Though it is hard not to be sympathetic of much of Eileen Myles' 'charges' - I find them a little disingenuous. I was not there, but I gathered her recent reading in the Bay Area drew a huge audience and was really well received - anarchistic in spirit, et al. She has paid lots of dues through the very channels that now seem so dead, or not so much of use to her now. A bit like getting to the top of the mountain that you have worked to get to and then dismissing all the trails that helped get you there.
So part of me wants to take her grand standing on this as a bit self-serving.
That said, the public landscape for poetry as we had been trying to discuss is not so much bleak as much unclear how to configure and make itself a player. Optimist, however, forever, I take it as a fertile time.
That also said, Obama's speech to me - if not poetry - was a mind boggling tour de force yesterday. He said things that no US President would have ever dared to say. I do worry for his safety given the fanatical thugs backing up the multiple interests he stripped bare. I think he is a genuinely global president - not in a stupid imperial sense - but a responsible one.
Sadly I don't think the dinosaurs - in this country and abroad - are going to take this lying down. I say help watch his back with poetry and what and all ever.
Stephen
--- On Fri, 6/5/09, Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
From: Douglas Barbour <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: i-hate-poetry
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Friday, June 5, 2009, 10:39 AM
Well, this morning on CBC there was an interview with a rap artist & Darren Wershler, who teaches communications & has published concrete poetry & also work based on a 'machine' that generates 'poems' from the world wide web. He teaches rap & hip hop beside Dada etc. They were there because Edmonton has chosen Cadence Weapon, a hip hop artist as its next poet laureate.
So: what is poetry? was asked & (non) answered, as it cannot be, since everyone has hie s or her answer.
Which I thought about as I perused the comments at this site. And found myself wondering how so many comments simply passed by on the other side of the street from whatever they were reacting to: many just didnt seem to understand what others had said. But, I liked Bernstein on coteries, & can see why O'Hara might be seen that way. But also, I just have to wonder, Who could NOT 'get' an O'Hara poem? Mind boggled, I go back to y simple delight in the oetry I love best.
Doug
On 5-Jun-09, at 2:13 AM, andrew burke wrote:
> Wow, yes, what entertainment. Haven't dredged through it all, but I
> agreed with one point so far: wouldn't it be good to get more poetry
> into general readership media! The lit mags are good, and some are
> even prestigious to be in, but I do like to land on the kitchen table
> after Early General News and before Births and Deaths. There is
> something apt about that. Although, even then, the major newspapers of
> this country, if they do publish poetry, do it in a supplment or
> somewhere arty where the general reader won't trespass. Defeats the
> purpose a little.
>
> Thanks for that link, Dave.
>
> 2009/6/4 David Bircumshaw <[log in to unmask]>:
>> http://www.poetryfoundation.org/harriet/2009/05/i-hate-poetry/
>> this is fun, and the comments, 85 in all, that follow it.
>>
>> (credit: I noticed the link on Silliman's blog)
>>
>>
>> --
>> David Bircumshaw
>> "Nothing can be done in the face
>> of ordinary unhappiness" - PP
>> Website and A Chide's Alphabet
>> http://www.staplednapkin.org.uk
>> The Animal Subsides http://www.arrowheadpress.co.uk/books/animal.html
>> Leicester Poetry Society: http://www.poetryleicester.co.uk
>>
>
>
>
> --Andrew
> http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
>
Douglas Barbour
[log in to unmask]
http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/
Latest books:
Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy)
http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664
Wednesdays'
http://abovegroundpress.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-from-aboveground-press_10.html
Swept snow, Li Po,
by dawn’s 40-watt moon
to the road that hies to office
away from home.
Lorine Niedecker
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