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Book of the Week — Kaddish: For Naomi Ginsberg, 1894-1956

And how Death is that remedy all singers dream of, sing, remember,
prophesy as in the Hebrew Anthem, or the Buddhist Book of
Answers—and my own imagination of a withered leaf—at dawn—
Dreaming back thru life, Your time—and mine accelerating toward Apocalypse,
the final moment—the flower burning in the Day—and what comes after,
looking back on the mind itself that saw an American city
a flash away, and the great dream of Me or China, or you and a phantom
Russia, or a crumpled bed that never existed—
like a poem in the dark—escaped back to Oblivion—

Kaddish: For Naomi Ginsberg, 1894-1956
Allen Ginsberg
San Francisco, CA: The Arion Press, 1992

From the publisher, “Allen Ginsberg is one of the most celebrated poets in America. The long poem ‘Kaddish’ is considered his masterpiece. It was written in 1961, five years after his poem ‘Howl’ had shocked the literary world and brought Ginsberg and the Beat Movement to prominence. ‘Kaddish’ is dedicated to Ginsberg’s mother, Naomi, who died tragically in 1956 in a mental institution. Two other poems, ‘White Shroud’ and ‘Black Shroud’, are included for their further recollections, dreams, and reincarnations of the departed mother. R. B. Kitaj is a highly respected American painter who has long resided in London, where a major retrospective exhibition of his work was mounted at the Tate Gallery in 1994 and toured museums in the United States.”

Introduction by Helen Vendler. Lithograph portraits of the poet and his mother by R.B. Kitaj.

Edition of 226 copies, signed. Rare Books copy is no. 116.

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