I Am!
By John Clare
I am—yet what I am none cares or knows;
My friends forsake me like a memory lost:
I am the self-consumer of my woes—
They rise and vanish in oblivious host,
Like shadows in love’s frenzied stifled throes
And yet I am, and live—like vapours tossed
Into the nothingness of scorn and noise,
Into the living sea of waking dreams,
Where there is neither sense of life or joys,
But the vast shipwreck of my life’s esteems;
Even the dearest that I loved the best
Are strange—nay, rather, stranger than the rest.
I long for scenes where man hath never trod
A place where woman never smiled or wept
There to abide with my Creator, God,
And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept,
Untroubling and untroubled where I lie
The grass below—above the vaulted sky.
Currently reading: Pietr the Latvian by Georges Simenon 📚
Reading The Strangers in the House for a bookclub in June and while I wait for that to arrive I’m reading one of Simenon’s Inspector Maigret stories—my first. I was slightly put off at the start but it’s reeling me in as I go.
Yesterday I went to the Orpheum Theatre in Vancouver to see the 1923 silent film Safety Last! starring Harold Lloyd. A live musical accompaniment was provided by an organist on the amazing vintage Wurlitzer organ. Watching with live music is by far the best way to see a silent film. In attendance was Lloyd’s granddaughter Suzanne Lloyd who gave a short talk after the film. A fun evening!
Today is Canadian Independent Bookstore Day. I only made three stops today which is probably for the best since I still far exceeded my budget.
First up from Paper Hound, The Castle of Crossed Destinies from Italo Calvino, Memoirs found in a Bathtub by Stanislaw Lem and Bunting’s Persia, a collection of Persian poetry translated by Basil Bunting. Also from Paper Hound—appropriately enough—a CIBD special postcard of Basil Bunting’s advice to student poets.
Next stop, Macleod’s Books were in the basement depths I found three new-to-me Tuttle paperbacks. We have In Ghostly Japan by Lafcadio Hearn, Japan: The Story of a Nation by Edwin O. Reischauer and Low City, High City (about Tokyo from 1867-1923) by Edward Seidensticker.
Lastly, PFB Main where I picked up a photo book of Fred Herzog’s B&W work. The purchase of which also qualified me ($50 or more) for entry into their top tier CIBD prize draw. Fingers crossed!
Basil Bunting’s advice to student poets.
I SUGGEST
1- Compose aloud; poetry is a sound.
2- Vary rhythm enough to stir the emotion you want but not so as to lose impetus.
3- Use spoken words and syntax.
4- Fear adjectives; they bleed nouns. Hate the passive.
5- Jettison ornament gaily but keep shape
Put your poem away till you forget it, then:
6- Cut out every word you dare.
7- Do it again a week later, and again.
Never explain - your reader is as smart as you.
I love this part from George Perec’s essay “Brief Notes on the Art and Manner of Arranging One’s Books”. The phrases “an indiviudal bureaucracy” & “good-natured anarchy” will always stick with me.
Opposed to this apologia for a sympathetic disorder is the small-minded temptation towards an individual bureaucracy one thing for each place and each place for its one thing, and vice versa. Between these two tensions, one which sets a premium on letting things be, on a good-natured anarchy,…
The Five Lems by Jonathan Lethem.
In a Station of the Metro
The apparition of these faces in the crowd:
Petals on a wet, black bough.
By Ezra Pound
