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Another Spring
by
Harry Buschman
I figured if push came to shove I could always call in sick. God knows, I
used up my whole inventory of sure fire excuses -- viruses were all I had left.
I
could always blame a virus. I didn't care what they thought; I just wasn't
interested in spending a Sunday afternoon with Althea Dryden. It wasn't that I
had a special distaste for poets, or poetry for that matter, it's just that
.... well, in most cases I'd rather read poetry than listen to someone read it
to
me.
I knew why the library wanted me there; it's because I was a part-time
reporter for the Westlake Village Guardian. They were playing suck-up to the
paper.
Everybody's got their own agenda; everybody's in it for themselves. Although
when you consider the Guardian and its standing in the newspaper business,
you've got to wonder just how low poets will stoop to peddle their jingles.
Then, to put the icing on the cake, the Westlake Village Library had the
unmitigated gall to schedule the reading for a Sunday afternoon. Yes! The very
same Sunday afternoon the Jets were playing the Buffalo Bills! Althea Dryden,
indeed! Who the hell does she think she is? I can just see her in her low-heeled
shoes with her strawberry hair in a bun tapping the microphone with her
fingernail to make sure it's turned on. Probably carrying an emaciated volume of
verse with tabs of yellow paper sticking out to mark her place.
I remember seeing Dylan Thomas at the 92nd Street "Y," and that was
different. Dylan's manager finally dug him out of a bar downtown. He was an hour
late
and listing ten degrees to port. He stepped up to the podium, leaned upon it
heavily and smiled at us angelically. He hadn't brought his book with him, and
someone from backstage had to come out and give it to him. Then he dropped it.
He was in no condition to bend over and pick it up, so he turned again to us
and started .... the words .... the words, they were seared into his brain. He
poured the unseen words out into the stuffy air of the old auditorium and it
was like the opening of a door to the heart of Wales. His whiskey-tenor voice
turned mellow and deepened, the Welsh lilt of it turned those words into gold,
and all I read about him and failed to understand suddenly made sense. A great
poet and a drinker of extraordinary capacity.
I read Althea Dryden's "What Matter Storms," and it was no "Under Milk Wood."
Her poetry had no sense of time or place. She lived in the ether, and the
ether is an equal opportunity habitat; anyone can live there, but no one would
think of calling it home. She had no voice; "It is a place," she wrote, "....
where fragile dreams fray out in worthless naught." I ask you, would you want
to spend a fall afternoon in a place like that while the Jets are locked in
mortal combat with Buffalo?
So I called in to the paper and the phone rang three times .... once more and
I'd get the answering machine. In that case I'd hang up. But Stacey picked it
up on the pause between three and four; she had probably been in the middle
of a record-breaking bubble gum bubble and never heard the phone.
"Good afternoon, this is the Guardian, Assistant Editor Pomerance speaking;
how may I help you?" Lucas Crosby and I had spent long hours rehearsing Stacey,
and now, after a year, she had it down pat. I hand-lettered a sign with those
words in bold magic-marker and pasted it on the wall by her desk, she rarely
had to use it now.
"Hi, Stace, it's Edward R. Murrow, how y'doin?"
"Hi, Mr. "B" .... how come you ain't here?" She could ask questions that
would cross a Rabbi's eyes.
"I am ill with the flu, my dear .... sick unto death. I will not be able to
see you today or attend the poetry reading at the Library on Sunday. Would you
please pass that information along to Mr. Crosby?"
Lucas had been listening in as usual. "Flu, my ass!" he thundered, "I know
what you're up to .... what about that oath of goddam allegiance to the fourth
estate you're always mouthin' off about?"
"Oh, Lucas, fancy you eavesdropping on the phone. I have 103 degrees,
rectally speaking that is. I'm afraid Sunday's out of the question. You can't
imagine
how crushed I am; I had so wanted to hear Althea Dryden."
"Look partner," (I had 10 percent of him now) "It's important to Muriel,
see?" (Muriel, you may remember, is Lucas' bird-watching wife) "She's paid $500
to
get this yo-yo to read her crap at the library. If I don't run a review, my
ass'll be in a sling."
"Why don't you go, Lucas? It might be good for you."
"You outta your friggin mind! -- 'scuse me, Stace .... the Jets are playin
Buffalo! Look, partner, if you can't make it Sunday don't make it Monday ....
you know the rule."
"You can't fire me," I reminded him, "I'm your partner."
"I'll make you wish you wasn't," he shot back.
"I already wish I wasn't." It was not exactly a snappy comeback, so I added,
"Nice talking to you, Stacey; keep those bubbles coming."
Well, it was only Friday, I knew the flu would be gone by Sunday. "What am I
thinking of," I reminded myself, "I don't have the flu in the first place."
Such is the blind honesty of the press! Even when you lie to yourself you
believe it.
Sunday came and I still had no flu. For the hell of it I took my temperature
in the morning and I couldn't get the damn thing above 96.5. Didn't I once
read that draft dodgers used to hold banana skins in their armpits to drive
their
temperatures upwards? (How did they hide them from the doctor?) I had a
banana with Special K this morning so I fished the skin out of the trash and
tried
it .... 96.5.
Well, at least I could exhibit my rebellious nature by being late. That would
give me a small measure of satisfaction. I'd wait 'til half-time. Althea
might be almost done by then, and I'd sit through a jingle or two and make it
back
by the fourth quarter.
By half-time the Jets were down 14 points; the quarterback had been sacked
four times and finally carried off the field with a concussion. It looked bleak
for the boys in green. I was in a mood equally bleak as I pushed my way
noisily into the library meeting hall. Muriel Crosby was up on the stage
introducing
the most beautiful, heart-stopping, ash blonde poet I had ever seen. I was
her adoring slave from the moment I saw her. Could this possibly be Althea
Dryden? Where was the brown tweed suit, the stainless steel bifocals, and the
flat
heeled shoes? One look at her and the Jets/Buffalo game was erased from my
mind.
Althea was late too. Great! I hadn't missed anything. She wore a black vinyl
mini-skirt, and her ash blonde hair hung just below her shoulders. A tight
white blouse, low cut, was partially covered by a black vinyl jacket. Her spike
heels were fully four inches high and forced the calves of her legs to reveal a
slight musculature. She was not wearing a wedding ring. Never .... never had
I seen such a poet!
It seemed, as she read from her work, that our eyes caught and locked at key
moments, particularly in passages of purple poetic passion. In retrospect I
must admit that the reading was sparsely attended, (there were only six of us,
and I was the only male) so she had to look at me from time to time. Yet I will
staunchly maintain that a laser-like electrical bond flashed between us when,
in her throaty seductive voice she read:
"How well I know the feel
of your strong hands, grown gentle
as they steal across my breast."
I was putty in her hands when she read of "swollen turgidities" and
"sheathing my length with your chiseled hardness." Old valves and switches, long
rusted
shut, were suddenly flung wide open. Bats flew out and blind beetles
skittered about in panic. The word without the person was not much, and perhaps
the
person without the word was equally lacking -- but together they were dynamite.
I fingered her book, "What Matter Storms," as she read her poems to us. I
held it so she could see it in such a way as to reveal that I was a devoted
admirer of hers. She seemed to recognize its purple and lavender cover,
identical
to hers. I fervently hoped it would cement our relationship, or at least give
promise of one. As she read she seemed to gain in confidence and animation. I
thought I could detect a slight glow of perspiration on her upper lip, and did
I detect the spicy scent of an expensive perfume? Perhaps it was one of the
other ladies, but I preferred to think it was Althea.
Time flew and her final poem was finished all too soon. Its closing lines
were:
"Clasped tightly in your arms, my body fain
would sway with yours."
I could not have said it better myself! I rose to my feet and applauded
loudly and could barely restrain a two-fingered whistle. My enthusiasm, however,
was not matched by the five ladies who stared at me with disgust. Muriel asked
if any of us had any questions, and a rather nervous silence followed with some
of the ladies looking at each other and shaking their heads. I think Althea's
"burgeoning tumescence's" and "swollen turgidities" might have put the ladies
off their feed. Their husbands were at home overdosing on Cheese Doodles --
burgeoning and swelling as they watched the Jets/Buffalo game.
It was hard to say goodbye to Althea Dryden; fifty years ago it would have
been impossible. It was a restless night, and I tossed sleeplessly. She had been
kind enough to autograph my copy of "What Matter Storms," I turned on the
light and studied her flowing signature. It looked as though it had been an
exercise in creative calligraphy. I finally rose around four and took the cover
off
the old L.C. Smith to wrote my review for the Guardian. I look at it now in
print and wonder if I went too far in my praise. I was writing in response to
the woman, not her work.
It's been two weeks now, and the woman and the work are fading from my
memory, just as stars invariably fade with the coming of the dawn. But her words
remain. Without her to read them, however, they are as empty and idiotic as they
ever were .... maybe even more so.
Such was not the case with Dylan.
©Harry Buschman 1998
(1840)
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