Loss - Morton Marcus, James D. Houston, Ruth Daigon
Preparing for my Esalen April 9-11 Autobiography workshop, find I'm preoccupied... wake at 4 AM to scribble, recounting dream in which I witness 3 giant pine trees near a hilltop... and they're falling / crashing like those trees in that climatic Avatar battle scene. And jotting, I realize they represent our loss in the course of just a few months of 3 dear friends, novelist James D. Houston, poet Morton Marcus, and Ruth Daigon, poet and editor of a magazine called Poets: On. Friends all, giants, each in their way, giants in our circle of friends.
Age 76, I realize that in addition to everything else we'll cover in the Esalen Autobiography workshop, loss and grief may be larger subjects than I'm accounting for. Reflecting now on how best to respond, how best to work with those in the class who, like myself, may find themselves dealing with loss, the loss of family members, friends, colleagues and/or personal illness... and how best to write about it.
These are such, sad, generous poems--peopled with characters it's impossible not to love, especially Robert's podiatrist-Jewish-Rosicrucian father with his wisdom that bridges dualities expounding on the feet and the soul, sex and death, the broken and the whole. In one poem, Robert asserts, In a world of 'No, dogs are a Yes.' And in the world of poetry, this book is a resounding Yes. Read it when you're happy, but especially read it when you're depressed. You'll find yourself joining in with the many dogs in these poems, saying, 'Woof, woof f----in' woof!”
—Poet Ellen Bass
About Robert
Guggenheim Fellow, chosen by Lucille Clifton for a Villa Montalvo Literary Arts Award, author of more than 20 books, including Four Incarnations (Coffee House Press), Heavenly Sex, God is in the Cracks and The Collected Poems (now in its 2nd printing),...
Connections
Causes Robert Sward Supports
Audubon Society, National Geographic, "Green," the Environment, SPCA...
Robert’s Favorite Books
Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass, Saul Bellow's Adventures of Augie March, Ezra Pound's Make It New, T.S. Eliot's Collected Poems, The Autobiography of Benjamin...
Robert is a fan of
info@esalen.org
Contact Esalen for more info and / or robert@robertsward.com
or, ph: 831.667.3038 for Esalen Program staff.
mourning for Ruth Daigon
Ruth was a talented poet who was kind enough to provide feedback and encouragement on a very early and rough poem I sent her. Poets On was my standard when I started writing