Remembering Alice Notley (1945-2025)

Christopher Luna, Douglas Oliver and Alice Notley in June 1998

I was sad to learn that Alice Notley has died. I was very fortunate to study with Alice Notley at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics from June 14-21, 1998, when she was a visiting faculty member for the Summer Writing Program. I found Alice to be charming, brilliant, and down-to-earth. Her approach to finding material for her poems was very liberating for me. I was also treated very kindly by her sons Anselm and Edmund and her husband Douglas Oliver, for whom I served as a teaching assistant that week. Other students in the workshop included Lisa Birman, Tyler Burba, Josepha Conrad, Virginia Evans, Derek Fenner, Rachel Levitsky, Colleen McGovern, Matt Meighan, Jeni Olin, Diana Rickard, and Cedar Sigo. Below I have pasted some photos from that wonderful week at the Naropa Institute.

Here are my notes for Alice Notley's workshop: 

     

Later I was honored when Douglas Oliver and Alice Notley selected one of my poems for literary magazine Gare du Nord, which was published iun France, where they lived.

This was one of my first published poems. It was so exciting to be published in another country, and by two such esteemed poets. 

Here is a black-and-white reproduction of the front cover of my journal that I included in the materials I submitted for credit that summer. 

My heart goes out to Alice Notley's family, freinds, and students. 

Poetry and Art in Loving Memory of Diane di Prima

Revolutionary poet Diane di Prima is gone, but her work and the positive energy she created and nurtured will live on. I count myself among the poets who consider her a heroic model for how to be a dissident artist and decent, loving human being. 

 

Diane di Prima and Anne Waldman at the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics 

Summer Writing Program, July 1997 (photo by Christopher Luna)

Ten years after I met Diane di Prima at the Naropa Institute, I was thrilled to find her name on my list for the August Postcard Poetry Fest. Here is the postcard and poem I received from her:

It made me very nervous to write a spontaneous poem to one of my poetic elders. Here is the poem I wrote for her (and the collage postcard I created):  

“Dustbowl Dirge” postcard sent to Diane di Prima, San Francisco, CA August 14, 2007:

EYE CATALYST for Diane di Prima

we are charged with a responsibility

whether we take on the role

            of observer, critic,

            priestess, or shaman

 

my painter friend is a former Kansas ninja

and the reincarnation of ninth-Century warrior

who smokes to quiet the voices in his head

and understands that to name

may also be to destroy

 

he brings me finished canvasses

which I am invited to amend according to my liking

and I get nervous, my Sharpie-holding hand trembling

with a sense of obligation

whatever I choose to add

must be right, it must be worthy

must move

must add

rather than take away

 

we get trashed, laugh

and rub our beards

(mark of our status, for some,

as revolutionary perverts)

we are dangerous

create word bombs

to dismantle capitalism

and undo the hatred in the human heart

while plotting our respective strategies

in the ongoing war against the imagination

A few years later, Erin Dengerink and I collaborated on an artwork based on this poem. She drew the figures in the foreground and cut the holes representing thought bubbles that I filled with collage. I also contributed the lettering featuring a few lines from EYE CATALYST:  

EYE CATALYST for Diane di Prima

by Erin Dengerink and Christopher Luna

DETAIL

EYE CATALYST for Diane di Prima

by Erin Dengerink and Christopher Luna

Here is the postcard and poem I received from Diane di Prima in 2008:

“Poetics of memory” postcard and poem ("Saving Janis") by Christopher Luna sent to Raul Sanchez, Seattle, WA on July 30, 2008 AND Diane di Prima San Francisco , CA on September 5, 2008:

 

SAVING JANIS

In the photograph

Janis looks like a hippie goddess

open, vulnerable

hair and beads

cascading over her nipples

hands crossed

in front of the flower

of her sex

 

Frame the fallen queen

and place her portrait

on your bathroom wall.

 

Rendering each morning

a portal to another time.

 

If you could you’d wrap your arms around her

whisper sweet words of praise in her ear

and when she closes her eyes to kiss you

hide the half-finished bottle of Southern Comfort

Posted by Christopher Luna with love and respect for Diane di Prima

November 7, 2020

Saying Goodbye to Two Beloved Naropa Teachers: Poems for Bobbie Louise Hawkins and Bill Scheffel

Bobbie Louise Hawkins with Jackson Mac Low, Jim Carroll, Peter Lamborn Wilson, and Steven Taylor in the tent at the 1999 Summer Writing Program, Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics, Boulder, CO

A Few Words of Encouragement from a Retired Muse

With Love and Respect for Bobbie Louise Hawkins

your hand on my shoulder

your gaze of steel

and your love emanating

in the form of a growl of command

as you let me know

that you think I ought to keep it up

a quick moment

you’d soon forget

an act of generosity

powerful enough

to sustain me

for going-on two decades

thank you for the permission

to tell family secrets

to eschew starfucking

& to proceed without fear

            never explain

            never apologize

            make friends with the microphone

even the fiercest of protectors

must eventually leave us

            if all goes well to

be transformed into

guiding spirits

angels of reassurance

reminders of our impermanence

our damnably reliable

temporariness

Resurrection Ritual for Bill Scheffel

based on notes from his Shambala Meditation Practicum

Naropa Institute, Fall 1997

I wouldn’t say that I understand the environment;

I simply experience it. John Cage

are you on time?

what is your experience of time?

do you feel you have enough time?

can you listen to someone

without simultaneously critiquing

what they’ve said?

how much are we tasting all of our experience?

how much do you consider the beauty in your life?

does the universe have an opinion?

is there consciousness before opinion?

before opinions is the cosmic mirror

nowness is intuitive intelligence

something intelligent that just witnesses

This is perfect (perfected, complete, flawless).

Expression of a man I admire.

we carry the burden

of survival

we are under duress

we need to undo this numbness

we are dominated by narration

we internalize metaphors, and they can become very powerful

we can hold on to a particular thought for our entire lives

            this thought may not be true

the drala has been dispelled by the modern industrial world

barrage of competing thoughts like gunfire

patchwork of masks which form a cocoon

we don’t want to deal with the intensity of the moment

emotions are energy, not a story

what we see is largely memory

get over your mythology

reverse the process, flip figure & ground

notch, catalogue, pivot

change allegiance from thought to intuition

return to awareness

become where you are

look at what is

when you notice an intensity

become a block of wood (this is a metaphor)

                                   

(this creates space)

vastness in the moment

experience has a duration

beneath fear is tenderness

the warrior cultivates both fearlessness & gentleness

faith, creativity, joy, nature, trust

curiosity is high intelligence

awareness is my home

It’s a lofty goal, but I’m not a bodhistattva

                        I’m right here

I have already survived

 

What did you learn from Bobbie Louise Hawkins?

A Call for Submissions

Kona Morris has been working on creating a craft book with Bobbie, tentatively entitled Bobbie On Writing. Kona and Bobbie’s daughter, Sarah Creeley, have decided that in addition to the pages compiling Bobbie’s remarkable insight on the art, craft, and process of writing, they will also include a section in the book from people whom Bobbie inspired.

We are asking anyone who ever internalized something from Bobbie’s exceptional wisdom—about the craft of writing and performance, but also about life and anything else—to submit a piece for the book.

These essays (or whatever form they take) will serve as a sort of collective Afterward, a compilation of testimonies, for all those people who were never fortunate enough to learn straight from the source, and for those who have yet to discover the extraordinary gift that the literary world had in Bobbie Louise Hawkins.

Please share this with anyone who knew Bobbie, and email all submissions to the following email address by December 31st, 2018: BobbieOnWriting@gmail.com