A memorial service was held for Allen Ginsberg, the Beat Generation poet who died of liver cancer at age 70. The service, attended by several hundred mourners, took place at the Shambhala Meditation Center in lower Manhattan.
Notable attendees included Philip Glass, Peter Orlovsky (Ginsberg's companion), and Kurt Vonnegut. The service incorporated Buddhist chanting and elements of Jewish tradition, including the reading of the Kaddish. The atmosphere was described as peaceful, with mourners hugging, smiling, and participating in chanting and prayers.
The memorial blended Buddhist and Jewish traditions. Buddhist chanting in English and Tibetan featured prominently, alongside the recitation of the Kaddish, a Jewish prayer for the dead. This reflects Ginsberg's personal spiritual practice, which combined elements of both faiths.
Anecdotes shared at the service highlighted Ginsberg's generosity and his peaceful acceptance of death. His remains were to be cremated and divided among three locations: a Buddhist center in Colorado, the Jewel Heart Buddhist Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and his family's plot in Newark.
Allen Ginsberg was remembered yesterday by several hundred shoeless mourners who laid the Beat Generation poet to rest with Buddhist chanting and smiles.
The mourners, many in the lotus position, sat on pillows in a meditation room of the Shambhala Meditation Center on the sixth floor of an office building in lower Manhattan. Others preferred a small row of chairs at the side of the room.
Mr. Ginsberg, who had liver cancer and died on Saturday at age 70, was a Buddhist, beginning each day with a contemplative exercise followed by a hot cup of tea with lemon.
Among those chanting, praying and talking during the four-hour service in English and Tibetan were the composer Philip Glass, his head deeply bowed, as well as Mr. Ginsberg's companion of 40 years, Peter Orlovsky, and the author Kurt Vonnegut.
Many of the mourners hugged each other and smiled as they surrounded the plain wooden coffin, draped with a yellow, red, blue and white silk flag bearing the image of the sun, a symbol of the Shambhala Buddhist community. They clasped hands and bowed before the two shrines at the front of the room, filled with candles, fruit and flowers and decorated with colorful hangings and sculptures of Buddhist deities.
''There is no birth and no cessation,'' the mourners chanted as gongs were struck, bells chimed and incense burned.
Mr. Ginsberg's stepmother, Edith Ginsberg, was one of the few whose voice broke as she spoke about him. She recalled how loving he was and added: ''We'll all miss him desperately. So be it. Peace.'' Then Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead, was read.
Others told funny stories. The poet Amiri Baraka said that when Mr. Ginsberg called him last week, the poet told him he had provided financially for Mr. Orlovsky and then asked, ''Do you need any money?''
Mr. Baraka said Mr. Ginsberg also remarked: ''I'm dying, but I'm not worried. That's how it is.''
His remains are to be cremated, then divided into three parts to be kept at a Buddhist center in Colorado, the Jewel Heart Buddhist Center in Ann Arbor, Mich., and in his family's plot at the B'nai Israel Cemetery in Newark.
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