Clive James Poem

You may have wondered in some idle moment why I haven't reprinted any of Clive James's poetry on this weblog. Simple answer: copyright. All of the poems reprinted here are old, necessitated by the fact that the works have to be in the public domain, which only happens in Australia 50 years after the author's death. Last time I looked, James was still kicking pretty hard so it'll be a while before Matilda can safely get round to highlighting his work. Not so "The New York Times" though. They have the clout to contact the poet directly and request reprint rights to his poem "The Book of My Enemy". The work has appeared as a lead-in to the upcoming publication of Opal Sunset: Selected Poems 1958-2007 by Clive James.