sw00010olp-2poets

2 Poets: David Antin and Denise Levertov


 Late last night into early this morning I read the
 better part of a David Antin interview.  Blessedly, 
 he has a sharp mind, otherwise he would not be able 
 to handle the threads of logic and intuition his
 talk performances require.  It is difficult to do
 what he does, but he believes that as poetry began
 as an oral art/ so should it remain.  His sense of
 poetry on the page is/ that it becomes drier and
 drier over time.  I, as you may already know, do
 not have that sense; but due to the comic in me, I
 find what he does attractive.  I even imagine myself
 now and again as an associative stand-up comedian,
 though if I ever do attempt to be one/ I will have
 my wee body brought on stage on a stretcher.  An
 opposing view comes from the late Denise Levertov.
 She felt poems should be written with a pen or a 
 pencil, then vocalized to catch "awkwardnesses".  
 I tend to write mine that way.  Lately I have been
 writing them on notepad paper.  She further felt/
 a poet should be in a kind of meditative silence
 when composing a poem, and that it is best if a
 reader is in a similar state.  I believe imagination
 can be revealed and enjoyed in as many ways as one
 can imagine.
 - - -
 Two clarifications
 -
 Antin does not see himself as a stand-up comedian,
 but neither does he disparage humor.  He would say
 one must go with the flow, or alter the flow as
 best seems fit.  What he does is not automatic
 writing, although the quickness of his mind may
 sometimes make it seem so.  The art he practices
 is highly active and interactive, and getting
 each passing moment right is the challenge.  Unless
 one has a photographic memory, Antin must be caught
 on tape, a fact he fully realizes.  Tape time is
 important, therefore, as well as is attention span
 and his intuition of the intelligence level of a
 given audience.  Gather ye forces as ye may. . . .
 -
 Works resulting from some ways of imagining are not
 what I would class as poems, even if the authors 
 of them think they are.  Hey! I can be a versifier
 as easily as anyone else can.  I've probably used
 all or part of the first line of "Mary Had a Little
 Lamb" a dozen times as a starting point to express
 another view.  I have also done the like with other
 nursery rhymes.  Once, when I read that Hamlet had
 a weight problem, I changed the famous "To be or 
 not to be" soliloquy to: 
 Tubby, or not tubby,
 "that is the question.
 Whether 'tis better to"
 go on a diet,
 or build a kite,
 and fly it.
 -
 I hope Shakespeare doesn't mind.
 = = = = = = =

 Sites to visit -
 www3.iath.virginia.edu/pmc/text-only/issue.593/
      antin.593
 -
 pw.org/mag/levertov.htm
 (Nicholas O'Connell, interviewer)



Brian A. J. Salchert