"A biography is something one invents" --Louis-Ferdinand Celine. (Epigraph to Lisel Mueller's poem, "The Biographer").
April makes me slightly nostalgic for Poetasters, a group of poets I accidentally invaded as a freshman. Most of the members were seniors and graduate students who had studied and practiced and labored much more than I had and yet they tolerated me and invited me to come along. They introduced me to poets and styles and words I could not have dreamed on my own. And now, in April, I wait for their collections of poetry to become available so I can savor and praise them.
In celebration of 30 days of April, and thus 30 days of National Poetry Month, I read a collection of poetry by Lisel Mueller today. While I enjoyed it, I admit I did not savor it the way I savor Kimberly Johnson, Jay Hopler, Lance Larsen, Czeslaw Milosz, Carl Dennis, Natasha Tretheway (to list a few that jump immediately to mind). Something about her language felt too casual for me; not flippant or imprecise, but not necessarily poetic. It reminded me of rapidly scratching out poetry in high school, repeating the same phrases because that was "what poets do"--when really, who knows what any of us do? Writers, engineers, bakers, breathers.
This is one of the few Aprils that I have not written a poem every day. I forgot. But Charles Lamb just pounded to remind me that regardless of what I do, he is still a poem. Okay: so I've been percolating this growing poem for eight months. I think I hold him in for another five weeks or so, maybe more maybe less. Can I let this poem revise himself if I offer him the tools?
What are the biographies poetry allows us to invent?
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