When you are done using all the words in your dizionario oscuro to cobble poems that might be at home in The New Yorker, Atlantic, other high-falutin’ magazines, please write one for me. I love The New Yorker; have subscribed for years; but read it–as they say about Playboy– for the articles and reviews, which tend to make sense, teach me something, give me something to look forward to. When I scratch my head and write WTF?? in the margin after reading your poems, my inner aesthete suspects that the items in question were written for show, not for go. It is, sorry to say, not my concern if you are bucking for tenure, trying to generate interest in your forthcoming book, or still grieving over the baseball glove that you left out in the rain when you were ten. If you want me to read, understand, appreciate, come back for more, tell me about the rain, or the team you rooted for when you were a kid and leave that other stuff out. In the rain. Your glove may appreciate the company.
C. T. Holte
C. T. Holte grew up without color TV; played along creeks and in cornfields; went to lots of school; and has had gigs as teacher, editor, and less wordy things. He recently migrated to New Mexico; and got a cool electric chainsaw for Christmas. His poetry has been published in Words, Touch, California Quarterly, Months to Years, Pensive, The Daily Drunk, and elsewhere, and has been hung from trees to celebrate the Rio Grande Bosque.