I love that. It's very funny.
I also agree with Bob. I understand the frustration that can be felt at the hagiography of usual suspects, but there is beauty and value and the learning of craft in such works; a seam of richness, which can provoke (even in rejection), be absorbed and assimilated and used.
I didn't know this Larkin poem, and I am very grateful to Max for posting it - particularly for the images in the first two thirds.
In bed with 'flu, so time to post.
All the best,
Cindy
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-----Original Message-----
From: David Bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>
Sender: "Poetryetc: poetry and poetics" <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Sat, 21 May 2011 06:50:13
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Reply-To: "Poetryetc: poetry and poetics" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: my home for sale
'This poetry is so conservative and boring there is no point reading it'
Suzi, it is quite possible that Larkin might have regarded your comments as praise.
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-----Original Message-----
From: Suzi Hall <[log in to unmask]>
Sender: "Poetryetc: poetry and poetics" <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 19 May 2011 18:00:13
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Reply-To: "Poetryetc: poetry and poetics" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: my home for sale
This poetry is so conservative and boring there is no point reading it
On 19/05/2011, at 5:45 PM, Max Richards wrote:
> What more suitable prompting for tears than the finding of evidence
> that
> one's parents loved each other! By all means stifle tears in certain
> circumstances, but do make time, Chris, for some tearful blessings
> on them
> surviving now merely in you and maybe your siblings.
> And write them a poem. Best from Max
> The one that comes to my mind is by Philip Larkin,
>
> Love Songs in Age...
>
> She kept her songs, they kept so little space,
> The covers pleased her:
> One bleached from lying in a sunny place,
> One marked in circles by a vase of water,
> One mended, when a tidy fit had seized her,
> And coloured, by her daughter -
> So they had waited, till, in widowhood
> She found them, looking for something else, and stood
>
> Relearning how each frank submissive chord
> Had ushered in
> Word after sprawling hyphenated word,
> And the unfailing sense of being young
> Spread out like a spring-woken tree, wherein
> That hidden freshness sung,
> That certainty of time laid up in store
> As when she played them first. But, even more,
>
> The glare of that much-mentioned brilliance, love,
> Broke out, to show
> Its bright incipience sailing above,
> Still promising to solve, and satisfy,
> And set unchangeably in order. So
> To pile them back, to cry,
> Was hard, without lamely admitting how
> It had not done so then, and could not now.
>
>
> On 19/05/11 5:57 PM, "Christopher C Jones" <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
>> On Sat, 2011-05-14 at 20:22 +1000, Max Richards wrote:
>>> Good luck, Chris
>>
>> Right now I am going over the long out of date cheque books and bank
>> statements of my mother's and burning them.
>>
>> In between I find not only letters from myself to my parents but love
>> letters and cards between my parents. I am so fortunate that I had
>> parents that loved each other as much as they loved their children.
>>
>> I am told, that to prevent crying, push your tongue hard up into your
>> mouth and stare into the middle distance.
>>
>
> --
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