A curious feature of this blogspot.com is that posts are sent to recipients at first publication but not in the tinkerings that may follow. So, if I tinkered with this very post after I press 'publish', you wouldn't perhaps know any changes I've made. Jon points out also that replies (always welcome) aren't set to be email alerts beyond to the originator of any given post.
Some changes are miniscule, important no less: Katerina advised that I change the "Amen" at the end of the new guinea pigs poem, and she's right. It's foolish to end an Orwellian Newspeak 'fact' with a holy 'so let it be'. I just liked linking Pushkin into the mix, adding his 5th (now heavenly) presence into the family of 4.
Some changes are rather huge, and that is what I just did to a still mediocre (but no longer awful) poem called "A fish called Haver". I wrote that one in a negative aspect and didn't even proof it when I hit publish. A typo like "predecent" late in the poem was of course supposed to be "precedent", but that wasn't the worst of it: I had no clear plan about the damnable side of the story, and still probably don't. At least now I feel it is gentler and indeed better proofed.
And that's what any of us can do here, in this little workshop/symposia. Joey and I constructed a basketball stand yesterday from a kit that had packed the wrong instructions. Katerina had ordered it online and it was a truly great surprise birthday present (which had to wait for warmer weather to put up). Complicated enough for its break-away rim springs and adjustable levers, Joe and I scratched our heads also to look for ratchet sockets and clamps and all sorts of tools strewn in our quite messy garage. But, as they say with worn books, that messy garage has enabled a lot of neat projects (inspired by Grandparents Elstad, Don Lamken, et al). I clean it occasionally, but don't mind so much if a couple projects--read: posts--go by with quick release.
And, to be sure, poems don't have to have the safety controls of, say, new shelves and stairs. I hope to post well, but I'm glad for that chance to revise.
Dan - I am intending to get a letter out to you - for all the time I spend on trying to memorize poems (more easily done while walking or driving), I don't sit down enough to simply write to people (as oppposed to the daily office work and the desk from which I must daily push away). But for now, know that I am reading and enjoying your latest entries. I especially like the Haver poem, and how you put some extended soul into it. Each time I've gone back to read that poem, I am surprised at how the poem, when you get to its natural turn, is perfectly longer than one expects. Now, I encourage you - memorize it. I am learning how valuable this is. But let me give more time to this in a regular letter - hopefully this weekend!
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