10.20.2008

Reading "The Kid", by Conrad Aiken. Poem in several sections, a kind of "American myth" poem. Interesting to me in its affinities with Crane's Bridge, and its focus on William Blacksone, the "maverick" early settler, preacher, scholar, orchardist (Boston and Rhode Island). A lot of WB in my poems. The epigraph to "The Lost Notebooks" (opening chapter of Grassblade Light) is from Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano :

"– "Talking of corpses," – the Consul poured himself another whiskey and was signing a chit book with a somewhat steadier hand while Yvonne sauntered toward the door –"personally I'd like to be buried next to William Blackstone –" He pushed the book back for Fernando, to whom mercifully he had not attempted to introduce her. "The man who went to live among the Indians. You know who he was, of course?" The Consul stood half toward her, doubtfully regarding this new drink he had not picked up."

I found out later that Lowry had been a student of Aiken's.

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