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Golden Sardine
Golden Sardine by Bob Kaufman was published as #21 in City Lights’ Pocket Poets series. Kaufman had already entered a long period of silence that extended from 1963 to 1972, during which he published nothing and appears to have written little, though previously unpublished poems were included in his 1981 volume The Ancient Rain.
Artist Mary Beach, who worked in in Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s City Lights publishing office, discovered the manuscript of Golden Sardine and insisted on its high literary value (because of Kaufman’s debt to Dada and the Surrealists, she considered his work superior even to Ginsberg’s). Her husband, the poet and translator Claude Pélieu, published it in French before Beach urged Ferlinghetti to issue it in his famous series, one of the foundational publishing imprints of Beat literature. Kaufman was well-known in Beat circles in San Francisco’s North Beach scene, but this was his only City Lights book during his lifetime. The press also published notable broadsides of his poems “Abomunist Manifesto,” “Second April,” and “Does the Secret Mind Whisper?”.
Golden Sardine is Kaufman’s second of three full-length, nationally-released books, wedged between Solitudes Crowded with Loneliness (1965) and Ancient Rain: Poems 1956-1978 (1981), both published by New Directions. (Coffee House Press’s Cranial Guitar: Selected Poems by Bob Kaufman would be published posthumously in 1995.) It marks a clear progression from a more tightly lyrical style to a longer, more open line and an increasingly adventurous approach to form, possibly influenced, like Ginsberg’s “America,” by the socially oriented comedians at the time, especially Lenny Bruce, but consistent in the manically biting, surrealistic social humor, jazz-immersive sensibility, and subtle, introspective expressions of deep pain that marks all his work.
Artist Mary Beach, who worked in in Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s City Lights publishing office, discovered the manuscript of Golden Sardine and insisted on its high literary value (because of Kaufman’s debt to Dada and the Surrealists, she considered his work superior even to Ginsberg’s). Her husband, the poet and translator Claude Pélieu, published it in French before Beach urged Ferlinghetti to issue it in his famous series, one of the foundational publishing imprints of Beat literature. Kaufman was well-known in Beat circles in San Francisco’s North Beach scene, but this was his only City Lights book during his lifetime. The press also published notable broadsides of his poems “Abomunist Manifesto,” “Second April,” and “Does the Secret Mind Whisper?”.
Golden Sardine is Kaufman’s second of three full-length, nationally-released books, wedged between Solitudes Crowded with Loneliness (1965) and Ancient Rain: Poems 1956-1978 (1981), both published by New Directions. (Coffee House Press’s Cranial Guitar: Selected Poems by Bob Kaufman would be published posthumously in 1995.) It marks a clear progression from a more tightly lyrical style to a longer, more open line and an increasingly adventurous approach to form, possibly influenced, like Ginsberg’s “America,” by the socially oriented comedians at the time, especially Lenny Bruce, but consistent in the manically biting, surrealistic social humor, jazz-immersive sensibility, and subtle, introspective expressions of deep pain that marks all his work.
- GenresPoetry
81 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 1967
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
October 19, 2022
This is, to put it succinctly, beat poetry at its VERY best.
Absolutely amazing. Iconoclastic, revolutionary, thought-provoking.
The words just roll off the page like a smooth glass of wine rolls off the tongue.
But there's a bite to it.
Kaufman is without a doubt the most underrated of the beat poets and his work defies classification under one convenient label. He has been called a beat poet, a Black poet, a Surrealist poet, a street poet, a modern poet, a revolutionary poet. He is all of those things and more.
At first, I didn't understand the movie-of-the-mind surrealist Caryl Chessman sequences that open this book but when I read it the second time, it dawned on me what Kaufman was doing. This is a scathing indictment of many things in America - the death penalty (of course), genocide (both ethnic and cultural), ecological genocide (the buffalo) and the threat of nuclear war, among other things. And if you stop for a minute, you'll notice that many of these are still genuine threats to the world today.
In this sense, we could say that Kaufman is one of the most RELEVANT poets in the 21st century because his themes are still relevant. Heck, he even predicted a war with Russia coming down from the East. Like the best poets of history (such as William Blake), his work is timeless (it defies the strict limits and restrictions of any given era) and in some sense, it is prophetic (like Blake).
I cannot emphasize highly enough how great a work this is. The only possible better book of poetry than this in the whole beat canon is Kaufman's final work, The Ancient Rain, which is just sublime. Sure go ahead and read Howl and Coney Island of the Mind - those works are great in their own ways, but if you want to read the REAL hidden king of the beat poets, then look no further. Read Bob Kaufman. Like Kaufman himself once said, "And when I die, I won't stay dead."
Absolutely amazing. Iconoclastic, revolutionary, thought-provoking.
The words just roll off the page like a smooth glass of wine rolls off the tongue.
But there's a bite to it.
Kaufman is without a doubt the most underrated of the beat poets and his work defies classification under one convenient label. He has been called a beat poet, a Black poet, a Surrealist poet, a street poet, a modern poet, a revolutionary poet. He is all of those things and more.
At first, I didn't understand the movie-of-the-mind surrealist Caryl Chessman sequences that open this book but when I read it the second time, it dawned on me what Kaufman was doing. This is a scathing indictment of many things in America - the death penalty (of course), genocide (both ethnic and cultural), ecological genocide (the buffalo) and the threat of nuclear war, among other things. And if you stop for a minute, you'll notice that many of these are still genuine threats to the world today.
In this sense, we could say that Kaufman is one of the most RELEVANT poets in the 21st century because his themes are still relevant. Heck, he even predicted a war with Russia coming down from the East. Like the best poets of history (such as William Blake), his work is timeless (it defies the strict limits and restrictions of any given era) and in some sense, it is prophetic (like Blake).
I cannot emphasize highly enough how great a work this is. The only possible better book of poetry than this in the whole beat canon is Kaufman's final work, The Ancient Rain, which is just sublime. Sure go ahead and read Howl and Coney Island of the Mind - those works are great in their own ways, but if you want to read the REAL hidden king of the beat poets, then look no further. Read Bob Kaufman. Like Kaufman himself once said, "And when I die, I won't stay dead."
November 14, 2019
Quite possibly my favorite American poet. This is a man who has earned his perspective the hard way.
January 29, 2022
Variations on a theme by morning,
Two lady birds move in the distance.
Gray jail looming, bathed in sunlight.
Violin tongues whispering.
Drummer, hummer, on the floor,
Dreaming of wild beats, softer still,
Yet free of violent city noise,
Please, sweet morning,
Stay here forever.
* * *
Tall strips of carrion moonlight.
sparing only stars.
Giant bees gliding along the sidewalks,
Lonely insects, stinging each other.
Unknown victims, mounting feathery scaffolds.
Lines of tired aprons dancing mobile-like.
Across lit stages of air.
Minute pieces of death, flinging themselves
Across crowded intersections.
Muted sobbing of a hidden child,
Filters over the sill,
Of a secret window, hidden
In the dark corner
Of evening.
* * *
Sun, Creator of Suns,
Sun, which makes Men,
My eye fails me,
Longing to see Thee
I touch stone.
For the sole desire to know
Thee
Might I know thee
Might I consider thee
Might I understand
Look down upon me
Sun, Moon, Day, Night,
Spring, Winter,
Are not ordained in vain.
* * *
Cool shadows blanked dead cities, falling,
Electric anthills, where love was murdered,
Daily crucifixions, on stainless steel crosses,
In the gardens of pillbox subdivisions, falling.
Poets, like free reeds, drift over fetid landscapes,
Bearded Phoenix, burning themselves, falling.
Death patterns capture the eyes, falling.
A saving madness, cast by leafless trees, falling,
Cushions the songs, filtered through smoking ruins,
From the nostrils of unburied dead gods.
Cool shadows, fall over drawn eyelids, falling,
Cutting off the edge of time, falling, endlessly.
* * *
Where the string
At
Some point,
Was some umbilical jazz,
Or perhaps,
In memory,
A long lost bloody cross,
Buried in some steel calvary.
In what time
For whom do we bleed,
Lost notes, from some jazzman's
Broken needle.
Musical tears from lost
Eyes,
Broken drumsticks, why?
Pitter patter, boom dropping
Bombs in the middle
Of my emotions
My father's sound
My mother's sound,
Is love,
Is live.
Two lady birds move in the distance.
Gray jail looming, bathed in sunlight.
Violin tongues whispering.
Drummer, hummer, on the floor,
Dreaming of wild beats, softer still,
Yet free of violent city noise,
Please, sweet morning,
Stay here forever.
- Cocoa Morning, pg. 32
* * *
Tall strips of carrion moonlight.
sparing only stars.
Giant bees gliding along the sidewalks,
Lonely insects, stinging each other.
Unknown victims, mounting feathery scaffolds.
Lines of tired aprons dancing mobile-like.
Across lit stages of air.
Minute pieces of death, flinging themselves
Across crowded intersections.
Muted sobbing of a hidden child,
Filters over the sill,
Of a secret window, hidden
In the dark corner
Of evening.
- Lost Window, pg. 46
* * *
Sun, Creator of Suns,
Sun, which makes Men,
My eye fails me,
Longing to see Thee
I touch stone.
For the sole desire to know
Thee
Might I know thee
Might I consider thee
Might I understand
Look down upon me
Sun, Moon, Day, Night,
Spring, Winter,
Are not ordained in vain.
- Sun, pg. 52
* * *
Cool shadows blanked dead cities, falling,
Electric anthills, where love was murdered,
Daily crucifixions, on stainless steel crosses,
In the gardens of pillbox subdivisions, falling.
Poets, like free reeds, drift over fetid landscapes,
Bearded Phoenix, burning themselves, falling.
Death patterns capture the eyes, falling.
A saving madness, cast by leafless trees, falling,
Cushions the songs, filtered through smoking ruins,
From the nostrils of unburied dead gods.
Cool shadows, fall over drawn eyelids, falling,
Cutting off the edge of time, falling, endlessly.
- Falling, pg. 65
* * *
Where the string
At
Some point,
Was some umbilical jazz,
Or perhaps,
In memory,
A long lost bloody cross,
Buried in some steel calvary.
In what time
For whom do we bleed,
Lost notes, from some jazzman's
Broken needle.
Musical tears from lost
Eyes,
Broken drumsticks, why?
Pitter patter, boom dropping
Bombs in the middle
Of my emotions
My father's sound
My mother's sound,
Is love,
Is live.
- O-Jazz-O, pg. 77
June 15, 2020
BLUE O'CLOCK
Seven Floating lead moons,
Red up night skies,
Seven twisted horns,
Mouth blown seven times.
Seven shaking angels
Shadowed stripe,
Night.
Seven ice white suns,
White down day skies,
Revealing our pains
To each.
Seven Floating lead moons,
Red up night skies,
Seven twisted horns,
Mouth blown seven times.
Seven shaking angels
Shadowed stripe,
Night.
Seven ice white suns,
White down day skies,
Revealing our pains
To each.
August 19, 2025
Unconventional and so surreal.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews