B: Yes, you're always working on a
poem. G: Right now I've got 3 poems that I'm
working on actively which I've brought with me here
to the hotel. I have 2 more that are at a slightly
lesser stage. I have 2 that I haven't started yet
and I have this long thing so I've got probably 7
or 8 poems that are in the works. B: Work which will keep you busy for a
year? G: Well I'm going to get a journal out
of going to Moscow, so that'll turn into something.
I always have things that I'm writing. This is a
kind of a method which I guess has come to me in
the last few years. I'm always writing first drafts
and then putting them away and not looking at them
again for 6 months, whereas I'm working right now
on stuff which I wrote the first draft of in late
89, so it's about 18 months. B: For me there seems to be a 10 year
period until enough work accumulates to become a
full size book. That goes counter to the common
notion some writers have that if you're not
prolific, there's something wrong. That doesn't
seem to bother you . G: No, again, it's another aspect of
looking at the situation of the literary world and
seeing that it is much more complex and specific
than I had thought--looking at all of the poets of
all time and seeing that some of them were
extremely prolific like Pound, and others were like
Catullus, who wrote only a small number of poems,
or Hart Crane. So there is no particular virtue of
being one or the other. It's like--would you rather
have blue or brown eyes? B: Purdy said that if he wasn't
writing, or if he went 2 years without writing he'd
kill himself [laugh]. I accept the silence.
G: Well I find it inconceivable that I
would go any length of time without writing because
A) I need to write for the reason that I've already
said,--it's the one thing that sort of makes me
feel that I'm in touch with some sort of
unquestionable absolute value that makes me happy,
and B)--and I think this may be the reason why some
people have these lapses when they don't write--is
that I know quite well that when I write something
that it's not going to look or feel very good when
I'm writing it. I'm not the kind of writer who gets
his best, or can recognize something as being good
until a little time has passed; B: Ya, I know what you're saying. For
me the test is when I write something that gets me
really curious about its structure and meaning--and
a kind of astonishment: that sense of, where has
this come from? Later I can look at a line and
wonder where the comma should go. But initially I
can go back and read it over and over and revise
until I feel finished with it and not read it
again, for as you say, 5 or 10 years to see if it
still stands up. You must feel that your work,
what you've published stands up. G: I can't know that. I think that
it's impossible to objectify yourself or your own
work. I can't know what kind of a person I am. I
can know--I seem to know what kind of person you
are, or what kind of person Scott or Stan is, but I
can't know what kind of person I am because I'm
in that person. I have a sense of your
body of work or Creeley's
in fact, it's almost the other way
around; it's almost like if what I've written seems
to me to be very dull and boring, it's probably
pretty good. And just the opposite: if what I've
written seems to me to be really imaginative and
making wonderful leaps and all that--it's probably
pretty shitty.
