Exquisite Corpse - A Journal of Letters and Life

Alice Henderson: Poets in Their Youth
by Alice Henderson || Author's Links

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	I have to describe myself as a very sensitive creature. My friends Jeffrey Miller and Glen Knudsen died 25 years ago, July 29, 1977, but I still have skid marks on my heart from that accident. The doctor says I have a heart condition but I know better. I teach art to high school students in the Talented program at Ben Franklin High School in New Orleans. Academically, the school is tops in the state; unfortunately, art is the orphan child, unloved by all except for my students. The students are dressing now like I used to dress way back in 1977, with bell-bottom blue jeans cut low at the hips, tiny little tops and straight long hair. I think they find me a kindred spirit. When I was a young artist, I didn't think of myself as a hippy, although everyone else did. Art wasn't just an idea or a study. It was the way we were living. I have to include Andrei, who was my husband then, because he helped me to actualize my art, making it something happening every day. Art was life. These watercolors were made after the accident. It is my tribute to Jeffrey Miller whose life collided with mine in a positive way. The first one is Jeff and then comes Glen. They died together. Michele is next. She loved Jeff and laid out his threads; looking for her boy, now in heaven. Various angels I painted for them and sunsets in Paris. Then we visited the graves of poets at Pere Lachaise and Keats' grave in Rome. Here is a flyer for a memorial reading. Following the widow we ended in Baltimore but it was also a beginning. Number one son Lucian hops over the porch in row house mania. We complete the cycle of death to birth with brother Tristan.

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