Poetics and Pahala

Hi all,
Hmm…synopsis. My statement of poetics is in the form of a fictional interview with Bill Moyers twenty years in the future in which I am perhaps the world’s first living, critically acclaimed, billionaire poet. If that’s not entertaining enough of a thought there’s also the fact that our “past” is revealed over the course of the questioning. Explained as a regretable alcoholic misadventure on my part, he’s eventually revealed to be a decrepit old man whose brain had been addled by hormone injections. Anyway. My main points are basically that my writing stems from the desire to elicit emotion in readers (which I find helpful to discuss in terms of Lorca’s “duende”), to exercise my voice as an artist (politically or otherwise, because unfortunately, politics have the tendency to reach into your life whether you like it or not), and to use the therapeutic aspects of writing to help promote (my own and others) understanding and healing. Variety of examples included.

In reading Saturday Night at the Pahala Theater while writing about duende--that emotional gut-check or turn a lot of good poems seem to have--I was struck by Lois Ann Yamanaka’s control of powerful emotion in her poems. Sometimes it hits you at the end, sometimes it sneaks up on you while you’re laughing, but the check (the turn, the deepening of the poem, whatever you wanna call it) is usually there somewhere. I tend to think this is related to the strength and believability of the characters’ voices and the way the book is occasionally structured as series of monologues. In addition, her poems are rife with details and stories (ah, oh helpful board list) and another useful tool—believable/realistic humor. Her humor often mixed in with pain and anger in her character’s attempts to deal with truly difficult and emotional situations. Not that the characters think they’re being particularly funny, a lot of the time they’re pissed off or just trying to deal with the fairly disturbing and illogical situations their lives and relationships throw at them. For example, “Tita: On Fat” cracked me up, but it also managed to deal with the illogic of the whole “body image” and “women and fat issue” in a realistic way. I’ve never read anything termed a “poetic novella” before, but it’s a fascinating thing to watch unfold. Perhaps, if this makes since, one of the reasons it works is that she takes her characters as seriously as they take themselves. Anyway, I can’t wait to hear her voice put to them next time.

An idea!

I just ran into Ken Goto in the hall. He asked if there is room on the blog for everyone
to post his or her poetics. I said no (perhaps there is, but that would be one huge chunk of texts). But why not post an abstract of your poetics, a one-paragraph summation of your central idea. That in itself is a worthy, and difficult, exercise. Then you can ask each other for versions entire if you wish and pass them around to each other...

Susan

Yamanaka and poetics

Those of you leading class on Monday (Cliff, Jim, Julia, Darlene), please let me know before Monday what you're planning to do. If you need sage advice on where to go with your presentations, I'm happy to lend it.

Remember to blog on Yamanaka. There is a tape of her reading most of the book; I'll play some of it on Monday. If you'd like to listen in the meantime, there are some tapes available at the UH Bookstore (or were) and probably (should be) at Sinclair. Even if you're not a pidgin speaker, in any case, read some of the poems out loud to yourself. This is not silent reading time. And we can talk about what that means, as well.

Also: remember to hand in revisions on Monday.

Finally: please bring 15 xeroxes of one of your poems to class on Monday. There does seem to be energy for reading each other's work, so take advantage of it!

Have a good weekend.

Susan

Asian American poets!

poetry workshop

Lawson Inada is a national treasure....

Kundiman, a non-profit organization dedicated to serving Asian American
poets is sponsoring a summer writing retreat for emerging Asian American
poets at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville. Please help us
spread the word. Tell your friends, students, teachers, colleagues, etc.
Post it on your listserves, etc.

Thank you.

*****

Kundiman Asian American Poets? Retreat
July 13 ? 17, 2005
University of Virginia, Charlottesville

Deadline for Application: Postmark March 1, 2005
For more information on Kundiman, see http://www.kundiman.org

Introduction
In order to help mentor the next generation of Asian-American poets,
Kundiman is sponsoring an annual Poetry Retreat at The University of
Virginia. During the Retreat, nationally renowned Asian American poets
will conduct workshops and provide one-on-one mentorship sessions with
participants. Readings and informal social gatherings will also be
scheduled. Through this Retreat, Kundiman hopes to provide a safe and
instructive environment that identifies and addresses the unique
challenges faced by emerging Asian American poets. This 5-day Retreat will
take place from Wednesday to Sunday. Workshops will be conducted from
Thursday to Saturday. Workshops will not exceed six students.

Writing Workshop
A nationally renowned Asian American poet will facilitate each writing
workshop. Workshops will consist of writing exercises and group
discussions on participant poems. At each workshop, participants will be
expected to write and workshop new poems. Participants will have the
opportunity to take a workshop with every Faculty member. In order to help
foster relationships between participants themselves, each participant
will be assigned a home group, and will remain in that home group for the
duration of the retreat. The Faculty will rotate in the work-shopping of
each home group.

Mentoring: Conferring and Connections
Faculty members will schedule one-on-one conferences with participants.
Prior to arriving, participants will submit a request indicating their
order of preference as to which poet they would like to meet
one-on-one. Administrators will try to accommodate each applicant?s request.

Faculty
Lawson Inada is third-generation Japanese American, born and raised in
Fresno, California. He has taught at Southern Oregon State College since
1966. For both historical and aesthetic reasons, Lawson Inada is a
significant figure in Asian American poetry and literature. He was one of
the co-editors of the landmark anthology, Aiiieeeee! An Anthology of
Asian-American Writers, and has participated in efforts to recover writing
by earlier Japanese American authors such as Toshio Mori and John Okada.
Inada?s collection Before the War: Poems as They Happened (1971) was one
of the first Asian American single-author volumes of poetry from a major
New York publishing house. Inada won the American Book Award in 1994 for
Legends from Camp and was named Oregon State Poet of the Year in 1991. He
has received a number of poetry fellowships from the National Endowment
for the Arts.

Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of "Miracle Fruit" (Tupelo Press),
winner of ForeWord Magazine's Poetry Book of the Year Award, the Global
Filipino Literary Award, and finalist for the Asian American Literary
Award and the Glasgow Prize. She received her MFA at Ohio State University
and was the Middlebrook Poetry Fellow at the Wisconsin Institute for
Creative Writing at UW-Madison. Other awards for her writing include the
Boatwright Prize from Shenandoah, The Richard Hugo Prize from Poetry
Northwest, an Associated Writing Programs Intro Award in creative
non-fiction and several nominations for the Pushcart Prize. She is
Assistant Professor of English at State University of New
York-Fredonia--right in the heart of cherry and berry country--where she
lives with her mini-dachshund, Villanelle.

Patrick Rosal is the author of Uprock Headspin Scramble And Dive (Persea
Books). His work has been published in many journals and anthologies
including North American Review, Columbia, The Literary Review, and The
Beacon Best 2001. He has been a featured reader at many
venues in and out of NYC, from Boston to Daytona Beach, as well as in
London and on the BBC radio?s ?World Today.? He is currently Assistant
Professor of
English at Bloomfield College.

Fees & Financial Aid
There is a scholarship fund for those who need assistance. Requests for
financial aid should be made after acceptance to the retreat. To keep the
cost of the retreat low, participants are not charged fees for
workshops. Room and Board for the retreat is $300.

Application Process
Send three (3) copies of five to seven (5-7) paginated, stapled pages of
poetry, with your name included on each page. Include a cover letter with
your name, address, phone number, e-mail address and a brief paragraph
describing what you would like to accomplish at the Kundiman Asian
American Poets? Retreat. Include a SAS postcard if you want an application
receipt. Manuscripts will not be returned. No electronic
submissions, please.

Mail application to:

Kundiman
245 Eighth Avenue #151
New York, NY 10011
Submissions must be postmarked by March 1, 2005

Wednesday

poetry workshop

I'll be in my office most of Wednesday, which is only taken from 11:30-12:30., in case anyone wants to talk poetics. It occurs to me that Normie Salvador's Tinfish chap, _Philter_, has a poetics statement at the back (about being a local guy who isn't a local writer), in case any of you would like to glance at it. If you want to buy one, then you'll have to wait while I pull out the adhesive spray (utterly stinky) and the perfume (which is sprayed in abundance), before taking your book away.

Hope all you poets are enjoying yourselves this week.

Susan

Poetics statement on offer!

poetry workshop

The poet and critic, Hank Lazer, sent me "A Poetics Conversation with Hank Lazer." When I asked, he said he'd be happy to make it available to you who are working on your own poetics statements.

His interview is rather long, so I won't post it to the blog. But anyone who'd like to read it, just send me an email and I'll get it to you that way. He's been writing for decades, so his thoughts are as retro- as they are pro-spective, but his way of explaining himself is elucidating.

aloha, Susan

oiwi release

poetry workshop

`Oiwi is releasing their third issue on Saturday, February 26 at the Center for Hawaiian Studies, 5-9 p.m. There will be lots of readers (I have a flyer you can look at in my office).

Be there.

Susan

suggestion box

poetry workshop

My first (strong) impression of your suggestions about the class is that you want very much to read and be read by others in the class. Putting poems on the blog has evidently not led to much commentary. So why not make xerox copies of each of your poems and give them to everyone each week? Paper's old-fashioned, but it still works. If you want to structure the commentaries, we could assign at least one person per week to read and comment on your poem. Otherwise, you could negotiate with each other for readings and comments. Any thoughts?

I'll get to other suggestions soon.

Susan

pipi

I was fortunate enough to hear McMullin read at the TINFISH #14 reading @ Native Books last October and was delighted to encounter his work again. I believe the mythic consciousness present in his work is one aspect that allowed “Drag Queen Named Pipi” to be more accessible than “Remembering Absence.” As we have discussed in class, the poems in this chapbook “work” because of the threads of mythic knowledge, imagery, and storytelling within a contemporary, multi-layered framework of gender/sexual/cultural-identity. I’m absolutely down with that multilayered action! I think this is a hallmark of good poems…especially if they can successfully negotiate complex and multilayered ideas…(so I guess that’s one that I’ll have on my list for today)…I feel as though this is when art (particularly poetry) is at its most potent, that is, when it has the ability to connect poet and reader through the collective unconscious even if we come from culturally different places…I think it was Ken who mentioned last class that the poems in “Pipi” resonate within us because the poems represent a shared experience of colonized peoples…I totally agree with that because even though I’m not a homosexual Samoan-American male (really, I’m not), I was still able to understand and appreciate Dan’s poetry. This is not to say that I was at all times completely comfortable with all of the poems in “Pipi”…I have to admit that I found myself holding my breath at times as I read through “Pipi” –some of the poems presented sensual/sexual qualities unfamiliar to me…and I don’t know about you all but when I come across something I’m not familiar with I don’t feel very comfortable; I squirm, or laugh, or in this case, hold my breath. Case in point: “The Doll: A Performance Piece” was almost disturbing to me because I thought it bordered on ideas about molestation in a way, but then, the turn comes at the end when the speaker/director/voyeur states “He had put his doll’s hand in my butt! I ran around the place with his doll’s arm up my butt!” –Actually, I laughed out loud…after I grimaced…now I’m thinking it’s funny….I read it to my roommates and they cringed but then brought up a point: Who is the ‘doll’? The other man? Hmm…or does he literally mean ‘doll’? How am I supposed to react? Is my reaction valid? If I find it a little funny, does that make me a weirdo? I mean, he could have said “He put his arm up my butt!” but then, would that make the piece less funny or more strange? Vice versa? So many questions! Details! Details! Do we need more details or should we just leave it alone? Does it work even if there aren’t a lot of details? Reading this piece was like …watching shadow puppets….or being immersed in Moana to her depths…

-julia

Voice that!

poetry workshop

from Charles Bernstein's "Stray Straws and Straw Men":

"The sanctification of the natural comes up in terms of 'voice' & has been extended by various excursions into the oral. On the one hand, there is the assumption that poetry matures in the location of 'one's own voice' which as often as not is no more than a consistency of style & presentation. 'The voice of the poem' is an easy way of contextualizing poetry so that it can be more readily understood (indiscriminately plugged into) as listening to someone talk in their distinctive manner . . .

"What I want to call attention to is that there is no natural writing style; that the preference for its supposed manifestations is simply a preference for a particular look to poetry & often a particular vocabulary (usually perceived as personal themes) . . . "

Something to think about, anyway.

Susan

Details Abound or "De Tale of Detail"

Hi Everyone,
(Sorry about the title, sort of.)

Yes, in response to Susan’s email, a poem presents the possibility/opportunity for a reader to think and feel, and it can be a real challenge for the poet to incorporate or balance both of these elements. Details are certainly important in both areas, though I think of them as being used to elicit feelings most frequently. Adjectives: a writer’s best friend or worst enemy? I ask because they’re obviously hugely important for our descriptions and our attempts to generate feelings in our readers (“It was a dark and stormy night…” probably has become a cliché because it worked for so long), but they’re easy to overdo.
Maybe part of the reason Ginsberg was successful in replacing “anarchy” with “Arkansas” has to do with the fact that he’s replacing an abstract idea with a concrete noun loaded with meaning. I guess what I’m getting at is that, while I’ve found revising to include detailed adjectives helpful at times, if I can hit on a noun like “Arkansas” that brings additional details or layers of meaning in, then I should be doing a little dance of joy because the chances it’s going to make the reader think AND feel have just skyrocketed. For me, McMullin’s use of Samoan mythology/worldview in combination and juxtaposition with contemporary cultural realities acted in a similar manner. But he also does a rather amazing job with the adjectives at times; he always seems aware of how effective it is to include the senses in a poem, as in the first line of “The Act of Memory in Laguna California”: “Lifting memory and wet planks, the scent of reef moss and story.” And look at what he does with color throughout that poem. All of this really seems to help with characterization, as does the ability to pick a single (two close together max) interesting descriptor or characterizing action for that character, maybe one that “essentializes” them in regard to the greater meaning of the poem. So, I suppose I am a fan of detail in adjective, noun, and verb! If that makes any sense…sounds so clunky to try to describe what has been accomplished so gracefully in a poem, and grammar class obviously permanently warped my brain, so I’ll stop rambling now. Thanks!
Eve

Spreading the word

Not sure if everyone already gets this email, so here's some info on upcoming readings at Revolution books...

*****

Hope you can come to the Second Sunday Reading at Revolution
Books (944-3106) happening this Sunday, Feb 13, at 3 pm. A professor
of political science at UHM, Noenoe Silva will be reading from and
talking about her recently published book, "Aloha Betrayed." There
will be copies of her book for purchase.

For March's Second Sunday, we will be having Hawai`i's Slam Team--
Steve "Kealoha" Wong, "TravisT" Thompson, Selah Geissler and Melvin
Borja--performing their outrageous poetry. There will also be an open
mike after their preformances.

Please spread the word

me again, bearing links

poetry workshop

here's an on-line poetry journal I just encountered:

http://www.wordswithoutborders.org/

equally international, though less multicultural, is the new Jacket magazine out of Sydney:

http://jacketmagazine.com/26/index.html

aloha, Susan

thoughts before next time

oetry workshop

Those of you who have not commented on Taulapapa McMullin's work, please do so this week. If you ask him direct questions, he might be tempted to join us. Dan? For example: Dan, talk to use about different kinds of narratives, stories, and how you try to tell them in your poems. How does your poetic work differ from you work in film and drama? How not?

We will be performing some of Dan's work next time, and also doing a couple of "exercises" aimed at getting at his (and our) use of detail in developing character.

Think about the word "detail" this week. What do details do for the poet? What kinds of details are effective? How can we replace abstract words (like "anarchy") with concrete words (like "Arkansaw"), as Ginsberg did. A poem creates the possibility for a reader to think and feel--it does not do the work for her. The poet creates the possibility for meaning to happen, it does not convey meaning in the same way that a technical manual does. Which is why it's interesting to experiment with writing a poem in the form of a technical manual....(see John Ashbery's "Instruction Manual").

Start coming up with lists of the elements you think make poems work (and, conversely, not work). We will come up with a class list of things to look for in poems we workshop. First on my list this week is "detail."

Have a good weekend.

Susan

more literary events!

poetry workshop

well, you can skip the dept meeting...

ENGLISH DEPARTMENT CALENDAR (for February only)

All events are held on Thursdays, 3:00-4:30 in Kuykendall 410, unless
otherwise noted.

February 10 Faculty Meeting (discussion of graduate curriculum in
response to Graduate Program Survey results)

February 15 (T) Reading: Cathy Bao Bean, author of The Chopsticks-Fork
Principle, A Memoir and Manual (contact: Ruth Hsu); co-sponsored with the
Center for Chinese Studies

February 17 Lecture and Reading: "Aching for Beauty" Wang Ping, author
of The Magic Whip (contact: Ruth Hsu); co-sponsored with Women's Studies
and the Center for Chinese Studies

February 24 Colloquium: John Rieder (UHM), "Colonialism and the
Emergence of Science Fiction"

(schedule for the rest of the semester will follow shortly)

office hours and a job

poetry workshop

My office hours will be disrupted tomorrow, as my son has a dentist's appointment in Kailua mid-morning, and then has to be back in Kaneohe (ah, the driving I do!). So please don't look for me before noon-time. Let me know you're coming, as my honors students are supposed to see me tomorrow, as well.

_Hawai`i Review_ is looking for a chief editor for next year. For information, or an application, contact: Jay Hartwell, 956-3217, hartwell@hawaii.edu. Deadline is Feb. 14.

Susan

Thoughts on the Little People

People have been writing a little about what they think of the opening pages of Taulapapa McMullin's book. I just thought I'd throw in my two cents. Apologies if this is repeat from class.

The modern silhouettes (in suits and dresses) at the bottoms of the opening pages give the book an Americanized (or at least westernized) feeling. On the page that reads, “The whole world was Moana,” the picture is that of six youthful men and women, standing casually. It looks more like a scene at a bar than the mystic world the words might create by themselves. This gives the book an urban edge despite the pervading ocean landscape. Here, people and society have been printed over the natural world, and they are crisp and well defined, in contrast to the hazy, disorienting, even dreamlike ocean world. While the ocean is a prominent theme, these small figures remind the reader of the gritty title, which also evokes ideas of mistaken or feigned identity. The two facing pages that read, “I am afraid” and “I am not afraid” show the reader how a woman’s dress and posture can make corresponding statements. Although the reader gets the sense of the coquettish damsel and the brazen hussy from the two silhouettes, we are reminded that they are just outlines, recognizable shapes, and of course, things are not always what they seem. Although the absence of a glossary explaining the Samoan in this collection has already been mentioned, it is interesting that the figures on the opening pages are seemingly westernized, and therefore familiar to a wider audience.

Noel

my short response

In response to Dr. Schultz's blog earlier this week:

Regardless of whether we choose to write directly “about the war,” we as writers are living in a time of war, chaos, discrimination, racism, inequality, etc. and therefore, no matter what we write, these realities surface through our creations, consciously or subconsciously. None of us can say that we haven’t been deeply affected by “the war” or by “tragedies:” we are all effected by these realities; they may exist as “background noise,” but nevertheless they are a presence in our life and as artists, these feelings we experience are channeled through us into our writing, our art.
Perhaps in times of war, artists create to do a variety of things, most importantly, to stimulate dialogue and hopefully to initiate or contribute to change. If an artist doesn’t have “an effect on their culture” then maybe they should change their line of work. My belief is that art exists and is created as a reflection of the world, and as a conversation between artist, world and audience. The tone of that conversation and the relationship between artist and audience are varied and therefore, I believe it’s possible that art can be created “to console, to provoke, to think, to act, to persuade” depending on who’s writing it and who’s reading it.
I don’t have an issue with writing directly or indirectly about subjects such as “war” or “racism” or “inequality.” I don’t believe poets (whether novice or acclaimed) should have to conform to an idea about what is appropriate to write or not. Poetry is an art. True art comes from the heart. If I’m feeling it, if my body, and my soul and my heart is telling me to write it, I write it, regardless if I’ve experienced it first hand or not; isn’t that the blessing of creative writing?
In regards to activism: I’m down for poetry as activism, after all, I believe “The personal is political.” My poems come from me, personally, so yes, I see them as a medium for my activism.

Peace,
Julia

Hello, My Name Is...

At Susan's suggestion, I just wanted to take a moment to introduce myself since I have been silent thus far. I'm a first-year PhD student living on Maui. Although I managed to fly over once a week last semester for classes, I decided to save a little money this spring. At first, I considered taking a leave of absence, but Susan graciously agreed to guide me through a 699 independent reading. To make it easier on both of us, I am following your 613 syllabus and reading a few other poetry collections. I was hoping to comment on Meadows' work, but my book disappeared temporarily (long story). Anyway, you will hopefully hear from me regarding future readings.

That said, I just want to say how much I have enjoyed reading the blog so far and to ask in advance for your patience since I won't be familiar with whatever discussions occur in class. I was going to write a little here about my thoughts on the purpose of poetry since that topic seems to have naturally come up in class, but this morning, I was struck by comments regarding Taulapapa McMullin's decision not to include a glossary. I had just written to Susan about another Pacific writer who made the same decision.

Just based on the discussions I heard in classes last semester, and what I've seen lately, it seems like this is a common decision for Pacific writers using non-English words, themes, etc. While I like the idea of challenging the reader and not feeling as if everything has to be spelled out and explained, it does seem like an exclusionary tactic that limits a writer's audience. Susan suggested (forgive the paraphrasal) that here in Hawai'i, many writers feel that we are writing for and amongst ourselves rather than for others. I just wonder if that's how you all are feeling about your writing as well. I went to college and graduate school on the east coast, but since I grew up in Hawai'i, my poetry often included Hawaiian words, themes, and landscapes...and I did feel compelled to include gloassaries/notes, which were appreciated. While I suppose that I consider myself a Pacific writer, I don't write only for a Pacific audience. Perhaps I am underestimating my audience in presuming that east coast folk wouldn't be as willing to look up unfamiliar words or themes, but I think that it's more that they wouldn't know where or how to do so. Here, we can recognize something as Hawaiian or Samoan, for instance, even if we don't necessarily have the exact definition or reference in mind, but a mainland or international reader might not have that foundation or starting point. And, I think, that poetry should be accessible in that way. Your thoughts?

Nice to meet you all,
Noel (like Noelle, not Nole)

yet more on moby

Sorry, some of us are trapped in the past, fairly drowning in it. But here's another entry from the poetry list I'm on:


winmail.dat 4K

Hi Prageeta,
My email was out, so I'm not sure if anyone has mentioned this already, but Judith Goldman has a poem "dicktée" from Vocorder that compiles all of the "un-" words from Moby-Dick. I once transcribed the first part of her poem thinking that I would use it in a paper:

under, unite, unless, unpleasant, universal, uncomfortable, unaccountable, under, unbiased, undeliverable, under, underneath, universe, unequal, understanding, unaccountable, unwarranted, unimaginable, unnatural, unoccupied, undress, unobserved, unknown, unwarrantable, unknown, unaccountable, understand, uncomfortable, unsay, unaccountable, uncommonly, undressed, unearthly, undressing, unnatural, unceremoniously, uncomfortableness, unmethodically, undressed, unendurable, unimaginable, unlock, unbecomingness, understand, under, unusual, under, under, undergraduate, under, unsheathes, undivided, unknown, unholy, unheeded, unrecorded, unceasing, unhealing, unbidden, universal, unstirring, unspeakable, unnecessary, unseen, unassuming, unheeded, unknown, until, uncheered, unreluctantly, unto, unwelcome, unto, unearthly, uncouthness, unbiddenly, unite, unite, unite, undressed, unmistakably, unduly, undulating, unconquerable, untutored, untutored, unfitted, undefiled, unlike, unconsciousness, under, unconscious, under, under, unfort'nt, understand

This goes on for seven more sections with approximately the same number of words in each. Some words repeat. She also borrows an epigraph from W.V. Quine: "Un-, like in-, has two meanings. In its second meaning, un-, is different in origin from the simple negative un- and in-... This un- does attach to a verb, and it expresses as undoing of what the verb expresses. Usually it carries an air of liberation."

-kaplan




_

more moby

this from a poetry email list I'm on, by the editor of POM2, Allison Cobb:

but in Issue 4 of the magazine I co-edit POM, the
Lebanese poet Etel Adnan has a letter from Moby Dick (oppressed
peoples, objects of desire, oil, the earth itself) to Ahab (George
Bush).

Let me also add that Moby Dick, whatever its canonical status, is a beautiful,
beautiful book. Do read it!

Hart Crane's "At Melville's Tomb" is another of my favorite poems. Crane read MD
at least three times.

Susan

In An Oceanic World

Hi Everyone,

In reading Dan Taulapapa McMullin’s A Drag Queen Named Pipi I was struck by this poet’s ability to move between, and often to intertwine, character study and mythology. For example, in “Jerry, Sheree and the Eel” he intertwines and overlaps the “real” world/story and the more mythological sounding “part of the story I made up” in such a way that the two blend together. Another way he accomplishes this occurs in “The Old Way” when he characterizes figures from Samoan mythology and humanizes them in their relationships to one another. The poem is almost like a love story between Moana and Tagaloa, who takes human form, since “Moana was everything to him.” Then, when she pours into Tagaloa’s small canoe, yet cannot fill it, she is compared to a beloved baby girl. For me, there is something mesmerizing about the concept that Moana, the ocean, can be rocked in the ocean. This poem also plays a large part in the design of the book. The book’s designer, James Nakamura, chose (at least, I’m assuming it was his choice) the first three lines from “The Old Way” to be the first poetic text the reader encounters in the opening pages: “Moana was the Ocean / The Ocean’s name was Moana / The whole world was Moana.” A few reasons for this choice struck me as possibilities. One is that, by including the underwater photographs, often done as close ups, the “whole world” of the book also becomes Moana, from cover to end page. Another related idea is that these lines imply an argument for inclusivity that is important in a book about giving value to people who, traditionally, have been marginalized and devalued (See “Jerry, Sheree and the Eel”: “Jerry always stays in the kitchen, / that’s what fags in American Samoa do”). In other words, the image of the ocean possibly shows how we are all connected by inhabiting the same world, Moana. These are just some possibilities though, and I’d be really interested to hear others ideas about the book’s design.

for Kristine

hon495


Kristine--if you go to salon.com and scroll all the way to the bottom of the page, there's an essay on nancy drew as girl role model.

Susan

oh lord, caught again

Seems I misquoted Deborah Meadows. Sorry about that.
What follows is from her:



Have to reply to Susan's comment: not quite anything a mentor said, neither ambition nor biggness. This has to do with how we each negotiate a relationship to failure in our art--it's different than linear success, safety in art--how complacency is death to art.

On privilege: bell hooks proposes the model of living a contradiction, to be educated but still affiliated with her working class origins. This means we don't assimilate to the dominant group but use our rarefied educations to draft letters to the editor, testify in court, make education accessible to other working class students, have a role in institutions civic or art or what have you, it means occupying a position that the field of Sociology does not recognize when it creates the category of "middle class" as someone with a college degree quickly absorbing our abilities to the projects of those already in power.
3:03 PM

note on revisions

poetry workshop


The question of what to do with revisions came up.
You can either email them to me, hand me hard copy, or come with them to my office.
Revisions are more than encouraged.

Susan

musings through a cold

A number of issues came up in the last class that weren't resolved. The problem is hardly a lack of resolution, but I am sure we can think about them more deeply, as time allows. These are some questions I've been pondering since Monday, which might be worth revisiting. Many come out of your bloggings, and you might return to them there:

--writing poetry in a time of war (and disaster). How does one write at all, after 9/11 or during the Iraq war, or after the tsunami? Do we write to console, to provoke, to think, to act, to persuade? What effect do we have on ourselves, to say nothing of others, most of whom do not read poetry of any kind? Can we have an effect on our culture without being read directly (the trickle-down theory)? Julia wrote a war poem this last time; do you have any ideas, Julia?

--the related question of poetry as activism. What is the job description of a language activist? The necessary cv?

--privilege. A biggie. Is the problem that we are privileged, or that others are not? Is there a difference between privilege in education and the ownership of an SUV? (That's a leading question, I admit.) Given that we are privileged (even if Moby Dick escaped us), what do we do with that privilege in and around our poetry? Are certain poetic styles "privileged" where others are not? Is that kind of privilege, in itself, a problem?

--method: are there forms most appropriate to addressing these questions, or is form a chimeric topic?

--how to think about all this and still enjoy what we do and what we read...

One of the lessons of Meadows's work is that ambition is a good thing in a poet. She related to me the story of one of her mentors who advised that, since we all fail, we should fail big. A good lesson to hold onto, I think.

I'll be in my office soon, head-cold and all. Hope to see some of you today.

By the way, all of the above questions are questions of "poetics."

aloha, Susan