Memories of Bernadette
The first time Clark and I met Bernadette Mayer was some time in 1969. She and Clark had corresponded before that, then Bernadette drove to CA with Ed Bowes in his sports car. I had been out on errands with our infant daughter Celia and had climbed the stairs to our third floor flat with her to find Clark in conversation with this beautiful young woman at our kitchen table!
In 1970 we moved to Hancock, MA, in the Berkshires. Bernadette and Ed visited us there, and Ed videoed Clark and Bernadette reading from Gertrude Stein’s work in various spots in our house. Celia, now about 3 or 4, was entertained by this “hide and seek”! That evening, we watched the results on a TV on our dining table. At one point, the camera was on, playing the results on the screen, so Celia could watch herself. So much fun!
On another occasion, Bernadette and Ed stayed at the house while we were away. It was summertime, and B kept the doors open (our house had all sealed windows, full A/C and little vents in each room to allow fresh air. We later added openable windows in the previously windowless bathrooms and laundry room, plus next to the front door, to allow more air and light). But with the doors open, birds flew in. Turns out Ed was afraid of birds. So B fashioned a net from a mesh shopping bag and a broom handle to catch the birds, a challenge as our living room had 11-foot ceilings.
Later that decade, Bernadette was in Worthington, MA, living with Lewis Warsh, whom she married at that house. At the wedding (in November?), we discovered Jack Daniels went very well with wedding cake! Lewis’s family including his niece Rose (?) was there, plus Celia, and Bill and Beverly Corbett’s daughters, Marnie and Arden. The girls had a fine time clambering in the woods, wearing their “wedding finery”!
Bernadette had created a cookbook for Lewis to use so he could help with meals after the birth of Marie. Later, at Christmas time, Bernadette (or Lewis?) called in great distress. The furnace had “died” and there was no heat. Clark and his father (Clark’s parents were visiting at the time) went off in our VW bus to “rescue” everyone, bringing the trio plus...) back to our place, where we found beds for everyone. It was a high point for Arlan, Clark’s father, rescuing this young family right at Christmas.
Later, B and L moved to Lenox, much closer to us. Clark visited them quite regularly, and for a time drove them to their appointments with a homeopathic doc over in NY. After that, the pair bought a not-very-reliable automobile, which gave them some independence. Sophia was born in Lenox.
Of course, we have memories of Bernadette at Naropa in Boulder, CO, and of various poetry readings there, in the Berkshires, in Maine, and in NYC. The family moved to Henniker, NH for a time before returning to New York, when B ran the Poetry Project.
Clark’s mother Sylvia really connected with Bernadette. For a time, they wrote back and forth, enjoying a shared love of diagramming sentences! Later Sylvia helped Bernadette with her “Phil” project [published in Poetry State Forest as “The Phil-Words”]. Sylvia was a Classics major at Radcliffe in the 1920’s and she loved helping with all the Phils.
After Bernadette and Philip Good moved to East Nassau, NY, we visited once while on a trip east, having by that time returned to California. I remember we shopped for items to add to a picnic lunch. We were entertained by a wine called “Irony.” Bernadette got a kick out of asking someone to “pass the Irony.”
Over the last decades, Clark and Bernadette lost touch, discontinuing their correspondence years ago. After Bernadette’s diagnosis, we were finally able to visit her and Phil last September. It was a lovely chance to connect once again. Clark was struck by Bernadette’s beauty; the decades seemed to have melted away and she reminded Clark of her younger self. The two had their heads together for close to two hours while Phil, Max, who was visiting, and I sat nearby, chatting. Max and Phil were very attentive, letting us know when Bernadette needed to return to bed, and we took our leave.
14 January 2023