Remembering Seamus Heaney

Three candles that illumine every darkness: truth, nature, knowledge. —Old Irish triad

"Once in a lifetime the longed for tidal wave of justice can rise up, and hope and history rhyme."

                  —Seamus Heaney

I first met Seamus in the early 1980s. I heard him read on KPFA FM—I never could get decent radio signal in Forestville—and I turned it on, only to hear his sonorous voice.

I hopped into my truck (code name: Blue Lazarus) and drove on down to SF (or was it Berkeley?) but the only seat left in the house was right in the front row—and so I sat in it, next to a woman. She patted the seat next to her—said sit. It was still warm.

We got to chatting, she said she was an Irish schoolteacher. I gave her a CPITS poetry book from my CAC poetry residency in Santa Rosa. And so the penny eventually dropped, it was Mairi, his wife. I was sitting in Seamus's recently vacated seat, it was the hot seat. Not many can claim their seat was warmed by the heat of Seamus' bum.

Thus began a friendship that spanned decades—he once sent me a letter from Adams House, Harvard—praising my voice, my long line. Gawd only know what I sent him. A letter I treasured. It gave me hope during a time when no one would publish my work. Too long, too personal, too difficult.

Our paths crossed on myriad occasions. I ran into Seamus again at the Avenali Lecture Berkekey—he always remembered me. Always chatted—sometimes in Irish, as he signed my latest collection of books.

Then I got to spend some time with Seamus at Poetry International encampment during the Summer Solstice in Rotterdam. I told him my grandmother was a Heaney, he laughed, called me coozin, giving me a big smacker. We sang Irish songs, lifted our glasses high.

Most memorable moment: we were stuck in an elevator between floors, a gaggle of poets from around the world—mostly African poets. Seamus  proclaimed that his whiskey flask had sprung a leak, and so we all drank tots from the lid and when it was done, we sang songs and proclaimed ourselves a collective noun. I said: a Genius of Poets. He repeated: almost on the same breath: a Genius of Poets. And so we were, and me, the only woman.

I read that Ted Hughes's Lupercal, spurred Heaney on to write poetry. "Suddenly, the matter of contemporary poetry was the material of my own life." Heaney once said to Sameer Rahim, that "The gift of writing is to be self-forgetful, to get a surge of inner life or inner supply or unexpected sense of empowerment, to be afloat, to be out of yourself.” I am reminded of what Seamus said in an interview, "Each poet is alone with his or her chances at the end as much as at the beginning." – 1996 interview w/ Seamus Heaney

In August of 2006, Heaney suffered a stroke, he said that left him "babyish" and "on the brink." An interesting place to find oneself in poetry. When he was fitted with a heart monitor, Heaney joked, "Blessed are the pacemakers..."

At the end of November, after the memorial readings were done, I dreamt Seamus came to visit, I was sitting on his knee as he reminisced about life. When I grabbed my camera, to take a photo of him, it was full of sand. In this way, I knew he was truly gone. 

Irish President Michael D. Higgins said: "...so many rights organisations will want to thank him for all the solidarity he gave to the struggles within the republic of conscience." Seamus lived like his poetry, upstanding, forthright, and generous. He was everyman's hero. It was a great honor to spend time with him in Berkeley, San Francisco, at the Marin Civic Center, and Poetry International in Rotterdam—and a few places in between. Seamus was always generous with his time, and always kind.

I didn't know those of us who went to see Famous Seamus every chance we got, were dubbed "Heaneyboppers" but I don't regret one moment of it. He was always seeking that phrase of light. He was my lodestone, my candle of truth, my bearla—my government of the tongue.

After a fall outside a Dublin restaurant, Seamus entered hospital. The newspapers reported that while waiting for a medical procedure, he texted a last message to his wife, Mairi. Noli timere, “Do not be afraid,” minutes before he died. His famous last words, not quite written in stone, but close enough.

May he rest in poetry. Go ndéana Dia fáilte roimh Shéamus, ní bheidh a leithéid ann arís.

Remembering the Adrians (Adrian Mitchell, Adrian Henri)

 

To Whom it May Concen:

It's come to this, getting the news, not from poetry, as the good Doctor-Poet wrote, but from blogs. Link led to a link (Poetry Scotland) which led to the death notice of Britain's shadow Poet Laureate,  Adrian Mitchell.  

This morning I dreamt that Sebastopol assemblage artist Raymond Barnhart was alive (he died in 1996) and he repeatedly kissed me on the lips. I shied away from the old man's kisses and  I wondered who had died, because it was a kiss as if from beyond the grave...and I awoke, troubled. Not that it had anything to do with anything. His thin moustache prickled. I awoke with the feeling I was supposed to find something. I remember something, I didn't know what. Call it an assemblage of information. Why Raymond Barnhart, and why, after all these years? Assemblage indeed. 

OK, so I'm feeling a bit mortal these days. Last Saturday I was racked with fevers of 102.2, a fallout of working with kids is that I get some pretty nasty viruses. I was definitely feeling sick. Some Valentine's Day. Maybe my brain's still a bit cooked. My bleedin' cough is killing me...breath is an issue. What is breath. To breathe, Latin: inspire, to breathe into as in inspiration. As in Godhead. He was trying to breathe inspiration into me? Raymond for God. I like that. Or God as an assemblage artist? I can see it now.

I'm still a bit gelly-kneed but my cough's improving. Catching up on my reading Sunny Dunny, a Scottish poetry blog I sometimes follow, I stumbled an oblique link that led to another link (I had no idea what I was following, what I was searching for, or why), and suddenly there it was. I was reading about the death of Adrian Mitchell on Dec. 20. And to be sure, both the Adrians were on my mind the past few months. it seems there's been a spate of deaths of friends and acquaintances. Getting the news indeed.

But then, I've been dredging up the past, posting old articles on the blog, letting them see the metaphorical light of day after languishing a decade or more of cyber-darkness. My friend Micaela read bits of my blog (she's probably the only soul actually reading this blog), she says I should write a book. But on what subject? Memoir without shape or form? As a name dropper? An oblique shadow It Girl of poetry? I write (infrequent as it seems) because I have to, not because I want to. Things come up, insist on a voice and direction generally not of my choosing.

Ah, the Adrians. Yes. I remember the Adrians.  The only other Adrian I knew was a girl, Adrian Daly, Adair Lara, the writer’s twin. Adrian preferred cowgirl outfits replete with holster, gun and red cowboy boots. She was a bit of a bully in second grade and last I heard she became a cop. Adair was the poet. One Adrian in a lifetime was enough. Not a name I'd associate with poetry. But then, I met the Adrians.

I first met the two Adrians (Adrian Mitchell and Adrian Henri) together one summer (ca. 1996) at Poetry International and we spent an afternoon terrorizing the citizens of Holland with spontaneous outbursts of poetry and song. After a reading, and an installation of the Poet's Wall, we went to the Pilgrim’s Pub in Delftshaven, raised a few pints, and afterwards, about a dozen of us boarded trams and sang and recited poetry, we were wayward poets with no other destination that life itself. And I was the only girl. Oh and maybe that evening's reading in Rotterdam.

A group of us led by the two pied pipers, Adrians (Henri, and Mitchell). Liverpudlian poet-painter Adrian Henri was perhaps best known for inventing the British “pop poetry” scene with the Beatles. With us was Pink Floyd “The Wall” guitarist Andy Roberts, (I don't know how he got there), but we all hopped a tram singing “Poetry, poetry, poetry. . .” to a bemused, if captive, Surinamese audience. We skipped our fare but nobody cared because we were the poets come to town. Besides, try to collect fare from a poet?

Mitchell was the quieter Adrian, but nonetheless, lively. I remember him telling me he was Scottish, or his father was. I think he was a little sweet on me. We sang Beatles songs and people ogled the crazy gaggle of mostly British poets let loose on the streets of Rotterdam, high on space cake. I believe Roger McGough was there too. Since I was the lone "it" girl or, more like a fly on the wall for lack of a better word for it, I was taking it all in. Imagine singing "Yellow Submarine' with that lot. The tram was our very own Yellow Submarine for the afternoon.

Besides poetry itself, we had poet teaching in the schools in common. Crazy poets, we all went into the grammar schools and turned young kids onto poetry. I was the lone American from California, Sonoma County Area Coordinator for California Poets in the Schools. I gave the Adrians some collections of my students' work. I had had a series of California Arts Council grants so I had some nice collections of poetry and art books. 

I was just so thrilled to find teaching compatriots in the UK, as teaching kids poetry was an odd, if lonely profession and few poets attempt to make a living at it. Most elect for the more prestigious college circuit and by that time it's too late for poetry. The brain's well on its way to ossification with the weight of all those dead white male poets cluttering the neuron pathways. Ah yes, the league of extraordinary scholar poets. 

I like the story, that as a safeguard, Mitchell wrote a preface to his poetry collections: "None of the work in this book is to be used in connection with any examination whatsoever." His riveting protest poem "Tell me Lies," originally written against the Vietnam War, was revived and dusted off for the 2003 invasion of Iraq. He was a ceaseless campaigner against the war, any war, or social injustice. 

We wrote and sent poetry lesson ideas to each other for a while. Adrian Mitchell was a better correspondent than I, or the other Adrian, for that matter. But then, time itself dropped away. A horrible car accident in June of 1997, and punctured lung derailed me and my charmed poetry life. Took the breath right out of me. Literally. I later wrote a few times to Martin Mooij and he said that Adrian Mitchell was still alive but sadly, Adrian Henri had died. Now the last of the Adrians is gone from us. Long live the Adrians! Thanks for an afternoon I will never forget.

Guess I'll have to make a trek up to my cabin on Forestville and haul out the old notebooks and photos to see what's there nesting in the cobwebbed memory banks of time. So this little bloggy bit is but a placeholder, a Kilroy was here placetag, a reminder for writing to come. (Or not). Meanwhile, here’s a card from Adrian Mitchell:

As for this bloggy bognote, perhaps like Rayond Barnhart, I too want to please the work. I want the work to please itself. Writing, like assemblage: you have to be ready to reassemble the parts. Only I'm not ready, yet. It's always a mystery. And I never have all the parts I need at the same place and same time. Like Adrian Mitchell, I was run over by the truth one day, and poetry never looked back.

I an left with the odd thought of imagining God as an assemblage artist dressed like Louise Nevelson. After all, God is a woman, right? What I remember about Louise was her huge fake eyelashes encrusting her eyes like debris at the mouth of a flooded river, a red wound of a mouth, and her big floppy hats covering her like a cape designed by Dracula. She was one crazy old Ukranian bat who built entire walls out of packing crates and painted everything black.  

I met her when she was putting up an installation at SFMOMA way back when—when I was an art student. But I liked this quote: ”When you put together things that other people have thrown out, you’re really bringing them to life—a spiritual life that surpasses the life for which they were originally created."   —Louise Nevelson

A Genius of Poets

In Colin Will's blog, Sunny Dunny, I read that Seanus Heaney suffered a small stroke two years back. I was shocked to hear the news from afar but relieved to know that he's on the mend. I'd heard something about it via the grapevine, but it was all the more shocking to see it so formal in print.

Seamus comes to SF/Berkeley every few years and we catch up. Come to think of it, it's been quiet on the Seamus front for some time, now. UC Berkeley hosts a Celtic Colloquium around St. Patrick's Day on the odd years (UCLA on even years) so we usually see Seamus in the madness of March.

Long before he became affectionately known in the Irish poetry community as "Famous Seamus," I first met him back in the 1981. One sunny afternoon on "A Terrible Beauty," KPFA FM, radio host Padraigin McGillicuddy was broadcasting the poems (Field Work) of this marvelous Northern Irish poet, a visiting professor at Harvard, who was scheduled to read later that evening at UC Berkeley.

It must've been around St Patrick's Day as I was hungry for some good Irish music, and of course, Padraigin's acerbic wit. She was reading about feminism & St Patrick, so it was an incendiary show.

Other than Padraigin's show, I rarely listened to the radio as it was difficult getting reception so far out in the country, unless the planets were aligned and the wind blew just right. We were ringed by coastal mountains and tall redwoods. But Padraigin was a force of nature to be reckoned with. If she said, "You simply MUST go and hear this poet read," then so we did. Seamus's disembodied voice rang out like the bell of St Patrick and disturbed the air around it.

I jumped into my old blue VW bug and drove 75 miles to Highway 101 and crossed the Richmond Bridge over to Berkeley just to hear him read (I lived in a remote part of Sonoma County, near the Russian River). It was a life-changing event that solidified my dedication to poetry. I was fairly new to writing but then I'd jumped feet first into the deep waters and learned to swim in the process. Well, maybe flounder....

I was terrified my '69 VW bug wouldn't make it the distance, as it was already old and on its last legs. It had a delicate carburetor and intermittent electrical coil issues so driving at night was a risky affair. I spent far too many hours by the side of the road fiddling with wires and fuel line to get it going. It wasn't cheap to drive to Berkekey either, plus I had an unreasonable fear of cities, having grown up in the rural backwaters of the country with cows and sheep....

Back then, I had a sort of agoraphobia (a real fear of the crowded marketplace) in the truest sense of the word. I rarely, if ever, left the wilds of West Sonoma County to visit the metropoli of San Francisco or Berkeley (despite the catchy milk ad" cows in Berkeley?), unless there was a compelling reason. Seamus's poetry was reason enough for me to crawl out of the hills.

It was an amazing evening. As luck would have it, I sat next to his wife Mairi (in the only seat left in the auditorium—I later realized it was Seamus's seat—talk about being in the hot seat!) and Mairi and I hit it off like a house afire as she was a teacher, I'd given her a book of my students' poetry and art (I was a California Arts Council artist in residence at a Santa Rosa school).

And so began my long distance poetic friendship with Seamus. Somewhere in cold storage, I have a letter he wrote to me while he was at Harvard, in praise of my long(winded) lines and sense of place in my poems—I will have to dig it out one day. Gawd only knows what drivel I sent him, one can only blush from afar, across time and distance.

* * *
We were at Poetry International in 1996, stuck in a sluggish elevator between floors with a crazy gaggle of giggling African poets, so Seamus pulled out a bottle and we were all drinking uisce beatha from a tiny bottle cap making all manner of toasts to the Summer Solstice and whatnot.

Keeping the whiskey flowing, Seamus discovered that his flask had, in fact, "developed a terrible leak" and that it was a at least a cardinal sin to to be ever putting the cap back on such a wee flask such as his until it was empty when we were in such good company.

So we lubricated our minds and invented toasts to many odd things. Geert van Istendael was soon proclaiming that ALL poets were Celts and so the African poets proclaimed themselves as being Black Irish and raised the bottle cap to the dim elevator light in giddy agreement.The best round was to toast a noun as we were all pretty much pure verb at that point and needed a good solid earthy noun to steady us down.

We coined a collective noun for a group of poets as a "Genius of Poets." Seamus and I shouted out in unison.

The elevator doors finally crept open and we stepped into the lobby, forever changed. A genius of poets blinded by the light.

Heal well, my friend. Heal well, the poet's spade isn't done excavating yet. Neil says, "Read the hand!"

Letter to Charles McGeehan

Dear Bertaijn & Charles—Happy Holidays!

It’s been raining steadily for a week, a slow, gentle rain, drumming fingers of rain on the moss-green scalp of my cabin roof nestled beneath live oaks. I’m cozily curled up in bed with the flu, playing with my computer.

There are flash flood warnings in Northern California, Oregon and Washington and record feet of snow has fallen in the mountains. I’ve been lax about writing to anyone since I’ve been back home. A kind of lethargy creeps over me. I do what’s necessary, read, and little else. Perhaps hibernation. . . Of course, it doesn’t help that I have an injured wrist.

Right before I left Amsterdam, I got into a bicycle accident. As I was returning home to Linde Voûte’s on Oetgenstraat from Westerpark, some idiot took a curved wrought-iron flower trellis (the arch that goes over a gate) out of the back of his double-parked car on Prinsengracht (near Utrechtstraat), and swung it in front of me, cutting my right hand. 

I tried to protect my face but smashed into a parked car, bruising my left wrist when I hit the back windshield. It was either smash into a parked car or fly into the canal—which would you choose? It was raining, and the bike’s brakes were no good on wet cobblestone & brick. 

Anyway, I’ve been ignoring my wrist for the past 2 months—until it hurt so badly (I was smashing a clove of garlic with the flat of a knife; the little bones in my wrist made a crunching sound like potato crisps!). I finally went to the doctor who put it into a splint to rest it—a bad sprain. 

I’m slowly typing (two-fingered pecking) this letter wearing my stupid wrist brace—which looks (& is beginning to smell) like an old gym shoe, and as winter’s chill creeps in, my bones ache (snow in the Sierras); injuries don’t heal quite as fast as they used to.

I’m finally finished with my Breytenbach essay on translation. I can’t believe it took me so long to write it, but I didn’t have the background or knowledge necessary to quickly write something. 

Besides, if I knew what I was going to write about, I wouldn’t write at all. What’s the point? The essay & footnotes is nearly 10,000 words (verbose), and it was very difficult for me. It’s long overdue, I hope J.L van Schaik Publishers (South Africa) will still use it!

It’s hard to say exactly how I’ve been wasting my time as I’m never idle. You know how it is, the life of a writer is a proverbial black hole. In Autumn I never have much ($) work: I’m teaching a poetry class to children, ages 6-8; I finished 3 “Elderhostel” classes (California history, poetry, art, etc.) to 60+ year-olds—and my strangest job yet—was as a naturalist leading a group of businessmen on a day hike to the headlands near Sausalito (& the Golden Gate Bridge) last Friday (probably when I caught this cold). 

Did Paul Evans do another issue of ORAL magazine? Charles, you haven’t sent me the second batch of poems that I typeset—you were going to proof them, remember? As soon as I get them, I’ll make corrections ASAP and send you a clean copy of all that I’ve typeset so we can see where the “holes” are. 

Herman got a letter from Guillermo Gelacio, & some photos. Guillermo was concerned with, among other things, Herman’s general sloppiness in the Asian issue. I’ve tried to tell him to take care, he’s losing credibility. 

A good thing we’re near the end of the project. He’s truly incorrigable, and becoming worse with time, impossible to work with. I want to make sure we get our issue together soon so send the corrected poems.

Here’s a letter fragment I never sent:

19 Sept., 1996 (midnight insomnia) Home, I am—and after a week of sunshine, I need dark shades—unused as I am to so much concentrated light. The weather’s turning cold. Fingernail moon (and a total eclipse on the 26th—the last one of the millenium—which I doubt you’ll even see, Dutch weather being what it is. 

Still suffering from acute jetlag, tunnel vision & disorientation by late afternoon is typical (for 6 pm is really 3 am—and I wonder why I have no appetite for dinner!). 

Driving is excruciating (asleep at the wheel is a virtual reality). My cousin Dave’s having the same symptoms. We may have jumped into this culture/time zone but the bio-rhythms aren’t yet shifting. 

He said “I have to keep moving around, flapping my arms, just to keep awake at work.” I laughed at the idea of Dave flapping his wings in an airplane hangar with all those dismantled planes. 

At a lively Brazilian party in San Francisco, I made the mistake of sitting alone on the couch for a few minutes. My eyes may have been open, but that’s all. I couldn’t even speak, let alone understand the Brazilians’ Spanish (who speak with a Portuguese accent). 

I drove Herman Berlandt & his girlfriend, Verona home to Novato, literally cross-eyed, thinking “I’ll never make it home” and slept on their couch. They say it takes a minimum of 1 day of suffering for each time zone. 

I remember how it took me weeks to recover from Russia. How long will I suffer this time? Someone said that in a Concorde jet, you travel so fast, you arrive before you leave—earlier, that is, in New York than when you leave Paris! Where’s Einstein when you need him?

My cousin Sínead (Dave’s sister) and I went huckleberrying last weekend out at our secret spot on a hill near Tomales Bay, where we used to go with my grandmother. (They’re like tiny blueberries with 50 times the flavor.) 

From the isthmus, we could see Point Reyes in the distance, like a comma against the shining sea, separating Drake’s Bay from the raging Pacific—a misnamed ocean. 

Offshore fog rising up like a vast wall where tiny fishing boats disappeared into its maws, made me think of the painter, Turner. The pine forest took a beating from last year’s severe storms—so many uprooted trees met an abrupt end—we used them as aerial pathways up the hillsides. 

Since it’s all part of the Point Reyes National Seashore, we’re not supposed to gather anything—even huckleberries, so I stole an antler. We were hiding from the rangers but we had Sínead’s 22-month-old nephew, Séan to lug through the undergrowth. I had the odd sensation we were re-enacting an age-old ritual, gathering berries before the fall—no matter that our skin is white, not red. 

My aunt will make pies and ice cream, our teeth will be indigo-stained for days (like my fingers). How Pictish! The berries are so labor-intensive (cleaning takes longer than picking) we make jokes, compare them to caviar. (We went to an equinox party at Albert Straus's—a local ranch and made gallons of huckleberry ice cream).

I spent my flight over the Atlantic being terribly sleepy but wide awake with fear. Unfortunately my airplane dessert had hazelnut filling in it, tho they said it was jam. . . and I had to take antihistimines, the stewardesses coming by periodically to see if I was still breathing. I was trying to figure out a place where I could hide to inject myself with adrenaline, if it came to that. 

I’m such a coward around needles and every muscle in your body contracts at once on adrenaline. The one time I had to take it, I could hear my scull crack as every muscle in my scalp went into shrinkwrap overdrive! Zip!

What struck me most about returning home is the sharp, aromatic odor of bay laurel, poison oak pollen, and sun-burnt hay, flavored with the acrid, thirsty dust—the smell of late summer making me nostalgic (like Proust and his madelines?). 

Seeing all the lovely, steep hillsides against a cerulean sky, cloaked in tawny blond oatgrasses like sleeping lions, and the thick green-black oaks roiling in their crotches—so sexual, it surprises me anew each time I return. 

I’ll never forget how the mirrored San Francisco Bay and Mt. Tamalpias (our Mt. Fuji-san) from the fire-ravaged Oakland hills takes my breath away. The Sonoma-Marin Coast Miwok Indian word for the shining golden gate, Yulupa. 

All that’s left of the Bay Area Ohlone Indians’ stories of this landscape is: Dancing on the brink of the world. 

I love this landscape, but not the culture. I hate the vacuous American loudness, the lack of body awareness, the shallow chrome and Formica existence, the urban sprawl. . . the ultimate loneliness. I try to be somewhat tolerant, but I guess it’s not within my nature. And so I am alone, dancing on the brink of I know not what.

My 2nd night home, I was invited to a Sebastopol Arts Council meeting for the promotion of poetry in west Sonoma County, and I felt so jaded. “Been there, done that. Got the shirt. . .” 

Guess I should be glad poetry is so “in” but it just makes me bad-tempered and ornery—especially when they dream big, and haven’t a clue as to what goes on in putting on reading series and workshops, wanting more volunteer labor to make it happen. . .and I’ve got that shirt too—in several sizes. (And it’s got bloody holes in it by now!).

It feels a bit like a mausoleum here, in this poetry mecca of the world (and in my cabin too). I know I’ll grow used to it soon enough. 

I saw a bizarre English movie, The Draughtsman’s Contract, by Peter Greenaway, the director of The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover. At the end there were all these Dutch references—someone speaking Dutch which I could almost understand. It had the peculiar effect of making me homesick for the wrong country. 

They say you always leave a part of yourself behind when you travel. Does that mean there’s less of me returning home each time I go away? (Heminway said: Travel broadens the mind. Writing broadens the ass. I write standing up.)

I’ve got to find a new home for our poetry reading series—book 20+ readers thru Dec. & do a newsletter /mailing on my own (done!). I’ve got a few 2-day teaching jobs with Elderhostel (open university for retired folks) in Oct. One on creativity and the arts, the other on early California history—I’ve got to start cramming the info. in soon. It takes me a while to re-establish those kinds of facts—I teach through telling lively stories and anecdotes—otherwise my elderly “students” will fall asleep.

* * * * * * *

Charles, today’s the anniversary of day President Kennedy was shot. The proverbial question: what were you doing, where were you? (Not on the grassy knoll, I presume!) 

I was in 3rd grade, sick with a flu (like today), sitting with my grandmother with my feet propped on the warm sides of the stove firebox (we have a gas stove with a wood burner for heat in Forest Knolls—not that newfangled modern heating! 

Bertaijn, my Grandmother’s house in Forest Knolls reminds me so much of your wonderful farm house in Rogny! Thank you again so much for inviting us, it was a highlight of my summer). Actually, she was sitting by the stove, I was wallowing around on the floor in my quilted robe like a red and yellow paisley dust-walrus. It was a dreary day, much like today.

My aunt Canice’s husband Bill (Dave’s father—they were staying with us a while. At one time or another, my grandmother’s house was a second home (a flophouse?) for three of her four daughters in various incarnations of distress). 

Bill Dinsmore (a sloppy drunk) came bursting through the front door, mid-afternoon—full of news. He was so excited, I mistook it for joyousness or frivolity. “The President’s been shot!” he shreiked. In retrospect, I think it was merely excitement and shock enhanced by the booze. 

My grandmother’s reaction of anguish (she who had buried a husband, a son and several brothers and sisters by this time), such a bizarre foil to my uncle’s giggling, I didn’t know what to think, only that Kennedy was akin to being a relative in our household. The Irish Catholics have elevated him to secular sainthood.

When visiting my relatives in Ireland in 1973, I was struck by how every house had its altar niche with Jesus and/or Mary (rarely Joseph) and Kennedy illuminated by a (red) votive candle. The sacred heart. Later, in 1989, when I visited Peru, it was like being in Ireland—Kennedy’s half-mast eyes blankly stared out at me from every niche. What do the dead still see from the eyes of photographs?

Of course, lots of controversial stories about Kennedy have surfaced since then. But, regardless of his politics and womanizing, he truly represented something as intangible as hope to so many oppressed peoples the world over. 

I can’t think of another American president that had that kind of global impact. Certainly not the Rosevelts, nor Eisenhower (course I wasn’t really politically savvy yet—born in 1952). Clinton’s been compared to Kennedy—but that’s a joke. Clinton couldn’t even fill the shadows of the soles of Kennedy’s feet. Still, I wonder, what would our perception of Kennedy been like if he’d run for office now, more than 25 years after his death; how would the world view him now?

Weird to see Fidel Castro on the telly the other night, Knnedy’s embargo from the Bay of Pigs crisis still in effect—we get little news of Cuba. I saw him on a Mexican TV channel—no voice of James Earl Jones sonorously announcing in that rich baritone: This is CNN! 

Charles, remember those radio emergency broadcast tests when we were kids? The piercing tones followed by the announcement, “This is only a test. If it had been a real emergency . . .” and we thought maybe the bomb was gonna drop? They’ve just eliminated them (I was surprised to hear them on the BBC radio broadcast you listen to in the morning). Now there’s new technology, just some computer chirps and clicks.

Charles, happy birthday to you too! I forgot the date, fellow Sagge.; my birthday’s in 2 days. I’ll be 44, or as my grandmother would say: Farty-Faer. Fulla hot air in more ways than one—nasty flubug!

1 Dec. Sun. Well, a friend (a student’s mother) whisked me away to the beautiful tourist town of Carmel-by-the Sea for the weekend, so I turned 44 beneath a full Gemini moon by the Pacific Ocean (we were 2 houses away from the beach, a painter friend of hers rented a house for a full month). 

I no sooner returned home (Tues.) and left again to spend Thanksgiving in Novato with Herman and Verona (his actress-girlfriend) and her 2 (adult) children, a Brazilian artist (Zoravia), and a Scottish actor (Neal O’Neill from Glasgow in a kilt (I think I’m in love!) played guitar, so we sang for our supper on full stomachs. 

Herman said he was going to call you, Charles, but every time we get the urge, we realize the hour you definately would not appreciate. There’s that little matter of time. He said he wrote to you but you never answered. He was worried about you, your health. Please write back to us soon.

My innards are still unhappy, so I spent the weekend back in bed reading after nearly a week of socializing. I’ve been reading more on the Celts—discovered that Laon was a celtic hillfort, and later, an Irish monastary until ca. 1500 to 1700 AD. 

My favorite mystery scholar whom I know little about, a founder of many of the continental universities, was Johannes Scottus Eriugena (John, the Irishman b. 810). He taught 25 years at Laon and at the Paris Court School for Charles the Bald (when he wasn’t being accused of heresy—which was often—for his radical doctrine preached the concept of free will. 

Note: this was long before Luther was a gleam in his great-grandparents’ eyes). In 486 the Loire was settled by Merovingin Franks, I don’t remember the dates at Marle. 

Do you have any information on the Abbey ring, Bertaijn? Suffice to say, there were probably still a few Gauls around—surely the Romans didn’t kill them all? Certainly most of the so-called “Roman’ troops were comprised of conquered Gauls—and with the fresh influx of Irish blood—well it seems to explain why everyone was wearing those Celtic beltbuckles! 

The thing is, no other group of people ever accomplished that kind of inlay design work. The Merovingian buckles were pretty crude workmanship though. Let’s all go back to Marle next summer—for a longer stay so I can scout out some history. 

Bertaijn, if you need some manual labor, I’ll be your slave. I’m very good at that sort of thing. Plastering, painting, gardening, etc. I’ve done all kinds of hard labor growing up in the country. Guess I’d better learn some French!

Here’s a little story about Eriugena: An emperor (Charles the Bald?) made a playful pun on two similar sounding words in Latin: sottum and scottum, and asked John what’s the difference between a fool and a Scot (Irishman) to which John replied, “Only the table.” (In Latin, of course: Quid distat inter sottum et scottum?).

The king must’ve been seated across from the Irishman. I bet he was flabbergasted by the answer—talk about turned tables! But then it is said in our myths, satire was the first art form invented in Ireland. 

I found this gem in my friend Vinz’s flat: Adversus stultitiam pugnare nil est laboriusius nulla enim auctonate vinci fatetur nulla ratione suddetor. Which goes something like: nothing is more laborious than to fight against stupidity for it won’t bend to any authority and it won’t be convinced by any reason. 

He must have had some very challenging students at Laon! If I don’t send this soon, it’ll be Christmas! Adieu. A’voir! Kisses & hugs!

P.S/ Well Christmas has come (the goose—well, actually, the turkey— is come and gone), and your package sat on the floor waiting for the last of my photos, and though the pieces were assembled, I forgot to mail this, so now I make another feeble attempt before year’s end. 

When I started this letter it was raining; would you believe it’s still raining! We have flood warnings for tomorrow, the Russian River is to crest at Hacienda Bridge in the afternoon, just 2 miles from my house. The power’s been threatening to go out all day, flickering—we’ve had terrible winds. Small branches falling on my roof and the hood of my truck. In today’s newspaper, a photo of ice skaters in Holland and in the Midwest—South Dakota, I think.

Charles, twice now I’ve tried calling you but no answer. Hope all’s well. I spent Christmas Eve and morning with my cousins Dave and Sinead in Nicasio; Christmas dinner and Boxing Day with Herman & Verona. 

Herman was given an old Mac computer, I have to find him a printer and a monitor. Did you ever get a better computer? What you really need is a letter quality printer ASAP! Your old computer programs might not be able to run the printer though, nowadays everything has its own special programs. 

You really should upgrade your whole system all at once if you can. Surely Anjum can help you? In the past two years there have been so many new chips (Intel, Pentium) invented, that the relatively new computers are now considered “obsolete” and if you can find someone who’s upgrading to a newer system, you should be able to find a deal somewhere. 

Since you only need a system for relatively simple wordprocessing and printing, it doesn’t have to be brand-new! You could get by with a small hard drive of 40 MB and 4-8 MB memory, both of which are upgradable. It would be nice to get a fax-modem too, because the telephone is so expensive. 

I realize you want an IBM style clone system, and they’re probably much cheaper, but if you should happen to come across a Mac system, Vinz has a Mac LC, and we can give you all the software and fonts you need. IBM’s highly touted Windows ’95 operating system (it runs the machine—you can’t get computers that run solely off program disks anymore) is merely a rip-off of Mac’s operating system invented circa 1989.

I don’t know if Dave’s sent you his photos yet, he’s been meaning to. Dave’s been working long hours on the “swing shift” (getting home at 2 am) in order to “buy” his grandfather’s house—an unscrupulous unrelated cousin managed to get her name included on the will and by California law, if property isn’t specifically bequeathed, it goes to whoever’s on the will. A real mess for him, but at least he’ll eventually own the house in Nicasio. 

The irony is that his so-called “inheritance” house will cost him about the same as if he were to buy it on the open market! But it’s a sweet old house—fraught with structural problems. That’s why he could relate so well to the problems of your house in France. 

(Do you think this is a long enough P.S.? I’m obsessed with filling the entire page with writing, I abhor the blank page in a letter, squeezing in as many words as possible, thinking I’m somehow getting my money’s worth at the Post Office. I know it doesn’t make sense, this obsession of mine, that’s why it’s so difficult for me to write letters—because once I get going I can’t stop! Enough already!!!)

November 22 - to Dec. 31?, 1996 

Letters to Paul Evans

Paul, obsessive ramblings, Lughnasadh, Aug. 2, 5 AM, 1996

Have you ever had the experience of making mental notes to say this or that to someone, some thing terribly important (or at least half-way intelligible) and in their presence (either in person, or via the phone), despite best intentions, you turn featherbrained on yourself, betrayed by a cheesecloth-that-stands-for memory/mind: whatever thoughts you had, driven clean out of your head, only to re-emerge at the oddest hours—say, at 5 AM, in a strange flat (and country) not your own—even the cats have deserted you because your tossing and turning like a crazed narwhal reminds them of the bilious sea, and water is not their favorite subject, unless fish are involved. (As the actress Tallulah Bankhead said, I nevah drink the watah, dahling, fish fhuck in it. By the time it reached the public, it was piss versus fuck. As if piss were preferable to fucking. You tell me why San Francisco society (or my computer dictionary) was not ready for that Anglo-Saxon word. My first and only opera I attended (Madame Butterfly), there she was in a peacock sequined gown, brandishing a cigarette holder longer than her arm, with a sotto voice that carried across the marble lobby into the streets. Fresh from the hills, I was wide-eyed in amazement, but that’s another story.)

In my case, this mental indulgence is exacerbated by bad cramps tempered with aspirin, cognac—one gets these images of wheels spinning in the muddied ruts in the backroads of the mind, and ends up having entire one-sided conversations that never actually reach their intended victims. Hence, the letter format. The good news is that I don’t write them often—who has the time to write to anyone—I’m a lousy correspondent—either dead silence for years, or a series of volumous ramblings like this one.

Letter to Wim Hofman

Wim's Weerelt, Summer 1996 Foto Maartin Hofman

Dear Wim & Toke—Happy Holidays to you! November 22 - Dec. 30, 1996

Dec. 29: I’m so sorry I didn’t write to you sooner, it was such a delight and pleasure to receive your wonderful letter upon my return in mid-September, but the whirlwind of returning, the myriad tasks to catch up on, and the pressure to finish a large article on the Poetry International translation project took up most of my time, and here it is, nearly the end of the year, and I still haven’t sent this (somewhat fragmented) letter. (Bad dog!) 

I loved the way you describe the events of the day, Wim, I loved visiting your family, and experiencing your hospitality, warmth and bone-deep kindness. It was like stepping into a precious jewel—if for only one magical day that will stay with me always, a day so much more than the mere measuring of hours, so, of course, it saddens me that you’re selling the house, for surely it is “the world.” I adore mussels but we have to wait for a month with an “R” in it (September) to eat them due to the Red Tide. Will I never be able to visit you in Vlissingen again?

Since I was able to spend some time at a friend’s dilapidated country house in France, in a tiny hamlet of Rogny on the Abbey Road (founded by Irish monks in the Dark Ages) between Marle & Laon, in Picardy, Ainse, I can also understand your urge for more land and a garden. 

Charles (Bert Schierbeek’s translator) McGeehan’s exwife/girlfriend, Bertaijn’s farmhouse needs so much work, I’d love to stay there next summer in exchange for working on it—it reminds me of my grandmother’s house where I grew up in Forest Knolls. A certain angle of light, red roses splayed against a wall, farm machinery from another era strewn in every nook and cranny. Triggerpoints of memory. 

Charles is an interesting character, a GI stationed in Germany in the late ’60s, on furlough, who never left Holland; he’d met a Dutch girl on a train: Bertaijn. Now he’s 60 years old, an expatriate, neither wholly Dutch nor American. 

Bertaijn was Bert Schierbeek’s sister-in-law; we met at Bert’s funeral my first day in Holland in June. We were 500 strong, the coffin, a barge dressed in flowers and sheaves of poetry—including our own Mother Earth Journal. Bert used to spend time at Bertaijn’s farmhouse. My cousin Dave & I felt his presence there. . .

I’m in the process of applying for an Irish passport (my grandparents left before Ireland became a republic, so I’m the last generation allowed to apply for a passport.) My uncle was in Dublin this summer and got his inside of two weeks. The passport allows us to work in the European Community, an important consideration. 

Wim, I guess I’m tired of having to always struggle to find work each year, with no future, retirement, or security—nothing at all, for this is the life of an “independent contractor,” outside the system, so to speak. This is life in America for the struggling artist. Brains and talent account for little in the land where the greenback dollar is God. 

I think I’d like to work at one of the American schools in Europe—Poetry, English & Art. If you know of anyone who can help me, let me know as I want a life where I can spend time in Europe, as I am always unhappy to return to the states, where I need to earn money.

Did you get my Dutch translations of the children’s poems via the Internet? I was in Liessel (Near Eindhoven) visiting a photographer friend (Jan Bogaerts), we tried to send the document to both your son Maartin, and Toke. I’ve enclosed a hard copy for you in case you didn’t receive it. 

As for the books I left, don’t worry about translating it if you don’t want to—only tell me what you thought. 

From my meeting with the workshop leader, Henk van Fassen, I got the feeling we were diametrically opposed in our approaches to teaching children poetry. I believe in what is possible, he believes children are limited by intellect and scope. 

I’m sorry I don’t have more poems for you in Dutch. Yes, I’ve been to those places in my poems, seen those sights, lived those experiences. All autobiographical. I can’t remember if I left you any Dutch translations of my work, so I’ll enclose another packet, if I’ve erred in sending you duplicates, please pass them onto someone. 

A funny connection—the translator of my poems, a college friend (and former boyfriend) of mine, philosopher Vinz van Neerven, stayed at your house some 20 years ago with his then girlfriend, Judith Smeur—I think she was house-sitting for you while you were away? Isn’t it a small Weererlt after all? 

I’m sorry I don’t have any pictures of your place, other than the scratchboard I did (I’ve enclosed a copy for you). I thought I took photos of you? Perhaps it was in black and white film—in which case, I have only the negatives. I don’t have a darkroom and have to set up a time at a photographer’s studio to make proofsheets. Yet another pressing item on my list of “things to do.”

I’m so relieved to be finished with my Breytenbach essay on translation. I can’t believe it took so long to write, but I didn’t have the background or knowledge necessary to quickly write something. 

Besides, if I knew what I was going to write, I wouldn’t write at all. What’s the point? The essay & footnotes (nearly 10,000 words—verbose), was very difficult for me. I hope J.L van Schaik Publishers (South Africa) will use it!

You said you had several computers. . . do you want to get rid of any of them? Charles McGeehan desperately needs something more modern than his 15+ year old (DOS) IBM clone and doesn’t know much about modern systems; he needs a more recent model CPU(with 20 - 40 MB storage space, 4 - 8 MB memory? I’m guessing), a worprocessing program with simple graphic layout capabilities and a letter quality printer. I think he’s using one of the very first versions of WordPerfect (on floppy disks). His address is Rustenbergerstraat 66 huis, 1074 EX A’dam 020-675-0778. 

Though Charles may have severe disabilities (a serious brain tumor was removed several years ago), he actually accomplishes more work—primarily poetry translations—more than most people I know. 

In August, my cousin Dave Dinsmore came over to Amsterdam to visit me—he works for United Airlines—Dave, Charles McGeehan and his girlfriend Bertaijn and I went to France for a few days—We took the coast route from Rotterdam to Zeeland islands—dunes marsh and grey sea—and the ferry at Vlissingen to Belgium. 

I saw the windmill and had that curious sensation of collapsed time, remembering our mad walk to the train station, wanting to come visit but we had so little time, having stopped overlong in Middleburg. 

Dave was so amazed, we wound up staying overlong, and had to hurry to Brugge—which was even more amazing—we were so exhausted, we spent the night (in an inn) beneath the tower on the main square. 

We got caught in horrible traffic in Lille—no road signs on the freeways, so we circled and circled the countryside for hours trying to avoid the toll roads and navigate our way east by following topographic clues and a certain slant of sunlight until dusk overtook us.

Lille, a real hellhole. Dunkirk ever to the west. The Battle of the Bulge was fought somewhere near here. You can still feel the ghostly reminder the blood-soaked fields at sunset when the light is right and the fog rises up like apparitions.

We wound up several times in a village where Reblais was born, Proust too. Closet hysteric Charles McGeehan forgot his passport (and his epilepsy pills) so we didn’t want to get caught up in a immigration control lines. Dave and I, having no French money, didn’t want to take the toll roads. 

Asking a Frenchman directions in a village square was a farce worthy of a Monty Python comedy sketch. Only Bertaijn spoke French.

 A 6-hour trip from Amsterdam to Laon took us nearly three days. Kafavy said the journey, not the destination, matters. 

On the way back, we stopped off in Antwerp; sat in the afternoon sun in front of that glorious Gothic cathedral quaffing strong Belgian beer. We earned the sight of spires piercing the blueness of sky. Odd, Laon’s hill fortress Gothic cathedral has no spires, just stumps.

* * * * * * *

NOV. 22: It’s been raining steadily for a week, a slow, gentle rain, drumming fingers of rain on the moss-green scalp of my cabin roof nestled beneath live oaks. I’m cozily curled up in bed with the flu, playing with my computer. 

There are flash flood warnings in Northern California, Oregon and Washington and record feet of snow has fallen in the mountains. I’ve been lax about writing to anyone since I’ve been back home. A kind of lethargy creeps over me. I do what’s necessary, read, and little else. Perhaps hibernation. . . Of course, it doesn’t help that I have an injured wrist.

Before I left Amsterdam, I got into a bicycle accident. As I was returning home to Oetgenstraat from Westerpark, some idiot took a curved wrought-iron flower trellis (the arch that goes over a gate) out of the back of his double-parked car on Prinsengracht (near Utrechtstraat), and swung it in front of me, cutting my right hand. 

I tried to protect my face but smashed into a parked car, bruising my left wrist when I hit the back windshield. It was either smash into a parked car or fly into the canal—which to choose? It was raining, the bike’s brakes were no good on wet cobblestone & brick. 

I’ve been ignoring my wrist for the past 2 months—until it hurt so badly (I was smashing a clove of garlic with the flat of a knife; the little bones in my wrist made a crunching sound like potato crisps!). I went to the doctor who put it into a splint to rest it—a bad sprain with injury to the ulnar nerve. 

I’m slowly typing (two-fingered pecking) this letter wearing my stupid wrist brace which looks (& is beginning to smell) like an old gym shoe, and as winter’s chill creeps in, my bones ache (more snow in the Sierras); injuries don’t heal quite as fast as they used to.

It’s hard to say exactly how I’ve been wasting my time as I’m never idle. You know how it is, the life of a writer is a proverbial black hole. In Autumn I never have much ($) work: I’m teaching a poetry class to children, ages 6-8; I finished 3 “Elderhostel” classes (California history, poetry, art, etc.) to 60+ year-olds—and my strangest job yet—was as a naturalist leading a group of businessmen on a day hike to the headlands near Sausalito (& the Golden Gate Bridge) last Friday (probably when I caught this cold).

Here’s a journal fragment: 19 Sept., 1996 (midnight insomnia) Home, I am—and after a week of sunshine, I need dark shades—unused as I am to so much concentrated light. The weather’s turning cold. Fingernail moon (and a total eclipse on the 26th—the last one of the millennium—which I doubt you’ll even see, Dutch weather being what it is. 

Still suffering from acute jetlag, tunnel vision & disorientation by late afternoon is typical (for 6 PM is really 3 am—and I wonder why I have no appetite for dinner!). Driving is excruciating (asleep at the wheel is a virtual reality). 

My cousin Dave’s having the same symptoms. We may have jumped into this culture/time zone but the bio-rhythms aren’t yet shifting. He said “I have to keep moving around, flapping my arms, just to keep awake at work.” I laughed at the idea of Dave flapping his wings in an airplane hangar with all those dismantled planes. 

At a lively Brazilian party in San Francisco, I made the mistake of sitting alone on the couch for a few minutes. My eyes may have been open, but that’s all. I couldn’t even speak, let alone understand the Brazilians’ Spanish (who speak with a Portuguese accent). 

I drove Herman Berlandt & his girlfriend, Verona home to Novato in Marin County, north of San Francisco, literally cross-eyed, thinking “I’ll never make it home” (an hour and a half’s drive) so I slept on their couch. (Wim, do you remember Herman at Poetry International, the little old man who is the editor of Mother Earth Journal—I’ve edited some issues too.) 

They say it takes a minimum of 1 day of suffering for each time zone. I remember how it took me weeks to recover from Russia. How long will I suffer this time? Someone said that in a Concorde jet, you travel so fast, you arrive before you leave—earlier, that is, in New York than when you leave Paris! Where’s Einstein when you need him?

My cousin Sínead and I went huckleberrying the last weekend before the Autumn Equinox out at our secret spot on a hill near Tomales Bay, where we used to go with my grandmother. (They’re like tiny blueberries with 50 times the flavor.) 

From the isthmus, we could see Point Reyes in the distance, like a comma against the shining sea, separating Drake’s Bay from the raging Pacific—a misnamed ocean. Offshore fog rising up like a vast wall where tiny fishing boats disappeared into its maws, made me think of the painter, Turner. 

The pine forest took a beating from last year’s severe storms—so many uprooted trees met an abrupt end—we used them as aerial pathways up the hillsides. Since it’s all part of the Point Reyes National Seashore, we’re not supposed to gather anything—even huckleberries, so I stole an antler. 

We were hiding from the rangers but we had Sínead’s 22-month-old nephew, Séan to lug through the undergrowth. I had the odd sensation we were re-enacting an age-old ritual, gathering berries before the fall—no matter that our skin is white, not red. 

My aunt will make pies and ice cream, our teeth will be indigo-stained for days (like my fingers). How Pictish! The berries are so labor-intensive (cleaning takes longer than picking) we make jokes, compare them to caviar. We went to a party at a local ranch (Albert Straus) & made gallons of huckleberry ice cream.

* * * * * * *

What struck me most about returning home is the sharp, aromatic odor of bay laurel, poison oak pollen, and sun-burnt hay, flavored with the acrid, thirsty dust—the smell of late summer making me nostalgic (like Proust and his madelines?). 

Seeing all the lovely, steep hillsides against a cerulean sky, cloaked in tawny blond oatgrasses like sleeping lions, and the thick green-black oaks roiling in their crotches—so sexual, it surprises me anew each time I return. 

I’ll never forget how the mirrored San Francisco Bay and Mt. Tamalpais (our Mt. Fuji-san) from the fire-ravaged Oakland hills takes my breath away. 

The Sonoma-Marin Coast Miwok Indian word for the shining golden gate, Yulupa. All that’s left of the Bay Area Ohlone Indians’ stories of this landscape is: Dancing on the brink of the world. 

I love this landscape, but not the culture. I hate the vacuous American loudness, the lack of body awareness, the shallow chrome and Formica existence, the urban sprawl. . . the ultimate loneliness. I try to be somewhat tolerant, but I guess it’s not within my nature. And so I am alone, dancing on the brink of I know not what.

My 2nd night home, I was invited to a Sebastopol Arts Council meeting for the promotion of poetry in west Sonoma County, and I felt so jaded. “Been there, done that. Got the shirt. . .” Guess I should be glad poetry is so “in” but it just makes me bad-tempered and ornery—especially when they dream big, and haven’t a clue as to what goes on in putting on reading series and workshops, wanting more volunteer labor to make it happen. . .and I’ve got that shirt too—in several sizes. (And it’s got bloody holes in it by now!).

It feels a bit like a mausoleum here, in this poetry mecca of the world (and in my cabin too). I know I’ll grow used to it soon enough. 

I saw a bizarre English movie, The Draughtsman’s Contract, by Peter Greenaway, the director of The Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover. At the end there were all these Dutch references—someone speaking Dutch which I could almost understand. It had the peculiar effect of making me homesick for the wrong country. 

They say you always leave a part of yourself behind when you travel. Does that mean there’s less of me returning home each time I go away? (Hemingway said: Travel broadens the mind. Writing broadens the ass. I write standing up.)

* * * * * * *

NOV. 22, continued: Today’s the anniversary of day President Kennedy was shot. The proverbial question: what were you doing, where were you? (Not on the grassy knoll in Dallas, I presume!) I was in 3rd grade, sick with a flu (like today), sitting with my grandmother with my feet propped on the warm sides of the stove firebox (we have a gas stove with a wood burner for heat in Forest Knolls—not that newfangled modern heating! She was sitting by the stove, I was wallowing around on the floor in my quilted robe like a red and yellow paisley dust-walrus. It was a dreary day, much like today.

My aunt Canice’s husband Bill (Dave and Sínead’s father—they were staying with us) told us the news. (At one time or another, my grandmother’s house was a refuge to three of her four daughters in various reincarnations of distress). 

Fresh from the Nicasio Ranchouse bar, Bill Dinsmore came bursting through the front door, mid-afternoon—full of news. He was so excited, I mistook it for joyousness or frivolity. “The President’s been shot!” he shrieked. In retrospect, I think it was merely excitement and shock enhanced by the booze. 

My grandmother’s reaction of anguish (she who had buried a husband, a son and several brothers and sisters by this time), such a bizarre foil to my uncle’s giggling, I didn’t know what to think, only that Kennedy was akin to being a relative in our household. The Irish have elevated him to secular sainthood.

When visiting my relatives in Ireland in 1973, I was struck by how every house had its altar niche with Jesus and/or Mary (rarely Joseph) and Kennedy illuminated by a (red) votive candle. The sacred heart. Later, in 1989, when I visited Peru, it was like being in Ireland—Kennedy’s half-mast eyes blankly stared out at me from every niche. What do the dead still see from the eyes of photographs?

Of course, lots of controversial stories about Kennedy have surfaced since then. But, regardless of his politics and womanizing, he truly represented something as intangible as hope to so many oppressed peoples the world over. I can’t think of another American president that had that kind of global impact. Certainly not the Roosevelts, nor Eisenhower (course I wasn’t really politically savvy yet—born in 1952). Clinton’s been compared to Kennedy—but that’s a joke. 

Clinton couldn’t even fill the shadows of the soles of Kennedy’s feet. Still, I wonder, what would our perception of Kennedy been like if he’d run for office now, more than 25 years after his death; how would the world view him now?

Weird to see Fidel Castro on the telly the other night, Kennedy’s embargo from the Bay of Pigs crisis still in effect here—we get very little news of Cuba. I saw him on a Mexican TV channel—no voice of James Earl Jones sonorously announcing in that rich baritone: This is CNN! 

Remember those radio emergency broadcast tests when we were kids? The piercing tones followed by the announcement, “This is only a test. If it had been a real emergency . . .” and we thought maybe the Bomb was gonna drop? They’ve just eliminated them (I was surprised to still hear them on the BBC radio broadcast in Amsterdam). Now the new technology is just some computer chirps and clicks.

1 Dec. Sun. Well, a friend (a student’s mother) whisked me away to the beautiful tourist town of Carmel-by-the Sea for the weekend, so I turned 44 beneath a full Gemini moon by the Pacific Ocean (we were 2 houses away from the beach, a painter friend of hers’ rented a house for a full month). 

I no sooner returned home (Tues.) and left again to spend Thanksgiving (Thurs.) in Novato with Herman and Verona (his actress-girlfriend) and her 2 children, a Brazilian artist, and a Scottish actor from Glasgow played guitar in a kilt; we sang for our supper on full stomachs.

My innards are still unhappy, so I spent the weekend back in bed reading after nearly a week of socializing. I’ve been reading up on my ancestors, the Celts—I discovered that Laon (where I was in France) was an Irish monastery until ca. 1500 to 1700 AD. 

My favorite mystery scholar whom I know little about, a founder of many of the continental universities, was Johannes Scottus Eriugena (or John, the Irishman b. 810). He taught 25 years at Laon and at the Paris Court School for Charles the Bald (when he wasn’t being accused of heresy—which was often—for his radical doctrine preached the concept of free will. Note: this was long before Luther was a gleam in his great-grandparents’ eyes).

Here’s a little story about Eriugena: An emperor (Charles the Bald?) made a playful pun on two similar sounding words in Latin: sottum and scottum, and asked John what’s the difference between a fool and a Scot (Irishman) to which John replied, “Only the table.” (In Latin, of course: Quid distat inter sottum et scottum?). The king must’ve been seated across from the Irishman. I bet he was flabbergasted by the answer—talk about turned tables! 

But then it is said in our myths, satire was the first art form invented in Ireland. I found this gem in my friend Vinz’s flat: Adversus stultitiam pugnare nil est laboriusius nulla enim auctonate vinci fatetur nulla ratione suddetor. Which goes something like: nothing is more laborious than to fight against stupidity for it won’t bend to any authority and it won’t be convinced by any reason. He must have had some very challenging students at Laon University! If I don’t send this soon, it’ll be Christmas!

* * * * * * *

Weeks later: This is just to sat that I’ve obviously failed my first attempt at a quick Christmas Greeting Letter, a generic form which I find impersonal, lacking in the very juices that makes a letter a letter. It got me thinking about various forms of writing—why the epistolary letter written to one person and available to all, is more interesting than a shopping list or the dreaded Christmas Letter. 

And I realized part of the problem of the Christmas Letter was a dearth of anecdotal details and the metaphors we writers so preciously cling to. There’s no place for interaction for the reader unfamiliar with those mundane facts that comprise our lives. . . 

I used to think those self-absorbed Christmas Letter scribes, like Scrooge, must live the most thoroughly boring and mundane of lives, but when all my writer friends began sending me generic letters, I had to rethink the genre (if you can call it that). 

At least writers tend to add in a few lovely bits of human dross. When we reduce our lives to statistics, what’s left to ponder? No magic conjuring up or acknowledgement of the other. On the flip side of the coin, we live such a frenetic lives, stacks of unanswered letters haunt us like ghosts of Christmases past. 

To wit, the lowered literary standard of the Christmas Letter at half mast, or no communication at all? Dog-eared choices. Though I dislike the Christmas Letter, or any generic letter, I’ve come to the conclusion I’d rather hear some news than no news at all. This longwinded missive, a strange hybrid of journal entries and letter, I hope you haven’t found too tedious to read. The alternatave is either no news at all or generic Christmas Letter! So please forgive the amount of time I took to reply to your letters.

Dec. 30: Well, to paraphrase an olde English song: Christmas has come (the goose—well, actually, the turkey— is come and gone), all our pennies are in the merchant’s hats while we haven’t even two half-pennies to rub together—and your package still sits on the floor waiting for me to finish this letter. 

Though most of the pieces were assembled, I forgot to finish this letter, so now I must make another feeble attempt before year’s end. When I started this letter over a month ago, it was raining; would you believe it’s still raining! We had two clear days: Christmas eve and day. 

I think we got our entire 1997 rain allotment in November and December of 1996! 

We’ve just had both a flash flood warning at 2 p.m. (right now—wherever roads and creeks or culverts intersect, the water can rise several feet within minutes because the ground’s so saturated with water, and the rivers are so full, they can’t carry all their water to the sea.)

We also have a major river flood warning for this afternoon: our Russian River is to crest at about 36 feet above its summer banks at Hacienda Bridge—just 2 miles from my house. I’m above 100 feet; thank god for small favors called mountains. Of course, they’re the reason who we’re getting so much rain. 

I imagine this equivalent would put most of Holland underwater (we crossed that Zeeland dam, saw the flood photos of’54? Unimaginable.) The power’s been threatening to go out all day, flickering on and off; my computer’s not a happy camper. We’ve had terrible winds. Small branches falling on my roof and the hood of my truck. Another storm due in New Year’s Eve. 

Think I’ll practice growing webbed feet and feathers, or build an arc! In today’s newspaper, a photo of ice skaters in Holland and in the Midwest—South Dakota, I think; -40 (that’s Fahrenheit, not Celsius) in Montana where I just got a two week poetry job at a school in Feb. Brrr!!! Luckily the post office is nearby, though I may need a snorkel to get there! Or devolve.

Jan.7-15, 1997, Little Christmas aftermath: Our New Year’s storm is officially the worst recorded storm in California’s history, and the worst storm of the century, a warm, tropical storm, they call it the Hawaiian Punch. The Russian River crested at 46 feet above its summer banks (about two stories high? 32 feet is considered to be flood stage, but 1986 at 49 - 51 feet, and 1995 - 6 at 49 feet were much worse).

When the rains moved east, they restored ancient shorelines of the Great Central Valley Laguna that once extended 700 miles from Redding near Mt. Shasta to the Tehachipi Mountains near Los Angeles, to its original pre-1850s goldrush state (before hydraulic placer mining in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada range silted the Delta, and land reclamation drained the Delta). 

How soon people forget the land was reclaimed, thought “reclaimed” isn’t exactly the right word, since they claimed land for the first time within the past 100 years. The Delta region is flooded: most of the “islands” (they’re really polders) are 15 feet (I’m 5 feet 2 inches) or more below sea level, then 7 foot tides and high winds created 28 breeches along 1000 miles of levee (dijk); the ungirded rivers: the Sacramento, the Feather, the American, the Mokelumne, the Stanislaus, the Tuolumne, the Merced, and the San Joaquin mingle and wander where they please. 

Each day, a new catastrophe. From Lake Tahoe, the tentacled Truckee River in Reno went gamboling into all the casinos at once. The streets had rapids! Yosemite is a lake, not a valley. Whole campground have floated off, the bears wakened early from hibernation, are partying on food abandoned by fleeing winter campers.

Meanwhile, on the coast, the Russian, the Eel, the Gualala, and the Napa rivers have meekly climbed back into their beds after a few days’ freedom. The Russian River has now had three 100-year floods within one year’s time—January 1996-1997. 

As one man put it, “How many 100-year floods can we have within a decade?” The theory, of course, is that the river only floods disastrously once every 100 years on the average. We’ve had nearly a dozen floods since 1950, 1955, 1964, 1981 - 2, 1986, 1995, 1996 - 7. 

This year (1997) Santa Rosa got 20 inches of rain in 7 days, 2/3 of its annual rainfall. In 1996, a very wet year, it received 9 inches. We get nearly double the rainfall in Forestville averaging 40 - 60 inches, only 12 miles away. Cazadero, near the coast, at 90 - 100 inches, is an official “rainforest” receiving more than double our annual rainfall. 

Remember the scratchboard drawings I showed you of the flooded river? I’ve added some new ones this flood season. Did I leave you a copy of my flood prose-poem? Building an Arc in the Dark of the Year.

They now estimate the damage at $2 billion; 44 of our 58 counties called disaster areas; more than 200,000 acres underwater. After 40 inches of rain in 1 week (14 inches in one day), the Feather River crested an amazing 70 feet above its banks, carving a new channel (or reclaiming a prehistoric one) across the Great Central Valley. Boulders the size of micro-buses boomed and clattered down the Feather River Canyon sounding like giant pool, or bowling balls. The canyon vibrated all night long. 

Hydrological numbers are staggering. They estimated the river at the Oroville Dam flowed at nearly 100,000 gallons a second (imagine filling six Olympic-size swimming pools every second), and downstream it was even faster! 

Within the first seven days of the New Year, the Sacramento River, at 500,000 fps carried enough water to meet the needs (89,600 acre feet) of the entire city of San Francisco for 33 years. One acre-foot equals the equivalent of one football (soccer?) field flooded one foot deep; a family of 5 uses less than that a year. 

All rivers have either reached or exceeded their highest recorded flood levels recorded in modern times. Needless to say, most of our major highways across the state have been closed at one point or another. The smaller mountain highways may be closed indefinitely. Highway 50 to Tahoe lost 39 miles of roadbed.

Row crops washed out to sea: asparagus beds, wheat, rice—gone. The orchards & vineyards will probably survive. After the water receded in Forestville, cabbages & “yuppie designer” lettuce floated across Guerneville Road at the Santa Rosa Laguna; like dense mats of colorful leaves, unharvested red chili peppers and enormous yellow squashes floating atop the orchards & vineyards on River Road; you could mark the high water mark by the chilies dangling in the treetops on this last day of Christmas! 

Massive livestock losses. The surviving cows refuse to leave pastures and spend their days looking like spotted hippos in a chocolate sea. No way to milk them, creatures of habit, they resist rescuing. The legs of the unlucky ones pluck strands of barb-wire fences until they drown. Or hypothermia kills them. No arcs or hot tubs in sight. 

Now ironically, we have blue skies, sunny days, and an Arctic cold snap, black frosts, snow on the way (very rare by the coast). It was 18 degrees Fahrenheit (-5° Celsius) one night; my outside plants survived summer drought & winter flooding only to die from frost. My fingers numb, this time from the cold. You might not find it cold, but we’re not used to such weather in this “Mediterranean” coastal climate zone.

California reminds us that it’s still a wild untamed animal, a sometimes dangerous land of extremes. Important reminder as we continue to mindlessly grow (31 million) develop and build on fragile land that should be better left for agricultural use for that very reason. 

Once again I’m under the blankets, this time just to keep warm! The kitchen heater doesn’t heat this part of the room, it escapes through the uninsulated knotty pine walls of the summer cabin, never meant for year-round habitation, nor severe winter cold spells. 

Unfortunately only my poor refrigerator freezer is warmed by the heater’s valiant efforts, and keeps melting faster the colder it gets. If only I could train the hot air to enter through doorways and lay low like groundfog instead of uselessly rising to the ceiling like the floodwaters. 

Sometimes I stand on a chair to reach the heat just to and thaw my hands and nose! (I over-exaggerate! hyperbole thins the blood. I’m never too sure where one paragraph should end, and another begin, I fall victim to runaway sentences and ideas, switch thoughts mid-stream. . . all this coupled with a miserly compulsion to fill every page.)

And I never even mentioned the event that derailed me from finishing and mailing this letter: the rain falling in sheaves New Year’s Eve practically on the stroke of midnight! It was as if the sky had opened a vast drain, water flooding the roads so fast. 

Driving home from a friend’s in Santa Rosa (I left at the stroke of midnight, as a severe thunderstorm began voicing a warning of more rain, the Russian River was already at 36’ above flood stage, any new rain meant getting stranded in Santa Rosa). I nearly went off into an embankment twice, skidding out of control when I hit invisible pockets of water. 

My New Year’s resolution was to find my driveway, which became an impromptu creekbed; I think we had something like 7 inches of rain. A 20 - 25 minute drive took me nearly an hour to get home. I went down to the river, it was about 40 feet above its banks and rising. I knew we were in for a big flood, but I had no idea the Central Valley would fare worse than us. A big surprise. 

I understand you too have had your share of cold weather. When we haven’t been preoccupied with water, we’ve seen photos of frozen waterfalls in Hungary, skating festivals in Holland, some 200 dead from the cold? Welcome to 1997? Dare I ask how you’re faring? I’d best send this soon or I’ll feel compelled to report on yet another catastrophe of biblical proportions like pestilence or famine.

Note bene: (2/18/2012) apparently my missive and care packages laden with poetry never arrived to De Weerlet, a house built in 1606, with De Weerlet and clamshell stucco over its door lintel—in Vlissingen, Netherlands, as Wim had moved. Sixteen years later, Wim found me on the internet via an article I'd published on Antarctica on RedRoom. Small weerlet indeed. So for the first time, I've got a photo of me painting Wim's garden, and the image on the same page. Circles colliding. A gift. It's rare that one gets closure, a circle of time completed like this.

Here's a Wiki entry on Wim.

Wim Hofman - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia