The Space Between 50 and 20, by Gary Corseri

“These are my selves, whose fragrance fills these rooms . . . “

She leans into her needlework and sees
Assisi rising in the silken strands,
her body like a question mark, at ease,
as though she wove her answers with her hands.
Then, with a thought, she rises into flight,
leaving the air quivering behind her,
so one might guess that she were made of light,
dancing around a memory’s whisper.

She comes back nonchalant, with a bouquet
of nothing but a smile, and youthful blooms
she places in a vase—as if to say,
These are my selves, whose fragrance fills these rooms.
And then her slender fingers weave, and know
the years between us, gathered like the snow.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Gary Steven Corseri has taught in public schools and prisons in the U.S., and at US and Japanese universities. His prose and poems have appeared at Dissident Voice, L.A. (and Hollywood) Progressive, The New York Times, CounterPunch, The Village Voice, CommonDreams, Global Research and hundreds of other periodicals and websites worldwide. His dramas have been produced on Atlanta-PBS, and he has performed at the Carter Presidential Library and Museum. His books include the novels, “A Fine Excess” and “Holy Grail, Holy Grail.” He can be contacted at [email protected].

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39 Responses to The Space Between 50 and 20, by Gary Corseri

  1. 5 dancing shlomos says:

    a repost it’s so good:

    all along the headbangers’ wall
    rabbis tickled young weanies
    the little snippers came and went
    and organless servants too
    nearby with the diseased and deceiving
    a pussywitz did spit
    exalted black hats were approaching
    the dogs they began to howl
    no reason to get excited
    the thief he writes the laws
    there are many here among us
    who feel the west is but a joke
    you and i we know it’s true
    they openly talk falsely now
    but the hour is not too late
    one among the many stands brave
    syria fights for our fate.

    5 dancing shlomos has not been allowed to teach anywhere. his poems and prose have been deleted from the best of blogs. his dramas appear mainly in county jails. he plays the lead actor. his novels include whatever he can plagiarize. 5ds follows the birthright jew and dylan-einstein rules.

    • lobro says:

      judging by poem that neither einstein nor zimmerman would ever surpass, the jails house the best and most creative minds of the noahide nation.

      my kingdom (and 600 of my finest boys, 60 best girls and 6 favorite transvestites) for a bit of 5 ds’s karma! cries baron lord $$$ count rothschild.

      may this year of 2013 see the conversion of whining wall to a bunch of brick shithouses.

  2. 5 dancing shlomos says:

    forgot:
    dont contact 5ds. he is tracked by cyber snoops.

  3. Berenice says:

    Gary, brilliant poem. Brought tears to my eyes. But hey, what does the title mean…?

    • Gary Corseri says:

      Thank you for your comment, Berenice.

      The actual title of the poem is “The Space Between 50 and 20.” (I hope that will be corrected!)

      Imagine a man of 50 struck by the beauty, innocence of a young woman of 20. She is an artist who is trying to capture the ineffable in her work. His admiration is tempered by the space between them–the years he has lived and she has yet to live.

  4. Sardonicus says:

    Unfortunately, the revised (or original) title of this poem doesn’t make the subject matter of the poem any clearer. The title, “The Space Between 50 and 20″, is a title that is equally unclear as the title “Between 50 and 20″.

    However, let’s not quibble. It’s the poem that matters. Not the deliberately obscurantist title that will leave most readers baffled.

    • Xanadu says:

      A sad comment, Sardonicus, and unworthy of a man of your stellar intellect. Does the title of a consummate work of art need to have a meaning?

      I don’t think so.

      The first time I saw a book with the obscure title “Hamlet”, aged 9, I thought it was about a small ham. When I got to 10 and had improved my vocabulary, I thought it was about a small village. Finally, at the age of 11, I discovered to my chagrin that it was all about a mad guy from Denmark who kept bursting into boring soliloquies like “To be or not to be, that is the question.”

      An acute disapointment, I must say.

      • Gilbert Huntly says:

        But now you are older, and know better, Xanadu.

        I have to agree with Sardonicus. Fifty(50) and twenty(20) are the very same numbers for a nine year-old as for a ninety year-old. “Hamlet” can multiply in meaning.

      • hp says:

        To be or not to be?
        So, would Hamlet (Shakespeare) choose not to be?

        I’d have to laugh and say no he would not choose or strive or wish to become zero, a nonperson. Part of a void never having to suffer and know.

        If he did choose not to be, like the impersonalists, we would all be less “Whether ’tis nobler,”
        and all the rest..

        Nor can you have it both ways.

        • Xanadu says:

          Hmmm . . . I’m not so sure about that Homer. I read somewhere that the literal meaning of nibbana /nirvana is “extinguishedness”, the state of being snuffed out like a candle.

          Not all religious teachers would assert that nirvana meant “the bliss of pure consciousness”, or the loss of individual consciousness by merging in Cosmic Consciousness … often compared to the water drop becoming one with the Ocean.

          Some religious teachers would surely claim that the most desirable state to achieve is complete escape from the Wheel of Birth and that

          NIRVANA = ANNIHILATION/EXTINCTION/NON-BEING

          My knowledge of these matters is admittedly superficial. Apologies for rabbiting on. To think that Jean-Paul Sartre wrote a massive tome on this subject! (“Being and Non-Being”).

        • hp says:

          Not to detract from Gary’s poem which I kinda liked for its roundabout honesty. Not being a fan of poetry, like most things, I felt it as a bit pathetic and sad.

          Also I don’t mind at all if 6 turns out to be 9.

    • lobro says:

      mr. corseri, please fix up the title.

      it should be 50 year old guy with 20 years to go vs. 20 year old girl with 50 years to go

      • Sardonicus says:

        Hardly worth writing the poem, lobro, if he gave it all away in the title.

      • Sardonicus says:

        Apart from which, I strongly object to numbers (50/20) in titles. Especially in poems. This tends to reduce poetry to mathematics. It is an affront to the Muse.

        • lobro says:

          to state that one form of thought is reduced to another implies an objective ranking system, which furthermore implies a notion of distance as well as an absolute point of reference.

          thus, one may say that talmud is the absolute zero, mathematics is 22.4, poetry 133, gastronomy 185, cartoons 227 and so on and distance is calculated by subtracting the rankings, e.g., poetry – mathematics=110.6.
          (note that some basic arithmetic ability is required to use this system, whereas no poetic gift is necessary for its functioning).

          the question is on what grounds to metricize the system.

  5. Gilbert Huntly says:

    Come to think of it, titles are about the most difficult part of any piece! A poet is moved to write, rather than label. So is a novelist – but the work is so long it finally produces a title. Or so I’ve been told….

    Some years ago, it occurred to me that Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata was a keyboard simplicity – almost as easy as Chopsticks. The beauty is in the TOUCH. The beauty is further enhanced by learning of the composer’s love for his student – for whom he allegedly wrote the piece. Bring all of that together, and it is an extraordinarily gorgeous composition. Simple, with a simple title.

    • lobro says:

      gilbert, i couldn’t agree more emphaticaly on both counts, i.e., that choice of title may be harder than writing a poem itself (cannot speak from experience) and that moonlight sonata is fiendishly difficult to execute properly.
      there are many famous concert pianists that completely miss the point, in my opinion, despite their technical virtuosity.

      aside from the fact that the classical music spanning the period from rennaisance to romantic is a happy marriage of poetry and mathematics, if you were to say that beethoven piano sonatas represent the highest reach of human thought, again i would find nothing to disagree with.

      if someone quibbled at the omission of bach, schumann or schubert, i would likewise conceed them an arguable point.

      • Seymour Zak. says:

        You forgot to mention Mahler. Typical anti-Semite! You exclude the greatest composer who ever lived.

        • lobro says:

          he practically worshipped richard wagner.

          therefore, you admit that wagner was the greatest composer who ever lived and by extension that hitler was right.

          so how about telling us that roy lichtenstein was the greatest visual artist who ever lived and not someone like leonardo, bernini, caravaggio, michelangelo (or as you well know, my favorite, adolph hitler)?

      • hp says:

        Whenever I hear or think of Schubert, I feel a little jiggy, I admit.

  6. Gary Corseri says:

    My God! I never thought the title of this little sonnet would take up so much space–(between or otherwise!).

    Titles can be important as guideposts. They can also–intentionally or otherwise–mislead. (“Moby Dick” comes to mind. It’s not really the whale’s story–it’s about Ahab’s obsessions and Ishmael’s revelations. And not a few critics have said it’s about good vs evil, or man vs. the elements, or man vs. God [or Satan]).

    I like what Gilbert has written above: “The beauty is in the TOUCH.”

    And, I like what Emily Dickinson wrote: “Tell all the truth/ but tell it slant.”

    Literalism has its place… and one seeks precision in mathematics and the sciences… but, in the Arts, a bit of indirection may be the shortest route to understanding.

    For the dissenters, perhaps I should change the title to “?”?

    But… I think not. …

    • Brenda T says:

      Pay no attention to Sardonicus. His name is enough to reveal his true intent. I mistrust him as a man as well as a critic. Lobro’s comments are also decidedly strange. He is a man whose opinions must be regarded with utmost suspicion. As for hp and Gilbert Huntley, the less said about these trolls the better. This is an odd site. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn it is run from Tel Aviv.

      • lobro says:

        to be on the safe side, best remain with brenda-T and zak (whom T clearly T-rusts implicitly by never mentionig him as a potential T-roll).

        i am crestfallen, indeed devastated, it is a total trollocaust.

        i wanna be like zak, not like these shady criminals, sardonicus and huntly.
        how can i escape from tel aviv, no country wants me, what a bunch of antisemites.
        zak, will you vouch for me, i cannot bear to be outside brendat’s circle of friends?

        • lobro says:

          forgot to mention hp, i suspect he is a double agent anyway.
          in fact, not double but multiple, in symmetric sense, happy to backstab everyone, incuding lord rama that he pretends so transparently to respect.

          well, brenda-t, stay safe tonight, tie your diapers in a tight knot lest mossadists figure out how to work it to their advantage while you sleep the sleep of the righteous.

          • Ruth Bernstein says:

            Brenda T has posted here before. And on the Ugly Truth site. She’a a Jew passing herself off as a gentile. She’s also a frustrated lesbian who has hit on me several times in the past, but I have always rejected her advances. I have good reasons for my cold attitude, but these remain strictly personal.

          • hp says:

            Better to be killed by Rama than Ravanna.

          • lobro says:

            ruth,
            i am gratified that you haven’t called me a frustrated lesbian, but paradoxically, you are one of the few posters here in whose character i have complete confidence.

            yours truly malfunctioning antisemite

            ps. must take my jewdar in for overhaul …

          • hp says:

            lobro, there are errors in your calculations.

            Proving the fact of there is more in vino than veritus. There is also nonsense aplenty.

            One such glaring example being your curious concern for Lord Rama, Who to you is – ?

        • Ruth Bernstein says:

          ps. must take my jewdar in for overhaul …

          Be careful, I could be a crypto-gentile. How would you ever know? Maybe your jewdar is working.

          • lobro says:

            like any medical screening procedure, jewdar has 4 states: true-positive, false-positive, true-negative and false-negative.

            the trick is to maximize “trues” or equivalently, to minimize “falses”.

            the amateur antisemites are all too ready to accuse everyone of being a jew, thereby suffering from intolerable level of false-positive readings … whereas i am a pro :-) as your example proves.

            for example, it is easy to capture all jews in the dragnet by declaring everyone on earth (except the jewdar owner) to be a jew, but how useful is it, in fact the hasbarites make capital use of this mistake.

            btw, it doesn’t matter whether you are a crypto-goy (what is hebrew for “cow”?) or the mythical good jew, so long as jewdar declares you judenfrei (as opposed to judenfrau).

          • Ruth Bernstein says:

            Hmmm… I’m not so sure if I pass your jewdar test. If I’m a “crypto-goy”, don’t you think my name is well chosen? It’s enough to sneak me in under most people’s jewdar, nein? :)

            BTW, I threw in that “nein” to make me pass the “Germandar test”. Most people will now think I’m a German Jew. (With any luck).

          • lobro says:

            an ideal jewdar is the one that picks out jews but screens out the 0.0001% of good ones.

            your name is not just well chosen, but in fact chosen.

            however, my jewdar kicks you out because you fail to qualify as that 99.9999% of real jews.
            whether you a goy or one of the world’s 15 good jews is immaterial to ideal jewdar, so long as you don’t trip the “achtung! achtung! un jude underneath the lot” alarm.

      • lobro says:

        As for hp and Gilbert Huntley, the less said about these trolls the better. This is an odd site. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn it is run from Tel Aviv.

        say-no-mour, brenda-T … or do i hear echoes of an ex-poster, tragically missed karen-T?

    • hp says:

      Lord Vishnu also makes His appearance in Moby Dick.
      To me this alone wonderfully veries Melville’s trancendentalist touches.

      • Gilbert Huntly says:

        Oh boy! My first! I have never been called a “troll” before. I have ARRIVED! I didn’t even have to be impolite to do it. I am a talented troll, indeed!

        To go ahead and critique the poem (sans title), it is far better and more touching than at first. Once the title is understood, it rings so true. Women/girls are so much sweeter before they have been jaded. It is evident the poet thinks so, too. (When they get jaded, after forty or so, they begin to act like Brenda T.)

  7. hp says:

    I’m not even sure this is legal.
    Nonetheless, – My Belated Life’s Belation.

    Standing so slightly loosely warm,
    as the the July sky’s breath adorns her straw profile,
    lustrous copper brow,

    and touches her cheek, a trickle,
    a scent to grow and grow,
    embrace forever and a smile

    This Antonio!
    This Casio!!
    This Baudelaire!!!

    Ever more woe, it seems..

    As if life is a sport,
    of a better sort of illusion
    of a better sort.

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