R.I.P. Hayden Carruth

One of my main pet peeves about the festival was it seems that many poets these days hadn't really earned the right to the title. Give them an MFA and they publish a book makes them all of a sudden a great sage of the world. Hayden Carruth is good proof of what happens when a life lived along with a ridiculous amount of talent really makes a poet. He didn't go the normal path of a writer and as I am sure you can see from the picture he lived life hard. What results is a body of work that should be envied by anyone wishing to become a poet. He deserves to read. He deserves to be respected and listened to. He was the real deal. Check out his web site and his page on the Academy of American Poets.