Archive for August 16th, 2011

August 16th, 2011

J. Myers Update on Smith Baker Renovation Project

by PaulM

Jennifer Myers in today’s SUN reports on the latest step in the City of Lowell’s effort to redevelop the Smith Baker Center on Merrimack Street near City Hall. Kudos to the SUN for making this Page One news. Her Facebook page has additional comments also.

Allen Ginsberg and friends reading poems in the Smith Baker Center, June 1988. Note that this is a side view of the upper floor church hall, which was filled with more than 1,000 people on this night. Poet Michael McClure later said that it was the most important poetry reading in America that year. McClure performed with Ray Manzarek (formerly of The Doors), and the readers included Ginsberg, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Gregory Corso, John Weiners, and others.  [photo (c) by George Koumantzelis]

August 16th, 2011

from ‘Dearborn Suite’ by Philip Levine, US Poet Laureate

by PaulM

Following is an excerpt from the poem “Dearborn Suite” in the collection “News of the World” by Philip Levine (Knopf, 2009).

.

Dearborn Suite

.

1.

Middle-aged, supremely bored

with his wife, hating his work,

unable to sleep, he rises

from bed to pace his mansion

in slippers and robe, wondering

if this is all there ever

will be to becoming Henry Ford,

the man who created

the modern world. The skies

above the great Rouge factory

are black with coke smoke, starless,

the world is starless now, all

because he made it in

his image, no small reward.

. . .

.

—Philip Levine (c) 2009

August 16th, 2011

A view from Lee Street

by DickH

A view from Lee Street: Bon Marché and St Joseph’s Shrine of the Worker — by Tony Sampas