Salinger, Myself, and Writing

If I've never told you, J.D. Salinger is quite possibly my favorite author. Of course most peoples initial reaction is 'oh Catcher In The Rye'. Not my favorite of his works. Personally it doesn't hold the same pinache and gusto contained within Raise High the Roofbeam Carpenters, or my absolute favorite Seymour-An Introduction.

His chaotic parenthetical whimsy of oration (i see this particular writing style as much more relating to actual speech than a stale page) is a thing of splendor. I like to think I myself relate to this style, partially from the uncanny ability to spend endless hours recounting stories that branch out in tangents and become their own roots, whose shoots never quite blossom before new seeds fall and take root on their own (yes, i tend to ramble and lose the main track of my argument or story). They way in which Salinger addresses the reader (like i myself have taken on here), is inspired. He brings up the amusing question of how can an author know who his audience is? The reverse is easy. So to you few readers (as i highly doubt i have some inordinately large reading base like some of the intangibles) I, like Salinger, apologize for this long winded and verbose explanation that a better poet would be able to state quite simply.

What i am trying to get at, is the reason that poetry is difficult for me. It is difficult for the same reason that 3 day trips for fun become a burden. I simply have no idea how to pack. A visual image, a thought, a smell, are things that i cannot simply compose in a line like many of the great poets i know. I have to wander around it, through it, cradle it gently (or roughly, depending on my mood), to relate it to everything i know (or as much as i can possibly stand, which is most likely a little bit more than what you would be able to tolerate yourself as the reader). So Poetry becomes a task of taking off layers and layers to reach some sort of primordial essence that will transcend the brevity of description and magically (in the very best of conditions, which is usually our goal isn't it?) add those layers again once the reader (or listener i suppose) allows themselves to be affected by this prose. This skill i am lacking (as should be apparent by this writing which for better or worse seems to be my natural style). So for those of you readers (if any of you are still there even) who made it through this, i appreciate it, and will be making more of these journeys around the peripherals of my psyche instead of what many would consider prose in order to sort out and alleviate this incessant chattering (whether its aloud, or simply in my head).