Poetry

 May 30, 2026

Re-watched Once Upon a Time in Hollywood last night, then in a dream Brad Pitt was my father (wearing the same yellow Hawaiian shirt) and we were selecting a vacation camping cabin, and as soon as we were set up he was going to show me how to butcher a cow in time for that night’s barbecue. 

Got spiffed up to attend a concert at Trinity downtown, which actually happens on another night. Had a cocktail at Times. 

SM turns out to be quite serious about poetry, and sends draft after draft. His latest drafts are actually readable. He’s an outstanding musician, so why not poetry? He is infected with the notion– which must come from bad teachers–that poetry enlarges emotion by expressing it in the most difficult and obscure way possible. The harder it is to figure out, the smarter the poet, the deeper the emotion. So many new writers are metaphysicians, thinking it’s needful for us to ransack history and psychology and etymology to help us unravel why that word in that place. Every statement is a knot to untie. For some that may be natural, but not for many. Anyway, he plunges forward, and I try to remain positive in my critiques. Aside from that, he is so beautiful. He sent me a voice recording of one of the poems, and though the poem is incomprehensible, I play it again and again.