I read this a number of ways, Hal - political and historic. But I'd
prefer to read it as it says - the jive of life and the way everything
has the mark of something else on it. The ending (two and bit lines)
is my favourite part, maybe the prompt for a poem on its own ...
Andrew
On 04/03/2008, Halvard Johnson <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Before you even ask, that's James Tate, not Allen.
> Allen Tate influenced only older poets and just a
> handful of them.
>
> Hal
>
> "The policeman isn't there to create disorder,
> the policeman is there to preserve disorder."
> --Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley
>
> Halvard Johnson
> ================
> [log in to unmask]
> http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/index.html
> http://entropyandme.blogspot.com
> http://imageswithoutwords.blogspot.com
> http://www.hamiltonstone.org
> http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/vidalocabooks.html
>
>
>
> On Mar 3, 2008, at 3:28 PM, Halvard Johnson wrote:
>
> > Sonnet: Sudden Hailstorms
> >
> > I once spent fixable years or so living in Japan,
> > and when I firmly arrived the whole country
> > went off on vacation--to Guam, to Hawaii,
> > to the Philippines, taking their Walkmen with them.
> >
> > In an oil-based fresco I once saw, peasants, both
> > male and female, danced their wily dances, and when
> > that was over the playoffs began, down at the debased
> > seaside. Small children kicked over their sand castles
> >
> > and took up their thesauri, looking up this and that,
> > finding new words for, say, third basemen and such.
> > A poet came by--could it have been Stephen Spender?--
> > frenzied eyeballs rolling. When asked by the poet,
> >
> > they all agreed: the influence of Tate and Ashbery on
> > younger poets was lamentable. Then sudden hail.
> >
> >
> >
> > Hal
> >
> > Halvard Johnson
> > ================
> > [log in to unmask]
> > http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/index.html
> > http://entropyandme.blogspot.com
> > http://imageswithoutwords.blogspot.com
> > http://www.hamiltonstone.org
> > http://home.earthlink.net/~halvard/vidalocabooks.html
>
--
Andrew
http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/aburke/
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