R.I.P., Robert Creeley

[fflo]

Just saw from susanstinson's post that somebody else just died besides the Story of the Month.



Later I would be more broadly into the work of the Black Mountain poets, but when I first "discovered" Robert Creeley it was through the following (probably much anthologized) poem, which remains one of my favorites:

I Know a Man

As I sd to my
friend, because I am
always talking, -- John, I

sd, which was not his
name, the darkness sur-
rounds us, what

can we do against
it, or else, shall we &
why not, buy a goddamn big car,

drive, he sd, for
christ's sake, look
out where yr going.

Comments

[susanstinson.livejournal.com]

I think I discovered him through that poem, too, which is so good to see and which I still love, because if you buy a car (and it' a rare person who doesn't, at least metaphorically), you surely do have to drive.

Denise Levertov was another Black Mountain poet I loved, and I studied with Ed Dorn, who spoke with such reverence about Charles Olson.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

It was the distinctive conversational language & odd, choppy syntax that caught me at first. I love where "which was not his name" falls, and that it's there. I still like to put a "goddamn" before a "big" myself sometimes, and I think nothing of boldly dropping all the vowels out of a word when I want that effect.

Moreover, I like how the bursting in of the last stanza to say "drive" & give a warning after the philosophical meandering of where we were going in the poem up until then---which then seems as if it was about to result into our driving into a ditch---can be read as instructive in a larger sense. I saw today (while seeking the text of the poem to plunk down here) that Creeley once said it's the 1st person narrator he thought of as speaking the "drive"---innarestin'. Either way, one might be well counseled when getting carried away pondering the surrounding darkness, to look out, at least now & then, for where one's a-goin'.

Maybe I'll get out some poetry tonight after the movie. Poetry seems so far away from me most of the time any more.

[susanstinson.livejournal.com]

Okay, that was such a fine, pithy summary of the many things that are great about this poem, and if poetry is seeming far away from you these days, then my-who-am-I--to-have-an-opinion opinion is that you should definitely be reading it because you've got such an eye for it, and all.

[susanstinson.livejournal.com]

Although that does look like quite a movie, too...

[fflo.livejournal.com]

Actually, I may have been drawn to your lj presence first by the fat connection, but I think what I love most about reading your posts is the sense of your thing for language, where "thing" = some perfect noun expressing passion and interest and a light kind of joy that's nonetheless deep and something like an acknowledgment of how much it's in the very what-we-are.

Venus of Chalk is #1 on my summer reading list.

[susanstinson.livejournal.com]

Whee! Beautiful, and thank you. Fingers crossed that you like the book -- I bet you will.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure I will, too.

[lth.livejournal.com]

This is the poem that introduced me to Creeley, as well. I heard it recited by an old friend of his, someone impersonating him, so I have this sound of it in my head that is particularly mesmerizing for me. Thanks so much for posting it.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

I heard it read in some old 16mm film my college library had, but I can't remember who read it. I just love those little thrown-in, haphazardly placed "because I am always talking" and "which was not his name" phrases.