From: jjwebb@cruzio.santa-cruz.ca.us
Newsgroups: rec.arts.poems
Subject: Re: the business of poetry
Keywords: condolences
Date: Tue, 14 Apr 92 19:29:26 PDT
Reply-To: jjwebb@cruzio.santa-cruz.ca.us



Joe Green writes:

>Yeah?  Prove to me that this is anything other than what it
>insists something else is.

Gee, that might take some thought ... well, I'll need a little time,
so, while we're waiting, why don't you tell us about ... VIETNAM! 

Yeah, Vietnam ... there's a fresh subject ... you were there, huh?
it was horrible, huh? war's bad, huh?   

I know joe, I know ...

>Are you so used to submission that this is your view of anything that
>might disturb you?

Just chalk it up to my frontier mentality ...

Ya piss me off joe! I think it's your patronizing style ... although
your dishonesty and hypocrisy contribute some.

You're going to get the black man into the room, huh? ... talking about
Rilke, Goethe, and Foucault? How about Gil Scott Heron, Le Roi Jones and 
Ferlinghetti?

(Oh, I remember, you asked for poems for Fidel. When did Ferlinghetti do that? 
early sixties, right? Somehow joe, it just doesn't have as much impact today.)

Score another one for JG's "just talk" box. 

>Make the effort to separate what you do and are able to do from
>what can be done.  Also make an effort to see that there
>might be something outside your world view.  

Like maybe, your world view? And your means of addressing it?
You've missed the point again joe ... that's just the means I'm
using ... and if you can't recognize its reflection then I know
why you piss in your kitchen instead of your bathroom, where you
might encounter a mirror.

There are lots of world views joe ... those from the mountains ...
and those from the bowels of a computer controlled world ... to name two.
Whose dog are you?

>Of course what you indulge in is a commodity.  That is my point.  You may
>not be able to see the possibility of something else -- much
>less enact that possibility.

You haven't a clue as to what I may or may not be able to see ...
and what's more, you couldn't care less. As long as I can't see you,
that's all you really care about ... well, you've succeeded. The only 
picture I have of joe green is that of a bored and bitter egomaniac who
likes to ridicule people, who plays 'Shock Theater' whenever the urge
to turn the gun to his temple becomes overpowering, and who pretends
that the bullshoi he spews on whim is well thought out opinion.

Must be wonderful to be so smart and so misunderstood ... Aren't you 
a bit old for this game though? Just asking ... I don't mind if you
continue playing ... (actually, I DO mind ... there's just nothing
I can do to get you to stop).

>>Poetry? Not here either .. but at least it's a labor of love
>>(or nagging agony, the itch that never quite subsides).

>No -- this kind of poetry a labor for a machine -- the itch
>you feel may have another origin -- you may want to get outside --

I don't think that's it ... ya see joe, I am outside ... I don't have to
throw a stone to hit the Santa Cruz Mountains. All I need do is drop the
stone. Those chains are heavy, huh joe? You can get lighter ones you know 
... you do, I know ... but it would ruin the image, huh? 

>but this kind of thinking (((hey, everything is a commodity
>anyway) is what keeps you in that machine.

More dishonesty ... aren't you the guy that bemoans the fate of the
small press publications? Ironwood, Hambone, Bronte Street and others
that us 'Mericans just don't support well enough? A noble sentiment,
if you really mean it ... you don't suppose those pubs use that silly
copyright symbol do you? Here, let me go inside and check ....

Hey joe, I got news for ya joe ... and a question ... you ever found
anybody as smart as you joe? I didn't think so.

>You think that the "control freak" is someone who suggests that poetry 
>might be a gift instead of a commodity?  

No, I think the "control freak" mouths the words with some other motivation
in mind ... and I don't mean the theft of intellectual property, so spare
me the obligatory remark about not having anything worth taking ... This
posturing of yours, you've got it down real well, are your robes equally
impressive? And I've forgotten my lines in the litany ... you say
"You are ALL .. slaves!" And our response is? "Oh, all knowing father,
SAVE us!" Those the right words? 

>Think about it.  Perhaps the real control is whatever it is that makes 
>you think of poetry in the same terms as writing a song for a pimple or 
>the scratching of an itch.

More dishonesty ... God, it's staggering ... I know you know how to read. 

I write songs for myself ... I've written PRESS RELEASES for teenagers 
that couldn't do it for themselves (and yeah, sometimes they made me mad 
enough to refer to them as pimples. And I'm sure that on more than one 
occasion, they thought of me as 'that damned old man' that just didn't 
understand). 

And joe green writes for the enlightenment of mankind, not for anything
as crass and human as an ITCH! MY God no! joe's far more nobler than that!
Tell me joe ... does the throne room ever get claustrophobic?

>I don't have any poets.  

Only yourself ... and that IS sad ... all that reading, and not
a tinge of humanity filters through that ego ... nothing, no one
can see you ...  and most everything you read is depressing ...

While I, in my ignorance, am caught humming by everyone, have many,
many poets, and am as depressed by the stuff YOU claim as poetry as
you are depressed by Frost, Tennyson, Sandburg and the stuff I claim 
as poetry. Better songs for pimples than blueprints for 21st century 
fascists.

>Then there is the fact (which I have been kind enough not to
>mention) that there is no need to copyright your stuff
>since no-one would want to copy it.  Dull.  Dumb.

Now here's a surprise ... Joe! You don't like what I write!? ...
Now, I really AM hurt ... this wouldn't have anything to do with,
nah ... 

>Hope this helps.

Sure you do ... we've all seen what a sweet guy you are ... but
you'll just have to think of me as a lost cause ... I'm sure you
already do.

		JJWebb
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