28 July 2004. Tomorrow, another old essay of mine. Today, a break while I take a moment to praise Karl Kempton's precincts of the 5th apocalypse, the poem I just posted an essay on. While again looking at it and thinking about it, I concluded that I was right in thinking it as good as I said it was in my essay. Maybe better. Looking back over Karl's work, which I've seen a lot of but have no properly organized over-view of, I think maybe it was a break-through work for him in one area of his mastery: narrative textography. He won't like the classification, or (probably) the term, but I think it his first major piece of that kind.

As I finished the preceding paragraph, I realized several things. One is how many other kinds of poetry Karl has brought to the level of precincts of the 5th apocalypse, such as visio-mathematical poems, infraverbal poems, spiritual solitextual poems, to name just three (not necessarily with great accuracy). I hope some day to have time properly to figure out just what he's done, and why so much of it is major or close to major. In other words, this entry is just a note to myself.

One personal observation: I found myself once again bemused at how strong a feeling of ownership of precincts of the 5th apocalypse I have. Nothing makes you appreciate, but also claim ownership of, a poem more than writing out a close reading of it. Sure, I realize that it's still Karl's poem. And it belongs to all who have let it into their minds. But it is mine as a critic in a different, quite pleasurable way. Little would make me happier than the knowledge that others took ownership of some of my poems the same way. (As a few, I believe, have.)