I learned backshooting from a crippled ornery character
who became the literary inspiration for Hopalong Cassidy
who was much less affable and presentable on the radio
(where he started) than the television (where he found
himself). If I see a phrase by another poet (Carl Rakosi,
for example) I have no qualms in stealing it. The anti-
Semite who fought for the Jews in the war before but
now wants to banish them from America (along with
all the Communists.) Carl, in his poem, has the man
cleaning stables but I’ve got him as a more heroic type,
winning medals for his bravery, and intellectually precocious
transforming himself into a Christian Zionist anti-Semite
the sort that hates the Jews, but loves the State of Israel
It was Ezra Pound who introduced him to Zukofsky
.
Steven Taylor
.