From the Aussie bush sing poets
Some whose words have not reached far
But we hold them dear to our hearts
And now you may see who they are.

A.B. “Banjo” Patterson

• The Geebung Polo Club
• The Man from Snowy River
• Clancy of the Overflow

Dorothea Mackellar

• My Country

et al.

First off, I really am a “Greg”, not a “Gregory.” Secondly, I’m not really the dotcom to your dotnet – our other namesake is a real estate agent in Washington state. And third – I don’t understand what you mean by “…since I take Greg Perry to my very depths, well, you know.” I thought you had repudiated the name, which was the cause for my very first comment on your blog, and the puerile reason I hold a bunch of sonrivers domain names – which really are yours, if you want them. Finally, I stand corrected – I believe I should have used the term “blank verse” when I said “free verse.”

I don’t know if you have recognized an inability to give coherent literary criticism, whether you modestly await your readers’ submittals of their favorites for consideration, or if the invitation to educate a philistine is so exigent; but I see that you have already come up with my reading assignment. Perhaps with some contrasts and comparisons I would be better able to explain why I have found your work… less than compelling.

What really confuses me is that you describe philistines (we really need to come up with some synomyms for that word, but it’s just so… juicy) as your target audience, but while going back through your archives, looking to get clubbed, I ran across several posts that indicate you have a keen interest in what you consider to be the travails of your Art – perspectives that would place you on the cutting edge, quite distant from the intended consumer. I particularly liked the one with the Frost inferences, even if I couldn’t follow the logic.

Ah. A formalist. I’ve been journeying away from that strict practice this past year, although I remain metrical. But still more blank verse than free. But you should check out poets such as Rhina Espaillat and many more at http://www.thehypertexts.com. Poets like Gwynn, Finch, Stallings. But also check these poets: Warren, Krisak, Crawford. There’s a lot there to taste. Some who aren’t but are worth a google or two: Timothy Murphy and Alfred Nicol. As for free versers: Gary Snyder and Robert Creeley (and many more) are worth googling too.

I’ll need some time to read more of your work, and I again invite your readers to point me to their favorites. However, I should warn you that I’ve never been a big fan of free verse. What poetry I have read that I liked tends to be more structured – epics such as Virgil’s Aeneid, and Beowulf; Kipling, Frost, Coleridge, Blake and the Bard’s sonnets.

I’ll admit to mixed feelings, including some appreciation, for Whitman, Sandburg, cummings, and especially Corso, but they’re not the sort of thing that I would pick up and read on my own initiative. And since I tend to romanticize the entire idea of poetry, it’s hard for me to accept modern technological references. It’s possible that I have an ingrained prejudice that you have to be dead to be a good poet, something I wouldn’t ask you to aspire to just to please me.

So if my tastes illustrate what was wrong with public school secondary education in the arts back two decades ago, I’m afraid all I can claim is a victim status. If you really want a perspective from my myopic lens, you now have an idea of what you’re up against. I’ve seen many, many links to your sites in search engines, suggesting you have quite an established base of appreciative fans. They might counsel you that you can’t, and perhaps shouldn’t try, to please everyone.