Let us return to old times, and that will be progress
— Igor Stravinsky


THE ONE OR TWO THINGS. . .







The one or two things I have been thinking about lately —

what happened to all the poets I was reading in the 60s-70s? Did they all just one day blow away? I have a library in the thousands of such books and I hate to tell you we have a bookshop with much of the same; and on top of that, I have close friends who care for me and Sweetheart, who wonder how we are possibly making a living? Like always, scratching away. Working all the time on a magnanimous load of wasted time. That’s dreamers for you. And even more, we publish all the time poets who don’t sell but write wonderful work. Ain’t life grand? I mean it is.



The other thing I’ve been thinking about is what in the world has happened to the world —

meaning, how we operate in it and so with one another. We actually aren’t. I hesitate to knock, even though I have, Twitter users and cellphones and all the junk that now fills our daily lives. Not my life, but lives of people I could be tossing a ball to, or having a conversation with, or waving hello to, or walking into a room where there is one person and only me and that person is having the grandest time yakking into his cellphone. I say leave home and so leave home, leave the stuff at home. Return to the world and be part of it. Carry away from home a book in your pocket, a fiddle on the back seat, guitar, a pair of binoculars, okay take a camera....but Blackberry, Twitter, cellphone, all the gizmos, keep those in their place: for an emergency, for practical use. Get back to talking to one another, walking down the street open for action. Ever think about whistling while you walk?

photo © susan arnold