Mulberry Days

When John Vance Gilbert first arrived in New York City, he lived at 110th Street and Riverside Drive. Many of his poems in the 1960s were written in that area. He also walked from 110th Street to South Ferry, stopping in bars and coffee houses to write. He traced Walt Whitman's steps in lower Manhattan. He moved to Brooklyn Heights and lived within a block of where Whitman had a print shop. A number of poems were penned in that area and along the Esplanade overlooking the East River.

In the summer of 2018, he lived on Mulberry Street, which had long been a favorite street to explore. The days on Mulberry Street brought a new energy and resolve. Mulberry Days chronicles the magic of discovery of time, age, and love as he enters the eighth decade of his life. This time and place contain the mystique of a renaissance of creative work. The poems are both celebratory and introspective, clearly a turning point. There is a mysterious energy along Mulberry Street that rises from its extraordinary history. This history serves as bedrock to some of Gilbert's most innovative work.