Oct 30, 2008 0
On Duplicity and Desire
Poets want things. There is a degree to which this notion runs counter to that of the common reader of poetry (provided such a thing anymore exists: let us say instead dull, or lazy, or naive). Perhaps this is due to precisely the notion that Arensberg (among others) articulates. The poet is a good liar or a master of equivocation and obliquity or he is not a poet, or at least a very poor one. I would challenge you to uncover a poet who is neither a liar nor an obfuscator. One could argue this obliquity a sign of cowardice, but it is more accurate generally to think of it as encrypted utterance accesible only to those with the proper key—and those are they who have what the poet wants.