22 Responses

1. one landmark I’d pickI would
   one landmark I’d pick

   I would have to say,morbid as it may be,the bar in New York where Dylan Thomas drank himself to death.

2. Correct … in fact, so
   Correct … in fact, so correct that it’s already on the list.

3. Hmm, overlooked that or I
   Hmm, overlooked that or I would’ve kept my mouth shut.

   So I will add a personal favorite of mine, Tropicana Motel, Santa Monica Blvrd, where Tom Waits resided during his “Wild Years”.

4. e e cummings is missingI
   e e cummings is missing

   I would also recommend Stevie Ray Vaughn’s memorial on Town Lake in Austin, Texas even though SRV was mostly a guitar player and sometime singer.

   I’d recommend something for Sharon Olds even though she’s alive. City Lights was still going strong the last time I was there.

5. Poetry PlaceOne of the
   Poetry Place

   One of the ultimate poetry places would have to be Mount Hekla in Iceland. Hekla’s eruptions spread ash all the way to france, and back in the day it was literally thought to be the gates of Hell. One can hike up to it today, but it still erupts every ten years and had a major blow in 1996.

6. Let’s seeThere’s Kerouac’s
   Let’s see

   There’s Kerouac’s aparment at 212 Orizaba in Mexico City, Han Shan’s cave in the Tien’Tai mountains of China; Lorca’s unmarked grave outside Granada, Spain; The Isle of Lesbos; myriad places from The Odyssey; Rimbaud’s house in Harar, Ethiopia; Robert Grave’s cottage on Majorca …

7. Nice one … I would never
   Nice one … I would never have come up with that one.

8. Excellent!
   Excellent!

9. Well, once we start letting
   Well, once we start letting rock stars in, there’ll be no room left for the poets.

10. Weimar, Prague, Tangier,
    Weimar, Prague, Tangier, Paris

    This may not be very original, but it’s what comes to my mind immediately:
    Goethe’s Weimar, and the whole city of Prague as Kafka’s home (the houses he lived in; the schools he went to; the streets and squares, cafes and bars he roamed). Paul Bowles’ Tangier, Morocco. The Beat Hotel in Paris, and other places in that city: The haunts, houses and resting places of Henry Miller, June Mansfield, Ana

11. Beautiful picture of
    Beautiful picture of Rimbaud’s house. Did you take it? When were you there?

12. Jamelah’s houseNever been
    Jamelah’s house

    Never been there, they tell me it’s nice.

13. The photo is courtesy of
    The photo is courtesy of someone else, via flikr, via wikipedia, via a google search for info. I’ve never been to Harar, or Ethiopia, for that matter. And from reading about it in Paul Theroux’s Dark Star Safari I’m not sure visiting is at the top of my list:

    Harar – an ancient mountain town of Coptic Christians and bigoted Muslims with a keen hatred of foreigners. A German agency had built two-story apartments for some of the lepers. The lepers had rejected them in favor of their mud huts. “The Germans had built houses that did not resemble any others in Harar, did not allow for the safety of the animals” that had to be taken indoors at night to protect them from the jackals, “and had the wrong proportions.”

    I have been to Mexico City a couple times, and I can’t believe it never occured to me to find 212 Orizaba. Same with Granada, though when I was there I was with someone who wouldn’t have been interested in finding the grave, and I believe that it hadn’t been officially located at the time I was there anyways. It was interesting enough seeing the region he wrote about.

14. black mt. collegescene of a
    black mt. college

    scene of a brief moment of brilliant creative energy conbined with inept practical organization.

    also north beach, san francisco, enough said.

15. Black Mountain College-
    Black Mountain College- that’s a good one. I’m glad you added that one to the list.

16. As Bowles is my personal
    As Bowles is my personal favorite author and I lived in Prague for quite some time, I must agree. And Bowles spent a long time in Ceylon and Mexico too. He used to own a small island near Ceylon which I would love to visit. Houses in Prague are few and far between that Kafka did not live in, especially considering his short life. And the Jewish Quarter, though housing no more Jews, does have a few monuments to Kafka.

17. PoeI’m sure some of Poe’s old
    Poe

    I’m sure some of Poe’s old haunts are still around.

    And all the old theaters that Paul Bowles, Tennessee Williams, William Saroyan, and Orson Welles used to put on plays must have links with the present.

    The Chelsea Hotel is a great one, for any number of reasons, but I imagine the entire Greenwich Village would be on that list.

18. 666 5th Ave. #281While there
    666 5th Ave. #281

    While there are a lot of fantastic landmarks in the above comments, the article was listing American landmarks, so I’ll chuck out a few of those that mean something to me…The Chateau Marmont…many a song or poem written in this flophouse/hotel…from Morrison & Airplane to Belushi, Dylan, & Lennon…Washington College Hospital, where Poe drew his final breaths — I’ll probably take one for this, but, State House (Independence Hall) in Philadelphia…If the constitution in its unmolested form isn’t poetry, then I don’t know what is…& finally 666 5th Ave. #281 if for nothing other than conversations such as this.

19. Lanier, Warren and AikenOne
    Lanier, Warren and Aiken

    One poetry landmark I’d pick would be Sidney Lanier’s house across the street from the Mimosa Inn in Lynn, NC. Sidney Lanier was a fine southern poet who wrote pastoral poetry about the Southeast. One of Lanier’s more well-known poems was “The Marshes of Glynn”.

    In addition, I’d pick Robert Penn Warren’s birthplace in Guthrie, KY.
    (I have pictures of both of these poetry places.) I guess you all know that Warren was one of the “Fugitive Writers” who were part of the agrarian movement during the “Great Depression”, along with Steinbeck and others from the West. A couple of Warren’s well-known poems were: “The Ballad of Billie Potts” and “Bearded Oaks”. Also, we musn’t forget “Brother to Dragons”.

    In addition, Robert Penn Warren was a “poet laureate” at the Library of Congress. He was also a great novelist who wrote ALL THE KINGS MEN and THE CAVE.

    Finally, we can’t forget Conrad Aiken, a pulitzer prize poet, short story writer and professor. His famous autobiography was “Ushant”. A well-known poem would be “A Coming Forth by Day of Osiris Jones”. Aiken had a home on Oglethorpe Street in Savannah, GA near Ms. O’Connor’s house. His gravesite in Bonaventure Cemetery has a marble bench where folks can contemplate inscribed: “Cosmos Mariner–Destination Unknown”. I have been to his grave and have seen his house near the Colonial Cemetary near downtown Savannah, GA.

    These are three southern poets and writers whose “poetry places” I can’t forget and need to share with the world.

20. Ha ha … thanks for
    Ha ha … thanks for mentioning the LitKicks address, Deminizer, but if this makes the list it’ll be the smallest poetry landmark in America, because #281 at 666 Fifth Ave is about 7 inches tall, 4 inches wide and 12 inches deep (it’s a PO Box). I appreciate the sentiment though!

21. Tower Of LondonWell, this one
    Tower Of London

    Well, this one is fairly obvious, but there is a wealth of poerty there. Sir Thomas Moore and Sir Walter Raleigh were imprisoned there. William Blake and the tyger that inspired the poem at the menagerie. Furthermore, Sir Thomas Wyatt penned poems from his cell there. This is to name a few.

    Tower of Power
    Tremble and Cower
    Poetry risen in defense
    prison now in tourism is fenced.

22. hey, cool poem.
    hey, cool poem.