RIP Judith Arcana
On Winter Solstice, 2025 Judith Arcana transitioned to the ancestors. I started my mourning by going to her page on the KBOO website and listening to her voice. She was the host of “Poetry and Everyting” for about three and a half years and before that was a guest on many shows, including ones I was part of producing.
Because we knew she was going to take advantage of MAID (Medical Aid in Dying) there was time to say goodbye. I got a few folks together to make a tribute zine for her. This is what I wrote for the zine.
Wikipedia and Judith: A Commentary by Erin Yanke
Judith Arcana is an American writer of poems, stories, essays and books. She was a teacher for forty years and her writing has appeared in journals and anthologies since the early 1980s. She has been an activist for reproductive justice since spending two years in the Jane Collective, Chicago's underground abortion service (1970–72). Arcana is notable for her insistence on the organically political nature of art and literature.
I can hear Judith in my head say “IT WASN’T A COLLECTIVE” every time I read that it was. Judith also wrote about the Abortion Counseling Service of Women’s LIberation as fiction, because too many people would get their feelings hurt if she wrote what she wanted as non-fiction.
Born February 5, 1943 in Cleveland, Ohio,she is the daughter of Anne Solomon and Norman Rosenfield. Following the death of Anne Rosenfield in March 1944, Norman Rosenfield married Ida Epstein in July 1945.
Judith and I became friends through community media, interviewing her for different projects over the years, and because we had the same birthday. We would get together on the half birthday, until our friendship was solidified and we hung out whenever.
Other notable Feb 5th birthdays include Trayvon Martin, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Eden Reinstein, Erroll Morris, Monica Beemer, Don Cherry, Matt Limo, DJ Beyonda, Duff McKagen, William Burroughs, Christopher Guest, H.R. Geiger.
Arcana's family moved frequently during her childhood.
Judith and I talked about not having “Neighbors” growing up, meaning people that you would socialize with just because you lived around them.
Judith Arcana's first teaching job was at the high school she graduated from, Niles Township High School (East Division) in Illinois.
They fired her and she got political.
Arcana was involved in the Jane Collective from 1970 to 1972. She was arrested for her work on May 3, 1972, indicted on "charges of felony homicide and conspiracy to commit abortion". The case never came to trial, however, with the charges being dropped with the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision in January 1973.
When we lost the right to abortion on the national level, Judith told me that she didn’t expect the right to last this long, actually, and we got a lot more years than she imagined would be possible in 1973.
Arcana became interested in writing at age three, but did not write seriously until she was in her 20s. Her two prose books about motherhood – Our Mothers’ Daughters (1979)] and Every Mother’s Son (1983)– are radical feminist analysis; both have been read, taught and discussed for many years in the US, Canada and the UK. Grace Paley’s Life Stories, A Literary Biography (1993),is Judith's study of the American writer/activist who died in August 2007.
In Dec 2007 Judith put together an event at Broadway Books to celebrate Grace’s life. Judith got some real heavy hitters (her words) together who read to us and told stories about Grace, including Ursula LeGuin, Elisabeth Linder, and Elinor Langer. It was the first time I met Elinor, which made some of my future work possible. There was also cake.
In the late 2010s, Arcana hosted a radio show on poetry on KBOO.
I wooed and recruited her to host a monthly show she called Poetry and Everything. There’s about 5 years of episodes on the KBOO website. Its a joy and treasure to have so much Judith in the archived audio and the written word.
Arcana has lived in Portland, Oregon since 1995.
I am so lucky that we live here at the same time. I’m so lucky to know her turns of phrases for the Street Roots vendors, that they named a sandwich after her at “her local” (at the time) cafe, that she is a hot dog aficionado. She has a great laugh. She asks excellent questions. She has a long list of published works, which someday when I learn to edit Wikipedia, I’ll add all the pieces and poetry she contributed to Chasing the Night. I’ll change the Jane Collective entry while I’m at it.
Judith Arcana. Photo by Lynda Koolish
