Marcus If

God. State. Science. Art.

sez who?

Chair of Ontological Engineering
Beyond Academia LLC Board of Directors Founding Member & Chairperson

Marcus If is the Headmaster and Guerrilla Ontologist for the Beyond Academia Free Skool in Boulder, Colorado, which he founded in 2012 at the request of the local poetic community. He is the current Chairperson of the Board of Beyond Academia LLC, a not-for-profit arts and education organization. He teaches a variety of courses in the Poetic Constructs, Ontological Engineering, and Esoteric Practices tracks. A veteran performance poet, Marcus has been reading at least monthly along the Colorado Front Range for more than 30 years at open mics and featured events. He has hosted the Speakeasy reading series at the No Name Bar on the Hill, serves as chief editor at Boar Hog Press, founded the Love Shovel Poetry Troupe, been the elected President of the Nederland Area Historical Society & Mining Museum, trained as a NEHA Certified Radiation engineer, traded futures on the S&P, managed disparate small businesses, and currently reigns as Zen Tyrant of the meritocracy of Love Shovel Ranch in Nederland, CO, half a dozen miles from the Continental Divide.

Marcus doesn’t publish often, but his chapbooks include Contraband (1993), Square Feet (1995), The Comic Book Plague (w/ Rob Geisen, 2009), and Tail Spin: A Garter of Sonnets (2012). End of the 20^th Century Man (Collected Works 1989-2009) remains unpublished. For more than 15 years he deviantly worked away on An Obvious Ruse, a pioneering exploration of Projective Sonnets, finished in 2016 (after a year internment by Homeland Security) and currently awaiting publication.

Links:
Marcus is My Favorite Serial Killer by Get in the Car Helen
Marcus If Poetry Videos
Essays by Marcus If

Sample Poetry:

nirvana , samsara

vow of the bodhisattva

yeah, I’ll fix yr car.