The Game Is Played on a Delicate Foundation, and even better poems, by George Arthur Lareau (Sufi George)

Paperback, 143 pages, ISBN 978-1-885570-37-6, published November 23, 2007, $14.99. Order at your bookstore or online at amazon.com.

"Lost" Boston beatnik poet George Arthur Lareau has reemerged with a book called The Game Is Played on a Delicate Foundation, and even better poems.

At age 19, Lareau was sitting in the Za Zen, the primary beatnik coffee house in Boston, notebook and pen busy.

His inspirations come in packaged form and he need only copy from his mind to "record" many of his poems. He also crafts poems, though, and an interesting example of that is "The Story of Cindy," a narrative about a love relationship written in 26 limericks.

As a Boston beatnik, Lareau sold his first book of poems, The Hunting Poise, on the sidewalk in front of "Coffee Corner," a city cafeteria that served as the unofficial headquarters of the beatniks.

Money, war and nature
Are leading us to Hell.
Funny we don't see it;
Maybe just as well.

Insanity is rampant,
Hiding in the books;
Profanity's malignant
Because of hero crooks.

We walk the daily walk,
We see but look askance;
Our choice is not to balk;
Just join in Zorba's dance.

Many poems in this newly-published collection are heavily onamatapoetic, delightfully so. "One for the Road" is stuffed with non-words that evoke the sensations of sitting in a bar. "Yer Hair" uses words (mostly) but distorts them for an audible effect that flows with the poem's content (where both anger at and reverence for one's hair is slurred out).

Lareau himself dances through life, with the movements of a butterfly. He has had many careers but also has had many stretches as a "bum." He finds living at times on the edge of survival makes it economically feasible to write his books, and to do so with minimal interference from an outside life.

Otherwise, he has been social worker, financial planner, computer consultant, esl teacher, city commissioner, ad agency president, and the list goes on.

Lareau is equally innovative in photography, and currently produces wall art and model portfolios in Tucson, AZ. As a professional, he was a member of ASMP. He has a wide range of styles and subjects; one of his categories is "Ugly America."

Lareau is also active as "Sufi George," a new paradigm metaphysician and author of several books on consciousness management. These books are described on his web site, sufigeorge.net.

This collection is an intimate chronicle of one American life. Yet, it reflects the rapidly changing and endlessly varied American experience itself during the latter half of the 20th Century.

Searching to understand himself and his times, George Arthur Lareau (Sufi George) has plunged into the waters of business, art, mysticism, and love, documenting much of his experience in poetic form.

Lareau is a surviving Boston beatnik poet whose work has appeared in several anthologies and journals of poetry. He has given poetry readings at the Za Zen coffeehouse in Boston, and to audiences at Harvard University, McKendree University, and numerous of other venues.

This collection includes:

THE HUNTING POISE, first published in 1962 by the poet in a limited edition of 200 copies and sold primarily on the sidewalk in front of Coffee Corner, the Boston beatnik "headquarters." The title was taken from an untitled poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti, contained in his volume, A Coney Island of the Mind.

READINGS AT THE BOILING POINT is a collection of poems most of which were first made public at a reading by the poet at The Boiling Point, a beatnik-style coffeehouse, in Freeport, Illinois. First published in 1967 by the poet.

THE GAME IS PLAYED ON A DELICATE FOUNDATION, published by Sufi George Books in 1994.

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