
Charles Bukowski by Ulf Andersen (Getty). Source: newyorker.com
Charles Bukowski by Ulf Andersen (Getty). Source: newyorker.com
Edmonton, Cairo / 1948. Source: raremaps.com
Youssef Rakha, Iford Delta 3200 Negative, 2003
“We knew that he was a wonderful poet (and also a painter for some time),” Marilyn Jossens wrote of Sargon Boulus (1944-2007), known to her and other San Francisco friends as Sergie. “We appreciated the fact that his soul was in the human condition, and in Iraq/Assyria and other areas of the Middle East, but I doubt many knew much of his life in the U.S.” She had noticed a piece recounting my first encounter with his voice. It took a long time for Marilyn and me to get in touch after she offered to share her photos of Sargon, the record of a life well lived, which I have opted to present as a montage rather than chronologically. I was glad to inform Marilyn of the fact that Sargon’s translation of Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet from English to Arabic has already appeared with the Cologne-based Al-Kamel Verlag, along with his translations of Allen Ginsberg and Ted Hughes.
Below, in lieu of captions, are extracts from Marilyn’s letters: