Ellyn Maybe — Photo by Cindy Beal

By Teresa Willis

Ellyn Maybe is a poet’s poet. The mention of her name among those familiar with her work often prompts a wordless response comprised of a drop-jawed expression of awe and wonder. But she also has an appeal that reaches those not impressed with poetry and poets. “I don’t like poetry but I like your work,” is a comment she hears frequently.

She is everywhere. From Laguna, to Santa Barbara, to Echo Park, to Venice, to, yes, even NoHo — wherever there is a poetry event or other eclectic art happening, it is not surprising to see her show up in the audience or as a performer. A recurring guest on KPFK’s Wee Hours, she has also been featured on KCRW’s Man in the Moon and Poetry Connection (also on KPFK). The latter is a long-running show that has featured many poetry personalities of local and global fame, but the show with Ellyn Maybe elicited the most response in the history of the program.

The January 17 earthquake shook her and her mother out of their Chatsworth home — their building was condemned — prompting a string of “Ellyn Maybe benefits” in the artistic community. Area poet Kiva J. Catalina hosted the Scary Talent Show at the Iguana Cafe in North Hollywood on February 5th, in which Ellyn appeared. Kiva and the other performers spontaneously opted to donate the proceeds of the event to Ellyn. In a more formal effort, poet/musician Matthew Niblock organized a roster of the community’s finest musicians and poets for a benefit in late February at the Iguana. The room was packed, and the show was phenomenal. Finally, on March 27, Pulitzer Prize-nominated poet Laurel Ann Bogen read from her upcoming book, The Last Girl in the Land of Butterflies at Beyond Baroque Bookstore in Venice. Proceeds were donated to Ellyn Maybe.

“It’s unbelievable,” says Maybe, of the overwhelming support she has received. “I guess there’s a real love. Its probably a mixture of [love] as a person, but also as an artist — which is nice, that I have friends both ways.”

I would fall into the second distinction — one of Ellyn’s “as an artist” friends. I first saw her perform at an open poetry reading in 1991. It was probably the first poetry reading I had attended in my adult life. The performers were what I have come to recognize as your basic blend of L.A. poets from the dull didactics to the perverse pontificates. Then it was Ellyn’s turn. She defied all my jaded categorizations. A frizzy-headed, high-voiced, hippie woman who seemed at once flustered and thrilled to be on stage — she seemed harmless enough at the time. Then she began to read. I didn’t know what had hit me. I’m only just now beginning to figure it out. But she still defies categorization, jaded or otherwise.

She christened herself Ellyn Maybe circa 1988. The name evolved from her hesitancy to read her work at open readings. “I’d put ‘Ellyn’ and then I’d put in parentheses ‘(maybe I’ll read)’. Like if I wanna run out, or freak out ’cause I was so new to it and everything, that’d be OK. So at a reading it just kind of ‘Ellyn maybe I’ll read? Ellyn Maybe?’ It just kind of ‘yes!’ It was an organic thing. It’s funny how things do their strange dance, the serendipity of things.”

In the poetry community, there is, thankfully, an abundance of criticism. However, Ellyn Maybe’s work is rarely questioned. She seems exempt from the scathing commentary whispered in the back of coffeehouses during readings. She has a rare humility concerning her work. It is as though an Ellyn Maybe poem wasn’t written, it simply… happened — like some undefined force of nature. “Well, I know I’m not a craftsman, because the poem comes. There’s not really a revision period,” says Maybe, “something will spark a poem, it gels, then it comes out when it’s ready. I don’t think it was ‘Oh, I gotta think of an image!’ No, I can’t do that. It comes because it’s not pushed, probably. It’s like, magical… a whole other language. By trusting, waiting for that language to knock, and it does, then it’s ready. But I don t know if someone could, like, bang on the door. It comes to you, but it comes ’cause you’re open to it. Like, yeah, somebody’s home. A lot of people get distracted and they’re missing the language. They’re numbing themselves in some way and it just can’t get through. ‘Cause it’s intense. It’s intense to have stuff come and not nod out. ‘Cause you face things that way. You deal in reality Surreality.

Ellyn was born in Wisconsin, but moved to L.A. with her family in 1980. At 20 years old, she felt compelled to move to New York City, where she was an apprentice at the Village Voice and the Actor’s Studio. For the first time, she had extended contact and encouragement from other artists. “It’s lonely when you haven’t met your kindred spirits yet. You’re how you are, but it’s not the complete thing. You’re just kind of flailing around, you’re just like, ‘Well, where are they?’ Like waiting for Godot or something. [But] there were people saying, ‘You should write. I think you’d be good.’ I just didn’t have any confidence, ’cause when I was little I wrote. Then as I got older, there was a long time of being unconventional and being mistreated for it, just took away any sense of self-esteem and confidence. So I started to write there, and the people I showed the stuff to were like, ‘Wow.'”

Being “unconventional” is a tough job, but Ellyn handles it beautifully. “I deal with a lot of people’s expectations and I just shatter them. If you’re different, if you stand out, it really hurts, ’cause I’m real sensitive. So you write. You use it in such a way that’s good. Like a tin can line that goes through all the people that go through stuff and it’s just a thing that is, or there’s just so many ways it could destroy you. If you don’t honor yourself enough to take a good route, you could go nuts. A lot of people think I’m on drugs because I’m very weird, but I never have smoked or drank or anything. It all goes into the work. I just never was around drugs. I was already seeing the kind of things people wanna use drugs to see. People tell me I have a naturally stoned sensibility, which I’m happy about. I think that’s really cool.”

Ellyn is also an archivist. She is usually seen with a small recorder by her side at performances by her favorite artists. “It feels like I’m taking something that ought to be done and just doing it. It’s really a passionate thing. There could be a time way down the road when you might want to know what was going on back there. In many cases, that is the thing that lasts — what artists say, more than was in, say, the equivalent of a newspaper of a certain time. They’re going to look at Van Gogh’s painting, they’re goin’ to listen to a poem, maybe by Ginsberg or something. We have to somehow honor our stuff. To feel it’s worth. To preserve it.” One would assume she’d run into resistance from musicians, especially, because of the bootleg factor. But Ellyn and her tape recorder are usually welcome. “Nobody gets copies of stuff because I’m afraid some people have in mind archiving in an exploitative manner. I’m real protective. I’m really staunch on artists’ rights. A lot of people are so into a certain fame thing that they’ll do anything, regardless of, in the long term, if it’s good the the work. [I] just have to honor the work. The work honors me.”

Ellyn was chosen to represent Los Angeles in the MTV Free Your Mind Spoken Word Competition. She opened for the tour’s Los Angeles show at the Troubador on March 1 “My stuff really says how I feel. It’s so accurate. But during the earthquake, there was a big chance that we might not get an evacuation and I didn’t have copies of my stuff. I was saying that I’d rather my poetry live than me. It’s larger than me. I learn from it myself. Since it comes in such a magical way, I have a good time just looking at it sometimes. It’s truly a gift to even be open to wanting to sit down and look at life that way. It’s just being willing to have your eyes open. There’s this poem I have, called, ‘Artists are only people who keep their eyes open with toothpicks: a Marlon Brando love poem’ ’cause I think that’s what he did during the making of Apocalypse Now. You have to, at least, for me, I have to… see. There’s so many ways to distract yourself that it’s really miraculous that there are people who are willing to see. It’s a wonderful thing because that’s what makes the world magic.”

Ellyn Maybe will be reading at the Iguana Cafe in North Hollywood on April 15. The event will include an open reading, so she encourages any poets out there to show up and participate. She also encourages any written comments to her work. You can write to her at P.O. Box 1793, Venice, CA 90294-1793.

She has a tape of her poetry on sale called A day in the life of a working poor xylophone maker. She has two books of poetry available, entitled, The Cowardice of Amnesia and Mantra’s Best Friend/Man’s Best Friend. All are available by contacting Ellyn Maybe at the address above.