"A poem, you could say, is like a bell: if you stuff a bunch of dirty laundry into the bell or make that bell too fixed, it can’t resonate. It thuds. Plud-plud. But if the bell is hung with the ability to move and room to swing, with air circulating freely in and about the body, it’s able to do its job, to vibrate after the clapper’s contact. It can resonate. Resonance, in the poetic sense, includes the reader in the process of experiencing the poem’s matter and consequence. Poetic logic likes air; it loves image and suggestion; it leans into negative capability; and it wants to include the reader in the work of the poem."
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Renee Ashley, great poet, great lady, dog lover
Read the entire interview. Renee is the featured poet in the Winter 2012 IthacaLit.
