Retrospect: The Pose of Mark Stabor Kobo
The latest new name in poetry to appear before the public has prepared his message well in advance of his presentation. He has already made that discovery about himself whereby he knows his intentions. His excitement for the sound and power imbedded in a new American voice impels enthusiasms calmer minds will give the character of excess. In twenty years of experiment and tedious doubts, I have crafted a voice and a poetics demanding a new - and newly appointed - audience. Today's body of published poetry so lacks vitality and force in our culture that the time seems auspicious for the Greatest Living Poets project.
No amount of depreciating statements a writer usually makes as preface to first works can hide a spirited pretension of wishing to be known by the world - and none will be attempted. There currently is no commercial market for poetry. At no other time in our culture might a poet with a well-prepared message hope to accomplish more through technology (e-publishing) than he might through traditional publishing methods. He may have more freedom to introduce a new voice through e-publishing than he would through small run literary presses. He may certainly have supreme control over his product in order to strike out fresh and discover a newly gathered audience. He is limited only by his own misjudgments and an overreaching message.
A pose like this should threaten no one. If successful, the greater wealth of American letters will lend benevolence to all petitioners to literary taste. If not, a poet greater than he will undertake a similar labor and find his own occasion. The man behind the mask will find that his message resonates or he will be hooted from the stage; either the pose is a well thought out presentation or it will merely seem ridiculous. He may have so lived his life that he can maintain some distance form the outcome. He has worn only a mask and the man can still walk the streets the morning after the event and buy bread and coffee without being attacked. He will have done what he came to do, then he will move on.
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