Collins, Billy. “Forgetfulness.” Sailing Alone Around the Room: New & Selected Poetry. New York: Random House: 2002. 29.
You know that point in a conversation when someone says something so true and indisputable all you can do is nod in emphatic agreement? “Forgetfulness” is that point in the conversation. How many of us read something, whether it be an article, book or poem and couldn’t remember who wrote it a week later? A week after that and now we can’t remember the title of what we read. We find ourselves saying stupid things like, “I read this great book about the tenth largest island in the world by…by..oh what was his name? Anyway, it was really interesting.” I also like Billy’s imagery of a brain making room for something else to remember. When a new address or phone number is added to the brain, the author or title of a book must come out. For every new piece of information stored, something older must come out and slip away. Who knows where it goes? Billy has the answer:
“…to a little fishing village where there are no phone lines” (p 29).
BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter called, “Kitchen-Sink Poetry” (p 138).
If it comes to you in ashes that means I burned it. Burned it, but sent it to you anyway. I am twisted enough that I would do something like that…just to show you my good intentions comes with an evil streak. I started this whole thing in earnest thinking I would, I could, build you a masterpiece. Something worthy of a bedside table as a good bedtime story..or maybe even a coffee table out in the open if I let myself dare to dream that big and ambitious and grandiose. Shopping for supplies was much like being a id again. I was drawn in by sparkly stickers, glittery borders, sticky glue, funky cutting scissors, colored paper of vellum and linen and cotton. So much to chose from I didn’t know where to begin or end. Embellishments aplenty. My credit card shook from exhaustion. I wish I could say my enthusiasm for the project held up through the piles and piles of purchases, pages and pages of printed out out-of-print pictures, the plethora of everything saved and once cherished. Suddenly, without warning I felt unworthy of the task at heart. Who was I to decide what to keep? What to exclude? How could I decide what was coffee table worthy? Every well-wished sentiment, every scrap of paper had something worth saving, keeping, holding onto. The insecurity grew and grew and grew with each passing page created until finally every page created became a page hated.
Forster, E. M. Aspects of the Novel. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1940.
Milford, Nancy Winston. Zelda: A biography. New York: Harper & Row, 1970.
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