----- Original Message -----
From: "Janet Jackson" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, January 12, 2008 1:40 AM
Subject: Re: three poems
> Yes more enjoyable, stimulating stuff from Fred. I felt a bit let down at
> the end of the first one though, when it finished 'with death in the
> house'.
> I seemed to be expecting something more. Also, it made me think of Robert
> Frost, somehow.
>
The end gave me enormous difficulty - went through three versions each of
which I thought was finished - and I'm still not satisfied with it, but have
to draw a halt somewhere. My idea is that *they, the relatives, are the
death in the house. Ignorant and fearful as they are, they nevertheless
represent death to the type (the class or "subculture") they are currently
among. My type. My hope is that the abruptness of the ending - and the way
"With death in the house" is set off, a phrase by itself - will cue some
readers to this larger meaning.
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