mere jonathans
About a year ago, I worked very hard -- for over a year -- on a poetry manuscript I named mere jonathans. Once finishing a first draft of the book, I "workshopped" it in a small group of three other poets who likewise had their own books they were working on. Once going through detailed note-making for editing, I felt exhausted, done with it. I put it aside and haven't touched it since.
In light of the realizations mentioned in my last entry, I find myself ... hmm ... fondly ... drawn back to mere jonathans. I think I left it far too early, tired and therefore ready to jump manically at any new pursuit. And writing it was not merely an aesthetic exercise for me. It was a coming to terms with a nexus of personal issues and interests. But I left the book and the issues hanging: exposed ganglia. Identity interruptus.
I want to dive deeper into mere jonathans. I want to smoothe the pages of becoming, rather than serrate them. And unlike some of my other goals, this one is sparked by grounded interest, interest that addresses me more wholly.
I have briefly mentioned the book in terms of what I was going for in terms of formal aesthetics, I think. But, here are some of things I was thinking about when working on the book:
* renewed understanding of the "citizen" outside the concept of "nation" and more in terms of local community
* a masculinity built more on understanding, cooperation, and tutelage rather than power and competition
* a concept of experimentalism connected to rural, rather than urban, culture
* rescuing of sacredness and sacrament from religion
* renewed endorsement of reason and dialogue
* search for more detailed, symbolic meaning behind the bear sexual aesthetic
* a slowing of pace and a deepening of attention
* a salvaging of utopia from absolutism
* occasional investment in late 19th-century American culture
* exploration of expanded sexual and romantic structures in terms of family
* mediation of participation in capitalist economies
* defiance of generation gaps between queer men and expression of respect for the wise among the older among us
* a reclaiming of the value of solitude
* re-definition of education as more intimate and personal
* conscious elevation of the everyday, meaningful quirkiness over spectacle and self-aggandizement
* an envisioning of the number three as a first choice beyond binary thinking, the color bown as an alternative to black-and-white thinking
* exploration of the concept of building secular myths around the modern self
* a fledgling attempt to understand serious role-play as a means towards personal, spiritual growth
A lot -- maybe too many -- ideas, I know. But, I wanted to remind myself of how much mileage the work of writing those poems got me, how much terrain the project took me through, how it all seemed to emerge from a single aesthetic that I sensed was whole and which I very much needed/need to articulate for myself. So that I could feel somewhat whole and meaningful myself. Even if these ideas aren't stated in personal terms here, mere jonathans has been my effort to envision my very specific self -- with my values and desires -- as a public queer man.
And I actually feel a solid share of warmth at the idea of returning to playfully wrestle with it again.
In light of the realizations mentioned in my last entry, I find myself ... hmm ... fondly ... drawn back to mere jonathans. I think I left it far too early, tired and therefore ready to jump manically at any new pursuit. And writing it was not merely an aesthetic exercise for me. It was a coming to terms with a nexus of personal issues and interests. But I left the book and the issues hanging: exposed ganglia. Identity interruptus.
I want to dive deeper into mere jonathans. I want to smoothe the pages of becoming, rather than serrate them. And unlike some of my other goals, this one is sparked by grounded interest, interest that addresses me more wholly.
I have briefly mentioned the book in terms of what I was going for in terms of formal aesthetics, I think. But, here are some of things I was thinking about when working on the book:
* renewed understanding of the "citizen" outside the concept of "nation" and more in terms of local community
* a masculinity built more on understanding, cooperation, and tutelage rather than power and competition
* a concept of experimentalism connected to rural, rather than urban, culture
* rescuing of sacredness and sacrament from religion
* renewed endorsement of reason and dialogue
* search for more detailed, symbolic meaning behind the bear sexual aesthetic
* a slowing of pace and a deepening of attention
* a salvaging of utopia from absolutism
* occasional investment in late 19th-century American culture
* exploration of expanded sexual and romantic structures in terms of family
* mediation of participation in capitalist economies
* defiance of generation gaps between queer men and expression of respect for the wise among the older among us
* a reclaiming of the value of solitude
* re-definition of education as more intimate and personal
* conscious elevation of the everyday, meaningful quirkiness over spectacle and self-aggandizement
* an envisioning of the number three as a first choice beyond binary thinking, the color bown as an alternative to black-and-white thinking
* exploration of the concept of building secular myths around the modern self
* a fledgling attempt to understand serious role-play as a means towards personal, spiritual growth
A lot -- maybe too many -- ideas, I know. But, I wanted to remind myself of how much mileage the work of writing those poems got me, how much terrain the project took me through, how it all seemed to emerge from a single aesthetic that I sensed was whole and which I very much needed/need to articulate for myself. So that I could feel somewhat whole and meaningful myself. Even if these ideas aren't stated in personal terms here, mere jonathans has been my effort to envision my very specific self -- with my values and desires -- as a public queer man.
And I actually feel a solid share of warmth at the idea of returning to playfully wrestle with it again.