Poetry

Sonbert’s creative relationship with poets is another subject worthy of further in-depth exploration. From his teenage years until his death, Sonbert was exposed to poetic discourses. Early influences (in New York in the 1960s) on his creative thinking in this field include Gregory Markopoulos, Gerard Malanga, Willard Maas (and Marie Menken), and Charles Henri Ford. Later, in San Francisco in the 1970s, Sonbert was surrounded by the likes of Language poets Lyn Hejinian, Ron Silliman, and Barrett Watten.¹ We have also reproduced an interview with Sonbert from 1990 that was published in Shiny, a journal of poetry.²