Who are the capitalists? Who extracts surplus value from us? Poets with tenure? Poets who publish with the large commercial presses, or even university presses? The "big" critics and book reviewers? Or is it the universities that swell the ranks of the adjuncts? The publishers who manufacture prestige for themselves through the loss leader of poetry? The foundations and nonprofits? Put another way: with whom would we poets collectively bargain? Who would we hurt with a strike? What would such a strike look like?

I have a fantasy of the stable of "name" poets at, say, Knopf or FSG banding together and demanding a more open review and publication policy. But is that just more feudalism? Noblesse oblige?

Poets manufacture poetry. Critics, editors, and academics manufacture attention. Which is the scarcer commodity?

Attention must be paid for.

Or less a union than a mutual aid society. If the members of such a society tithed some portion of their incomes they could perhaps make healthcare available at a discounted rate. General financial assistance, etc. PLUS collective bargaining where it counts.

At the very least: more ad hoc magazines, more ad hoc presses. More blogs devoted to reviewing small press work. More Subpresses.

The traditions of collective action in this country are extremely weak. Perhaps nowhere weaker than in the arts. But if poets—cultural workers, vision manufacturers—cannot imagine a meaningful collectivity, who can?