"This morning I re-read the 12th (unnumbered) section of the first poem I ever read by Ron Silliman, *Ketjak.* It's the one that uses the words 'aardwolf' and 'adz' and, toward the middle, the sentence 'A sequence of objects, silhouettes, which to him appears to be a caravan of fellaheen, a circus, dromedaries pulling wagons bearing tiger cages, fringed surreys, tamed ostriches in toy hats, begins a slow migration to the right vanishing point on the horizon line,' which first appears as the poem's second sentence, in § 2.
I discovered Ron somewhere between Marilyn Hacker, Rae Armantrout (to whom *Ketjak* is dedicated), and Anne Carson.
Silliman was born on August 5, 1946, and I have met him a few times here in Philadelphia at Kelly Writers' House (where he mentioned to me, in passing, that the "revolving door" that opens the poem, belonged to the Bank of America, somewhere in San Francisco), and also at the Naropa Summer Writing Project.
I've also read most of his poem *The Alphabet*—which compares favorably to Wordsworth's "The Prelude"—my favorite section of which is "Skys" (p. [cetera desunt]
I think it fair to say we belong to a mutual admiration society . . . and it has given me hours and, indeed, weeks of pleasure since Larry McCaffrey first suggested I read him, sometime between 1970 and 75. Without him, I certainly wouldn't be the reader I have managed to become." --Samuel R Delany on Fb
departed-sparkle · pillage team
lowering clouds · cluster like worries
a nacreous needed · nap shrivels
if i ever erred · & then doubled down
on my wretched wrong · ravens have sailed
since & unsaying · is eke no option
rain batters · the barrier of glass
i have to use headlights · Kharkiv falls
two pledge drives · the drake tittering
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