Photo of Eileen Myles (left) by Kelly Writers House staff, March 2016.
A stingray doesn’t know the word for “pathetic.” A saintdoes not care if prayer renders her pathetic. Poets are pathetic because they devote themselves to form in the face of formlessness. (Are they? Do they?) These kinds of formulations and queries arise in reading Pathetic Literature, the momentous anthology edited by Eileen Myles and released by Grove Press in November 2022.
A stingray doesn’t know the word for “pathetic.” A saint does not care if prayer renders her pathetic. Poets are pathetic because they devote themselves to form in the face of formlessness. (Are they? Do they?) These kinds of formulations and queries arise in reading Pathetic Literature, the momentous anthology edited by Eileen Myles and released by Grove Press in November 2022.
Begin anywhere
The Short Takes on Long Poems symposium
I'm taking the beach-poem at its word, and beginning anywhere.
In my case, since I’m just back from the Short Takes on Long Poems symposium at the University of Auckland, I thought I might start there.