Frank Samperi’s notes on poetry and poetics
8/29/69
Handwritten original from “Marginalia” included in Quadrifariam.
For Dolores
These poems may seem to be just occasions; (but) nevertheless there is a desire to place
them more substantially: the spiritual world a light coming thru. (Gathering up or better)
revealing the domestic worthy of the metaphor: the family aware of the fall of light,
darkness no longer something to be eradicated.
9/24/69
-There should be no indenting – also, the lines should fall without spacing.
Anti-Hero
What is known the world over business makes men brutal.
Still feel that the deeping of The Triune depends upon my getting complete rest – no other
way to the spirit except thru a purity of disposition.
It is best that my work remain unknown – the age continues the work of the last 600 years:
Who’s the poet, then?
I’d like to write of friendship, but that’s more memorial than actual fact; nevertheless, the
memory of it mollifies walks otherwise hapless. Not much time for walks these days – the job
tyrannical. It is not possible to teach the young poetry if their sense of (poetry) it is competitive.
They seek judgments that have nothing to do with the art, that is, a man gains nothing from being
told that his work is stronger than another’s: but again, the age wants no part of a teaching that
has God as end, the audience in no sense identifying with a work, release necessarily telic.
Here it comes clear: the teaching of poetry says just that we might be heirs of a view that impedes
no sense – second that the wholeness of a work is equally given up: from these the audience is
fulfilled, the sense the wholeness unimpeded. What happens when the age is false (propagandistic)?
The artist must seek the truth doubly.
You waste away for want of companions – those who insist you only wait upon a verification that
is referable to themselves rather than the common that makes companions participants in the greater
life.
What comes upon one that makes him (you) feel that everything has reached its peak, and that
anything more to do is over and above! There is separation, and the terrible sorrow of the day reflects
It, makes me inwardly dual.
Handwritten original from “Marginalia” included in Quadrifariam.
For Dolores
These poems may seem to be just occasions; (but) nevertheless there is a desire to place
them more substantially: the spiritual world a light coming thru. (Gathering up or better)
revealing the domestic worthy of the metaphor: the family aware of the fall of light,
darkness no longer something to be eradicated.
9/24/69
-There should be no indenting – also, the lines should fall without spacing.
Anti-Hero
What is known the world over business makes men brutal.
Still feel that the deeping of The Triune depends upon my getting complete rest – no other
way to the spirit except thru a purity of disposition.
It is best that my work remain unknown – the age continues the work of the last 600 years:
Who’s the poet, then?
I’d like to write of friendship, but that’s more memorial than actual fact; nevertheless, the
memory of it mollifies walks otherwise hapless. Not much time for walks these days – the job
tyrannical. It is not possible to teach the young poetry if their sense of (poetry) it is competitive.
They seek judgments that have nothing to do with the art, that is, a man gains nothing from being
told that his work is stronger than another’s: but again, the age wants no part of a teaching that
has God as end, the audience in no sense identifying with a work, release necessarily telic.
Here it comes clear: the teaching of poetry says just that we might be heirs of a view that impedes
no sense – second that the wholeness of a work is equally given up: from these the audience is
fulfilled, the sense the wholeness unimpeded. What happens when the age is false (propagandistic)?
The artist must seek the truth doubly.
You waste away for want of companions – those who insist you only wait upon a verification that
is referable to themselves rather than the common that makes companions participants in the greater
life.
What comes upon one that makes him (you) feel that everything has reached its peak, and that
anything more to do is over and above! There is separation, and the terrible sorrow of the day reflects
It, makes me inwardly dual.
"It is not possible to teach the young poetry if their sense of (poetry) it is competitive".
ReplyDeleteThis one jumped off the page at me. And it is only a false propagandistic age in which poets write to compete. Silly awards, silly poets who covet them.
"How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!" (Emily Dickinson)
Conrad,
ReplyDeleteSo true, so true - yes, the poetry for fame is false. True poetry is from within and from God. It needs only a true voice to be heard from others that seek only the truth.
Love the Emily Dickinson poem!