Mark Weiss wrote:
> The morality of poetry is honest craft.
>
> I get a bad holocaust poem in the mail almost every week, some from
> very fine poets. Especially on the part of Jews it seems to be a
> required exercise, or maybe exorcise. Like trying to describe an
> orgasm, or saying what's so wonderful about one's girl-boy-friend. Or
> how awful one's parents were. Basically, no matter how deeply felt (or
> coerced--one's lover usually expects a poem) it's usually occasional
> verse, a task one sets oneself to. No matter that it may be the
> reality that hangs over everything. Like most important things it's
> usually only possible to talk about it indirectly. And the self in
> self-expression lives somewhere beneath all this; the evidence that
> it's there at all inheres in the words chosen.
>
> Poetry is sometimes therapeutic for poet or reader, but it's not therapy.
You jogged something. I wrote a ur-poem called "The Liberator" which I
dedicated to my former wife's uncle, who was one of the Yiddish-speaking
troops summoned from Eisenhower's army to translate for the survivors
and dying at Bergen-Belsen. I dreamed the incident, wrote it down, sent
it to Charles Fishman, and he said (in effect) "This sucks, burn it." I
didn't burn it but it really _does _suck. A reminder that trying to
describe what you've never seen is a neat trick at best. Now, I've had
some success writing out of time, writing historically. Where is the line?
Ken
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Kenneth Wolman www.kenwolman.com kenwolman.blogspot.com
39. Not observing the imperfections of others, preserving silence and a
continual communion with God will eradicate great imperfections from the
soul and make it the possessor of great virtues.
--St. John of the Cross, Maxims on Love (The Minor Works)
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