it wouldn't have worked out beween us

Thank you for inviting us into your bath, enjoyed it right up until you fell asleep on me... ain't it just my luck!!! Now as to who you are referring to... hmmmm could it be someone that may ravage you with appreciation... hmmmm ... I dare not give it away... but I can tell you I loved both writes... Richard

~A, Two poems, like bookends, and right nice ones at that. I love the line "I no longer ask the stars to shine, neither Esmarelda nor Quasimodo". ...great writing...wcw

I was moved to whistle through my teeth with sheer admiration at the first piece, and to tears at the sadness of the second. Second fiddle? No ... rather a whole symphony orchestra complete with conductor ... Mike "not all matterings of mind equal one violet" ~ e e cummings ~

I remember Buda and Pest [pesht], turned by brutish landlords into a shopworn Vienna, bullet holes still mending. It is not just the Hungary of recent recall, but back the ages, for the Carpathian Basin has felt as many human rain drops as the Ukrainian Steppe. I bought the strong local cigarettes there when I still smoked. I have followed all of your recent poems but cannot keep pace with comments. Partially that is dyslexia, partly chores. Yesterday and today I was six feet down the well, replacing a foot valve. No municipal water system here: if something breaks and you want a bath then fix it. But in your case, in your case, there was also waiting. I asked you first for consent to comment. And, after a decided pause, which itself was meant by you to communicate something, you agreed. I don't forget such things. But I know how I comment. And I have come to know something of you. You were the only additional commentator to an exchange earlier this month and I took it to have nothing at all to do with the subject at issue. Perhaps you think that men are less sensitive or self absorbed or thinking with their six shooters. But you yourself communicated the level of sensitivity required. And so I made no comment to you directly, even when you offered a bit of a scrum. And here you are writing up a storm of beauty. Normally, I'd say "Your poetry of late is becoming very appealing (English understatement)". And I don't think that it is just me. The evidence is manifold. What do you think of this: "poems are delusions of the highest order and nothing else fits so perfectly over the hole in my heart". I was out recently. And there were no stories on display. Everyone had edited themselves or Googled themselves into little water closets with the doors nailed shut. If I may respectfully disagree; no matter how poetic the sentiment, poems are not just delusions but myth making, story telling and the imagination with its eyes open and its tongue, well, doing a variety of things a tongue does. Can you imagine a party of poets?: wanderings and swollen talk and anachronistic polemics and idiosyncratic mosh mouth movements. Still, I understand your point. That longing which poetry only fills one drop at a time, not enough to keep up with evaporation. Olya and I got lucky late in life finding each other. I didn't expect that to happen. As it turn out, she had written two books of poetry all to me before I dated her. I generally don't read them; they feel like spears of sadness. But we write new poetry nearly every day, and I read to her nearly every night, using different voices for each character. We are reading Salman Rushdie these days. Back to your poems; from "to you know who": "loneliness makes lies out of the most beautiful declarations" These are lovely lines. They have that spearing potency of sadness that evokes the reader to enter the same door. And there is a rhyme but it is a lovely and subtle rhyme "loneliness makes lies". This is like listening to rhythm on the radio in the evening as the sun dips on the lake. I think one of the earliest things I wrote to you in comment upon a poem was, "this is the way to complain". Well your poetry is getting better by the day and perhaps soon you will just giggle in delight at your own image. Adieu, bjp

I am speechless. So all I can muster is that I loved these two parts and look for more each time I am here, you dance with such elegance and grace among the poetry it is a joy to watch. Yours Ann of Norway