The other Christopher Buckley

The October/November issue of The Writer's Chronicle features an article by Christopher Buckley. Why not? The political commentator and son of über-conservative William F. Buckley does write novels. Buckley might be looking for more work, after resigning from National Review because of his turncoat endorsement of Barack Obama for president. (If you haven't read his reasoning on this, you should.) Maybe his new gig at The Daily Beast isn't enough.

But to see a Christopher Buckley piece in the somewhat academic journal of the Associated Writing Programs would be surprising. The usual roster of contributing writers reads like the speakers line-up of the Conference on College Composition and Communication, which means: Unless you're involved in college writing instruction, you haven't heard of them. These are contributors such as Mike Chasar, Carol Smallwood, and yes, yours truly.

But no; there's another Christopher Buckley out there, being eclipsed by the famous son. This one has published 16 books of poetry, all with respectable small presses. He teaches in the creative writing program at UC-Riverside. His piece in The Writer's Chronicle is about Luis Omar Salinas, a "Fresno School" poet who died recently. Buckley asserts, "Luis Omar Salinas was, and posthumously continues to be, one of the leading Chicano poets as well as an important voice in contemporary American poetry for thirty years." Salinas once read at the Library of Congress with Sandra Cisneros, but he never achieved anything like her name recognition. In fact, writers seem to feel it necessary to explain him to readers unfamiliar with his work. On Amazon, many of his books are now out of print or of limited availability.

Buckley quotes from one of Salinas' political poems, "How Much Are You Worth":

Come sit with poverty for an hour.
Capitalism is a large room with idiotic stares.
And seagulls might as well recite the rosary.
Money that runs its hands over your face.
Anger that does not approach justice.
Come sit by the Martyrs of the highway.
Tie the shoelace of the beggar.
Come make yourself useful.
Boil an egg. Fry some cheese.
Run after Senators—stop their cars.
Wash the feet of the poor.

Two lesser-known writers, worthy of reading. But don't try to Google them.

Comments

[Karen Harlow-McClintock]

The quote you make from by Luis Omar Salinas is not a well known poem by him or indicative of his work. If you had Googled him, you would have seen this. Salinas is probably the foremost Hispanic poet in the United States, post WW2. He does indeed have a book in print currently, Elegy for Desire. He wrote 9 widely acclaimed books in his lifetime not counting chapbooks. He won numerous awards as well. His poetry is studied at major universities like UCLA, and as far away as the Sorbonne in France. His work has been widely anthologized and translated into many languages. His famous poem, My Father is a Simple Man, is currently in 500,000 English textbooks published by Glencoe-McGraw/Hill in the US, and Pronk & Associates in Canada and Europe ( I know because they paid me for my author photo of him.)
A comprehensive anthology of his 9 books is being prepared now (Salinas just passed away this summer.) Stanford University just purchased his literary papers for their permanent achives (you can Google this too.) I doubt they woudl be interested in the papers of a nobody.
The Hypertexts Poetry site has a nice sampling of the work of Luis Omar Salinas. If you read it you might see why this man's work has garnered the respect of his fellow poets as well as the Hispanic community. Chris Buckley is just one of his many fans. Philip Levine is another. You might recognize his name. He won a Pulitzer Prize for poetry. (You can Google him too.) He was Salinas's professor and teacher.

[Karen Harlow-McClintock]

Sometimes Mysteriously

Sometimes in the evening
when love tunes its harp
and the crickets celebrate life, I am like a troubadour, in search of friends, loved ones, anyone
who will share with me a bit of conversation. My lonliness arrives ghostlike and pretentious, it seeks my soul, it is ravenous and hurting. I admire my father who always has advice in these matters, but a game of chess won't do, or the frivolty of religion. I want to find a solution, so I write letters, poems, and sometimes I touch solitude on the shoulder and surrender to a great tranquility. I understand I need courage and sometimes, mysteriously,
I feel whole.

-- Luis Omar Salinas,(1937-2008)

I apologize I cannot put this into the poem form it should be in, but this post
format will not allow it. --KM