Those Were the Days, My Friends

The Editors of Madrona (Seattle, Washington, 1971-1979?): Photograph taken on the terrace of Eleni’s house in Remmatia, summer, 1985. From left to right, John Levy, JK (Ken) Osborne, Vassilis Zambaras—those were the days (including those much earlier than these), my friends. Ah, but do not let the somber black bordering deceive you: All three are alive and well and living their separate lives, though separated by thousands of miles of earth and water: Levy works for the Public Defender’s Office in Tucson, Arizona, Osborne is a retired high-school teacher now taking it easy in Marica, Brasil, and Zambaras is self-anointed Poet-in-Residence in the Peloponnese. 

More on Madrona and its editors coming up soon.

Concordance

It is thus duly decreed:

In accordance with the laws
Of nature, heavenly

Raindrops shall fall,

And remain

Shining strings of beads adorning

This drab, naked clothesline

Till almighty earth overpowers them

And they succumb to the temptation

To exist accordingly.

Wise Old Bird

Sunset’s dying,

Not so

 

Transient owl

Tells me

It won’t

Last forever,

 

But who am I

To give a hoot.

Morning "Haiku" Exercise

Freezing grey

Blanket of fog

At zero visibility

Warming up,

Biking through.

Huuklyeand Cinquor on Poets Sick to Death of the Muse

Ma chérie, I know

You’re dying to tell us a story,

But before you do, please

Please don’t tell us

It ends adieu.

Moderator’s comments: In all seriousness, could this indecorously punning poem be a veiled allusion to Graves’ Good-bye to All That? If so, it would serve to reinforce the opinion—shared by many seasoned and decorated veterans of the poetry wars—that Cinquor has finally crossed the thin, hazy line separating poetic decency from crass stupidity; he should therefore be declared persona non grata in La República Musa and dispatched to No Man’s Land with no further ado.

Frank Samperi's A Remotis

A Remotis, published by Querencia Books, Seattle, 1979. Cover photograph by Mona Nagai. See Claudia Samperi-Warren at poetfranksamperi to read some of her father’s poems from this beautiful little book edited by John Levy.

The Three Stages of the World According to Monsanto

Where we find our indefatigable poetic muckraker plowing through the once-fruitful, now seedy lower forty only to find nothing out there standing but the husks of sodbusters stalked to death by a transmogrified jolly Green Giant.