The Poetry Series of the Church in Ocean Park presents
A Tribute to William Pillin
Saturday, Nov. 11
7 p.m.
featuring:
francEyE
John Harris
Suzanne Lummis
Wanda Coleman
Austin Strauss
Michael C. Ford
"William Pillin's poems are haunting, honest and memorable, free of formal rhythms and patterns. They were published in hundreds of literary journals and he was a mentor to many poets and artists in Los Angeles who were shunned by critics for individual style."
Church in Ocean Park
235 Hill Street
I would guess there were fifty people who listened to francEye, John Harris, Suzanne Lummis, Larry Colker, and Michael C. Ford read from their own works and mostly from the work of William Pillin. Wanda Coleman and Austin Strauss couldn't attend and Colker of the Redondo Beach Poets read in their place.
francEyE included William Pillin's poem, Ocean Park. (1963). John Harris contributed copies of William Pillin's To the End of Time Poems New & Selected (1980) which he published at Papa Bach Press and read one of his own poems dedicated to William Pillin. Suzanne Lummis recalled being in writing groups led by William Pillin in the last years of his life and read from Pillin's work. Michal C. Ford read a poem, Looking for Providence (1981) he had dedicated to William Pillin from Ford's Emergency Exits, The Selected Poems 1970-1995 and which he had read to Pillin at the Library in Ocean Park Poetry Series in the 1970s.