[184] Communication

LITTLE CHIP OFF WHAT WOULD BE A MANIFESTO

     IF THERE WR MORE OF IT

It is at least a part of a poet’s duty now to write poems which if subjected to the kind of analysis prescribed for, say, “A” level Eng. Lit. (“Comment on the imagery of this poem.”) (“What do you learn of X’s political views from this poem?”) would produce NOTHING. i.e., poems which cannot be broken down into their component parts any more than a piece of wood can be, with a saw; thrfore organic in some sense other than haphazard. /and from which you cannot extract a MEANING or ESSENCE other than what is apparent and meant; i.e. what I gather of X’s political views from this poem is what X states his political views to be in this poem, nor more nor less; thrfore not a plain statement decorated/made-up/projected/dramatised into “poem” but the statement itself, if it’s worth speaking, if it really exists.

I’m not saying you can’t talk about poetry. You can and should say what is going on, why it is important, and where it leads.

Peter Riley

from Certain Prose of The English Intelligencer

      Black Mountain Press (2012)