Tuesday, August 01, 2006

James Weil (1929 – 2006)

By various electronic means, Ed Foster and Ron Sillman both bring us news today of the death of James Weil. For me to provide links here would imply a false familiarity with his work, but you can do a Google search on him and find a large number of references.

Among the accomplishments Ed included in his email obituary for Mr. Weil were these lines from "A Coney Island Life", which is on the Academy of American Poets' list of Great Poems to Teach:

Having lived a Coney Island life
on roller coaster ups and downs
and seen my helium hopes
break skyward without me,
now arms filled with dolls
I threw so much for
I take perhaps my last ride
on this planet-carousel
and ask
how many more times round
I have
to catch that brass-ring-sun
before the game is up.

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