A photo of William Corbett reading behind a podium
William Corbett

William Corbett Reading / March 18, 2010

Event Report

Poet William Corbett read before an audience of approximately 45 people in the New Writing Series on Thursday, March 18, 2010. Corbett began his set with selections from James Schuyler’s Other Flowers and concluded with poems by—and in dialog with—Philip Whalen. He also read from his own collection Opening Day, a “documentary poem” on Willem de Kooning, and “Tokyo Travel Diary.”

For the full photoset, visit our Flickr page here.


Set List

Introduction Steve Evans

from Other Flowers: Uncollected Poems of James Schuyler

“Gifts”

“From the Island”

“Poem: The day gets slowly started”

“Things to Do When You Get a Bad Review”

From Corbett’s Opening Day

“CUE”

“Through gloom of a mid-November morning”

From Corbett’s documentary poem titled “De Kooning”

“Sunday Drive”

“At Black Mountain”

“Woman I”

“De Kooning”

from Corbett’s chapbook Poems On Occasion

“For Gerrit on His 75th Birthday”

“Cowboy Up”

“Tokyo Travel Diary”

from Corbett’s “The Whalen Poem”

Philip Whalen’s “Hymnus ad Patrem Sinensis”

Sampling from Corbett’s “The Whalen Poem”
Letter from Philip Whalen to Tom Raworth

Closing Poem

“Two Glasses of Malt Scotch in the Rain”

Questions

Advice for poets?

How do you know when a poem is finished?

What has remained constant in poetry since the days of Li Po?