Elizabeth Bartlett

“ Whereless in a sea of space,
how shall we reckon with the dead
whose graves we marked on a shifting land
and left at a distance travelled by light?
What pilot navigates our course
through a finite but expanding void
no almanac explains or chart defines?
Sun, stars, birds, nothing avails
since Phoenician and Viking passed
with cross-staff, astrolabe and compass
to bring us to shores we have left behind.
We are speeding our unborn young
to harbors no heard voice guides us toward,
no radar yet detects, no octant sights. ”

“ Though breath was all I owned
to force my heart to climb,
though words were all the stones
I had to seal my mind,
you will know why, in time.
THE TEST
He who would climb the heights of tone
and scale the peaks beyond the listening ear
must first walk over water
and learn to stand on air, alone.
He who would swim the waves of light
and dive past shores into a sunless glow
must first merge with his shadow
and melt through solid glass, like night.
Where eyes are fins and sound is leap,
the rhythmic force performs its own ballet ”

“ Each has a name,
a face, an age—none of them mine.
Yet are we all
cells of the selfsame root in time.
No closer ties
bind us to those we call our own.
For we are one,
living each other's lives, unknown. ”

“ Through the smoke, he traced the wry and twisted road
down whenless years that had plunged him here to rot—
and yet, of Nielson he had required no bond
of hate, for this neither one had bought or sold.
Torrent to trickle, not friendship had reversed
the law, but an unnatural love of worm for bird,
of plant for weed, of a sterile man for Merle,
a woman he could not wed and mark as cursed
without destroying the very universe
that had mothered her and which she owed rebirth.
"You take the farm and Merle. I'll make my own world
over." The words had been all too well observed. ”

“ We are fed by desire
and consumed like the fire
on our tongues, in our hearts;
a flame forever unappeased
by our words, symbols, deeds
or monuments; the phoenix, man himself,
recreated from his own ashes
out of hungering dreams and parched.
We live with hunger always,
that fearfilling, painpinching cave
wherein we hide like hunted stags,
lips dry, but tasting heroically
of miracles... Who has not seen
visionary lions fall to dust
and, scornful of the world's ambition,
left the hunters truth in rags? ”

“ Bartlett's poetry came to the attention of leading poets, writers, and critics as diverse as Marianne Moore, Wallace Stevens, Mark Van Doren, Conrad Aiken, Allen Tate, Alfred Kreymborg, Robert Hillyer, Louis Untermeyer, Rolfe Humphries, John Ciardi, Richard Eberhart, Richard Wilbur, Maxine Kumin, Robert M. Hutchins, Kenneth Rexroth, William Stafford, and others. Over the years, Bartlett maintained an active and extensive correspondence with eminent poets, writers, and literary critics ”

“ A third collection of twelve-tone poems, In Search of Identity, was published in 1977, further establishing the diversity and versatility of ways in which Bartlett was able to make use of the new form. A fourth collection of twelve-tone poems was published in 1981, Memory Is No Stranger.
Her husband, Paul Alexander Bartlett (1909 – 1990) was an American writer, artist, and poet. He made a large-scale study of more than 350 Mexican haciendas, published novels, short stories, and poetry, and worked as a fine artist in a variety of media. ”

“ The wish reflects a view
almost transparent. Past and distance blaze,
caught in a foreground of light, then shift.
The darkness grays, thickens. One tastes
salt rain on the wind that blows through the mist. ”

“ The sails gave way to engines, the spars to wings,
the continental coasts to cosmic shores,
and still we see no end to journeying.
Although our rocket shrinks, we keep our course.
We watch, we sleep, our dream a toylike thing
that wakes and wonders—-whose will, which force? ”

“ About her first book of poetry, Poems of Yes and No, Marianne Moore wrote: "I surely find good in the Poems of Yes and No.... The clearness of the book is certainly beautiful." Wallace Stevens was impressed by Poems of Yes and No and wrote: "Your poems give one a sense of intelligence and sensibility." Alfred Kreymborg was enthusiastic about the book: "You have found a style of your own and developed it. I say yes to your Poems of Yes and No. ”

“ Bartlett's readings of her poetry have been recorded for the Library of Congress, Yale, Harvard, Stanford, and other collections.
Bartlett's twelve-tone form of poetry was introduced in her book, Twelve-Tone Poems, published in 1968. In Bartlett's words: "The 12-tone poem is a new form.... It was inspired by Arnold Schoenberg's musical system. The poem consists of 12 lines, divided into couplets. Each couplet contains 12 syllables, using the natural cadence of speech. The accented sounds of the words are considered tones. ”

“ Now retired and let out to pasture, he
does not mind the clouds, the rain that fogs the highway—
his eyes are patched with blue.
Hands leathered and roped,
knees astraddle, boots shined, he is seated beside
as neat a filly as any in the herd he used to lope
in season.
With stallion gallantry, with sweets, he holds
the miles to coffee stops and anecdotes ... till memory
spurs his old man's hopes ... and the night stampedes. ”

“ Behold This Dreamer was published in Mexico City in 1959. By 1961, Jonathan Williams wrote of the book: "Your language is cultivated, employed consistently and lucidly. To my observation, it seems fair to say that you belong with the best of your generation, which I would say includes May Swenson, Denise Levertov, Garrigue, et al." Louis Untermeyer added his voice: "I particularly like your fusion of observation and whimsicality, as well as your avoidance of the poetic stereotypes." Rolfe Humphries was intrigued by Bartlett’s poetic techniques: "I enjoyed your poems and admire many...." ”

“ Separated by long years and the visibility poor,
her mood reflects the weather, darkening within.
Dishes, diapers, sighs, and pills ... roof by roof,
she hears the monotone of wheels recite the gloomy
catechism, and prays for a different kind of virgin
miracle.
Nervously, she rubs her good luck stone,
then wraps her thoughts in cellophane as a heroine
of film and fashion, glad to forget home, school,
and all the lost-girl tales they tell of Hollywood,
She listens, nods, and smokes. ”

“ Yes, yes, the words of the wise,
but I do not eat their bread
or cover my lips to swear
by the debts of the guilty,
for I can not see the light
that moves men to take pity
and neither can I forget.
When harvest is past, the ties
with summer are ended. ”

“ All the breadlong day she moved about the house
and nibbled at its crust, until she saw Carl
walking griefwards with his shadow to the barn,
whereless in his step and heedless of the cows,
and she wondered how he could be so thoughtbound.
What sad, whyful thing could make a man so lost
within his world that he had no fisthold on
it to demand a moreness for his account? ”

“ Elizabeth Bartlett (1911-1994) was an American poet and writer noted for her lyrical and symbolic poetry, creation of the new twelve-tone form of poetry, founder of the international non-profit organization Literary Olympics, Inc., and known as an author of fiction, essays, reviews, translations, and as an editor. She is not to be confused with the British poet (1924-2008) of the same name. For more detailed information about her life, work, and critical commendations, see the Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Bartlett_%28American_poet%29. ”

“ Cracked like their hands and cups, who knew when its seams
would give? In the fearwhile, the question unasked
kept their lips still, as though words tempted a risk
beyond their strength to mend should the seams be loosed.
The meal done, she freed the table from its chore
and brought him the county's weekly paper, their
footnotes to other people's answers and prayers,
then bent to her needlework, seeking accord. ”

“ Extensive permanent collections of Elizabeth Bartlett's papers, literary correspondence, publications, unpublished manuscripts, and art have been established, one as part of the Archive for New Poetry maintained by the Mandeville Department of Special Collections at the University of California, San Diego, and the second by the Rare Books Collection of the University of Louisville. ”

“ Along the coast a lone train
tolls the night, slowing its race
to a throttled brake
as a hand plows the mist
to draw a moving bridge
across the mainland's tip.
O magnetic eye that signals
when human daylight fails
and all's invisible ”

“ About this work, Allen Tate wrote: "The new form is most interesting, the poems quite beautiful and distinguished." Encouraged by this and other commendatory responses to her twelve-tone poems by poets, musicians, and composers including Stephen Sondheim, Bartlett continued to develop the new form. The House of Sleep, published in 1975, was the result, consisting of 62 poems related to dreams and written in the new form. Of these poems, William Stafford wrote: "There is a trancelike progression in these poems, in which all unfolds quietly, with a steady holding of a certain pervasive tone." ”

“ Already our eyes are widened
by the miles that split us here
as we turn at the bend
and pause. Dark reefs appear.
Together we mark the distance
between words and waves, the wind
swinging our cables. Chance
moves forward—we, behind. ”

“ Now that I have finished with maggots and shed
their dust with some misgiving,
I am glad for the words not said,
for being spared the hungers other men have bred,
in my old age needing
but a tranquil bed. ”

“ She does not mind his boasts,
only too aware how the ashes cling to his coat.
(1 x 1) n
I can accept
the being born
and the dying,
in doubt, alone.
I do not reject
or, seeing, scorn
anyone's crying
about the unknown.
And yet. And yet.
How the being alone
in the living
makes me mourn. ”

“ Lost by, he stared unseeing at the words poured
through his eyes as though, shuttered against exposure,
the negative in his mind could be immured
in its acid and yet bring some meaning forth.
For a hurt away and far as a man might walk
on a friendly day to a neighbor's door, lay
Nielsen's farm, a credit to God had He made
it with His hands, but none to the man whose straw
grew luckside up as though his plow left a spore
of gold in every furrow. ”

“ If we could collect the whole
evidence grain by grain,
the words, numbers, symbols
that shaped the color and sound
of mountains
If we could record the dreams,
the chain of centuries from dusk
to dawn, those testings of beliefs
that broke the link and shook sparks
from the sun
If we could model its twin
as a lasting monument,
a brain with all our findings,
long after men, their myths,
wonders, gifts
SELF-EVIDENT
Some birds there are that do not like a cage,
that want the whole world free to come and go
as seasons do, despite drought, heat or snow ”

“ Perplexed by reason
reality itself dissolves in the sun
while the question
remains above and beyond all consideration
of doubt and fog
a bubble suspended in the hands of God.
THE UNDERSTANDING What is it you want? he asked.
Looking at him. As though she thought he had something to say and could find the words to say it. The words no one else had yet found or said. ”

“ As such, the connection
is important, if not profound,
because, without it,
we would no-doubt flit
as in a vacuum,
like birds,
not needing the support of words,
rising, in-fact, above them.
I protest the conclusion,
despite the evidence
that I am a valid one,
by necessity, if not consequence,
for while I argue and pursue
What I think is true,
in self-defense,
God does not suppose—
He knows—
and that makes the difference.
INSTINCT AND REASON
They would have us believe
that to defy authority
is to punish nature. ”

“ We die hungry even while hyenas howl.
VOLUNTARY, EXILE
The day to day commitment to failure
that judgment daily argues against me
condemns me to despair. I am guilty
of more than silence. At times words fail your
wisest men and then, intentionally. ”

“ I may
know the how and why of it
CITY GAME: MARBLES
Like gods competing for the universe,
they shoot the planets between their fingers
with trigger thumbs that scale the speed of light
to intervals of space-colliding time. ”

“ Thanks are also due to the Beloit Poetry Journal, Chelsea Review, Commentary, The Critic, Dalhousie Review, ETC., Fiddlehead, Harper's, Harper's Bazaar, Literary Review, New Mexico Quarterly, New York Times, Odyssey, Poetry Dial, Queen's Quarterly, Quixote, San Francisco Review, Saturday Review, Tamarack Review, Yale Literary Magazine. ”

“ IT TAKES PRACTICE NOT TO DIE
Elizabeth Bartlett
It Takes Practice Not to Die was originally published in 1964 by Van Riper and Thompson in Santa Barbara, California. The book is now out-of-print and the publisher no longer exists. ”