Gracious, Tim! What a generous appraisal. I had to go look through the book again to see whether I could find any of those qualities you attribute to it. I did find six occurrences of the subjunctive mood: 5 be's and a were. No actual magnolias, though.
You are right that a couple of the smaller pieces were dashed off at the last moment without time for proper maturation. Robt and I wanted to get the book ready in time for him to take a copy to West Chester. Several other of the poems were written earlier this year, but the great majority go much farther back, as much as fifty years.
If Clock and Rose Press had a subscription salesman with your descriptive gifts, they might hope to break even on this book.
Many thanks...
Wiley
|