But the most important day in my career as a writer was when Linda said, Did you ever think of listening to your poems? And my poetry changed. I didn’t give up making precreated poetry, but you have to write a poem the way you ride a horse—you have to know what to do with it. You have to be in charge of a horse or it will eat all day—you’ll never get back to the barn. But if you tell the horse how to be a horse, if you force it, the horse will probably break a leg. The horse and rider have to be together.I really like the idea of listening to a poem.
I was introduced to Jack Gilbert by Mal Morgan - another poet who wrote plainsong poems with enormous heart. Poems from Gilbert's The Great Fires still haunt me. And how wonderful, to be haunted by poems.
