Anne Waldman

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From the Preface of Triumvirate of the Monkeys
(One of my new poetry chapbooks)

Estoit-il lors temps de moy taire ?

—François Villon

A triumvirate is a political regime dominated by three powerful people.  For the title of this collection of poetry, I thus chose to depict the three infamous see-no-evil, hear-no-evil, speak-no-evil monkeys as a sort of omnipotent intellectual triumvirate reigning, as unwritten rule of law, over the firmly entrenched Academic/Literary Established Order in America.  The god-like figure of intellectual corruption standing behind the triumvirate, William Bulger, was former president of the Massachusetts State Senate. then University of Massachusetts, where he was forced to resign, though had overwhelming support from the faculty. He’d refused to testify in a 2003 Congressional hearing about communications he’d had with his brother, Whitey, mass-murderer, Boston crime boss (today serving a life-sentence in prison). From political hack to university hack has become Massachusetts in a nutshell.  As for the three monkeys, I chose Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets Anne Waldman, Poet Laureate of the USA Natasha Trethewey, and Obama’s PC-Inaugural Poet Richard Blanco.  Of course, many others could have illustrated them, including Robert Pinsky, Gary Snyder, Ferlinghetti, Maya Angelou, Andre Dubus III, Billy Collins, John Ashbury, Mark Doty, Nikki Giovanni, Louise Gluck, Martín Espada, C. D. Wright, and Franz Wright. 

Much of my creative criticism has been directed against the triumvirate, though the latter is essentially impervious to such criticism.  Why therefore bother?  In early 2010, an anonymous personage, pseudonym’ing as Mr. Spock, posed that question on The American Dissident blog site: 

If you really disdain the academy, then why this blog and journal that seem to be obsessed by it and its petty squabbles? How can you afford to spend so much energy on your bitterness? I grant that I'm not responding to your arguments but I don't understand, from a mental health standpoint, how you can go on making them and making them.

In the above message, four derogatory terms are used with my regard—disdain, obsessed, bitterness, and petty squabbles.  The “academy,” or as I term it the Academic/Literary Established Order, represents the very core of the nation’s intellect.  So, why shouldn’t I be interested in it?  In fact, why are so few poets and artists interested in how it tends to scorn FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION and VIGOROUS DEBATE, preferring instead speech codes, collegiality, cronyism, and resultant toadyism?

What I disdain is not the “academy” per se, but rather its cogs—professors, poets, deans, librarians, publishers, cultural apparatchiks, etc.—who disdain debate and freedom of speech.  If the majority of those cogs were open to those cornerstones of democracy, I would not have any disdain.  As for the ivory tower, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education notes that about 60% of universities possess policies that seriously restrict freedom of speech. Even in the institutions not possessing such policies, many professors clearly do not appreciate the First Amendment.  Speak the PC-party line, or keep your mouth shut constitutes their prevailing rule of order. 

Moreover, it is not a question of obsessed, but rather one of creative impulse.  In essence, provoking academics and poets often provides me with interesting material.  If writing poetry and drawing satirical cartoons from such material constitute obsession, then any interest can be subjectively deemed thusly.  I mentioned this to the  anonymity in question, but he or she remained silent. Epithets serve to divert attention away from uncomfortable truths.  It is likely the anonymity was an academic and/or poet, who did not possess the courage to do as I do and thus felt compelled to dismiss what I do as disdain, obsessed, and bitterness.  Standing up and speaking openly, not behind closed doors as most professors tend to do, enables me to maintain a certain human dignity that so many willingly sacrifice for career, fame, and money. 

How to explain to poets why I chose to stand up and read poems critical of the poetry-event organizers, who in 2001 paid me $800 and provided a hotel room gratis for 10 days as an invited poet in Canada?  Of course, I was never invited back.  But I kept my dignity, while sacrificing who knows how much money.  If I had been a nice smiley-face poet, I probably would have been invited back every year like many of the other smiley-face poets.  That’s about $10,000 or more since 2001!  But the 149 other remunerated poets at the Festival International de la Poésie de Trois-Rivières would not understand.  Evidently, the anonymity would not understand.  So, I suggested he or she consider moving to Saudi Arabia and perhaps adorning a burqa. From my perspective, the time I spend denouncing intellectual fraud is well spent. But from the “cog” perspective, it could only be perceived as a sign of bitterness.  The important question regarding these things is why so many citizens—the vast majority—, from a mental health standpoint, do not give a damn about intellectual corruption and tend to dismiss anybody who does as bitter. Most citizens seem to prefer Stepford-wife positivism, censorship, self-censorship, and authoritarianism to the First Amendment. That certainly reflects my experiences testing the waters of democracy. 

Finally, at the end of this collection are poems written during my two-month winter stint teaching English on the USS Boone, a military frigate, which sailed from Norfolk, VA to Columbia, then back and dumping me off at Panama City.  I’d also done a stint several years earlier on the battleship USS Bataan.  Those two experiences were unique.  Once I was a tenure-track professor at corrupt Fitchburg State University (MA).  If I’d succeeded in getting tenure, I’d probably be writing dull articles on geolinguistics today and wouldn’t have gotten to do stints at sea, nor in Louisiana, North Carolina, and Martha’s Vineyard Island. BTW, Estoit-il lors temps de moy taire is a refrain from a poem written in 1463, “Ballade du Guichetier Garnier.”  Imagine, a lone poet stood up for Freedom of Speech in the darkness of the Middle Ages.  “Should I have kept my mouth shut?” he wrote over and again. Most say, yes.  Villon and I say, no. 

 

Mary Jo Bang

Fluttering Dichterlings

There’s often a world of cocooned vacuity on the website of the Academy of American Poets... because the high-and-mighty Academy chancellors are as established order as it gets.  Do not offend is their mantra.  Smile, you’re on clever camera!  You’d be hard-pressed to find just one dissident mind amongst the lot of them.  Gary Snyder?  Maybe 100 years ago, but certainly not today.  He's comfortably gone from Beatnik to tenured emeritus academic stuffed in the established-order canon.  Oops.  He’s no longer on the chancellor roster. 

A handful of poets were asked on the Academy website (poets.org) to respond to the following question posed by some invisible Academy chancellor or likely lackey thereof: 

“What do you see as the role of the poet in today’s culture?” 

Now, if I were asked that question, I’d state upfront precisely what the chancellors would not wish to hear, for evidently they'd feel inevitably and uncomfortably, though indirectly, targeted. 

The poet, above and beyond all else, ought to decry censorship, speak rude truth even at the expense of literary and/or academic career, and otherwise be a soldier/defender of freedom of speech and vigorous debate, democracy's cornerstones.  He or she ought to have the courage to especially denounce the censorship effected by organizations like the Academy of American Poets. 

A few years ago, I’d contacted members of an earlier flock of chancellors who proved indifferent to censorship.  One of them is present in the current flock, prof emeritus, ex-hippie Lyn Hejinian.  No matter.  The careers of chancellor Dichterlings depend on chancellor Dichterlings turning a blind eye and adorning a classy-looking muzzle. 

Mary Jo Bang was first to present a response:  “Today, as in any era, there are myriad roles for poets: semiotician, elegist, eulogist, gamer, white noise machine, musician, Sapphist, theorist, father figure, bird watcher, a video projection of a moving mouth—all trapped behind the glass of Wittgenstein's fly-bottle.”   

Jo Bang seems to excel like most other known poets in the art of vacuous verbiage.  Perhaps that’s the true role of today's poet.  Brilliant, Jo Bang!

Mark Bibbins was next in line:  “To point out that today's culture has spinach in its teeth and egg on its face.” 

Now, that’s a good way to avoid speaking rude truth!  Cover it up with egg… and why not throw some bacon in its mouth too?   Brilliant, Bibbins!

Timothy Donnelly fired out the fundamental problem, without of course realizing it was in fact a problem:  “The role of the poet qua poet is to write poems. What is the role of the architect in today's culture? What is the role of the chef? The answers are self-evident. A poet writes poems. I don't see any other additional role or function or responsibility that all poets share...” 

Yes, the poet as ostrich supreme.  Brilliant, Donnelly!

Randall Mann echoed Donnelly’s modus operandi of scribouilleur uber alles:  “The poet should shut the door and write poems, and then, after much time and care, show the world. If this goes well, the role-playing will take care of itself.” 

Yes, the poet as role player certainly mirrored the sad reality of most poets as role-playing poseurs.  Just look at their websites.  Brilliant, Mann! 

Ben Mirov noted with a little touch of fanciful Dali:  “The role of the poet in today's culture is the same as it's always been: to be a huge transparent eyeball.”   

But it took more than a mere eyeball.  It also took a mouth and especially the courage to open it when doing so might irk the flock!  Brilliant, Mirov!

Brenda Shaughnessy suggested:  “Not that the poet's work makes it all the way out into actual ‘culture’ very often, but nonetheless, I do see the poet as someone whose role it is to push back against anti-intellectualism, anti-activism, and passivity in general.” 

Yet how not to be anti-intellectual when the intellectuals remained buffered in academic herds, ever truncating freedom of speech and vigorous debate in the name of today's world religion:  PC?  Would Shaughnessy remain passive now that she's been informed the Academy not only censored my remarks but also banned me from participating in its online forums several years ago?  But of course she would!  Brilliant, Shaughnessy!'

 

Gary Snyder

The following is an excerpt from Contention: Conversations with the Established Order and Other Parodias de Discursos.

I tried to read Synder but couldn't get into anything he wrote. But in poetry reputation is what matters not what you write. There is also something askew when a counter culture poet gets on some council, its like he's been given the good housekeeping seal of approval.
—Dave Ochs

Stand alone to decry censorship in the midst of a herd of incoming poets, professors, and poetophiles, and expect not one herd member to support your cause. On the contrary, the literary mass will likely chuckle in harmony, scorn a tad, chuckle again, then dismiss you as an egotistical attention seeker. In the skull of that literary mass, a myriad of reasons will ferment to justify inaction and consequent acceptance, if not outright support, of censorship.

It wasn’t like I hunted for trouble. Illogical nonsense was ubiquitous in America. Step out of the house and there it was sticking its drooling tongue out at you, provoking you to respond, that is, if you had failed the happy-face, positivist citizen indoctrination test. Or even just stay in the house, and there it was mocking away at intelligence. In any case, a correspondent informed me that a poet had just croaked: “Well todd mo/ ore is dea/d did you he/ ar? Check this ridiculous letter that Moore wrote Scot Young.” So, I checked it out and ended up writing and posting a comment. That seemed to have become my profession: comment poster. But the comment was censored. America today was educating an army of little caeser censors obsessing over possible offensiveness, while ever rationalizing censorship and truncation of free speech and expression. The brave new world was here now. Some called it PC.

A back and forth email battle had ensued with Fred Wright because the censor, Scot Young, had sent my comment to him. Moore’s buddies and family were attempting to canonize him. But now the only hope for the poor fellow was a post-mortem Robert Creeley Award, though that hope was a dismal one because, to date, not one post-mortem had been designated. Moore had paraded around as one of the “outlaw” poets, yet he’d spent most of his life as a tenured high-school English teacher and hadn’t even spent a day in jail. Hell, I’d spent a day and so had Henry D, but we weren’t “outlaw” poets. Villon was an “outlaw” poet, spent time in a donjon for murder, was almost executed, and deserved the designation.

It was about 6:15 and still with plenty of daylight. Spring was just around the corner. It had seemed like the longest, coldest winter I’d yet experienced. I was like a bear just out of hibernation partly stunned by the sudden warmth in the air. First, I stopped off at the local library to dump off some DVDs, then headed to the next town over, got lost, then found my way again, and pulled into the lot. I’d prepared a broadside, reworked it a number of times and even drew a cartoon for it. Thanks to friend Dan, I had 50 copies to distribute. Dan had been inviting me to his English classes once every semester for the past three years. Amazingly… astonishingly, he was actually using The American Dissident in those classes.

My protest was against tenured professor poet chancellor beatnik Gary Snyder, who was going to read and receive the Robert Creeley Award. Creeley had lived in Acton before he’d kicked the bucket. Now, he was comfortably enshrined in the literary canon.

A male-female couple about my age, looking definitely like they were going to the reading, were walking ahead of me. They entered the school. I stood outside the doors. Then soon they walked out of the school and were standing in front of me.
—So, you’re the guy hanging up fierce things on poets!
—So, it’s not here?
—No, this is the junior high. The high school is down the road.
The grayish-blond haired woman did the talking and pointed down the road. Several years before I’d protested against the John Ashbery reading. The couple walked on back to the lot. I followed them. The woman had a thick accent.
—Did you say, fierce?
—Yes. Fierce.
—Well, that’s a first. I’ve been called lots of things, but never “fierce.”
—Someone I know was concerned about you.
—You mean that I might have a gun or something?
—Yes. Something like that.
—Well, I suppose I could say the same about that person or you for that matter. So, you’ve seen me before?
—Yes, I’m William Creeley’s widow.
—Ah, so you’re the woman who cried after seeing that cartoon I sketched and distributed?
—Yes.
She didn’t seem angry, just aloof—bourgeois aloof. The boyfriend or friend or whomever remained silent, though seemed to be listening. He had short gray hair, was well-groomed and attired, and definitely looked the part of the proverbial academic poet—no fangs, no rough edges, just proper word craftiness, probably a former hippie turned established order. Clearly, neither he nor she had any interest whatsoever in my protest.
—You know, I wrote something about you just this morning. Another poet died and everyone was praising him. But I didn’t like the guy, so criticized him. And, of course, that upset the poets. One of them wrote: "next time, send condolences to a person's family instead of desecrating his grave before they have even put him to rest." But I figured since they were pushing for canonization, they should be prepared for not just happy-face commentary. If the family really wanted peace, it shouldn’t have been pushing the fame button. So, of course, that reminded me of you.
She didn’t respond. Perhaps she didn’t quite understand. But evidently the same thing pertained to her husband, who she’d help canonize with the Award.
—Are you Deutsch?
—No, I’m from New Zealand.
They walked over to their car, while I to mine and without good-byes or see-you-laters. Last time I'd protested in Acton, the gala was indeed held at the junior high school. So, maybe Snyder was higher up in the bourgeois poet-pecking order than Ashbery, since his reading was at the high school.

Students were hanging around mostly in little groups by the front doors, where I planted myself like an unruly cactus. Now and then, mommy or daddy arrived to pick some of them up. I placed my two small placards against the wall: HATE FREE SPEECH, LOVE CENSORSHIP, MOVE TO CHINA! and DEMOCRACY NEEDS MORE THAN SMILEY-FACED POETRY! On the door was a little sign indicating the Snyder reading. Creeley’s widow and beau were pacing around, probably waiting for someone. Eventually, they were standing in front of me, though not really out of interest. The beau seemed hyper-timid, even somewhat fearful, kind of like a handsome squirrel. I opened my mouth. What the hell.
—No curiosity?
—What do you mean?
She seemed to have a difficult time concentrating on my presence as a human being. She really didn’t look at me at all, not even when she spoke to me.
—Well, you didn’t want to take a flyer.
—Oh, I’ll take one. Why are you protesting?
—Well, simply put, Snyder’s a censor, that's why. I’m a fervent free speech advocate and against censorship. If they censored you, I’d be here right now at your side to lend support.
—Well, I don’t think anyone would want to censor me. My son is a free-speech lawyer.
—Well, that’s interesting. I really do have a passion for the subject, especially regarding colleges and universities.
—Have you ever heard of FIRE?
—Sure, I’m in contact with them periodically. It’s a great organization.
—Well, my son works for them.
—Well, that’s interesting.
It was as if somehow by proxy what the son did made her important. She was not interested in any further details regarding Snyder. She’d folded up the flyer and had placed it into her pocket without even looking at it. No doubt the nearest garbage bucket would be in for a treat.
—His name is Will Creeley.
—Ah, yes, I know the name.
—He’s a poet too.
She looked at the beau, so evidently didn’t mean the son.
—Yeah, well, poets are probably all over the place right now.
The beau smiled in agreement. How not to think of the Quebecois term, platte. Indeed, he was as platte as it got. Bourgeois platte. And she was as platte as it got. Bourgeois platte. They disappeared into the building… platte. No good-byes and no see-you-laters. Poets and poetophiles were now arriving in a constant flow.
—Protest against the poet!
—Really? Come on, now.
—Why, isn’t that possible?
—Take it easy, dude, I’m just surprised.
Well, he at least took a flyer and smiled. Was Snyder that bland? A young high-school student walked up to me, stood in front of me, and actually held out her hand and with a big smile.
—Could I please have one?
—Really?
—Yes, we’re having a poetry reading tomorrow in class.
—Well, then you’ll have to mention my protest.
—They’d kill me!
She took a flyer and scooted off to where her two friends. Poets and poetophiles kept arriving, flowing by, and into the building. If popularity was a measure of greatness, then Snyder had probably achieved it. But if popularity was only a measure of inoffensiveness, nicety, and not going against the established-order grain, then Snyder was perhaps a lousy poet, though a popular one.
—Curiosity is the first step to enlightenment!
—Thank you, sir.
—Thank you, mam.
A woman approached and stood in front of me. The light of familiarity suddenly glowed inside my head.
—May I have one?
—Ah, it’s Madame Le Poutine!
I hadn’t seen her in 15 years, more or less, but recalled her name because of its Quebecois origin. Once upon a time, she was one of my adult evening students at Fitchburg State and had even slapped the make on me suddenly in her car one evening. But that was as far as it got. She appeared quite surprised, laughed, fully recognized me, and stood by my side for a while, waiting for a friend. Well, that was nice, an ally of sorts. We chatted while I intermittently inserted a “Protest against the poet! Protest against censorship!” She was curious. Most were not curious.
—Why are you protesting against Snyder?
—Well, he’s a member of the Academy of American Poets, which censored and banned me.
—Really? What did you do?
—Well, I didn’t do anything. I just expressed an opinion they didn’t like. Should poets be into the censoring business? I didn’t threaten anyone, nor did I use four-letter words.
—Do you know Marie Ponsot?
—Never heard of her.
—She just became a chancellor. She’s 85 years old and a very good poet. She's a friend of mine.
—Good poet? Of course, she must be "good," but "good" at playing the game. "Good" for you ain’t likely gonna be "good" for me.
—What do you think poets should do then?
—Poets should speak truth, that’s what they should do. They shouldn’t be playing established-order games and climbing ladders all the time. A good poet should be a truth teller, not a blind-eye turning careerist!
—You must like doing these things.
—Well, I do sort of get a jolt of adrenaline, but actually I don’t like doing them. I have to force myself to do them. Who wants to drive 10 miles to see a bunch of scorning free-speech hating faces? My experience tells me that not one person here will even respond to my flyer.
—So why do you do this then?
—For free speech and democracy. There’s a principle involved. And you probably won’t understand that.
—Oh, I do.
—Can you believe someone actually said I might be dangerous?
—Well, I know. I’ve heard that too. People think you’re angry.
—I’ve heard that a lot. But weren’t the Revolutionary Patriots pissed off or were they smiley and happy?
—Yes, but angry isn’t always good.
—Well, it’s always good for democracy. And why should happy be good? Take a flyer! Here, take one, it’s free! Why are poets so incurious?
The pod of passing poets and poetophiles didn’t want to take flyers. My temporary ally actually tried unsuccessfully to interest a couple of them.
—Come on take a flyer.
—See, they’re not curious.
Then her friend arrived and she suggested I write.
—Why don’t you email me?
—Well, why don’t you email me?
—Is it on the flyer?
—Yes. And let me know if he does his Smokey the Bear poem.
They entered the building, and that would probably be the last time I’d see or hear from her. How to make the bourgeois understand? It was simply not possible. Ole Harry Haller couldn't do it. So how the hell could I do it? Well, they couldn't understand. That was why they were bourgeois. Droves of them were arriving, passing by me as if on a merry-go-round. It was a free reading. And free always meant droves. It was free thanks to the state cultural councils. Even the Concord Cultural Council was paying, yet the event wasn’t even in Concord. I was in Concord, but it wouldn’t give me a cent of a grant.
—Protest against Snyder! Take a flyer!
—But I like him! I don’t want to read a protest about him.
—Now, that’s a good one! Blind poets are just like blind Obama-philes. They just don’t want to see. Here, take a flyer!
—If he’s writing poetry, he’s okay!
—Well, I’m writing poetry too, but evidently I’m not okay.
The dude disappeared into the building without taking a flyer. Why did so many poets seem to experience such difficulty with basic logic? How did it get that way?
—Protest against Snyder! He’s a censoring chancellor!
A passing poetophile chuckled, then another chuckled, then another.
—We’re for free speech too!
—Sure, tell me about! Free speech for you, but not for me.
—Thank you!
—Well, thank you.
Then a pod of dowdy, hefty females arrived chuckling at me and refusing to take flyers. Probably from Concord Poetry Center. Then another pod arrived and another wave of chuckling. Free speech protest and censorship had become a chuckling matter in bourgeois circlets. On the ground, I spotted a rolled up bill. I picked it up. A buck, my payment for service to democracy! Whoopee. Another passing pod chuckled.
—Protest against censorship! Take a flyer.
—No, thanks!
—Today you chuckle at censorship! Tomorrow we’ll have dictatorship, and you’ll damn well deserve it!
No coppers were in sight. Usually the coppers arrived.
—Free flyer!
At about 7:15, I ran out of broadsides. Yet still waves of poets and poetophiles were arriving. So I began handing out AD flyers. I watched the kids run around the lit-up track on the embankment across the parking lot. It had slowly gotten darker. It was a beautiful spring evening. I breathed in the scented air.
—Spring! Spring is here! Ah, Beatniks! More Beatniks! Protest against Beatniks!
They chuckled. Well, at least I could amuse them.
—Ah, here comes a couple of Beatniks! Protest against Beatnik Censor Chancellor Tenured Poet Professor Snyder! Here come more Beatnik poets! Whoopee! Protest against Beatnik Snyder!
—Why?
—Because he’s a censor. He belongs to a censoring academy.
But the poet or poetophile just chuckled and walked by.
—Yes, chuckle away! And soon we’ll have censors all over the place! Well, I guess you must be a Beatnik.
But the kid was only about 20 years old and looked at me like what the fuck are you talking about. I wonder if he even knew what the word beatnik meant. Snyder was cocooned in fame. It was difficult to penetrate that kind of armored veneer. I doubted he’d even get word of my protest. Well, I did email the broadside to his university address. They must have shuffled the old bugger in through the back door. I didn’t even get to see him. Interestingly, three different high-school kids had approached me separately and actually wanted flyers. “You must really have great teachers,” I’d said to one of them. Well, the gods were with me. The gods wanted me to protest. If it had been the night before during the great deluge, I wouldn’t have bothered showing up. Longhairs and beardos and typical dumpy older females kept flowing into the building. Another day of confirmed total alienation would soon be over for me. At about 7:30, I walked back to the car, my black shadow preceding me on the pavement. I opened the door, got in, and drove the hell out of there, while the poetry legend was probably being applauded by professors, politicians, town leaders, town businessmen, librarians, prize judges, students, and of course Great Book readers.