Explosion

There are moments in many other poets that make me think: "That's as great as Lorca."

Quedo de nuevo grabado en la memoria
de mi madre. El sol se mueve, mas no sé para qué sirven
las llaves del vientre, todo lo que fue mi casa
al amanecer...

(José Barroeta)

There are moments of poetic explosion. Not every poem by Lorca has that explosive quality, either. In a way, the canonization of a poet is arbitrary, not because the canonized poet is not great, on many levels, but because it distorts things. A bad dish made on an off day by a great chef still tastes bad, but a hypercanonical poet is under the microscope for every detail. I guess I benefit from this is a Lorca specialist, but I recognize that as a distortion.

I've often said that people claim to be interested in non-canonical things but don't really commit to that. The debate is always to get other things into that category.