The light was growing dim in the late afternoon of July 10, 1972, when the poet Kenneth Rexroth halted our conversation abruptly and reached for a file at the corner of his desk, sliding it across in my direction. "Look at this," he said with some exasperation. It was a manuscript, 64 typewritten pages, which had originally come to him under a blind cover letter. "A fellow down in Los Angeles has sent this to me," he said. "Perhaps you can make some...