Hi Tim, 

That's nicely put. (especially that final insight about how people hate deconstructing mystery, which I link up with Riley's comments about the mystery of nature's processes in Burnside's poetry). 

This is a subject that's dear to my heart. I do see it as vitally important that we are able to give a persuasive account of poetry outside the experimental sphere. I suppose I have a power-struggle idea of the dominant discourse being the one that is best able to explain the others, so let's do it! And not merely by explaining the essential negativity, though that's important and a difficult challenge - not merely that, though, because after all the same principles tend to apply to whole schools of poetry, so it tends to be generic and to de-individuate its subjects (as well as leading to stand-offs in poetics, entrenchment, and all those things you mention). 

So I conceive the requirement for a sort of  "method reading" on the analogy of method acting,  i.e.  temporarily become the  reader who is drawn to the other poetry in question. Perhaps that's really impossible, but it's the image I have in my mind, anyhow.  Over the years I've had a few goes at this (e.g links below), and as it happens I've got another one on the boil at the moment:

(Richard Murphy)
http://michaelpeverett.blogspot.co.uk/2012/04/suns-kingfisher-rod.html

Some of these pieces are more critical than others, most are a bit mischievous, but I don't think there's any in which I haven't for at least a few minutes and a few lines felt real enthusiasm about something in what I'm reading. Without that feeling I wouldn't consider the exercise a success. There is, and must be, a genuine risk of ideological corruption. 

And really, that's why I'm disappointed with Riley picking his topics from the mainstream, because I don't find any real enthusiasm in e.g. his chilly words about JB's skilled use of language. I know it's a tough one. But he isn't compelled to write about Burnside. I'd rather he wrote about what he cares about. Maybe, as I began by suggesting, it's a contradiction inherent in writing for the Fortnightly Review. I will admit this much, that Riley's FR articles are cross-linked from the Poetry Society, he's certainly got visibility outside the alt-ghetto, so it's a terrific opportunity to put things out there. 

best, Michael

Those links: 

Colin Falck
http://www.intercapillaryspace.org/2008/02/colin-falck-post-modern-love.html
Cathal Ó Searcaigh
http://www.intercapillaryspace.org/2006/11/cathal-searcaigh-by-hearth-in-mn-le.html
Thomas Kinsella
http://www.intercapillaryspace.org/2006/06/thomas-kinsella-marginal-economy.html
Mario Petrucci
http://www.intercapillaryspace.org/2006/09/mario-petrucci-catullus.html
Rosanna Warren
http://michaelpeverett.com/selhist6.htm#RWarren2005





*

Hi Michael, now I'm not Peter Riley, and Peter Riley and myself have  
had our differences in the past with regards to the hard and soft  
options of opposition etc, but I do think you are being unfair here. I  
was tempted to follow up Peter's post with my own views about  
Burnside's poetry, but essentially what Peter said about it, as a  
description, matched my own take on it perfectly. The difference I  
suppose is the emotional one. How do we try to be objective about  
something that in certain terms appears to be quite excellent and yet  
does next to nothing for us personally (subjectively I suppose), or  
worse, highly irritates us? The choices are not simple. The work in  
question finds us enthusiastic or neutral or negative or irritated etc  
for a reason. Yes, what Peter doesn't do is shine any light on those  
reasons, the reasons for his own implied lack of enthusiasm for the  
work, but the alternative, to delve into the mechanics of that  
situation, is a sticky one, because it nearly always ends up in the  
attempt to fight    the battle from the 'poetics' corner, which leads  
to ideology and entrenchment. I'm not saying it has to do that, but  
that it usually does. And Peter is someone who does not do that, and  
for those very same reasons, I would assume. Therefore his critique is  
implied, not stated - it maintains a rather safe position, but it is a  
safe position which leaves the issue open to civilized debate. The  
problem with this, from my own experience, is that it limits the  
debate, it papers over what are fundamental fractures.

But the alternative, which is my own polemical experience, is fraught  
with problems - you start digging a hole and the hole gets deeper. I  
would never say that I had an entrenched position, but I would say  
that I was often pushed into what looked and behaved like one. What  
critique from an entrenched position tends to do is to take almost  
everything that is considered to be positive about a poem and turn it  
into a negative - which might seem to be ridiculous, after all this is  
poetry we're talking about, a shared activity to some degree, surely -  
we call both Carol Ann Duffy and Allen Fisher poets. And yet this  
attempt to understand what is going on with our positive and negative  
responses needs to be articulated. The question now is how to do it  
without the emotional while at the same time not restricting its  
scope. Not easy - because I am pretty sure that straight description  
(such as Riley's of Burnside) will probably be received negatively by  
those who 'love' Burnside's poetry. They don't want its mystery  
deconstructed.

Cheers

Tim A.