unconventional words: sound poet bill bissett
By David Silverberg

It doesn't look like a grown man's apartment.

Goggles hang on coat hooks. The old Macintosh computer is decorated with fuzzy monkey stickers. A large poster of the movie Edward Scissorhands drapes over the bedroom door. If not for the volumes of poetry, Depeche Mode tapes and a biography of Anne Murray, this would suit an 18-year-old just fine.

The apartment belongs to sound poet bill bissett (legally lowercased), although many times I mistake him for a loveable overgrown child.

bissett encourages hugging. He will call his friend Tanya, "Princess Tanya." Instead of saying "Good-bye," he'll cry out in his soothing effeminate voice, "Lightning, magic, rainbows!"

However odd someone may regard the wispy-haired, bespectacled 60-year-old, bissett is one of the leading performance poets in Canada. Years ago, Jack Kerouac dubbed him "the best living poet in Canada." Poetry pubs rave about bissett's readings. Besides taking the stage, he has written more than 60 books of poetry.

A new collection, "peter among the towring boxes/text bites," will be released in spring by Talon Books. A CD collaboration with musicians, rainbow mewsik, is his most recent album. bill bissett can't stop — not many people would let him.

bissett was born in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1940 to a father whose chief desire was to see his son become a pillar of the community. Young bissett was pressured to become a lawyer or a white-collar businessman. But his love revolved around the arts, so the boy ran away from the East Coast to Vancouver, British Columbia at 16, leaving behind his father and two sisters (his mother had "gone to spirit" a few years earlier).

bissett knew he wanted to be a poet, claiming the reason is glandular. The brain and poetry is closely linked, bissett asserts. Whether it was the inspirational mountains or the freedom from family, bissett's creative success took off in B.C. His poetry matured, he gained popularity and, more importantly, he found a voice. He developed his own phonetic spelling, which some may find difficult to read; but it's not the literal meaning bissett is concerned about.

"I am devoted to the tactile sense of language," he says. "When I look at letters, I see pictures. Some poets are more devoted to the meaning as representational, but that's not my objective."

A bissett poem is unlike any other piece of creativity. The rhythm is based on physical pauses, not grammatical form. Poet Sharon Nelson put it best, saying, "For bissett, a poem serves as an invitation to breathe. The attentive reader breathes the poet's rhythm, breathes with the poet's lungs. In effect, the reader experiences the poet's breathing and the poet's body."

While it is ideal to hear bisset's poetry read aloud, the unique spelling and rhythmic flow is exquisite in every written piece. The following is an excerpt from one of bissett's poems, "life may b apokriful":

"I want to write each poem how it sounds," bissett says, his eyes dancing wildly with excitement. He speaks quickly while discussing his poetry. "A lot of people who learn English as a second language find my poetry easy to read. They say 'Thank you' and I say 'How come?' and they say it is easier because most English poems are difficult because of the complicated language." bisset will write "mewsik" instead of "music"; he'll spell "thoughts" as "thots" and "the" as "th."

"Jeez, no one says 'the' anymore," he scoffs, stressing the hard 'e.'" He doesn't fill out tax forms, invoices and cheques as his neighbors do. He'll write any official form with bissett spelling.

Talon Books in British Columbia has published more than 50 of bissett's works. Karl Siegler, the president of Talon, finds bissett's poetry fascinating. "He sends a clear message to readers," Siegler says, "that if they are not prepared to make a real effort to understand the text, then there is nothing to learn." He also says that by abandoning convention early in his career, bissett became part of the counter-culture movement of the 1960s. His name became synonymous with beatnik, rebel and progressive.

And why the lowercase name change? "I use capitals for volume, for loud words." bisset blushes and looks down at his feet. "bill bissett is not a loud name, it's quiet."

Sound poetry focuses on the aural manipulation of words rather than the literal text. It's a combination of precise literature and the interpolation of music that is wasted if only read on paper. It is the celebration of the human voice, of an experimental sensory experience that pushes the boundaries of language. Electric and acoustic music has recently been incorporated into sound poetry. But no matter what future movements incorporate into sound poetry, above all it is performance poetry. bissett wags his head like an excited puppy when asked if sound poetry relies on improvisation during readings.

"Oh yeah, sound poetry gets more rockin' and more innovative with improvisation," he says. "It's like a blues musician doing riffs, just flying off and doing new stuff."

Allan Briesemaster has organized the Imperial Pub Library's poetry night for the past four years. bissett has performed at the Dundas Street Bar three times, always with torrential applause afterwards.

"His performances are very energetic," Briesemaster says. "I even enjoy hearing him do the same poem twice. It's like music — I know how the poem goes but I'm happy to hear him do it again."

The relationship between music and poetry is prominent in bissett's life. He was in a band called the Luddites when he was writer-in-residence at the University of Western Ontario in London, Ontario. bisset's bookcases are lined with vinyl records of their recordings, dating back to 1989. He compares being a lyricist to being a poet, saying "songwriting is matching a beat to a syllable, just like poetry," he says.

After London, he found himself in Toronto, the center of Ontario's creative pulse. In 1993, he spent one-on-one time with York University creative writing students. From 1994 to 1996, he spent two months each year workshopping with students from an Etobicoke school. Today, bissett bounces from Vancouver to Toronto every year. He enjoys "the buzz" of Toronto, but the breathtaking nature of Vancouver calls him back every April.

During my interview, I ask him to give me an example of sound poetry. bissett smiles, thinks for a moment and opens his mouth. What follows is an 18-second meandering articulation of the word "flower." He lowers and raises his voice dramatically. The word sounds almost gibberish: "Flo-ow-ow-flo-ow-ow-ow-ower-ower..." The other coffee-drinkers at the café stare at our table queerly. Yet when I get over my embarrassment, I realize I was just taken on a linguistic and vocal journey. bisset, with little time to reflect, had performed one word to suit how he saw its growth. Perhaps the deep growling during the first syllable was the seed being planted, his rising crescendo signifying the growth of the flower.

A reader can study bissett's text until the eyes blur. Yet until one hears the evocative power of the staged reading, sound poetry may remain phonetic confusion.

Most of bissett's friends treasure their moments with him. Dr. Bill Berinadi, bissett's chiropractor and friend since 1993, cherishes every Christmas dinner, or "C-night," spent with bissett. "bill, two others, and I make dinner, wrap each other in blankets and howl in the backyard at the Christmas moon." Only during a specific evening does Dr. Berinadi find his time with bissett frustrating. "When we play Scrabble, his spelling can mess things up," he laughs.

Back at the café, bissett sips his tonic water — "I'm addicted" — and then munches urgently on some Caesar salad. As a full-time poet, bissett has reason to be hungry. He leads a frugal life, rarely eating out for fear of spending a week's rent on a high-priced meal. He relies on readings in Toronto and abroad to support him.

"I don't think bill wants monetary goods," friend Kerry Lamond says. "He bases his success on whether he's a good human being." By most people's reaction, it seems bissett is doing something right.

Strolling down Wellesly Street, he hugs acquaintances and waves like a schoolboy at shopkeepers. Old women and little girls alike admire him. But has bissett made his mark on the artistic world outside North America?

In one indirect way, he has.

When he visited the Louvre in Paris, bissett was curious if the alarm would ring around the Mona Lisa if he attempted something risque. So he flicked a booger at the painting. As he expected, the alarm didn't sound.

"Maybe a part of bill is still there," bissett says, giggling.

E-mail David Silverberg at heavyonthefunk@hotmail.com.