There is a frozen lake with a grand piano in the center of it.
There is an older man playing songs from our childhood as we stand around him and sing the words to his music.
The cool breeze is getting cooler and snow is threatening to fall at any second...
But there is soup on the stove and warm couch for us to sit together and lay down.
Drink a glass of wine, raise a glass for all our times.
Smiles, tears, dances and doors slammed.
Children born, parents gone, friends say hello and just as quickly say goodbye...
The old man is tickling the ivory and the ebony keys - songs like brown eyed girl and I guess that's why they call it the blues. He plays Cole Porter and Ira Gershwin tunes too...
We hold hands and I want to take you in my arms and sweep you off your feet, fly away to another world...another time...
But the lake is frozen, the snow is beginning to fall and the soup is on the stove...I can smell it from here...
So say goodbye to the sadness, say goodbye to that old man, playing Fire and Rain...maybe tomorrow we can do this all again.

This morning,
I walked with god and man, and animal

I've come to believe,
no other possibility,
He denies me sleep
as His insurance policy

some One wants to be sure,
someone sees His sunrise poem,
He selected this ancien regi-man
to be His admiring audience,
with deer, squirrels, rabbits, a red fox, an osprey
always complaining, why do they get
the cheap seats

so up at five,
no jive,
gotta get there early,
for a good seat,
on the dock by his name

watch the color blue transgender
from feminine elegy elegant pale
to peacock royal male,
the water,
a contributing editor,
phases in with a steely grin,
with ermine whitecap hints
and an orange marmalade sky homage,
I cannot try to describe

and here is where man comes in...

as the tableau reveals a still life
come to be,
a painting enlivened,
come to me free,
bursting with
effervescence and
animal life tribunes,
paying on...

strange...

my Pandora app
back to back,
plays for me
Gershwin's Rhapsody In Blue,
hard upon it comes
Saint-Saëns's
The Carnival of the Animals

and I
enfeebled amateur,
needy for a
word titan Titian,
can think only
this trite thought:

I know not who is the
instrument and who
is the
artist,
but virtuous us,
We, all, now-capital-buddies,
now, all, well-color-capitalized,
god and man and animal,
crooning a chorus of appreciation

let this "accidental" miracle,
this collaboration,
enthuse me,
to live happily
with anticipation
for just one more day...

June 2014

Paul Wittgenstein returned from war,
feeling half a man.
He had fought his nations’ battles
at the cost of his right hand.
The loss of an appendage
scars anyone, its true.
Paul was a pianist-.
With just one hand what could he do?

Paul Wittgenstein was fortunate
Having Ravel for a friend.
A confidante of Gershwin,
He said Paul would play again..
He wrote a sweet piano piece
To be played with just one hand.
If you close your eyes and listen
You would never guess his plan.
A composer of precision,
With a jazzy playful side,
His left handed concerto
Was one to make the angels cry

Paul Wittgenstein took to the stage
A sea of faces looking on.
He played the piece so brilliantly
None guessed his hand was gone.
Not until he left his seat
To bow to their applause
Some gasped in their astonishment,
But most just cheered and roared.



Ravel's Concerto for the Left Hand is one of the most brilliant and important of 20th-century concertos for any instrument. Composed for Paul Wittgenstein, a pianist who lost his right arm during World War I, there is no way by simply listening that you would ever know its secret. Both of Ravel's concertos were heavily influenced by jazz--possibly also by his acquaintance with Gershwin--and successful performances must combine his customary precision with a certain ability to "swing" the tunes. --David Hurwitz

It is Summertime
like in the George Gershwin song
the grass is waving, tall
& my step -father's rich
& my mom's not bad looking
(still despite being in her late years)

In a mansion house
that is a museum
someone is polishing
a large copper ***
& dusting the books
in the old library

A vagrant locked out
of childhood haunts
in my dreams I walk
along a country road
The grass is waving, tall
it’s summertime
like in the George Gershwin song

Lay with me, darling
Within the New York summer
And hand me softly, a Gershwin kiss
Under celluloid sky.

We will dance, you and I
Beneath the bridges of central park
And we will sense
The Broadway skyline.

Frames pass by unseen
With imagination and ideal
Burnt into their core, as
The music of a thousand orchestras
Start our fandango
As we fall in love
With the freedom of tomorrow.

.last time i heard... the time difference between Bach and say... a Gershwin was... 187 years... what' the difference between a... say... Joshua Redman (1969) and a Cedric Brooks (1943) - a difference of... a grand total of? 26 years! short attention span or something? too much ***** too many drugs?! why did acid jazz take over?! tell me... i'm not black enough to understand the classical music equivalent in the black community, that is jazz... beat poets?! they cursed the whole affair, yes, no, maybe? just when i thought i might escape the opera, or the tux, or the orchestral hall filled with pensioners... when jazz made the living room everything other than a family communal space... just then... these ******* stopped making decent music, and turned to rap... ****... call me what you like, a racist... whatever... i'm an aesthete... which is not an athlete... ******* should have stuck to their guns... sure... you'll out-run us... but sure as **** you won't out-swim us.

white privilege?
                  seriously?
so...
    the ******
(sorry, emphasis)
   in the gospel choir
at church,
or the one on the dance
floor busting all
the: applying
gymnastics
   to a dance
moves...
  he... she... they weren't
born with a
black, "privilege"?
no? not any...
seems kinda unfair
to presuppose
i come from
a privileged household
of ethnicity;
****... if you want it...
you can have...
the box...
****... inherit my
successes in abstraction...
have your genesis
in ancient Greece...
have it!
           it's yours!
now show me something...
*******(!) spectacular!

An overnight sensation
Twenty years in the making
Finally you're noticed
All the roles that you've been taking

High School plays gave you the bug
Standing out front and centre stage
You made your choice of a career
Your life had turned a page

Little theatre groups did beckon
You'd learn your craft and be a star
But, no one told you just how long
you'd wait, or ...just how far

You beat the boards in summer stock
Singing Gershwin in the park
You'd work in summer themed resorts
Cleaning rooms out after dark

Acting, was your calling
You'd be a star one day...you knew
But, even though you'd keep on working
Your name to them was...who?

Extra work and commercials
You'd work the chorus for a while
No matter where you heard...no luck
You'd always leave them with a smile

You swore you'd not get botox
There'd be no nip and tuck
You swore you'd keep on trying
Remember...you've got pluck!!!

The lines were forming around your eyes
As time kept marching on
Your lips were getting thinner
The lead actress roles were gone

You'd pile on the makeup
And you'd lie about your age
No one checked your background out
So, you lied about the stage

But, one day ...there was a call back
A job you never thought was yours
It was sure to go to a younger girl
A true , new, photogenic *****

But, there it was....an offer
The one role to get your start
It said "Miss Watkins we are proud"
"to offer you the part"

You gratefully accepted,
didn't let them know the truth
It was better than a cruise ship show
You were truly through the roof

It was a show way  off broadway
The big time was around the bend
You could see the lights from out the back
You had made it...you'd pretend

The makeup went on heavy
But no one really cared
they just ate up your performance
Your soul you truly bared

The critics were enamored
They all loved you at first sight
It only took you twenty years
But, you'd made it overnight...

In the morning
before the day gets too distracting
your piano’s at its very best.
 
Say Hello! to it with a scale or two.
Nothing quite like the harmonic minor
(in contrary motion – 3 octaves please)
to get its hammers hammering,
the pedals pedalling, and those
black and white keys
to skip under your fingers.
 
Bach today or shall it be Brahms?
Gershwin maybe, or just a little Grieg?
No matter what, they’re all your friends.
Nice people composers, no trouble to anyone.
All they do all day is sit in their studios
and dream about music.
Sometimes they write it down,
​carefully,
measuring every note and rhythm
​for your piano to play
before the day gets too distracting.

this is
                                                     a poem of a
                                     bird, a duck to be tota-
                                        lly specific .Although
                                                       ­    there might
                                                          not seem any-                                                          
  ­                                                        thing that duck-ish about this poem as you read
                                                           it, it will soon occur to you (if it has not already) that  
                                                           this poem is really very special since it is not only
                                                             about a duck but it is in the shape of a duck...
                                                         ­     You see this duck is called Gershwin and he
                                                              ­    likes splashing in puddles so that is  
                                                                ­       what                 makes          
                                                 ­                         he ,                  him
                                                                ­         does               happy
                                                           ­                 all                  bec-
                      ­        this is   ...                             day                ause
                        supposed to be a                     long .              he
                   puddle .Yes it is and          and   that  ,         is a duck!
                      a     .......    too   ........                                              
                          ...........   ....... ... .
                             splash                                                           ­                   
  
                      
                                                   look below......
                                                     ­                  ......
                                                          ­   ......  ..................
                                      ­                         ......................
                                          ­                        ..............
                          ­                                            .......
             ­                                                            .




                                                       * this is the most weirdest poem i
                                                    have ever written and its just so RANDOM*
                                                         ­       ;p

in elementary school we were told
to write interesting facts about ourselves
on the first day, to get to know one another
and at that time the only things i could think of
were that i collected nutcrackers
and had many siblings
i see myself in better lighting now
hello, i am emily
my middle name is kane,
my great grandmother's surname,
and i take pride in it
my fingers shake when i explain things
that i don't understand myself
and my legs shake on their own time
that's the quirk of a chronic tic
i draw to express myself to myself
and to show off
and to be better than the girl i met in the third grade
who painted a sunset
just a sunset
and all my friends ooh'd and ahh'd
and i sat there, confused
if savannah could paint a sunset
and get such a reaction,
then watch out world.
here i am, painting roses and butterflies and cartoons
on the cardboard backings of old spiral notebooks
i found in my closet
and leaving my sloppy signature in sea-foam green
on the corner and in the back of
my mind
and smudged on the side of my left hand
i have a scar on my cheek
from getting just too close to a dog
and scars on my arms
from staying just too close to the edge
and playing mind games with myself
the kind in which neither of us
came out victorious
i like mozart and debussy
when i'm working
and gershwin and joplin
when i want to have fun
i write on the spot, spur of the moment and
my words don't seem to
fit on the paper in a way that pleases most
but i assure you, they speak volumes
in the middle of the night
when i lay in bed, pen in hand
anger in mind, worry in chest
i am in love with a boy who lives
far away though it seems
every night when we talk
he's right next to me
wrapping his arms around me,
binding us together and
keeping promises
and holding on to the
agreement we made
at twelve a.m.
i can sing and play instruments
and tell you anything you want to
know about the surrounding universe
or the Liverpudlian lads who
started a musical revolution
and taught me that
all you really did need was love
i read every day
from books that have been sitting on my shelves
every day for the past five years,
some even longer
when i sleep i snore
though i've heard that
it sounds like a cat
purring while being pet on the head
but i think that the most interesting
fact about me
is something that
has not come about just yet

And when it hits the fan and the men
from the Met' with the stun guns
come to get you,
who will you be then?

a Johnny come lately
come in Johnny
come hate me?

Gershwin
raps to me in blue,
Ah
slightly classical
(It's the nose you know)

Thinking things link or you'd think so,
I think so or I don't think at all,
sometimes the walls I fall from
are my own creations.

' Rhapsody in Blue' was written for you
I know that now
but
still wondering how Gershwin knew.

Notes,
like boats on the sea,
softly sailing through me,
the music makes waves in my heart.
I am listening to, a
Rhapsody in Blue and it's hot,
a top hat and tails
and off Gershwin sails,
one more boat that will be,
sweet
music sailing through me and
into the depths of my sea.

Debussy's in the air
Satie's in the sea
Gershwin's growing in the ground
how much more beauty can there be

Einstein's up in orbit
Newton's sitting 'neath a tree
Schrodinger's both here and there
so where should I be

Naruda conquered love
Bukowski; Reality
Ginsberg Howled all the rest
what thought is left for me

I'd like to say something never said before
something of wonder, profundity
here it comes
here it comes

I'm coming up empty

That was the day your face seared onto the inside of my eyelids. That was the day a gentle hunger stroked my belly, and that was the day where we trekked the entire length of Manhattan with Gershwin bubbling from our mouths. And that was the day I discovered the city at night in broad strokes, that was the time where my steps grew a little bit larger, where we painted the soles of our feet and colored the sidewalks our footprints dripped where the colors blend you held my hand and held your breath as you walked against the red light.

That was the summer you began the nonchalance around me and that’s when I knew our friendship was over, sailed on when the vessels in my nose broke and blood started gushing out. I was bending over the sink to catch the droplets in the water fingers poised over the bridge of my nose to stem the flow and when I called out for you, called out your name, you replied with clinical directness completely impassive and proceeded to google how to stop nosebleeds all the while chanting “nose nose nose” in a singsongy breath and that’s when I knew that the ship has sailed onto muddy waters.

Which is the dream and which is reality? For there are some images that are so beautiful I find it hard to believe I was awake and yearning

*That was the day where you reached to fix a leaf on a branch and I caught a pale sliver of flesh, that streak of white stomach, the glance down at me, the blush, the light tarnishing that yellow hair, setting my heart ablaze

a drinking duel to George Bush I lost once
a woman to George Clooney
I spent many George Washington's
foolishly

Listened to George Harrison sing about
My Sweet Lord,
and related more to Thorogood
One scotch , bourbon, beer

I wish I was funny
as George Carlin,
or had the clarity
of George Orwell

But my name is not George.
I am not Patton.
Can't sing like Jones.
Or compose , like
Gershwin.

I tried to change my name.
It did not help.
so , don't
call me George.

I'm the face on a Norman Rockwell cover
and a nameless soldier honored
in a single noble tomb

You see me -
a fearful face in a
sea of fearful faces,
a part of those huddled masses
yearning to breathe free.
Armed with dreams and apprehensions,
I wave to the majestic lady in the harbor,
her torch warming my hopeful heart.

You stand with me
in the stillness of Arlington,
a grieving parent
clutching a folded flag,
remembering my fallen child.

And you listen to the sounds I love -
the music of a marching band
on the Fourth of July,
a rhapsody by Gershwin,
the soul of Bourbon Street jazz,
the roar of rock.

You know me.

From sea to shining sea,
I am America.
You are America.
God shed His grace on thee.

Forsooth.



(sonnet #MMMMMMMDCLXXV)


Lo, Gershwin--did I think to thus avail
Me with pure ambience for coffee's dense
Black notes? Tis quashed upon attempt, as thence
Thin hopes of drinking in good compny.  Pale
Blue skies own icy clouds, and on that scale
How golden light is rather ghastly hence,
Whileas I stoke the thought that for intents
I'm being a proper Swede sans cream's detail.
No danish could quite answer for as twere
Exactly what my instinct sought to do
This black elixir good.  No sugar, to
Be certain, either. Milk was allus poor
In that regard.  And now dead poets' tour
Of compny is as well?  Whose music too?

29Jan19

“This Dream”

I'm looking through the ruins to find Socrates
I'm thinking there's a clue he's sending me
to lead me to the forest green
Mountain meadows rarely seen
Answers to the riddles that have always been
part of this dream

I'm looking through dusty shelves to find Sophocles
I'm thinking there's something new he's telling me
That gives to me a sense of sight
to lead me through this darkened night
into the brilliant morning light to see
this dream

I'm listening to this Gershwin rhapsody
I feel there's s special way it's touching me
sending me above this rhyme
beyond the sense of space and time
to know a love so sublime and free
as part of this dream

Lawrence Hall, HSG
Mhall46184@aol.com

      “Anglo-Saxon Students Would Not Like to Be Taught by a Jew”

                                                      cited in
                   -Stanley Kunitz Lyrics, Songs, and Albums | Genius

To the Privileged Youth of Columbia University:

As a child of situational poverty
I am so grateful for all my Jewish teachers

Including

Moses
Joshua
Jeremiah
Samuel
David
Solomon
J­esus, Mary, and Joseph
Saint Peter and the others in The Twelve
Saint Paul
Elie Weisel

Chaim Potok
Herman Wouk
Leon Uris
Franz Kafka
Leonard Cohen
Anne Frank
Bernard Malamud
Isaac Bashevis Singer
Philip Roth
Osip Mandelstam

Saul Bellow
Isaac Asimov
Woody Allen
Mel Brooks
Edna Ferber
Yip Harburg
George Cukor
Mel Brooks
Oscar Hammerstein
Alan Lerner

Carl Reiner
Rod Serling
Franz Werfel
Alan Arkin
Claire Bloom
Leonard Nimoy
Chaim Topol
Ed Asner
Mel Brooks
Peter Falk
Werner Klemperer

Jack Klugman
Walter Matthau
Tony Randall
Mel Torme
John Banner
Kirk Douglas
Lorne Greene
Eli Wallach
Sam Wanamaker
Morey Amsterdam

Leo Genn
Otto Preminger
Jack Benny
Leslie Howard
Ernst Lubitsch
Cecil B. DeMille
Mortimer Adler
Allen Bloom
Harold Bloom
Irving Berlin

Boris Pasternak
Emil Ludwig
Eric Wolfgang Korngold
Elmer Bernstein
Max Steiner
George Gershwin
Dimitri Tiomkin
Samuel Fuller
Alexander Korda
Zoltan Korda

Emeric Pressburger
Erich von Stroheim
Billy Wilder
William Wyler
Fred Zinnemann
J. J. Abrams
Peter Bogdanovich
Michael Curtiz
Stanley Donen
Stanley Kramer

Howard Caine
Leon Askin
Robert Clary
Dinah Shore
Stephen Sondheim
Volodymyr Zelinsky
Simon Schama
Louise Gluck
Siegfried Sassoon
Isaac Rosenberg

Joseph Brodsky
Rob Morrow
Vasily Grossman
Stanley Kubrick
Viktor Frankl

And more, so many more, a cloud of witnesses
Whose names are written in gold on a scroll in Heaven

But somehow, in this world of beauty and truth
And humanity’s aspirations to the good
All you have found are bullhorns, trash fires, chants
Clinched fists, obscenities, lies, and shrieking hate

for my parents with love

Such a grand and festive lady
that steamer to Put-in-Bay
escaping her dock
just after dawn
leaving Detroit's factory din
moored to the Michigan shore.

Sunbeams glanced off waves
in lake Erie's tranquility
bound for Sandusky
and Put-in-Bay Island.

Clattering silver and porcelain
veiled by sweeter sounds
of congenial banter and
ballads crooned by the shipboard band.
playing late beneath the stars
for 'swing' and 'jitterbug'
reeds and horns and ritual beats
blazed the air with frenzied jubilation.

Paired in the rhythm section,
Jim drove chords from strings and pick
while Janice matched beat for beat -
fingers gliding over ivory and ebony
until Detroit lights shone ashore
on the port side bow
where the Put-in-Bay would
re-tether to its Motor City pier.

How their union sealed is forever’s mystery.
Was it bonded
checking chords in a Gershwin tune
or on break over scotch at the bar
or with a sideward smile during “All of Me? ”
No one knows but the moment came,
as sure as rain to Lake Erie,
when Janice knew that Jim would ask
and he knew she’d answer, 'Yes.'

Thanksgiving day, 2008
(also Dad's birthday)