For now, poetry will be my beach. Since May ’68 is a popular topic these days, I’ll say that one of my favorite slogans from that time is “Under the paving stones, the beach.” Having recently published in the Village Voice a roundup of some of the more notable—or at least noteworthy—poetry titles released circa November 1, 2007 to April 1, 2008, I had thought about proposing to the Poetry Foundation website editors (one of whom had invited me to write for the site) a companion piece on poetry books to take to the beach this summer, except that I haven’t been to the beach in years, and I can sympathize with Cam’ron’s jeer at Jay-Z for wearing man sandals in the Hamptons.
Anyway, before I could propose my article on poetry books for the beach, I got asked to blog for Harriet. So here I am. I don’t have a blog of my own; I don’t participate in listservs or online social networking sites; and while I used to thrill to the sense of inclusiveness conjured by the word community, I now tend to view it more for the exclusions it creates. But I do write a lot about poetry. And I’m not nostalgic for much of anything except the future, though I wonder whether if in forty years the anti-globalization protests that took place in Seattle in 1999 and afterward will be seen as more important than the rebellions of ’68 currently being celebrated.
This by way of introduction. Contra Ezra Pound: paradise is artificial. Under the beach, the paving stones.
Thank you, Alan, for introducing two of my favorite words to Harriet in this entry & via yr Voice article: Jay-Z & Lil Wayne – who on Tha Carter III is kind enough to deliver my favorite line of the year, by any poet: “My picture should be in the dictionary / next to the definition of ‘definition.’”
Posted By: Michael Robbins on June 6, 2008 at 12:36 pmI love Frederick Seidel as much as the next heteronormative white guy, but I don’t think even he could come up with this.
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Michael—No history of 20th-century poetry will be complete without an extended entry on hip-hop.
Posted By: Alan Gilbert on June 10, 2008 at 8:40 pmReport this comment