Gayle Elen Harvey: In Memory of a Small Press Poet

As a publisher in the business for some 25 odd years, I get lots of bounced mail. With the advent of the digital age, I've been able to locate quite a few poets who have moved on with a variety of online resources, managing to get contributor copies and subscriber issues connected up with their owners, something that had been previously nigh impossible.

So, when the above bit of mail bounced back, I put it aside for further investigation with a number of others. Before I got a chance, however, I received bad news from long time correspondent and poet, David Chorlton.

Gayle Elen Harvey had died in a traffic accident nearly a year ago.

As David noted, "We can't assume that news travels," even this technology-laden time.

David had heard of Gayle's death from another poet/long-time correspondent, Alan Catlin, awhile back. When he saw Gayle's poem in #190, enclosed in the envelope above, he got in touch with me to pass on the sad news. 

Over the years, a number of small press poets I've known have passed on and I'm often shocked at how little is out there about some poets (you will find a list in the sidebar towards the bottom of this page). So, I'm gathering here, in this spot, the six poems I published by Gayle over the years, including the latest, just out in #190 of Lilliput Review. 

As you might imagine, Lillie has evolved, as have I, over the years, and now has a more minimalistic, Eastern bent than it did in the early days. Gayle's poems reflect that change of style - on my part, not hers. The poem published in #20, Because, way back in March 1990, stands fairly well, arm in arm, in tone, style, & subject, with Still Hungry, published in the Autumn of 2013.

The poem from #49, Where once they lined up, was from an all-women issue of Lilliput, and can be seen as heightening an ongoing thread this work of what might be described as a chronicle of the constant struggle in relationships.  

Because, from #20, was selected as one of the best poems of the first 49 issues and so appeared in #50, which was a best of issue of those early years.

When I began public reading again a few years back, I read a selection of Lillie poems, reflecting my lack of confidence at that time in my own work. Because was one of the poems I read. It is still one of my favorite poems published in the magazine.

Though I found a poem or two here and there by Gayle and a mention in contributor notes searching the net, there seemed to be little of substance. One gem I finally did locate, however, courtesy of google books, is the introduction by Gayle herself to her collection Greatest Hits, 1976-2001, the Greatest Hits series being one originally put out by Pudding House Press and since taken over by Kattywompus Press. This gives something of a sense of the poet herself and is at once straightforward and poignant.

Finally, following Gayle's poems, which are presented in reverse chronological order, is a poem by David Chorlton in memory of Gayle. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Still Hungry

   for memories, he continues to love her
   with deception
   and atonal flatteries.
   Devotee of serial urges, they’re his own
   dark parentheses.

   Fakir in worn corduroy, he surrounds
   himself
   with the kudzu and weeds of his sex
   as he scurries by, leaving
   messages trailing
   scars.                                    #190

Dreaming (for Paul)

   Memory's suckled
   with memory.  The mossy foreheads
   of stones are dripping
   with moonlight.
   Nothing is
   lost.  Reef after reef, all these sleep-shapes
   under our eye-lids
   as cranes ablaze
   in their arrogant fringes, pattern
   the blackness.                           #61

As if spring had not gone away

   and what you said would never be safe
   with anyone.  Always, starting over,
   unconnected to everything else
   as if the balance of things
   has been changed in the middle
   of what is happening.
   And you wake, finding nothing
   but her shadow
   on the last page.                       #57

Where once they lined up

   according to size, your words come
   muzzled, rushing straight out of
   colonial history, Master 

   and slave.                                         #49

Thinking it has nothing to do

   with the women you love signaling
   from a thousand windows,
   you are still running in the dim light, moved,
   as if by obedience, by one passion
   which is denial
   of everything.                           #39

 

Because

  you are tired because I thirst for
  salt, we turn to each other.   
  You are barefoot.  It is winter.
  This is going to be a difficult story.    

                                                  #50, #20   

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

  

Line Breaks
                          In memoriam Gayle Elen Harvey

Whoever lives by the line
knows how to take a switchback turn to reach
the meaning

promised in the phrases
that carry one thought into another, until
there is light in the language.
Each word

is ordinary before
the one that follows
transforms it.
Paper

could be snow
falling by the ream, or apples
become the scent of rain; always there is

an element of surprise
transforming what we think to the gold

the alchemist long dreamed of
but finding lead
would always be lead
gave up his kitchen to the poet

who knew better
how to stretch the words we use routinely

across the page
until they are luminous.

David Chorlton

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Photo by Vmenkov

    Even  in Kyoto—
hearing the cuckoo's cry—
       I long for Kyoto.

Bashō

translated by Robert Hass

best,

Don

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Six Gallery Press Reading

Photo by Jessica Fenlon

Last Saturday's Six Gallery Press reading at Modern Formations went very well. As with last August's reading, I read a mix of past Lilliput poems and some of my own work. Here are the poems from Lillie:

National Poetry Day

This being that fine occasion
to honor appreciative friends
with a wisdomy verse
pulled from one's hip
I am telling myself to first
keep straight my pockets
so as not to go
blow my nose into
William Carlos Williams

Richard Swanson

only one flower
is needed to answer
your question

Stanford Forrester

winter haiku
here, we have five or six
words for snow
and they all start with fuck

Mark DeCarteret

Because

You are tired, because I thirst for
salt, we turn to each other.
You are barefoot. It is winter.
This is going to be a difficult story.

Gayle Elen Harvey

an echo

The grassy grassy grassy
--plain
reaches out across across the road
--the road
cutting man's lifeline in two two
trying trying to reclaim for mother
--nature nature
what is by all rights
hers and hers and hers

Michael Estabrook

How Frightening to be the Male

a pair of cardinals on my neighbor's
fence: the male--so bright, so eye-
catching, so out-there, so
dispensable

Kelley Jean White

Cannibal

When you've rent the flesh and sinew
from my supple skeleton and you've
sucked the last sweet drop of marrow
leaving lonely, brittle bones
will you save the jagged splinters
to adorn your chieftain's chest
or scatter them like toothpicks
over yesterday's dung.

Sue De Kelver

Each step into simplicity :: undoes the weave

Grant Hackett

We forget we're mostly water
till the rain falls
and every atom
in our body
starts to go home

Albert Huffstickler

¶blue thorn gallop rose
why does language have to be so perfect?

Charlie Mehrhoff

TAOUBT

Ray Skjelbred

In addition to the Lilliput poems, I opened with a quote from Jim Carroll, and a dedication to his memory. The quote:

"It's too late
-to fall in love with Sharon Tate.
-And it's too soon
-to trace the path of the bullet
-in the brain of Reverend Moon."

Jim Carroll

I followed the Lilliput reading with 7 poems of my own, with only one that I'd read in August. Though I practiced "an echo" by Michael Estabrook, it was difficult to get the right aural effect and I'm afraid I didn't do it justice. Otherwise, I think it went over pretty well. Not too shabby for an old man decidedly out of practice. Overall, it was a solid reading by all. Che Elias from Six Gallery did a great job picking readers and so my personal thanks to him. I was particularly taken with the work of M. Callen, Scott Silsbe, Karen Lillis and Bill Hughes but, again, all the readers impressed.



********************************


Since this is a week folks are likely on the road for the holiday, I'll keep it brief. I'm in the process of combing through all the poems for the Bashô Haiku Challenge again. Though I've made a large preliminary selection, I'm going through every poem once more to make sure I didn't miss anything and that what I previously set aside is actually up to snuff. Editing the mag all these years has taught me to space out multiple readings of particular items since mood, attention, and physical condition can actually effect how one approaches work. I read most work first thing in the morning while I'm fresh and rested and save the mundane stuff of replying, printing, collating etc. for later in the day. I'm hoping to make an announcement of the winners by December 2nd, December 9th at the latest.



********************************


This week's featured issue is #150, a broadside of 11 poems by powerful tanka poet, Pamela Miller Ness. Enjoy.

Autumn again
in the Japanese garden;
leaves
of last year's euonymus
burn still in my journal.

A bud
of the red anemone
ready to burst . . .
the child
she never bore.

Years
after her passing
on the path
I greet my neighbor
in Mother's voice.

Pamela Miller Ness

a wind-blown boat
a skylark
crossing paths

Issa
translated by David G. Lanoue

And thanks to Jessica Fenlon for sending along the photo of me cawing "Crow" from the reading.




best,
Don

Written on the Sky: Kenneth Rexroth

There is a new collection of the Japanese translations of Kenneth Rexroth, entitled Written on the Sky: Poems from the Japanese," published by New Directions. Although the copyright page lists the years 1974, 1976, and 1977 (with a co-translator, Ikuko Atsumi, listed for 1977), nowhere is it stated what volumes these translations originally appeared in. Only on the fly leaf
is found the statement: "Written on the Sky is a selection of some of Kenneth Rexroth's perfect and enduring translations from the Japanese ..." This lack of clarity is unfortunate; from this statement, the reader must assume all of these translations have previously appeared, either in book or journal form.

Of course, the exact opposite might also be assumed. For those who might wish to trace back a poem to its original appearance, in search of context and companions, no trail is provided. The only other volume of translations listed for Rexroth is Songs of Love, Moon, & Wind: Chinese Poems, a new companion collection. It would seem New Directions' only interest is in these two volumes, despite having published Rexroth's seminal collections in the past (most of which are still in print and available from New Directions).

That being said, Written on the Sky is a handsomely produced volume, with 88 poems, each appearing on a single page. Many of the poems originally appeared, as might be imagined, in One Hundred Poems from the Japanese and One Hundred More Poems from the Japanese. The difference in presentation from previous volumes is readily apparent. Transliterations of the original poems are not provided (though the original Japanese script for the names is, to the cynical allowing for the vertical use of much white space). Translations of some of the names have changed, making collation between the original volumes and the new cumbersome.

There seems to be no apparent unifying theme or approach; if there is, it isn't obvious to the non-scholar. It is 4 x 6," produced with an embossed cover of heavy mylar-like stock and beautiful to hold and behold. The poems are generally every bit as beautiful, which is as good a unifying theme as it gets, I suppose. Rexroth's translations from both the Japanese and Chinese have served over the last 50 years as the introduction to Eastern lyricism for the curious poetry reader. And this book, something of a curio one might expect to just as soon find in a museum shop as a large or independent bookstore, does not disappoint when it comes to the poems themselves.

A small selection illustrates the overall high quality:





The flowers whirl away
In the wind like snow.
The thing that falls away
Is myself.

Prime Minister Kintsune

No, the human heart
Is unknowable.
But in my birthplace
The flowers still smell
The same as always.

Ki No Tsurayuki

The fireflies' light.
How easily it goes on
How easily it goes out again.

Chine-jo

No one spoke.
The host, the guest,
The white chrysanthemums.

Ōshima Ryōta

If only the world
Would always remain this way,
Some fisherman
Drawing a little rowboat
Up the riverbank.

Minamoto No Sanetomo

If there is a unifying factor among all these delicate, beautiful pieces, perhaps it is the demonstration of the immortality of the moment. Even in the uncharacteristic conceit of "The flowers whirl away," wherein a direct analogy is drawn between the fleeting nature of the snow and human life, the lasting image in the mind is the flakes, whirling. The sadness, too, lingers, but there is a bittersweet quality to the moment that is at once painterly and transcendent. Another, deeper reading might suggest that the falling away of self for the Eastern mind in fact has no negative connotations, though for me the bitter lingers as an almost perfectly captured epiphanic episode. The tanka "If only the world" expresses a similar sentiment, perhaps with more emphasis on the sweet than the bitter; one has the sense of an immortal moment from a seaside jaunt, although it might just as well be an every day sight seen through fresh eyes. Again the image conjured is painterly. The speaker's realization in "No, the human heart" is potentially catastrophic, yet the focus returns to the beauty of the moment, the unchanging nature of all life, turning what begins in the negative to a seemingly positive realization.

I simply love "No one spoke." We have all had such moments. The resonance here, and in those shared moments, is thunderous. The question for the Western mind is "What would the chrysanthemums say if they could speak?" A Zen pretender might say, "Ha!", yet one need only look to the other poems in this selection for the answer.

The beauty of the Eastern approach is that the reader is as if invited to participate in the creation of the poem. For others, these images will conjure different feelings, possibly diametrically opposed interpretations. To paraphrase Whitman, the Eastern forms contain multitudes. What is shared for all is the perfectly captured moment, the artistic quality of the image, and, above all, a closeness to nature that the West has largely, sadly lost.

Let the chrysanthemums speak to you.

This week's selection of poems from the Lilliput archive comes from issue #20, originally published in 1990, 19 years ago.

Cover by Bobo

Because

you are tired, because I thirst for
salt, we turn to each other.
You are barefoot. It is winter.
This is going to be a difficult story.

Gayle Elen Harvey

Of Duluth I Sing

Oh Duluth.
Oh downtown Dul-
uth. Oh oyster-on-the-
half-shell Duluth. Oh
boarded-up poet-infested
storefront hole-in-the-wall
Duluth, oh.

Wayne Hogan

Song Of Advice

First, you must waken,
Then walk, in cool morning,
Into a meadow
Not of your making,
And listen intently.
Then you may answer.

Paul Ramsey

for the big
chrysanthemum too
autumn ends quickly

Issa
translated by David Lanoue

best,
Don

Lilliput Review: the 20th Anniversary

Click on the cover to enlarge

Somehow, the day has arrived: it is the month of March and, incredulously, it is the 20th anniversary of Lilliput Review. I made (or perhaps that's dreamed) big plans for this moment. An anthology chapbook or, better still, a "best of" Lilliput, the first 20 years, a collection that another, adventurous press would be willing to take the risk and publish.

All of which I haven't taken step one toward.

Publishing the magazine and its imprint, Modest Proposal Chapbooks, got in the way. An impromptu haiku contest, prompted by an unexpected comment to a post about Bashô, resulted in the first annual Bashô Haiku Challenge, and a chapbook of the best work resulted (more about this below). I fell behind in getting the new issues out. There were piles of submissions to attend to. I got mixed up with Facebook and the wonderful deluge that's resulted.

To put it simply I was just too damn busy to do another thing. Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans, as the cliché goes.

And I wouldn't have it any other way.

So, for now, this post will serve as a celebration.

Lilliput started on the floor of a bungalow at the Jersey shore, amidst books and sand and ubiquitous crickets, me on my knees, cutting and pasting little bits of paper on to other little bits of paper. It was inspired by other small press publications that took that term very literally, such as Pig in a Pamphlet and This is Important. As a regularly published poet in the little magazines in the 80's, it seemed a good way to tap into the creative juices when my own poetry would hit a wall. I received the support of many other small mags, that helped to get the word out and the mag afloat. The camaraderie of the small press, which is a blessed thing and continues to this day, is something I cherish.

The first "issue," which I put together in March 1989, was essentially a test run to see if I could actually do it and what it might look like if I did. For the test run, I printed up 10 copies of 7 of my poems in a 4.25 x 5.5" format which was to be the size for the first 8 issues, before switching over to the current 3.5 x 4.25." The cover is pictured above. I won't burden you with any of the work, which was in a slightly surreal style I was sporting at the time and, though I remember it fondly and still fall back on some its stylistic anomalies, is frankly painful to read beyond the circle of two it was intended for. Succinctly put, this was a set of poems for the woman I was dating who, happily, I married. Since I seem to be bandying about clichés, I'll avoid the next one and just say she's been there with me since the beginning and her understanding, care and support have been as important as any other element to make this work. It also helps that she's spent time as a proofer and has a high tolerance for bs.

You'll notice that the original title was Lilliput Revue. The title change came with issue #2, not because I wanted to change it, but because the artist, Bobo, incorporated a "new spelling" into the artwork for the cover and I didn't have the heart to ask him for a redraw. There is much to be said for serendipity and going with the flow. Here's the cover:

Well, appropriately enough, that's the short version of the 1st 20 years. Let the party begin. I intend to celebrate all year. I'm happy to say that the entire run of 168 issues is still in print and still available. The standard rate of 15 issues for $10 is applicable; however, if anyone is interested in the entire run, query me for special pricing. The email address is at the bottom of the right hand column. If there is any publisher out there that thinks a 20th anniversary collection of the best of Lilliput makes a lot of sense, I'm listening. Meanwhile, it's time to keep on keeping on. There's lots more to do.

This past weekend, I'm happy to announce, the contributor copies of the Basho Haiku Challenge Anthology went out and should begin arriving in a mailbox near you. The chapbook, which contains 25 poems by 19 poets, is now available for $3.00, postage paid. It far surpassed my expectations and I believe any regular reader of Lillie will find much to ponder over and enjoy.

In addition, yesterday the contributor copies of issues #167 and 168 went out in the mail. Over the next couple of weeks I'll be getting out the full run of subscription copies. Individual copies of both are available for $1.00 a piece.

The same price as it was going for in 1989.

Finally, if it's Tuesday, it's back issue archive day. In the inexorable march back in time, this week we arrive at October 1993. This issue, #49, was the second of two All Women issues. Here's a sampling of what you'll find there. Enjoy.





Cover me
I'm going out
to write
a poem. Keep
firing
over my head.

Karen Alkalay-Gut

Where once they lined up

according to size, your words come
muzzled, rushing straight out of
colonial history, Master

and slave.

Gayle Elen Harvey

Empowered

is to be filled with a tank of yes

seeing behind the light of morning stars

a readiness in veins, singing through
--bone and sinew

it is all I ever wanted and didn't want
--rolled into a tight cigarette
--smoked at the end of the day

-----------------Vogn

Always

I'll keep writing
these poems
in the dark
pretending you're
near me rain falling
on my lips this flower
budding for no other
girl somewhere
inside me
a song you'll
never understand

Gina Bergamino

Quasimodos

Because we are deaf and hear stone
we make the most unbearably beautiful music.

Lorene Moore

After Forgiveness

you only come
when trees lift their branches
to kiss my wounds

Vogn

Resurrection

If there is to be a second
coming I wish it would
be Chagall

Suzanne Bowers

Fairy Tales

An ever-ever land
where happy endings
hurtle off the pages
into the emergency wards
of
our lives.

Janet Mason

best,
Don