More on Irony and Distance

This is from Peaches and Penumbras, an article on BOOKFORUM. 

The last line of the essay hurts because it is true, but it doesn't have to be. 

"The poetry of our time is dominated by a deep and sometimes rich skepticism about the self. When Ginsberg was a countercultural hero in the '60s, such skepticism was embodied by the work of Elizabeth Bishop, Robert Lowell, and W. H. Auden, among others. Its presence has grown only more pronounced during the last thirty years through the examples of John Ashbery (whose first book, Some Trees, appeared the same year as Howl and Other Poems) and Jorie Graham and a renewed appreciation of Wallace Stevens and George Oppen.

Ginsberg's strength was the evocation of vulnerability, a sensibility that could never accommodate skepticism because it grew out of his belief in the inherent innocence of the self. Frank Bidart writes in his contribution to The Poem That Changed America that, for Ginsberg, "within spirit itself there is no unresolvable dilemma, no dilemma inherent in the demands placed upon it by its own nature or the nature of being." The limitations or failings faced by the self are not native to it but planted there by an external force, whether that force is Moloch or Birdbrain or America. In turn, Ginsberg's dissatisfaction with the world often manifests itself as betrayal instead of despair. Ginsberg doesn't consider the world to be utterly indifferent to his fate; rather, the world singles him out and inhibits him from realizing his nature. Ginsberg's vulnerability is also at the root of his interest in visions: He hungers to be possessed and awed by the appearance of something miraculous in the world. The skeptic's experience of being overwhelmed by an inherent and insurmountable human inability to comprehend the world with any certainty is alien to him. And his vulnerability is what compels him to portray the body as a stage where cosmic dramas play themselves out, as with the wounded innocents in "Howl" who have "purgatoried their torsos night after night" in the hopes of experiencing metaphysical bliss.

The wounded innocents who populate Ginsberg's poems seem out of place, even alien, today, but that is no reason to declare smugly that the Age of Ginsberg is a closed chapter. "Howl" blew through an entire culture with fury and exuberance and eloquence and charm, and it was the work not of the guru but of the young poet. During the last half century, no poem, not even Ashbery's "Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror," has been able to match the prominence and resonance achieved by "Howl." These days, few artists, let alone poets, are hailed as heroic prophets, and no amount of cheerleading during National Poetry Month will change that. Instead, it's the gurus—scrubbed, smiling, and outfitted with respectable titles like "motivational speaker," "life coach," and "personal trainer"—who continue to mesmerize."

This article is so on the mark

Awhile back, I wrote about DFW's quote about how irony was hurting creativity by making people embarrassed to be sincere. He called for people to risk being seen as sentimental.

I have felt (still feel?) the pressure to write in that particularly current ironic voice-- especially when I write poetry. I fail. The sly jokes fall flat. The observations don't hit their marks.

If I write about a heartbroken, brutalized rhino, it turns out okay. I'm not saying I am the new anti-rebel, as DFW put it, but I don't do well talking through a cool, distanced wall. I am that heartbroken rhino. I am that grieving, angry mess of a beast.

http://www.salon.com/2014/04/13/david_foster_wallace_was_right_irony_is_ruining_our_culture/

The two authors of the article also talk about the use of irony in contemporary painting. It really is a heartening piece of writing. It made me feel good and hopeful.

Necessary Fiction: Atlantic City

Hello!

Necessary Fiction picked up my piece titled "Atlantic City". I wrote it as part of Peter Markus's summer workshop, and with his insightful comments and keen ear, I was able to polish it up to this final story.


Atlantic City


If you know me, or know anything about me, you know that I grew up in South Jersey. I did work at a Texaco, too. It was strange to write a piece of fiction with true elements. I try to keep things entirely separate from real life, but it did feel good to have the permission, so to say, to write something that could be true.

Interview: Part Two

I was asked to interview for the second part of Land Beast.

Here is it: The Collagist Interview: Part Two

I talk about writing as a beast and the economy of bodies.

Rhino post

I was going through my notebooks from my MFA and I found this quote:

"E... had a theory about rhinos. They see through smell. Their tiny eyes don't bring in enough light. But smells linger longer than light, allow more depth of knowledge. Five days of smells can be presented in front of a rhino's nose and he sees them all. This 'extra time dimension' allows a different perception-- on that appears differently, depending on where you are. Days overlap, extend, flow into one another. Rhinos are not limited by light. Chemicals track pathways to the brain, illuminate objects internally."

If that isn't poetry, I don't know poetry. I wish I had sited the source of the quote! Some of it is paraphrased.

I also had this: 18 million years old. 30 million years ago, no horn, long neck.

And a lot about mud.

I knew that I did a small writing project on a rhino I saw at the zoo, but I was surprised by the connections to my current writing.

Land Beast, Part Two

Matt Bell asked me to send him a story for his last issue as editor at The Collagist.

You can imagine how nervous I was. I didn't want to disappoint.

I had more Land Beast, but it took months of courage for me to send it.

I finally did and he said he wanted it! I'm so happy to be in his final issue.



The Collagist: Land Beast, Part Two
 

Cotton underwear

Clint and I sat down to eat dinner. We turned on Netflix. Oh, let's just try that House of Cards, it's too much work to look for something good. First thirty seconds and a dog is wounded by a human. That's it for that show. Okay, X Files. Sci-fi is really doing it for me lately. I had watched the show with my family--a strange thing indeed, strange that we were allowed to watch something "iffy".

Clint and I watched the pilot over kale, carrots and pine nuts. He cooked. It was delicious.

It was '92 when the pilot was filmed and '93 when it aired. Gillian had gorgeous skin. She did a great job being a smart woman.

 I was caught off-guard when she stripped down to her bra--it seemed so intimate because she had been so buttoned up with such straight hair. Invulnerable. But the thing that made it really intimate was the choice to have her wear such an average bra. It was the same color as her skin and a basic underwire. Not black, not satin, not push-up. Then she look off her pants! She wore off-white cotton panties with high leg holes and a high waist. They didn't fit her tiny butt very well, were a little saggy. The viewer was tasked to look at her body, and then asked to examine it for alien bites.

Wait, I said! Pause it! Clint hit the space bar on our Mac.

Her underwear! Can you believe she's wearing cotton? Geesh, it's like she's extra naked.

I was very uncomfortable. It was '93 on the TV for heaven's sake. Maybe I was back to being 13 and prudish, but no, that didn't seem quite right.

It's pre-Victoria's Secret, Clint says.

Oh, I said. Yes.

I'm so used to seeing actresses in lingerie that it seems like another type of clothing, like they aren't nearly naked.  But cotton underwear, whoa. Time-warped me more than the alien abduction. Would I have reacted so strongly if I had been 32 when I first saw the pilot? Probably not. I probably would have worn the same underwear Gillian did and my surprise would only be at her stripping down in the first show. (Which, come on, was lame)Growing up during the lingerie shift, I felt shame and embarrassment when viewing her plain underwear. It felt like we, the viewers, were truly violating her privacy.