I’m Okay, I’m Just Floundering April 23, 2007: A snippet of a quite engaging and sensitively written review by Conor O’Callaghan on Louise MacNeice called, quite badly, “His Master’s Voice” in Poetry, posited a curious idea that has been riding me since. Here is O'Callaghan's statement: “The received thinking has long been that MacNeice hit a drab spell during the late forties and [...] by Kwame Dawes

Shall I nail thee to a summer’s day? April 20, 2007: Stephen Colbert challenges Sean Penn to a Meta-free-phor-all, with Robert Pinsky presiding. (Via Betsy and Jimmy) by Ed Park

Poetry is Dangerous via Kazim Ali April 20, 2007: This story came to our attention via the NYU listserv. Kazim thought it was a good idea to post it here, too. "On April 19, after a day of teaching classes at Shippensburg University, I went out to my car and grabbed a box of old poetry manuscripts from the front seat of my little white beetle and carried it across the street and put it next to [...] by Emily Warn

Open Thread #1: Art & Commerce April 20, 2007: Kenneth sed: (referring to this post) Kwame, It's clear to me why you feel the way you do: you're getting paid to blog here. As Brian Eno says, "Art is everything we don't need to do." Blogging here is something you must do (at least for three months), hence it ain't art. -- Kenneth Kwame sez: Kenneth, you have to be wrong, I think. The day [...] by Kenneth Goldsmith

More Translation Matters April 19, 2007: So while plowing through a recent translation edition of Poetry, I began to underline a few interesting phrases and sentences that struck me as a useful addendum to my other posts on translation. I am intrigued by most of these statements because they are so rich with cliché and tautology, and yet they have this quality of contriteness and [...] by Kwame Dawes

Responding to Violent Poems in the Classroom April 18, 2007: When I taught creative writing at Lynchburg College in Virginia, I discovered, like many creative writing teachers, that violence pervaded the lives of many undergraduates students. After receiving several poems about assaults, suicide, and abuse, I conducted an unscientific survey. I asked students to anonymously list violence they, their [...] by Emily Warn

Book Notes: D. Revell and C.D. Wright April 18, 2007: Book Notes Is Kenneth Goldsmith the lost triplet of Henry Thoreau and Ronald Johnson? Donald Revell called the latter two “twinned visionaries” in his new book of essays Invisible Green (Omnidawn). They both drank from the same arrowhead he hypothesizes--by which he means their writing depends on “facts found as they are.” Their art is to [...] by Emily Warn

Does He Not Have a First Name? April 18, 2007: So here is my take on the Imus matter. Might as well get it out here before it decides it wants to be a poem or something. Wouldn’t want to devote my poetic reserves on something that has already gone past its “sell-by-date” in the media market-place. (I am being ironic, people). I have watched Imus without regularity but with enough [...] by Kwame Dawes

Honoring the poet inside? April 18, 2007: A few months ago I asked some of my students: what are you doing to honor the poet inside you? Now I will turn a version of the question towards myself. (more...) by Jeffrey McDaniel

Martin Espada April 17, 2007: Martin Espada dances when he reads--his tall, full body twists elegantly, and he lets his right hand create waves of grace in the air as his words hustle to keep up with the body's desire to leap, to take to the air. He will bend a knee awkwardly, the plant his foot back down tenderly, as if afraid to crush something under foot. He says that [...] by Kwame Dawes