Paradise and Inferno

The World War I poet Ivor Gurney wrote: “There are strange Hells within the minds War made.” If a new Vietnam War poem is ever written in America, it will be a descent into that…

With Gratitude for Rexroth

Kenneth Rexroth, 100 Poems from the JapaneseNew Directions, 1964 Dear EJ Kenneth Rexroth—poet, polymath, anarchist, and pacifist—is a fine guide to Chinese and Japanese poetry.  He provided six books of translation for the enrichment of…

Dylan’s Tweets

Yesterday I had lunch and spent some time with Andrew Ivers, a gentleman and a scholar, at Courtesy Diner on Hampton. Of course, we eventually came around to Bob Dylan, after Andrew gave me a…

Favorite Mary Oliver Poems

Instructions for living a life: Pay attention.Be astonished.Tell about it.–Mary Oliver, from “Sometimes” Laura …When I Am Among the Trees When I am among the trees,especially the willows and the honey locust, equally the beech, the oaks…

Denying Adorno

I have no idea that at the same time in the United States of America, Theodore Adorno has come out with the sweeping statement that to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric. A meaningful, powerful…