Poetry is not a zero zum zame. The only limit is mortality: when I die there will be books on my shelf I have not yet read. If I had the money I would just have a life-time subscription to sun and moon press. I don't think I could stand the pressure of having a poetic career to manage. I'd prefer to invest ego in more trivial games. Looking over your shoulder to see the young Turks riding up behind you. It would be like in Graduate School when I walked around wondering whether I was "brilliant" or not. If you weren't brilliant, you didn't exist, weren't noticed.

The academic Marxists at Stanford were the worst group of people (from my perspective at that time) I had ever known. It was all about jockeying for position. They would literally take over a class and stifle discussion. The second detestable group with which I came into contact were the reactionary Spaniards at my first real job. The opus dei is alive and well!

***

I like reading Asbhery because of the thoughts that I have while I read him. A second language accompanying and shadowing the language I am reading.