As much as I love my books, I’ve learned to share over the years and this seemed extremely important.   I boxed up a huge box of books that included my college freshman Children’s Literature anthology (that was 30 years old) and my Bat Mitzvah prayer book (which was even older).  Books are one of my great loves, so there were many books that had been on my shelves for many years. 

It was important I told myself and left for the Post Office, almost leaving when they asked me to fill out a huge amount of paperwork for custom’s reasons.  Never heard anything, assumed my good deed was in a black hole somewhere at the bottom of the Atlantic.

While casually searching Google the other night for the three blogs I’ve created, to see what is being sent out to the universe (by me), I came upon this website in Poland which had my name attached.  Being unbelievably curious and not knowing Polish, I used Google translator.   

Copy, paste, click, read.    Copy, paste, click, read.  I had no idea what happened to my book box until now.  On Google.com it says ”darczyncy” and my name.  The Rabbi Remuh Jewish Library was established in June 2005 and it is the only Jewish Library in Cracow open to everyone. 

I am listed as a donor.  OMG was all I could pray through all the tears.  What makes this so special is my Dad Berek Nathan was born in Warsaw.  His entire family – brothers, sisters, parents, aunts, uncles died in the Holocaust.   He was the only living survivor.  Saving himself by running to the forest while the Nazis were kicking his brother to death in the streets of Poland.  He was 15.  Berek Nathan died August 2005 at age 87.  A Painter’s Daughter is listed amongst these poems as a small tribute to him.  He was my Hero.  At least some of his books are back in Poland at a Jewish Library where they always belonged.

 All rights reserved.  ©2009 by Sara Fryd  

The last moments of a sunset and the passing of an early September storm create a rare double rainbow over Balanced Rock in Arches National Park, Sept. 4, 2005

My wisdom comes in short bursts

Of learning out loud

And in silent contemplation.

A sprinter I am

A marathon runner not so much.

Learned to hear with my heart

To feel with my navel

To listen with my eyes

To let my soul nourish me.

My very own soul

With its own character is enough

When others are unavailable

Are involved in their own lives.

I learned to demand less

To request more

Of myself, not of them.

Learned a little blue Agave syrup

Goes a long way to sweeten the pot

That has always been sweet

If only I had noticed along the way

Those rainbows will always have colors

That I can devour for breakfast.

All rights reserved.  ©2010 by Sara Fryd

I could mix the colors of heaven,

            of mountains; of Arizona in the spring.

Each morning in darkness before the molten Phoenix sun

            would crest the parched desert,

Papa would sneak out the door

            quiet as a whisper

            to paint this house or that castle.

Peeking…

            With one eye around the blinds covering the window

I heard more than I saw.

Sounds my Papa made loading his royal blue

            1948 Ford pick-up [truck] with ladders and brushes,

            turpentine, putty, tarps and cans.

Oh, those magical cans of paint

            that could change the heart of a room

            from sullen to sunlight

            from dreary to delicious.

Some knights ride into a little girl’s heart

            on horseback or steed

            large, tall, strong with white mane flowing.

My knight drove a short, wide blue ‘48 pick-up

            with a three-speed stick shift on the column

            and white wall tires;

            pulling a bed filled with cans of colors streaming

for all the rainbows that surprised us after a desert storm.

For all the saguaros, yuccas, Joshua trees in need of renewal.

Mostly though…

            for one little girl

            who wanted her room the blue of the sky

            after angels washed it with an August storm.

When you are veterans of a Holocaust, have been homeless for most of your teenage years and twenties stuff and money matter most.  They matter more than shelter or food, because stuff can be traded for food and money buys food.  My childhood home was one where money, material items (stuff), and food mattered.  Often we believed they mattered more than we did.  They argued about everything; even the plastic covered couch and who had the right to sit on it. 

I spent most of my childhood learning how to become a “success.”  I have a very different idea of what that means to me now than what it did then.  From my teens on, I spent most of my time trying to succeed at becoming financially and materially successful according to the values of my parents, which meant education, nice car, good job, great house, money in the bank.  The American Dream personified. 

In 1992, there was a recession that hit Southern California harder than any earthquake I have lived through.  I lost everything of material value – my job, my house, and all my stuff.   Everything I had worked for my entire life, with very few options (or so I thought then), and very little money left.  California became a bad dream as I moved near my family in Phoenix, Arizona.  Probably should mention here that I married in 1967 to escape Phoenix and the family, so having to come back divorced and broke was a fate worse than prison or death (one and the same in my book).

One day, contemplating my financial failures with daily reminders from the family, I wandered into Van’s Rock Shop on 7^th Street in Phoenix for lack of a job or anything better to do with my time than write or listen to them.  I must have looked like death walking, wandering up and down the aisles of this block long store.  

A young female clerk came over and tapped me on the shoulder.  I thought she was going to ask me if I needed help.  When I turned she handed me a polished rock slice – pale tan with colored concentric rings of dark rust and orange (like a slice of an old cut tree).  I told her I didn’t have the money to pay for it (it was $1.98). 

This beautiful young woman with a sandy blond pony tail whispered, “It’s a present.  Remember it took millions of years of stress and pain to create something this beautiful.  It’s yours.”  I clamped my jaw shut, my eyes filled with tears ready to drop, and nodded “thank you” to keep from sobbing.  

I have a clear glass cookie jar on my desk filled with treasures.  My rock slice and orange rind rose are inside.  Remember it takes millions of years of stress and pain to create something this beautiful.  It’s free, it’s yours.  May I share them with you?

All rights reserved.  ©2009 by Sara Fryd

What if they found out that late at night at home on my Mac, I was writing love poems of loss and longing, hunger and sex.  In free verse that didn’t rhyme, no less.  Oh my God, the humiliation, the embarrassment, the giggles.  High school all over again.  I might even get fired.  Contract administrators, 46 year old mothers do not suddenly awake one day espousing free verse about feelings, wanting to do nothing else except write.  Whom was I kidding?  If I didn’t stop this falderal immediately, the poetry police would show up and lock down my Mac.  I definitely needed therapy or at least to leave Los Angeles.  And quickly.  Where was a Bekins truck when you need one?

Uncle Aron said Los Angeles was a terrible place to live.  There had to be a PA (Poets Anonymous) meeting somewhere in Los Angeles?  There were meetings for every addiction known to mankind with acronyms to match.  Where were the yellow pages when you needed them?

Josh was in his junior year of college with every belief he would write the next great screenplay.  He wouldn’t leave home.  Why should he?  I paid for his lifestyle and let him borrow the RX-7 when he had a date or totaled the car he was driving that month.  All his friends had a place to hang out during earthquakes.  And should a tsunami follow, the fridge was always full of food so all his buddies could camp at our house.  We lived five miles east of the Pacific Ocean, food was free, I did all the cooking, paid all the bills, and knocked on the door before entering his room.  If God hadn’t intervened I’d still be working eighteen hour days, living with him and whatever girlfriend wanted to come over and play during daylight hours when Mom was at work.  As usual I digress, sorry.  So many stories, so little time.

I would sit down after work, pull out my tiny spiral chamois notebook (that Mead went everywhere with me), along with my Uniball blue 10 pt fine pens I purchased by the box.  I’d be typing oblivious to time or hour, when I would feel him behind me reading over my right shoulder.  He would want me to read the poem aloud.  The came his first question, “How long did that take you?”  For him it was always pragmatic, about mathematics not feelings.  His mathematical brain working the next angle.  One day instead of the math comment out comes, “Mom, you do realize that Emily Dickinson died a virgin and a pauper?”

To which I retorted, “Well I have her beat on one count.  I’ve had sex once in my life.”  He left the room.  His dream of inheriting a trust fund wasn’t coming to fruition quickly enough. 

After writing from March to August 1991, I needed a large three-ring binder with alphabetic tabs.  One Sunday in August, Josh knowing my fear of speaking in front of crowds, drags me to Portofino’s – a college hang out near California State University, Long Beach.  Sunday nights they had the latest rock group perform with poetry readings during intermission.  Terrified does not properly convey my state of fear.  My son, the soon to be Academy Award winning playwright, who was majoring in “writing screenplays” at Steven Spielberg’s stomping ground, wanted me (his mother) to come read my poems to his friends.  Now I get his sneaky brain at work, I will be dead by Monday morning.  And he will inherit the house, the jazz CDs, and the RX7.  Not to worry.  Now he can have women over any time he wants, not just while I’m at work.

Off we go, me hugging the three-ring binder so tight there are nail marks in the vinyl, sitting in back listening to the band though only hearing my heartbeat.  There are roughly 99 people in attendance, 77 college females, a few males, band members, and staff.  I’m shaking.  Intermission arrives I’m the last poet to read and the only one over 20.  I read poem one, not bad a little clapping, didn’t throw up.  I read poem two, a little more noise from the girls (guess angst is appreciated amongst female intellectuals), I SNAP.  Guess the applause went to my head.  I turn the alphabet dividers to “O.”  I read Orgasms and Other Feelings.*  The room explodes and 77 college girls are on there feet cheering at the top of their lungs.  Noise that could be heard at the Marriott on Ocean Boulevard a couple of miles away. 

*Note to college boys/men – never ever give your Mother a hard time about anything.  Not if she can write or speak.  A time will come when she remembers.  

Orgasms & Other Feelings

We learned early on

Not to talk about “them…”                             

Orgasms…

          …and other feelings.                                     

So women grew up wondering

What one was

Feeling cheated

If they didn’t have multiple ones

As read about in Cosmo

We didn’t know much

Though we were sure

Men must be the culprits

And held them responsible. 

We traded in our mates

Our husbands

Exchanging partners

Looking for the “them”

Divorce became the right of passage

To adulthood.

Whose to blame?  Who knows?

If the truth be told

No one can teach you to be unafraid

You need to learn it…                                   

                 …for yourself

All rights reserved.  ©2009 by Sara Fryd

with waves of mulled citrus mist

warmed by your face watching mine

in the mirror from the hallway

as I lacquer on deep burgundy

candy apple lipstick

before the sun awakes early

April morning.

Memories of orange blossoms

permeating the night sky

on Route 66…

the beige top down on

the old black convertible with red leather seats

When I was eighteen and Steven French kissed me

behind Paradise Mountain

where the sheriff watched

with the gigantic flashlight

and I was told “good girls” never go

alone.

Underneath the auburn henna

graying hair peeks.

Longer jackets of fine silk smooth the hips

and lengthen the torso.

Longer skirts cover the knees.

And still…

I am overwhelmed by emotions

that smother my driving

North on the 605

with one whiff of warm mulled citrus

transferred from your face

to my sheerest pink silk blouse

during our dark, early morning embraces

that still make my knees week an hour later 

my heart pound.

Remembering again how it felt

to be wide-eyed, eighteen

and waiting for my prince.

          you know…

Some of them were true.

I’ve loved a lot of men

          you know…

Though none like I loved you.

Some loved me back

          some didn’t care.

One kissed my nose

          then touched my hair.

Questions asked…

          then left unanswered

Who came before? 

Were they romantic?

Why is it men have such needs to know?

Who came before?

Then how many?

What of your thoughts? 

Now here’s a penny…

I’m not a contest or a prize.

Only female…

          often unwise…

Why who I’ve been with should it matter?                                 

I’ve been alone more than together.

Please, stop questioning

          what I can not answer.

I’ll love you now until September.

For when the leaves begin to fall

I may not love you

          then

                at all…

All rights reserved.  ©2009 by Sara Fryd

San Francisco by Sara Fryd

A sign of the times

What sign is that, I ask myself?

That America is in trouble?

That our veterans have no place to live?

That a roof over one’s head is not a necessity

For a Marine?

Who fought for our security and more?  Who now

Sleeps on the ground next to his wheel chair.

Since he has no other place to sleep

Except the grass beneath his sleeping bag.

Roll up a $20 bill and gently place it in his palm

His fingers close around it.

His eyes remain closed, his breathing slows.

I turn my eyes to the cerulean sky recalling

I have no job, nor means of support…

Still…

I have $20, a roof over my head, food in my fridge

And there but for the grace of God… 

Go I…

All rights reserved.  ©2009 by Sara Fryd

held its breath

as two previous enemies

agreed to lay the past to rest

for once and always.

We who have grown up as

children of one war or another

prayed that this would be the

greatest miracle of all…

            a sign

            a beginning

            an omen.

 That maybe in our lifetime

            the world would know…

                      …Shalom!

And each of us who

so cherish this fragile planet

could continue

with the important job

of making this place

            more special

            than we found it.

*signing of the Peace Accord July 1993

My soul was touched at twilight,

     melting my five year old heart

     as first stars appeared on the horizon in winter.

Whispers…

Hold my heart’s attention

     like the saxophone notes

     that breeze past gracing walls

     as sounds drift up the stairs

      stirring my eyelashes

      as sleep envelops me. 

For I have known the thought of you since nine…

When Alan pulled my hair and made me cry.

Not felt feelings this intense since twelve

     when Michael kissed my mouth in darkness

     on my childhood porch;

As she was imminently awaiting me,

     the woman I could hardly wait to be.

I have heard the music of this melting voice,

     my blood has turned to maple syrup more than once.

Whispers…

So intense they’ve since become

     a warm caress of summer sun, ivory sand in late July. 

For I have loved and lost but not as this,

   knowing love and loss go hand in hand.

I still can hardly wait to feel your kiss…

This love of yours will surely be the one

    that lifts my spirits higher than the plains.

Gently held in trust above the clouds,

     time escaped though never lost in vain.

My arms are open wide to grasp the sun as if in reach…

     praying for your touch so warm at dawn

     as sleep surrounds my silent waiting heart.

Joy as this comes only once then may be gone.

For I have loved the thought of you since dawn…

  and I will love the thought of you till I am gone…

All rights reserved.  ©2009 by Sara Fryd