Philip Whalen's Collected Forthcoming from Wesleyan University Press

The Collected Poems of Philip Whalen, edited by Michael Rothenberg of Big Bridge Press with a forward by Gary Snyder and introduction by Leslie Scalapino is due out in November 2007.

Review Forthcoming.

Forthcoming Poetry Readings by Jacqueline Gens

Jacqueline Gens will read in Amherst, MA on November 2, 2007 for The Hampshire County Partnership to Improve end of Life Care program along with poets, Barbara Paparazzo and Christie Svane at:

How We Remember: A Day of the Dead Celebration
Friday, November 2, 2007 beginning at 7:30 pm
Nacul Center
592 Main StAmherst, MA

The festivities include
• an art show with the theme of remembering,
• A mariachi band to add to the celebration,
• Food and beverage (of course!)
• a program consisting of readings, dance and other
entertainment with the theme of remembering.

5:30 – 7:30 pm open art exhibit, live music
7:30 - 9:30 pm poetry program

The Partnership is a nonprofit organization with the mission of educating the community to make informed choices about end of life care. Because the Partnership recognizes that dying is a part of living, our goal in having the Day of the Dead weekend is to invite our community to take part in activities to help raise awareness of the issues surrounding death in our culture.

***

Putney, VT Library Series, December 6, 2007, Jacqueline Gens and John Rose of Landmark College will read. Further details TBA

Jacqueline Gens is co-director and a founder of of the MFA Program in Poetry at New England College. For many years, she worked for the late poet, Allen Ginsberg and is a long time practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism. Her manuscript, Primo Pensiero, with a foreword by Anne Waldman, is forthcoming from Shivastan Publications in the winter of 2008.

Backstory

My poem in honor of the Dalai Lama receiving the Congressional medal of honor on November 17, 2007.

Backstory

Above the din of Amy’s café
in the backroom overlooking the river
loud words drift over to our table,
Did the Dalai Lama ever have a job
like shinning shoes? The old Vermonter
leans towards his wife who's eating a croissant
looking away from him.

I want to reach across the room
and tell him “yes” about my dream
of the Dalai Lama in a glass airport tower
directing traffic on the runway
of life and death and that his question
isn’t so ridiculous as his wife’s response suggests.

I want to tell him that the monk once held my left hand
at a reception while he massaged my palm
looking into my eyes talking of nothing much
as he rearranged my subtle energies,
my right hand gripping
the glass of white wine until I jumped
in recognition of what was happening.
So strange, so intimate, so wonderous--
the shock of his kind gesture in passing,
as loud as the man’s words in the café.

10/17/07
by Jacqueline Gens

Barbara Moraff

Vermont poet, BARBARA MORAFF recently sent a letter regarding a project she is fundraising for in honor of her much loved son, Marco Moraff Alonzo, who died April 18, 2007. Although diagnosed with cystic fibrosis, Marco lived far beyond his normal life expectancy with a passion for painting, gardening, sculpture and writing. He taught organic gardening for youngsters at the White River Junction Community Gardens. Barbara is currently collecting funds for a three-stage composting facility for the White River Community Gardens in Marco's honor.

Donations can be mailed to:

Barbara Moraff
76 Harveys' Hollow Road
Danville, VT 05828

Click on her name above to link to her wikipedia biography and list of publishers and publications. A couple of summers ago while I cooked for a two week retreat at Karme Choling in Barnet, Vermont, l met Barbara again after 20 years when we first attended Chogyam Trungpa's last 3 month seminary retreat together back in 1986. She makes the most extraordinary Tibetan Barley Bread that she sells along with her pottery to supplement her income. Along with her recent letter, she sent a fine Longhouse limited edition book, Footprints.

Online poetry from Barbara Moraff
Three Poems for Cid Corman

Here's a great photo of Barbara and Allen Ginsberg circa 1959, I found on Kingdom Books blog [Allen Ginsberg and Barbara Moraff at 7 Arts Coffee Gallery, NYC, 1959; photo by Dave Heath]. You can also read more on Barbara on their site.

Robin Kornman (1947-2007) Translator of Gesar of Ling

Professor Robin Kornman, reknowned Tibetan translator and scholar of the Tibetan Gesar of Ling epic died peacefully on July 31 after a long illness. Robin was a life-long student of the late Tibetan master, Chogyam Trungpa, founder of Naropa University, whom he met in his youth. As a translator of Tibetan literature, Robin was part of the Nalanda translation team who worked on The Rain of Wisdom, one of the first collections of Tibetan poetry translated into English.

For decades Robin devoted his life to working on translating the
Gesar of Ling epic, the longest epic in world literature believed to be over 1000 years old and still widely performed through out Central Asia. While a number of translations exist of the Gesar epic, Robin's unique gift and exacting scholarship rivals many of these translations. For an exquisite taste of his elegant language, click here, to access some examples. The Gesar of Ling represents a living Heroic epic cycle where the forces of good and evil are played out in the human realm. In Robin's own words:

The Tibetan Epic of Gesar of Ling is an immense oral epic which is still sung by bards. It exists in literally hundreds of volumes, some of them transcriptions of bardic performances, others original compositions.

The Gesar is a vast treasury of Inner Asian literary culture. It is still sung today in Tibet and is known in different languages and editions along the Silk Route and throughout the Far East. It contains long sections of prose narration alternating with hundreds of epic ballads and examples of every sort of poetry in the Tibetan repertoire, both folk and classical. In size it is like The Arabian Nights. In its breadth, unity, and seriousness, it is like the Homeric epics or the Mahabharata.
It tells the story of a enlightened warrior named Gesar. At the beginning of the epic he is a Buddhist deity named Good News, living peaceably in a Buddhist heaven. The Tibetan tantric sorceror, Padmasambhava, and the bodhisattva of compassion, Avalokiteshvara, attempt to involve him in worldly affairs. These events are reported in the extremely metaphysical first volume of the epic, the Lha gLing or The Divine Land of Ling.

During the years I worked for the poet, Allen Ginsberg, Robin met with Allen on a number of occasions for feedback on his translations into English. For a fine article on Robin, read Larry Mermelstein's recollection.