My last memory of Robert Duncan

My last memory of Robert Duncan, when I was still new to poetry, we were all loitering on a street corner in North Beach after a reading, whose reading I don’t remember, probably himself, and there was Duncan standing by the lamppost, holding court, talking talking and we were all mesmerized. Paul Mariah, Robin Blazer. Who else? If only I had a photo, instead of memory. We couldn’t bear to leave that street corner. He had me at Often I Am Permitted to Return to a Meadow.  I was hooked. I was also an eavesdropper, newly arrived to poetry. The traffic light kept changing from green to red over and over again. Stop, go, stop, go, as twilight settled in and the stars appeared.