I’ve begun studying Autumn Journal (1939) with great love. Though shorter, it’s every bit as brilliant as Tennyson’s In Memoriam or Wordsworth’s Prelude. I have to take my time to read the sections over and over, noticing and appreciating different things on each read—diction, rhythm, assonance, consonance, rhyme, closure, the power and pathos. I’m sorry… Continue reading Louis MacNeice
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Thinking about Jenny Xie
A few things I noticed about Xie’s verse…
Five Pages of Verse
Yesterday my friend Kristin and I completed our submission for an Orange County grant that would enable us to commission and perform a song cycle based on my poems. The idea excites me. Also yesterday, I submitted five pages of verse, as required, to the North Carolina Poetry Society, which offers a weeklong residency at… Continue reading Five Pages of Verse
Reinventing myself (again)
I’ve reached iteration Paul 9.0, Poet. I test-drove a few poems in performance in front of local audiences this spring was surprised at how receptive people were…
American Academy of Poets angel Autumn Journal Burnett dashes Dickinson Emily Dickinson exercises history hyphens immigration Jacob Kermode Lanier lyrics MacNeice Marianne Moore Merwin Middle East nature poems Oliver pantun prosody punctuation rain reparations rhyme Seidel Shakespeare sonnet Springsteen Tate verse voice weather Zevon