I’ve known Ross for many years and I am delighted to be here today to launch Piano Hill.Ross is interested in many things, but summing them up briefly I’d say that his work demonstrates a preoccupation in the mysterious and obsession. He is concerned, like many poets, with the shape of words, lines, sounds, and images – and as a practitioner with a foot in both the worlds of music and poetry – his poems are evidence that language can do very different things to music.
In a recent conversation we had a delightful misunderstanding brought about by the sound of words. I have some hearing loss and the misunderstanding came about between what Ross said and what I heard. Being partially deaf is a lot like pressing a key on one of Ross’s ruined pianos or accordions and experiencing the difference between expectation and actuality. Ross quoted Ezra Pound to me. Pound said “Rhythm is form cut into time” but I heard “Rhythm is formed by the trapping of sound.”
Read the complete speech here.
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