Wednesday, August 8, 2018

220/365/Poetry and Form

Your folders were OKAY. Some members of the group did some fairly remarkable revisions and 2 semesters of growing in one workshop. Some circled the airport for months and managed to land with all cargo in tact. More than one member of the group blamed the group for the demoralization to which they undoubtedly contributed. You were, for better or worse, a weird and dissonant crew. You resented being reminded that you don’t seem to know much about the glorious company you wish to join. Every time I got up to look for a poem I thought might shed some light on our discussions, you broke up into little coffee clatches [sic] and talked about anything except poetry. Dave thought he was the co-pilot and never stopped talking; Marc hardly said a word but nonetheless did a very good revisions of one of John’s poems; Kathleen was hip and witty and neo-sixties and condescending; Kim was solemn and neo-classical and condescending; Marianne was surprised this wasn’t group therapy, was forthright and humble, and did some fine revisions; John joined the 20th Century with considerable success; Jackie stopped doing the suburban minuet and might learn to boogie yet; Dan filled in every pause in Dave’s monologue, never listened to anybody, and yet somehow (osmosis?) translated his transcripts into po-ems.

I don’t ever want you all back in the same room, EVER, but I want you all to keep reading and, if you must, writing. Your final assignment is Theodore Roethke’s essay, “The Last Class.” Also the complete works of Whitman, Hopkins, Baudelaire, Hardy, Dickinson, Frost, Williams, Pound, Eliot, Stevens, Moore, Blake, Donne, Browning, Keats, Lowell, Bishop, Roethke, Berryman, Creeley, Levertov, Kumin, O’Hara, Ginsberg (you can skip around), Wright, Brooks, Kees, Crane (H.), Gibran.

Happy Trails,
[professor’s dog’s name redacted]
[May 1987]

13 comments:

  1. Now the light dawns in a little corner of my memory and I remember this shot over our bows! Why is it that I don't remember having so many men in the workshop? And were we both condescending, at the same time, or did we take turns? Ha!

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    1. I thought I was too introverted to be considered hip and witty and neo-sixties, but hey, I'll take it. But I would never deign to condescend.

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    2. Oh, and I was worried there was the slightest chance you would be unhappy with me posting this, but it looks like it was OK to do it...? I certainly hope we were sometimes condescending at the same time. Perhaps we mastered the eye roll.

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  2. Holy shit, your life is never bland. I really think you should arrange a class reunion, possibly culminating in a "Murder on the Orient Express"-type revenge (Kim, apologies for the potentially dubious hyphen).

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    1. I would have used an en dash there, Helen, but that's me.

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    2. Then it definitely classifies as a dubious hyphen.

      (Bloody condescending bitch.)

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    3. Aacck: I meant "qualifies," not "classifies." I should stop putting anything in writing.

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  3. Oh yes, there are stories to be told here.

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    1. If only I could remember them. I can't even conjure many faces to these names.

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  4. I thought this was your letter to them until your name showed up and I thought surely this was fiction but no. So perfect.

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  5. It was a truly bad-energy workshop with very little talent. As insulting as some of this is, he isn't exactly wrong. There was one real poet in our group. I love that crazy, solemn, neo-classical, condescending gal. (Condescending? Really?)

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