I Am Flying Into Myself: Selected Poems 1960-2014 by Bill Knott (2017)

The first, and perhaps the last, collection of Bill Knott's poems published since his death in 2014.

Poetry Review: I Am Flying Into Myself is a selection of work by a little-known poet in a culture of little-known poets. Not only little-known, but thorny, uncooperative, curmudgeonly, and a writer who went through immense changes in his writing, from the almost epigrammatic poetry of his early books, through surrealism (or Aurealism as he called it), to the complex, thorny, intellectual, syllabic, more formal poetry of his later years, but always with his own odd and individual sense of humor. As the editor Thomas Lux notes, Bill Knott was "a school of one, among the American poets." Lux notes that he edited this collection of 152 poems from Knott's own collection of 964 poems, and states that he generally adhered to Knott's order, which was "meant to be random, neither chronological nor thematic." This books lists Knott's 12 books, which through haunting thrift stores I've managed to collect seven and read eight.The existence of I Am Flying Into Myself is a wonderful thing in and of itself, it makes me happy just to know I can hold it in my hands. It's interesting to note which poems Lux chose from so many choices: many sonnets, many formal works, so much of his wordplay, puns, games, neologisms, and the magic Knott found in words. At his best Knott works in elements of Joyce, Shakespeare, perhaps even some Dylan Thomas. I believe these are the poems Knott himself would have wanted preserved. As grateful as I am to Lux for shepherding this project, these poems are not always the ones I would have chosen. For me there are too few from the early books on which Knott, to his later regret, made his reputation. He never quite lived down his image as the angry, young, anti-war poet. Though I treasure all his work, for me the work in this collection is not as immediate, emotional, political, powerful as those early efforts. My only other wish is that there were even more poems in the collection (there's room). Here is one from the book, called "Goodbye": "If you are still alive when you read this,/close your eyes. I am/under their lids, growing black." And if Bill Knott was still with us and could see this collection, I think he would say something dismissive, about "sure, after I'm dead, what good does this do me?" But I also think he would be secretly pleased, quite pleased, and would eagerly and approvingly look through the pages, and would be just as happy (though he wouldn't admit it) that it's from a prestigious publisher like Farrar Straus Giroux. I Am Flying Into Myself is a good thing; look for it in your local bookstore or library. [4½★]