Reviewed by David Grundy

Kaufman preferred to recite his poetry in coffee shops, bars, or on the street rather than publish it in print. All three of his collections were compiled by editors from the scraps, written and oral, he left lying around. Kaufman deliberately cultivated marginality, yet he was also marginalized—subjected to forced electroshock treatment, harassed by racist police, penniless, and virtually homeless. In his later years especially, Kaufman existed on a kind of periphery, a ghostly figure glimpsed on San Francisco street corners or in North Beach bars, boisterously living out his poems.