Joy Leftow's Blog, page 24
July 4, 2012
Judgement Day
“You’re not a Jew,” she says, “not one of the few chosen
ones, you’re a big nothing, a song a dance, a few laughs.”
A Johnny come lightly flowing to my rhythm, I reply,
“And you’re a bitch a vicious witch with a twist, you give me a stitch in my
left side.” A brutal switch to her words, I continue, “You call yourself a
Christian yet sit in judgment, call me a nothing. Step lightly I caution. Everyone
is someone. You think because you sit in church and pray to Jesus it erases
your sins, your forgeries your jealousies. Who died and made you God?”
“Who gives you the right to decide what I am.”
I stop arguing. I’m tired of this dance. What’s the purpose?
I cannot change how she sees. She has cohorts of sorts who see the way she
does. I live under the misconception I’m a Jew because I was born one, through
and through. No one can take that away from me.
Impassioned by the fruits of my labor I know I’m a Jew. In a
stew, it’s not important to define myself by her illusion. Misconceptions, putdowns
and judgments morph into perceptions. I look at her again and see she’s never
been my friend.
Get thee behind me I say to myself as much as her and
continue on my way.
Mean People Suck!
June 28, 2012
Sally Is Dead!
I should have known
how wrong things were when she rang my bell suddenly at midnight on a day
before work. I didn’t know what to do and at first considered not ringing her
in. I hadn’t heard from her for at least ten years. I rang her up and tried to
make short work of it but spent over an hour listening to her repeat the same
sentences, sometimes as many as three times. I knew something was amiss but
couldn’t figure it out. I wondered if my old friend had Alzheimer's. Sally was
only 43. How could she have Alzheimer’s? It seemed strange that she would
repeat sentences I told her and act like it was the first time she asked the
question. I gently asked her, “Sally, don’t you recall? We just said this same
thing 20 minutes ago. Realizing that it was now going on 1 a.m., I told Sally I
had to get up at 6 for work the next day and escorted her to the front of my
building both of us promising to keep in touch. After many unanswered calls, I
ran into John, her ex-husband, in front of the hospital where he’d worked for
25 years. It was 10 p.m. He sat there calmly eating a sandwich in his blue
scrubs, chatting with a co-worker.
“How’s Sally?” I asked.
“Didn’t you hear?” John responded.
“Hear what?”
“Sally’s dead.”
“Dead from what?” I asked
surprised.
“She died in her apartment about a
month ago. She’d been dead at least a week and neighbors noticed the smell.”
“She visited me two months ago and
I hadn’t seen her for years,” I said. “She showed up at midnight.”
John laughed. “That would be
Sally,” he said. “No one could handle being around her anymore. Even our
daughters moved in with me.”
“I didn’t know that. How old are
they?”
“Stephanie started college this
fall and she’s 18. Brenda is 23 and just graduated Queens College.”
“Congratulations,” I said. “How did
Sally die?”
“Sally just stopped eating and
going out. She was found on her bed. They said it was death through
starvation.”
“Oh my God! Just starved herself to
death just like that?”
“She said she was too fat and
needed to diet. She used to come here on my lunch hour and sit here with me
while I ate my sandwich. She did it at least once a week.”
“Yes she told me too she’d gotten
too fat but she didn’t seem too fat. Maybe she could’ve stood to lose 15 or 20
pounds. She had no one else in her life?”
“Her mother died some time ago. Her
grandmother is gone too. There was no one left. I guess that’s why she used to
come here to sit with me. She had no one else in her life.”
“No one knew how desperate she
was?”
“We were all used to her
eccentricity. When she showed up here a month ago and said she was starting a
new diet, we figured, here goes Sally again, off on a new spin.”
“No one saw how ill she was,” I
said, “not even me. I saw she repeated herself over and over but I didn’t
suspect things were that bad that she’d starve herself to death in seclusion.”
We said our goodbyes and I left
wondering if there was anything I could have done to prevent her death. I knew
her mom had been institutionalized when Sally was a child and we used to hang
out at her grandma’s apartment. I remember we visited her mom together in the
institution. Her mom never left the hospital except once for a visit. I remember grandma made us matching dresses in
a beautiful stretch nylon sleeveless with a round neck and knee length. Sally’s dress was gold,
burnt sienna and brown diamond patterned and mine was blue, turquoise and green
diamond shaped pattern. I remember because it was the first really pretty sexy
dress I had clinging to all my curves. Back then I wore a size 34 size A bra
and had a 25 inch waist. I weighed 125 pounds. Sally weighed 115 and had brown
gold eyes and a heart shaped face. I introduced her to her husband. She married
him when she turned 17 and was pregnant with her first child.
I sit here today, 18 years later,
remembering Sally and wondering if anything could have prevented her death. I
miss Sally too as she was my first true friend.
Sally took this pic of me in the dress her grandma made for me when we were 14 years old.
June 10, 2012
Jamming in the Heights
There are bad days and there are good days, stupendous days and plain old shitty days and sometimes there are bad days that stay around forever or it can seem like that anyway. Yesterday was a big day for me, one that made me feel better than I've felt for a long time, months actually, better, healthier and happier.
Today is about shout outs for me, shouting out to all those people around me who enrich my life by being part of it.
Yesterday was the Annual Ring Garden Art Show, Art In The Garden 2012, and as usual, I was listed on the menu. I use the word 'usual' because back in 2006, when I first proposed to Liz Popiel who organized the event that I read poetry at her upcoming event, Liz politely said, "Well, I kind'a made up my mind after the last poet who performed, not to include poets."
"What happened then?"I asked.
"He caused me no end of grief about the noise, about the crowd not paying attention, and about our sound system, which I provide."
"That's it?" I said. "I promise not to do any of that and just be happy to be there and be part of it."
We shook hands on it then and I asked if I could include a few of my neighborhood poetry buddies who felt the same way as me. When poetry and music began back then, we started with me, Demetrius Daniels, Fred Arcoleo, Robin Glasser either reading her adult Dr. Seuss or Geisha stories.
Over the years we've continued to add many more talented performers including Carlo Baldi, Dubblex, Ruben Gonzales, Peggy Ann Tartt, Greta Herron, Carla Lynne Hall, and Amy Soucy who usually performs back up for Fred and who occasionally graces us with one of her own numbers. This year Ruben didn't show and neither did Amy, but the rest of us came and performed our little or big tushies off. This year another newbie came, Roger E Ranski, and Ranski worked it out.
Demetrius took a minute to back me and I was like, damn what's up here but later he said he guessed he became like Dubblex, afraid to intrude. I'm like, "Please don't wait for invitations in the future!" I really swooned the last number, Stormy Weather and our small but enthusiastic audience threw in, swooning right along with me. Thanks to Demetrius for his tromboetry, Dubblex for his soulful melodica and Roger E Ranski for his improv guitar.
A shout out to Donna Deming, our illustrious and charming host who replaces our beloved Liz Popiel, who nurtured this event for many years. A shout out to all the participating artists who come every year.
A special shout out too to Carolyn Stanford for her tireless work in supporting and promoting art created by incarcerated non-violent offenders through her organization, "Inside Out Art".
I am looking forward to June 30th to Poetry & Music In The Garden. Please come and enjoy and BYOB!~
Hopefully this will help to banish those blue days that don't want to go away ~
This is the line up so far:
Joy Leftow
Carol Lynn Hall
Peggy Ann Tartt
Greta Herron
Demetrius Daniels
Dubblex
Roger E Ranski
Carlo Baldi
Arthur Sherry
Mario Coppola
Curtis Becraft of Curtis and The Dilettantes fame.
More info to follow ...
Today is about shout outs for me, shouting out to all those people around me who enrich my life by being part of it.
Yesterday was the Annual Ring Garden Art Show, Art In The Garden 2012, and as usual, I was listed on the menu. I use the word 'usual' because back in 2006, when I first proposed to Liz Popiel who organized the event that I read poetry at her upcoming event, Liz politely said, "Well, I kind'a made up my mind after the last poet who performed, not to include poets."
"What happened then?"I asked.
"He caused me no end of grief about the noise, about the crowd not paying attention, and about our sound system, which I provide."
"That's it?" I said. "I promise not to do any of that and just be happy to be there and be part of it."
We shook hands on it then and I asked if I could include a few of my neighborhood poetry buddies who felt the same way as me. When poetry and music began back then, we started with me, Demetrius Daniels, Fred Arcoleo, Robin Glasser either reading her adult Dr. Seuss or Geisha stories.
Over the years we've continued to add many more talented performers including Carlo Baldi, Dubblex, Ruben Gonzales, Peggy Ann Tartt, Greta Herron, Carla Lynne Hall, and Amy Soucy who usually performs back up for Fred and who occasionally graces us with one of her own numbers. This year Ruben didn't show and neither did Amy, but the rest of us came and performed our little or big tushies off. This year another newbie came, Roger E Ranski, and Ranski worked it out.
Demetrius took a minute to back me and I was like, damn what's up here but later he said he guessed he became like Dubblex, afraid to intrude. I'm like, "Please don't wait for invitations in the future!" I really swooned the last number, Stormy Weather and our small but enthusiastic audience threw in, swooning right along with me. Thanks to Demetrius for his tromboetry, Dubblex for his soulful melodica and Roger E Ranski for his improv guitar.
A shout out to Donna Deming, our illustrious and charming host who replaces our beloved Liz Popiel, who nurtured this event for many years. A shout out to all the participating artists who come every year.
A special shout out too to Carolyn Stanford for her tireless work in supporting and promoting art created by incarcerated non-violent offenders through her organization, "Inside Out Art".
I am looking forward to June 30th to Poetry & Music In The Garden. Please come and enjoy and BYOB!~
Hopefully this will help to banish those blue days that don't want to go away ~
This is the line up so far:
Joy Leftow
Carol Lynn Hall
Peggy Ann Tartt
Greta Herron
Demetrius Daniels
Dubblex
Roger E Ranski
Carlo Baldi
Arthur Sherry
Mario Coppola
Curtis Becraft of Curtis and The Dilettantes fame.
More info to follow ...
May 26, 2012
New drawing
A drawing I did yesterday of someone I had just met from a very old friend of mine. It took a few minutes and I didn't have a good pencil.
May 9, 2012
No Easy Answers
I live my life in service as if curing the ills of others
will make my maladies go away.
I define myself by the self I give away
defined by people who say what I do but don’t see who I am
Help others define their existence helps me define myself
Help others learn to do is what I always do or try to do I
try to do it each time around but can’t succeed each and every time even if you
want to
so take the edge off, smoke some ganja
It’s all about love, that’s what they say; it takes a village
it takes a revolution if we all think together about what life means
Money counts but love counts more and how long does love
last when there’s no money no money no money no money
No no, no money
I didn’t do it for that money I did for feeling satisfaction
that money can’t buy you love it doesn’t matter how hard you try money can’t
buy love
I did it because that’s what social workers do is help
others grow
I was a social worker before I earned my Columbia degree.
Born with the ability to see
Astrologers, tarot readers, doctors therapists teachers all
agree I’m a mitzvah to humanity designed to suffer they all agree what can I do
do do….
Lessons follow me from Sabbath to day’s glow
I watch the surface of society grow designed for consumerism
it’s not a joke.
Today bill collectors froze his bank account took two
thousand. It’s no joke. Looking at loophole is what bill collectors do
Money went from checking to savings they found their
loophole to steal from disabled and pensioners.
Lawyers hired by bill collectors take everything we own – just doing
their job to take away from the 99 percent. No bail out for the needy! – Only
bankers and mercenaries are in charge of our society and bailouts are for them.
I want my bailout and I want it now. I want my debts
forgiven. I paid mine to society a long time ago and intend to keep paying so
please please give me my bailout – I can’t survive these streets with the
pennies you throw me.
And while I’m at it, please… please … no more wars…
What if everyone lived an altruistic dream
like parents loving their children unconditionally
The rich giving to the poor and paying their taxes
Let’s build a better society right here right now right on
Let’s build peace on earth forever more
We don’t want war we want peace right now right on
Peace on a earth – right here not delayed heaven doesn’t
exist
Let’s get it together and think of each other peace peace
peace
My brother and sister after the revolution there’ll be peace
on earth
Amen
Shalom
As-Salam Alaikum
Peace out
Peace Peace
Peace
will make my maladies go away.
I define myself by the self I give away
defined by people who say what I do but don’t see who I am
Help others define their existence helps me define myself
Help others learn to do is what I always do or try to do I
try to do it each time around but can’t succeed each and every time even if you
want to
so take the edge off, smoke some ganja
It’s all about love, that’s what they say; it takes a village
it takes a revolution if we all think together about what life means
Money counts but love counts more and how long does love
last when there’s no money no money no money no money
No no, no money
I didn’t do it for that money I did for feeling satisfaction
that money can’t buy you love it doesn’t matter how hard you try money can’t
buy love
I did it because that’s what social workers do is help
others grow
I was a social worker before I earned my Columbia degree.
Born with the ability to see
Astrologers, tarot readers, doctors therapists teachers all
agree I’m a mitzvah to humanity designed to suffer they all agree what can I do
do do….
Lessons follow me from Sabbath to day’s glow
I watch the surface of society grow designed for consumerism
it’s not a joke.
Today bill collectors froze his bank account took two
thousand. It’s no joke. Looking at loophole is what bill collectors do
Money went from checking to savings they found their
loophole to steal from disabled and pensioners.
Lawyers hired by bill collectors take everything we own – just doing
their job to take away from the 99 percent. No bail out for the needy! – Only
bankers and mercenaries are in charge of our society and bailouts are for them.
I want my bailout and I want it now. I want my debts
forgiven. I paid mine to society a long time ago and intend to keep paying so
please please give me my bailout – I can’t survive these streets with the
pennies you throw me.
And while I’m at it, please… please … no more wars…
What if everyone lived an altruistic dream
like parents loving their children unconditionally
The rich giving to the poor and paying their taxes
Let’s build a better society right here right now right on
Let’s build peace on earth forever more
We don’t want war we want peace right now right on
Peace on a earth – right here not delayed heaven doesn’t
exist
Let’s get it together and think of each other peace peace
peace
My brother and sister after the revolution there’ll be peace
on earth
Amen
Shalom
As-Salam Alaikum
Peace out
Peace Peace
Peace
April 24, 2012
Want a little piece of mind
At the crossroads between dejection boulevard and desolation
road
I try to leave the dead behind I’m so
Tired of dealing with unkind references
to myself and others
I’m tired of making lemonade with so many lemons
I want to leave the bad behind, keep an open mind
I want a little piece of mind so I can leave behind
Everyone unkind, stop being confined by the tales
they
unwind
People can’t see, no one’s clever; hope survives
forever
blind
I live in a world where everyone is kind
Our great nation is at the mercy of another oppression
a
rising recession
a looming depression of immense proportions
like we’ve only
seen once before.
I paddle faster trying to stay afloat – and stay positive. I
keep trying to figure out the solution to the pollution the question of destruction
to humans and animals. Keep searching for direction in all this confusion,
hoping for evolution a revolution a new solution for all great nations.
In a rhapsody of blue dreams undefined
blowing in the wind
The planets aligned provide piece of mind
I want a little peace of mind to keep hope alive
Like fresh brewed java in the morning served
with a little
steamed cream
Sunlight steams though my window blinds
giving memy piece
of mind.
April 18, 2012
Super Hippie Vegie Girl
Super vegie hippie girl wearing a thin blue Indian gauze skirt and misty blue lacey t-shirt standing on her head in the corner talking about how her organs are finally getting some rest. That girl was crazy and beautiful in her own way.
Awareness and loneliness seeping through to the bottom of her shoes so she could look up and you’d recognize her pain and see yourself in the darkness emerging out of a festering wound finally brought to sunlight. You’d place your hurt alongside hers and you’d know someone in the world really understood.
She was like that. New agers called her a good old soul, kind hearted to a fault. I once watched her give away a handcrafted velvet one-of-a-kind hat that even now, forty years later, she still can’t find one similar. A wiz on the Internet and helping friends get government benefits, she failed miserably in matters of the heart, placing her faith in one ungrateful miscreant after another.
She wore a smile on her face that made her seem beautiful. She wasn’t really beautiful but her inner beauty shined though her smile. She smiled at everything and everyone when she wasn’t busy crying.
Crazy hippie vegie girl took everything to heart.
If you looked at her cross or had a mean tone she’d analyze the words you said for days on end crying about her loss.
When she speaks about her about her childhood she cries with a passion that will never end. She cries when men on helicopters shoot down on helpless wolves and wild horses with high-powered rifles and when she learned about canned hunts and how they kill penguins and seals just born, she said she couldn’t understand why anyone would kill just to kill and why are there wars by the way.
If you get her temper up she’ll never stop talking and she could probably win a war with her mouth if anyone would listen.
Her tears fell easily over a few unkind remarks or mistreatment. I don’t understand how someone can be so sensitive. Her therapist told her it was because she was stuck at the age of an infant and lacked impulse control like infants do. Generously she gave away things she’d barely used behind her husbands back, gave them away like pieces of herself floating away.
Crazy hippie girl listening to Bob Marley before he was famous, hooking her cheap stereo to her cheap microphone while she dusted her old broken furniture and mopped her scratched and damaged wooden floor, singing "No Women No Cry."
It makes me wonder if some are born to be tortured to hear the same words set to fifty different songs with so many suppositions and fears, and by the way why are there wars?
Awareness and loneliness seeping through to the bottom of her shoes so she could look up and you’d recognize her pain and see yourself in the darkness emerging out of a festering wound finally brought to sunlight. You’d place your hurt alongside hers and you’d know someone in the world really understood.
She was like that. New agers called her a good old soul, kind hearted to a fault. I once watched her give away a handcrafted velvet one-of-a-kind hat that even now, forty years later, she still can’t find one similar. A wiz on the Internet and helping friends get government benefits, she failed miserably in matters of the heart, placing her faith in one ungrateful miscreant after another.
She wore a smile on her face that made her seem beautiful. She wasn’t really beautiful but her inner beauty shined though her smile. She smiled at everything and everyone when she wasn’t busy crying.
Crazy hippie vegie girl took everything to heart.
If you looked at her cross or had a mean tone she’d analyze the words you said for days on end crying about her loss.
When she speaks about her about her childhood she cries with a passion that will never end. She cries when men on helicopters shoot down on helpless wolves and wild horses with high-powered rifles and when she learned about canned hunts and how they kill penguins and seals just born, she said she couldn’t understand why anyone would kill just to kill and why are there wars by the way.
If you get her temper up she’ll never stop talking and she could probably win a war with her mouth if anyone would listen.
Her tears fell easily over a few unkind remarks or mistreatment. I don’t understand how someone can be so sensitive. Her therapist told her it was because she was stuck at the age of an infant and lacked impulse control like infants do. Generously she gave away things she’d barely used behind her husbands back, gave them away like pieces of herself floating away.
Crazy hippie girl listening to Bob Marley before he was famous, hooking her cheap stereo to her cheap microphone while she dusted her old broken furniture and mopped her scratched and damaged wooden floor, singing "No Women No Cry."
It makes me wonder if some are born to be tortured to hear the same words set to fifty different songs with so many suppositions and fears, and by the way why are there wars?
April 14, 2012
Floating in and out of words
Transcending time never out of words Out of mind words carry me to and fro
between different uni-verses I growWords correspond words transport me to another place words fall, likitty –split,from my lips heating your ears like whipswords channel though me Tick Tock - time stalks mePendulum swings from thought to thoughtClock chimes consider moments bought and unused,
borrowed and blueWords force me through closed doorsUnknown scary places words chase me plague meFollow me taunt me
chastise me For dear life I hold on to words Words ...Searching through lost words
discovering new words to turn over and lose An entire day spent turning words aroundsearching for misplaced words find my soul in words Words play over and over in my mindWords keep me prisoner for days in a rowWords mime me chide me imbibe me find me Impossible to hide from words no matter where I goWords reside in my brain jumping cell to cellAnalyzing and attributing meanings to wordsWords play no way to escapewords are here to stay Words locked in and outside my brainClosing the gate after words escape once spoken can never be taken back Words build escalate exacerbateWords build hierarchy policy describe trap and abusewords cause wars to be fought words create space and places People forgetting their place return to a private base words trap me enslave me cause wounds to openNever out of words in the woods because of wordsHonest words offend old wounds mend Words start race riots expose the caste system alive here just like IndiaWords create reality Words keep me alive no time to rest till death inhales my words rest on paper like smoke crumbling in time how long do you suppose my words will survive suspended on internet sites in people memory ram words live on internetWords are the beginning the end and beginningAnd the word is …
March 17, 2012
Set me free Set me free
To be the best me I can beSet me free set me free I want to be me like you are youI want to follow in your footsteps jet around the planet make stops in every nation Perform and leave my words like seedsTo flourish into flowers before the final frostWords grow along with a world that everyday is more crazyPower and money go to those few lucky So set me free set me free let me be meThe same way you are who you want to be Let me be who I want to be An overnight sensation performing in ParisAll that money and power right beside you Will I go crazyWill I still stand up and preach loud and clear about the rights of the peopleOr will I forget them if I get the big bucks?Will I forget this poor besieged planet Forget all that I stand forif I become free and am the best me I can beIf I get the payoff and am one of the one percent will I become one of them?That's why it's easy to choose you over me.Set me free set me freeLeft out of everything frowned upon and looked down uponThey made fun of my name.Looking me in the face, they'd cruelly say, again and again,like it was some kind of fun game to make fun of my name"Leftout, right? That's your name?" sniggering with delightThey were justified being better than me I didn't fight back.Yesterday's dreams and memories follow meLetting go is never easy Set me free set me freeCould I become one of you if I had power money and will the way you do?Set me free set me freeBreak on through to the other side in my fantasy Amy's absence screams inside and I reach to pull her out of memy eyes sting - tears follow the tracks for who she could be – soul sisterSet me free set me freeAnd makes me wonder who I would be if I had half the chanceI want to be me set me free set me free let me be me
