Not only have I never kept a diary, I've never been interested in reading someone else's (except perhaps my wife's before we separated). I know blogging has become bigger news than some so-called "real" news reporting. I know blogging appears to be, for some, mainly an example of today's narcissism. Still, the medium appeals to me. For some reason.
"It is difficult to get
the news from poems
yet men die miserably
every day for lack
of what is found there"
-William Carlos Williams, "Asphodel" (1955)
I have nothing new to offer in terms of the form. Hell, this is a template, just like most other pages you'll find. Even my content may not differ greatly from what you see elsewhere. Perhaps, my delivery? It's free. Take it or leave it.
"Another Beauty"
We find comfort only in
another beauty, in others'
music, in the poetry of others.
Salvation lies with others,
though solitude may taste like
opium. Other people aren't hell
if you glimpse them at dawn, when
their brows are clean, rinsed by dreams.
This is why I pause: which word
to use, you or he. Each he
betrays some you, but
calm conversation bides its time
in others' poems.
-Adam Zagajewski (translated by Clare Cavanagh) from "Tremor"
Zagajewski also gets credit for this statement:
"A writer who keeps a personal diary uses it to record what he knows. In his poems and his stories he sets down what he doesn't know."
So, here's what I know. What I'm willing to tell you. Today. Until it changes. Take it. Then leave it. Nothing is strange, only strangely familiar.
