[Rhina P. Espaillat]

There are many things for which I'm grateful to Tim Murphy. One of them is the fact that he introduced me to the work of Suzanne Doyle. I had never read her--a confession of ignorance on my part!--until Tim, during one of those long screenhouse conversations that have taught me so much, mentioned her as one of the most gifted poets he knew.

I have Suzanne's "Calypso," and am adding to this thread's selection of her work a wonderful poem that hits me where I hurt, because it's a "teacher poem." It speaks to that sense we all have in the classroom sometimes, when a students clearly needs more from us, something different from us, than we can give, and maybe more than anybody can give. I love the way the scene is created in only 12 lines, and the tenuousness of the encounter that is hardly an encounter at all:

For a Student

The bell rings and they stampede for the door,
Except for you, with one quick question more,
Each fine point born of heart's distress,
Each fine point torn from your tender breast.
And though I answer to the point, I see
That is not not what you want of me.

Now I must say, and learn to mean it too,
"Be careful what you set your heart to do;
It's likely it will happen. Let Romance go
And then, at least, I'll teach you what I know.
This will not cure what lately seems to ail you,
But neither will it ever come to fail you."

[Suzanne Doyle]

Rhina: Thank you so much for your kind words. They mean a great deal to me. AND thank you for quoting "For a Student" from _Calypso_ and bringing to my attention that I must have sent that poem off to Scienter Press before it was finished!! Clearly the 'knife of perfection was not being held to my throat' when I proofed the galleys. Lines 3 and 4 are actually me at work on line 4. Here's what the final version of lines 3 and 4 actually are:

Each word as careful as a first caress,
Each fine point torn out of your heart’s distress.

At least I finally got line 4 to scan.



[This message has been edited by Suzanne Doyle (edited December 01, 2008).]

[A. E. Stallings]

Suzanne,

Thanks so much for posting here. It is a delight to read these poems, some for the first time. I think it was Dick Davis who recommended your work to me. Wild Lightning and Demon Rum are just terrific. I think there are more opportunities nowadays for trade books with a formal bent--the New Criterion and Waywiser prizes among them, and I hope you will consider them.

Am fascinated by the potential relationship between the Davis and Bishop villanelle--it seems so obvious they must be linked in some way. Thanks for sharing this!

PS--edited in to say, I am really intrigued that nearly all of the interviews describe a childhood of a lot of unsupervised, unprogrammed time to drift and dream in, and many also comment upon hours spent in church and listening to hymns--also true for me I think, and certainly where I unconsciously imbibed a lot of my metrical sense, as well as a tolerance for quite slanted rhymes...

[This message has been edited by A. E. Stallings (edited December 03, 2008).]

[Susan McLean]

Suzanne,
I have enjoyed reading your work since I was first introduced to it years ago by Tim Murphy here on Eratosphere. I am glad to hear that at least the chapbook CALYPSO is still available. One problem with the work of formalists is that it is less likely to be carried in libraries. The only way to get to know it is often by buying a book on the basis of recommendations, and when no copies are available, the recommendations are in vain. I hope that the discussion here (or any other stimulus) will get you writing again, so that even more people can be exposed to your work. I appreciate your efforts to make the work of Catherine Davis available for other readers, since I do not believe that all good work automatically will find its public. No one can know how much great writing has been lost to readers just because of bad luck and obstacles.

Susan

[Suzanne Doyle]

First, let me apologize for letting nearly a week lapse between posts. It's hard to feel like you are having a discussion when that happens. After I posted to Alicia's thread last week I got the news that I was being laid off in two days and then my mother was admitted to the hospital. Double whammy.

Alicia and Susan, Thank you so much for the encouraging words and for all of your thoughtful and incisive commentary during this discussion, which has been as precious to me as the discovery of your poems. Susan, I just ordered your book, and think the poems posted here are wonderful, especially "Deep Cover," "Cassandra," and "Indians," as well as the Martial translations.

Alicia, I so admire your slant rhymes! As I've been reading your books, more than once I've thought 1) Oh man, how's she going to carry that one off? or 2) Oh wow, look at what she just did! I also think your poem about fishing with your father is beautiful and your elegy for him brilliant. I am in awe, really, and that's something I learned in church too.

[Janice D. Soderling]

Suzanne, I was not previously familiar with your work, but looking it up when your name was presented, I was very taken by it, and am happy to have extended the acquaintance via this thread. I hope the ill effects of your double whammy will soon be resolved, and I do not doubt but that you will return to poetry. Your golden age is now. That which is not written "now", will not be written because perspectives change as we go along. I don't know much, but I do know that.

Thank you for participating. Much enjoyed.