{"id":109455,"date":"2017-03-30T18:41:16","date_gmt":"2017-03-30T22:41:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=109455"},"modified":"2017-03-31T10:37:02","modified_gmt":"2017-03-31T14:37:02","slug":"joanne-kyger-in-the-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2017\/03\/30\/joanne-kyger-in-the-review\/","title":{"rendered":"Joanne Kyger in the Review<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/a>

Photo: Elsa Dorfman.<\/p><\/div>\n

 <\/p>\n

We were sad to learn that Joanne Kyger, whom the San Francisco Gate<\/em> calls \u201ca leading poet of the San Francisco Renaissance and a rare female voice of the male-dominated Beat generation<\/a>,\u201d died last week at eighty-two. In an illuminating 2014 interview with\u00a0The Conversant<\/em><\/a>, Kyger discussed her process and, memorably, the role of psychedelics in her work:<\/p>\n

I participated in several peyote ceremonies and in February of 1959, while taking it with some friends, I had a quite unpleasant experience of massed black energy intercut with animal faces. The fact that I was unwisely taking this trip in my apartment, which was over a bar in North Beach, and was not feeling well, added to a very unstable sense of \u201creality.\u201d This \u201cblack energy\u201d resembled an animal, which I later named, hoping to focus it. A wild animal, which I paid attention to whenever I saw it or saw mention of it. For years I was afraid of stepping over some edge into a loss of self or schizophrenic duality. Living in Japan and seeing the guardian warriors outside the temple doors with their fierce animal-like expressions, I finally realized they were protectors. Fear creates a wall one can be afraid to pass by. If they scared you off, you didn\u2019t have enough courage or knowledge to enter further. I think I was fearful of the energy of the animal self, whatever I thought that was.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The\u00a0Review\u00a0<\/em>published Kyger\u2019s poems in the late sixties and early seventies; digital subscribers<\/a> should check out her work in our Spring 1966<\/a>,\u00a0Summer 1970<\/a>, and\u00a0Spring 1973<\/a>\u00a0issues. Below is \u00a0my favorite, \u201cJune 7 \u2026 \u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

June 7 \u2026<\/strong><\/p>\n

June 7. To get a head start<\/p>\n

Yea, but I\u2019m too old
\nYea, but I\u2019m growing too old
\nTo wait around this long
\n______________________<\/p>\n

Nobody wants to sit with me
\n_______________________<\/p>\n

Forgive this interlude for a while: I became infinitely
\nglamorous and careless, like the best memory, of past
\nloves.
\n___________________________________________<\/p>\n

I often tell women\u2019s secrets to men
\n___________________________________________<\/p>\n

It was open, in the clear gray, morning. Babies
\ncries, and a dog barks, birds shrill from the top
\nof the trees.
\nI\u2019m going to run away from all this.
\nI am going to enter into another dimension.
\nOh my little head and hope. I am projected
\nahead. I will realize the continuum from the past.
\nI will not be abusive, I am smitten in glory.
\nI am full of hopeful rushing. On into
\nthe high out rocking waves.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Read the late poet\u2019s work in sixties- and seventies-era issues of The Paris Review.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1188],"tags":[16304,370,22946,26616,20537,28129,11989,165,2047,2427,2428],"class_list":["post-109455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-archive","tag-archive","tag-back-issues","tag-beat-poets","tag-digital-subscription","tag-in-memoriam","tag-joanne-kyger","tag-obituaries","tag-poetry","tag-poets","tag-seventies","tag-sixties"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nRemembering Joanne Kyger (1934-2017)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Read the late poet\u2019s work in sixties- and seventies-era issues of The Paris Review.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" 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