HA! My first book was called “The Empress Has No Closure” and my 2nd book had two front covers – so, closure is not something I’m fond of; ) All to say, even when i think a poem is finished; is published and bound in a collection, i still find myself re-working it, supplementing because the world keeps shifting; new ideas are always coming, the poem is alive, breathing ever-evolving. Often I will live-edit the already published piece in performance / infuse it with variant rhythms textures, sound clusters, puns.
Also sometimes lines that work in the US don’t translate as well in Canada, India, Italy or Prague; needs massaging. Or what works for a jazz poetry bar in NY might need tweaking for a giant outdoor festival. So, yes depending on venue, culture, ambience, i‘m constantly reworking even “finished” pieces. Particularly, this is true in the case of my recent book, Checking In (Talonbooks, 2018) which features a series of faux Facebook updates – i continually think of new lines and now a whole new book is erupting from it. As i think i said in The Empress Has No Closure, “a finish is only a gloss”.
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