Just started reading lots of Anne Carson which has been consistently blowing me away.
― Michael_Pemulis, Monday, 5 September 2011 22:50 (twelve years ago) link
I like Halliday a lot, especially his first book Little Star, which was embarrassed/confessional/honest in a funny way. He has a kind of casualness that may have been fresher in the world before blogs and message boards.
There's something about his assumption of a stance of resignedness that I find weirdly offputting: that might be part of it.
Meanwhile, today the British poet laureate told us that "poetry is the original text messaging" -- also that "If you look at rapping, for example, a band like Arctic Monkeys uses lyrics in a poetic way."
― thomp, Tuesday, 6 September 2011 10:43 (twelve years ago) link
Has anyone read Philip Levine, the new U.S. laureate? I didn't realise they had such sharply defined terms for the job, over there.
― thomp, Tuesday, 6 September 2011 10:44 (twelve years ago) link
He's one of the 1928 poets (also Merwin, Ashbery, Kinnell, and more. This one and this are representative of his work. Depending on the poem, reads like bad Whitman or great Whitman. Easy reading, in terms of flow and clarity.
― reggae night staple center (Eazy), Wednesday, 7 September 2011 00:03 (twelve years ago) link
i never mentioned on this thread that i'd read lynn emanuel's noose and hook, which i thought was kind of fantastic
― desperado, rough rider (thomp), Monday, 20 February 2012 22:28 (twelve years ago) link
Maggot - Paul Muldoon. Read through about a month ago, didn't leave a huge impression. Liked that first combat/cancer sequence, but overall I'm feeling a bit worn out by the Muldoon music: that rhyme game again, verse always twists into the same patterns of unexpectedness. A step back from that big poem at the end of Horse Latitudes maybe? Anyway, he's interesting, always distinctive, etc etc but I don't really like his verse that much
is this the one with the sort-of sonnet-sequence with the repeating verse? yeah that sucked
― desperado, rough rider (thomp), Monday, 20 February 2012 22:31 (twelve years ago) link
I need recommendations! The last poetry I read was a collection of (Dante Gabriel) Rossetti sonnets.
― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 20 February 2012 22:32 (twelve years ago) link
Then you might like Charles Sinker's poem about, actually to Parkinson's. Mark's context becomes poetic too, under the pressure of communicationhttp://freakytrigger.co.uk/ft/2012/02/music-poetry-parkinsons-disease/
― dow, Monday, 20 February 2012 23:39 (twelve years ago) link
I'm a poet, you guys should read me. Google "crucial spawl"
― Raymond Cummings, Wednesday, 7 March 2012 05:47 (twelve years ago) link
Read a fair bit of Hugo Williams's Collected Poems; always found him sporadically impressive but a bit footling before, then read that poem from a few LRBs back, 'From the Dialysis Ward', and thought it brilliant. Reading the Collected, felt I was closer to right the first time, tho' I underestimated him a bit - gifted, first collection terrific, but really rapidly slides - fairly dull poet of domesticity, prosy line, and a removed/poised patrician thing that grates. Also half his poems are about his dad, he should let that go. Feel like his most fertile territory is poetry about being quite handsome, this is an unusual topic.
― woof, Saturday, 23 March 2013 20:02 (eleven years ago) link
Hey I'm a poet too, read me, google "yeah right"
― donald nitchie, Wednesday, 27 March 2013 01:07 (eleven years ago) link
You seem to speak sarcastically, as if being a poet were some unattainable height. On the contrary, a poet is just a person who writes poetry. There are great poets, good poets, intermittently competent poets, rather bad poets and horrible crapulous poets. btw, writing one poem is not enough to qualify as a poet. At a minimum you have to work at it and care about poetry.
― Aimless, Wednesday, 27 March 2013 01:36 (eleven years ago) link
just finished Charles Bernstein's latest, Recalculating. never read Bernstein before; found the book bracing, challenging, and (ultimately) wonderful. what else should I read?
― underused emoticons I have gotten confused (bernard snowy), Wednesday, 27 March 2013 01:48 (eleven years ago) link
Agree with you Aimless on all points. Sarcasm intended, though I thought Raymond's post was like a poem worthy of pointing out (though I didn't google "crucial..." Did you?) I also think every poem written is implicitly saying Hey I'm a poet read me, and is greeted with (and rightly so) Yeah right
btw, Charles Bernstein is, I think, a waste of time as a critic but an an intermittently competent poet. Read Girly Man
― donald nitchie, Wednesday, 27 March 2013 03:52 (eleven years ago) link
I also think every poem written is implicitly saying Hey I'm a poet read me
An interesting critical stance, but not one I expect to take the world by storm.
― Aimless, Wednesday, 27 March 2013 04:29 (eleven years ago) link
DOES ANYONE HAVE AN OPINION ON PATRICIA LOCKWOOD oops capslock
― attempt to look intentionally nerdy, awkward or (thomp), Sunday, 7 April 2013 14:37 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.theawl.com/2011/12/two-poems-by-patricia-lockwood
bernstein is pretty good at both criticism and poetry but girly man is maybe his worst thing ever, get a copy of 'all the whisky in heaven: selected poems' (been remaindered i think?), have a flick through 'attack of the difficult poems' and 'content's dream' if you have access to a library with that sort of thing, particularly 'recantorium' in the former
― attempt to look intentionally nerdy, awkward or (thomp), Sunday, 7 April 2013 14:39 (eleven years ago) link
one of the poems in the new book is a list of the words in girly man, in descending order of frequency
I got the selected, haven't done more than flip thru it yet tho
― Emeralds should have definitely done this before they split imo (bernard snowy), Monday, 8 April 2013 18:33 (eleven years ago) link
more patricia lockwood, sort of
http://www.thingx.tv/articles/mad-men-poetry-recap-season-6-premiere-2335/
― attempt to look intentionally nerdy, awkward or (thomp), Monday, 8 April 2013 18:54 (eleven years ago) link
Sorry guys
I suck at self promo
― Raymond Cummings, Sunday, 14 April 2013 04:07 (eleven years ago) link
i flipped through the new bernstein the other day in st marks bookshop and it didn't really "click", unfortunately, but i want to return to it at some point. i really like the poetry of ben lerner, and have read two of his collections: the lichtenberg figures and angel of yaw. they touch on theoretical questions, and in this way show the influence of the Language poets (i suppose), but for the most part work really well just as lyrics. There is a lot of humor in his work, and an everpresent mood of sublimated melancholy... the prematurely resigned sadness of the precocious artist. Here is a link to some poems from the Lichtenburg Figures (2004): http://www.theparisreview.org/poetry/248/ifrom-i-the-lichtenberg-figures-ben-lerner Lerner's 2011 novel "Leaving the Atocha Station" is very enjoyable too.
― Pat Finn, Sunday, 14 April 2013 05:56 (eleven years ago) link
Hey, a good friend of mine has an essay in today's NY Times about the influence of Jack Handey's Deep Thoughts on a new generation of American poets.
― cougars and sneezers (Eazy), Sunday, 14 April 2013 13:50 (eleven years ago) link
that is a good essay and i should probably read some of those poets
― attempt to look intentionally nerdy, awkward or (thomp), Sunday, 14 April 2013 16:27 (eleven years ago) link
that lerner poem upthread is really good! that is all
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Tuesday, 16 April 2013 01:28 (eleven years ago) link
or 'those lerner poems', i'm not really sure
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Tuesday, 16 April 2013 01:30 (eleven years ago) link
they are separate poems. the lichtenburg figures is a sonnet sequence actually. but thanks, yeah, he is one of my favorite contemporary poets. if you liked those you should check out his novel too, which had me laughing out loud at several points.
― Pat Finn, Tuesday, 16 April 2013 03:11 (eleven years ago) link
Damn!
http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=KBK1sjr-MT8
― Public Brooding Closet (cryptosicko), Tuesday, 16 April 2013 14:22 (eleven years ago) link
I said, damn!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBK1sjr-MT8
― Public Brooding Closet (cryptosicko), Tuesday, 16 April 2013 14:23 (eleven years ago) link
not watching that
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Tuesday, 16 April 2013 15:38 (eleven years ago) link
was it a requirement of the form that they address their damn poems to famous women, what's that about
i saw louise mathias read last weekend and think she is pretty wonderful - there's a small sampling of her stuff here:
http://home.earthlink.net/~pero/louise-mathias.html
― Salt Mama Celeste (donna rouge), Tuesday, 16 April 2013 17:51 (eleven years ago) link
thanks for linking that jack handey article, eazy
― johnny crunch, Tuesday, 16 April 2013 18:03 (eleven years ago) link
Emily Berry's "Dear Boy" is absolutely fantastic, btw
― ✌_✌ (c sharp major), Sunday, 9 June 2013 17:42 (ten years ago) link
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/media/landays.html#feature
― Public Brooding Closet (cryptosicko), Thursday, 13 June 2013 03:25 (ten years ago) link
What's a good anthology of recent/contemporary American poetry?
― cardamon, Thursday, 20 June 2013 01:55 (ten years ago) link
the examples in that jack handey article sound a lot more like npr moth radio hour bits than deep thoughts
― i don't even have an internet (Hurting 2), Thursday, 20 June 2013 03:37 (ten years ago) link
probably not the right thread for it but, what do people think of jorie graham
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Thursday, 20 June 2013 16:58 (ten years ago) link
Have never liked a Jorie Graham poem, but in each case you could def come up with a list of interesting things the poem could be said to be doing.
― cardamon, Thursday, 20 June 2013 17:45 (ten years ago) link
haha yeah i see that
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Thursday, 20 June 2013 19:08 (ten years ago) link
I'm co-signing with cardamon's comment.
― Aimless, Thursday, 20 June 2013 20:16 (ten years ago) link
that's kind of how i feel about all poetry tho
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Thursday, 20 June 2013 20:26 (ten years ago) link
I saw Jorie Graham give a talk and a Q&A once and she was lucid and compelling, and I was like, Oh! I like her when she speaks directly!
― lols lane (Eazy), Friday, 21 June 2013 02:22 (ten years ago) link
yup, with cardamon here. I think of her as epitome of in-the-academy US poetry.
― woof, Friday, 21 June 2013 09:35 (ten years ago) link
got bought John Burnside's The Hunt in the Forest for birthday. Clearly a good poet, finding the repeatedly used tools (woods, darkness, illness, slaughter) a bit tiresome. It's enjoyable, but there aren't many 'Yes!' bits really. I like best his less freighted depictions of nature - esp winter, drizzle, that sort of thing, and he's at his best in this where extremes of darkness, death, insubstantiality, dying etc are replaced by things attenuated by... well, atmospheric dreariness I guess. I like his general approach, and the pastoral of cancer, illness and sensations of light and gloom, but it somehow doesn't quite hit the mark a lot of the time. Still good, still very pleased to get it.
― Fizzles, Monday, 1 July 2013 20:17 (ten years ago) link
― woof, Friday, 21 June 2013 09:35 (1 week ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
which american poet is the epitome of not-in-the-academy u.s. poetry?? not that i disagree with you, the biggest fan of hers i know is a hahvahd guy
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Monday, 1 July 2013 20:36 (ten years ago) link
i don't know i spelt it like that, he's not one of those harvard guys
I Watched a Snake
hard at work in the dry grass behind the housecatching flies. It kept on disappearing.And though I know this has something to do
with lust, today it seemed to have to dowith work. It took it almost half an hour to threadroughly ten feet of lawn, so slow
between the blades you couldn't see it move. I'd watchits path of body in the grass go suddenly invisibleonly to reappear a little further on
black knothead up, eyes on a butterfly.This must be perfect progress where movement appearsto be a vanishing, a mending of the visible
by the invisible--just as we stitch the earth,it seems to me, each time we die, goingback under, coming back up . . . It is the simplest
stitch, this going where we must, leaving a notunpretty pattern by default. But going out of hungerfor small things--flies, words--going because one's body
goes. And in this disconcerting creature a tiny hunger,one that won't even press the dandelions down,retrieves the necessary blue- black dragonfly
that has just landed on a pod . . . All this to sayI 'm not afraid of them today, or anymoreI think. We are not, were not, ever wrong. Desire
is the honest work of the body, its engine, its wind.It too must have its sails--wings in this tiny mouth, valvesin the human heart, meanings like sailboats setting out
over the mind. Passion is work that retrieves us,lost stitches. It makes a pattern of us, it fastens usto sturdier stuff no doubt.
― the bitcoin comic (thomp), Monday, 1 July 2013 20:38 (ten years ago) link
presented without comment except that obviously the indenting is not meant to be like that.
which american poet is the epitome of not-in-the-academy u.s. poetry??
wcw!! at least then.
― j., Monday, 1 July 2013 21:04 (ten years ago) link
I agree with the magazine's slogan: whatever that is, I'm against it.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 6 August 2021 21:22 (two years ago) link
.
― No Particular Place to POLL (James Redd and the Blecchs), Friday, 6 August 2021 21:41 (two years ago) link
jesus
― flopson, Saturday, 7 August 2021 05:49 (two years ago) link
, conditionally,
― jmm, Saturday, 7 August 2021 12:31 (two years ago) link
lol i was wondering if that would get posted here
― plax (ico), Saturday, 7 August 2021 16:54 (two years ago) link