& I once left a folder of poems in the motorway cafe at Scotch Corner, on
the table beside my empty greasy plate
About a month later, I got a letter from the police up there saying they had
"certain documents" of mine... I had put my address on one; so they'd taken
the trouble to go through. Looking for republican sympathies no doubt
& they posted them to me, on request
so there's hope
L
----- Original Message -----
From: "Erminia Passannanti" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: 26 January 2002 09:40
Subject: Re: URGENT: LOST FILES ANF POEMS
| Dear Friends,
|
| thank you for sympathizing with my loss of poems (especially those written
| in Italian, which are more valuable).
| Went to bed at three, woke up at six, my head feeling like a balloon,
| thinking thinking which may the poems be - some of course are saved on
| floppy disks, others are stored as you say in the crashed memory somewhere
| and I imagine I could find a specialist to retrieve the data from my PC's
| brain. I dreamt of roaming around Oxford looking in all the bins in search
| for my lost folders and files, so I feel very tires, also because I
| physically have done it in the last couple of days - actually, not looking
| into bins but asking all possible place, even the police station, where
| they showed with my surprise, a big sympathy, confirming Oxford to be an
| enlightened city of writers and appreciators of the Arts). Most people -
| especially men - would make sure I gave them my address and telephone
| number to contact in me in case they found the poems: how dear of them. I
| am here waiting for possible findings.
| I am also feeling exhausted by the effort I am making with my own memory
| to trace back the titles of the poems written, not that I will ever be
| able to recompose the texts that went lost but because I need at least to
| know what to mourn about.
| I will put my name on all search engines on the Internet to recuperate
| those poems that likely were published and are on line. Luckily, my
| friends, I have the risky habit to write and send the poems I have just
| conceived, as crude and unfinished as they are, in the stratosphere of the
| world-web, and I do it for this very purpose - as I said in another
| occasion - just in case they would get lost given to my frail alertness
| with properties, say any possessions (in the last week, lost not only my
| folders, but a pair of leather gloves and my favorite "hundreds and
| thousands" scarf wearing which used to put in a good post-modern pluri-
| coloured mood. Sorry to be so talkative in this letter, I have all this
| accumulated in my forehead pushing to come out so I am speaking out my
| heart. Indeed, there are moments when the appearance of a give lost poem
| on the page of my memory becomes the sole determining factor that keeps me
| concentrating, otherwise, as I said, I feel this dizziness, as though I
| had lost some essential part of my constitution. The act of trimming my
| memory of all excesses to single out the very moment in which I lost
| concentration and did not keep an eye on my lost or stolen black bag
| brings me again and again to the arrival in the pub where I was having a
| drink with my fellow poets after the Open Mike of my dear daughter who
| said "You see Mamma, now it is me coming to pick you up, and take you
| home, as you used to do with me when I was little". I was so happy to hear
| that that took my personal bag only, which was hunching from the chair,
| and possibly disregarded to pick up the other bag containing the folders,
| left at my feet, on the floor, by the many chairs put in a circle. My
| daughter was so charming that all the people presents turned to say hello
| to us when we left, and we left almost feeling pushed out by all those
| smiles and waving (she said she does not remember me leaving carrying any
| bag). The Greeks cherished the idea that sight results from shining
| penetrating rays issuing from the pupils: I wished I had these piercing
| rays and be able to locate where my files are and if they still exist.
|
| Paper is such a frail insubstantial staff and in the last few days it has
| been raining...
|
| Thank you again for the understanding and help,
|
| Erminia
|
|