MOI’S JOB

It looks like there’ll be 36 reviewers in Galatea Resurrects’ upcoming issue. I’m still formatting it (several do multiple reviews), but here’s what I notice:

Of the 36 reviewers, only two -- as far as I can tell -- are not poets. And of that twosome, one of them is my mother (yes, I yanked my mother in to do a review...heeee!).

This statistic gets to the heart of my concerns as a poetry reviewer. See, there are plenty of poets out there who are all concerned about the state of poetry criticism, and the need to do better evaluations as well as articulations of such. Good for you -- more, indeed, should share your concerns.

But this is a type of dialogue that often gets too inbred for me. It’s the kind of conversation that happens in a corner (not even all four corners but barely one corner) of, say, a huge loft-size room where a party may be happening. And the conversation, in this far-off corner, gets all hot and heated at times…but at the end of the day, the distinct majority in the party aren’t paying attention. They got their good times elsewhere. Heck, they even got their bad times elsewhere and what's poetry for if not a bad time, youse know?!

So, my intent with Galatea Resurrects is about a forest, not a particular tree -- even if that tree is full of laurel leaves. It’s why I knew Galatea Resurrects had to be an online publication as it would have more reach that way than the typical print journal. And what I’d like for it to reach for is to persuade as many people as possible -- I say "people", not "poets" -- that it’s worth paying attention to poetry.

This approach -- even as it need not be a binary against, say, the cerebral or academic or even the Gate-keeping POV -- poses certain implications. And one of them is that Galatea Resurrects must provide a space for also experiencing Joy.

That’s Moi’s job. And that’s why I like Moi’s job.

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Took me decades to earn Moi’s job. Having said that, what I never anticipated is the … loneliness of this POV. Poor Joy…