Pictures of the Gone World

Here we have it: the first book in the mostly-OOP Pocket Poets series by Ferlinghetti's SF-based City Lights publishing house, and Ferlinghetti's own first book of poems, arguably just as good as A Coney Island of the Mind (which, actually, can be said of almost all Ferlinghetti's books of poetry. High class, all over the place), and only 95 LT users bothered to pick it up. Ferlinghetti, Whitman's 20th-century successor, the "new" poet for the common man (and woman!), and an adorable old guy (still kickin' at 89! still readin' and writin' pomes), semi-member of the Beat scene, definite member of the SF Renaissance, gives us 27 (or 45 if you picked it up after '95) of his precious, wise-for-his-age (born: 1919; published: 1955) show more free-verse observations.

This 'nik is famous for his cut up style, a style that adds to the intended jazziness of the lines, all intended to be spoken out loud. A favorite of mine, only available here (a number are reprinted in his more famous Coney Island) deals with vanity: number #17, or "London," and goes like this (keep in mind, I can't accurately copy the structure of the poem here, severely--no! slightly!--detracting from the poem's inner jazz):

London

crossfigured
creeping with trams

and the artists on sundays
in the summer
all 'tracking Nature'
in the suburbs

It
could have been anyplace
but it wasn't
It was
London

and when someone shouted over

that they had got a model

I ran out across the court

but then
when the model started taking off
her clothes
there was nothing underneath
I mean to say
she took off her shoes
and found no feet
took off her top
and found no tit
under it
and I must she did look
a bit
ASTOUNDED
just standing there
looking down
at where her legs were
not

But so very carefully then
she put her clothes back on
and as soon as she was dressed again
completely
she was completely
all right

Do it again! cried someone
rushing for his easel

But she was afraid to

and gave up modelling

and forever after

slept in her clothes

Oh yeah. You love it. This and "See/it was like this" (or #9) from Coney Isle. are what got me into Ferlinghetti (and with a little help from Whitman, into poetry!), as well as a few friends. Just memorize those two suckers (and maybe #25, "The world is a beautiful place") and you'll have all the cats swooning. (Or, if you're like me and live in America, calling you a faggot for reading poetry.)

F.V.: 95. Highly recommended. Also recommended is going to Google images, and running two or three searches for pictures of Ferlinghetti so you can to stare in wonder at his jolly-faced glory. show less

I have the New 1995 Expanded Edition of the collection of Ferlinghetti's poems and I have to say that probably the biggest complaint is with the newly appended poems. Why would he put new poetry into an old book? The reason I suspect the bonus poems of being new is that the word "cyberpunks" crops up. Shouldn't he have grown enough at this point that he could no longer write as he did in 1955? Anyways, the original poems show someone who is not afraid to lay it out like a Bukowskian but he doesn't have the pulp hero aspect of Bukowski nor the flare of peak 1956 Allen Ginsberg. What you get instead is a series of straight up poems that can appeal to the greatest mass, the greatest cross-section of educational attitudes. I haven't read A show more Coney Island Of The Mind yet but I imagine it expands upon this content in all the right ways to create a super hit of collected poetry. show less

Simply a beautiful pocket edition of Ferlinghetti´s 1955 poems. "A poem is a mirror walking down a strange street..."