Punk’s Reviews > Against Forgetting: Twentieth-Century Poetry of Witness > Status Update

Picking this back up. One day I hope to not be Currently Reading this.

Born from the summons of becoming and from the anguish of retention, the poem, rising from its well of mud and of stars, will bear witness, almost silently, that it contained nothing which did not truly exist elsewhere, in this rebellious and solitary world of contradictions.

from René Char's "Argument"

I'm deep into WWII and just realized there hasn't been a single poem from a Japanese, or anyone else from that region. It's been so long since I read the introduction that I can't remember if Forché acknowledged the scope of this collection, but this seems like a pretty big omission.

From Beth Archer's translation of Francis Ponge's "The Water of Tears":

"Between the water of tears and the water of the sea there can only be a slight difference, if--in that difference, all of man perhaps..."

From Francis Ponge's "The Silent World Is Our Only Homeland":

Poets should in no way concern themselves with human relationships, but should get to the very bottom. Society, furthermore, takes good care of putting them there, and the love of things keeps them there; they are the ambassadors of the silent world.

Picking this back up. Let's see, where were we? Ah, yes, World War II.

and gun sales lead to more gun sales
they do not clutter the market for gunnery
there is no saturation

from Ezra Pound's "Pisan Canto LXXIV"

Gertrude Stein writes my kind of nonsense: simple, repetitive, driving. Oh, you know what her work reminds me of--a certain kind of spam. That must be why it feels so familiar.

On to World War II (1939-1945).

Robert Bly did the English translation for some of these Spanish poems.