Craft: Paul Zimmer
Paul Zimmer (1934-2019) was an important poet in my life. He died without any notice in any newspaper or poetry publication—too major to be taken care of, but too obscure to be noticed.
Zimmer lived on 117-acres among the dairy farms and green ridges of Soldiers Grove, Wisconsin, a village of approximately 500 people. He was the director of university presses at Georgia, Iowa, and Pittsburgh, and helped produce many books of poems there.
From 1954 to 1955 Zimmer served in the United States Army as a journalist. He was stationed in Nevada and witnessed numerous atomic bomb tests. His memoir, After the Fire, has a cover photo of Zimmer standing in front of a mushroom cloud. The Ribs of Death, his first book, was published in 1968.
Zimmer and I had a correspondence for some time in the early 2000s. He loved jazz (as do I) and his quirky sensibilities rang true for me (then, as now). His poems reflect his plainspoken whimsy and invention.
Zimmer quoted Georges Braque: “Progress in art does not consist in expanding one’s limitations but in knowing them better.” And Zimmer, in both reality and his speakers’ voices, embraces limitation. His self-deprecation maintained a general affection for the universe. His devotion to working on his poems every day comes across—even when he had many other things to do, like make a living or recover from a heart attack and bypass surgery.
