Reading Style

Most of my life I have been basically a serial reader; that is, I have read books one at a time, one after another.

Then I had kids and I became a simultaneous reader. Stealing moments here and there left me less time to read, so I would start various books and leave them in various locations, in reach when I could manage a moment. Still, I only read one of each kind of book at a time: one fiction, one non-fiction, and one poetry book, usually.

I still do this, except that recently I have started reading multiple poetry books at once. Instead of reading 5 to 15 pages of poetry from one poet in a single sitting, I now tend to read 5 or so poems each from 2 or 3 poets. This is a new strategy for me, and here's how it developed.

I was reading Rusty Morrison's Whethering, and I was admiring her technical virtuosity, the line breaks, the repetitions, and I wanted to let the techniques sink in, so I studied the poems and wanted to think on them rather than plowing ahead to the next set of poems. So I picked up Alicia Suskin Ostriker's The Book of Life to read in the meantime. And it was so intense that I didn't want to lose the emotionality of it by reading it too fast.

As it happens, I've been reading Karen An-hwei Lee's Phyla of Joy for over a month now, prior even to beginning the Morrison book, and I've been reading that one so slowly because Lee and I have so many of the same shared obscure obsessions (selenographia, blindness, invisible blue lines, celadon) that I get overwhelmed by that and have to put the book down.

And then I wanted to read something whimsical because of the weight of all the other books, so I picked up Carol Guess's Doll Studies: Forensics, which wouldn't seem to be whimsical when you consider that her poems are all based on dioramas of crimes scenes as portrayed using dolls by artist Frances Glessner Lee, and then photographed and researched by Corinne May Botz. It's Guess's word choice that constantly surprises me and gives this deeply disturbing book its whimsical quality. There isn't a poem in here that doesn't surprise me with word choice or imagery.

And reading these books concurrently is really working for me in a way I hadn't known it would. The aesthetics of the different poets bouncing around in my mind at once is giving me new ways to appreciate each artist's work, and new ways to see their work and my own.

(And for completeness, let me just add that in non-fiction, I'm just finishing up Bill Bryson's Mother Tongue, and for fiction I'm reading Nathan Englander's The Ministry of Special Cases.)

Three+ Poetry Ideas

Today, three good poetry ideas.

First, Poetry Kanto editor Alan Botsford announced on his website that the submission period is open for the 2012 issue from December through April or May. Poetry Kanto is a high-quality bilingual print journal out of Kanto Gakuin University, and has featured poets such as Jane Hirschfield, Mari L'Esperance, Alicia Ostriker, and Judy Halebsky. If you want to see your poem alongside work in Japanese as well as in English, you'll want to submit to this gorgeous print journal.

Second, if you don't already subscribe to Diane Lockward's *free* monthly online newsletter, you'll want to sign up now (go to her blog, scroll down and keep your eye out for the newsletter sign-up on the right side). This month Lockward features a craft tip from Alicia Ostriker called "Confronting Your Fears."  Ostriker includes such insights as "The idea that poets neither conquer nor surrender to their fears, but use them, and find form through them—to me that is brilliant. Because fears—notice the plural—are part of our deepest selves. We have fears from the time we are born," and "And a mantra in my writing workshops is 'Write what you are afraid to write.' It is a lifelong task. Use the fears. Bring them up from the subconscious, and find the words, find the form." You'll want to read the entire piece and get some writing prompts from the master Ostriker.

Plus Lockward's newsletter this month features the link to Charles Bernstein's Experiments page, and other interesting online resources. You really do want to receive this monthly newsletter, so sign up now.

Third, subscribe to the journal Hoot: a postcard review of {mini} poetry and prose to get one postcard per month featuring fiction, non-fiction, poetry and prose in under 150 words. That's under 150 words for the entire journal, which fits on a single postcard. Come on, even you have time for that! Consider submitting there too, with poems under 10 lines, and prose under 150 words.

So 3+ good poetry ideas for a Sunday morning (Japan time). Enjoy!