Frederick Seidel on what stands in the way of writing poetry:
I asked Seidel if, looking back, he understood what was in the way of his getting back to poetry. Seidel didn’t hesitate:
“Cowardice.”
What was there to be afraid of?
“The expression of aspects of the self that you understand or, rather, that you fancy may not be attractively expressed or attractive once expressed.” He added: “Another way of talking about this is to talk about your becoming yourself: your finding who you are as a poet, finding what you sound like, finding your subjects that bring you out of you that are your subjects. It’s almost as if there’s a moment when you decide, Well, whatever the problem of writing this way, of writing these things, whatever the difficulty with presenting yourself this way . . . well, that’s it.
in this article on him in The New York Times.
Last link broken, I guess.
Thanks Scherezade, Wordpress was acting up. Have fixed.
I was born 1941 also very similar experiences as Seidel had especially w my rabbi and my parents and bar mitzva and schooling, etc…
I did some work w Sarojini Sahoo (The Dark Abode)
you may know here (work)
cheers, Ed
Cowardice!! I guess, the one time feelings in most of the poets!