition and, perhaps more to the point, partial repetitions that morph into new statements within several of the poems in the collection. From this language and memory arise the research for the collection; there are no sources given.
There’s also a theme of ignorance and revelation, both of which feel as though they’ve been given physical mass by their presentation as spheres of time. Ignorance is not a state of being in these poems, but rather a period of time before the fall, a smooth surface of innocence disturbed by some revelation, or experience. And more, it is belonging to a time you will not always belong to, a time before forced migration, the death of loved ones—the time before capillarity.
“We will be them someday and throw back into the dark what was once ours to give / Just the sound of
debris hitting the water and disappearing...”
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