Anny, understood. I think I should feel as you do, but long training is hard
to overcome. I think, at its simplest, it is a matter of the editorial
function. Which -- as your own site demonstrates -- can be exercised on the
web. I'm just talking about a gut-level feeling that if it's not printed in
a book or journal, it isn't real. Partly, too, this is because books have
saved me so many times in my life, especially when I was young. And I, too,
read a lot on the web, with profit, though poetry not so much as prose.
jd
On Sun, Jun 29, 2008 at 10:56 AM, Anny Ballardini <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
> Opps,
> I think that Internet publishing is a publication, the fact that it is
> "virtual" instead of "real" does not affect me that much. It even partly
> appeases my guilty feelings for the destruction of trees to buy paper and
> stack it in my library bursting new books I have not had the time to read
> until now. And I do read a lot on the net, instead.
>
>
>
> On Sat, Jun 28, 2008 at 9:03 PM, Joseph Duemer <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > Ed, ouch! I guess the internet is a "literary catheter" & you're right I
> > don't really believe internet publication is "real" publication (I know,
> I
> > know), but yeah the cure is to keep on writing & writing to think. I
> hardly
> > know what I think until I have written it & the poem, lyric or narrative,
> > for me, is a mode of thought. I think that's what it's good for, to sort
> of
> > go back to Stephen'[s original question. The structures & constructions
> > required to make a poem offer a resistance to the chaos of sense
> > impressions
> > / impingements involved in living. The poem is how we map where & what we
> > are. OK, I get that much. Why, then, should any kind of publication be
> > required? (I think I have something like an answer to this question, but
> am
> > curious what others will say.)
> >
> > jd
> >
> > On Sat, Jun 28, 2008 at 2:46 PM, edward mycue <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> > > joseph, the "condition" (of not having recent poems accepted) may have
> > much
> > > to do with the changeover from the exclusively written publication
> > sources
> > > to the broader internet (which we "accept" but really don't believe in
> as
> > > much as even publication of very small press magazine publication
> issues
> > > that were likened often to kleenex--used and discarded--). ARE YOU SURE
> > IT'S
> > > RUST? says the little cockroach on the keyboard when my genie from
> > between
> > > my ears suggested pensively that i'd slowed as i maundred dawdling abt
> > what
> > > to do fustigating my failing self-regard in great danger of becoming
> > > annihilating narcissism and blaming it on age-deprived oils of youth.
> > >
> > > of course i counter: just press on regardless!
> > > but does work truthfully? my inner george carlin parries & thrusts.
> > >
> > > i think it's physical: think of bladder infection when you have a
> > > bladderful. forcing is not the answer here. you need the literary
> > > equivalent of a catheter perhaps. (what would that be?)
> > >
> > > keep writing?! yes! (but keep at near remove a device to relieve
> > > remembering the lawrence fixel comparison of poets' having the
> imaginary
> > > carrot and imaginary stick vs. the real carrot and stick that writers
> of
> > > plays, screenplays, & other narratives have.)
> > >
> > > edward mycue
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > --- On Sat, 6/28/08, Joseph Duemer <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> > > From: Joseph Duemer <[log in to unmask]>
> > > Subject: Re: The lyric poem - what be its current fate?
> > > To: [log in to unmask]
> > > Date: Saturday, June 28, 2008, 6:11 AM
> > >
> > > *Stephen writes:* "Without this surrounding labor of critical
> community,
> > so
> > > many often extraordinarily fine lyric poems - let alone larger forms. -
> > end
> > > up fleeting around, or become paralysed in a kind of statuary limbo.
> They
> > > may vibrantly appear in a small publication, then disappear as readily.
> > For
> > > the poet it takes a fierce stubbornness to put up with can appear as an
> > > almost instant annihilation or a perennial sense of being 'not quite
> dead
> > > on
> > > arrival'."
> > >
> > > This has certainly been my recent experience, both as reader and
> writer.
> > > Poets have almost always worked the liminal edges of American culture,
> > but
> > > the edges seem to have become cliffs in recent decades, with poets &
> > poems
> > > dropping out sight leaving hardly a trace -- not even a fading cartoon
> > > scream followed by a thud & a puff of dust. That would be something, at
> > > least. Stephen is right, I think, to note the effect of recent American
> > > politics on all kind of cultural habits, the trend starts before Bush's
> > > completely demoralizing presidency. The country seems mostly dead to
> me,
> > > without affect, lost in a vaguely buzzing media haze in which the idea
> of
> > a
> > > lyric poem has no place.
> > >
> > > Speaking for myself, I've come to think of the poems I'm writing now as
> > > posthumous works. After a career of moderate success getting my stuff
> > > published, nobody will take what I'm writing now. Maybe I've just
> > > become a
> > > terrible writer after turning 55, or maybe my moment has simply passed.
> > In
> > > any case, I figure I'll keep at it until I hit 60 in three years and
> > unless
> > > something changes in the reception of my work, I'll turn my full
> > attention
> > > to gardening and cooking and leave poetry to others.
> > >
> > > jd
> > >
> > > --
> > > Joseph Duemer
> > > Professor of Humanities
> > > Clarkson University
> > > Weblog: sharpsand.net
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> > --
> > Joseph Duemer
> > Professor of Humanities
> > Clarkson University
> > Weblog: sharpsand.net
> >
>
>
>
> --
> Anny Ballardini
> http://annyballardini.blogspot.com/
> http://www.fieralingue.it/modules.php?name=poetshome
> http://www.moriapoetry.com/ebooks.html
> I Tell You: One must still have chaos in one to give birth to a dancing
> star!
>
--
Joseph Duemer
Professor of Humanities
Clarkson University
Weblog: sharpsand.net
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