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Rod & Sunny: Photo by Bob Gentry 8/5/1999

A Thought for Today

Strength is the ability to weather insults and take criticism for what it is. Somebody else's opinion. 

Today's letters include questions and feedback.

JENNY

Mr. McKuen, Let me first start this letter by saying thank you. Thank you for filling those lonely nights with words of wisdom & experience yet to be sought out and discovered. The first time I ever heard about you and your works was in high school. I had a speech class and my teacher had some of your poems hidden in files that students dared to tread in. 

This one student by the name of Christina had written a speech concerning your works. I don't quite remember the speech she did, but I do remember the poem that she included in her essay. It was excerpts from Listen to the Warm. The only reason that I remember this girl was because 6 months after Christina wrote her essay, she died in a car accident heading home from college. It's sad to see such a young life go by wasted and unfulfilled. Thanks to my teacher, Christina, and her essay, the introduction of your poetry into my life will never be forgotten.

Now concerning my question about Jenny. Recently (in July 2000) I had gone to New York and stopped into a record store. I came across a copy of your Listen to the Warm album and found an inscription on the back of it. It reads as follows:

"For Jenny- the first one in America to hear the album. best; Rod

I know that you must have written countless of inscriptions on albums and poetry books. But, is there any chance that the album that is in my possession is inscribed by you and is referring to the Jenny in your poem Meditation on Jenny Kissed? I know it's a long shot, but I thought I would take a chance in asking. Thanks for inspiring me and the millions of people in America and around the world. God Bless, Mia-Andrea E. Veliz, Student of Life

Dear Mia-Andrea, Thanks for telling me the very moving story concerning your classmate Christina. The loss of a young life is always the hardest to comprehend and come to terms with. So much promise wasted.

As for the inscription you found on the "Listen to the Warm" LP, I wish I could be of some help. Considering what I wrote it must have happened 31 years ago shortly after its release. I don't remember who that "Jenny" was, sounds like I might have autographed it at a signing party in a record store.

Meditations on Jenny Kissed Me was written only a year or so ago.

Thanks for writing and for the unusual question. Warmest regards, Rod

THE BOX?

Where can I find a copy of your poem THE BOX? Thank you very much, this is for a good friend of mine. Clancy Boyer

Dear Clancy, I have to admit your question stumped me, since I can't remember ever writing a poem entitled "The Box," So I turned to my friend and expert in all things McKuen, Jay Hagan. 

Dear Jay, "The Box?" Sometimes I feel like I'm having an out of body experience. Is there another matched set of Jay & Rod in a parallel universe somewhere?

Here's his answer:

Good Morning Rod, I'm all for that matched set. We could get them to work for us and you and I could skip off to someplace very warm and sip martinis and you could teach me to like jazz ( NOT ).

I found a 'matched set' of poems that might fit the bill for this request.

Boxer

I am so amazed
at finding out
my head still reels
under even friendly blows
that I'm determined
not to let the boxer
        or the battler
come in close again.

I will not willingly go out
into the evening any more
and place myself within
that enchanted circle,
the moving staircase
       or the rain.

I should stay at home
behind the iron gates
       and rainbow glass.
Sure places I've constructed.
The disappointments yet to come
can be lived by me in private.
No one need know
if the wounds are fatal
or if I'm waiting out
              some healing time.

There is am emptiness
and it is deep.
A wound so old
that healing wouldn't work.

If I have not yet
come back around
to where I started
then I am only inches
from that now narrow
               corridor
meant to bring me there.

                    -from "The Sea Around Me", 1974, 1975


Boxing Lessons

Wiser by half a year
I enter into your brown body
like a blind man sure of every step.
So assured
        sometimes I feel embarrassed.

So delighted that I wonder
how I earned the privilege
of your light limbs around my back.

If indeed I've earned
your body and your love
then I'll return
       undefeated.
A lover who by accident,
or even by design
stumbled into something
so unusual yet real
he comes back blushing
from every new encounter
with your touch.

                              -from "With Love", 1970

And just in case your caller is dyslectic (sp) and can't spell, you can offer this one too.

The Boy

Waves pound along the rocks
children with pails gather water
        splashing on the rebelling sand.
A little girl fashions a necklace from shells.
The great bodies of men and women
       move together for love.
A walrus dives... reconsiders...
       and dives again.

Only the shadow of a passing train sees it all.
Mirrors it in smoke and rumbling
       and passes on.

His hair is black.
He stands twenty summers tall.
And the prints he leaves on the sand
        as he runs along the beach
                sent her heart singing.

He is like me... we are brothers...
        though we haven't met.

He runs because the bird does not sing sweetly
                      when he's caged.
He runs because she smiled too often
        or did not understand
        when being alone sometimes...
                 was all he asked.

                          -from "In Search of Eros", 1959

Keep up the good work and we'll let you have November 4th off. Waterfalls, Jay

I hope one of the above is what you're looking for, Clancy. Regards, Rod

FEEDBACK: MOZART THEN AND NOW

Hi! Rod, It's me again. Since I just got into your ASPTL site this year, I never saw the Mozart/Clinton writing. I read it today and I really liked it. I didn't vote for Clinton but during these last years of his term, I have become a Clinton fan. I agree that he has done a lot and also his private life is just that! private. I thank you for your writing.

Do you remember when you lived in Oakland and my girl-friend and I came to your apt. for a very short visit? You had records all over the floor. I'm sorry but I do a lot of reminiscing now that I'm getting older. 64 next week. Wow!

I hope you don't think I'm a pest for e-mailing so many notes to you. I'm not a phone talker and I really get into this way of communicating like Sunny! Jane

Dear Jane, I do remember. Those, indeed, were the days. Sunny's a sweetheart and at the moment he's fast asleep with his left front paw resting on my keyboard. As ever, Rod 

FEEDBACK: FLIGHT PLAN POLITICS

Dear Mr. McKuen, I'm inferring a bit here from Sunday's Flight Plan, but how could so many people have been opposed to the impeachment of Bill Clinton?

Aren't these the same people that were fiercely in favor of impeaching Richard Nixon? Why? Is it because Bill has a nicer smile than Dick had? Folks give credit to Clinton for our prosperity while we've had a republican Congress that formulated and passed the legislation that fostered it. These same people would give credit to a democratic Congress instead of a republican president if the roles were reversed. But it takes two, doesn't it, with Congress first? If it don't come out of Congress, it don't get signed by the Prez.

I don't get it. Bill Clinton made a mockery out of moral values, and everybody flamed Jerry Falwell. Jim Bakker went to jail and Jane Fonda didn't. Calvin Klein ads border on pedophilia, and nobody cares.

The Supreme Court majority is openly hostile to religion and
everybody shrugs. Is this the "prosperity" that Bill Clinton has
fostered for us. I won't list his stable of women, or his collection of questionable business dealings, or his host of legal shenanigans again. I'm tired of looking at it. But to me, character and integrity and honesty means more than money. Richard Nixon got us out of Kennedy & Johnson's Vietnam, supported and signed into law the Environmental Protection Agency, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 which added disabled persons to those protected by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission), and the first federally mandated cost of living increases for social security recipients. 

He began diplomatic relations between the US and red China and negotiated the first nuclear weapons limitation treaty between the US and the USSR. He proposed legislation for the Family Assistance Program, which would have consolidated several large welfare programs and provided more comprehensive assistance to welfare families with dependant children; he lost because the democratic party (who held the majority in Congress) opposed any legislation that included a "workfare" provision. He mandated by presidential order federal "set-aside" programs that guaranteed minority contractors a percentage of federal projects, tripled funding for the EEOC, and federal re-funding programs that returned billions of federal tax dollars to the states.

Oh, and in his spare time he ended the draft. And no, I'm not a big Nixon fan. I just think fair is fair. But this isn't about dirty politics vs. clean politics, is it? It's about democrat vs. republican. Too many people have a simple pair of equations. Republican = Good and Democrat = Bad, or vice versa. I'm that way sometimes. I wish I weren't.

Let me close by wishing you the best of everything.
Alan Nicholson, Pasadena, Texas

Dear Alan, Whew. There's an awful lot in your letter to digest. It's impassioned and obviously springs from your honest beliefs. It would take several flight plans to answer it the way I'd like to, but in fairness to other letter writers and the attention span of all of us (you, me and the readers) I'll try to be brief.

I do have to take issue with some of your statements.

1. President Clinton's moral indiscretions can hardly be equated with Mr. Nixon and members of his administration attempts to circumvent the process of our constitutional right to an honest and democratic vote.

Yes, Mr. Clinton lied about his affair with a woman other than his wife and there is no excuse for that. However I am one of many Americans who believe that that ought to have remained a personal matter between the parties concerned. Nobody elected me or you to judge his behavior.

I did not help elect Mr. Clinton to set my moral standards. I voted for him because I believed (and still do) that he was the best candidate for president. My beliefs have not only been borne out but he exceeded my expectations.

If the election rules allowed it, I dare say that based on his record, Clinton could easily be elected again. Isn't it fair to go back and use President Bush's question. "Are you better off now than you were eight years ago?"

Clinton's record, in terms of what he was elected to do is as impressive as any president during my lifetime (I was born during the Roosevelt administration.) This despite the fact that he had to battle a Republican congress all the way.

2. To blame the ever-declining moral climate of this country on Clinton just doesn't hold water. Was it because of the Pope's lack of moral responsibility that "La Dolce Vita" became a short cut for describing morality in post war Italy? What Clinton has to do with Calvin Klein's underwear ads escapes me. As long as sex sells, and like it or not sex and skin still seem to be Madison Avenue's standard for pushing everything from alphabet soup to zit removers, we can expect ever racier ads.

3. Questionable business dealings? Nice try, but even you must have heard by now that despite the many millions of dollars of public monies spent on investigations of The Clintons, they have been totally exonerated. Amazing isn't it that even with all these distractions our current president has been able to do so much good for the country.

4. Nixon's efforts with Communist China were brave and brilliant and he deserves credit as a leader in many other areas that only time and history will afford him. Better recheck your history books, however, on President Nixon's efforts with The Soviet Union. 

5. While the Vietnam War ended during Nixon's administration he has to share the credit for its cessation with some of the pop culture leaders of the day including Joan Baez, Bob Dylan and yes even Jane and Peter Fonda. Most of all it was the American people finally tired of body bags and Dan Rather's in the field reports on 'the war that couldn't be won' that turned the tide. 

I'll not go on with any comments or rebuttals regarding Richard Nixon, since I have never used the Flight Plan to address his presidency. Your right to do so is important and I've given you the forum.

One last thought, in making an argument for morality, don't use Jerry Falwell's name on the side of the good guys. His brand of bias, bigotry, ignorance and misinformation is every bit as destructive to honest moral values, equality and just treatment for all Americans as anything some so called Christians can point to coming out of Hollywood or Madison Avenue.

I agree with you, Allan, Republican doesn't equal good nor Democrat bad. Some of my best friends are people. . . including those with strong opinions like yours. So, I know you'll respect my decision to not change horses in midstream and vote for a shrub when I have a chance to keep the big oak growing. All the best to you, Rod 

HELLO FROM A FAN IN OHIO

Hi, my name is Heather Benson. I just found your site on the Web, and I know you're probably very busy, but I just wanted to e-mail you to let you know that you have a fan out here at the University of Dayton in Ohio. I'm a freshman here, a double major in Religious studies and Theatre. I just wanted to say that I have loved your poetry since I first found it in my high school library when I was in ninth grade. 

It's so hard to find some of your books, but I've managed to get eight of them and three of your CDs. I love your work and I know this must sound very cliché, but some of your poetry has inspired me to start writing, and I've had several of my poems published since I first read your work. 

I love you work, but most of the people that I have met don't know who you are! Especially the people my age. I have a feeling that's the way it is most places, but you have at least one fan in my generation, and I've already made two of my friends here interested in your works. I know that I have tended to babble a bit in this, but to be honest, I don't know really what to say. Just thank you for all of your writing, I you are my favorite poet of all time! Life, love and happiness, Heather Benson

Dear Heather, I can't imagine a more interesting double major than Religious Studies and Theatre, since there has always been a lot of each in both. I'm sure by now you've realized that.

It's true that since I took my books and many of my recordings off the market a number of years ago, many titles are hard to find. Used book and record stores, The Net and, of course, Stanyan By Mail are your best bets in unearthing them.

Ohio has always been a great state for me, I must have played every college, university and theatre in the state at one time or another. And I'm willing to bet that once the dates are firmed for next fall's concert tour more than one appearance in Ohio will be scheduled.

It surprises and pleases me that these days my fans seem to be spread pretty much across the spectrum. I hear from people as young as thirteen and as old as . . . you don't want to know. I owe a lot to parents and grand parents who've passed my work on down to their kids and to people like yourself who continue to spread the word. Thanks and love, Rod.


Don't forget that tonight is the final presidential debate before the election on November 7th. Tune in. Stay informed.

Join Ken tomorrow for his weekly "This One Does It For Me" feature. Sleep warm and I'll be back on Thursday.

                       RM 10/14/2000 Previously unpublished

DENNIS