My vocabulary did this to me: the collected poetry of Jack Spicer

500 Pages·2010·3.678 MB·English

by  Spicer, Jack, Killian, Kevin, Gizzi, Peter

Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page i
1
2
3
4
5
my vocabulary did this to me
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page ii
1
2
3
4
5
wesleyan poetry
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page iii
1
2
3
4
my vocabulary did this to me 5
6
7
8
9
10
The Collected Poetry of
11
JACK SPICER 12
13
14
15
16
17
Edited by Peter Gizzi and Kevin Killian
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
Wesleyan University Press Middletown, Connecticut 34
35
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page iv
1
2
3
4
5
6 Published by Wesleyan University Press
7 Middletown, CT 06459
www.wesleyan.edu/wespress
8
© 2008 by the Estate ofJack Spicer
9 Introduction © 2008 by Peter Gizzi and Kevin Killian
Printed in the United States ofAmerica
10
5 4 3 2 1
11
12 All rights reserved. No part ofthis book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or me-
chanical means, including storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the
13
publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote briefpassages in a review. Members ofeducational
14 institutions and organizations wishing to photocopy any ofthe work for classroom use, or authors
and publishers who would like to obtain permission for any of the material in the work, should
15
contact Permissions, University Press of New England, One Court Street, Lebanon, NH 03766.
16
17 Library ofCongress Cataloging in Publication Data
18 Spicer, Jack.
19 My vocabulary did this to me : the collected poetry ofJack Spicer /
edited by Peter Gizzi and Kevin Killian.
20
p. cm. — (Wesleyan poetry)
21 Includes bibliographical references and index.
978–0-8195–6887–8 (cloth : alk. paper)
22
I. Gizzi, Peter. II.Killian, Kevin. III.Title.
23 3569.479 2008
24 811'.54—dc22 2008024997
25 F : Jack Spicer at the 6 Gallery
26 opening in San Francisco, 1954. Photo © Robert Berg.
27
This project is supported in part by an award from the National
28 Endowment for the Arts
29
30
31
32
Wesleyan University Press is a member ofthe
33
Green Press Initiative. The paper used in this book
34 meets their minimum requirement for recycled paper.
35
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page v
CONTENTS 1
2
3
4
5
Acknowledgments ix 6
Introduction xiii 7
About This Edition xxvii 8
9
10
I. (1945–1956) 11
12
BERKELEY RENAISSANCE (1945–1950) 13
Berkeley in Time of Plague 5 14
A Girl’s Song 5 15
Homosexuality 6 16
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Landscape 6 17
An Apocalypse for Three Voices 10 18
One Night Stand 13 19
An Answer to Jaime de Angulo 13 20
A Lecture in Practical Aesthetics 14 21
Dialogue Between Intellect and Passion 15 22
A Night in Four Parts (Second Version) 16 23
Orpheus in Hell 18 24
Orpheus After Eurydice 19 25
Orpheus’ Song to Apollo 20 26
Troy Poem 21 27
“We find the body difficult to speak ...” 22 28
“They are selling the midnight papers ...” 22 29
“Any fool can get into an ocean ...” 23 30
The Scrollwork on the Casket 24 31
The Dancing Ape 25 32
Imaginary Elegies (I, II, III) 26 33
Psychoanalysis: An Elegy 31 34
35
Contents v
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page vi
1 MINNESOTA POEMS (1950–1952)
2 Minneapolis: Indian Summer 37
3 Watching a TV Boxing Match in October 37
4 Portrait of an Artist 38
5 Sonnet for the Beginning of Winter 38
6 On Reading Last Year’s Love Poems 39
7 Orpheus in Athens 39
8 Train Song for Gary 40
9 A Second Train Song for Gary 41
10
11 BERKELEY / SAN FRANCISCO (1952–1955)
12 A Postscript to the Berkeley Renaissance 45
13 A Poem for Dada Day at The Place, April 1, 1955 46
14 “The window is a sword ...” 47
15 Imaginary Elegies (IV) 48
16
17 NEW YORK / BOSTON (1955–1956)
18 IInd Phase of the Moon 53
19 IIIrd Phase of the Moon 53
20 IVth Phase of the Moon 54
21 Some Notes on Whitman for Allen Joyce 55
22 The Day Five Thousand Fish Died Along the Charles River 56
23 Hibernation—After Morris Graves 56
24 Éternuement 57
25 Song for the Great Mother 57
26 “The city of Boston ...” 58
27 Five Words for Joe Dunn on His Twenty-Second Birthday 58
28 Birdland, California 60
29 “Imagine Lucifer ...” 61
30 The Song of the Bird in the Loins 62
31 Babel 3 63
32 They Murdered You: An Elegy on the
33 Death of Kenneth Rexroth 64
34
35
vi Contents
one line short
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page vii
A Poem to the Reader of the Poem 65 1
Song for Bird and Myself 69 2
A Poem Without a Single Bird in It 73 3
The Unvert Manifesto and Other Papers Found in the 4
Rare Book Room of the Boston Public Library in 5
the Handwriting of Oliver Charming. By S. 74 6
7
8
II. (1956–1965) 9
10
SAN FRANCISCO (1956–1965) 11
Poetry as Magic Workshop Questionnaire 99 12
AFTER LORCA 105 13
ADMONITIONS 155 14
A BOOK OF MUSIC 169 15
Socrates 179 16
A Poem for Dada Day at The Place, April 1, 1958 180 17
BILLY THE KID 183 18
For Steve Jonas Who Is in Jail for Defrauding a Book Club 192 19
FIFTEEN FALSE PROPOSITIONS AGAINST GOD 193 20
LETTERS TO JAMES ALEXANDER 203 21
APOLLO SENDS SEVEN NURSERY RHYMES TO JAMES 22
ALEXANDER 217 23
A BIRTHDAY POEM FOR JIM (AND JAMES) ALEXANDER 223 24
Imaginary Elegies (V, VI) 230 25
“Dignity is a part of a man ...” 233 26
HELEN: A REVISION 235 27
THE HEADS OF THE TOWN UP TO THE AETHER 247 28
LAMENT FOR THE MAKERS 315 29
A RED WHEELBARROW 323 30
Three Marxist Essays 328 31
THE HOLY GRAIL 329 32
GOLEM 359 33
34
35
Contents vii
one line short
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page viii
1 MAP POEMS 365
2 LANGUAGE 371
3 BOOK OF MAGAZINE VERSE 403
4
5
6 Chronology 429
7 Notes to the Poems 437
8 Bibliography 455
9 Index of Titles 457
10 Index of First Lines 461
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
viii Contents
Spicer: My Vocabulary Did This to Me page ix
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Many helped us in the years during which we edited this book. First of 10
all, we would like to thank Robin Blaser, who shepherded these 11
materials for forty years and whose edition of Spicer’s Collected Books 12
(1975) was a landmark volume. Blaser’s kindness is legendary, but it’s 13
real. The late Donald Allen, Spicer’s friend and editor, answered a 14
hundred questions with patience. The present volume builds on the 15
work he did in the 1957 “San Francisco Scene” issue of Evergreen Review, 16
in his anthology The New American Poetry, and in One Night Stand, the 17
volume of Spicer’s shorter poems he published in 1980. To the painter 18
Fran Herndon, we owe the survival of The Holy Grail manuscript, as 19
well as the “Fix” sequence known as Golem, and the files of J, the 20
magazine she and Spicer edited in 1959. Lewis Ellingham established 21
chronologies, elucidated texts, sought out informants, shared his 22
knowledge intimate and arcane, kept the flame alive—an invaluable 23
resource in every conceivable way. 24
A special thanks to Anthony Bliss and Tanya Hollis of the Bancroft 25
Library; without their generosity and vision this book could not have 26
come to pass. At the Bancroft we owe thanks all around, and especially 27
to Bonnie Bearden, Steven Black, Bonnie Hardwick, Jocelyn Saidenberg, 28
Teresa Salazar, Dean Smith, and Susan Snyder. At the Special Collec- 29
tions and Rare Books Department of Simon Fraser University Library in 30
Burnaby, British Columbia, we were fortunate in working with the late 31
Charles Watts and with his successor, Tony Power. Robert Bertholf and 32
Michael Basinski showed us many kindnesses at the Lockwood Library 33
at SUNY Buffalo. 34
35
ix
one line short