Feverishly gardening, mowing, and washing clothes; dodging among the rain showers; training children in chick-sitting and greenhouse-watering . . . all in preparation for our trip to New York City on Tuesday. The boys are missing most of a week of school and couldn't be happier. They want to go to the zoo; they want to eat lunch at the U.N.; they are full of big plans for fun fun fun. I wish we had a transporter like in Star Trek so we didn't have to drive for 10 hours to get there, but I am resigned.

Going to New York from rural Maine is like entering a parallel universe. Up here, I forget that such things exist: noise and crowds and restaurants; stores open all night, and a bar on every corner. We stay with friends in Brooklyn, who still live like college boys, by which I mean that they decorate with beer and the stereo and find small reason to clean the bathroom. It's refreshing, and exhausting, to dip back into that lovable old life.

from Manahatta

Walt Whitman

Trottoirs throng'd, vehicles, Broadway, the women, the shops and shows,

A million people--manners free and superb--open voices--hospitality

          --the most courageous and friendly young men,

City of hurried and sparkling waters! city of spires and masts!

City nested in bays! my city!

Received Milly Jourdain's poems in the mail, and they are breaking my heart. More anon, because I am writing a review of them. Somebody has to. But I'll give you a poem:

Watching the Meet

Joan Arden [Milly Jourdain]

The air is still so new and fresh and cold,

It makes a warm excitement in our hearts

To drive beside the sad and lonely fields.

And now we see a wider space of road

Where groups of horsemen moving restlessly

Are waiting for the quiet-footed hounds.

The hounds come swiftly, covering the way

Like foaming water surging round our feet.

And then with cries and sound of cracking whips

All, all are gone: the distant beat of hoofs

Like trailing smoke of dreams, comes fitfully

To tell how near they were a moment past.

But we see only winter trees again,

And turning homewards meet a drifting rain.

Update: Well, I wrote the review at manic speed, in the space of three hours. Now I don't know what to do with it. Who publishes reviews of obscure, out-of-print poetry collections? I'll send it to you to read, however, if you'd like to see it.

Ivy Compton-Burnett on Henry James: "A curious talent. One has to respect him. But how one would like to give him a push."

To the novelist Rosamund Lehman: "I've read your book, oh yes, I've read your book, and I've decided that one of us cannot be a woman."

When asked later about the same Lehman novel: "'If it had been half as long--which would have done no harm--and if she had taken out half the characters--which would have been an improvement--' Pause. 'Well, there wouldn't have been much left, would there?'"

On a novel by Olivia Manning: "It is really full of very good descriptions. Quite excellent descriptions. I don't know if you care for descriptions? I don't."

[from Hilary Spurling, Ivy (New York: Knopf, 1984), 467-70, passim.]

So once again, I need your advice. In September I'll be reading with Maine poet and memoirist Elizabeth Garber, an event that the Maine Humanities Council will record and make available as a podcast on its website. The council has a number of these podcasts, which are intended to introduce listeners to working writers and literary history.

Over the summer, as a preview to the reading, the council would like to record us in a conversation focusing on why poets might choose to turn to memoir. Of course, we have to be prepared with questions to ask one another, and this is where you come in. What would you like to know? What makes you uneasy? What would you like to point out? Feel free to refer specifically to Tracing Paradise, if you've read it. Elizabeth's memoir is currently under construction, but I'm sure she'd be glad to share samples with interested parties. Just let me know.

We're excited about this opportunity, which may also morph into a panel discussion at the Stonecoast MFA residency this winter, including writers such as Baron Wormser and possibly Barbara Hurd and Ann Hood. So act now: get bossy, ask a few nosy questions, and see what we can invent for you.

    Do not expect me to explain who might still be in the classroom on July 1 . . . or even who has time to hire a poet at this late date. Nonetheless, I pass it on.

    Opportunity for Poets in Residence

High schools and middle schools

 

The Maine Arts Commission wants to further enrich the student/poet interaction inMaine’s schools.  Building upon the recently successful Poetry Out Loud competition the agency is offering schools up to $1,000 to bring a poet into their classes before July 1, 2009.

 

This is a new opportunity that allows teachers to bring a poet into the classroom before July 1, 2009. The money should fund a poet to come into your class and give a workshop or short residency, or you might bring in a poet to do a creative writing workshop.

 

The Maine Arts Commission is offering this opportunity on a first come - first served basis and based on availability of funds. First, decide the type of workshop you need. Second, contact the artist to determine availability, cost and scheduling arrangements. Go to www.MaineArts.com to find listed artists in the directory, or contact Paul Faria for assistance at 287-2790 or paul.faria@maine.gov . Finally, after contacting the artist, contact us to set up the details.

 

Please contact us if you have someone in mind that you've worked with before or that you've had a recommendation about and would like approval to work with this opportunity. This is very limited opportunity so the time to act is now. Workshops must take place before July 1, 2009.

Contact Paul Faria for more information at 287-2790 or paul.faria@maine.gov

A discovery: Midway through Hilary Spurling's biography of the novelist Ivy Compton-Burnett, I began to run across scraps of poems by a woman named Melicent Jourdain. Known as Milly, she was the youngest sister of Ivy's companion, Margaret Jourdain. Both were also siblings of the mathematician Philip Jourdain. Like Philip, Milly was crippled and eventually killed, at age 44 (oddly enough, my own age at the moment), by Friedrich's ataxia, a hereditary form of multiple sclerosis characterized by childhood onset and rapid progress.

On the Internet, I found one copy of Milly's poems available, which I have ordered: a first edition, published in 1924 and titled Unfulfilment, under the pen name "Joan Arden." For this first edition (by which the seller means "only edition"), said to be in excellent condition, I am paying a mere 30 dollars. Apparently there is not a run on this book.

From the bits and pieces quoted in Spurling's biography, I can only say that Milly may be a quiet poet, but her eye and the purity of her diction are notable, as this tiny excerpt shows:

O only once to loose my hold, and slip

Down the familiar bank, and feel the chill

Of water lapping round my feet, and hear

The sounds of distant music in the wind.

I expect to be disappointed by her book, yet I'm hopeful also. Something about those lines moves me, rather as John Clare can move me, almost in spite of myself.

Really: look at this stanza . . . what could be more beautiful?

And still I see how clearly shines the light

On winter branches, and how the dripping rain

Deepens the colour on the hills, and how

To draw those horses plodding up the lane.

A lovely reading last night. People actually walked in off the street to hear poetry. Imagine!

Every once in a while, a room full of people becomes briefly aligned, a sort of simultaneity of mind and sensation. Oddly, and sweetly, it was that sort of reading.