I'm sorry if I offend with my reductive sociology of Jorie Graham. I
suppose my comments could be reduced to: badmouthing. This is the
twilight of list discussion, where assertions are blurted without
evidence, a form of gossip.
Here are a few poems of hers I found on the web:
www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmlD=59
www.diacenter.org/prg/poetry/00_01/graham.html
www.diacenter.org/prg/poetry/96_97/grapal.html
After looking at these poems, I still think there's a tendency to
bombast, which intrudes in the gap between some initial,
specific imagery (minnows, an Italian painting, water flowing, etc)
and the wide, grandiose emotive-spiritual gestures the images
are meant to trigger. This rather huge gap between a particular image
and a big abstract statement is smoothed over by her emphatically
flowing syntax, but in my opinion it's not a very solid bond.
best, Henry
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