My Imps Names Are Illemauzar Pyewackett by Vincent Zepp

MY IMPS NAMES ARE ILLEMAUZAR PYEWACKETT

he was a great poet
i remember eating
chili
at the new college diner
in state college pa

reading bukowski

i dont remember
how i
came to know his poetry

imagine

at thirteen he
began drinking
it was magic
he said

he was considered
too antisocial for the army
not to live in philadelphia

at 26 he decided
to give up writing
and concentrate on drinking

at 35
he was in usc medical center
dying
but
didnt

he started
writing
again
this time
poetry

1000 poems
32 books of poetry

he wrote
vile and interesting
stuff
that made people hate me
i threw people off my porch
into the night
i sneered at hippies
i was in and out of drunk tanks
a lady accused me of rape

he was a
dishwasher
truck driver
guard
gas station attendant
shipping clerk
parking attendant
elevator operator
worker in dog biscuit cake
cookie factories
wrote
factotum

worked as a mail sorter
for years
at the terminal
annex in downtown
los angeles
wrote
post office

he was a poet of the desert

he wrote for
hustler magazine
2 million books
in print

he knew
faye dunaway
and
mickey rourke
sean penn was his friend
he
wrote
hollywood

he went from
hard liquor to
red wine and vitamins

he was a success
but not like
say
jp kellogg md
who invented cornflakes
and believed in the existence of an evil masturbation epidemic

my wine does most
of my writing
i just open a bottle
and
turn on the radio
it just comes pouring out
i only type every third night
i have no plan
i sit down
the typewriter gives me things i
dont know im working on
its a free lunch
a free dinner
i dont know how long it is
going to continue
but
so far theres nothing easier than writing

if i die
i hope to go with my head
on that typewriter
its my battlefield

he worked till the end
73

fernando rey
who died the same day
said
bunuel
always wanted him to
play
dirty old men

a friend of yours
robert burton
gave
me
your
address
i
never wrote

look up a
guy named
chas hajduk
a
friend of mine
he
read
ulysses
and
knew poetry
hed be a
good drinking buddy

the streets
should
be
thick
with
buddhists chanting mantras
resurrected
by
tertons

on
every symphony stage
a
naked woman
pukes
into
the
piano
closing the lid

mounts a blue horse
post time at
the
end
of
the rainbow

you who rode with neal cassady
two
days before his death

i know longer
mourn
the
dead
it is the dead
who
mourn for us

Vincent Zepp about Vincent Zepp. Arriving at the time in history (including literary history) when I did. I was blessed to have such a rich tradition of poetry, art, music, and culture to available to me. This continues to allow my poetry to flourish in a rich loam of influences. The work I believe is representative of the best thoughts and intuitions of my generation of writers whose challenge is to move forward with the gifts given to us from previous generation of artists. From Ferlinghetti who opened my eyes to Pound and Eliot through the various significant literary and art movements of the 20th century. Then there was the haiku master Basho who showed us frogs leaping into the pond of our mind. John Berryman said our poetry should be something no one else could do. I’ve tried to focus on that idea.

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