Personal Viewpoints on Poetry and Poetics

I was honored to be interviewed recently by Diane Lockward about aspects of my poetry, particularly focusing on “After the Miscarriage,” a poem from my new book, Seeded Light, as one entry in a series of talks with poets she calls “The Poet on the Poem.” Moreover, I am pleased to note that the questions and answers are now available at Blogalicious, Diane’s fine literary site.

I always enjoy participating in conversations concerning elements from the history of poetry and poetics, something I frequently find myself doing when in my office during different conferences with members of my creative writing classes and students of literary studies (one of whom took the photo seen here) or when sitting at my desk to jot down notes for posts entered in this blog. However, I was appreciative of an opportunity this time to discuss my personal practice in writing poetry and a few points on my approach to poetics, especially since I was engaging in dialogue with an individual whose work, as a poet and as a critic, I admire very much.

Indeed, readers will find a couple of Diane Lockward’s poems (“Hunger in the Garden” and “The Temptation of Mirage”) in the current issue of Valparaiso Poetry Review. Various other examples of Diane’s poetry and commentary can be found by visiting the archives of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

During the interview, I spoke about a number of issues—including my process of writing a poem, the manner and stage of composition in which a title is selected, my choice of form, the use of specific details to create texture as well as context, and the importance of lyricism within a poem, particularly in free verse. The following excerpt provides a sample from our conversation:

Diane Lockward: In addition to the work done by the title, your details provide an understory, a sub-text. For example, “boys in black coats,” “Shrill whistle,” “slow toll / of cathedral bells,” “morning Mass,” and “its own form of warning” convey an untold story and heighten the emotional intensity. How do you manage to balance the lyric and narrative impulses?

Edward Byrne: My style of writing seems to naturally combine lyric language and ingredients of narrative or implied narrative subtexts. I feel comfortable with this mixture. Indeed, I intend that the two parts complement one another. Most of the details you mention were added in revisions (although all of them come from specific memories I have about various actual instances) after I had established the context of the poem, and each was inserted in order to create an ambiance supporting the subject matter or as a contrast to the position in which the couple find themselves.

My personal history includes interest in film studies, a topic that I have taught over the years and about which I have written extensively in the past. As my wife can verify, when watching films I’m always conscious of the many minor components within the frame of the screen. Directors making movies are aware of the contribution subtle background atmosphere (natural scenery, weather, sounds, actions, set decorations, and extra actors populating the area) can add to a film moment’s dramatic tension and emotional tone, even offering possible undercurrents or sub-plots. In my poetry I try to think cinematically and inject images or elements evoking various senses, as well as objects that mirror the kind of attention to detail I observe in effective movie scenes.

I invite readers to visit Blogalicious to read the rest of the interview—which is also accompanied by the text of “After the Miscarriage” and a video presentation in which I read the poem—and I urge everyone to browse through the many excellent past posts offered by Diane Lockward at her blog.

Poem of the Week: "Bird in the Garage" by T. Alan Broughton

The VPR Poem of the Week is T. Alan Broughton’s “Bird in the Garage,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2007-2008 issue (Volume IX, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

T. Alan Broughton has published four novels and a collection of short stories. His seventh collection of poems, A World Remembered (2010), has just been released by Carnegie Mellon University Press. He also has been the recipient of various grants, awards, and fellowships, including a Guggenheim Fellowship and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship.

Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it. Please check the sidebar to view the list of poets and works that have been past “Poem of the Week” selections. Additionally, readers are reminded that VPR pages are best read with the browser font preference in which they were set, 12 pt. Times New Roman, in order to guarantee the stanza alignment and the breaks of longer lines are preserved.

Robert Frost Speaks About His Poetry: Video

Robert Frost was born on March 26 in 1874. For a previous post at “One Poet’s Notes” about Robert Frost, readers are urged to visit the following: “Richard Poirier Description of Robert Frost.”

Patricia Fargnoli and H. Palmer Hall

Today’s post at The Writer’s Almanac features a poem by Patricia Fargnoli, “Breaking Silence—For My Son,” which appeared in her collection titled Necessary Light and is read by Garrison Keillor (who also speaks in the audio of Flannery O’Connor on her birth date, born Mar. 25, 1925). Fargnoli’s volume had been selected by Mary Oliver for the May Swenson Poetry Award and was published by Utah State University Press in 1999.

I am pleased to note that Patricia Fargnoli appeared as one of the earliest featured poets in Valparaiso Poetry Review (Spring/Summer 2000: Volume I, Number 2). The issue also included a review of Necessary Light that had been written by H. Palmer Hall. Among the Fargnoli poems discussed in his review, Hall commented upon “Breaking Silence—For My Son” in the following excerpt:

Patricia Fargnoli has a sure way of talking about the things that matter, about love and sex and death. I love the contrast between “Landscape in Blue and Bronze” and “From Eleven Years Later” with “Breaking Silence—for My Son.” The poems are “real.” Men and women together. But the first two are almost mythic, as Fargnoli says in the second:

I want to speak with you in the round vowels
of your own language
to tell you how
I’ve named you myth and memory,
how I’ve made you a half-god.

Compare that with the scene in the car in “Breaking Silence”: “I know you want me to say I loved him / but I wanted only to belong—to anyone. / So I let it happen, / the way I let all of it happen....” The contrast is between the way we think things ought to be—love that is mythic in proportion and sex that awakens sweet memories for years with what actually happens and, yet, a true, real love that ensues, between mother and son:

And in a distant inviolate place,
as though it had nothing at all
to do with him, you were a spark
in silence catching.

Visitors are urged to examine the rest of Hall’s review, as well as poems by Patricia Fargnoli and H. Palmer Hall in that early issue of Valparaiso Poetry Review. Also, both writers are represented by poems in the current issue of VPR, the tenth anniversary issue of the the journal. In addition, by searching the VPR archives page, readers will find links to various works by Fargnoli and Hall in other issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

Best Poetry Blogs

Accredited Online Colleges has issued its 2010 list of the 100 Best Poetry Blogs, which it describes as including sites where readers will “find a range of poetry related help, information and inspiration,” and I am pleased to observe that “One Poet’s Notes” can be found once again among those blogs included. As I mentioned last year when noting the presence of “One Poet’s Notes” on a similar list, I realize such rankings can be subjective or incomplete, and there are many deserving poetry sites online. Nevertheless, I am pleased anytime “One Poet’s Notes,” the Valparaiso Poetry Review editor’s blog, is selected for such an honor.

The 100 blogs are locations cited by Accredited Online Colleges as fresh sources for information about poetry and poetics. I was again impressed this year by the fine company on the list, which includes many blogs I regularly enjoy visiting for entertainment and enlightenment about poetry or other topics concerning writing and the arts, from well-known and well-funded sites—like the blogs of the Poetry Foundation, the New York Times, or Writer’s Digest—to the personal blogs of various poets, such as Sandra Beasley, Alfred Corn, Lori Desrosiers, Paul Lisicky, Diane Lockward, Ron Silliman, Allen Taylor, and a number of others.

I also look forward to exploring some of the sites about which I had not yet been aware, and I invite readers to browse through the list to discover new voices and additional locations for information about poetry, poetics, creative writing, literature, or the relationship between poetry and other arts—such as painting, photography, and music.

Poem of the Week: "New Jersey Spring" by Christine Cuccio

The VPR Poem of the Week is Christine Cuccio’s “New Jersey Spring,” which appeared in the Spring/Summer 2009 issue (Volume X, Number 2) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

Christine Cuccio received her MA in writing from Emerson College. Her poetry has been featured in such journals as Carolina Quarterly, New York Quarterly, and North American Review.

Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it. Please check the sidebar to view the list of poets and works that have been past “Poem of the Week” selections. Additionally, readers are reminded that VPR pages are best read with the browser font preference in which they were set, 12 pt. Times New Roman, in order to guarantee the stanza alignment and the breaks of longer lines are preserved.

"Spring Walk Along the Lake" by Edward Byrne

As we welcome the new season today, I offer a piece from a sequence of poems that appeared in my book-length diptych, Tidal Air, published by Pecan Grove Press in 2002. This poem is inspired by a spring trip to nearby Lake Michigan, an annual ritual for my wife and me since we spent our first afternoon together at an Indiana lakeshore beach more than two decades ago, and an event that regularly has included our son in the years since his birth.

Indeed, the author’s photograph of me that appears on the back cover of my new book, Seeded Light, and that can also be seen in the blog sidebar, is a picture taken this past year by my wife during one of the visits with our son to the dunes stretching along the shore of Lake Michigan.

SPRING WALK ALONG THE LAKE


. . . . . I

We listen to the sweet lilt of a warbler whistling
. . . . . in the thin fringe of dune forest that stretches

beside us. When its yellow feathers flutter
. . . . . among shadows, those startling splashes of color

light the low-growing oak and hickory like a lone
. . . . . night lantern flickering in a brisk wind. Despite

these still and chilly waters, my wife and I
. . . . . have returned again, as if in a ritual, to witness

the beginning of spring. And now our young son
. . . . . Alex wanders ahead. Stepping uncertainly

across the beach, as though to guide us, he tiptoes
. . . . . through the seasonal debris that has collected

for months in this cleft of shorefront,
. . . . . that still litters the whole expanse of sand.


. . . . . II

By instinct, he picks up sticks and bits of shells,
. . . . . gathering together the grit left by another bitter

winter. However, this is only his first walk
. . . . . along the lake, and he doesn’t know the history

of these visits; he doesn’t understand yet
. . . . . the tacit covenant with nature that someday

also will govern his actions. A ring-billed gull
. . . . . skims the water’s surface. Following a repeated

pattern, it lifts toward the clouds and then tilts
. . . . . over the shore once more, unfurled wings riding

an otherwise indiscernible updraft. As if baffled
. . . . . by our presence, voicing its shrill call, it ties

loose loops twice around us before rising
. . . . . even higher in a widening reel beyond the treetops.


. . . . . III

I stare, spellbound. Alex watches
. . . . . for a moment, then turns away, unimpressed

by the bird’s apparent weightlessness,
. . . . . as though his three-year-old innocence

assures that nothing is impossible,
. . . . . no defiance of natural law is inconceivable.

Suddenly, I’m stunned by my son’s
. . . . . lack of surprise at anything nature offers,

and I realize how much wiser than I
. . . . . he may be, as I remember how quickly

this backdrop of trees will be transformed,
. . . . . how their leaves will be gilded in a flush of light

when at last a late June sun burns above
. . . . . the lake, warming these slack and shallow waters.

[Tidal Air is available from Pecan Grove Press. Interested readers may also purchase a signed copy of the book directly from me by mailing a check for $12 (free shipping) payable to “Edward Byrne” at the following address: Department of English, Valparaiso University, Valparaiso IN 46383.]

National Poetry Month Free Book Giveaway

As we approach the beginning of April, designated as National Poetry Month, fellow blogger Kelli Russell Agodon has initiated a “poetry book giveaway” on the web and invited those of us who blog about poetry to participate. Kelli explains that, as a way to celebrate National Poetry Month, bloggers are urged to offer two books to be given away to visitors. One book can be one’s own and the other ought to be authored by a favorite poet. I believe this is an excellent idea, and I have decided to join in the activity.

Therefore, I vow to give the following two books, one each to be mailed free of charge to a pair of readers: Seeded Light by Edward Byrne and Time to Mow by Maxine Kumin. Information about my book, Seeded Light, can be found above and in the sidebar on this blog page. Still to Mow, the sixteenth collection by Pulitzer Prize-winner Maxine Kumin, was released by W.W. Norton in 2007. This volume is described by the publisher as “the powerful work of one of our greatest poets, a master of line and sound.”

As Agodon suggests, everyone who posts a comment below in response to this post between now and midnight of April 30, 2010 will be eligible for the free books, and I will use a random number generator to decide the winners. If you do not have a blog, you will need to include an e-mail address in your comment as a way to contact you. Readers are also urged to visit Kelli’s site to learn about other bloggers participating in the poetry book giveaway. Good luck!

THE BOOK OF IRISH AMERICAN POETRY

On this St. Patrick’s Day, perhaps today provides the perfect opportunity to remind readers about the extensive anthology (976 pages) of Irish American poets that was edited by Daniel Tobin and published by the University of Notre Dame Press in 2007: The Book of Irish American Poetry (from the Eighteenth Century to the present). The jacket flap of the volume responds to the question about what it means to be an Irish American poet:

The question is not merely rhetorical, claims Daniel Tobin in the introduction, for it raises the issue of a certain kind of imaginative identity that has rarely, if ever, been adequately explored. This anthology brings together exemplary poetry of the “populist period” of Irish American verse (in particular the work of poets such as John Boyle O’Reilly), with the work of those Irish Americans who have made an indelible imprint on American poetry: Robinson Jeffers, Marianne Moore, Louise Bogan, John Berryman, Thomas McGrath, John Montague, Robert Creeley, Frank O’Hara, Ted Berrigan, Charles Olson, Galway Kinnell, X. J. Kennedy, and Alan Dugan, among others. Finally, the anthology includes distinctive poems by contemporary Irish Americans whose work is most likely to stand the test of time: poets such as Tess Gallagher, Alice Fulton, Brendan Galvin, Marie Howe, Susan Howe, Billy Collins, Michael Ryan, Richard Kenney, and Brigit Pegeen Kelly. The poems in this collection cut across the broad spectrum of American poetry and place Irish Americans within every notable school of American poetry, from modernism to confessionalism and the Beats, from formalism to imagism, and from projectivism to the New York School and Language poets.

I am pleased to note that two of my poems, “Homecoming” (from Words Spoken, Words Unspoken: Chimney Hill Press) and “Listening to Lester Young” (from Seeded Light: Turning Point Books), are also included in this anthology.

Poem of the Week: "Jumpshots in the Dark" by Daniel Henry

In recognition of March Madness, the VPR Poem of the Week is Daniel Henry’s “Jumpshots in the Dark,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2001-2002 issue (Volume III, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

Daniel Henry received a Ph.D. in Educational Psychology at Indiana University, and he is currently an Assistant Professor at Auburn University. His poetry publications include work in English Journal and Yankee Magazine. Daniel Henry has also published a number of scholarly articles in national magazines.

Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it. Please check the sidebar to view the list of poets and works that have been past “Poem of the Week” selections. Additionally, readers are reminded that VPR pages are best read with the browser font preference in which they were set, 12 pt. Times New Roman, in order to guarantee the stanza alignment and the breaks of longer lines are preserved.

Memories of March Madness and the AWP, Basketball and Poetry

This week the weather has finally warmed somewhat, and today the last remnants of snow have melted in Valparaiso. We’ve even experienced our first thunderstorms signaling the eventual oncoming of spring in Indiana. However, the arrival of the NCAA basketball tournament, preceded by a week witnessing all the conference championship games, offers another sure indication the beginning of spring may be upon us. Indeed, my spirits are lifted every year by the start of March Madness no matter which teams make their way into the brackets of office pools across the country.

Nevertheless, the 1998 tournament (chronicled above) remains among my favorite memories, particularly because of Valparaiso’s miraculous run to the Sweet 16 and the appearance of my alma mater, Utah, in the championship game. Additionally, these elements blend with a few fond recollections associated with literary events, as I viewed some of the games at an Associated Writing Programs conference in Portland at a hotel bar among a number of fellow poets, including a couple of other Utah grads.

I doubt my breast pocket name tag, worn at any conference I ever attend and identifying me as being from Valparaiso University, will ever receive as much attention and as many nods of approval as I observed while walking the corridors toward poetry readings and panel sessions or touring publishers’ exhibits after the famous last-second winning shot by Bryce Drew was broadcast repeatedly during that week of the Associated Writing Programs conference. Consequently, I believe some of the subsequent literary conversations developing from the initial talk about basketball may have helped promote and sell more copies of my book, East of Omaha, which had just been released and was being displayed at my publisher’s table in the AWP book fair.

The AWP conference in Portland wasn’t the first or the last that I have attended. Likewise, the 1998 NCAA tournament isn’t the only one from which I hold great memories; however, that year my enthusiasm for college basketball and my passion for poetry intersected in a manner that will not likely be repeated.

For further thoughts concerning connections between March Madness and poetry, visitors are invited to read a pair of my previous articles about basketball and poems: “March Madness and B.H. Fairchild’s ‘Old Men Playing Basketball’” and “Indiana Basketball, Homer Drew, and ‘Jumpshots in the Dark.’”

Poem of the Week: "Mountain Fog" by Roger Pfingston

The VPR Poem of the Week is Roger Pfingston’s “Mountain Fog,” which appeared in the Fall/Winter 2001-2002 issue (Volume III, Number 1) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

Roger Pfingston is a retired teacher of English and photography in Bloomington, Indiana. He has two published books, Stoutes Creek Road (Raintree Press) and Something Iridescent: Poems and Stories (Barnwood Press). His poetry has also appeared in many literary journals, including Adirondack Review, Green Hills Literary Lantern, Laurel Review, New Letters, Ontario Review, Snowy Egret, Spoon River Poetry Review, Wisconsin Review, and Yankee Magazine. Roger Pfingston has been the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, two PEN Syndicated Fiction awards, and a Lily Endowment Teacher Creativity fellowship.

Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the archives of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it. Please check the sidebar to view the list of poets and works that have been past “Poem of the Week” selections. Additionally, readers are reminded that VPR pages are best read with the browser font preference in which they were set, 12 pt. Times New Roman, in order to guarantee the stanza alignment and the breaks of longer lines are preserved.

Literary Journals, from Print to Online: An Update

In an article posted at “One Poet’s Notes” nearly a year ago (“Online Literary Journals: A Coming of Age”: April 18, 2009), I commented about how the shift of publication for literary journals from print to online apparently had moved to a point of no return. In addition, I noted how the quality of works included in electronic journals now rivaled what readers would find in print literary journals: “Much has changed since the publication of Valparaiso Poetry Review’s first issue ten years ago. At the time, the concept of an online literary journal was still fairly new and relatively untested. Reputations of existing electronic literary magazines among authors and readers were spotty at best.”

Indeed, I suggested that as the editor of Valparaiso Poetry Review, “I felt a responsibility to produce an online literary journal that would attain a certain amount of respect and contribute to the slowly growing overall reputation of electronic journals due to the efforts by a number of other editors at similar journals, who also were attempting to build a community of publications that would complement the numerous excellent examples in the world of print journals. I believe most readers of fine literature have been amazed in the past decade by the growth and sophistication of online literary journals. As further evidence of an increased respect for online magazines, I have been pleased to see the contents of online literary journals now display a wide range of well-known poets and fiction writers whose presence was limited to print journals only a few years ago.”

I chronicled the advantages of online journals, and I reflected: “When Valparaiso Poetry Review was begun in 1999, I imagined universal acceptance of online literary journals would take a number of years, and I considered the possibility that a decade might pass before electronic literary magazines would come of age. With the general recognition today, by almost all poets and most short-fiction writers, of such journals as satisfactory locations for publication, as well as the nearly universal presence of print journals in some online form, perhaps the maturation of online journals has happened just as I had hoped would occur.”

Today, another piece of evidence exists that the transition of literary journals from print to online has further advanced. In a news notice to its readers, Shenandoah has announced that it will discontinue publication as a print periodical at the end of this year, after its 60th anniversary issue, and the journal will continue as an online only publication beginning with the fall 2011 issue. The explanation offered with comments by R.T. Smith, the editor of Shenandoah, follows:

Shenandoah will publish in its usual format in fall 2010. In spring 2011, there will be a limited-edition anthology of poems published in Shenandoah over the last 15 years. And then will come the biggest change of all. “For the foreseeable future," said Smith, “that will be the last print issue of Shenandoah.”

Starting with the fall 2011 issue, it will be entirely online. A paid subscription will be a thing of the past. “It is perhaps inevitable when we look at what has happened to other literary journals,” said Smith. “Literary magazines per se are going to have to change their way of conceiving themselves and of reaching their audiences. And this is all tied up in the deep inquiry going on in our culture about the future of print. There is time to make that transition and be an innovator.”

The report concludes that Smith “wants long-time readers of Shenandoah to know that ‘the veteran authors are coming with us, and this medium will allow us greater access to discover the new authors.’ Shenandoah will continue to offer honoraria to its contributors and to bestow most of its current awards, including the Graybeal-Gowen prize for Virginia poets. ‘We will bring all of the very best features of a physical magazine except three-dimensionality,’ said Smith. ‘We believe that we're going to be gaining in terms of interactivity, accessibility, audio, the kinds of things that have made the whole concept of the Internet interesting to start with.’”

Valparaiso Poetry Review welcomes Shenandoah to the community of online literary journals!

SEEDED LIGHT: Poems by Edward Byrne

Poem of the Week: "From the Maelstrom" by Ned Balbo

The VPR Poem of the Week is Ned Balbo’s “From the Maelstrom,” which appeared in the Spring/Summer 2006 issue (Volume VII, Number 2) of Valparaiso Poetry Review.

Ned Balbo’s first book of poetry, Galileo's Banquet, received the Towson University Prize for Literature. A second collection, Lives of the Sleepers, won the Ernest Sandeen Prize in 2005 and was published by the University of Notre Dame Press. Lives of the Sleepers was the ForeWord magazine poetry book of the year, and it also was a finalist for the Arlin G. Meyer Prize. A chapbook of poems, Something Must Happen, was published by Finishing Line Press in 2009. Ned Balbo’s poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Antioch Review, Crab Orchard Review, Dogwood, Pleiades, and many other journals. He teaches at Loyola College in Baltimore.

Tuesday of each week “One Poet’s Notes” highlights an excellent work by a poet selected from the issues of Valparaiso Poetry Review, except when other posts with news or updates preempt the usual appearance of this item, with the recommendation that readers revisit it. Please check the sidebar to view the list of poets and works that have been past “Poem of the Week” selections. Additionally, readers are reminded that VPR pages are best read with the browser font preference in which they were set, 12 pt. Times New Roman, in order to guarantee the stanza alignment and the breaks of longer lines are preserved.

Helen Vendler, Robert Lowell, Modernism, and LIFE STUDIES

Robert Lowell was born on this date (March 1) in 1917. Therefore, this appears an appropriate moment to present Helen Vendler speaking a bit about Lowell’s contributions and influence, as well as his place among modern poetry and art. As seen above, Vendler was interviewed last October by Jim Cuno, Director of the Art Institute of Chicago, where she offered a lecture on “Robert Lowell and the Modern Legacy.” Audio of Vendler’s complete presentation is available in a podcast.

Perhaps this is also an apt time to remind visitors of my essay, “Life and Language: On the 50th Anniversary of Robert Lowell’s Life Studies,” which appeared in the Spring/Summer 2009 issue (Volume X, Number 2) of Valparaiso Poetry Review and includes the following excerpt referencing Helen Vendler:

As readers today remember the lyrics of Lowell’s Life Studies produced fifty years ago, they might also observe the many ways in which much of today’s poetry resembles those early explorations of self through thoughtful reflection and frank language, an examining of one’s personal situation by a focus on evocative images or exact details. They might recall those words written about Lowell’s Life Studies by Helen Vendler in her essay, “The Difficult Grandeur of Robert Lowell”: “It was not the confessions that made Life Studies so memorable; it was rather the quality of memory indelibly imprinted, a brilliance of detail almost unconsciously preserved in a store of words perpetually refreshed.”

Since Robert Lowell expressed displeasure with the “confessional” label with which he had been burdened, he most likely would be pleased to see readers appreciating him for his distinct ability to depict dramatic personal incidents or troubling instances in his private life through an emphasis on his well-chosen words and compellingly phrased statements, valuing his poetry not as much for the chronicle of a troubled life lived with personal difficulties but for the innovative stylistic devices and impressive illuminating studies of that life in lasting lines of lyrical inquiry.

In addition, I recommend readers examine the following previous posts at “One Poet’s Notes”: “Robert Lowell’s Voice,” “Robert Lowell and Elizabeth Hardwick,” and “Robert Lowell: ‘New Year’s Day.’”