Harry E. Northup is the author of many collections of poetry, including Eros Ash and Enough the Great Running Chapel, both from Momentum Press, as well as The Ragged Vertical, the images we possess kill the capturing, Reunions, Red Snow Fence, and East Hollywood: Memorial to Reason, all published by Cahuenga Press. He made a living as an actor for over 30 years, and appeared in a substantial number of films by some of the finest directors ever to work in Hollywood. He starred in the film, Over the Edge, which is enjoying a new surge of appreciation. He is also an activist in the poetry communities of Los Angeles; he founded and directed the Gasoline Alley Poetry Series in the mid-1980s, and has also organized poetry readings, such as a full-length presentation of Thomas McGrath’s Letter to an Imaginary Friend.
His poems have appeared in many magazines, such as Beyond Baroque NewLetters, Bachy, Momentum, ONTHEBUS, Barney, Pearl, Chiron Review, and Solo. New Alliance Records released two full-length compilations of his poems, recorded with producer Harvey Robert Kubernik. His poems have also been reprinted in several anthologies of Los Angeles poets, including The Streets Inside, “Poetry Loves Poetry,” Wide Awake, and Grand Passion.
I first heard Harry Northup read his poetry at the Wednesday night poetry workshop at Beyond Baroque in the early 1970s. Without Northup’s presence at the workshop, it is doubtful that it would have ever caught the attention of Lee Hickman at that particular time, and it is very unlikely that Hickman would ever have gone on to meet many of the poets whose work he went on the champion as editor of a series of magazines: Bachy, Boxcar, and Temblor.
The following poem first appeared in his blog, and is reprinted here by permission.
With Saintliness
With sainted water
With faraway canoe
With tremulous care
With sainted oars
With sainted light
With joy saintliness
With focused centre
With sainted arrows
With sainted circle
With sainted closing
With joining light
With saving hand
With sainted blemish
With circumference blue
With climbing saintliness
With joy eliminated
With saintliness diffused
With sainted hope
With closing hand
With sainted mouth
With joining hearts
With shining road
With long gone cascade
With sainted sound
With sainted search
With saintly doom
With connected light
With sainted substance
With light flowing down
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Harry E. Northup
https://timestimes3.blogspot.com/2017/08/with-saintliness.html
About Bill Mohr