The Best American Poetry

The Best American Poetry website, with searchable archive [by Stacey Lehman]

Ever wonder which volume of Best American Poetry included a particular poem or poet? Need to settle a bet about how many times a certain poet has appeared in BAP? 

Vist the Best American Poetry website for information about the current volume and guest editor (Mary Jo Salter) along with info about the series editor (David Lehman). You can search the archive by the name of a poet, title of a poem, or the journal in which a poem appeared. The archive includes every volume from the series' inception in 1988. 

Click on the image above or here to visit this valuable resource. 

-- sdl

An Autobiography in Cookbooks: The Culinary Arts Institute Encyclopedic Cookbook © 1948 [by Stacey Harwood-Lehman]

My mother received this cookbook as a wedding gift and passed it on to me many years ago. It remains one of my favorites, not because of the recipes though there are some good ones, but because this book is responsible for kindling my love of cooking and poetry, especially poetry that rhymes.

The recipes are punctuated with light verse to serve as mnemonics for proper technique. For example, the captions to a series of photos illustrating loaves of bread read:

This is the well-made bread about which we’ve all read;
It’s so easy to make, so come, on, let’s bake.

See what results if the oven’s too hot;
decreased volume and over-brown top.

If the oven’s too slow, the crust will be pale,
the texture’ll be porous; it’s sure to fail.

In homemade bread, especially rye,
you know there’s more than meets the eye.

and on and on through yeasted breads and rolls, specialty loaves, quick breads and muffins.

My mother was a competent cook though not an enthusiastic one. She fully embraced the post-WWII convenience foods such as frozen TV dinners, boxed macaroni and cheese, and canned soup. It seemed that for years everything was made with a can of Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup, with its sponge-like brown bits suspended in a gelatinous goo. I loved those meals.

They were children of immigrants, my parents, who left the Bronx in the 1950s, first to New Jersey, then to Rockland County, New York, where my mother found work as a school teacher while my dad worked a salesman ("plastics"). From the outside, our's was a typical suburban development home. Not so inside.

My mother was a long-time subscriber to both Women’s Day and Family Circle magazines, with their projects for the thrifty homemaker (“Feed a Family of Four on Fifty Dollars a Week!” “Transform Your Home with Color in One Weekend!” and “Bring the Outdoors In with Rustic Cedar Shingles!” The latter project transformed a wall in my parents’ bedroom with hours of furious hammering.).

My father was a scavenger who often arrived home with odds and ends he’d picked up while making his sales calls in and around New York City. The combination of mom's and dad's talents was on full display in our kitchen where one wall was covered with silver metallic wallpaper illustrated with scenes from the Folies Bergere, done up in pink and black; the floor was covered with carpet tiles in every color; and the cabinet pulls were ringed with the colored plastic inserts to 45 RPM records. My mother made new curtains for every season, some quite beautiful. 

The crowning glory of the kitchen was the table--a wood slab that my dad refinished with pockmarks to make it appear aged--suspended from the ceiling with picture wire. One day I arrived home from school and Noah, our large white German shepherd, was reclining on the table as it swung gently to and fro. Meals at that table were an adventure as one had to take care to avoid the wires while passing dishes. You could lose an arm. At my mother's insistence, my dad eventually anchored the table to the floor with more wire.

Years of preparing meals for our family of six, on top of full-time work, took their toll. When I was in my early teens, my mother declared a moratorium on cooking. My two sisters and I would have to take over responsibility for dinners several times a week. She delivered this news as if it were a punishment and my sisters took it as such but I thought it a grand opportunity to experiment. We were told we could cook whatever we liked; my mother would shop though she refused to buy exotic ingredients, like ground black pepper, or nutmeg. “You don’t need that,” she said, crossing off those items on our shopping lists.

I remember my attempt at Moussaka, the Greek casserole of eggplant and ground beef baked under a layer of béchamel. Is there a sound more dreaded to the cook than that of diners' forks silently pushing a poorly executed entrée around a dinner plate? Finally, my father put his fork down and looked across the table at my mother. “Renee,” he said, mouthing his words, “I don’t like it.” The leftovers were fed to Noah, who devoured them without complaint and in short order deposited them on the carpet-tiled kitchen floor.

Posted by The Best American Poetry on August 13, 2016 at 03:4

My mother received this cookbook as a wedding gift and passed it on to me many years ago. It remains one of my favorites, not because of the recipes though there are some good ones, but because this book is responsible for kindling my love of cooking and poetry, especially poetry that rhymes.

The recipes are punctuated with light verse to serve as mnemonics for proper technique. For example, the captions to a series of photos illustrating loaves of bread read:

This is the well-made bread about which we’ve all read;
It’s so easy to make, so come, on, let’s bake.

See what results if the oven’s too hot;
decreased volume and over-brown top.

If the oven’s too slow, the crust will be pale,
the texture’ll be porous; it’s sure to fail.

In homemade bread, especially rye,
you know there’s more than meets the eye.

and on and on through yeasted breads and rolls, specialty loaves, quick breads and muffins.

My mother was a competent cook though not an enthusiastic one. She fully embraced the post-WWII convenience foods such as frozen TV dinners, boxed macaroni and cheese, and canned soup. It seemed that for years everything was made with a can of Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup, with its sponge-like brown bits suspended in a gelatinous goo. I loved those meals.

They were children of immigrants, my parents, who left the Bronx in the 1950s, first to New Jersey, then to Rockland County, New York, where my mother found work as a school teacher while my dad worked a salesman ("plastics"). From the outside, our's was a typical suburban development home. Not so inside.

My mother was a long-time subscriber to both Women’s Day and Family Circle magazines, with their projects for the thrifty homemaker (“Feed a Family of Four on Fifty Dollars a Week!” “Transform Your Home with Color in One Weekend!” and “Bring the Outdoors In with Rustic Cedar Shingles!” The latter project transformed a wall in my parents’ bedroom with hours of furious hammering.).

My father was a scavenger who often arrived home with odds and ends he’d picked up while making his sales calls in and around New York City. The combination of mom's and dad's talents was on full display in our kitchen where one wall was covered with silver metallic wallpaper illustrated with scenes from the Folies Bergere, done up in pink and black; the floor was covered with carpet tiles in every color; and the cabinet pulls were ringed with the colored plastic inserts to 45 RPM records. My mother made new curtains for every season, some quite beautiful. 

The crowning glory of the kitchen was the table--a wood slab that my dad refinished with pockmarks to make it appear aged--suspended from the ceiling with picture wire. One day I arrived home from school and Noah, our large white German shepherd, was reclining on the table as it swung gently to and fro. Meals at that table were an adventure as one had to take care to avoid the wires while passing dishes. You could lose an arm. At my mother's insistence, my dad eventually anchored the table to the floor with more wire.

Years of preparing meals for our family of six, on top of full-time work, took their toll. When I was in my early teens, my mother declared a moratorium on cooking. My two sisters and I would have to take over responsibility for dinners several times a week. She delivered this news as if it were a punishment and my sisters took it as such but I thought it a grand opportunity to experiment. We were told we could cook whatever we liked; my mother would shop though she refused to buy exotic ingredients, like ground black pepper, or nutmeg. “You don’t need that,” she said, crossing off those items on our shopping lists.

I remember my attempt at Moussaka, the Greek casserole of eggplant and ground beef baked under a layer of béchamel. Is there a sound more dreaded to the cook than that of diners' forks silently pushing a poorly executed entrée around a dinner plate? Finally, my father put his fork down and looked across the table at my mother. “Renee,” he said, mouthing his words, “I don’t like it.” The leftovers were fed to Noah, who devoured them without complaint and in short order deposited them on the carpet-tiled kitchen floor.

"Life there is sweet / happiness complete" [song by the Gershwins]

On Coming to America [by Anne Lehman]

David and Anne Lehman

In observance of Holocaust Remembrance Day, here is an excerpt from Anne Lehman's essay about escaping the Nazis and coming to America aboard the President Harding:

It was a nightmare to live in Vienna at that time. Every time the doorbell rang, we were afraid--they're coming for us!
...

 A friend of mine got me a permit to go to England as a mother's helper. This way I got out of Nazi Germany. These people, Wright was their name, lived in Southsea. He was a shipbuilder and she was a dentist. They treated me very well and he gave me English lessons every day. But I was lonely there, so after a few months I went to London, where I have some friends from Vienna. My friend Trude and I found work in the home of an English theatre producer by the name of French. Trude was supposed to be the cook and I was the parlor maid. Once Rex Harrison came to dinner. He was very friendly, a real gentleman. 
. . . 

But the American consulate finally opened its door again [having closed it in 1938] and I received my visa to go to America. How happy I was. Naturally I was worried to travel on an English ship, so my cousin from America sent me additional money and I changed my ticket to an American ship, the President Harding. I think it was the last Atlantic crossing it ever made. It took us ten days of the most terrible shaking. Everyone on board was sick and wanted to die. We were so sick that we weren't even afraid of hidden mines, and as in a dream we did all the safe drillings, etc. The last day was Thanksgiving. We had, and for me it was the first time, a delicious Thanksgiving dinner with turkey and all the trimmings, they played 'Oh, say, can you see,' and when I finally saw the Statue of Liberty, I was really grateful to God, that he let me live and see America. 

Find the complete essay in Yeshiva Boys, by David Lehman

A group of German and Austrian Jewish refugees  in New York on board the SS President Harding. New York, United States, June 3, 1939. (source: Holocaust Encyclopedia

(Ed note: Anne tried hard to get her parents to England from Vienna but "everything took so long," and by the time she had assembled the necessary documents, England was at war and she had no way of getting in touch with them to bring them to safety. She later learned that they were murdered by the Nazis in Riga, Latvia.)

-- sdl 

 

David [poem by Marie Syrkin]

David
Marie Syrkin

Suppose, this time, Goliath should not fail;
Suppose, this time, the sling should not avail
On the Judean plain where once for all
Mankind the pebble struck, suppose the tale
Should have a different end: the shepherd yield,
The triumph pass to iron arm and thigh,
The wonder vanish from the blooming field,
The mailed hulk stand, and the sweet singer lie.

Suppose, but then what grace will go unsung,
What temple wall unbuilt, what garden bare;
What ploughshare broken and what harp unstrung!
Defeat will compass every heart aware
How black the ramparts of a world wherein
The psalm is stilled, and David does not win. 

 

  Marie Syrkin (March 23, 1899 – February 2, 1989) was an American writer, translator, educator, and activist. She emigrated to the U.S. from Bern, Switzerland in 1908 and earned bachelor's and master's degrees from Cornell University, then taught high school in New York City. In 1950 Marie Syrkin was named associate professor of English at Brandeis University, where she taught until her retirement in 1966 as professor of the humanities. On top: Bernini's David.

 -- sdl

Who Makes the Ball Drop on New Year's Eve? [by Stacey Harwood-Lehman]

During a recent lunch with my friend Jen, we got to talking about the holidays and other matters when she casually mentioned that in the early days of the last century, her great uncle, Jacob Starr, invented the ball that drops every year in Times Square. Jen knew some, but not all, of the details around Starr, a relative of whom she is understandably quite proud.

My family's New Year's Eve tradition was to go to a kid-friendly movie (The Sound of Music comes to mind) and upon returning home have dinner and later watch the ball drop to welcome the new year. These days billions of people around the world watch the spectacle on television and thousands brave the cold in Times Square to watch in person. While I've marvelled at the Times Square ball, I've never wondered about how it was made and by whom.

Who was the Jacob Starr who had such an outsized influence on our culture and the urban landscape of New York City? 

It didn’t take much more than a quick on-line search to find out more about this gifted man.

The New York Times started the modern-day tradition of dropping a ball on a pole to mark the beginning of the new year. Fireworks displays had already been drawing crowds to Times Square but a ban of such pyrotechnics in 1907 put an end to that practice.

To continue to attract visitors to Times Square, New York Times publisher Adolph Ochs commissioned Jewish-Ukrainian immigrant and metalworker Jacob Starr to create an illuminated iron and wood ball to be lowered from the flagpole of the Times Tower. The first ball-drop in Times Square took place at the turn of the year from 1907 to 1908. It was a huge success.

Jacob Starr was quite a remarkable person and it’s understandable that my friend Jen would be proud to be his relative. He came to the United States from the Ukraine--a dangerous place for Jews--in 1897 and in 1903 went to work at a small New York sign company founded by Benjamin Strauss. While occupied with menial tasks during the day, he attended Cooper Union, the highly competitive tuition-free college in lower Manhattan that offers a world-class education in art, architecture and engineering. Starr graduated with a degree in electrical engineering. Starr, along with his partner Strauss came to be known as the “lamplighters of Broadway” for the many spectacular signs atop buildings in the Great White Way. Jacob Strauss owned the company since 1931 until his death. The Artkraft archive resides at the New York Public Library and makes for fascinating reading. Artkraft designed and built some of the most memorable signs in New York City--the fizzing Coca Cola sign, the painted Camel cigarette sign that blew smoke rings, and hundreds of glittering billboards, theater marquees and illuminated signs that symbolize New York City to visitors from around the world. The neon landscape of Times Square is almost entirely the handiwork of the Artkraft Strauss Sign Corporation.

This year, when you join the billions of people who count down the final seconds of 2024 while watching the famous Ball-drop, remember that it was created by a Jewish immigrant with humble beginnings whose genius found its full expression in the USA.

--sdl

Paul Robeson "There is a Balm in Gilead" and "Curly Headed Baby" [by Stacey Harwood Lehman]

"The Essential Paul Robeson" was the first record album I bought myself after my dad gave me the gift of a stereo record player and speakers. It was on repeat for years and to this day during the Jewish holy days of Passover I listen to the songs of struggle, so many of which Robeson recorded over his lifetime. 

But it is his moving version of "There is a Balm in Gilead" that came to mind today, as I read in the New York Times of the successful germination in Israel of a 1,000 year old seed believed to be akin to Judean Balsam, the source of the balm of Gilead. It is a fascinating story. You can read more about it here. 

Here is Paul Robeson:

What a voice!

And just because so many friends are either having kids or becoming grandparents (and also because I have curly hair), here's Robeson singing the lullaby "Curly Headed Baby" another favorite from the same album:

 

Gift Giving, Ithaca Edition [by Stacey Harwood-Lehman]

I'll be shopping locally this season but before I feature my favorite vendors, I hope your lists will include poetry books. I can recommend without reservation these titles:

Here are a few of my favorite Ithaca area small businesses. Each of these artisans will ship to you. 

Heirloom quality gifts:

John Truex, co-owner with Liz Seru, of Borough Furnace, braves the cold at a recent farmers market pop-up.

Each one-of-a-kind hat is custom-designed, blocked, sewn, and trimmed in-house by Kimberly Hutsal, owner of Two Foxes Studio.

Many years ago I wrote in the Wall Street Journal about Borough Furnace (above left), maker of hard-working and beautiful cast-iron cookware crafted in Syracuse, NY.  An added benefit? Borough Furnace has Climate Neutral Certification.To receive such certification, brands must empirically measure their cradle-to-customer greenhouse gas emissions and create quantifiable plans to reduce that footprint year over year.

One of my favorite shops in New York City is the tiny storefront of East Village Hats on 80 East 7th Street in Manhattan. It is a wonderland of beautiful hats, some of which are made by Kimberly Hutsai, owner of Two Foxes Studio. Now you can find Kimberly and her hats at the Ithaca Farmers Market, where she maintains a small booth loaded with--you guessed it--hats, and a mirror where you can admire yourself while trying to decide which hat to buy, for yourself or as a gift. I have a terrific straw hat that I wear in summer to protect my punim from the sun. I love it. Visit Kimberly's instagram feed  to see the full range of her millinery or visit her website to place an order or arrange for a custom lid for a loved one. 

When our beloved Johnny of blessed memory was still with us, I arranged with Katherine Solomon to have his portrait taken, in situ. She and her partner arrived with everything needed to take photos of our sweet boy and a few days later, her proofs landed in my in-box. Deciding which to enlarge and frame was tough! In the end, I picked the photo of the three of us to frame and made a calendar with the others. See two examples below. Wasn't he a noble beast?  You may not be able to arrange an in-person photo session with Katherine but you can still buy one of her gorgeous photographs of farm animals. Take Tallulah, for example, one of the Shetland Sheep at Miller Creek Farm. So many portraits to choose from! 

 

Gifts for hosts and hostesses:

When I have a visitor, I like to send them home with a gift bag of locally made artisinal food products. My favorites include Ithaca Dukkah from IthacaDelish seasonal honey from The Honeybee Embassy, wrapped up in a tea towel or basket. A great ambassador for Finger Lakes wineries is Hillick and Hobbs, a relative newcomer on Seneca Lake. The winery, on a beautiful spot with an unobstructed view of Seneca Lake, makes only Rieslings. A dry Estate Riesling makes a great gift. 

 

If you have a local vendor who ships, please drop the details in the comments.

 

Happy Holidays!

-- sdl

R.I.P. Robert Coover (1932-October 5, 2024) [by Stacey Lehman]

Ed. note: I just learned that Robert Coover died on October 5, 2024. I read and loved several of his books. I had a terrific chapbook of his short-short stories "In Bed One Night and Other Brief Encounters". One of the "encounters" describes a rolicking night in a convention hotel that makes me wonder if he was describing an experience at the MLA or AWP. Unfortunately, the chapbook went the way of books that are loaned to friends: I no longer have it. Here's a post I wrote way back in 2009. Don't forget to read the comments:

 

A Tale (Tail) of Two Covers [by Stacey Harwood]

 

David Yezzi’s post a few days ago about Philip Larkin prompted this post by Jim Cummins, which prompted a comment string about Robert Coover’s Spanking the Maid, a book I read and loved when it was published in 1982 (Grove). I was living in Albany, NY at the time and Coover came through to promote another book. When I asked him about Spanking, he told me that the book was really about “language.”  I was confused, felt dumb.  The book I read was about the S&M relationship between a man and his maid. Oh well.

Anyway, Jim Cummins hasn’t read the book, though he would like to, so I did a quick search to see if it is still in print.  It most certainly is, yet with a different cover than the Coover I read and loved.  Check this out.  On the left is the book I read in '82; on the right is the cover as it appears today.

 

Which cover would you like, Jim? 

Charles Bukowski: Woodcut by Loren Kantor

 

Charles Bukowski (c) Loren Kantor

Woodcuts are by their very nature brusque, harsh & bold," writes woodcut artist Loren Kantor.  "What makes a woodcut portrait come to life are age lines, wrinkles and weathered faces." 

Kantor has been posting images of his woodcuts of actors, writers, artists, family, and friends over at Woodcuttingfool for about a year.  He sent me this likeness of Charles Bukowski last week and I love it, especially because of the way he's captured the weariness in Bukowski's eyes.  Thank you Loren for letting us share this image with our readers.  See more about Bukowski here.  Read Bukowski's The Laughing Heart (a personal favorite), here.

-- sdh

from the archive, first posted May 25, 2012

Charles Bukowski (c) Loren Kantor

Woodcuts are by their very nature brusque, harsh & bold," writes woodcut artist Loren Kantor.  "What makes a woodcut portrait come to life are age lines, wrinkles and weathered faces." 

Kantor has been posting images of his woodcuts of actors, writers, artists, family, and friends over at Woodcuttingfool for about a year.  He sent me this likeness of Charles Bukowski last week and I love it, especially because of the way he's captured the weariness in Bukowski's eyes.  Thank you Loren for letting us share this image with our readers.  See more about Bukowski here.  Read Bukowski's The Laughing Heart (a personal favorite), here.

-- sdh

from the archive, first posted May 25, 2012

James Earl Jones (1931-2024) reads "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849)

For Friday the 13th:

Roadside Stand [poem by Charles Simic]

Earlybird Farm Stand (closed), Newfield NY

If you travel the back roads at this time of year, you might get lucky and come across a roadside stand where seasonal produce is for sale. Oftentimes these work on the honor system: there's a price list for the produce, and a can or box where you deposit your money. Some stands sell a single crop, others sell a wide variety of whatever is ripe and ready. Whenever I pass one of these places, I pull over. I'm reminded of this poem by Charles Simic: 

Roadside Stand
                    -- by Charles Simic

In the watermelon and corn season,
The earth is a paradise, the morning
Is a ripe plum or a plump tomato
We bite into as if it were the mouth of a lover.

Despite the puzzled face of the young fellow
In scarecrow overalls reading a comic book,
It’s all there, the bell peppers, the radishes,
Local blueberries and blackberries
That will stain our lips and tongue
As if we were freezing to death in the snow.

The kid is bored, or pretends to be,
While watching the woman pick up a melon
And press its rough skin against her cheek.
What makes people happy is a mystery,
He concludes as he busies himself
Straightening crumpled bills in a cigar box.

"Corn Dog with David Lehman" photo@Stacey Lehman

-- sdl

Four Days Until the Big Event [by Stacey Lehman]

At 7:00 am last Sunday, I took the plunge into Cayuga Lake for the second “test” swim in preparation for the 21^st Women Swimmin’ for Hospicare fundraiser. I was able to swim about one mile in just under an hour (a distance that Katy Ledecky would cover in about 15 minutes. Ponder that.).  Earlier this summer I participated in a few open water clinics where we learned strategies to keep ourselves on course and how to avoid panic and such. We learned that bumping into other swimmers, especially at the start, is inevitable but that eventually we’ll be able to swim in our own space. Several of the swimmers I've met have participated in this fundraiser from the very beginning. These intrepid women, some in their 80s, are a true inspiration and had a lot to offer first-timers like myself. By the way, there's still time to contribute to this worthy cause. 

Although I’m confident that I’ll be able to go the distance and at the same time have fun, I can’t help thinking of this poem while I'm in the water:

Not Waving but Drowning

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he’s dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.

                         -- Stevie Smith

George Balanchine's Stars and Stripes, a ballet for the Fourth of July [by Stacey Lehman]

Few artworks arouse my raw patriotism than this ballet, choreographed by Russian emigre George Balanchine to music by American composer John P. Sousa. When asked why he would choreograph to Sousa's marches, Balanchine replied, "because they make me happy," a variation of which should be the answer to why we do most anything. Stars and Stripes is Balanchine's valentine to America. When the American flag unfurls in the finale, it's time to reach for your hankie. 

In 1981, following the end of the Iran hostage crisis, Balanchine had the New York City Ballet perform the finale of Stars and Stripes as a surprise encore at the New York State Theater, with the dancers wearing yellow ribbons. How I long for the time when the finale could be performed to celebrate a hostage release. 

This performance features Damian Woetzel and Margaret Tracy. I love the contrast of Woetzel's braggadocio with Tracy's delicacy. Plus, they're having so much fun! 

--sdh

Rereading "Staying With It: On Becoming an Athlete" by John Jerome [by Stacey Lehman]

I first encountered John Jerome's book decades ago, when I was training to compete as a "master" in the Empire State Games. My events were the 200 breast stroke and the 1500 freestyle. The time trials were my first experience as a competitive swimmer; I hadn't competed in high-school or college and while my swimming stroke was OK, no one would mistake me for "real" competitor, with long fluid strokes and sharp flip-turns. I did it for fun. My team trained at the College of St. Rose (RIP) in Albany, NY. My good friend Linda, who learned that I was a fitness swimmer, invited me to join. My first outing in the pool with other masters swimmers was humbling. Everyone else was so fast and had such stamina. At the end of each lap, I clung to gutter as if for my life. On several occasions I shared a lane with a former professional football player who was training for a triathlon. He was so big that he nearly filled the width of the lane and swimming behind him was like swimming in the churning wake of a high-speed motor boat. 

I picked up Jerome's book having read a favorable review. Jerome had decided, at the age of 50, to become an athlete and swimming was his sport of choice. At the time, I was most interested in his training regimen and the physics of swimming and I found that the book motivated me to push harder to improve my times. 

After a long hiatus, I am swimming once again. This time I'm looking for motivation because I have volunteered to take part in a fundraiser on August 10 for Hospicare in Ithaca. I'm part of a team "Diana's Divas" that is swimming in honor of my friend Diana, who died earlier this year. Barring bad weather or an algae bloom, we're going to swim 1.2 miles across Cayuga Lake. It's not a race but I don't want to humiliate myself by being unable to cover the distance. I've begun to work out with a coach and other swimmers at the local YMCA. Tackling the drills is hard and by the time the hour is up, I'm spent. Fortunately, I had kept "Staying With It" and have been reading it, hoping for encouragement. 

The first time around, I was nowhere near what seemed to me to be the author's advanced age of 50. Anything about aging seemed abstract and not something that would happen to me. Now that that age is in my rear view, I am struck by different passages than the ones that resonated the first time around. Like this one, for instance: 

The physiological downslope of one's life does command a level of attention that isn't quite possible during the upslope, or growth, part of the process. I expected that. Still, I received regular, recurring, shocks. Aging is very rude, making no attempt at diplomacy, at softening its message. No small talk: it just starts slamming doors in your face, yanking things out of reach (of your arms, your eyes, your deeper longings). 

Ain't it the truth! 

You can find out more about about Women Swimmin for Hospicare here. And if you're inclined to make a small donation, Diana's Divas and hospicare would be most grateful. 

Catching my breath after the 1500, Empire State Games, Syracuse, NY

-- sdl

Kafka: It can always get worse. . .

"Let the bad remain bad, otherwise it will grow worse." 

Happy Mother's Day

"Just call me George" [by Peter Martins]

New York City Ballet rehearsal for "Chaconne" with George Balanchine, Peter Martins and Suzanne Farrell

“Après moi, le board,” Balanchine said to me near the end of his life. I guess he wasn’t completely sure about me or the future.

The Board was always starstruck by [George Balanchine], and the dancers adored him. He was like a god, but always a constructive and supportive god. And he could be funny. Once [during a rehearsal] he was watching from the audience with a microphone when Violette Verdy made a mistake. “Oh God,” she exclaimed.

Over the PA system came the reply, “Just call me George.”

        from "A life in ballet" by Peter Martins [The New Criterion, Volume 42, N 7]

Save the Date: A Poetry Reading in Response to Antisemitism [by Stacey Harwood-Lehman]

Sunday, February 18, 2024, 2:30 PM

In Person at the Museum of Jewish Heritage
Edmond J. Safra Plaza
36 Battery Place
New York, NY 10280

Livestream

Cultural critic and keynote speaker Ruth Ben-Ghiat, author of Strongmen: How They Rise, Why They Succeed, How They Fall, will provide historical context for today’s worldwide uptick in antisemitism, focusing specifically on New York City. Curators Martine Bellen, Ruth Danon, and Andrew Levy have brought together poets Rosebud Ben-Oni, Jordan Davis, Sharon Dolin, Joanna Fuhrman, Nada Gordon, Patricia Spears Jones, Pierre Joris, Adeena Karasick, Vincent Katz, Burt Kimmelman, Basil King, Stephen Massimilla, Sharon Mesmer, Uche Nduka, Mercedes Roffe, Sean Singer, Yerra Sugarman, Anne Tardos, and Edwin Torres to share works, reflecting on this current moment. 

Find more information here.

The Conqueror Worm [poem by Edgar Allen Poe]

Who better to usher in Halloween than Edgar Allan Poe, the master of horror, suspense, and the macabre. Does your lifelong fear of being buried alive originate with Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado”? Do you ever lie awake imagining a heart is beating from beneath the floorboards? You have Poe to thank for your nightmares. He brilliantly locates our collective fears and animates them in the short stories and poems written over the course of his brief and mysterious life. His ballad “Annabel Lee” hovers over Vladimir Nabokov’s “Lolita,” whose protagonist’s first love is “Annabel Leigh.”  (“When I was a child and she was a child, my little Annabel [Leigh] was no nymphet to me”). Then there’s  “The Conqueror Worm,” an appropriately creepy poem that comes to us from beyond the grave. Poe describes a theater performance; the actors are “mimes,” the hero is a large worm that eats the actors. The curtain falls. Boo!

The Conqueror Worm

Lo! ’t is a gala night
Within the lonesome latter years!
An angel throng, bewinged, bedight
In veils, and drowned in tears,
Sit in a theatre, to see
A play of hopes and fears,
While the orchestra breathes fitfully
The music of the spheres.

Mimes, in the form of God on high,
Mutter and mumble low,
And hither and thither fly—
Mere puppets they, who come and go
At bidding of vast formless things
That shift the scenery to and fro,
Flapping from out their Condor wings
Invisible Wo!

That motley drama—oh, be sure
It shall not be forgot!
With its Phantom chased for evermore
By a crowd that seize it not,
Through a circle that ever returneth in
To the self-same spot,
And much of Madness, and more of Sin,
And Horror the soul of the plot.

But see, amid the mimic rout,
A crawling shape intrude!
A blood-red thing that writhes from out
The scenic solitude!
It writhes!—it writhes!—with mortal pangs
The mimes become its food,
And seraphs sob at vermin fangs
In human gore imbued.

Out—out are the lights—out all!
And, over each quivering form,
The curtain, a funeral pall,
Comes down with the rush of a storm,
While the angels, all pallid and wan,
Uprising, unveiling, affirm
That the play is the tragedy, “Man,”
And its hero, the Conqueror Worm.

 

        -- Edgar Allan Poe

(Ed note: The poster, above, is from the final of three films by British director Michael Reeves before his untimely death from a barbiturate overdose at age 25. Have you seen it? -- sdl)

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Don't Kill Yourself [by Carlos Drummond de Andrade; selected by Stacey Lehman]

I was looking through my copy of Elizabeth Bishop's The Complete Poems: 1927-1979 for the publication date of "One Art" so I could respond to Dean Rader's challenge when I found Bishop's translation of this moving poem. -- SDH 

Don't Kill Yourself 

Carlos, keep calm, love
is what you're seeing now;
today a kiss, tomorrow no kiss,
day after day tomorrow's Sunday
and nobody knows what will happen
Monday.

It's useless to resist
or to commit suicide.
Don't kill yourself. Don't kill yourself!
Keep all of yourself for the nuptials
coming nobody knows when,
that is, if they ever come.

Love, Carlos, tellurian,
spent the night with you,
and now your insides are raising
an ineffable racket,
prayers,
victrolas,
saints crossing themselves,
ads for better soap,
a racket of which nobody
knows the why or wherefor.

In the meantime, you go on your way
vertical, melancholy.
You're the palm tree, you're the cry
nobody heard in the theatre
and all the lights went out.
Love in the dark, no, love
in the daylight, is always sad,
sad, Carlos, my boy,
but tell it to nobody,
nobody knows nor shall know.

-- Carlos Drummond de Andrade (tr. Elizabeth Bishop)

from the archive; first posted November 10, 2010