Month: March 2023

8 Spring 66 Space Age

I have checked out a book from archive dot org, entitled Writing Across the Landscape by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Just reading the introduction I have learned more about this man than I ever knew before. Until today, I mostly read his poems and not much more. Now I know only the barest bones of his life story, but it is a skeleton of fascinating power and feeling.

Usually I don’t read introductions to books because I want to dive into the book itself. But this time I held back, and slowly moved page by page through the front matter, before reaching the so-called words of the author himself. Yes.

.

I owe a debt to this artist, writing, traveler, human being. He is was shall be one who inspires me.

Inspired me when I was in high school. At some point (possibly in 1967) I saw a tv documentary performance of some of his poems from Coney Island of the Mind. I was never the same after that. I knew I wanted to write. I knew what I wanted to write. Contemporary verses.

Now.

.

I knew that I had my own Coney Island inside my heart. I knew that it had me.

.

6th day of spring, 66th year of the space age

Several hours ago, in the middle of the night, I woke up to the sound of a coyote howling and yapping outside somewhere. Not inside the patio, by the sound of it, but somewhere near, maybe just outside the six-foot high fence that protects our swimming pool.

(I suddenly wonder when will it be warm enough to swim – probably not for another two months at least.)

Anyway, I woke up with the wild dog howling outside and for a moment, coming into consciousness from nothingness, I worried it was my dog, suffering unspeakable agony, so painful that she could only howl.

Then I realized that no, this is not inside the house. It is outside. It is a coyote.

Yeap yap yip.