Here, Take This, I Love You: Chapter 4

An unexpected surprise brings some needed closure.

Photo by Sergio Sala

Friends,

One of the first essays we published here on Listening in the Dark: A Place to Be Heard was about the power of mentorships, specifically, my relationship with my late writing mentor: the great San Francisco Poet Laureate, Jack Hirschman. In the essay, I reflect on how Jack’s guidance throughout my youth helped shape the writer I am today and how I’ve navigated the grief I’ve carried since his unexpected death in 2021. I also share how, toward the end of Jack’s life, he wrote a poem for me—the first and only poem for me he’d ever written. It was titled “The Angranize Arcane,” inspired by the hybrid term I coined to describe a woman who gets angry then organized. He’d asked me to give him some feedback on his initial draft, something poets often do with their peers. For us though, this was a first in our creative relationship. I was honored and sent him my thoughts on the poem, but that’s as far as we ever got. I was never able to read the final piece; he died before it was finished. 

I’ve thought about that poem since I read its first draft back in January of 2020, just before Covid-19 would become a worldwide pandemic, taking the lives of millions of people all over the world, including Jack’s. That poem has hung in the balance of my mind, feeling like a metaphor for all that was left unsaid and unfinished between us. 

At the end of 2022, when the pandemic was coming to an end (Was it? Did it ever?) I flew to San Francisco to visit Jack’s widow, the artist and poet Agneta Falk. When I walked into the house, I was overtaken by the familiar smell of Jack and their home: old cigarette smoke, espresso, acrylic paint, and books. Lots and lots and lots of books. It was a smell I grew up around, a comforting one that reminded me of all my years spent here with Jack and Aggie in North Beach. I had expected to be strong and not cry in front of Aggie—this woman who I love who one year earlier had lost the love of her life. But I folded into uncontrollable tears right there in her arms the moment I walked through the door. She held me and we cried together. For the rest of the afternoon, we sat and talked and went through a few of Jack’s things, but I did not have it in me to ask about whatever happened to that poem.

A photo I took on my trip to San Francisco. A writing/reading chair of Jack and Aggie’s, surrounded by some of Aggie’s art on the walls.

Recently, I reached out to one of Jack’s publishers in Italy, Casa della poesia, to order copies of his Arcanes collection of which there are four massive volumes. (And I do mean massive; each book is roughly 800 pages . . . of poetry.) I ordered multiple copies of each, including his final volume with a yellow cover which had come out posthumously last year. I hadn’t seen or read it yet. I wanted to have these in stock to give away as gifts—to keep his work and spirit alive and out there, among the living. 

Jack’s volumes upon volumes of Arcane poems, fresh out of their box from Italy.

When the shipment arrived, I opened the box, set all the books out on the table, and began to look through the newest volume, the yellow-covered fourth volume. Out of the dozens of his books that I own, this was the first without a personalized inscription to me. I flipped through the pages, reading a poem here and there. It was then that I saw it: “The Angranize Arcane,” fully finished and in print, with For Amber Tamblyn written beneath the title.

I was speechless. The most painful part of losing Jack so suddenly was not getting to say goodbye, and this surprise felt like I was, in some way, getting to. We were instantly in conversation again, one last time, in spirit and on the page.

Though nearly two years would go by between when I sent him my feedback on that first draft in 2020 and when he died at the end of 2021, Jack never sent me a second draft or even told me the poem was finished. I now know he meant for its publication to be a surprise for me, and a surprise it was. Neither of us could have ever imagined it would happen like this—after he was gone and I was deep in the healing of my own sadness over his loss. How ironic; how poetic. Jack didn’t get to say goodbye in person, but he did in poetry, and I know that’s exactly how he would have wanted it. 

Lunga Vita, Jack Hirschman. I love you forever. 

Here are a few of my absolute favorite poems of Jack’s. Enjoy, and as always, thank you for being here and investing in this community. It means so much to us.

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One Day
by Jack Hirschman

One day, I’m gonna give up writing 
and just paint. I’m gonna give up painting 
and just sing. I’m gonna give up singing
and just sit. I’m gonna give up sitting 
and just breathe. I’m gonna give up breathing 
and just die. I’m gonna give up dying 
and just love. I’m gonna give up loving
and just write.

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All That’s Left
One Finger from the Seasons
New York, New York (Video)
Love Poem (for Aggie) (Video)
Mother (Video)
Blue (Video)
Path

Question for all of you: Have you ever had an experience like mine, where someone you loved and lost unexpectedly left you with a parting gift, either intentionally or unintentionally? Was there something you found or received or came to understand after they were gone? A letter? An insight? An offering? What was it, and where is it now?

As part of our ongoing Here, Take This, I Love You series for our paid subscribers, I’m giving away a copy of The Arcanes: Volume 4, the book “The Angranize Arcane” is published in. This book is a huge volume of Jack’s work and the last thing he wrote before he died in 2021. For the recipient, I’ll sign this copy for you in Jack’s absence and throw in a few additional surprises too.

Please review the full eligibility details, rules, and info below. All Paid, Founding, and Gift subscription recipients that have subscribed anytime before Friday, May 5th, 2023 at 5pm ET will be automatically entered into the Chapter 4 giveaway.