[Janice D. Soderling]

But it's in our power to make [the sandbox] bigger. We just need to take a different approach.

I play in the pretty well the whole sandbox. I write vers libre as well as formal verse in a variety of received and experimental forms, and am constantly proving new and/or unusual approaches and patterns. I dabble in surreal poetry and light verse, and even, at times, attempt to project deeper meaning in my work. I write political poetry. I write fiction, both flash and longer pieces, and essays. I write in more than one language and I translate.

Whether I do any of this well or badly will be judged differently by different ears/eyes. But I do it.

What I don't do, I hope, is to put up flarfific prefabs and conceptual facades unvaried as the movie set fronts of a wild west main street.

And because I build my castles throughout--and even exterior to--the sandbox, I make the claim that my critique of flarf and conceptual poetry is legitimite and justifiable; it isn't small-minded muttering or because I have an anal-retentive or xenophobic attitude.

It is not because I have no aesthetics, but because I have differing aesthetics. I see no reason to be apologetic about this.