Stephen Vincent wrote:
>I am arguing that our skills (poetry) are transferable and can help butter
>the bread (like create a salary). I mean why else is Ken Wolman - bless my
>jealous soul - getting this great new job with a fantastic salary!
>Definitely a stealth poet! Right Ken?\
>
>
And the days dwindle down to a precious few.... No, today, Happy End.
I don't know how great ANY job is anymore and the salary puts me back to
where I was 11 years ago when I got my first New York investment bank
job (it was back office, not Equities!). In other words I have been
living a version of Bohica for several years now because even a crappy
income was better than none.
Call me Wallace Stevens. I should live so long. Call me Dana Gioia,
former product manager for Lever Brothers. Shoot me. Don't call me
Weldon Kees or Ambrose Bierce, I don't park illegally and you'll always
know where to find me. Am I jealous? WTF, dude? I am jealous of the
people with full-time academic gigs, artistic work that pays anything,
people with a book or two and who get invited to read stuff at odd
places. I was out of class when they taught How To Capitalize on One
Success. After I won my one serious award in July '95 I thought I would
be invited as a "Poets Among Us" (local boyz 'n' girlz made good) at the
'96 Dodge Festival. How naive! How little I knew about connections
back then and what one may have to do to get an invitation to a festival
of that magnitude, regardless of merit. I try not to let my petty
resentments rule me, but they are best acknowledged--living like Jude
Fawley since 1990 can be irritating. As for Stealth Poets, I don't
know what a "stealth poet" is. As far as I know, poetry is not an
Anonymous program. "My name is Ken W. and I write poetry, sob-sob." I
have never made a secret of why I work--to support my writing habit
whether or not it "pays." A good friend was and remains the
Acquisitions Librarian for Drew University. She raises and trains dogs
and used to have a signature line "I'm only in it for the Kibble."
Ginny and I are not friends for nothing.
ken
--
Kenneth Wolman
Proposal Development Department
Room SW334
Sarnoff Corporation
609-734-2538
I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.
-Douglas Adams
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