Right from the start of rock ‘n roll in the mid-1950s musical artists copied technique, style, words, whole songs. Plagiarism was simply not an issue.1 That is also true of my poetic idiom. While most of what I write is mine, still I borrow a great deal as well: ideas, concepts, techniques, styles, phrases, philosophies. When I read Einstein who wrote that he had only one idea that was all his in his life, I can appreciate that perspective. In the end, it seems to me, what is uniquely mine in my poetry is: my experience, my way of conveying my experience, indeed the overall specificity of my thousands of poems. This overall poetic work, in toto, the way I put it together, it’s quantity and quality is all mine. It’s value, well, that is another question.-Ron Price with thanks to 1ABC TV, “John Lennon’s Jutebox” 9:30-10:30 p.m., November 8th 2004.
What makes this oeuvre mine
is a voice, a body, a set of words
which flow through me but often
not from me, are often not mine:
they are the sons and daughters
of life’s longing for itself.
They tell of a life lived,
like everyone else under
a blue radiance, like millions
of others: born into a family,
schooled, married, kids, jobbed,
retired, three squares a day,
et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
But the pages of my book,
while looking the same as others
have a unique set of marks, words
on a page, words that make the me
that is me----me.
