ERIN MOURE's review of Poets 88 (January?February) is marred by the very conservatism which she claims to oppose. Indeed, her notion that poetry is only realized when poets "get behind the self, the central reified self' is a convention that results in the self?conscious dilettantism of poems about poetry.
Moure also observes that "the poets exist inside the forms." I should hope so: all poets exist inside forms whether sonnets or the most "formless" vers libre. Furthermore, in our time, the use of traditional verse forms and narrative can constitute a greater threat to the State than anecdotal ramblings that communicate nothing save their own self?involvement. For instance, rhyme is the best form for protest verse in English and I suspect it will remain so for a while yet.
I reject vehemently Moure's glib characterization of my work as "sexist." Such criticism is about as accurate as describing Rushdie's The Satanic Verses as anti?Muslim. Indeed, my poems and songs ?because they attempt to describe the moral complexity of human relationships have been used by Black feminists to combat racism and sexism. Moreover, if writers are to be judged by the characters they invent, then Eliot is merely an anti?Semite and Pound a Fascist.
To conclude, Moure's article deconstructs itself. Rather.than being a clarion call to a self?analytical, progressive poetry, it exhibits instead a rather regressive authoritarianism. In her obsession with her idea of poetic form, Moure has forgotten that poetry is not just form but being.
George Elliott Clarke
Ottawa
Erin Moure replies: As I said in the review of Poets 88, Conscious involvement in the work of language, in its constituting power and markings, uncovering its repressions, its drives, and internally consistent forces, is to my mind, critical to the writing and reading of poetry. 'Others may not share this "mind." So be it. I still think that poets, rather than just existing inside the forms (yes, we're all inside the forms) should be like Bertolt Brecht, in his house, and "hang up their No masks and picture scroll/ Representing the Doubter." Also to my mind, phrases like "Beauty survived . . . / In dark men stroking womanwild banjos" (from George E16 liott Clarke, whose work has much better things to recommend it!) are sexist. A banjo (inanimate object) compared to a woman? "Wild" because "stroked" by the man? Or is it . . . the old nature/culture split? If not ?sexism then . . . delusions of grandeur? For the most part, banjos aren't stroked anyway, they're picked on. And held with one hand around the neck . . . As I said in the review (the substance of which was not about sexism . . . ), "Small indicators maybe, but mental structures that . position women in a certain relationship to men . . . are still there, passed down to another generation." Is it any wonder that I won't sing in harmony with that same old tired tune?
