Blog Post 6: CA Conrad and Ben Patterson

For CAConrad’s (SOMA)TIC POETRY EXERCISES, I will perform number 4.

"Take a red magic marker and draw a 9 on your naked chest. Draw the 9 from the bottom up. Start the tip of its tail at your naval and sweep UP to have the round circle of its head in the middle of your breasts. Put on a shirt that conceals the 9 from other eyes. Go out to the corner and quickly choose a direction. At the next corner choose another direction. Don't think about where you are going, instead spend the time between corners looking carefully at the world. Finally come to a complete stop at the 9th corner. Look across the street and focus on four different objects. Draw a line to connect them, looking carefully at what's inside this square you've just made. What's outside it? What's half-in? Imagine you string lights to make the square. Imagine its contents at night, dimly lit. Imagine this square a year from now. Ten years from now. Now go somewhere quickly and write, run, run to a place where you can write. Suddenly the city, your city, is a place where places to write come to mind, you must always know those places at all times."

I often walk around my neighborhood looking at my surroundings in great detail. Looking for notable things to point at and show my friend who often walks with me. This exerciser is meaningful to me because that friend's "lucky number" is nine. I will be channeling my energy during this exercise to give them good luck in their current endeavors in life which I am also partially involved in. I will treat this somatic exerciser as a serious spell I will cast. The performance as a spiritual ritual that will aid me in this troubling time.

For Ben Patterson's "THE BLACK & WHITE FILE," I will perform

"discover interesting sound

capture it

preserve it

perform it"

My plan is to go out in the world and record an interesting sound in my recorder app. I will bring it to class along with my melodica, and I will play the recording on repeat for five minutes. While it is playing, I will improvise with the recording, trying to capture the essence of the sound I find. I will try to balance the audibility of the recording and my playing by playing quietly in the beginning and getting louder and creating a more complex composition the longer I play. I will practice a little before I perform in front of the class.

February 24, 2026