In search of Mary Ann Jenene

Elaine and the kids and I entered a sprawling Strand-like bookstore. The three of them went their own ways, and I stayed near the entrance to ask a question of the employee sitting there. I was looking for a memoir by Van Dyke Parks about a neglected American poet, Mary Ann, Mary Ann. I couldn’t remember her last name, so I looked it up on my phone: Mary Ann Jenene. The name rang no bell for the employee. When I said again that the memoir was written by Van Dyke Parks, something clicked, and the employee reached for a manila folder on the bookshelves right by his seat.

Inside the folder was a large piece of cardstock, folded in two, holding several much smaller folded cards, perhaps three by two inches. One was about Mary Ann Jenene, with the details of her life and poetry. “Thanks. VDP” was printed on the inside of the card, on its right margin. Something similar, with my name, was on the back. “Oh,” I said, “I thought it was a book of some sort.” Still, I wanted to buy it. But when I looked for it, it was gone. I searched my backpack. No luck. I told the employee that there were readers who thought that Jenene was better than Eliot or Pound. He just nodded.

A likely influence: the documentary The Booksellers (dir. D.W. Young, 2019), with several scenes of the Strand. John Ashbery held the neglected poet David Schubert in high esteem: “I myself value Schubert more than Pound or Eliot, and it’s a relief to have an authority of the stature of [William Carlos] Williams to back me up”: Other Traditions (2000). “My Jeanine” is a song by Van Dyke Parks, from the Parks and Brian Wilson album Orange Crate Art (1995). Bass harmonica by Tommy Morgan, but as far as I know, that has nothing to do with the dream.

Related reading
All OCA dream posts (Pinboard) : A David Schubert poem : David and Judith Schubert : David Schubert, TR5-3713

[“Only fools and children talk about their dreams”: Dr. Edward Jeffreys (Robert Douglas), in Thunder on the Hill (dir. Douglas Sirk, 1951).]