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Bidart returns to Kern, inspiration of many of his powerful poems

BY CAMILLE GAVIN, Contributing columnist | Monday, Oct 19 2009 02:01 PM

Last Updated Monday, Oct 19 2009 02:01 PM

Poets who "make it" nationally are rare indeed. Even rarer is finding a Bakersfield native who has gained such stature.

I'm pleased to report Frank Bidart, this year's winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for poetry and a finalist for both the National Book Award and the Pulitzer, is a member of that elite circle.

And the further good news is that he'll share his wisdom and his poetry Tuesday evening at Cal State Bakersfield.

During a phone interview on Sunday afternoon -- at the time, Bidart was in New York, waiting for his delayed flight from JFK to LAX to be announced -- he talked candidly about his childhood, his early attempts at writing poetry, and the message he hopes to bring to students.

"Very early I loved poems but I didn't write many," said the poet, 70. "And the ones I did weren't any good, although I may have had one or two published in the school newspaper."

After his graduation from Garces Memorial High School, he went to UC Riverside and then on to graduate school at Harvard.

"It was in grad school that my poems got better," he said. "I could shape things, make things out of what was in my mind, things that really concerned me, obsessed me."

Many of those thoughts reflected his feelings about his parents, Frank R. and Betsy Bidart, who were divorced when he was 5. Both his maternal and paternal grandparents were Basque immigrants who came here in 1905. The poet's uncle, John Bidart, and his brother -- young Frank's father -- were farmers. They founded Bidart Brothers, which became a multifaceted business that thrives today.

But, he added, "John Bidart is the person who really built the business -- my father didn't have much to do with it. My parents were very frustrated people; they never found what they wanted to make out of their lives. My father was an alcoholic -- my poem 'The Third Hour of the Night' is about his life."

That particular poem includes these haunting lines, ones that are meaningful to anyone who has ever dealt with alcoholics or alcoholism:

"Understand that there is a beast within you that can drink till it is sick, but cannot drink till it is satisfied. Understand that it will use the conventions of the visible world to turn your tongue to stone. It alone knows you. It does not wish you well."

Nearly all of Bidart's work is free verse done in a narrative style with a notable economy of language and an uncanny ability to strike with exactly the right word.

Assistant professor Marit MacArthur, who invited Bidart to speak at CSUB as part of the university's California Writers Series, praises his ability as a storyteller.

"Frank Bidart is one of the finest public readers of his poetry I have heard, and I have attended many poetry readings by some of our most prominent poets," said MacArthur. "His poetry is direct, intense, and emotionally rich, and his background in Bakersfield continues to be important to his identity as a writer. He has taken on subject matter that is not easy to write about and legitimized it in the process, and helped put the San Joaquin Valley ... on the national literary map."

Self-realization is a key element in his poetry, shining a light on our quest to dive under the surface and find what it is that we are meant to do with our lives.

The message he hopes to bring to students at CSUB is summed up in "Advice to Players," which is included in his latest book, "Star Dust."

"That poem is about how I think -- it's the desire we all have to make things," he said. "I tell kids to do something they like to do, whether it's making a family, a life, a job, or a business. That's much better than spending their time seeking happiness."

Bidart's first book of poems, "Golden State," was published in 1973; seven more have been published since then. He has taught poetry and creative writing at Wellesley College in Cambridge, Mass., for 35 years and is still an active member of the faculty.

"I love to teach; I have no intention of retiring," he said. "Why should I as long as I'm in good health?"