Hi Mark,
I bet you are the youngest on this list...
I would like to ask you, by saying:
As for education
> I can't currently afford the interest.
do you mean you cannot go to university?
If this is the point I am sure a lot of people have plenty to say about the
kind of education they received at university. On my side I had a very
technical one since I am a translator and interpreter, nothing to do with
poetry or prose; and I couldn't wait to end it in order to have some time to
read the books I wanted and kept on piling up, which is something I am still
doing.
I think you can reach a maturity in any artistic field only through
self-education.
Sure, I do not deny what I studied in those university years, be it at least
for the notion of the amount of time one has to spend on and with books.
Take care, Anny
> For what it's worth I too enjoyed the poem and the story.
>
> But poetry is no dead duck. It may be severely mutilated, abused,
> detached and isolated but this is an uprising at source. I am surprised at
> so much seeming negativity on the prospect of the future by so many
> inspiring minds. I thought that through language people could find a
higher
> ground, (even in the face of over whelming odds) and in poetry counter,
> perhaps, the 'real', - but this is possibly an un-useful term. I am not
the
> brightest, and it is difficult for me to communicate here, - 'overly
> paranoid cast in a self-alienated barrack' (generational!?). But some
modern
> poetry invigorates and attempts to negotiate a possible inference. If only
> in a small and strangely silent way. (butterflywings.)All of this probably
> means very little; but book shops that can't even distinguish between art
> and graphic pornography are faceless and base (they could and should do
> more). Anyway bring out my violins because I may never have the courage to
> write anything here again. but as a voyeur. and hope. I continue to find
> poetry that instructs, delights and draws acid to my mouth. As for
education
> I can't currently afford the interest. and as for a pension I'm banking on
> poverty. but while there is Grannom on the water, I won't starve!
>
> love,
> mark
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Douglas Clark" <[log in to unmask]>
> To: <[log in to unmask]>
> Sent: Monday, June 24, 2002 10:41 PM
> Subject: Re: so far so good
>
>
> I enjoyed the poem and the story. I am now in my tenth year
> of redundancy/retirement and am in my sixtieth year. I only
> do what I want to do and spend most of my time reading/in pubs/
> listening to music. I am lucky that there is just enough money
> for me and the cat. Future generations wont have my luxury with
> the current crash of final salary pension schemes. Or my luck
> in having a free education. I am currently reading Niall Ferguson's
> 'The Cash Nexus' and getting an eagle-eye perspective on what
> has produced globalisation which I have to follow-up in
> Eric SChlosser's 'Fast Food Nation'. I have stopped buying
> poetry because it is all so mediocre nowadays. If I see a
> new edition of one of my old masters I may be tempted.
> But poetry in the UK is a dead duck. The bookstores realise
> that. And maybe next week I will write a new poem if I can
> think of a subject I can write about.
>
>
>
> Douglas Clark, Bath, England mailto: [log in to unmask]
> Lynx: Poetry from Bath ..........
http://www.bath.ac.uk/~exxdgdc/lynx.html
>
> On Tue, 25 Jun 2002, cooee wrote:
>
> > these exchanges about birthdays, and now the to me very resonant phrase,
> so
> > far so good, bring me to unearth a doodle written during a semester of
> long
> > service leave in my early sixties...
> >
> > The Retiree in Winter
> >
> > Off you go, they said,
> > have the rest of your life!
> > Have, enjoy. Oh, I'm having it,
> >
> > in lieu of alternatives,
> > and it looks like lasting
> > well, here for the duration.
> >
> > Lasting takes time, I find.
> > Still, I can spare the time
> > which is all I've got.
> >
> > My gardenıs fallen leaves
> > I raked in
> > from beneath my bare trees.
> >
> > Each evening now
> > I light the fire
> > with the rakings.
> >
> > Like emptied files
> > from a closed-down office
> > they burn slowly and well
> >
> > to signal-less smoke
> > and inscrutable ash,
> > gratifying my nostrils.
> >
> > Then I burn sections
> > I have sawn and split
> > from former trees:
> >
> > slow to grow,
> > slow to die,
> > slow to burn.
> >
> > Everything runs down,
> > yet with a little help
> > the garden renews itself.
> >
> > Finished with work
> > I have made my will:
> > cremation, of course;
> >
> > to my son, axe and saw;
> > to my daughter, potting-mix;
> > to my wife, my urn.
> >
> > Whatıs left beside,
> > tax office and bank
> > expect to divide.
> >
> > Time treated me kindly:
> > temperate climate,
> > fertile soil; enough rain;
> >
> > flowers and fruit,
> > wine and meat;
> > company better than deserved;
> >
> > decent job and pay,
> > the pleasures of leisure;
> > a roof over my head;
> >
> > holiday travel,
> > safe return home,
> > a warm shared bed.
> >
> > So far, so goodS
> > beyond? much to fear;
> > but now is a lull.
> >
> > That came, then, out of mere fear of retirement. Now I have just reached
> my
> > midsixties and another bout of leave to burn up next year. Thirtyfive
> years
> > teaching, and I still wake up thinking such thoughts as 'when week one
> gets
> > going, I shall really get the new students humming with 'Neutral Tones',
> try
> > again to get them to see why it's better than Yeats's 'Ephemera' ('Your
> eyes
> > that once were never weary of mine...'). then push on as far as 'During
> Wind
> > and Rain' - which got crowded out last year...
> >
> >
> > Ah, no! the years, the years!
> >
> >
> > best wishes to all the young from
> > Max Richards at Cooee, Melbourne
> >
> > the pre-dawn winter solstice full moon webbed by bare magnolia branches
> > shines on the clingwrapped morning paper on the driveway with its pages
of
> > bad news, trivia, death notices, birth notices, and no doubt the
obituary
> > columns will be mostly about achievers who were younger than me when
they
> > died
> >
>
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