Once, on the way to Oregon, I stopped at a California
winery to get free wine from the tasting room.
Just at that time a tour was starting so I decided to go along. A young
man of about 23 was the guide and began that strange kind of language
guides use, almost a chant:…and on the
left a 1500 gallon redwood barrel containing Burgundy kept always at the
temperature of…and then he said Whose
kid is that?
The force of whose kid is that
caused everyone to pay attention to the real moment we were all in. A small child was about to fall in a very deep
vat of wine.
I
vowed, at that moment, that every statement in my poems should at least have
the force of whose kid is that.
It is
an impossible standard, but a good one.
Few really bad lines can stand against it.
The
guide was chanting remembered lines to a vapid audience. The distance between his Mind, our Minds, and
the subject of wine-making simply was not being bridged. But the endangered child called words to his
mind which were immediate and un-premeditated—it was organic, as a leap would
be if one were frightened by a truck.
--Lew Welch
I really love this passage, and find it helps to keep it in mind while writing both poetry and prose.
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