747 Poems And Tonto's Revenge

Jonathan Shaw has posted a really nice review of Tonto's Revenge here.

He muses on the term '747 poems'. I like the idea it could mean seven hundred and forty seven poems! In Hawai'i I believe 747 is an adjective used to refer to touristic views of Hawai'i. We fly in, fly out, write about the place. Pam Brown has a small pamphlet called 747 poems, which are travel poems, one of which is inspired by her trip to Hawai'i

After living with the term for over a year now. I started to think of it as universal, thus Jonathan's quizzical response to it as an 'obscurity' among a playful set of poems I really welcome his response, as I feel that he's right about what I wanted to do in the book. Finding a new term, word, phrase etc. and playing with it is all part of poetry's potential, as Jonathan finds in the book. And this is precisely what I wanted to do - to let go, play with language, and still make a comment about what a visitor's experience of Hawai'i could mean.