Saturday writers' group - Poems: Just Another homeless Vet - Half Light - Giving Tuesday

I never followed up about our writers' group at B's house.

We call it the Beehive, right Martha?

Martha wrote a couple chapters of some characters who were prancing around her mind. Twas about gay men, something I don't read much about.

Altho on FB, someone posted John O'Hara's poem about Lana Turner.

View it here. 

Well, actually, I had wrin the entire blog, complete with photos, but the darn thing would not publish!

DECEIT AND SEDUCTION was an essay by Beatriz about how the Lady Slipper Orchid catches prey to  pollinate her.



I'm coming, Mama, I'm coming! Can't wait to get inside you!

I brought cheese n crackers for all of us.....

DONNA wrote one of her dark poems that was very dark and very good. 

BOB, Donna's brother, read a story about how grateful he is to be alive. He had heart surgery.

LINDA wrote one of her stunners... the way that woman thinks, we all remarked, a story of hate and revenge between a mother and daughter. Linda, btw, has a great relationship with her own mom.

REM wrote the last chapter of his novel. He got very emotional b/c he was writing about his beloved late wife, Valerie, who passed only a year and a half ago. He is positive he will meet her again on the other side.

As usual he made reference to many songs.

Now that I've wrin the highlights of the meeting, since I can't remember the details, may I now bore you with some poems I've wrin on FB?

JUST ANOTHER HOMELESS VETERAN

Once I walked around
the Willow Grove mall
maintaining a rapid pace
the clock tower I wrote
an article about chimed
twelve times, knock knock
you're dead

He came out of nowhere
a handsome young man
and asked if I'd walk
with him

He'd served in one of
our wars, forget which
one, and would deploy
again in two weeks

Ate out of garbage bins
the food sustained him
His girlfriend had
dropped him. I thought
I knew why, the smell
of booze enveloped him
like a halo

Meantime he slept in
the woods, covered by
leaves, twigs and bits
of cloth blowing in
the breeze, a friend of
the deer, the groudhogs
ad skunks

Gotta go, I said, and
stopped. Pulled out a twenty
from my purse and pressed it
into his warm hand. And
squeezed.

***
HALF LIGHT

I awoke from my turkey slumber
and poked my head out the upstairs
drapes. So little light, a
soft nearly purple palette
of color.

The houses across the street
were lined up like soldiers
keeping sentry. Not a single
light on.

Huge piles of swept-up
autumn leaves crouched
like silent stallions
in the road, waiting,
just waiting, for
children's noisy
approach.

***

You MUST read this hilarious blog about raising money.

Short Story "On Good Days I Remember My Name" pubished on Twisted Sister

  When I drive to Dan n Nicole's I pass by a nursing.  home. I've never been inside.

Read the short story here, published by Twisted Sister. Thank God they like my work.

Gotta hurry cuz I'm exhausted and wanna fall into bed and read a terrific book. I'd given DESTINY to Dan on his 40th b day. He just gave it back and I'm hooked.


  Tomro is our Writing Group. Two choices:  fix something I'd wrin... or write something new.

In my mind I picture a teenage boy, nice looking, overly emotional, who has roseacea. I met a woman with that condition. Together we watched a Second Opinion Show about it, so I thought about this young man.

Will I write it?

What dyou think? I'm guessing yes.

Am watching this C+ documentary right here on my laptop. Pardon me while I watch and fall asleep.

Thanksgiving Dinner at Dan n Nicole's

 I had a long night ahead of me as I was gonna make a bread and refrigerate it, then to complete the baking in the morning.

First, tho, I wanted a spectacular treat. I stood over the PUDDINGS for 10 mins trying to decide. They were unknown quantities to me, the Flan, the Hershey's Chocolate Pudding, filled with junk, so I finally took myself to the bakery and bought this apple-filled dumpling.

Whenever I go there I think of my late friend Winnie who wanted me to bring her some tea biscuits. We sat on the porch of her sister Tony and munched em with tea.

 On Thanksgvg day, the dough had risen to the top of the bowl. I punched it down.

 It rose in the oven.

My work table. Learned from Nicole later on that the Ikea table is 14 yrs old. First it was her brother Sean's when he lived in Phillly. Then it passed on to Nicole. Then to me, replacing the green table the Travis family left.

 Bubby! cried Max the moment I walked in. What a great feeling!

I like your ponytail, I said.

 We're playing Musical Chairs.

 We let Max win a couple of times....

 Hello, cute one!

But later I was out for blood. And won from Dan!

I was roaring with laffter.

 Barb took a video and put it on FB.

 Apple Lattice Pie.

 Pumpkin Pie.

I had both with vanilla ice cream. Punkin was my favorite.

What's that I'm listening to now?

Live at Lincoln Center with Pianist Lang Lang. Rufus Wainright had sung a love letter to NY. The lyrix ended with something like AND LOVE YOKO. Gorgeous song.

A guy was singing with great feeling. Who he? They get their mouth into wide open positions to have the sound come out right. Kurt Elling.  49.  Put him on my wish list. I wish he'd come over for dinner and sing for his supper.

 Was trying to get a pic of Ole Man Blank. For some reason he wanted to hang around with me. Unusual.

 Dan's new $8 video game.  I played it.  It's 3 D and did quite well.

Hello Dan. He and Grace were playing one of their tag me games around the house. He lifted her high up, then brought her down, nose to nose. Never have I seen such love between two people. He's 40, she 6, going on...

Today I ran after Mailman Dante THREE TIMES. First was a deposit to ND from someone who works at Merck, two checks. Wanted to mail it as I had just send $10 cash to Pennypack Trust.

Second was a postcard that was still wet with blue paint.

Third was a thank-you card to Nicole for a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Has a virus contaminated my downstairs laptop? Poems: My Own Personal Twilight Zone - Happy Thanksgiving to Members of New Directions

So, I'm on episode two of this exciting series, and figure that while my challah is baking in the oven, I'll watch Episode Two.

Suddenly a message comes on. "We've detected a virus. Call this phone number immediately!"

Would YOU call?

So I shut down my laptop. And guess what, Marcy, it won't turn on.

Oy gevalt. Or oy gevult.

Read the comment I received earlier.

AND, NO, there was no virus. My laptop just wouldn't start for about 20 mins. Like a car with a lazy alternator.

What a time I had making my bread. The dough is - literally - all over the kitchen.

  Too much yeast, Ethel and Lucy!

I got out my flat cookie sheets, two of em.

One looked as if it had burned down with a house, so I threw it away and borrowed one from Nancy, across the street.

That's the sheet where I made a huge mess. The egg yolk topping got all over the pan. Don't tell him yet, but I'll ask Scott to clean it for me. He's asleep now.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO MEMBERS OF NEW DIRECTIONS

Tonight I make a challah
with yeast that makes us
rise to the occasion
of our recovery, great or small

The water I add is what we drink
to take our pills, a rainbow of
colors, mine are yellow, pink,
a teeny white one that often drops
on the kitchen floor, the merry
prankster

They come in capsules, injections,
round pills and even pills with
the middle cut out like a Weinrich
bakery doughnut

We work as a team. We have phone
greeters who answer those phones
every day of the year
except when they forget

You'll hear the voices of Nick,
Charlotte, Harriet, Gregory,
Fontaine

Meetings surprise us!
Who will be there? Alex?
Briana? Atiyah? Katrina?

Loved ones, I announce,
report to the library in
the back, where the Hodges
await

Pointing to Ada, whose husband
Rich has stopped running and
now walks at a rapid pace, is
over there, the gal whose smile
lights up the room

And I'll be in the bipolar group
waiting, just waiting, to hear
your story. Mostly I let the
other folks talk.

Dough under my fingernails
tonight, as I listen to
the jazz station and
dream of many things.

May all your dreams come true
on this, Thanksgiving Eve.


***

And how can I forget Helen, who runs
our Daytime Group? She'll stay late
to confer with you privately and offer
the wisdom she's collected like some
folks collect fine china.

In absentia, Jonathan runs the group.

His passion is art. The good folks
with bipolar are a talented bunch.

Just don't tell a soul you got it
or they may not hire ya!

MY OWN PERSONAL TWILIGHT ZONE

As usual I took my cheese-
mushroom omelet outside to
eat.... reviewed the troops
who wouldn't cry defeat:

The lantana, begonias and
Gerbera Daisies

Not a soul was on the
street. Where were the
dogwalkers, the purr of
engines going up n down
the street?

Took my plate inside
Scott's and whispered
Are you awake.
Silence.

Finished my omelet
on the park bench
on his porch. Watched
for Smokey, our
unafraid feral cat

And thought, not for
the first time,

They've finished us off.
Sprinkled venom from on
high - did you see it,
Captain Kirk?

And I am the only
one alive.

***

Daniel Goldsmith, Holocaust Survivor, soon to be 85, speaks at Upper Moreland Historical Association

Most of us are familiar with Steven Spielberg's Holocaust Survivors Project.

Our guest speaker Dan Goldsmith was videoed by one of Spielberg's associates. She said he MUST go out and speak in person at schools - and of course other venues - to show that he's a real person, which is more convincing than a film. Here's his hour-long video here.


       His talk was riveting.

A young woman sat in the front row. He said to her When you get older, marry and have children, all of us survivors will have passed away.

BASHERT, he said, was the reason he survived.

He had many close encounters with death yet lived to tell the tale of his mother, who lived to be 88, and his younger sister Lillian, who lives in Warminster, PA!!!

I was shocked to learn he lives in nearby Hatboro, home of Daddypops Diner, and the Hatboro Post Office.

Altho his family were Polish Jews, they traveled to Antwerp in Belgium and lived there. French and German were spoken there. His dad was a plumber and made a good living.

His mother saved a lot of memorabilia and gave it to a neighbor for when the war ended.

She and others were part of the Resistance, a dangerous existence. After the war, her mom refused to talk about what happened, so her son Dan got her to talk about it in bits and pieces.

Everyone in the family survived except his father, whom he loved very much.

If you were a Jew, you had to register where you lived and how many people in the family. You wore a Jewish star.



In the middle of the night, the Nazis arrived and pulled people from their homes.

Everyone was screaming down below on the street.

The Nazis wanted young and strong men and picked the dad to go to a labor camp. He was 39.

I'll see you soon, said Dad. I'm strong and know I'll survive.

He was later gassed in Auschwitz's Birkenau. 

The Goldsmiths lived on the top floor. They'd been tipped off, so they escaped thru a back door so they wouldn't be seen and climbed a ladder to the roof. They hid under a cornice.

Bashert, said Dan, is b/c Lillian the baby was asleep the whole time.

One peep from her and they would have been shot dead. In fact a Nazi did climb up on the roof and shone his flash light across the roof, but missed them.

Remember these pix? Said Danny. This was him.

Dan and Lillian. Dunno when or where.

Lillian spent most of the war years with a Catholic family who loved her very much. She became a part of their family.

The family refused to give her up at the end of the war.

Uncle Murray, who was an American citizen, straightened out the situation and brought her back to the family. To this day, the 'righteous gentiles' refused to keep in touch.

Blurry pic of a secular school Dan attended.

He was given false Baptismal papers and raised Catholic.

He was expelled from school b/c he was Jewish.

The Jews were gradually stripped of their rights and their humanity.

Hitler had planned it in advance.

They had a curfew and couldn't be on the streets from 7 PM to 7 AM.

They could not go to PUBLIC PLACES, whether parks, museums, concerts.

"It was one and a half years of stripping us of our rights and demoralizing us."

At the time they didn't know about concentration camps.

The Jews could only live in four cities in Belgium, the four largest. 

 Antwerp Train Station.

 Forty years ago, Dan returned to his old haunts. He went upstairs and knocked on the door.

An Indian family lived there.... this is Antwerp. He asked to see his old apartment. The Nazis had trashed it when they couldn't find the occupants. Mom had the sense to grab Dad's tools to use as bagaining chips, and blankets to keep them warm.

The family refused to let them in. 

This priest is remembered in the Holocaust Museum in DC.

This time, living as a Catholic, the Nazis got all the Jews. Pull down your trousers, they ordered.

The Jews were the only ones circumcised.

They ended up on a cattle car, replica below.

Joseph, 16, took on a leadership role.

He brought a long bar of iron and pried open the door of the moving car. He instructed the boys that when the train slowed down he would push each one out, which he did.

Then, in the dark, they had to find one another. The injuries were not too severe, some bloodied cuts and ankle sprains.

They ran into the dark woods while Joseph said he'd find help. He heard speaking in French inside the house so he figured they were safe, which they were.

Dan last heard from Joseph in 1950 and was doing fine.

 Little Dan's attic home. Had to keep quiet during the day. At night, he could go out in the huge backyard and play. The family had bought him a pet rabbit who stayed outside.

Another wonderful priest, possibly Father Andre.

 After the war, Danny stayed at this hospital in Belgium. He'd had his childhood stripped away. When his dad was first abducted by the Nazis, he told his 10-yo son, you're the man of the family now. Take care of Mom and Lillian.

The below graf is mostly true.

The Jaffe family took in Danny and dozens of other Jewish boys. He learned how to be a boy again. They played games, ran races in the yard, and ate candy.



Ee-ow! Take me to the dentist.





Thunderous applause greeted Dan Goldsmith.

I walked into the dark night, slipped on my driving glasses, and drove home.

Genocides are happening all over the globe. And from where I sit on my red couch, the desctruction of the native Americans - Lenapes - 400 years ago - made it possible for me to live here.

DANIEL asked us one thing. When you see an injustice, speak up. Don't allow it to happen.

Life is too short.