Questioning my mode of configuring
experience, even as I gave
expression to it in words, my
intention in writing in the late 70’s
and early 80’s evolved from lyrical
expression to mirroring what I saw.
To describe without interfering,
without making emotions or
language itself determine what was
said.  I saw myself as an artist
moving about the city with his sketch
book and at night making the scenes
cohere with a narrative sense.  What
I discovered was a nobility in
circumstance that would undermine
it.  I took to photographing the same
scenes and people I was writing
about.  A heightened objectivity was
what I sought.  With the artist’s
sketchbook I retained a simplicity of
seeing, with the camera I was
besieged by the redundancy of these
instants.  The narrative line could no
longer hold up against the weight of
instances.  In the early 90’s my
writing took on a shotgun approach;
each poem a contact sheet containing
many disparate moments.
Circumstance weighed heavy upon
me…