![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-h909qdGzyQgZfuFljND94kI7EZYnOGQKOvHesBMho4LyElsN9Vtm4ckKYmZU2aHP4l9jdMQ3Cz36puV57nCwItOIiXmJo9DkYNIgnSKfUQO4swbhRuIxvJqCSWu7ypp-nCb7dzMvdxrT/s400/lax1.jpg)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj57vUvxpN2_J2lf_SBUIrgVGSFa2g24XAXw6HGhsw7PtiZQQeD_Gkz-jdieGwFZC6_kmR0t8TkT3LoKHcFPdsv-vrJMp23UlmN_d57wCFW8fQz5UKnq5FJzgk2t9GGvJDqcbzHrTxfnL17/s400/LAX2.jpg)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiV_lpSaW5OmHrG8oTcGHdt1bFptCRYY3lHrKCI4jKC7o3ZdYGjwN5VMAzKURBvJViumCqAG4Y93PsCRpNcXwS4onD4ml4_xFoJyl2aIG2Rv-xd-b1aVfNXndtumPrY5PM-uvLf9_7C8N_I/s400/LAX3.jpg)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjcWuMw65EWrg6FY2VRzTtoKdNwlpx76uc7glZ6E0NlTvmqtX_7blaSRwZFUrow8EOPkV1Yv4VIJIVUV0OAC5Qs7BY2FXSswwShK2uAh6gY22UIISGxTfrULydFdk3ecziRg4Yrl2BgBoL/s400/LAX4.jpg)
![](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjySpd5sQtQdkaCLLS7JMoVfki-aJfVM4-FWi5adMXlBV-zoQZF5AIHfSkvUeyq5F3PybOcwJxObStx4cuDN9_D7lE8R-LnfE0SycCCZJhzknbzknZdh307Am75gRjxXMf6inSvgS3OhSVw/s400/LAX5.jpg)
This is how Lax tells it:
LAX: Somebody asked me how I felt after Merton died. I said I certainly felt as though I'd lost a correspondent. It wasn't that I'd lost a friend because I don't feel that now either. He's there in that sense, the friend is there. But as a correspondent he's hard to get to.
I think Gladio [Gladys Lax Marcus, Lax's sister] must have sent me a cable to tell me that Merton had died. All I can remember is that right after I received it, I went down to the chapel in Kalymnos where I was living, a nice little family chapel I used to go to. I had to go to town that night and I saw this star and this cloud and this hill and I started writing a poem. It was like the "one stone" poem, just writing it because it was a poem, I usually have a notebook with me so by the time I finished it I probably stopped on the street and wrote it down in the notebook. Whatever it was, when I finished it, and not until I finished it, did I realize it was a poem for Merton.
[Note: I published this Lax poem/drawing last year on the anniversary of Merton's death on my other blog. Lax, and the friendship between Merton and Lax, is important in my knowing of Merton, and I need for this poem to be here on louie, louie.]
Simplicity!
ReplyDeleteYes, and kind of Zen-ny too, don't you think?
ReplyDeleteI cna't get past the simplicity! :)
ReplyDelete