Pipe Dreams, by Marty Matz Herbert Huncke's Introduction to Pipe Dreams, by Marty Matz
[Pipe Dreams is a collection by San Francisco poet Marty Matz, who was a longtime friend of Huncke's.]
Martin Matz is in my feeling one of the most positive and eloquent poets it is my privilege to be in touch with. How fine and beautiful are the opium-drenched lines in his Pipe Dreams, exquisitely presented in manner: delicate, mysterious and wondrous. He succeeds in developing an awareness of the strength and awesome beauty, the hidden power and intricate structure in the heart of a stone; the intangible mystique beheld in the flight of a hummingbird, the wing of a dragonfly or exotic butterfly kissing and drawing the sweet nectar from each flower. His demanding retentive memory in order—the essence complete and alive of that instant in time—fuses into revelation, of all which there is to see: the surface, the depth, a vibrancy we can instinctively recognize; the perfection of the moment. Thus he has lived, and knows the great power of what I refer to as Spirit—a word I believe, quite honestly, very often fails to consider the rush of life, or all that we find somewhat difficult to accept or handle.
There exist certain people of strange, mysterious bent who see the palest colors of each day—who look beyond the heavy gray rolling clouds periodically illuminated by revealed areas of light, patterned with mint and wisps of gently fringed pearly smoke like bits of swirling cloud fragments. The eyes see what is not there, not necessarily due: agitation and undirected time—thought moving steadily through the inner being, alerting our senses to the charm and almost imperceptible awareness of the inspiring beauty, the outpouring of an energy pulsing with the scene unfolding before one unexpectedly. Mr. Matz can successfully blend the strange and fascinating dream-level reality with the mundane daily experience most perfectly, weaving perfect magic.
All of this only a fleeting moment, now indelibly marked most vividly within the pictured memory of that moment. The poem becomes memory we will instinctively know—and unequivocally, always remember.
It seems to me I spend a great deal of time racking my brain while attempting something in the way of verbal or written description in order to speak of a friend—a poet, a prose writer, a painter, a musician—anyone who is alive, I suppose, is what it comes to—if I am to be understood. Regardless, I attempt this introduction with a sincere desire to speak of a man I admire not only as a man to be respected as a friend, but as an unusually fine poet as well.
When I think of his poetry I think particularly of his words ... or should I say his choice of words, words that he has rolled around in his thoughts, perhaps tasting their sounds in his head, his mouth. His lines are strong yet tinged with a touch of pathos. His world of color and ancient life, caught in the web of deep wisdom and deep knowledge and response to mystique, makes dreams unfold before him. There is a "force" at work within the whole of his poetry, very nearly in every one of the poems I've read. But it is most definitely true of the poems in this volume. This can be sensed most clearly when Mr. Matz reads his poems aloud—there is felt an exotic richness, as well as an almost world-weary sultriness and throbbing in the voice as he reads his Pipe Dreams.
And he draws support for the solidity of his statements from the earth, the soil—of all nature; trees, rocks, and gems—upheaval and restless winds—strange dream-producing flowers. His is an awareness of the endless mystery we are all so much a part of. Of such stuff are we allowed to fill out the shape of our lives, no matter our aim—or better, our hopes. Nor does it matter what dreams and memories compose the substance of our future. The moment is all. Marty Matz has lived the moment, and his poetry speaks of it wonderfully.
—Herbert Huncke
Summer 1989
Reprinted with permissions
