Title: Whose Words These Are (8): Rosanna Warren

" I'm Christopher -- with the -- Rosanna Warren. Project -- has. Is wrenching modern meaning in and out of the ancient architecture of words this is open source from the Watson institute at Brown University. On the way to the Massachusetts -- festival later this month we've been sampling the ports of our time in our neighborhood in this series whose words these are. -- bruise and a warrant from Boston University with two powerful legacies finder one from a classical education in Europe. Another from growing up in breathing poetry in the home -- proto American father Robert Penn warrant the novelist of All the King's Men. Rosanna Warren portrait is all about the year violent conflicts. Tenderness and rage restriction and exclusion stress and death. She speaks she says to the agonies and confusions. About flailing feeling American empire."

" Rosanna -- it. Like parents regular special case in terms of the beginning of all this or the poems. What was it about poetry that that -- you at the beginning."

" The beginning for me was. Early childhood and living in house where. My father especially was reciting poems often just for the love and fun -- it it was like breathing room so. Can we mention that name with honor repair and -- Yes I'm not ashamed to be his daughter -- Though I have all my. Literary life and being very careful to associate. My work from his and never to try to. Used his name and it is -- gratifying to me to find that often people. Who know my work don't know that I'm related to him and that's tremendous relief -- talk about being nursed him and poetry. Well the the palms of my early childhood that is the -- I began to know by heart when I was six years old seven years old eight years old nine years old. Work bleak. And Tennyson. And Houseman. They're marvelously -- onyx. And easy to commit to memory mean. Song like and deeply emotional. In their own ways. So. Continues to have some of them sure yeah for instance if you want Blake London."

" Which remains for me -- home. A key to life I think the quality of rage in his palm and the demand for justice."

" Linked to a rhythm. Which is a conflict to a written between a rising rhythm and a falling rhythm within the same palm jammed up."

" But this comes -- Sydney's and my childhood to. London. I wander through each charter street. Near where the chart should Thames does flow. And mark in every face I meet mark of weakness marks of world. In every cry of every man. In every infants cry of fear in every voice in every band the mind forged medical's I hear. How the chimney sweepers cry every blackening church a polls. And the hapless soldiers sign. Runs in blood down palace walls. But most through midnight streets I hear how the youthful Horowitz -- Lasts the newborn infant tear. And -- with plagues the marriage hurts."

" I've forgotten that. Glickman. -- more. More from Blake who just -- you know the diploma through windows and."

" Yes well one would be Blake's. The sick rose which is an odd home to think of a little girl reciting. But I think children have more insight into corruption. Than their parents often would like to know. Of course a child's insight is not. They're grown ups in sight and this is a very Blakey in -- since his collection of shorter lyrics to songs of innocence and experience. Oh rose though art sick the invisible worm it flies in the nineteen howling storm -- found out thy bed of crimson joy. And his dark secret love does my life destroy. I had no idea what I meant when I was eight years old but it sure sounded cool."

" On the occasion that she's put your personal. And asking everybody sort of how would you report to Blake. What you Shakespeare to it was sample homer. And the world report to you live in today. How houses doing."

" Well for one thing I think it's international. In a way that. I believe. Would it surprise Afro. My get surprised Blake a little less. But still Blake's main. Other source of poetry was through the Hebrew Bible. I don't think he knew he -- that was English reconstitution -- And today through the very active trade routes of translation. We can read that and be stirred by the polish poets as -- and Herbert. Battalion of entering a multi they were but I mean. Any number of bombs from China and --"

" quick sketching. You're network. Of ancestor is chosen ancestors in chosen relatives."

" mine my own are. Along the classical modernist axis so from. Homer. And I have. Studied Greek for years I'm not good at all at Greek but I've. Translated from it and worked at it for years. Because I wanted that degree of the syntax in the -- in my own nervous system. So I've worked at. -- homer not to publish but just for me. And the lyrics of self cellphone and I'll coyotes and -- month. And Latin the Latin poets the Roman poets like -- who learned so much from the -- poets. Are also my beloved so parson could tell listen Virgil. And that tradition is linked to me not at all to an -- to query an instinct but to a radical. Perpetually modernizing. Instinct of making shapes out of experience but also out of inherited forms which -- men abuses the abusive inherited forms I think is key to the art. So poet like Thomas Hardy who. Painstakingly wrote down in his auto didactic notebooks and he had very little formal education the -- medical schemes of land homes. So we can learn wouldn't ethic was -- meter. He -- is those meters into his own peculiar English with his dorsett dialect and a whole new politics comes out of that wrenching. That recombinant DNA parties in key figure for me."

" The abuse of the form is that wrenching yes yes I think I think of poetry in. Fairly violent way sometimes my images that I want to plunge my hand into that sacrificial animal and -- its heart and wrench it out."

" While it still beating. -- present -- Warren Richey and animals currently and sometimes I think of seizing. The experience or the inherited -- one. That I want to become a -- by the throat and clinching it till it cries in spite of Mike mentioned. And that cry."

" Could become -- common trying to write. And what is your early forties and your -- I started to. I'm wrote stories more when I was a child. I wrote fiction. Com and attacked story I wrote was published as a small book when I was ten. But I loved poems. I started writing columns when I was child in the least say in France when I was. Twelve and thirteen and four strict old fashioned -- education we had to memorize lots and lots of prose and poetry. I was memorizing lots of those fables of -- and and -- Nancy and palms of and you -- and etc. And I began to -- magical homes in French. At the age of twelve and thirteen. And a couple of years later when I -- Great privilege of having very good Latin teachers. Back in the United States -- so adored provident tallest and Horace that I began to not write -- in Latin but to try. To get effects in English -- that I was learning from the Latin -- so I came to writing English poetry. Through French and Latin models. And they remain hmm I suppose my deepest sense of architecture comes from them. The European architecture also formed a centuries of poetry in English because. It eat until very recently an educated. Person in. In England or the United States would have had some Latin and had some experience in. Translating how examiner. And reading notes of Morrison. Then nobody Thompson could tell us perhaps. And even if they hadn't had something like a high school Latin education. In the readings seventeen -- English poetry reading John -- and reading George Herbert your reading stands us that are shaped by. Intense classical education so you're getting it second hand but you're getting it. There is a for a sense I believe of the power to be gained from. Politics of intense closure. But intense. Centrifugal force busting out of that closure which is what stands -- gives you if you know how to use it. I do think -- of any kind of art has to be a result of well organized conflict. So the conflict between structures of closure. -- the line and someplace for the stands and someplace and also some typical structures that want to fly out and refuse closure. Refused restriction so the sentence wants to pour over the end of the line or the thought wants to pour over the into the stanza. You get this intensely and staff out who in jams violently. Sometimes she breaks a word and have to get from online to the other. And at this I look for that kind of intensity and poetry whether it's free verse from magical verse I look for intense structures of restriction. And then. Powerful forms of dynamic. Explosion. Them but if you only have explosion. You have chaos. And if you only have restriction. You've got a bowel problem."

" And I'm gonna hit the poetry you'd you'd give us as in sometimes representative of your work. Your life you're thinking."

" my work is changing. That's a good thing. I hope this change in the right direction. This new book that I've just finished is more obviously and intensely political than anything I've done so far in the past. I had. I hope rather. Deeply felt homes that involved war but they were filtered through homer and Virgil in World War I and World War II in some way. From the -- I'm writing now are a bit more clearly. Derived from them contemporary events political. Awareness so I can I can read it home that was published last year in the New York review of books that I think represent something of a a new direction for me. It's called hooked -- which is the flea market in Rome. But as I hasten to. Assure my Italian friends in case -- should be offended I said it's not really about room it's about Wall Street. This I wrote the August before. Last. False economic meltdown but I seem to have felt some kind of seismic waivers. In August 2008."

" Booked up what they say. If it -- gleaned if it ticked if it buzzed if it all we'll be eternal youth if it whispered on an old tape with a sexual allure of infinite cash if it said I am your private castle and you are queen. If Atlanta thousand bulbs at that shaved a thousand hairs if it declared god loves you with it promised to cure it. Hair -- eczema KB's raged. If it -- hang mails if it delivered proverbs it pig hugged the -- it's laid out on a collapse civil table Laura mapped on asphalt. Honeywell changed hands money will change us all changed Gypsies professors Nigerian -- limping children drugged. Babies iPod -- teens Somali refugees artists in drag illegal Albanians cruising polls we said. One world we said isn't time money good enough for you switch blade which bank that cola come -- Sima accept old currencies the tie -- leaks yellow between its legs. The Muriel venerable duty free luxurious so can -- clean classical way. Sold and saw -- solved it reflected here."

" I put the opportunity. Because when I was living in Rome a few years ago. My haunted that place it use it struck me as the place where all the nations of the earth were flowing together. And where did chunk of the earth -- chunk of what is essentially global capitalism. Had washed up in Nick's battered form but there it was the cheap perfumes. -- Stolen cassettes. Does it. She -- probably. Get pour this people. Living on the edges of a society of gross. Consumption of luxuries and the desire for luxuries. There are a lot of desperately poor people. Trying to sell things or steal things. A hustle things and themselves. In -- to post -- and it's an image to me of the luxury stores in the big international airports it looks to me just like. The duty free shop in -- the airport in in in. Paris or. The airport in Frankfurt airport in London where the seem basic shady. Commodities are being sold but dressed up and slightly fancier packaging. The same illusions are being sold the same compromises are being made."

" There's more to -- more you can see I think that Blake's London is still in the half. -- do. That's another. Well I'm not only reading angry political homes these days. Another part of this new book. Has love homes in it and here is one of those rank. Trying to. Modulate the tone. To a very different pitch. --"

" Silver gelatin defined outline of the windows sash at dawn and but mourning turned a blind eyes to us nor could. Icu. Sleep had -- do you like a pharaoh. And later when we walked in the frozen field -- be cracked every mirror. Swamp grass is ticked against each other. Metallic puddles showed us nothing not even our shadows. My shadow asked your -- though where was -- lost child. Smaller sent for a soft sound don't give it to the oboe but only to some monster instrument that most struggle and force beyond its natural range to murmur. Or hum. We outpaced Russia and news we we're looking for the place where light would cry out when ice slice State's hands. But we found instead the crimson -- she fungus ruffled in its petty coat. General Dan not -- system. From which -- healing T could be boiled. Though we abstained. Left it on its stump and returned with our homes and T. Hungry for ninety eager for another --"

" It's hard to take that in so --"

" It has no punctuation."

" Some of my columns these days have no punctuation may just have breathing spaces."

" And I'm looking for a greater fluidity. And also the fluidity to move from. Description. Like swamped -- ticked against each other. To this inept -- to a statement like Mahler said for a soft sound don't give it to the oboe but."

" Only to a monster instrument. So that in mind of the reader or here. Must follow that since NAFTA -- And become a participant in the poems experience. To that -- So that one must. Give oneself to its flow and trusted it will take you somewhere. Perhaps dangerous site. -- my icons to be at least a little dangerous even the love poems perhaps especially the love poems. To rid as the -- was among. And as well. I think that home is called old which is the traditional medieval name for a poem of lovers. Having to park at dawn after a night of -- It's. Usually sad about at -- and usually those are homes of of longing as well as of celebration and soundness of Willis. To my. Perhaps. Gentle anxieties. And."

" Unlike the compost the posting is they would it's."

" They. What is essentially human trafficking."

" This. -- needed. The quietness. Of the mystery. Of Arabs. A great mystery I honor Aphrodite. And this particular form of -- in this poem. Needed to quietness. But it had to be a quietness that was highly charged. So I was. Looking for. A model. For that and I founded in Mahler and is particularly in this marvelous advice he was giving. That when you want a soft sand in the orchestra he was so counter intuitive -- Dyson don't give it to an instrument that you might think could. Could as a -- murmur or hum but give it to some give it to the the sooner or give it to the did didn't -- can do -- Crashing grand piano or something else and make that. Be quiet. And I I felt that was in the sense the the challenge I had set myself in this pond. The highly charged passionate. Feelings that needed to be Jun told. Into a controlled quietness."

" Give us into the -- of these recorders I'm glad you like them some of them. A third. Grouping and then new manuscript. Is composed abilities for a dear friend of mine the writer Deborah tall who was both a poet and a non fiction writer. And this is a short elegy for her she died of breast cancer -- three years ago. And has an epic -- from one of her poems. Aftermath. -- The moment it was. It was over. -- toll."

" It was that last euphoric summer between one chemo and another. When you looked out pure kitchen window and saw the dose standing. At the edge of your lawn with a ticket gathers. Altamont -- thorn for Cynthia. -- And when you stepped outside. The -- stage still. And looked in your eyes you've thought with a companion -- complicit question. And didn't run. You are light headed. The -- lowered her nose to shove at the small bundle of her feet folded up like an awkward deck chair. Till then invisible. In its hollow of grass. She had just given birth. The Fon couldn't stand. But raised its two large tent to gaze -- you. You were as you said it already more or less posthumous. You took each other in. One review before. The other beyond. -- Two creatures. Side effects on one another. Headed in opposite directions."

" I remember that process. Still remember the fund the fallen. And the thing when."

" And other sides of fear yes. This is hoosiers were. Well I'm grateful to hear it because when it's new and you know it's raw. It's. Feels risky. And yet you have to go where your calls."

" What's your process. I mean do you rate everyday do these things come that you're driving down the turnpike you're brought."

" Well. The process seems to me. Continuous. It's it's a for a way of life. And so. It's a cumulative."

" Practice in life. Years and years doled out. Love being attentive to -- observations. And one's memory. And I carry around."

" Several notebooks."

" I carry around a little notebook in which -- make drawings. I carry around another notebook in which -- note. Observations that could be scraps of conversations I've heard or quotations from something I'm reading or. John things for a possible com or. Some little tire -- stick. Note this is just raw material. It's a compost heap. And I have another notebook which is full of he palms are dying and memorizing -- have memorized and I write them out by hand tonight often keep the I think you're caught a glimpse of that one yes it's a little. -- I can't review of handmade notebook I've had it for years. And I was then I have for years. On many many years memorized poetry. And when I'm working on memorizing -- Tom -- need to carry it around in my coat pocket who likened. Put my hand in my pocket and check myself and work on it while I'm walking when I had a dog I did this while I was walking the dog now I don't -- longer have the dog but they still do it. And -- the palm pretty securely in my adult head I tasted into the notebook and that becomes my prided anthology. And it becomes you might say. A picture of the brain waves. I hope I have as a reservoir. And expressive reservoir. And this includes a lot of Yates and John done Blake. Tennis and yes -- still love tennis and in the more him. And less known poets. Like I ever Gurney -- my door."

" Anyway it is my reservoir. So this is all an answer to your question about how do I what is my process is a writer it's a process of trying to be continually both absorbing. By memorizing and by observing by drawing. And and already transmitting those observations to some kind of potential shapely -- And it's a state of reverie to. And when nine when life allows me to have a more disciplined."

" But look reverie. A few hours in the day that I can have apart and protect from email or the telephone or correcting papers were. Paying my bills. I'm ready for the reverie I'm ready for the time to be productive. Because I've got my accomplice -- I just need to stick in my pitchfork and stirred up a seat so -- comes up."

" Beautifully said. Speak of the times that you wrote him. How does. Our political times well. -- times technologically. Politically the emotionally culturally. Historically. Where where you're writing from. You you be remembered as -- part of that they try to early -- since you what was the times about remind me."

" Well that's what -- important to me. Because."

" My adult life. Has been. Mountain coincident with. The though wars of a what looks like a failing a rapidly failing empire. Flailing around the planet to try to consolidate its power. And or -- citizen of that empire I. Can only. Observed since I'm not in the armed forces and nor would I want to be because I don't believe in these recent wars. So I am an anguished witness. Of my country's. Agonies. And confusions."

" Straight question that to me as a sort of self evident brilliant beautiful summary of where we all know we are. This empire that -- rapidly flailing rapidly and empire and it deals and of unbelievable. Range and power flailing and failing. -- Do we hear this from poets and not from our politicians not from our journalists not on the front page of the paper than or or the television. Why why how is it. This is a random question but how is that we. Compartmentalize. Our knowledge and that's where that we'll take that from apart and would be shocked to read it in the New York Times oh by the way country. The are failing and you straighten out all over the world that's getting serious."

" Well surely they must be reading. Some of it in the -- times since that's right get a lot of my contention. Maybe it in the news more than in the commentary. So if you read Paul Krugman you're getting some pretty -- Of hard nosed commentary. Not a dream would die before he would tell -- that yes but he's not the only Royce. But you're the journalist you know -- denying what that the media are saying and I'm not saying. I have found the last few years. That I read the business pages having no training in economics because I thought that's what the real news was. In a sense that's what my call vote to put things it was about it was about. -- corporate capitalism having an epileptic fit and that's before even had to fit."

" We you don't use. Prescription there I'd love to think of all the things human being can do. What's the talent you loved to have that you haven't got yet."

" Then. I'd love to be able to ride a horse really well pare back button."

" Hoosier ideal artist in another medium maybe another century. Who speaking rose and -- mind in another boat entirely."

" Matisse. I -- Because. He was. Bringing to the two dimensional canvas. A three dimensional awareness. A sculptural awareness. Of shapes. In space you can see it in the line that goes around the -- of a woman's face you can see it in the contour of the back. He is making wholeness. On a flat surface with such economy and rapidity of means and I'm not even speaking here about his extraordinary sense of color. In which it he has I believe unrivaled. A grade by Matisse. Is a work of genius and let alone his reds. His line is almost well I mean he makes lines too important to. Yes fast and slow when they need to be fast and slow varying pressure. What's the key note of your personality -- the support. Stress. And that's symmetrical turned to supply and many cited were retrieving. Well in Prague city. Stress in English is the word for. Accent -- in Massachusetts. That Chu is accented."

" Stresses of loss we all know. Physiological slash psychological term and to me poetry is a highly stressful formal response to. Life which I regard as highly stressful."

" Present a -- with homes that meet you want to write poetry. And and told you could. Maybe had to do. Well certainly with the -- I grew up on. Like the -- attention. Blake tennis and in house and an early childhood the first time I remember coming upon entirely by myself and for myself. I think I was about twelve. Years old and I had been left alone and for an evening. My parents had gone out my brother was I don't know where and I remember. Most seeing around. Family. And librarian. Almost at random taking down -- volume of the palms and Edgar Allan Poe. And flopping down on my tummy on the -- and -- Annabel Lee and going into a state of semi delirium."

" And I remember that. Vividly as the first time I found upon that no one had given to me that I found from myself and I immediately want to get. I wanted to memorize it I want this dance to it wanted to reproduce it."

" And it felt like -- theft if felt like something a little illegal about rifling your parents bookshelves without permission. -- of course they wouldn't of minded but. They sense of light criminality was important to me belief. And can see you walking down the street who you suppose it's from Q are."

" I I imagine sometimes that I am perceived. As a slightly V looking middle aged matron trying to look respectable. How many people on the subway. We guess that your report. Probably no one. Play it's often -- poetry is quite often a secret society. -- I should say nor do I want to quote look like a poet because a certain kind of exhibition is a missed the last thing night. Applaud or seek. We're quality do you look for and love in a -- yours or somebody else's."

" Drama."

" That your --"

" Two great in the light of death. How would you like to die and painlessly. And look how urged. How how would you describe the state of the art poetry. In English in our time. I think it's exciting. -- and I do think it's international for instance I've read. -- greedily poetry from Ireland poetry from England. Poetry from the Caribbean. As well as -- from North America which does include Canada. -- that some people forget sometimes it. And the header which in a do you rate for your readers you wrote yourself your family immortality god. -- Well I think they're they're have to be many layers stoop to such an answer. My intimate. First. Sounding boards are that. Poets I love. From the past. You know. Staff so tallest people left. -- Just imagine what. Sonar my poem which sendoff. To them."

" To their homes. Beautiful Rosanna -- it's such a pleasure. Thank you thank you."

" Paul McCarthy -- this conversation and Rosanna Warren whose new book of poems is titled departure. Our brand new university interns and Olson and -- kind of -- get ready to listen. Thanks also to the growth of poetry workshop and Harvard Square Cambridge for giving us studio space so to speak. In the -- favorite haunt him also to the Massachusetts torture festival for helping us gathered the players. Post a comment on the portrait of your life your notebook your family your dreams and our website review open source dot org. I'm Christopher lighten things thank you for joining the conversation."