When we lived in Cleveland, we took piano lessons from Ann Kultti, Lebanese last name. Never knew it until I saw the recital programs, but Mrs K was a big cheese in the world of piano teachers.
The best player in the group was one Manly Sims. He was so good, she sent him to a specialist who gave him muscle exercises. I remember her describing them to me and Mom.
Herewith, some programs from those days. BTW, Manly is my friend on Facebook and never touches the piano. The only one in my family who does is my sister Donna.
These programs of course are for me, as I'm gonna throw them out. Click to enlarge.
Highlights: Arlyn Katovsky and I played a duet from the movie Exodus. Can't remember this at all. Arlyn is dead.
We also played at the Alcazar Hotel, which I also can't remember. Usually we played at the Settlement Music School.
You know what? I'm gonna save these for my sister Donna. She'll love them!
OMG! Then Mom says to me she has a lot of our old sheet music.
Throw it out, I said.
I can't, she said. Maybe Ethan will want them now that he's teaching grad students in Boston.
Y I K E S !!!!
I spend hours "submitting" my poems and short stories.
Here's a couple new ones I submitted that I don't think you have had the pleasure to read.
STAY APRIL STAY
April, o loveliest of
months, I beseech you
to linger.
Your green carpet allows
us to forget the winds of
winter, the spinal chills,
the cold entering our
bundled self like fragments
of the cold moon
determined to make us
suffer, like she does,
forbidden forever
to follow but never
embrace her
beloved earth.
My street makes
for me a path
to come home to
Strewn with pink petals
from the peach tree
yellow and gold
from the tulip tree
At home I sit
love-lorn at
my window
and watch
the mourning
doves splash
loudly in
the bird bath.
Stay April Stay.
MRS ADLER'S GEFILTE FISH
I think it's fair to say that if
I hadn't been born Jewish
"gefilte fish" would just be
one of those landmark
Jewish words like
hamantaschen
afikomen and
Dachau.
Gramma Green, as
religious as a
saint, used a special
sawing tool
round on the bottom
like a rudder on a
rocking chair to
chop the three types
of fish
Fish, you know, the
symbol for Christianity
and worked all day
to mash and and poach
and season to perfection
her pillow-shaped
delicate mounds that
are served cold.
Cold fish! With beet-
colored horseradish.
We survived. Survived the
camps. I offer every
delicious bite to
the six million martyrs
who God forgot.
God? What's that?
Some sort of a joke
thought up by a clown?
THE BIG WIND
Driving my car
down Davisville Road
it swerved like a
drunken boat
Up the grassy hill
we climbed only
to crash into
the showroom window
of an office furniture
store, a thousand
dollar ergo-
nominally correct
desk chair
with side pockets
for bottled water
and Hires root beer
clinging for dear life
to my tail fin
as we slide unscathed
down the grassy hill
back to Davisville Road
with a jaunty
rubber bounce bounce!
When I awoke this morning, I was working on a poem. This has never happened to me. My former BF Chris Ray, a sculptor, said he often had ideas in his sleep.
The first two lines appeared when I awoke, then I had to figure out the rest.
THE ROAD BY THE COAST
We took the road by the coast
the suitcases rattling in the back
like a couple of bowling pins
out for a stroll
ahead of us the sun was
coming up, I rolled down
my window to see if a
fragrant stream of
orange had lit up
the world, the only
world I know and
call my own.
***
I looked up the first line on the Internet, cuz it sounded so familiar. Nothing there.
Fell asleep last night to the late Wayne Dyer. He was there in all his carnations. My fave is when he where's a beret. Great storyteller! The monarch butterfly story is priceless.
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