Anodyne
Tuesday, May 10, 2005
 
Mr. John Latta quotes Ms. Alice Notley: "I wanted to be clear, and not consciously innovative in language: I had done that before in discussing poetry and probably will do so again, but I didn’t want to make, as much as to serve. However, I did want to invent a viewpoint in each instance according to what was required, that is, to see what was there without a predetermined terminology or logic getting in the way. Any contemporary poem or poet deserves to be approached without preconception. If it’s of now, who knows what it is?" Those first and last sentences sat me bolt-upright, so I poked around in the Buffalo archives while finishing my decaf, discovering Ms. N's amazing clarity for myself:

"I'll look up 'love' in the dictionary. They're beautiful.
Bodily they're incomprehensible. I can't tell if they're
me or not. They think I'm their facility. We're all about
as comprehensible as the crocuses. In myself I'm like a
color except not in the sense of a particular one. That's
impossible. That's under what I keep trying out. With
which I can practically pass for an adult to myself. Some
of it is pretty and useful, like when I say to them
'Now will I take you for a walk in the snow to the store'
and prettily and usefully we go. Mommy, the lovely
creature. You should have seen how I looked last night,
Bob Dylan Bob Creeley Bob Rosenthal Bob on Sesame Street.
Oh I can't think of any other Bobs right now. garbage.
It perks. Thy tiger, thy night are magnificent,

it's ten below zero deep deep down deep in my abdomen.
It pulls me up and leads me about the house. It's got the
sun in the morning and the moon at night. It does
anything in the world of particulars without wanting.
The anyone careless love sees that everything goes, minds.
The melody was upsidedown, now the melody turns over.
One note: my feet go."
- posted by cjb @ 8:45 AM


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