I liked Joe Green's statement about the weirdness of
poetry. I just got a new book, by one "Geoffrey Hill"
and it contains a poem titled "Improvisations for Jimi
Hendrix." Holy Electric Ladyland! This might be even
more delectible if it were a hoax. Like uncovering a
"Fifth Quart-tet" by Eliot switching his allegiance
from God to the "waters of oblivion."
The Yasusada affair was delectible after all. I just
checked my backfiles of Stand and see that Jon Silkin,
after he received a Fax from a Professor of Japanese
in Australia, published his own fax to Kent: "It is
one thing to hoax, but it is quite another to take
money under false pretenses, which I believe you have
done. After all the money was supposed to go to
translators and there aren't any!" So he got the money
back--smart man. Literary magas always need money.
Lots of readers responded positively to the poems
though.
David Latane
http://www.standmagazine.org (Stand Magazine, Leeds)
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