January 2018
E D I T O R ' S   N O T E ​
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This issue of Verse-Virtual is dedicated to the memory of Dick Allen. 
May he rest in peace.

​Dear Vee-Vees,

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Our dear Dick Allen passed away last Tuesday, December 26, 2017. He was an active member of V-V since April 2015. A brilliant poet and an extraordinary person, Dick was good, kind, wise, compassionate— and so much more — a man full of love and care not only for his family and friends but for humanity itself. Since I only knew him through Verse-Virtual I asked his longtime friend, Sydney Lea, to write something for me to publish here. These are his words:

Sad as I am to note Dick Allen’s passing, I am pleased that, on reading (or re-reading) “Mr. Gorsline’s Town” in the last issue, I wrote to him both to applaud and to reminisce. I recalled that, when I first started thinking of myself as a poet-in-the-making, Dick’s Regions With No Proper Names  (St. Martin’s, 1975) was among the first contemporary volumes that spoke to me. I’m not sure I ever shared this intelligence with him; I think or at least hope so. Over the years, I saw the poet less often than I wish I had, but we remained in touch after I first published him in New England Review,  and word from him was not only always a pleasure but always in one measure or another an enlightenment. The Buddhism of Dick’s later life is continuous with something at the heart of his work ab origine. One sees it already in “Mr. Gorsline’s Town”: the notion that the most important realities lie behind the scrim of preoccupations, anxieties, and aspirations that we all experience.  I will hold Dick– and on my better days, his example– close to my heart for as long as I tread the earth. R.I.P., good man.
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In honor of Dick, the (optional) theme for February is KARMA.

I think Dick probably contributed about forty poems to V-V. To read them type DICK ALLEN in the search box on the Verse-Virtual website OR click the link below.

http://www.verse-virtual.com/apps/search?q=dick+allen.html


Sincerely yours,
​Firestone