Wednesday, January 27, 2010

5- A Poet's Attempt at Fiction

When i am having a particularly horrible day i go to the nearest bookstore, sit on the ground, and grab randomly at poetry books. if i don’t like the title- i shove it back in its place. if i don’t like the paper color or smell- i shove it back. if i don’t like the specific combo of words my eyes fall on in the middle of the page in the middle of the book- i shove it back. i reach and grab and reach and grab and shove and slam until i eventually find exactly what my subconscious has been searching for. today i found Anne Carson. and it is so extremely fitting that i have found her, and today, of all days. yesterday i finished the most beautiful book in the world. it hurts; i miss it, a lot actually. i found myself wishing i could still be reading it for the first time. that i could be reading it eternally. i dislike re-reading. this book is titled Fugitive Pieces and it is by Anne Michaels. this book, and the new books i discovered today, are prose-poetry. they are poem-novels. they are a postmodern intersection of lyricism and plot. and they freeze me. they stop me cold and turn me off of the world. i read these books and i am gone. a poet's first novel, a poet's 'attempt' at fiction.... this is my true love. no genre completes me like this. the first book i read in this manner was The Way Through Doors by Jess Ball. it stunned me. and i have been forever grasping for more of it. today's books are precisely what i need, precisely what i want. Autobiography of Red and Decreation by Anne Carson. When i grow up- this is what i will do, this is what i will write.

3 comments:

  1. I think that is great that those books compel you so much and my dad always told me that you want to love what you do for your job, so it sounds like you will.

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  2. Wow, what a great way to relieve stress. :) Maybe I'll try that sometime. I always love the smell of coffee when I go into Barnes and Noble. Not that I drink it, but it makes the bookstore sort of magical. Fugitive Pieces? I've never heard of it, but I'll have to put it on my "Books to Read" list.

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