November 12, 1970, Diane Wakoski.
[INTERPOSING VOICES]
Good evening, and welcome to tonight's reading.
I would like to announce first that Diane Wakoski, our reader,
has agreed to stay 20 or 30 minutes after the reading
to chat with anybody who'd like to come down and talk.
It seems very fitting that the first poet
to read at Pima College should be a woman,
and it's very fortunate for us that that poet
should be Diane Wakoski.
She was born in Whittier, California,
and she graduated from the University of California,
Berkeley in 1960.
Much of her formation as a poet took place in the late '50s
in San Francisco, where exciting and important things were
happening for American poetry.
She now lives in New York City, another place
where exciting and important things happen for poetry.
One of the earliest recognitions of her talent
came in 1962 when her work appeared
in a volume called Four Young Lady
Poets, edited by LeRoi Jones.
A sampling of titles from her own collections of poetry
includes Coins and Coffins, The George Washington Poems, Greed,
Inside the Blood Factory, Some Poems
for the Buddha's Birthday, The Magellanic Clouds,
and The Moon Has a Complicated Geography.
In recent years, her work has appeared
in several of the most significant anthologies,
including Technicians of the Sacred, Young American
Poets, Contemporary American Poets, and American Literary
Anthology II.
Audiences throughout the country remember her
not only for her youthful appearance,
but especially for the youthful energy of her poems,
it's a great pleasure to introduce Diane Wakoski.
[APPLAUSE]