May 3rd, 2008

Are these the same viewpoint?

Or opposites?

“Does anyone connect looking
anymore with beauty?”
–Speaker, “On Utility” from Ken Babstock’s collection *Airstream Land Yacht*

“‘I had almost given up hope of being loved…But, ladies and gentlemen, I’m now in love… Now, imagine the, um, beauty of that… I want to express it. I’d like you to know. When you wonder about love, about your own worthiness, maybe you’ll read a poem I’ve written about it. Maybe you’ll recognize yourself in there. I want to evoke my feelings, my ragged faith, my desolation, and my desolation, and my subsequent salvation so completely, so perfectly, that for you there will be no mistaking what we have in common…

“I am trying to…communicate as best I can. I want to help. I want you to know.”

–Dermot Schofield, fictional poet, in Lynn Coady’s novel *Mean Boy*