Hallock Hill

Robert Creeley, “I Know a Man,” Vancouver Poetry Conference, August 12, 1963.

Creeley’s most well-known poem, heavily influenced by his aural education from jazz and bebop. Thom Gunn called it an “elegant stammering.” The way the lines break and enjambe illustrates the rhythms at work: language is music and illustrated as such here. Close readings of a lot of post-war music can benefit from a study of the same period’s poetry. Conceptions of language and meaning are entwined between the two. And both can be pretty damn fun, if you let them.

I Know a Man

As I sd to my
friend, because I am
always talking, — John, I

sd, which was not his
name, the darkness sur-
rounds us, what

can we do against
it, or else, shall we &
why not, buy a goddamn big car,

drive, he sd, for
christ’s sake, look
out where yr going.