Blown away

Review of EB finished, and as usual, I learnt more doing it than just reading...Focussed on her use of repetition - in her poem Argument, she says ...argue, argue, argue... in the middle of a line, very effective. The poem is about missing someone and the argument is between Distance and Days, which separate her from this person. It is so well done. She also piles on adjectives without hesitation, an eye-opener for someone who has been taught to eliminate them wherever possible.

She writes fluidly, no contortions in order to get a word into a desired position in the line. This is all the result of painstaking work, her output remained small.

On to Marianne Moore and Robert Hass now.

Yesterday, resumption of the course and I woke up versifying in my head, thinking about poems I am busy with. Neat.

We looked at erotic poetry, which was fun. I was absolutely blown away by Sharon Olds' Topography, because of what it says about duality, or the absence of it.

It made my day.

The stuff of poetry

Got Sharon Olds' book The Father; Poems (1999, Alfred A. Knopf, New York) from the library, read it in one go, some of it made me cry.

Here are some of my recently acquired insights into poetry:

- poetry is not only about daffodils.
- poetry does not have to be obscure.
- some of the best poetry packs a wallop.

Poetry about 'wonderfully observed moments' on its own is good, but not enough. The significant poets have something more to say, like Sharon Olds showing how love takes over as a force greater than her rational, everyday self, in caring for her dying father, despite the fear he inspired in her when she was a child.

This is the second book I've read which is on a given theme: the other is Anne Kennedy's Sing-song, which I'll finish today. The narrative link between the poems creates a greater sense of intimacy with the writer. I go back and re-read...

Writing: I'm working on the Soundwalk set of poems - there may be three, I think. Much encouraged by the groups' approval yesterday.

Viv said that one can buy poetry books cheaply on-line via TradeMe; shall check that, and BookHaven which is Wellington-based and easy to access.

I am out of my routine, it is three in the afternoon, not early morning. Too tired to get up early today. No writing tomorrow, Saturday, but shall be back at it on Sunday morning, after Zen.

Oh, and a friend sent me an article by Helen Ventner about the way Yeats wrote poetry. Started with prose and then polished and polished, reading it out aloud as he went, with a particular intonation. Comparison of poetry to music, the text up-front and other stuff happening underneath.

Amichai after forty years...

Watched a slow and wonderful Korean movie entitled Why Bodhidarma came from the East. Peter fell asleep on the couch beside me towards the end. It reminded me a bit of the other Asian movie about a Zen master, called by the names of the seasons, Autumn, Winter, Spring, Summer, Autumn, only am not sure which season was the first. In both, it happens a child is cruel to an animal... In this film, an ox breaks lose and is lost. It is found at the end, the final picture has stayed in my mind, of the ox tethered and compliant, following the man, both silhouetted against paddy fields covered in water.

More reading of John Marsden and Natalie Goldberg. John Marsden is not good enough, his own writing is shoddy, too many adverbs and adjectives, and yet I feel obliged to finish, in case, just in case the idea for structure suddenly appears among the chaff.
No time yet for Michael Dibdin. Went out for pizza with a friend tonight, and she lent me another book about an Italian detective, this one originally written in Italian, the friend says good translation, it takes place in Sicily. Entitled The Terracotta Dog, by Andrea Camilleri. The book belongs to her daughter, so I must read it quickly and return it.

Read some Amichai last night - the book has the Hebrew original and the English translations, some of them in collaboration with Ted Hughes. Rediscovered the poem about Jerusalem which was the one that made me remember Amichai, written after the Six Day War, when we were naive and innocent. It affected me differently now.

If I forget thee, Jerusalem,
Then let my right be forgotten....
Let my right be forgotten and my left remember.
Let my left remember, and your right close
And your mouth open near the gate.
[...]
Should my right forget,
My left shall forgive,
I shall forget all water,
I shall forget my mother.

A terrible love.

Better is this:

On a roof in the Old City
laundry hanging in the late afternoon sunlight:
the white sheet of a woman who is my enemy,
the towel of a man who is my enemy,
to wipe off the sweat of his brow.

In the sky of the Old City
a kite.
At the other end of the string,
a child
I can't see
because of the wall.

There is more but I'll stop here because of copyright.

Yesterday, Hinemoana read us a text called The Solution by Sharon Olds, from a book The Gold Cell. Wanting not to be shocked, I was shocked, and then delighted by the ending.
They have three of Sharon Olds books at the Central Library.