"We live in a time when productivity is everything - to produce a lot, to have a lot, to write a lot. But in poetry, it's not what you want, but what Poetry wants, what Poetry gives you. I can neither force it nor demand it to appear. Poetry has taught me to be patient."
Gloria Gervitz (tr. Mark Schafer)
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- Alan Baker
- I founded Leafe Press in 2000 and am now co-editor. I've edited Litter magazine since 2005. I was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and I live in Nottingham. My most recent book is "Variations on Painting a Room: Poems 2000-2010" from Skysill Press. I've also published this translation: Yves Bonnefoy, "Début et Fin de la Neige/The Beginning and End of the Snow" (Leafe/Bamboo Books).
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4 comments:
"Poetry has taught me to be patient". Yes. Very. But it's also taught me that "Poetry (like God) helps those who help themselves" and that I MUST sit down and, so to speak, and slap some words around (or vice versa) on a daily basis ... or my patience will NEVER be rewarded.
Yes, I also have to make myself 'slap some words around' (nice phrase) instead of waiting to be inspired - otherwise, as you say, nothing would be the result. But those groups of words, once slapped into place, seem to evolve, take on new meanings, merge with other groups, and end up being rejected as 'no good' or accepted with surprise as being OK. That process I think is the one that requires patience.
"Accepted with surprise"?? No need to be so modest, bro. You got skilz.
Send me your 'rejects' and let me see what I can do w/em ... if you want to, that is ...
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