A high-school teacher from Spain writes me, in an email:

"Soy un lector de poesía norteamericana. Más: tengo a la poesía norteamericana y a la tradición de la modernidad en esa literatura: Pound, William Carlos Williams, H.D., los objetivistas de los 30 (Zukofsky, Reznikoff, Oppen, Niedecker), los proyectivistas de "Black Mountain" (Olson, Duncan, Creeley, Dorn, Levertov), la escuela de Nueva York (Ashbery, O'Hara, Koch), pero también a los confesionales como Berryman, Lowell y últimamente James Merrill, tengo a todos ellos como parte de un santuario privado, una colección de "diferencias" de las que el viejo "Ezra" es la divinidad tutelar, el objeto sagrado y cuasi ritual."

"I am a reader of American poetry. What is more, I hold American poetry and the modern tradition in this poetry.... blah, blah... I hold all of them as part of a private sanctuary, a collection of 'differences' among which old 'Ezra' is the presiding divinity, the sacred and almost ritual object."

I wish some of our university professors were as well read. Hell, I wish I myself could spell "Zukofsky" "Niedecker," "Reznikoff," and "Merrill" with consistent accuracy. At least I won't write "Alan Ginzburg" and "John Ashberry."