& the winner is

in yesterday's mail a small package from Judy Henske. it was the CD rerelease of "Farewell Alebaran." there's a reason she sent it to me. the first cut on the album was "Snowblind"   a song Judy wrote with Jerry Yester & Zal Yanovsky. a line in that song -- "20 sonnets bound in gold" -- inspird me to write my sonnet sequence which I dedicatd to Judy. Canada's Killaly Press printd it as the first in their chapbook series in 1972. in an edition of only 100 copies it's one of my most collectible items.

the only time Robert Duncan ever acknowledgd reading me was his verbal appreciation of the sonnet sequence. I used them to open my selectd poems The Avalanche of Time (1986). my publisher Richard Grossinger wasn't happy with my decision. he thot the sequence "too difficult" to start the book. perhaps he was right. I became a neglectorino while still in print.

I've written here before abt my devotion to Judy Henske. she's one of those touchstone personalities who bob up & down thruout my life. if you haven't heard her   go to her website & order a batch of her CDs. you won't be sorry. she's the real thing.

one reason I tend to turn off the Grammy awards is my embarrassment at the wins by nontalents. I became an awards junkie as a boy & have trouble shaking it. however it didn't take long to learn that awards are more abt politics than art. Frank O'Hara never won a Pulitzer. Hitchock never heard his name calld as best director at the Oscars. & where the bleep is Henske's Grammy? well Judy -- if you read this -- know that it's in my heart.