oet, editor, translator Cid Corman died March 11, 2004, at the age of 79. His NY Times obituary can be found at http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/16/books/16CORM.html. Corman's close friend, Chuck Sandy, wrote me:
It is with great sadness that I write to tell you of Cid's passing from this earth. He died peacefully, an hour ago, at 6:00 p.m., March 11th, 2004. I have no words to share with you now beyond this, beyond what Cid has already written:
Like saying goodbye saying nothing. Be held by letting go.
What follows is a radio letter I sent to Corman shortly before his death. Sandy put out the word that Cid enjoyed hearing poetry, his own and other people's, in the hospital; we were asked to send tapes or CDs. Thinking of Cid Corman's many contributions--and particularly of his famous magazine, Origin--I produced this poem:
Origin means "arising" means the sun what burning there when corman sd print this print this
Hello, Cid Corman,
My name is Jack Foley. We never met, but Larry Eigner may have mentioned me in a letter. Larry and I were close friends during his last years.
I'm an admirer of your work both as editor--Origin is one of the great literary magazines--and as poet. And of course the story of how Larry Eigner heard you reading Yeats on the radio, and wrote to complain about it, is now legendary. Larry was suddenly catapulted into a new world--into publication, literary friends, and relationships which would last a lifetime. I know the joy with which Larry received your letters. And of course the quiet delicacy and wisdom of your own poetry--oriented always towards (your term) "life."
I will tell you the secret. Listen. What is it?--you ask? I keep telling you: Listen.
Only the living want life only the dying get it It takes all the sky there is to warrant and keep the light
No matter how much garbage they take away more-- it always seems-- remains. Nothing keeps piling up.
When Chuck Sandy wrote to tell me that you were in hospital, I found myself immediately writing a poem--a short one, like yours, but not with your quality.
I'd like to talk to you about Yeats some time. I have a somewhat odd version of him. I think the answer to the question at the end of "Among School Children"--you know, "O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer, / Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?"--is No, it is not. And worse, that the other question, "How can we know the dancer from the dance?," is not a rhetorical question but a real, anguished question, that Yeats' inability to know the dancer from the dance has cost him dearly. Material for another time.
I'll send you an hour radio program I did with Larry Eigner--Larry talking, me questioning and translating. I hope you'll enjoy it. In the meantime, I'd like to read you a letter I wrote to Charles Bernstein after Larry's death. Chinese New Year's celebrations are just ending now, and I'd like to wish you, despite setbacks, a happy new year. May the monkey bring you strength and healing.
This is my letter to Charles Bernstein. It's dated February, 1996.
Dear Charles,
I've been so busy, partly with trying to spread the news about Larry Eigner's death and partly with other things, that I've been barely able to put my thoughts together. Larry had been in the hospital, comatose, for a week before his death on February 3rd. This morning, quite early, both Michael McClure and my son Sean phoned to tell me they'd heard of Larry's death and funeral arrangements on NPR. That was exactly the kind of thing Larry would do-phone me at an hour when no one else would phone me to tell about something he'd heard on the radio, particularly something on NPR.
He's been my friend for ten years. I'd see him once a week and hear from him on the phone quite often. Our birthdays were two days apart: we had a joint party once. He wrote a preface to my first book, Letters/Lights-Words for Adelle. Except for the few remarks he made at the beginning of Ron Silliman's early book, Crow, that was the only preface he wrote to anyone's book. I had asked for a blurb. He responded with a preface. My current book, Exiles, was at his bedside during the last conscious week of his life. His voice on a message machine was something to hear! He once left a message for Michael McClure. Michael couldn't make heads or tails of it, but I was able to decipher it.
In many ways Larry was not easy to be friends with. The pattern tended to be for people to visit him for a while, make some effort to understand his speech, and then to drift away. I was able to stay friends partly because I didn't live with him-and so never suffered burn-out-and partly because I understood his speech as well as anyone.
This latter was something I willed more than something I learned. In the middle 80s I was running a poetry series in Berkeley. I admired Larry's work and wanted him to read in the series. Barry Watten gave me Larry's phone number-not his address, only his phone number. I've never known whether this were some sort of joke on Barry's part. I phoned and Larry answered, saying something like "UNGHHHHH." I had known that Larry was disabled but hadn't realized until that moment that the disability extended to his speech. I simply decided I would understand Larry. There is no other way to put it. By the time the conversation was over, Larry had given me his address and directions to his house, and we had agreed on a date when he was to read. One of his caregivers, Kathleen Frumkin, told me later that she had been listening in and had been ready to help out if needed. She never said anything.
You write, "His will to think was unsuppressible." Yes, but so was his will to speak-to speak in any manner he could. You've been with Larry and know how he would talk all the time. "i break out with a man's cry." His writing, with all its silences, necessarily partook of that urge towards talk. People complained of it, accused him of "monologuing." Yet there it was, at his very center, controlled in certain ways but in others not. Hard to think of him silent.
One final thing , Cid, before I read you a few of your own poems from a favorite book, nothing doing (New Directions). A friend held a Chinese New Year's party and asked me to write a poem for the party. Poetry is a craft as well as an art, and I think poets should be able to supply occasional poetry when occasions arise. I wrote this poem, called simply "Happy New Year." I'd like to dedicate it to you.
the new moon the first day the full moon 15 days later the "Lantern Festival" on the 15th day children [my wife's birth, in summer, the 15th of August] who are my ancestors? poets who lived and still live as I breathe and speak them poets who have become their own words in a loss loss loss which cannot be countered or counted all the dead "Cold Pastoral" says Keats Magic at the full moon "A full moon in March," says that Irishman "loonely in me loneness," says that other Irishman "make it new," says Ezra Pound all the dead voices which teach and beckon all the superegos which inhabit my lines in a chorus they speak: We are the ancestors We are the cause of whatever newness you accomplish You are nothing but us whirled round "surrounding the stove" I have cleaned my house I have put away my brooms, brushes, dusters and dust pans If you sweep the dirt out over the threshold you will sweep one of the family away, you will sweep out the good luck you must always sweep inward, then gather it up take it out the back door welcome the year with the noise of firecrackers open the door so the old year can go wear red pay debts do not use a knife or scissors keep the luck inside, keep words alive keep the ancestors cooking bring bright song to light in long night (along night) welcome the fire that flares in the bright sun's mirror
Cid, I hope this finds you feeling better. Perhaps we'll meet someday. I'd like that very much. But, as you've written,
Poetry becomes that conversation we could not otherwise have.
Take care!
© Jack Foley