Robert Creeley, 1926-2005

As I sd to my
friend, because I am
always talking, -- John, I

sd, which was not his
name, the darkness sur-
rounds us, what

can we do against
it, or else, shall we &
why not, buy a goddamn big car,

drive, he sd, for
christ's sake, look
out where yr going.

("I Know a Man," from The Collected Poems of Robert Creeley, 1945-1975)

Robert Creeley, one of the key members of the Black Mountain school (in both senses of the word), died earlier this week. Dinitia Smith's NYT obituary goes through the facts of Creeley's life while linking them to his role in "transform[ing] postwar American poetry by making it more conversational and emotionally direct," but I'm also partial to a Cortland Review interview from 1998. The Electronic Poetry Center at SUNY Buffalo has a Creeley page with links to poems, reviews, and other biographical information.