The Bard of Hyde Park

Albert Huffstickler, of Austin, Texas, died on Monday, February 25, 2002. Here is an article from Susan Bright, editor of Plainview Press, sent to Stazja McFadyen, editor of Map of Austin, who passed it along to Sol Magazine with permission to re-publish. This article in its entirety, was written by Chuck Lindell, and appeared in the Austin American Statesman.

SUSAN BRIGHT: "Even though many of you don't know Huff, I did and we published a book of his titled "Wanda" -- This will give everyone a sense of him.

STAZJA MCFADYEN: "Huff earned the honor of being remembered."

Bard of Hyde Park Lived a Life of Everyday Poetry
Albert Huffstickler 1927-2002. By Chuck Lindell American-Statesman Staff, Wednesday, February 27, 2002

Drinking free coffee and smoking his beloved cigarettes, Albert Huffstickler reigned as poet laureate of Hyde Park -- a rumpled hometown fixture with piercing eyes whose work found a national audience.

Friends popping into Dolce Vita for a quick hello would receive his latest poem, fresh from the photocopier at the Fresh Plus grocery store. Strangers, feeling they knew Huffstickler through his writing, would stop by his table and talk. Poets sought advice from the man all knew as Huff.

"He was the grand old man of Austin poetry," friend and poet Joe Hoppe said.

After feeling poorly for the past year, Huffstickler, 74, entered St. David's Hospital on Sunday and died the next day from an aneurysm on his aorta. Tuesday morning, graffiti appeared on the rear of the Fresh Plus: "Long live Huff."

"This is a very tight-knit neighborhood, and Huff was a mainstay. He was an anchor," said Concetta Mastroianni, owner of Dolce Vita Gelato & Espresso Bar.

From national literary magazines to crudely photocopied 'zines, Huffstickler's work received wide distribution. He won two Austin Book Awards and was honored by the Texas Senate for his poetry in 1989. Still, the prolific writer often favored a more personal approach as he wandered the area around 43rd and Duval streets.

"He'd wake up during the night and go to his Selectric 2 typewriter and bang these things out," friend Dennis Cole said. "First thing in the morning, he'd go to Fresh Plus and make copies and carry them around. Then he'd page through and select one or two he wanted you to have."

If you don't like it, he'd say, throw it away.

Dolce Vita displays three binders stuffed with Huff's work. He'd visit repeatedly, shuffling with a cane because of nerve damage in his feet, for a cup of black coffee and a chair on the patio.

"He repaid us with his poetry and his presence." Mastroianni said. "We definitely came out the winners in the deal. We considered it an honor that he chose our place to hold court."

Huffstickler radiated a personality that Austin, for all its boomtown money and high-tech splendor, can still appreciate.

His clothes were so sloppy -- ink-stained shirts, missing buttons, baggy pants held up by suspenders -- that a police officer once tried to arrest him for vagrancy. Huff had to go into Quack's 43rd Street Bakery to get somebody to vouch for him. Of course, everybody inside knew him, Cole said.

Money wasn't a priority, either. Huffstickler wanted only enough to pay for his small apartment, selling artwork and more than 30 books and booklets. A $2,000 check for a recent book, "Why I Write in Coffee Houses and Diners," came as a shock.

"He said, 'I don't know if I like this or not. I may have to get involved with the IRS,' " Cole said.

When Huff's favorite outdoor bench disappeared with the closing of Hyde Park Bakery, a neighborhood newsletter printed his poem lamenting the loss. A new bench soon bore a plaque honoring Albert Huffstickler.

"I've never met anybody as dedicated to writing poetry as Huff was. That's what he lived to do," said Michael Ambrose, a friend who helped Huffstickler publish more than a dozen chapbooks, or booklets of poetry.

"His specialty was writing about ordinary people, ordinary working people, down-and-out people. And he felt himself part of that slice of humanity. The title of one of his chapbooks was, 'It's Lonely at the Bottom, Too,' "Ambrose said.

Huffstickler was born in 1927 in Laredo; a twin sibling who died at birth became the source of many poems. He married twice, divorced twice and had four children. Huffstickler arrived in Austin at age 37 and worked odd jobs for about eight years. Needing a steady income so he could focus on writing, he reluctantly found full-time work at the University of Texas Perry-Castañeda Library.

"It seemed to me that I would have to plant myself and proceed," he once wrote.

"He refined his life until it basically was about art," Hoppe said. "He would write or draw or paint. That's what he did."

A memorial will be held at 8 p.m. Monday at Hyde Park Theatre, 511 W. 43rd St. Dolce Vita, which will continue the Dec. 17 poetry readings honoring Huffstickler's birthday, is selling copies of his books to help pay for the funeral.