Abstract

Two years ago today, we participated in the event Listen Deep: Poetry, Sound and Multitudinous Remix, curated by Margaret Christakos and hosted at the University of Toronto on 8 March 2019. What follows is a brief description of the event’s activities, and then a transcription of a conversation that we had shortly after the event. We met at the Hinnawi Bros. Bagel Café across from Concordia’s Hall Building (hard to imagine a work date at a coffee shop these days), and discussed our immediate reflections on the day. Playing with Friedlaender’s idea that all spoken words remain in the world as vibrations that are imperceptible to the human ear—vibrations that can be picked up and made audible with the right imaginary amplification device—we wish to discover what other frequencies our past spoken words might tune us into. If you attended and/or participated in the event, we invite you to add your thoughts, memories, and reflections to a Google Doc version of this post using the “insert comment” feature; these comments will be transcribed and added as footnotes to this post on SWB (please let us know if you would like to be named or remain anonymous in your comment). We hope to continue the practices of listening and responding initiated in the original event in this written medium—that is, at least until our voices can sound together again.