~~Poetic Voices~~
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Vol. 2 Iss. 2                                                                           February 1998
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Featured Poet Interview
Larry Jaffe
by
R.C. Travis
WRTRGracie/GracieamL
This month I would like to introduce you to Larry Jaffe,who G. Murray Thomas, Editor of Next Magazine calls "one of the hottest shows in LA." Larry lives in Pasadena, CA and hosts poetry readings at some of the hottest poetry sites in the area. He is 49, married, has two daughters and an 8 month old grandson named Rocky. He is very fond of his pet computer and can frequently be found caressing his keyboard.

But on a more serious note, Larry is a full time Poet who concentrates on his writing and hosting poetry events all across the LA area. He began writing when he was 11 years old at day camp when he wrote "Uncle Larry's native Corner for the camp newspaper. Through out High School and college he continued writing for school papers and was a sports editor. During the 60's and 70's he wrote for the underground media, and then moved into ad copy writing.

What inspires Larry to write? He says, "Life. I describe myself as a poetry machine. I breath in life and spit out poetry." His favorite authors are L Cohen, ee cummings, Dashell Hammit, and Raymond Chandler. Larry also stated that he loves to read detective stories, was into science fiction, and enjoys reading Sue Grafton. "I love female protagonists," he said.

Larry claims that he never had a mentor and felt at many times he needed one. This is what motivates him so fiercly to run these poetry groups and events throughout LA. He does claim though, that a teacher in college impressed him and a friend, Angela Lavow said, "You have the ability to capture and create poetic portraits of people and things." He stated this has stuck with him throughout his life.

Larry shared with me some interesting thoughts and viewpoints about life and poetry which I would love to share with you.... "I see poetry having a renaissance. Poets do not get the respect n this country like they do in other countries. There is probably not a person on this earth who has not written poetry, and yet, poetry is suppressed and degraded as an art form. We are making reading into an art form, as a host, I have the purest art form in front of me. The audience becomes the poet and the poet becomes the audience. If someone hosts comedy or music, the participants are not coming out of the audience. I like to make the reading a Spiritual Experience. It is fascinating doing this live as I watch spectators become active participants and observe the advancement of each poet as they push the envelope each week."

I asked Larry what form or style of writing he most enjoys, and he said, "I have a concept of ‘Word Shaping' life become a concept and then the concept becomes words in my poetry machine. I want my readers to experience the reality, but I also have a dream of reality changed to something improved. Word-shape conjures and image of what I am saying... it's like.... a worded portrait of that essence of life I am trying to capture."

In parting, I asked Larry what advice he had for beginning writers and poets.... he said "write your butts off, read a lot, and go to live readings like crazy. And most of all, NEVER let anything come between you and your poetry. Poetry is a life and death matter. Poets are the only pure artists that put spirit into society..and that can spark revolution."

Larry is truly an inspiring person and a talented poet! In closing, I shall leave you with a review by of his Live Poetry Show at Celebrity Centre Theatre in Hollywood on January 4, 1998 by Russell Salamon...

"Larry Jaffe is one of the leaders of the new art form, the live poetry
reading. He heads a weekly series in Pasadena, California, at the Juice
and Java every Tuesday. At Celebrity Centre's Live Poetry Show on January
4th he showed what the buzz is about. He brings buzz. He is buzz. One
can almost imagine him wearing a yellow jacket below his smile and friendly
attitude. Friendship is one of his best poems and he emanates it as he reads.

At a time when the official philosophy is, "I don't know, I don't care," Larry in his poetry says, "I know, I care." Whereas official poetry is the beautiful sigh of a dying animal, or the less official, "I am me, and you have been mean to me," Larry's poetry brings an emotional moral code which holds that Mankind is valuable and should be rescued. It should be rescued and made alive with communication. And what is to be rescued is the lost soul. In one of his poems, "soul keepers" he says, "we are the soul keepers, the poets,  marching angels, avengers of destruction, the prophets of a new tomorrow." This is a serious respect for the basic nature of people. We are not bodies, and Larry has a poem about that too. We are "construction poetz", we build with communication a net, then as fishermen poets we troll the depths of chaos and pull up gasping survivors who are willing to rise from the dead and drink poetry in great gulps of truth and awakening. Larry sees a large mankind and speaks to it. He wants to light up voices with eloquence; he  gives poetry back to the people for use. It is a civilizing point.

Moreover, Larry Jaffe confronts the past as movingly as he sees the future. In "history lesson" he recalls his Jewish parents stepping through gates of Ellis Island into the ghetto of the American Dream into "a safer plantation/ filled with green apartment/ buildings growing to skies/ littered with promise..." In "how many jewish backs does it take to make a proper lampshade" he will not let the Nazis, nor us, forget evil: "i see these nazi craftsmen/ drinking beer and/ smoking cigarettes/ their ash spilling/ on skins that once covered/ cremated jewish bodies/..."

Larry Jaffe's range is wide. From Nazis he moves to a tender bittersweet poem "one eyed splendor" which alternates from the beautiful to the real, "i see you with one/ eye because/ my other eye is too busy/ confronting reality/ with my right eye/ i take in your grace/ and your beauty/ while my other/ eye is jaundiced/ by the man in rags/ begging for food or drink/ and maybe work/..."

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