Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Unfinished Fragments

In the zeal to post a "sentence" a day sometimes I put things up before they're ready.... still working on this. I think what I mean to say is there's always stuff going on under the surface, so reading beneath the lines...

7 comments:

  1. I love the sentence-a-day idea and I agree that this one isn't finished. If you'll forgive my butting in, why not try to bring it closer to the stated aim of a short work? I think the first and the wonderful last stanzas are by far the strongest. Think, What would William Carlos Williams do?

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  2. I confess I am fascinated by reading your works when they progress. I love watching how someone else works. And your tendency to spin out beautiful cascades of words is so different from my own verbal style that to see you revise and adjust is interesting and educational.

    I think, by the way, that Richard may be onto something in terms of a direction for this one. But you, of course, will be the one to find the needed path.

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  3. PS, I've copied the last stanza into a little notebook of quotations in which I've filled a grand total of two pages in the past year.

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  4. Heliotropic coda.

    Bachelard would definitely call that a poetic act.

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  5. Richard, you are right on - the first and last stanzas were written yesterday, all the rest were reworking of an earlier piece of writing. I've got to run to a tutoring session... probably clip it later.

    MB, you don't show us work-in-progress in the same way, hmmm. When I said at 100 Days that you seem in a meditative state all the time, I also meant how your poems seem fully born, in the moment, writing without looking back, and mostly stunning. That's a "zen mind" to me!

    Thank you both! And honoured, Richard.

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  6. Stray, heliotropic coda was yesterday's title...

    Interesting!

    Bachelard, Oh, Bachelard...! One of my very most favourite philosophers - he's in a taped box somewhere, who knows where - so more, more! Drop quotes like a trail of delicious cake crumbs... please!

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  7. Brenda, I give myself a little time to work them as they emerge, but not much time. That you don't see this from me is very intentional on my part ... not because of YOU (the reader) but because of what it does for ME (emotionally, and in terms of my inner critic) to not continue to work them past a certain point, to let go, to let be, to let it be enough. That's of great value to me at this time. Some day perhaps I'll go back and do more editing, we'll see.

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