The Living Dead

Honouring our poetic ancestors

Airs and Angels: This Night Only

By Kenneth Rexroth 1905-1982

Moonlight   now    on Malibu

The winter night    the few stars

Far away   millions    of miles

The sea   going on    and on

Forever     around   the earth

Far    and     far     as your lips    are near

Filled    with the same light     as your eyes

Darling     darling     darling

The future     is long gone by

And the past     will never happen

We have     only this

Our one forever

So small    so infinite

So brief    so vast

Immortal     as our hands that touch

Deathless     as the firelit wine we drink

Almighty      as this single kiss

That has no beginning

That will never

Never

End

Wikipedia (see the link on the poet's name, above) describes Kenneth Rexroth as 'an American poet, translator and critical essayist' and goes on to say:

'He is regarded as a central figure in the San Francisco Renaissance, and paved the groundwork for the movement. Although he did not consider himself to be a Beat poet, and disliked the association, he was dubbed the "Father of the Beats" by Time Magazine. He was among the first poets in the United States to explore traditional Japanese poetic forms such as haiku.'

The same article notes that his erotic poetry was particularly admired, springing from 'a deep fascination with transcendent love'. I certainly admire the poem I've chosen for you this week. I love the haunting sensuousness combined with a feeling of timeless calm.

City Lights Bookstore says of him

'His poems are characterized by such an unusual range of concerns that he often began his poetry readings by wryly asking the audience: “Well, what would you like tonight: sex, mysticism or revolution?” Though almost entirely self-educated, his erudition was astonishingly broad-ranging, as reflected in essays on topics as diverse as ancient Chinese science, modern jazz, American Indian songs, California mountaineering, medieval mysticism, avant-garde art and utopian communities.'

Rexroth had a long and busy career, working for some years as an academic, but mainly publishing a lot of books – mostly poetry but also essays and criticism (though he said he only wrote prose for money!) as well as many translations of Japanese and Chinese women poets. We are told that he also promoted the work of women poets 'in America and overseas', and that he was famously anti-misogynistic. He was a pacifist, was perceived as being aligned with various radical movements during his life, and described himself as 'a philosophical anarchist'. 

Here is a fascinating fact which I didn't know before:

'With The Love Poems of Marichiko, Rexroth claimed to have translated the poetry of a contemporary, "young Japanese woman poet," but it was later disclosed that he was the author, and he gained critical recognition for having conveyed so authentically the feelings of someone of another gender and culture.'

(I gotta get that book!)

There is a longer and more scholarly article about him at The Poetry Foundation, going into great detail about his poetics, and on his importance as a figure in American literary and political life. 

His writings are available from Amazon – of course running into several pages. 

Poems and photos posted to 'The Living Dead' for purposes of study and review remain the property of the copyright holders.