The Bard of Duch Hill

Imagery of Clifton wins Jim Gwyn prestigious poetry award By Jordan Schwartz

For most people, a morning train ride into the city is a time to relax. Many commuters will read the paper, sip a cup of coffee, or catch some extra Z’s before a long day at work.

But James D. Gwyn, 59, isn’t most people. For the Bard of Dutch Hill, the daily trip across the Hudson is for poetry.

“I try to write something every day,” he said. “I find a spot on the train facing forward and write until I get to New York, which usually gives me a lot of uninterrupted time.”

However, Gwyn wrote his poem, “The Burning Bed,” at an adult school workshop.

“Usually I’ll go through seven or eight drafts, but every once in a while there are poems that just come right out like this one.”

The piece won the Cliftonite first prize in the 2008 Allen Ginsberg Poetry Contest sponsored by the Poetry Center at Passaic County Community College. He’ll be reading the poem at the Paterson Poetry Center on Nov. 8.

“The poem is really a dream sequence and speaks to the difference between illusion and reality and how it is easy to confuse the two,” said Gwyn.

“The Burning Bed” also references some famous Clifton locations that have caught fire over the years, such as the mattress store, the Pirogi Factory and Lee’s Hawaiian Islander.

“All on Lexington Ave!” writes the poet. “And what was left, defying all odds? The Hot Grill!?”
Gwyn has been crafting poems since he was a teenager growing up on the shores of Lake Ontario in Medina, New York.

“It was just a way to capture ideas, thoughts and feelings,” he said.

Gwyn majored in creative writing and English literature at Binghamton University, studying under Basil Bunting, a British modernist poet.

Following graduation, the aspiring writer traveled the country, taking a number of odd jobs from picking strawberries in Oregon to working as a bank teller in Rochester.

Gwyn returned to Binghamton in 1975 as a part-time grad student, during which time, he survived by tutoring blind students, driving a taxi cab and delivering pizza.

While at grad school, the poet got a call from someone who worked for a magazine publisher in New York City. The friend helped Gwyn get a job in the industry and he’s been in Manhattan ever since.

He’s been a desktop publisher, an editor and even a crossword puzzle writer.

“I’ve done everything except run the press,” joked Gwyn, who today works as a senior project manager in marketing and publication services at The College Board in New York.

But the Dutch Hill resident still finds plenty of time to write. He’s had his work published in several chapbooks and anthologies over the years, but he’s never been honored with anything as prestigious as the Ginsberg Award before.

“I think it’s one of the most fantastic things that ever happened to me,” he said.