On a Wayward Waddle Through the White Willows: Book One

I wrote Wayward Waddle primarily as an undergraduate at the University of Oregon, around 1973-74. Vietnam was still going on but I received a high lottery number thus escaping the draft and general concern about things political. Rather I was into yoga. The poetry was still pretty experimental. I’ve cut out the poetry that really sucked. The remainder has gone through several incarnations. First they were written in green ink, then typed, eventually word processed and punctuated. I don’t labor over poems trying to get them just right, rather trusting the original creative act. Of course I tinker. Some poems are actually old fashioned poems while most are more like stream of consciousness. “Waddle” because the U. of O. mascot is the duck, plus that year saw a big showdown on the track between Prefontaine and Waddle..