Like most everybody who reads blogs about poetry, I’ve been sucked into the recent uproar about David Lehman and Best American Poetry. Seth Abramson seems to have spent the most time making constructive arguments here, here, here, here and here.

As a poet who falls well outside the poetry establishment, I’m thoroughly amused by all of this, and pretty squarely agree that maybe putting your wife into your anthology might not reek of editorial ethics, but I can also see both sides. We each answer to a different authority. Fairness is nice, but the establishment as a whole is clearly unfair; good work should be expected to rise to the top regardless of its inclusion in BAP but BAP certainly helps, so why not do “what it takes” to make yourself accessible to BAP’s selection process?

Even the whole Stacey Harwood thing has its own sad, sympathetic side: I’m a married guy, and I regularly find myself thinking, “Boy, I’ve really screwed the pooch here. How can I get out of this one?” I don’t have an anthology series, and if I did, it wouldn’t mean much since my wife isn’t a writer. But hey, if I thought including her in my anthology (and letting Billy Collins take the credit/blame for her inclusion) would make my marriage a happier place, I can’t honestly say I’d be above that. I’d know that it was shady and perhaps a little creepy, but I can’t say I wouldn’t do it anyhow, because I don’t imagine there’s an anthology series out there whose credibility is more important to me than making my wife happy. She’s a pretty keen person. Also, an anthology series won’t keep me warm in bed. And yes, I have tried sleeping next to Best American Poetry. It was the 1999 edition.

For my part, I disagree with Jordan Davis that one couldn’t create a list of the best poetry out there without naming a lot of friends; that’d be really easy to avoid if you also avoid making friends. Which sounds better: complete aesthetic purity or existing in the world as a human being? I’m going to choose the latter.

But Jordan has done more to combat any cronyism or douchebaggery (if there really is any) from David Lehman than the rest of us combined: Jordan’s created a list of the best poems in a given year, and he’s populated it with some superlative work. Lehman and Scribner may have dibs on the name Best American Poetry YearX, and they’re welcome to it. No one is stopping you from creating Best Poetry in the US YearX and publishing it at your micropress, or The Year’s 100 Best Poems, or America’s Best Poems YearX, or anything like that. Scribner doesn’t have the market cornered on “Best.” Jordan’s list, published in his blog– maybe it isn’t as influential as Lehman’s anthology series, but at least he’s staked a claim to communicating what he thinks the best poems of the year are. It’s tempting to do the same here in my blog, and let you reader judge whether you think that I’m more right than David Lehman or Jordan Davis or anyone else who puts the subjective tag “best” onto poems. Whatever you make think of Lehman’s editorial practices, or Davis’s, whatever compromises you believe they have made along the way, there’s something to be said for those who are trying to put work they find worthy in front of others.

I won’t go so far as to say “If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.” But take a good look before you blog about how unfair poetry or po-biz is. Answer some questions:

1. Do you routinely advocate for the publication of work other than your own?
2. Are you editing or publishing a magazine, online journal, or book series so that you can get work you believe in before a wider audience, despite the fact that you may not receive adequate (or any) monetary compensation for your efforts?
3. Do you buy books of poetry (by people other than your friends)?
4. Do you buy books of poetry (by people other than your friends) for other people?
5. Do you recommend or require that friends, students, associates, family, or cronies purchase books of poetry other than your own or those by friends?
6. Do you run a reading series and regular attempt to attract new audiences?

If the answer yes to at least 4 of those questions, I’m now happy to listen to your complaints. If they’re in cartoon form, I’ll enjoy them much more.