The Via
Negativa is a road
well-travelled, at least in Dave Bonta's cyber-corner
of it, even if in the real world it is hidden in Plummers
Hollow, a Pennsylvania mountain woodland richly populated
by a great variety of animal, vegetable and mineral
wildlife, every specimen of which our Dave knows personally,
addresses by proper name, and often photographs, films
or writes poems about. I say our Dave because
he's a friend among good friends, first encountered
in the blogosphere, then in New York in 2007, then last
week right here at home. Here he is looking at the cyclops-eye
of my camcorder while we talk - a rambling conversation
which he recorded and which will eventually appear on
Via Negativa as a podcast.
It takes a very good reason to
lure this hermit-ish poet/ philosopher/ naturalist away
from his porch in the woods and the excellent reasons
which brought Dave to the UK for two weeks were a book,
a reading and an exhibition. The exhibition: Clive
Hicks-Jenkins' 60th birthday retrospective at the National
Library of Wales in Aberystwyth, beautifully documented
on Clive's
Artlog.
The book: The
Book of Ystwyth for which Dave contributed poems;
and the reading of his poems, along with the other
poets, as part of the festivities around this prestigious
event. You can see more about all this on Via Negativa
including links to other bloggers who have written
about it.
I enjoyed Dave's visit so much,
savouring the peaceful attentiveness he gives to everything,
a rare quality that I can learn from. The attention I
give to the world is often agitated by ego-driven judgements
and coloured by emotions - not the best way
to use one's perceptive faculties.
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