The unflattering reviews are painful for short periods of time; the badly written ones are deeply, deeply insulting. That reviewer took no time to really read the book. ↗
If I were to die thinking that I'd written three poems that people might read after me, I would feel that I hadn't lived in vain. Great poets might expect the whole body of their work, but most of us - well, I would settle for a handful. ↗
It's true that I'm taking a break from writing a regular column to do other things but it's got nothing to do with what dear Simon has or has not written. ↗
I am still interested in the long or serial poem, but have written a few smaller things. I may start sending to journals again in a year or so... that's about it. ↗
If pushed, though, I'd say that the next stage will be reached when it it's no longer true that about 75% of the best games were written in 1980's on the way to that. ↗