"Voyage in the Blue" Engagement #4

October 17, 2022

The painful freshness of each thing being exactly itself.

…and therefore perfect. This line is perfect because it is as it is. This poem is perfect because it contains this line and all of its accompanying lines, each of those lines itself, each plucked from the cosmic creative plane, vibrating ever so slightly, each a threat to escape from time and space, and so Ashbery their herder, a steady hand. The poem emerges from the ether. A technician Ashbery really is not. He is a maestro of the intangible poetics. And yet: freshness. Pure sorcery is not afoot here. There is an organic quality to the proceedings. Each line requires time to ripen, to grow into that self. Ashbery cultivates. I’ve keyed into his tenderness now. He cares for seedlings of language until their eventual bloom, when they become something grand and beyond imagination, or not. That is a beautiful thing. And painful. Ashbery’s reverence for process as poetry is not navel gazing. The cited line does not indicate Ashbery’s appreciation of himself and his own creation, but for the very possibility of creation itself. “Voyage” reminds us that language exists and that its freshness––all of its complexity, its dissonance––is a gift. Take your time with it.

^bit of a reach?

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