"Paradoxes and Oxymorons," by John Ashbery

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Ashbery - One of Four

I've said before that my taste in poetry easily finds John Ashbery's work very palatable. I am well aware that this is not a universal opinion among those who delight in reading contemporary poetry. Ashbery has many detractors. Still, it's a fact that at age 81 Ashbery need not fret about his mark on the American literary culture. It is well cemented. If you doubt this, consider that Ashbery is about to become only the fourth American writer to see their works published during their own lifetime by the Library of America. He joins Philip Roth, Eudora Welty, and Saul Bellow in that distinction.

With a firm grip on my pen...

Jane Pupek had a link to a place for writer's gifts - her selection was "Will write for chocolate." I had to chuckle when I saw the one at the left. When the actor Charleston Heston passed away recently I made some disparaging remarks about his NRA affiliation and ardent opposition to handgun controls. My wife responded saying I should leave the poor man alone, he's dead. She went on and said your the same way about your pen. We'll have to pry it out of your cold dead fingers to get it away from you. She's right of course, but I've never accidentally or intentionally killed anyone with my fountain pen... yet.

Went to the half-price book store today & picked up a copy of John Ashbery's The Mooring of Starting Out: The First Five Books of Poetry. Two of the things I love about Ashbery's writing is his command of language and the pictures I contrive in my head when reading his work.

Last night, my wife and I watched ReCount on HBO. The chronology of events in those post election days in 2000 are worth every American reliving.

The recent catastrophic disasters to hit China and Myanmar are heavy on my mind. Add to that the rash of sever storm related death and distruction to parts of the Midwest, south and southeastern parts of the U.S. The need for 3.3 million tents in China is mind boggeling. Where do you turn to get that kind of need met overnight?

I heard Frances Richey on NPR this weekend - Soldier's Mother Bridges Distance with Poetry.

It's a compelling example of poetry that renewed a bond between mother and son.

Poetry News

A few poetry items:

• John Ashbery Reads at Haverford (story)
• Robert Frost's Dartmouth Lectures Published (story)
• ‘Living In Storms. Contemporary Poetry and the Moods of Manic Depression’ (review)
• Ezra Pound's birthplace in central Idaho draws poetry pilgrims (story)
• Pulitzer Prize-Winning Poet and Essayist W.S. Merwin to Lead All-Star Cast at 2008 The Kenan Writers' Encounters 'Earth: Writers and Artists Engage the Environment' April 12-22, 2008 (information)

What the poem wants

"The poem is sad because it wants to be yours, and cannot be." - John Ashbery

Have you ever stopped for a moment to ask yourself what the poem wants? Ok, chuckle if you want, but people are always trying to force something out of a poem that they believe is secretly hidden by the poet. Something he or she hopes you'll look for, but never find. I know this because more than one person has suggested the same.

When I write a poem, I may well have something in mind, but I may not. For the most part what I have in mind is of lesser significance that what the reader finds in the poem. By that I don't mean what I've hidden and they have decoded, but rather what that poem speaks to them in their own voice.

When someone tries to discern what I am saying in poetry, they may well become befuddled. My advise to readers of poetry is to let the poem become yours. Once that has happened, you'll know what it is telling you.

Welcome to the new year...

A little poetry news from around the world...

• More than 70 years after García Lorca’s death by a fascist firing squad at the start of the Spanish Civil War, the shadowy elf apparently inhabits García Lorca’s country me. Click
• Thousands of dissidents silenced under Argentina's military dictatorship - tortured, executed and made to "disappear" in the so-called Dirty War against dissent - are gaining new voice through poetry. Click
• For Ferlinghetti, poetry's "use" extends far beyond the personal into the political. "Poetry can save the world by transforming consciousness," he argues in "Poetry as Insurgent Art," a slim hardback pocketbook manifesto of prose epigrams, seemingly addressed to poets and those who might be. Click
• Ashbery's poetry makes you wonder what the wish to understand may protect you from; what the pleasures are of not understanding. Click
• Letters to the World, a poetry collection by the world's female poets, including an Iranian, is to be released early in the New Year. Click

Poetry in the News - Sunday Night

A few stories of interest -

• Letters of Ted Hughes reveals a fascinatingly honest man (click)
• Poetry of Protest - a story from Iran (click)
• John Ashbery & Robert Lowell - Two great American poets but very different (click)
• Robert Pinsky has perfected a kind of multicultural poetic shorthand (click)

Mail Box

From the mail box yesterday, came my latest issue of Poets & Writers. This is the issue where P&W features the 12 debut poets for the year. I always enjoy this issue because I like to see who's there. A notable gem was among the 2005 list - Dana Goodyear. Her book Honey and Junk was a very worthwhile read. It will be interesting to see who among the 2007 group will hit my radar down the road.

Also noted a piece in this issue that looks interesting titled The Art of Reading John Ashbery.

Side note... 8 out of 10 people responding to the survey - If Spencer Tunick came to your community to do one of his photo shoots and needed volunteers, they would you talk it all off for art. There were two blushers who said no way. (OK, I added the blushing part)

Poetry Revision Part 2

I am revisiting the "revision" subject of my earlier post with a few thoughts.

For my own part, I have been hanging on to my own work longer lately. I think there is value in revisiting work after a bit of a break from it. I read where the Roman poet Horace believed one should wait nine years. I'm not sure you can call any specific period of time extreme in the context of a single piece of work, but I'm not planning any such length as a matter of personal procedure. I do believe that we create a distance from the work when we put it away and bring it back out later. That distance can improve our perception of what we are saying.

In an article written by Nina Shengold, titled Perennial Voyager - John Ashbery at Home, Ashbery speaks of endless revisions in his younger days. Today, he days, " If I'm not pleased with something, I tend to discard it rather than reworking it to death." I'm a huge Ashbery fan, but I don't see myself trashing a lot of stuff... or do I?

If one looks though my journals, there are quite a few instances where I have something with a squiggly sort of strike through the text. I suppose these are throw-aways, though I haven't thought much about them in that context. There are certainly many other things I've started that are not completed poems yet, I have not given them the disapproving strike through. These I will on occasion go back to and rework. I did one this weekend, which I started last May. There are however, times when I will indeed abandon a piece of writing that I believe has failed the very basic level of having viability. Then I have tons of material that are like little unborns already on life support... while I've thinking of a cure.

I would of course like to believe that I could create successfully without revision. I won't however kid myself on this point. Few of us are John Ashbery's. Still, in a way, what he is doing is revision by elimination. With the number of successfully completed books he has, I'm sure he is not concerned with the quantity of work he is producing, even at his age.

Write, patience, reading, rewriting, patience, writing, reading..... it is all a part of the process.

supersized sigh

I am mulling over in my mind a number of questions relating to poem revisions. I am not sure if I will be finished with this and ready to post over the weekend or not, but just to alert you, I hope that when I do, it will be something that will create further discussion.

Is is Friday isn't it.... yep! [supersized-sigh]

I looked at the Fred Thompson campaign site yesterday. Very nicely put together and very void of specifics on issues. I guess he believes people will just like his down home style and to hell with where he would take us. Do I sound cynical yet?

This is good news: Judge Rejects Parts Of New Patriot Act
The government investigators must have court's approval to order businesses such as internet service providers and telephone companies to turn over records without telling customers.

The court found that government orders must be subject to meaningful judicial review and that the recently rewritten Patriot Act "offends the fundamental constitutional principles of checks and balances and separation of powers."

For John Ashbery fans: check out-> Perennial Voyager

Friday Links of Interest

• Pulling Paper Towel Poetry - What a great Idea!!! I love it! Thanks Jilly for the link
• One poet of the past - speaks to 10 artists today link
• Bob Dylan was not on Pope Benedict's radar in 1997 when he sang at a youth concert with the late Pope John Paul link
• "A Wordly Country" by John Ashbery gets rave review in the New Your Sun link

John Ashbery - Not Poet Laureate Material

John Ashbery is a highly recognized figure in contemporary American Poetry. The last of the so-called New York School of poetry. He has some 24 poetry books that have been published and in the realm measuring success by publication, one is hard pressed to discount is successes.
He has had poetry books published in each of the last six decades.

Deborah Solomon in a New York Times Magazine article posed the possibility that Ashbery may have felt snubbed since he has never been asked to serve as Poet Laureate. But Ashbery himself insisted, "I really don’t think I’m poet-laureate material." He added, " To be poet laureate you have to have a program for spreading the word of poetry. I’m just willing to let it spread by itself."

In earlier biographical material I've read on Ashbery I've noted that he seems to be quite content with a more laid back, less public posture. I can appreciate that the remarks attributed to him in Solomon's article are an honest expression of his view. But I can't help but believe this man, who's work I believe so brilliant, would in fact bring a robust and exciting debate to the
public discussion of contemporary poetry.