Ed Foster, a personal obit

I met Ed Foster at the first of the Russian/American conferences in Hoboken in the 1990s. The conference was amazing, though the scheduling was not. There were two breakfasts in a row, as I recall, and then no time between panels/events. The "lounge" exploded with smoke from the Russians talking to the Americans in no particular language. At one point, Russians and Americans bonded over hearing the sound of gunfire at night in St. Petersburg and Detroit (say). One Russian poet tried to walk out of his own reading, but was heckled back on stage by Andrew Dragomoshenko. (Lyn Hejinian told me what they were arguing about, and I forgot.) I later saw him wrapped around a staircase railing. I believe he died by suicide some years later. Ed was quiet and kind throughout; there was no grand master of ceremonies shtick from him. 

 

At the last Maine conference, he spoke up from the back of a room to say that becoming an editor was "a disaster." "No one thinks of you as a poet ever again," he said, I attended one of his conferences in Amherst in 2019 (was it?), a lovely gathering of souls who read to each other (no one else seemed to come!) and ate Chinese food together. Ed's introductions to the readers, including me, were kind, thoughtful, incisive. It was a blessing to be so introduced.

 

Ed published two of my books and would have done a third if illness hadn't taken him away from us years ago. He sent me his last book of poems, which was stark. His childhood had been more than difficult and, combined with the New Englandly stoicism, made for a stern brew. 

 

In recent years, the conversations between some of us have centered around the question "how's Ed?" I corresponded occasionally with his friend of the many names, now deceased (like my memory), about his failing attempts to keep Talisman on track. Now I find the Talisman House website littered with hacked intrusions, and feel sadness. (Google his books and you find them--and a slew of books on being Wiccan.) And I feel awe at what Ed accomplished over his many years of service to our craft, his close care to others' work, his quiet kindness.