12/20/2005
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Rewinding the shuffle: Waldrop & di Prima (Revolutionary Letters). Amid everything else, about once a month the shuffle spits out a poetry track from In Their Own Voices, a 4-CD box set that isn't much use to me now, but then how things were different when it was a gift from SP about nine years ago... Next topic: this last week I was standing on the symmetry of blue book values, blue book exams, and blue the color of the paper in Warsh's book Part of My History (Coach House, 1972). I was busy and unable to get to emails, so the refrain kept winding through my head, "It's Thursday, the day we read from your letters." Then naturally this weekend I came down with a cold. I laid around, didn't get out much, but thumbed through things I'd read before, like all the Eileen Myles that is on my shelf at home (Skies and On My Way and Not Me). I reread Petroleum Hat and wondered about patterns of selection and arrangement. Here is the last line quoted from memory: "I squished time into love." For the sake of comparison, isn't there at least one 20C long poem with "love" as the very last word? As in the poet goes through a rough time, which the poem dutifully records, but then he/she ultimately has the resources to end on a promising note? And what is the deal with Wallace Stevens? I like it, but I want to figure out if there is a reason he makes a cameo in Deer Head Nation too. Next topic: Saturday I was the push of a button from ordering a robot vacuum cleaner for Dad. I decided not to, but apparently it's a big winner. Meanwhile I learned that the St*rnosed mole is the go-to person for all things Eastern European.

Comments on ""

 

Blogger Jessica Smith said ... (6:38 PM) : 

blair has one of those robo-vaccuuums. you should ask her whether she likes it.

 

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