6/24, Wednesday. Nothing scheduled. Linda Wargo's class was canceled at the last minute. These things happen. A riot, a lockdown, and everybody loses. So I hang out with the typewriter and Patricia ushers likely unsuspecting prospects my way.
I got a nifty Canon Typestar six typewriter that has a three-line memory that allows me to type and print poems out at Napa. That process instantaneously makes a radical difference in how people respond to the writing process. Immediate reward.
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Peter D, a Berkeley communist revolutionary, tells me his fiancée jumped off the Golden gate Bridge and will bring a poem later.
On the outside, and why I'm here were our writing prompts.
Peter tells me, We had an unique situation in Marin. We had a teacher, Sam Johnson, at College of Marin, who led us, who brought us books, we wouldn't have been able to otherwise read. He was eventually hit by a truck.
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Peter D, a Berkeley communist revolutionary, tells me his fiancée jumped off the Golden gate Bridge and will bring a poem later.
On the outside, and why I'm here were our writing prompts.
Peter tells me, We had an unique situation in Marin. We had a teacher, Sam Johnson, at College of Marin, who led us, who brought us books, we wouldn't have been able to otherwise read. He was eventually hit by a truck.
Someone else said, and don't let that man have any magazines. He's a child molester. There's a picture of kids and babysitting them.
In the library I run into Sally Lacy, my mom's old friend from the Sausalito days. My mom, Sally Lacy, Sally Stanford, Juanita Musson were Sausalito's bad girls. These unique women were my early mentors. A cook, a mayor, a former Madame, and an actress. Sally tells me she's from Ward Q1. There's a payphone near their ward which is a very big deal. Communication with the outside world is possible with one thin dime.
Well, Mom told me to look out for Sally Lacy here. Sally was standing by the world globe, muttering and looking for Malaysia. The librarian asked her, Do you want to meet a poet? She snapped, NO. And she fiercely spun the globe. I recognized her voice. I said tp Patricia: Tell her that Kellé's daughter is here to see her. Kellé who? She asked, trying to place the name. Kellé Green, I said. Startled, Sally turned toward me, recognition, dawning, and asked, What on earth are YOU doing here? Thinking I too was an inmate. Hahah.
Sally tells me I look just like my mother, she says. Spitting image. Petting my face. We talked about my mother and caught up on old times. She wants to know how Kellé is doing. It's always a variable thing, I say. Sally gets it.
It is eerie, even uncanny to be sitting across the table from Sally in the library, knowing that I knew her way back when—when I was very young. And here she is now, the blonde bombshell, once a Hollywood stand-in actress for Marilyn Monroe, now a withered crone, her tongue thick from medication, dry mouth, missing teeth. smeary mascara, Is that what's in store for me? A sobering thought. I didn't ask what atrocity brought her here. That would be delving too deep into the past.
It is eerie, even uncanny to be sitting across the table from Sally in the library, knowing that I knew her way back when—when I was very young. And here she is now, the blonde bombshell, once a Hollywood stand-in actress for Marilyn Monroe, now a withered crone, her tongue thick from medication, dry mouth, missing teeth. smeary mascara, Is that what's in store for me? A sobering thought. I didn't ask what atrocity brought her here. That would be delving too deep into the past.
I put up a display of my Mexico aquarelle paintings and poetry in the library, and I made and mailed flyers and sent them to all the wards. I wonder if anyone will come. still, it is comforting to me, to be surrounded by all my work in that library.
Scheduling problems again. I'm trying to work with more groups. Too much slack time. We spent most of the afternoon trying to fill vacancies. Clearly I'm not good with downtime. I like to be busy. I could use the time to write, but I'm easily distracted, and it's hard to concentrate in this strangest of places. My California Arts Council artist in libraries grant is unique. The other artists who were chosen for the project, are working in regular libraries with a normal clientele. And here I am, hanging out with the crazies. Double indemnity.
Chuck comes up, and spontaneously dictates a poem to me. You have to be ready to assemble the parts—to borrow a line from David Meltzer. I'm glad they are beginning to see me as the town scribe. But the impulse and urgency to get it down takes over everything else. I feel like I'm up at bat, the bases are loaded, and I'm on strike two. And someone just kicked sand in my eyes.
Inside Chuck's locker
Inside Chuck's locker
A domain
Artistic paintings
Four corners
A picture in the middle
Three cats
A picture of a woman
down below a rainbow
underneath a tunnel
It has a saying on there
Once upon a time
A story
A hat
Went to autumn
Come cat
Brittle star
A windmill,
It has a saying on there
Once upon a time
A story
A hat
Went to autumn
Come cat
Brittle star
A windmill,
like a bucket drifting off.
Chuck D Ward S – 9
List poem
Chuck D Ward S – 9
List poem
