5:48 pm

Today read a few of Lorna Crozier's Mrs. Bentley poems, the ones that give a voice to the Mrs. B of Sinclair Ross's As For me and My House. In Crozier's hands, Mrs. B is a poet naming, for example, the various spirits of horse, grass and sometimes rain. My class found them convincing, I think--"Joe Lawson's Wife" such a finely honed telling of story.

In the other class today it was "Naming of Parts" by Henry Reed. About the instructor barking out the parts of a rifle while keeping one eye on the blossoms out the window, the silence there (except for bees). Lots of repetition evoked--of action, of season and some poor bugger of a rifle instructor wondering How can I get out? and Should I?

And marking the last of the poetry assignments (six poems, at least three of them revisions) plus a page of commentary. No fun coming up with a grade, but looking over the poems is a gas. I guess I should admit that I'm worried some of the writers are putting down what they think I want to see. As long as what I want to see is fresh stuff that listens to itself and doesn't settle for easy words or phrases and stirs up some action in its lines, well then I suppose that'll do.

Tonight: reading for Grain.

(Last night: first curling game of the year. We kept it tight for four ends then lost it.)