week gone by

A long week gone by and a good one but long which is sometimes how the good ones are.

Teaching is serious now, the introductions done and the work at hand at hand. Reading Whitman and Lorca with Pound on the horizon (and Lorca a constant). With Whitman some interesting conversations that go from his influence into the present as well as his work over his own time. We've been reading Leaves of Grass 1855 and Leaves of Grass in the deathbed 1891/92 editions and thinking about how much the small changes mean and the larger ones as well, the sense of the earlier work in some ways as the poems in process and the last work as the poems as done (which they obviously by that point more than are). A serious joy here is reading Whitman again and again and recognizing just how much pleasure there is in doing just that.

The same is true of Lorca, although until now more time has been spent setting the stage for the rest of the semester, a lot of background, Spanish history, Lorca's life, Lorca's New York. Reading the first Poems of Solitude at Columbia University makes me realize how much a part of me the poems have become. I read the lines and remember how much time I spent working with them, the conversations Pablo and I had in the intense three years we spent on the book. Interesting how much presence it has, the intersection of that with memory.

I'm pushing myself now to finish the Hinojosa selected. I've been feeling good about it, sure and certain of the voice. The final translation draft should be done by the end of February, early March. The introduction should be done as well. Funny to be conscious of, if not exactly able to see, the light at the end of that tunnel.

And working hard on new poems. A good feeling to do that. Going through the most recent moleskine typing even as a newer one is being slowly filled.

Snow coming. The storm is supposed to center more to the south, with DC and Philadelphia taking larger hits. But the coming 2-6 inches could be romp in the snow fun.

abrazos,

Mark

Whitman (again?)

It's interesting to see that I posted about Whitman the other night--wasn't even thinking about how in one of the courses I'm teaching Whitman is the first poet on the syllabus--first thing we're reading is "Song of Myself" from both the 1855 edition and then the 1891/92 deathbed edition of Leaves of Grass. As always I stand in amazement at the rhythm and movement of the poem, both in terms of the form and the content (this I that is so powerful and is both about description and place and time, and out of place and time, which is the point of the Whitman I, to be both in and out of location of self, other, etc). The juxtapositions (the pimpled prostitute and the president), the use of names (places, plants and trees, tribes, etc), the repetitions of phrase and structures to move the poem along, what a pleasure.

And to see words like pismire and kelson!

In other news: because of the Tobenski/Algera series tomorrow night (tobenskialgera.com), will miss the State of the Union, something I haven't done in years. The president will use the word fight a lot and he will talk about the need to listen and be thoughtful and in all of it I fear will come a further deflation of hope--that he will listen and be thoughtful and in the spirit of compromise (the new nickname for leadership, how thoughtless and passive) that the fight will be to advance an agenda that is not bold and not progressive and, finally, ineffective.

I don't like feeling that after a only a year the president has missed some big opportunities to be bold and decisive and that he has made the good elusive , but this is what I worry about. Still, I refuse to give up on hope. I see the power of it in small ways in my life and if that's what I've got, well it could be worse, even while longing for better and better on a larger scale.

Abrazos,

Mark