There is no Frigate like a Book
To take us Lands away
Nor any Coursers like a Page
Of prancing Poetry —
—Emily Dickinson (1830-1886)
I wouldn't argue for a minute that poets have to travel in order to write. Emily Dickinson hardly strayed from home during her entire life, while 1,700 poems poured out of her head like honey from a hive, the queen bee of Amherst. (Queen bees have retractable stingers, so they can sting without killing themselves.)
But most writers find travel useful. Not the journey itself — that's a pain these days — but Jeanne and I like to go some place, settle down for a while and get to know the neighborhood: the bakery and the bistro, a few of the neighbors. It's not always easy, but we make it a point to right away learn how to say "Excuse me" wherever we go; that seems to help: "Excusez-moi" in Paris, "Entschuldigung Sie" in Munich and "Przepraszam" in Warsaw, where we lived for a year and had to say it a lot. Speaking Polish, a friend said, was like "taking Novocain and trying to say 'Rubber baby buggy bumper.'"
In the States, our favorite destination is New York City, because we have children nearby, and speak a similar language. We were there when we learned I was going to be appointed poet laureate of St. Petersburg on May 14. I was sorry to miss the actual ceremony — a proclamation was read! — because we love our city, and I'm proud that St. Pete now has a poet laureate (and happy that I'm it). I'm going to enjoy reading with our friend James Tokley, who's been Tampa's laureate since 1996. Along this line, I'm grateful, too, to Creative Loafing, for letting us smuggle in poems for over two years now, in a culture where poetry's a minority taste, except in emergencies and fits of adolescent love-sickness.
While in the Apple, we stay at a b&b in Chelsea that has a comfortable library/bar/breakfast nook, and proximity to certain reminders of the writing life, both sober and not-so-sober. Nearby is the famous Chelsea Hotel, which over the years housed such literary luminaries as O'Henry, Thomas Wolfe, Arthur Miller and Brendan Behan (the first play I ever took Jeanne to was Behan's absurdist "The Hostage," in 1960, where the hostage's corpse leaps out of his coffin at the end and sings "O death, where is thy sting-a-ling-a-ling…?"). Also a Chelsea resident: Shirley Clarke (1919-1997), a dynamic filmmaker around whom many of the writers circled. Her film, Robert Frost: A Lover's Quarrel with the World, starring Frost himself, won the 1963 Academy Award for documentaries.
Plaques near the entrance mark these writers, but the most poignant one says DYLAN THOMAS, who lived and labored last here at the Chelsea Hotel, and from here sailed out to die. Jeanne took a photo of this plaque and then — what else to do? — we headed to the Blue Bar of the Algonquin Hotel for a celebratory drink or two (but not three, Algonquin drinks being too expensive). After his second champagne, our son Pete somewhat irreverently dove into a Wizard of Oz presentation: "Therefore, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Universitartus Laureatis Poeticus E Pluribus Unum, I hereby confer upon you…" He was picking up the tab, so I couldn't complain; besides, it sounded sort of right. The sardonic spirits of James Thurber and Dorothy Parker hover about the Algonquin, like Cheshire cats. (Jeanne and I once lived in Thurber's actual house, in Columbus, Ohio, in the attic where the bed fell and the ghost got in. We've never been the same.)
Unlike Dylan Thomas, who died at 39, I've been lucky to live a long time (a mixed blessing, of course). Years ago, we visited Laugharne, Thomas' home town in Wales, and went to Brown's Hotel, his favorite pub, where he got his inspiration for Under Milkwood. With ales in hand, we walked around looking for evidence of Thomas. The walls were covered with group photos of the town's soccer teams, but finally, in a dark corner, we found a small photo of the poet. He would have smiled at that.
Our b&b, like the Algonquin, has a feline muse, though for a muse she makes it difficult to write: Dorothy likes to sit on the computer. A tubby tabby — the name exotically stemming from attabiyah, a striped Baghdad silk — Dorothy's a natural but good-hearted stalker and, watching her, I think of Dickinson's poem that begins "She sights a bird — she chuckles — /She flattens — then she crawls — /She runs without the look of feet — /Her eyes increase to Balls — . . .
I hereby resolve, when I feel a twinge of pride at this latest appointment, to remember poor Thomas' sad end (choking on his own vomit), and that cautionary figure, Dickinson. She was a tough nut. Even more than that public man, Senator William Butler Yeats, she could cast a cold eye on life, on death, and — as our New York cabbie might have said — nail it, real good:
How dreary — to be — Somebody!
How public — like a Frog —
To tell one's name — the livelong June —
To an admiring Bog!
Peter Meinke (www.petermeinke.com) realizes that not many know America's poet laureate, much less St. Petersburg's, but hopes if it's just one small step for a poet, it's one giant leap for the Tampa Bay area.
This article appears in Jun 3-9, 2009.