Veteran's Day (a poem for Mitch Sisskind) [by David Lehman]

On Veterans' Day let us remember the fallen, and honor them.
It used to be Armistice Day.
Now it is a three-day weekend, if that.
As King David would have said: How the mighty have fallen.

But some things don't change even as all the fashions do
so the old feel older in an orgy of planned obsolescence.
I wondered: Who will inspire them to do the great things
the Alte Kockers of the past revealed in prophecies?

So I went to Mitch, my old friend, thinking: if anyone knows,
he does, and he told me a very simple solution he had
for the problem of inspiration, which Freud would have called
the problem of anxiety. "When you need inspiration,"

Mitch said, "there's no need to look any further than
Orson Welles' classic commercials for Paul Masson wine.
Many of them can be seen on You-Tube. I saw a nice one
the other day. I just wish it went on longer."

Comments

[Suzanne]

Ha! I was working a low-level, pay-the-rent job (and it barely did that) at Doyle Dane Bernbach Advertising (huge then, now defunct) in the Market Research department when the firm landed Orson Wells for their client, Paul Masson. I never met him myself but heard that sometimes he'd arrive a bit drunk, and irritable because he'd been reduced to making TV commercials.

[David Lehman]

Dear Suzanne, Thanks for your comment. I didn't know you worked at Doyle Dane & Bernbach way back when. This experience must have made you a receptive observer of "Mad Men," no?

[Terence Winch]

Burl Ives is also very inspirational---https://youtu.be/Rr4jeaaVGCA

[Bruce Kawin]

Just remember the night when Welles hosted the Tonight Show because Carson was busy hosting the Academy Awards.

[David Lehman]

Bruce, what were the highlights when Welles hosted the Tonight Show? -- DL