Volume is equal to One over ditto
where Volume is given as ‘Best’.
Will the most radical mag in Australia
converse with my radical test?
Poetry looks all the same to your eye
because Volume is equal to One
where One is the one that the editor loves
over ditto infinitum.
Don’t get me wrong
I’m not dissing the ed.
where equal means equal
to what you have read.
Volume is equal to One over ditto
where ditto is given as rest
both from fully confirming one’s self
and from putting one’s hand to the test.
Why do you waste your most powerful words
on screwing a person’s aesthetics?
Maybe because you are poet
where poet has misplaced heretics.
Read me a poem you think is the best of his or her best.
Or write me a poem that references you to their greatness:
Lest we forget.
April 14th, 2010 at 8:45 am
This is cool. I’ve never seen a critique expressed as a mathematical formula.
April 14th, 2010 at 7:19 pm
Thanks, Mark. This formula is a proposed initiation, where Tara Mokhtari has expressed a desire for such in conclusion to her review of The Best Australian Poems 2009; a review which I think is fascinating and has the potential to influence a stackload of positive debate if we keep it alive. More than that, mine is not just another comment. It is a practical experiment with a hypothesis. I am willing to accept that my experiment will fail to achieve the desired result.
April 14th, 2010 at 3:46 pm
Brad I think you have conflicting denominational definitions ie., ‘lost for words’ and ‘rest …’ so the solving of the problem is made even more difficult (plus I don’t know what you are talking about). I’d also like to add that I write bird poems but they are never about birds and I have included H2O, but it usually represents some other thing as well. What do you mean by ed. ?
April 14th, 2010 at 7:39 pm
ed. is an abbreviation of editor. Birds are an abbreviation of natural beauty, and of ugliness by extension too.
Maxine Clarke’s response to Tara Mokhtari’s review – “Somebody shoot me if I ever write a bird poem.”
No. No. No, Maxine. Somebody give you immortality for writing a bird poem your way.
April 15th, 2010 at 7:33 am
It’s strange that the discussion turned to nature poetry. I had a similar response to yours. All nature poems are environmental poems and all environmental poems are political poems.
Given that the environment is the most pressing political issue facing us at the moment, one might suggest a certain responsible activism in writing nature poems.
April 17th, 2010 at 8:21 am
I liked it. Well written. Beyond this, I have nothing to say really because as a Canadian we only write about freezing to death, Kraft Dinner, Hockey and black flies. :0 As always Brad, you are clever and complex, a combination that beats a bird or water poem any day.