sharing a dinner table with some friends tonight, talk turned to belfast's pride parade, lgbt rights, human rights, celebrating difference, otherness, equality, the (potentially dehumanising) language of liberalism...
there is so much i could say about all of this. but, listening again to denison witmer's philadelphia songs, i think all i want to share is this.
it's an interview with mark doty.
who is an incredible poet
who has written about aids
who has written about dogs
who considers what it means to be a 'self'
who is a wonderful reader of his work
who falls in love with men
who is american
who is amazingly sensitive to language's texture and tone
who considers what it means to overspill the boundaries of the 'self'
who responds to walt whitman in profound, intelligent and innovative ways
who celebrates sensuous contact
who watched his lover disappear to illness
who expresses himself with clarity and humility
who considers what it might mean to be a 'self' and to remain interconnected
the interview lasts for 47 minutes, during which time mark reads from his 2002 collection, source.
i listened to it for the second time today. it's so hard to put into words what i feel about his work. except that i am moved. deeply and quietly. moved.
i imagine that not many people out there will listen to this. but it came as profound gift to me.
without wanting to speak in labels...with all the ways i feel i belong these days...and with all the ways i don't...i love mark doty's poetry for how it communicates the complexity and simplicity of what it means to be a self, and simultaneously to long to be one; to make yourself a home, and to be restless as hell; to live out your private little days, and to take your place in a grand and glorious and ferocious universe.
