Corrections

Last night I was reading a book by one of my favorite prose poets, Morton Marcus. It's hard to imagine that he's gone now. He died of cancer last March. His work is so vibrant, so alive, and I can still see his face in the audience when I had the honor of reading in Santa Cruz two years ago. Although I'd read this collection several times, I'd never noticed that he had corrected it, adding a few commas in black ink, trying to make them look like the print.

I had to laugh. I thought I was the only one who did that, though usually I can't stand to look at my books. Once they are in print, I want to change everything about them. I can imagine myself as a ghost, trying to come back and correct any pages where my poems appear.