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Show Arts & Leisure SOUTHERN UTAH STATE COLLEGE, CEDAR CITY THE THUNDERBIRD THURSDAY, MARCH 30, 1989 PAGE 6 Lee to read in Old Church Springdale landmark will host SUSC professors poetry reading BY JAMES SPAINHOWER Professor David Lee, department head and professor of language and literature, will give his first southern Utah public poetry reading in 14 years, detailing the platitudes and latitudes of his creative soul. Lees original poetry reading slated for Saturday, April at 7:30 p.m. is the by Springdale Rio Virgin sponsored Arts Council, and the Literary ProgramUtah Arts Council. Lee will be reading selections from published and 1 works. will be reading from Porcine Legacy, Porcine Canticles, selections from my new book, Days Work, and I might read from a book Im working on now, My Toien. Lee said the title for his latest book, Days Work, came from an incident that happened to him as a boy. I I stole a plug of Days Work chewing tobacco from my grandfathers grocery store in Matador, Texas. My mother caught me and made me eat it all. The book, said Lee, traces one day in the life of a farmer, beginning with the days work 5 a.m., and ending in a hospital bed. The hook takes the reader through an entire year with its many seasons and chores plowing, planting, castrating pigs, mending machinery, roofing barns ending when John, the persona of the book, suffers a ruptured spine, he said. Lee, as an award winning poet, Milton Scholar, and former pig farmer, has combined the best of these worlds to create poetry authentic in its approach and rich in its vernacular. I write 'agrarian poetry, that is, about people who work with poetry heir hands and the language that they jsc; my poetry reflects the things that they do, he said. Lee said his courtship with the muses of poetry started when he was in high school, but it was very much high school poetry, After a brief hiatus, Lee had the opportunity to sample poetrys charms from an Army hospital while they were putting my leg together, he added. It wasnt until 1971, that Lee realized the relationship was serious, giving birth to a conscious awareness of poetry, he said. I had to learn poetry because I was teaching it; I learned more in one afternoon than in 10 years of study, he said. Imagination, Lee insists, is the essence of poetry, and he credits an uncle of his, June Hunter, with giving wings to his flights of fancy. My attitude as a writer is that everything I hear is grist for the mill. Sound is always the stimulus for the impetus of what I write, he said. As a result, Lee feels his poetry has an auditory quality lending it authenticity. In contrast, Lee views the 80s as an Age of Spiritual Inflation, giving rise to an emptiness in todays poetry. Were in a period almost like the early 16th century, when sprezzatura, or careless elegance was the rule. We have poetry without a soul, Lee said. SUSCs Dave Lee has refused to read his poetry in southern Utah for the past 14 years. That will be remedied Saturday in Springdales Old Church. TTOGm5 721 SOUTH SUPERIOR AUTO PARTS AUTO SUPPLIES MAIN 586-420- 0 SAFETY INSPECTION $g ALL AUTO OFFER EXPIRES PARTS AND CUSTOM WHEELS AND RV SUPPLIES GOOD ONLY AT WERE YOUR LOCAL AUTO PARTNER (AFTER HOURS 42489. 721 S. MAIN. ACCESSORIES! j 210 W. 200 N. BIG-- o I 586-389- 6 586-891- 5) LUBE, OIL & FILTER OFFER EXPIRES ! GOOD ONLY AT BIG-- 42489. 721 S. MAIN |