Latta keeps it close to speech-writing, today. People behind the phraseology, actual warm-bodied human beings, speaking. Literary history as a process of finding a genuine way to talk in print, or imprint talk.

Coming down from physics to chemistry. The phasal interaction between ordinary (not so ordinary) banter, dialogue, musing - truth-telling, directness - on the one hand - and the more basic or inherent rhythms of words & letters, materialized in text - on the other (measured music). I guess Zukofsky put it more elegantly, with his function sign, speech/music.

The American style of bluntness. Stephen Crane, Hemingway. Or the American style of jive. Twain, Melville. Straight or slant. Is there an American middle style, that doesn't become bland & academical or stuffy & academical?

The poet must do a couple of things, I guess - 1. find an authentic way to combine these two phases; 2. once there, actually have something to say.