[2] Following these teaching stints, the family moved to Monte Rio, California, and soon after to San Francisco,[1] where Gallup befriended poet and NPR commentator Andrei Codrescu.
A review of the play by Rich MangeIsdorff in Chicago’s alternative newspaper Kaleidoscope describes it as “already an underground classic,” a piece of theater that is “a written analog of Zappa’s ‘Let’s Make the Water Turn Black.’”[5] Gallup's early poetry embodies the playful experimentation of his New York School peers, including examples of homophonic translation, collage, and adaptations of traditional forms like the pantoum.
[1] As Padgett has noted, the full range of Gallup's work exceeds a singular style with "its combination of graceful lyricism and everyday language, and a willingness to explore unexpected corners of the mind and yet maintain a sense of humor about it all.
'”[1] Anne Waldman's blurb on the back cover of Shiny Pencils at the Edge of Things describes Gallup as the "secret hero of the second generation New York School."
Waldman continues: "Gallup’s lines, like his mind, full of sweet surprise, lift us higher, toward this kind, tremulous edge of beautiful ‘things.’ What a pleasure his jaunty wit, his sure ear, his radical American virtue.”[6]