Category

		Envelope - front
		"Sommarhuset" means "the summer house" in Swedish. This poem was collected at Martin Hagglund's summer house in Kaxed, Sweden. There's actually a different word that Swedish people use to say "summer house," but I wanted to use a cognate. The "poem" is opaque enough without making people learn Swedish to read the title. When you get a Sommarhuset envelope, this is what it looks like. The title is stamped in blue ink. If you want a copy of Sommarhuset, email me. There are still a few left of the original 25.

		Opening the envelope
		Each envelope is sealed, so you have to rip it open. Some recipients have politely cut it open with a letter-knife. I ripped mine. I like that you have to break it to make it.

		Contents
		If you withdraw the materials in Sommarhuset carefully, this is what it looks like. You can also just turn over the envelope and see what falls out.

		Handmade lace
		Martin's grandmother, Margit, gave me a roll of handmade lace for Christmas, but it originally came from her sewing drawer in her apartment in the summer house. I was going to sew it onto my jeans but then I decided it was too poetic. I like that the lace is a trace, a pattern, of former movement. Someone made this. This indicates "I wuz here," as the graffiti says. It also indicates what specific hand gestures a person made while they were "here." The lace is a tale of lace-making.

		Blueberries
		I picked a lot of blueberries last August in the High Coast region. There are a lot of photos of me with various parts of my body stained dark blue. I smuggled the blueberries through customs in raisin boxes so that I could put them into this poem.

		Sand
		This sand is from the beach outside the summer house, and is thus from the coast of the Baltic Sea. It's always interested me how different beaches have different sand; my little brother used to collect vials of sand from all over the world. I smuggled this "soil sample" through customs by putting sand in my shoes.

		Illustrated lyrics
		This is a copy of a page from a children's book of songs/hymns that I found in the bottom of a box in the attic. I am one of those people who, if invited to your house and left alone for a few minutes, will go through your medicine cabinet, your drawers, and any secret space of the house (the attic, the cellar), and take things. I know, it sounds bad, but I have good intentions. I am a poem-collector and the things I take from your house will end up as poems, rather than as food for worms in the dank basement. I thought this little book was very beautiful. The Swedes are crazy about singalongs. At family events, holidays, and even on Tuesdays in the summer, there are singalongs. There are tons of folksongs. One of the most popular summer t.v. shows is "Allsang pa Skansen," which is a singalong broadcast from the Stockholm zoo. People line up hours ahead of time to join in the singalong, which is broadcast live. Did I mention the Swedes haven't been to war in a couple of hundred years?

		Wallpaper
		Your copy of Sommarhuset might have a different kind of wallpaper. There are two. This one is the wallpaper in the kitchen. There's also a 70s bright floral wallpaper (orange, yellow, green circular flowers) which is on one of the walls in the old storage room (which is now Martin's room). The summer house used to also be the local general store.

		Packing tag
		As I said, the summer house used to be a general store. I found a few boxes of old general-store stuff in the attic, including these tags. There was also a box of old snaps (for sewing into clothes) but I didn't take those.

		Video of the Baltic Sea
		One of three short videos (more like a "moving picture") included on a CD-rom that's in the envelope. You're gonna have to right-click and open this in a new window, I think; I can't figure out how to make it play in this window.

		Contents
		The contents of Sommarhuset spread out. The physical version also includes a cd-rom of videos.