James Dickey's notoriety is belied by his appearance. An Atlanta-born former football player, fighter pilot, and advertising writer, within the last ten years he has won prominence as one of the most provocative of American poets. But the large crowd that came to hear his Morris Gray Poetry Reading on October 25 may have been surprised to find itself faced with a solid, comfortable Southern businessman. This is what Dickey appears to be, except when his eyes glitter as he relishes the turns of his own conversation.

Apart from what he is saying, only this glitter and his expressive use of his hands give him away for being a poet. His exterior seems particularly unexotic if one has come fresh from hearing him read poems about bestiality ("The Sheep Child"), voyeurism and sexual assault ("The Fiend"), the bombing of civilians ("The Firebombing"), and adultery ("Adultery"). "Nothing is excluded from the poetic conscioueness," Dickey proclaims. "Anything that happens to your mind is grist for your mill."

He has assumed the role of a pioneer, a twentieth century Whitman, not only in the exploitation of untraditional themes but also in the development of a style that takes no cue from any predecessor--not even from Whitman. He takes enormous risks in his wriitng. He likes to quote Randolph Bourne: "The trouble with American culture is that the American artist is never allowed to make any mistakes. Poets today are afraid of gambling." He adds thoughtfully, "You have to get out on the edge and thread that very thin line between the predictable and the impossible, the ordinary and the ridiculous."

One of Dickey's most recent poems that teeters on this brink is called "Falling." An airline stewardess sucked from an aircraft falls to her death in a Kansas cornfield. On the way down she is:

like a glorious diver then feet first her skirt stripped beautifully

Up her face in fear-scented cloths her legs deiiriously bare then

Arms out she slow-rolls over steadies out waits for something great

To take control of her . . .

she passes

Her palms over her long legs her small breasts and deeply between

Her thighs her hair shot loose from all pins streaming in the wind

Of her body let her come openly trying at the last second to land

On her back This is it THIS . . .

The "Sheep Child" treads an equally daring line, portraying a legend of farm boys:

That in a museum in Atlanta