I thought if I washed out my mouth with lots Of soap and water, my speech Would henceforth spume forth A fountainhead
Of pure verse shining And smelling like a million bucks— But all that came up reeked Of a foul, wishy-washy tongue all
Fucked up and too utterly bankrupt To strive towards any semblance of upkeep.
Moderator’s comment: Huuk certainly knows his way around the poetic blogosphere—
who would have thought he’d latch on to a catchy phrase from Conrad DiDiodato’s comment on a post over at
ursprache and work it into a telling commentary on the modern poet’s coming to terms with his/her language predicament—whatever that may be.
NB:
In the event
the ursprache link is broken, here’s Conrad’s comment on a Seferis quote (“Unimaginable
how much patience is needed to see the simplest things. How much
patience I need to write a single verse.”):
Borrowing
phraseology from C.S.Lewis, I'd say you can start by wanting to write good
verse (for which much patience is required) and in the end you may get Poetry;
however, beginning with the "soap and water" of much contemporary
poetry will get you nothing at all. Of that you can be certain
I’ve been lying low on this hillock waiting for the sun To descend behind the floating blue Black mountains every evening for ages And have yet to let anybody down—
As sure as my name is Legion, any minute Now the needlelike cypresses reaching For the heavens will begin Sinking into the landscape again.