Good discussion.
He's dead but I'm rereading Thom Gunn with great pleasure.
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Wednesday, 23 June 2021 22:23 (two years ago) link
plax, my opinion doesn't arrive from a conservative view, I don't think.
When I read Bernadette Mayer, for instance, or someone more actively "contemporary" like Lewis Freedman, I can tell that while the poems are often composed of long, sentence-like syntactic units, that they are *meant* to be that way; that is, they were written qua poems utilizing the form of the sentence.
In Robbins' work, I'm not so sure— the line breaks seem either disinterested or obvious or both. They read, in other words, as if Robbins wrote them as sentences, then lineated them later. I guess I should admit, then, that my bit about them "not being poetry" was hyperbolic, but what I meant is that I find poetry like this to be incredibly boring— but at least Robbins isn't as boring as this absolute shithead of a human being, whose work is *about* ideology rather than arriving from it, and whose entire first book is just bland rad-left truisms like this crap.
https://t.co/Qj8BW4UOD1 pic.twitter.com/ST18bLJKFr— Patrick (@prosepoems) June 4, 2021
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Thursday, 24 June 2021 20:44 (two years ago) link
He lives in Philadelphia, and honestly, I will punch him if I ever meet him.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Thursday, 24 June 2021 20:45 (two years ago) link
That's a poem?
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 24 June 2021 20:56 (two years ago) link
Supposedly.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Thursday, 24 June 2021 21:15 (two years ago) link
One of the strains in US contemporary poetry is what might accurately be called "socialist realism," in which a usually white person writes poems that are more about showing their personal commitment to class struggle and the cause of socialism. If you don't like the poem, then that means you are an elitist snob. Trust me when I write that these people have no sense of nuance, grace, or social skill.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Thursday, 24 June 2021 21:18 (two years ago) link
I think we may be overlooking the fact that poetry that is difficult to parse or understand is generally not popular, and the most popular poetry is generally pretty easy to read and understand because it follows rules of sentence formation and logic that are commonly assumed in prose.
Rupi Kaur, for instance. No socialist message, just short affirmative poems that generally read like prose-like fragments.
― o. nate, Thursday, 24 June 2021 21:23 (two years ago) link
we're talking about poetry, tho, not schlocky self-help shit that could be on a hallmark card
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Friday, 25 June 2021 17:26 (two years ago) link
That poem quoted above is way way worse than Michael Robbins, to the point that I find it really weird to bring it up in the context of Robbins's line breaks, and is from a book titled "Profit/Prophet" no less
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 25 June 2021 17:55 (two years ago) link
One of the strains in US contemporary poetry is what might accurately be called "socialist realism,"
I'm sure this is right but at the same time the poet quoted above says "Some of Patrick's writing can be found in Peace, Land, and Bread, SORTES, Recenter Press Poetry Journal, Mad House Magazine, Apiary, & Bedfellows" so he's not exactly representative of what kind of work is being rewarded by the mainstream US contemporary poetry universe
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Friday, 25 June 2021 17:57 (two years ago) link
Perhaps you don't understand how poetry actually operates in the world, then— almost any poetry book that sells over 250 copies is a high-selling book in contemporary US poetry. Even people whose books get published by major publishing houses don't sell much more than that. The actual "mainstream US contemporary poetry universe" consists of maybe 10 people, and many of them are (rightly) given little heed or respect. For example, no one I know gives a *shit* about Michael Robbins— he's considered an absolute joke among poets, some of whom are quite well-regarded.
This isn't meant to be a "oh whoa is me, why doesn't anyone love poetry," by the way— I'm fine with the crumbs thrown to me by the establishment, and that my last book went into a second printing. It's just that there needs to be a big adjustment as to what is considered "mainstream" in this conversation, seeing as how books that haven't sold more than 100 copies win the National Book Award for poetry *all the time.*
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Sunday, 27 June 2021 19:27 (two years ago) link
And given that Blagrave's poem has been shared and retweeted hundreds of times, and his magazine Prolit has been featured in a major daily newspaper, his reach is one that might be considered "large" for the poetry world.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Sunday, 27 June 2021 19:30 (two years ago) link
Yeah I don't understand how poetry actually operates in the world so this is really interesting to me! I would have thought the "mainstream contemporary poetry universe" was people who were published in, like, the New Yorker or Poetry (I know those are different people or can be) and whose books came out with FSG or Graywolf (also different I know) and who, like, won the National Book Award. But looking at this longlist
https://www.nationalbook.org/2020-national-book-awards-longlist-for-poetry/
I can see that indeed close to half of the books are from presses I've NEVER heard of. (The ones I know are Wesleyan, Copper Canyon, New Directions, Graywolf to give some sense of what I'm talking about.)
I guess what I'm saying is that I don't really know what I think the poetry universe IS. I thought a lot of it was, like, the people who have jobs teaching creative writing in colleges and publishing in Tin House or whatever. Except I see that Tin House has stopped publishing which goes to show you how up to date I am.
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Monday, 28 June 2021 15:42 (two years ago) link
lol that socialist realist poet reads to me as a kind of barbed irony (as in sincere but also self effacingly bald-faced)
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 13:09 (two years ago) link
Yeah, eephus!, it's a weird world that doesn't make a lot of sense any longer— with many writing programs relying on contingent labor, and a subcultural yet tiered market that in some ways mimics the larger literary marketplace, there's a ton of variation in terms of what gets lauded, what is accessible, and so on. For example, I have friends who have won some big awards, or been long-listed for some big awards, but none of them have books on major presses, and none of them are in academia. By the same token, I have friends who have been academics for 20+ years, but whose books never win awards and don't sell very well.
Sorry if any of my previous messages came off as dick-ish, btw! I find this conversation really interesting.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 14:58 (two years ago) link
There's also the case of someone like Liz Waldner, who won numerous awards and was considered one of the brightest poets of her generation, but who could not get hired for a full-time academic gig, so kept bouncing around visiting jobs until her health took a turn...and then, she had to run a fundraiser to keep herself alive. This is one of the finest poets of her generation!
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 15:01 (two years ago) link
On the contrary, I think I was the one being somewhat dickish, you said "one of the strains" and I think I just hadn't grasped how multidimensional and fragmented "success" was in poetry now so I made a snarky post based on the assumption that "has never published in a magazine I've ever heard of" meant "this is a poetry nobody." (pobody?)
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 17:22 (two years ago) link
Haha, well yeah, I just wanted to make sure that my giving of additional context wasn't read as me being some know-it-all shithead.
Some of the most well-regarded poets aren't widely know until they're old or dead. Just the way it goes!
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 18:55 (two years ago) link
i think in ireland eg the situation is somewhat different, bc of the relative size of the country and also because of how literature is seen as less elitist in general i think because of the relationship between literature and 20th c historical events etc.
that is to say 'contemporary poetry' is far from hegemonic and national and local contexts will have very different metrics of success and opportunities for support.
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:19 (two years ago) link
i'm always shocked (shocked!) at what privileged backgrounds people you meet in art/literary worlds are in the UK and while I know that this is pretty much the historical norm, it feels far more accessible and diverse in ireland but also far more knitted into people's ordinary lives so I think there's something to be said not only about success etc, but also a diversity of contexts that we care about and the kinds of non-professionalised practices/platforms that we recognise.
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:26 (two years ago) link
certainly it was totally normal for people of my grandparents generation to be able to recite poetry, often people with little literacy skills.
And i remember attending a wedding where a friend was getting married to an australian guy and his family was pretty baffled at how all the irish people kept insisting on making speeches and incorporating long passages of poetry (often written by non-professional poet friends!). I'm not saying this happens at every irish wedding but its not incredibly unusual either. the speeches thing is pretty universal though!
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:30 (two years ago) link
Oh absolutely, and I only really talk about the US because my knowledge of non-US poetry and literary communities isn't large...I know a good deal about Vancouver and Montreal, but that's still so-called North America. The only poets I know personally in the UK are white dudes, for example, which is clearly not representative...
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:33 (two years ago) link
i would say the 'hottest young thing' is ak blakmore whose work, to me, is simply "i went to oxbridge and then i got a septum piercing" but thats probably more uncharitable than it needs to be
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:42 (two years ago) link
my sex
enter breakfast truck, the bluebottlesperforming obsequies to marbled bacon
enter girl with manacles. enterso damn adorable. he likes small fuckdoll.
girl who looks plaintively at porcelainsalt and pepper shakers shapedlike kittens sleeping, intertwined. enterdesolation beside a pinstripe spider-plant enterknowing how to dress your pear-shape historyhistory, and after you follow, with a bucketand a mop – or words to that effect.
enter girl who applies the cooling gel.enter the Tate Modern to see Yayoi Kusama’sI Am Here But Nothing which please youcannot photograph like wheni found out there was a fetish for everything sexualityseemed like a great leveller. enter nothingtoo weird to enter, biking, amused savagetender repetitions of toilet cubicle graffiti.
enter Fathers in the Clouds (’99)enter my sex like act not gender and other songsthat make me cry my sex sometimes ballet shoesboth the stones in the pockets of my coatand the welcoming cold river.
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v40/n11/a.k.-blakemore/two-poems
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:44 (two years ago) link
i guess
― Guayaquil (eephus!), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:50 (two years ago) link
lmao that is rank
― imago, Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:50 (two years ago) link
replace that with the lyrics to 'my sex' by ultravox for infinite improvement
― imago, Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:56 (two years ago) link
Yeah that isn't quite good. Most of what I know is from SPAM and Face Press and Critical Documents...so perhaps similarly situated in the Oxbridge nexus, but more students of Prynne and that kind of thing..."difficult" poetry lol
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 19:58 (two years ago) link
i was loosely in with the Prynne crowd at the tail-end of university...there was some good stuff but it often came off as way too obscurantist and aloof for its own good
― imago, Tuesday, 29 June 2021 20:00 (two years ago) link
― imago,
my first thought when I saw the title
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 20:23 (two years ago) link
Imago, I admit that I am a huge fan of Prynne's work, but for the most part, I don't find his students' work as compelling.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 21:00 (two years ago) link
i feel almost bad about posting that blakemore one. i feel like the first thing i ever read by her was really good and i've never been able to remember where it was but yes that particular one is like the lyrics to a bongwater song except too full of itself and not as funny
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 21:32 (two years ago) link
also i can't say i've ready anything by prynne is there anything you would recommend? i read a thing about him online just now that says he is influenced by olson holderlin celan and o'hara which is quite a mix and very intriguing
― plax (ico), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 21:45 (two years ago) link
Plax, his collecteds (there are three editions, with timely additions in each) are worth looking for, but the one that gets most people into him is 'The White Stones,' which was reissued by NYRB a few years ago. The book is an outlier, in some ways, as the density and hermetic wordplay of his later work is not as foregrounded, but it's a lovely book, with some absolutely devastating poems in it.
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Tuesday, 29 June 2021 22:23 (two years ago) link
lol all of white stones is on genius.com for some reason!
― plax (ico), Wednesday, 30 June 2021 12:43 (two years ago) link
Ha, brilliant
― heyy nineteen, that's john belushi (the table is the table), Wednesday, 30 June 2021 13:17 (two years ago) link
I bought an actual physical copy of "Walkman" last week, at a bookstore in Cincinnati. I like it.
― o. nate, Tuesday, 6 July 2021 23:04 (two years ago) link
😬 https://www.3ammagazine.com/3am/jia-tolentino/
― jaymc, Friday, 6 August 2021 20:11 (two years ago) link
I have been enjoying the twitter reaction to that incredibly bad poem today.
― emil.y, Friday, 6 August 2021 20:52 (two 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