“Theory
can explain why revolution may be necessary and analyze what
constrains us. But perhaps only poetry can show how that cry emerges
from modes of awareness more intimate, more widely shared, and more
desperate than theory can develop.”
Charles Altieri, 'The
Pleasures of Not Merely Circulating: Joshua Clover's Political
Imagination,' in Claudia Rankine and Lisa Sewell, eds., American
Poets in the 21st Century, Connecticut: Wesleyan
University Press, 2007: 164-79, p. 173.