That ought to be a very good poem… “Riffled”
is a cliche, false-color. The last line sounds too
much like a last line! It might end better simply
without it. It is absolutely perfect iambic pen-
tameter, which is one reason why it sounds like
a last line. And “lovely” seems just vaguely honorific
to me… What kind of song is a “lovely song”?
I think I like the floating trees. I wish it were
not iambic at all.
Don
Editorial note about this letter: The poem Don is discussing in this letter is the elegy, “A Dream of Herman.” In it, McNair pays tribute to his father-in-law, Herman Reed, a band leader, whose life seemed to him “unsung” in his letter of November 24, 1980. Here is the draft Hall responded to on December 9.
A Dream of Herman
I was driving the old Dodge wagon
again, with Coke cans rolling
to the front at stop signs,
and you rubbing the dash
every so often to thank the car
for not needing the spare tire
we hadn’t fixed. We were on a trip
that felt like going to your father’s camp, only
we never got there and didn’t care.
It was a beautiful day, just enough wind
coming into the back to make the kids
squint with pure pleasure
as it riffled their hair, and your mother
patted them, saying what a nice ride it was
in the odd, small voice
she used only for your father.
It was then in the rearview mirror I saw him,
wearing the brown cardigan he always wore
and putting on the shining bell
of his saxophone as if just back
from an intermission. You were smiling,
and suddenly I saw the reason
we were traveling together
and did not want to stop
was Herman, who just sat there
in the cargo space, breathing the scale
until the whole family sat back
in their seats, and then he lifted his sax
and opened one more song
as wide and lovely as the floating trees.
Wonderful about the sabbatical. Colby-Sawyer
has made up for its (one person’s) insensitivity
in connection with the current grant.
Having fifteen months off in a row will ruin
you forever!
That is where I learned my taste for such liv-
ing as I do now, taking a year off here and there.
Well, may you join me in – as people sometimes
suggest – “retirement.” Of course I work a hundred
hours a week, in my retirement. It is the only way
to go however! Love as ever,
Thanks for your words of support about my sabbatical
decision. I will remember that Hall principal and your
obsession about people wasting their lives doing sensible
things.
The news about the sabbatical is good. It was approved
just after I sent my last letter. That means 15
months of solid writing, a gift from heaven. I was
a bit worried about being granted a full year, since I
have had a lot of time away from the college recently
(was gone in 77-78, and am, of course, gone this term).
I believe the committee which approved my application
had the prerogative or recommending the half-year
alternative if it seemed American Studies was suffering
as a result of my absence. But I have been grooming
Pat Anderson for the past several months to replace me
as co-ordinator of American Studies (again, to
give myself more time for writing), and I am sure
the knowledge that Pat will be running things soon helped.
Also, I convinced Wally before the committee made its
decision – before I submitted my application, too – that
Carl should be replaced for the benefit of the A.S. program,
2/
this in spite of the college’s position that a “new Carl”
was not needed. As it turns out, the new person will be
able to take some of my courses, as will Pat.
The pay for a full-year sabbatical at Colby
is ¾ – not ½ – of the professor’s salary. The ¾ pay
policy was instituted at the college by faculty vote a
couple of years ago. Diane and I figure that my
salary, plus hers, plus the money we get for
renting part of the upstairs, will carry us through
so that Diane will be free during evenings for work
on her ceramics, I will be a “househusband”
(in the parlance of the talk shows), just as I am now.
As you can imagine, I am just ecstatic to have
this time. It will help me to capitalize on the
momentum I have gained from the current time
off.
And the momentum is significant. I have
several poems – many more than I have ever had
at any one time – finished and nearly finished in
my notebooks. And I am speaking here not of
3/
poems I have sent to you already, but of new work.
I am sure that with the addition time off, I will be
able to complete a large share of the second book I
am currently working on. For the first time in my life,
I can call myself a poet, without misgivings.
Thanks for your comment about the work of this
term, by the way. I can only say there is much
you haven’t yet seen. But there has been a lot
of work, and knowing how things might have gone,
I feel very fortunate in this. Naturally, I also
feel lucky to have had the sympathetic attention
of Fran McCullough, one of those who read the
poems I submitted for my N.E.A. grant. And I
am mindful of who first brought these poems to
her attention.
So in spite of my difficulty with that book
of mine, I feel blessed in my writing, and
in the continuous help and encouragement of
yourself and of Joey Amaryllis.
More poems after a while. In the meantime,
all the best to you in your writing, too. And
to Jane in hers.
Good to have your good letter. I am delighted that
you are applying for a full year off. You are acting according
to the Hall principal, which is to save nothing, conserve
nothing, and devote every possible moment and piece of energy
to writing the best that you can. When I had taught for two
years in Michigan I applied for a Guggenheim because I was
so crazy for time to write in. I did not get it. I had
saved $2000 from poetry readings, book reviews, etc. – and
we took the year off, Andrew five and Philippa just born –
and I have never regretted it for a moment. So many people
waste their lives doing sensible things.
May you get it. What is at issue? I am assuming that
you might either have a half-year at full pay or a full year
at half-pay, and that therefore you asking for a full year
at half-pay. (That was the way it was at Michigan and the
way it is at many places. Naturally enough I always took
the whole year at half-pay!)
Sorry about the bad news. Form letters reveal that
Georgia, like most places, is a lottery. If I were editing
for a big university press now, I bet you I would reject good
things with form letters also! Not that I approve of it! But
when you get so many manuscripts in the mail, it is incredibly
hard to keep any judgment at all. Of course you are right to
keep it out, and under these circumstances to keep it out
multiply. Of course I continue to hope that I might sometime
be able to be helpful.
You have really been getting a lot of work done with your
time off, wonderful and good for you… Also good to hold back!
Just so you won’t think you have a Louis Untermeyer
on your hands, I do want you to know I am aware
of the resonance of that last sentence in “Out, Out-.”
I think the sentence means just what you said.
On the one hand, it suggests the people are outrageous
in being so sensible as to turn to their affairs,
given the strange and violent death of the boy, and
the seeming malevolence of the saw that caused his
death. But the sentence also implies, as you say,
that there is little else for the people to do – and
besides, their ignorance (some of it willed) saves them
from living with “fright,” and perhaps from giving
their own hands to saws.
I happen to feel that a certain malevolence
hung over Herman (my father-in-law), especially
in his last days, and that he was aware of it, too.
So in a way, I see what the boy, with Frost, sees.
But I also identify with those people, and so
my quotation. With them, I feel the danger of
“fright” and the pull of “affairs.” More knowing
2/
than they are, I nonetheless respond as they respond.
There, I hope I have cleared things up.
I will try not to take so much for granted next
time I quote Frost!
Good that Joey is moving onward with
the new poems. I hope for some good news,
as my book has been rejected by Georgia,
with no more than a form letter. Earlier, I
got a note from Costanzo at Carnegie-Mellon
which said that he like the book very much,
but that he would not be able to publish it
this year as he had already accepted all the books
the current budget would allow. Did I tell you
I got a form rejection letter from Houghton
Mifflin some time back? Over two years after
the book’s completion, the rejections keep coming in.
I am not too down about that yet, but I do
hope something breaks by spring. Otherwise, I
could be in trouble.
Ah, well. To affairs! In that department
3/
I should tell you about my sabbatical application
I have decided to take a year-long sabbatical
next year if I can get it – and I think I can.
I haven’t ruled out a move from Colby, but I
do believe I should not pass up the possibility
of a year (15 mos. Actually) for writing if
I can get it. I would, besides, much rather have
completed poems than a job at any university,
however stable or prestigious.
I let you know how this goes. I should
know by mid-December.
The writing still goes slowly and well.
I shall hold all back, with no help from
Joey, for a while though.
Thanks to you and Joey for all your help,
and regards to Jane!
But there is also a bitterness, a self-
bitterness, in Frost, in that poem and also in
the Home Burial, about turning one’s affairs.
You know there’s nothing else to do, but he
regrets that the world is such that there is
nothing else to do! Well, don’t we all.
Thanks for the thugs and the where I live…
Joey moves. Onward!
Diane and I both appreciated your note. I have
from time to time during this period thought about your
poem to your father. I imagine I will be writing about
my father-in-law, too. His life feels so small to
me now, and so unsung. I want to change that,
if I can.
Jane has our sympathy in her apprehension about
her father. We have known that feeling, too, and
it’s a difficult one to deal with.
But we press on – like the people of Frost’s poem
who “turned to their affairs.” There’s no other way.
I enclose a freshly typed version of the “Thugs”
poem, in case you would prefer it that way,
rather than in mimeographed form, as you have it
now. Suit yourself, and if Joey has already
sent the poem out, fine.
I also sent along a slightly revised version
of “Where I Live.” True, it has only been a
couple of weeks since I sent you the first version,
but I have been sitting on the first version for some
time already, and I’m therefore as sure as I’m
likely to be that the poem is ready in its present
form. Incidentally, I, too, worried about that
line-break you mentioned and played with it a great deal.
Your comment gave me the courage to make the
change of the enclosed. I do feel, though, that
there shouldn’t be a comma after “gas station.”
Please tell Joey, then, that it’s ok to send
out “Where I Live” and “Trees That Pass Us.”
And thank you, as usual, for your help.
Love,
Wes
A note from McNair about this letter:The revision of “Where I Live” involved changing one line break and two lines — from “beyond the last colonial/ gas station and unsolved by zoning/ is a road” to “beyond the last colonial gas station/ and unsolved by zoning/ is a road” — which responded to Don’s earlier questions, while keeping faith with the flow and meaning of the poem. Though place becomes a metaphor in “Where I Live,” the poem’s situation derives from my daily commute home from the college town of New London, New Hampshire, with its restored colonial homes, to my unvarnished location of North Sutton.
I am so sorry about Diane’s father. It is a wretched
time. This December will be the twenty-fifth anniversary
of my own father’s death, and last October I turned older
than he was on the day he died. He is still there for me,
[Written in margin: I know you know the poem.]
freshly, around the corner, with the familiar sound that his
feet made walking – only he is younger than I am now. Very
strange.
Jane’s father, who is seventy-six now, is chronically
ill. He has had cancer twice, had a little stroke last year,
has congestive heart failure – and they may, or may not, –
be coming out for Christmas. We worry about him, as you might
expect. How old was your father, Diane? He certainly packed
things in together, didn’t he? Horrid.
Wes, many thanks for the poem, which Joey will make
excellent use of. Very good to have it now, and I think that
we will do better by it. Good for them, in their fecklessness.
Have just gotten back from Keene, where Diane’s
father’s funeral just took place. He was in the hospital
for three weeks, had a broken hip, which (because he
was a “bleeder”) was complicated to fix. Eventually
the operation on the hip led to two other operations –
one to prevent a blood clot in his leg from moving, the
other to remove a very diseased gall bladder,
which was preventing the blood from clotting, even after
medication for coagulation was administered. But the
bleeding wouldn’t stop; indeed, there was much more
of it after the latter operations. And so he died.
It’s been a sad time. That guy meant a lot to all of us.
The fact is, all the news I have for you today
is upsetting. I just learned from the editors of The Journal of Popular Culture that “The Thugs of
Old Comics” was never published by them, even though
they sent me a note of acceptance back in the fall
of 1976. The poem was to be published, or so I thought,
during my year out of the country. It occurred to me
the other day that I never did receive a copy of
the issue the poem appeared in, so I wrote to ask
2/
about getting one. No one there has any record of
receiving or accepting the poem, I am told, and, of course,
it never did appear.
It is the sort of half-assedness I’ve come to expect
from The Popular Culture Association; which seems to
screw everything up, from conferences to subscriptions.
Initially, I was ticked at the magazine editors,
as you can imagine, but I have come to think the
foul-up may be to my advantage because the poem is,
I think, a good one that better magazines might be
interested in. Anyway, I do want you and Joey to
know that I have told the JPC I will publish
the poem elsewhere – called to this, actually –
and the editor I spoke with – Pat Browne –
sheepishly agreed concurred with my decision to do so.
I therefore enclose a copy of the poem. It would
perhaps go well with the “pop” material which
Nims has accepted. Or maybe, do you think, at
The New Yorker? Whatever Joey decides to do with
it, I will be ok, I’m sure. He knows best, and he
has just proved it again by working the recent
combination with Nims!
Do you recall your suggestion that the word “beat”
in my earlier version of the poem might be changed to “beating”?
I did make that change, as you see, but I am still a bit
worried that the “-ing’s” pile up at the end of the poem.
If you think not, I’m happy. —And speaking of the end,
here I am at the bottom of the pages – so I’ll stop.
Love, Wes
THE THUGS OF OLD COMICS
At first the job is a cinch like
they said. They manage to get the bank teller
a couple of times in the head and blow the vault door so high
it never comes down. Money bags line the shelves
inside like groceries. They are rich, richer
than they can believe. Above his purple suit the boss
is grinning half outside of his face.
Two goons are taking the dough in their arms
like their first women. For a minute nobody sees
the little thug with the beanie is sweating drops
the size of hot dogs and pointing
straight up. There is a blue man flying
down through the skylight and landing with his arms
crossed. They exhale their astonishment
into small balloons. “What the,” they say,
“What the,” watching their bullets drop
off his chest over and over. Soon he begins to talk
about the fight against evil, beating them half to death
with his fists. Soon they are picking themselves up
from the floor of the prison. Out the window Superman
is just clearing a tall building and couldn’t care less
when they shout his name through the bars. “We’re trapped!
We got no chance!” they say, tightening their teeth,
thinking, like you, how it always gets down
to the same old shit: no fun, no dough,
no power to rise out of their bodies.
– Wesley McNair
A note from McNair about this letter: Don made his suggestion about “The Thugs of Old Comics” in person at his farmhouse. As it turned out, the poem was never published by Poetry or any other magazine, so I published it myself in my first book, where it appears in the above form. Later, I shortened some of its lines, as I did with “Hair on Television,” so they would fit into the normal 55-character line limit of publishers (in particular my later publisher, David R. Godine) and therefore would not have to be broken. This became a standard practice for me whenever I wrote a poem, using the 55 character line to shape my sense of the poem’s turns and vocal intonation. Here are the two poems as they appear on the 55-character grid in Lovers of the Lost :
Yes, it is nice about Poetry isn’t it?
Terrific. …As you remember, Nims has not
yet accepted them! But he has largely promised
to accept them, so I expect to forward an
acceptance slip to you before long.
If you will not keep your stated intentions,
Joey will help you out. Joey will not send out
those poems for a few weeks, waiting for you
to make a change! The only one that I can see
is the a-typical syntax of the middle sentence
of “Where I live.” Syntactically and in its
punctuation if it were like the rest of the poem,
there would be a comma after “gas station,” and
probably the line-break would be different. I
am not sure that it is a bad thing. It certainly
does slow me down and make me go back and parses
the sentence… But it would take me a while
to figure it out for sure also. But I don’t
want to send it out and then get a new version
in the mail… So why don’t you look back at
it for a while? I will hold on.
