About

Neeli Cherkovski (born Nelson Cherry; July 1, 1945–March 19, 2024) was an American poet and memoirist.

Born in Santa Monica, California, Cherkovski grew up in San Bernardino, California. In the 1970s he was a political consultant in the Riverside area, who came to San Francisco to work on the staff of then-State Senator George Moscone. Cherkovski has written biographies of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, and Charles Bukowski, with whom he co-edited the Los Angeles zine Laugh Literary and Man the Humping Guns. Cherkovski produced the first San Francisco Poetry Festival, and in the early-1990s helped to found Café Arts Month, a yearly event celebrating San Francisco’s café culture.

Cherkovski authored Whitman’s Wild Children, a collection of essays about twelve poets he has known: Michael McClure, Charles Bukowski, John Wieners, James Broughton, Philip Lamantia, Bob Kaufman, Allen Ginsberg, William Everson, Gregory Corso, Harold Norse, Jack Micheline, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti. This book combines biography, personal stories, and poetry analyses.

Cherkovski was a writer-in-residence at the New College of California in San Francisco. He taught literature and philosophy there until the school closed in 2008. His body of poetry includes Animal, Elegy for Bob Kaufman and Leaning Against Time, for which he was awarded the 15th Annual PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Literary Award in 2005. In 2017 he was awarded the Jack Mueller Poetry Prize by Lithic Press. Cherkovski’s papers are housed at the Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley.

Cherkovski was the subject of the documentary film, It’s Nice To Be With You Always.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Poems for the Wailing Wall, (San Bernardino, CA: Black Cat Press, 1968).

Pre-Rabbinic Poems, (San Bernardino, CA: Tecumseh Press, 1969).

Don’t Make a Move, (Big Bear Lake, CA: Tecumseh Press, 1973).

The Waters Reborn, (Los Angeles, CA: Red Hill Press, 1975).

Public Notice, (San Francisco: Beatitude Press, 1975).

The Be Attitude, (San Francisco: Beatitude Press, 1976).

The Summer Palace, (San Francisco: Twenty-Two Press, 1976).

Notes from Syropa, (San Francisco: Klean Karma Press, 1976).

Ferlinghetti: A biography. Garden City, (NY: Doubleday, 1979).

Love Proof: Book of poems and drawings, (North Beach, San Francisco:

Green Light Press, 1980).

Home American: Section 1, (Alexandria, VA: Deep Forest, 1983).

Juggler Within, (San Francisco: Harwood Alley Monographs, 1983).

Clear Wind, (San Diego, CA: Avant Books, 1984).

Animal, (Berkeley, CA: Pantograph Press, 1996).

Elegy for Bob Kaufman, (Northville, MI: Sun Dog Press, 1996).

Hank: The Life of Charles Bukowski, (New York: Random House, 1991

and also published as Bukowski: A life. South Royalton, VT: Steerforth 

Press, 1997).

Whitman’s Wild Children: Portraits of Twelve Poets, (Venice, CA: Lapis 

Press, 1988; South Royalton, VT: Steerforth Press, 1999).

Leaning Against Time: Poems, (Penn Valley, CA: R.L. Crow, 2004).

Naming the Nameless: Poem, (San Francisco: Sore Dove Press, 2004).

Einstein Alive, (San Francisco: Solo Zone, 2005).

A Packet of Love Poems, (Santa Rosa, CA: Word Temple, 2008).

From the Canyon Outward: Poems, (Penn Valley, CA: R.L. Crow, 2009).

Grotesque Empire, (Dover, DE: Bottle of Smoke Press, 2010).

From the Middle Woods, (Cullowhee, NC: New Native Press, 2011).

Manila Poems, (Dover, DE: Bottle of Smoke Press, 2013).

The Crow and I, (Penn Valley, CA: R.L. Crow Publications, 2015).

Elegy for My Beat Generation, (Fruita, CO: Lithic Press, 2018).

In The Odes, (Los Angeles, CA / Bagnone, ITL: Magra Books, 2018).

Coolidge & Cherkovski: In Conversation, (Fruita, CO: Lithic Press, 2020).

Hang On To The Yantze River, (Fruita, CO: Lithic Press, 2020).

Bukowski, A Life: The Centennial Edition, (Boston, MA: Black Sparrow 

Press, 2020).

ABC’S, (Brooklyn, NY: Spuyten Duyvil, 2021)

Ferlinghetti, A Life, (Boston, MA: Black Sparrow Press, 2022).

AS EDITOR

Anthology of LA Poets, co-edited with Charles Bukowski and Paul Vangelisti (Laugh Literary / Red Hill Press, 1972).

Beatitude 30: 1980, co-edited with Raymond Foye (San Francisco, CA: 

Beatitude, 1980).

Peace or Perish: A Crisis Anthology, co-edited with Herman Berlandt 

(San Francisco, CA: Poets for Peace, 1983).

Beatitude: Golden Anniversary 1959-2000, co-edited with Latif Harris 

(San Francisco, CA: Beatitude/Latif Harris, 2009).

Cross Strokes: Poetry Between Los Angeles and San Francisco, co-edited 

with Bill Mohr (Otis Books, 2015).

Collected Poems of Bob Kaufman, co-edited with Raymond Foye 

and Tate Swindell (San Francisco, CA: City Lights, 2019).