Barbara Guest

Barbara Guest, née Barbara Ann Pinson (September 6, 1920 – February 15, 2006), was an American poet and prose stylist.

Guest first gained recognition as a member of the first generation New York School of poetry.

Guest wrote more than 15 books of poetry spanning sixty years of writing.

Born in Wilmington, North Carolina and raised in California, Guest attended UCLA, and then earned a B.A. in General Curriculum-Humanities in 1943 at UC Berkeley.

She worked as an editorial associate at ARTnews magazine from 1951 to 1959.

Barbara Guest wrote more than 15 books of poetry spanning sixty years of writing.

"Her poems begin in the midst of action," wrote Peter Gizzi in his introduction to a collection of her work, "but their angle of perception is oblique."

Her poems are known for their abstract quality, vivid language, and intellectualism.

She believed that the subject of the poem finds itself through the writing of the poem and through the poet's imagination.

"Disturbing the conventional relations of subjects and objects, of reality and imagination, is one of Guest's signature gestures," noted Gizzi.

Among her most well-known poems are "Parachutes, My Love, Could Carry Us Higher," (MP3) "Wild Gardens Overlooked by Night Lights, (MP3)" "Roses," and "Photographs."

"The subject matter finds itself...You find the subject as you proceed with (writing) the poem."

"Poetry is where the concrete object is bathed in a new atmosphere lifted out of itself to become a fiction. The poet is not there only to share a poetic communication but to stimulate an imaginative speculation on the nature of reality."

"The poet wishes to align the contents of the poem with the vision which directs it. When this occurs, we say of a poem that it has wings. It is possible that words may occur in a fixed space and sequences so that they are called words of a poem. We say this poem is made of words. It is true many poems are constructed solely of words. These are the words that sit on paper without vision. We have all read these poems and we know after we have read them, we feel curiously bereft. Our expectations of enoblement by the poem have been disappointed by the lackluster condition of the poem. We decide that this poem is not very inspired. And what do we mean by this? We desired inspiration that the poem contained within it, the spirit of poetry. We have learned that words are only utensils. They are inorganic unless there is a spirit within the poem, to elevate it, to give it wings so that the poem may soar above the page and enter our consciousness where we may, if we wish, give it a long life."

"(Imagination) is something fluid which can twist itself into a poem."

She was also well known for her biography of the poet H.D., Herself Defined: The Poet H.D. and Her World (1984).

In 1999, she was awarded the Frost Medal for Lifetime Achievement by the Poetry Society of America.

Guest also wrote art criticism, essays, and plays.

Her collages appeared on the covers of several of her books of poetry.