Joe Gonnella’s Profile

“What I like more than anything is to visit other islands...”
― George Oppen

“Infinite is a meaningless word: except – it states / The mind is capable of performing / an endless process of addition.”
― Louis Zukofsky

“I was the solitary plover
a pencil
for a wing-bone
From the secret notes
I must tilt

upon the pressure
execute and adjust
In us sea-air rhythm
"We live by the urgent wave
of the verse”
― Lorine Niedecker

“An Irish Airman foresees his Death

I Know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate
Those that I guard I do not love,
My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.
Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public man, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;
I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.”
― W.B. Yeats, The Wild Swans at Coole