Four in the morning: my stomach is bothering me (was it the soy sauce?).
Restless, stretches of time in bed sectioned with looks at computer screens and taking various books off the shelves.
I keep looking through the five shelves of poetry for just what I want to read: I don't know what it is but will know it (perhaps) when I see it –
not Anne Carson, a new name, she gets too visceral at points; not Cavafy, Auden, Rilke. Something calm and perfect, beautifully made, but not upsetting: almost but not quite like some of Pound's Personae. (And absolutely nothing anywhere in the worlds of Plath, Sexton, Eliot – all way too upsetting, utterly not what I'm looking for at the moment).
Most modern Western poems don't fit my mood: the desperation of individuals trying to arouse the great public of a too-crowded world to listen, listen, listen – all too passionate, dramatic and shrill. Or tragic. None of those things, not now: some kind of poem that is like a dream, and a calm one, glassy and fascinating.
Perhaps like that wonderful one by Charles Wright – what is it – 'Snow' I think.
I hear you saying: well you want haiku, don't you?... no, too clichéd. Even Basho is too artificial in English.
Milosz, maybe, as he remains calm: not the long poems, but something short. I don't want to be led into a long disquisition on time and everything that is.
Or maybe best: a small pile of books, those blessedly slim and graceful poetry books, put on the shelf next to my bed....
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