Lax - the peacemaker's handbook

Lax’s poetry is vertical, going down the page instead of across.  In order to get the cadence, you have to read and see the vertical lines as they go up and down and across the page as well, like stanzas. It does a number on your mind, reading this way.  You can't assume that you know what is coming next.

The St. Bonaventure Archive site has pdf files of one of Lax’s works - The Peacemaker’s Handbook.  Peacemaker’s Handbook was first published by Pendo Verlag of Zurich Switzerland in 2001.  Most of Lax's poetry was published by European book companies in English with facing German translated pages.  I could find many of them on Amazon.de, but not the U.S. site.

The reproduced text on the pdf's linked to below is a digital copy of the original typescript/printout submitted for that publication. It differs from the published version in regards to the arrangement of some portions of the text.   But it gives you a good idea of how Lax’s poetry should look on a page.  (I would love to see this book reproduced in America.)

The Peacemaker’s Handbook - part 1

The Peacemaker's Handbook - part 2

The Peacemaker's Handbook - part 3: Contemplation

The Peacemaker's Handbook - part 4: Peacemaking

Here is a little snippet from the Peacemaking part:

fight

fire

with

what
?

water

---

(seriously, though, you need to read the whole thing to get the breadth and depth of Lax's simple wisdom)

And here is a little snippet from the Contemplation part:

con
tem
pla
tion

is

watch
ing

---

what

hap
pens

if

you

watch

?

you

be
gin

to

see


---