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[Zend's] poems display a ready wit and frequent flights of fancy. In Beyond Labels the poet shows more formal ingenuity and invention [than in From Zero to One], especially with his "Ditto poems" and "Drop poems," which are reminiscent of concrete poetry. This book also includes the poet's address to Amnesty International, which discusses the destructive compulsion people feel to label others.
- John Robert Colombo, in The Oxford Companion to Canadian Literature, Toronto, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, 1983, p. 842
Praise for Beyond Labels:
Very sincere and moving poems. I love your poems, especially those which you dedicate to me. y'r a marvlus word tamer miracle, wundrer uv. Knowing your poems I understand why you like mine. Robert Zend is a one-man literary renaissance. Zend does't write poetry; he breathes it. I can't understand why his poems are not translated into twenty-seven languages of the world! You are my friend because you are a Hungarian and a poet. Zend is so funny that we must take him seriously. Zend is a citizen of the universe. |
Zend is a great poet. He is my chosen brother. The answer to every reader's quest--the Living Zend. What a mind! Wow! Zend is a split-personality and I love him both. Zend's poetry is whimsical, rare and much needed on this continent. His double-edged humour, like a splash of cold water in the face, wakes you up and it has a wonderful aftertaste. I had a very pleasant afternoon while reading your poems. Robert Zend's feet are planted in the ground, his heart is forgiving, his head is in the clouds. Between your poems and mine there is no iron curtain. |
Read a sample:
Poems on Poetry:
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PROPHECY
The static that you hear when reading my poems today will sounds like sweet music in the ears of your sons - Robert Zend, January 15, 1967, p. 72 SKY BLUE
The day will dawn when someone will seize my poems and unravel the lovely blue lines of ink knotted in my letters and take the thin thread and bury one end deep inside the earth and bind the other end around his waist for his leap out into space - Robert Zend, March 27, 1964, p. 76 |
WHAT THE POET IS
The poet is a wos
(a sow backward) feeding on trash, emptying food - Robert Zend, January 8, 1967, p. 54 THE DIFFERENCE
The pseudo-poet uses the medium of poetry to speak; the true poet is used as a medium through whom poetry speaks. - Robert Zend, March 3, 1982, p. 24 |
Selected "ditto poems:"
"Ditto Poems cannot be read like ordinary poems. Because of the letters placed at random, they have to be scanned, like radar or TV tubes. The reader's eye has to follow the letters patiently, from left to right, line by line, top to bottom, with conscious concentration. To understand the poems, the reader must link the letters into words (every new word starts with a capital letter) and the words into phrases. Ditto Poetry is a reversed sort of poetry: the poet has the fun and the reader does the work."
- John Robert Colombo in Beyond Labels, p. 86.
- John Robert Colombo in Beyond Labels, p. 86.
Robert Zend and John Robert Colombo (Ditto poem), p. 112.
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Robert Zend and John Robert Colombo (Ditto Poem), p. 113.
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Selected "drop poems:"
"I invented Drop Poetry in 1982, as an off-shoot (improvement?) of Ditto Poetry. Its rules are tougher than those of its predecessor, both for the poet and the reader. Since the letters of the poem "drop" from the title, the poet can use each letter of the title only once, and only in the original order. The reader, on the other hand, has to read each poem twice: first the title (in two lines), then the poem (second line only). Thus, the possibilities are even more limited, and the discrepancy between the "title" and the "poem" is greater than in the Ditto poems."
- Robert Zend in Beyond Labels, p. 116.
- Robert Zend in Beyond Labels, p. 116.
Robert Zend, p. 117.
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Robert Zend, p. 117
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Essay and Prose Poems:
Robert Zend, "Preface: Labels," pp. 1-10:
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"Psalm," for Northrop Frye, pp. 55-57
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Robert Zend, "Dragonfly, for Julius Marosan," p. 51
Robert Zend, August 29, 1963, p. 51.
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Painting by Julius Marosan that inspired the poem:
"Dragonfly," by Julius Marosan, Janine Zend's private collection.
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As early as 1963, Zend was beginning to experiment with spacial configuration in his poetry, adding visual movement complementing the meaning,
- Camille Martin, "Robert Zend: Poet without Borders, Part 7. Canadian Literary Cross-Pollination: bpNichol," rogueembryo.com, February 17, 2014
Robert Zend, "An Epistle to Leopardi," pp. 65-69
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The poem of Leopardi's to which Zend is responding: | ||
Camille Martin on Zend and Leopardi:
"Zend shares with [Italian Romantic poet Giacomo] Leopardi [1798-1837] the mindset of a misfit and skeptic contemplating the absurdity of life and death, albeit often with a more playful tone." [...] "In Zend’s tongue-in-cheek 'An Epistle to Leopardi,' addressed to 'my dear dead friend, / Italian count, poet, philosopher and misfit,' the epistoler tries unsuccessfully to assume the bleak mood appropriate to the dread of death and (quoting Leopardi) its 'dark tunnel,' 'steep abyss,' and 'annihilation.' Although everything dies, from 'Universe [to] Quark,' he imagines an afterlife in which one of Leopardi’s 'former atoms now resides somewhere / in one of my ear-lobes,' or conversely, 'one of the molecules in my brain / was part of the white of [Leopardi's] big toenail.'
"However, try as he might, he finds himself unable to experience the emotions that Leopardi associates with mortality: relief, remorse, unhappiness, and anxiety. As an antidote to Leopardi’s austere melancholia without the promise of paradise, he deploys an absurdly tautological argumentat to prove Leopardi’s obsessive theme to be meaningless: his problem is 'not death, but existence,' 'against which we have but one weapon: Life,' which, coming full circle, is in turn 'solved by death.'"
- Camille Martin, "Robert Zend: Poet without Borders, Part 11. International Affinities: Italy (Leopardi and Pirandello)," rogueembryo.com, March 1, 2014
"However, try as he might, he finds himself unable to experience the emotions that Leopardi associates with mortality: relief, remorse, unhappiness, and anxiety. As an antidote to Leopardi’s austere melancholia without the promise of paradise, he deploys an absurdly tautological argumentat to prove Leopardi’s obsessive theme to be meaningless: his problem is 'not death, but existence,' 'against which we have but one weapon: Life,' which, coming full circle, is in turn 'solved by death.'"
- Camille Martin, "Robert Zend: Poet without Borders, Part 11. International Affinities: Italy (Leopardi and Pirandello)," rogueembryo.com, March 1, 2014
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