10
KR: I don't think there were very many people in the thirties. There were people in San Francisco who were writing and not publishing anything when I came. Most of those people became involved in red San Francisco. The interesting thing is that most of them became practical labor organizers, rather than Bohemians sitting around in Union Square arguing about proletarian literature.
There was a real pattern there, due to the fact that there were all sorts of things wrong with red literature in the thirties in New York. But when the Communist artist and writer's groups were formed, the John Reed Club the one in San Francisco, they put up some pretty stiff qualifications. The members were actually artists and writers. They stayed around.
What happened in New York was that the clubs became dominated by Bohemians who didn't do anything except argue about Marx, whom they had never read, and they would avoid the artists and writers. It's very hard to convey to the present generation what that was like. People talked about communism . in those days the way people talk about acid or smack. I mean, they bored you to death, and they didn't know anything about it.
lol
KR: I don't think there were very many people in the thirties. There were people in San Francisco who were writing and not publishing anything when I came. Most of those people became involved in red San Francisco. The interesting thing is that most of them became practical labor organizers, rather than Bohemians sitting around in Union Square arguing about proletarian literature.
There was a real pattern there, due to the fact that there were all sorts of things wrong with red literature in the thirties in New York. But when the Communist artist and writer's groups were formed, the John Reed Club the one in San Francisco, they put up some pretty stiff qualifications. The members were actually artists and writers. They stayed around.
What happened in New York was that the clubs became dominated by Bohemians who didn't do anything except argue about Marx, whom they had never read, and they would avoid the artists and writers. It's very hard to convey to the present generation what that was like. People talked about communism . in those days the way people talk about acid or smack. I mean, they bored you to death, and they didn't know anything about it.
lol
66
The Autumn constellations
Begin to rise. The brilliant
Moonlight shines on the crowds.
The moon toad swims in the river
And does not drown. The moon rabbit
Pounds the bitter herbs of the
Elixir of eternal life.
His drug only makes my heart
More bitter. The silver brilliance
Only makes my hair more white.
I know that the country is
Overrun with war. The moonlight
Means nothing to the soldiers
Camped in the western deserts.
The Autumn constellations
Begin to rise. The brilliant
Moonlight shines on the crowds.
The moon toad swims in the river
And does not drown. The moon rabbit
Pounds the bitter herbs of the
Elixir of eternal life.
His drug only makes my heart
More bitter. The silver brilliance
Only makes my hair more white.
I know that the country is
Overrun with war. The moonlight
Means nothing to the soldiers
Camped in the western deserts.
67
Every day on the way home from
My office I pawn another
Of my Spring clothes. Every day
I come
home from the river bank
Drunk. Everywhere I go, I owe
Money for wine. History
Records few men who lived to be
Seventy. I watch the yellow
Butterflies drink deep of the
Flowers, and the dragonflies
Dipping the surface of the
Water again and again.
I cry out to the Spring wind,
And the light and the passing hours.
We enjoy life such a litde
While, why should men cross each other?
Every day on the way home from
My office I pawn another
Of my Spring clothes. Every day
I come
home from the river bank
Drunk. Everywhere I go, I owe
Money for wine. History
Records few men who lived to be
Seventy. I watch the yellow
Butterflies drink deep of the
Flowers, and the dragonflies
Dipping the surface of the
Water again and again.
I cry out to the Spring wind,
And the light and the passing hours.
We enjoy life such a litde
While, why should men cross each other?