When Ron Silliman asked me to participate in this 5 Things meme, I thought why not, then took the question seriously.

As it happens, I do have news. Last week, Ali and I got married. We'd been talking about it for a while, and then we were standing with some friends in front of a judge in an official room made warm by the most beautiful light. The judge's last name, incidentally, was McSweeney.

Marriage, this marriage, is wonderful, thanks. About great and private information I've learned from a family tradition of reserve to keep quiet. Still. If I've seemed brimful for some months, now you know why. For those who hear news like this and want to make a generous gesture: We've been talking about registering with Bridge Kitchenware, and Alitalia.

But forgive me for asking: who are you, anyway? who am I to you. That's the flaw in the premise of the meme that gets me. Can't say what someone doesn't know if you don't know who someone is.

I began blogging to write my way out of a congenital confusion of feelings. If the archives were still there you'd see I come by the clipped syntax and haphazard publication schedule honestly. I started writing this robot blog to notice what I was thinking and feeling, not to get attention, but once that (your) attention arrived, how could I stop? I'm a poet -- I'm used to assuming resistance to what I write. Not the healthiest worldview, but it's not so bad. Thank you for reading this far.

My general theory of (my) reading and writing is that I write to get a response, and I read to respond. There's a bond between reader and writer, but it only offers so much support. We read each other. The dream of a life work, of life as art, though, that's a nightmare from which I am finally awake. I'm glad there's a community of writers -- I love to read.

Incidentally, I've been aware of a disconnect, a difference, between what it satisfies me to write and what I am pleased to read. Claudia Emerson says in an interview that it's at least as likely that every narrative obscures a lyric as the converse, and I admire her syntax. I've been dreaming that my life will become simpler, that I'll be able to tell stories, write lyric poems, make plays, movies, a weekly poetry tv show (why not), live someplace beautiful relaxing and voluptuous. Make money not art. Make art. Have a life I both like and love.

Have a great new year. I'm not tagging anyone.