How 1984 marked the start of my career as a poet and my admiration for the Nobel prize-winning songwriter
As a poet, I’m supposed to be attracted to Bob Dylan as a lyricist. Even as a fellow poet. That’s the received wisdom, and it’s certainly true that I’ve come to Dylan through a series of recommendations and tips, nearly always from other writers. It was the poet Matthew Sweeney who first explained to me that Highway 61 Revisited and Bringing It All Back Home were the two albums I shouldn’t be able to exist without. And it was Glyn Maxwell who explained to me that the best of Dylan didn’t stop with Blood On The Tracks.
He also let me in on a fact that all Dylan fans have committed to memory. Namely, a man hasn’t found true love until he finds the woman who will hang on to his arm the way Suze Rotolo hangs on to Dylan on the front cover of Freewheelin’. No one else will do.
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