Nice, Max. I've reviewed the CWC other book, and it is definitely worth
reading. Start at the front - it is loosely a verse narrative, with all of
Chris's quirks in it :-)

Your poem brings to mind two generous events:

When Tom Shapcott married Judith Rodriquez, they had many duplications of
modern poetry collections - so he bundled up the extras and sent them to me.
Brilliant present: Olson, Dorn, Rich, Harwood, Campbell, and so on. I was
stonecold broke at the time, so it was very timely and lifted my spirits.

When Andrew Taylor left his university office and took his books home, he
culled a lot of old American lit reviews - like Coyote's Journal, Kayak,
Evergreen Review, Kenyon Review - plus a few books (Brecht, Freud, etc) -
and gave them to me. Wonderful!

I'm off to live in China for a year from August, so don't send anything to
me, but be generous to some poverty stricken poet of your circle and they
will love you forever!
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Max Richards" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, April 19, 2006 9:36 AM
Subject: Snap 19 April 06


> Read It Again
>
> Just as I was being steered -
> elbow gripped by wife's hand -
> out of Alice's Bookshop
> ('you'd agreed we'd buy no books for a while'),
> a smile materialised in the Australiana room.
>
> It was Chris Wallace-Crabbe's,
> accompanied by himself,
> my senior by three years.
>
> Of course (we agreed) there's
> no room at home for more books,
> and the day impends when we each
> must vacate our loaded shelves
> at our old universities.
>
> 'There's a large category of books
> you know you won't live long enough to reread
> but still aren't ready to part with.'
>
> Sometimes at the nearby op shop,
> he offloads books, knowing students
> find some useful, as may those local
> workers who are into self-education.
>
> We didn't mention poetry.
> I didn't say Sorry I missed
> your recent double launch, Chris.
> Nor that I'd bought the cheaper one -
> it's called Read It Again, and already
> it's buried under more recent purchases.
>
> Out on Rathdowne Street
> I said to my wife 'Chris still has
> that resonant baritone voice.'
> She, the speechie, noted
> (what I hadn't) his slight lisp.
>
> Later I recalled Pope
> the Augustan poet,
> proud of his infant rhyming:
> 'I lisped in numbers for the numbers came.'
>
> In Pope's day no doubt
> both Chris and I (especially me)
> would have figured in his Dunciad.
>
> But the last King of the Cats is dead,
> and poetry is a fading smile
> out somewhere in a back room
> like that in Alice's Bookshop.
>
> Wednesday 19 April 2006
>
> Max Richards, Melbourne
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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