Not too long after the beginning of the 20th century, Lawrence Ferlinghetti was walking through a field strewn with corpses, saying "no, no," and trying to knock down with a walking stick the huge billboards with the faces of Hitler and Stalin. Happily, he met a fellow vagabond who was greater than Marx, Lenin, Stalin or Hitler, and even Christ or Buddha. He was a little tramp named Charlie Chaplin who was not afraid to laugh in the faces of tyrants and not ashamed of his job as a street-sweeper in the City of Lights. Chaplin gave Ferlinghetti a sword of laughter and the power to be a mirror walking down a strange street, and ever since, everything Ferlinghetti did was a slapstick in the face of that century that hastened its demise
And now the 20th century is dead
The wicked witch is dead
And all that remains of it is a bit of laughter and love
And here are some of the things Ferlinghetti did:
He was a mirror walking down a strange street, a poet, a painter, a happy person
He loved the Paris of his youth, of artists and bookstalls
And he transformed his own neighborhood in San Francisco
Into the Paris of his youth
And he marched right up into the face of the 20th century and called in a mighty voice: "Read something different, you ignorant fool!" because the world was full of criminals waiting in line to slaughter everyone for ideas they'd gotten from bad books
And he made the poems of his loving, tragic and chaplinesque friends into books that the young of the 20th century read and then set out to bring about the demise of the 20th century
And Charlie Chaplin and Edith Piaf were regular customers at City Lights
Making everyone laugh and cry
Until laughter and love grew stronger and the streets changed their names
From those of politicians and ignoramuses to those of poets and artists
Who traveled through underground tunnels from Paris and Prague and New York
To bring their lights to City Lights bookstore
A honeycomb of tunnels ran through the second half of the 20th century
Weakening it and hastening its demise
And whenever it threatened to blow up these tunnels
A ragged mob with wild eyes spilled out holding blinding mirrors to it
Led by Lawrence Ferlinghetti with Chaplin's hat on his head and a rolled up newspaper in his hand
Fifty years later the poet, actor, satirist, fearless contrarian, wanderer and citizen of San Francisco and the world, stands over the corpse of the 20th century
The future shops at City Lights Books
NOTE: City Lights Books in San Francisco, founded by poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti, celebrates its 50th anniversary on Sunday, June 8. During the festivities, the streets around the famed meeting place for generations of bohemians will be closed to traffic. Lawrence Ferlinghetti has been named Poet Laureate of San Francisco. Thanks to his efforts, many of the streets around the bookstore have been renamed for rebel poets and writers whose works were first published by City Lights Books, beginning with Allen Ginsberg, whose "Howl" was the greatest protest anthem of the 20th century.
