Monday, June 30, 2014

Idyll: The Meadow and the Muse
In strong sunlight green leaves shimmer
Underneath a sky of deepest, vibrant blue.
The meadow extends between two streams
That sparkle downhill towards a lake
Serving as genesis for a meandering river.

She glides along the copses
Examining myriads of flowers
In red, purple, orange and white,
Rainbowing at forest’s verge
Under hanging wisteria between boughs,
Inhaling the fragrances as dew dries.

From a distance I observe her
With my back resting against an oak.
She personifies elegance and sensuality
In slow motion.

As the sun ascends above the rolling hills
She will have come close enough to me
To hear the verses I have composed
As if words could express the loveliness
Of all that I glimpsed.

Arthur Turfa, 2014






Friday, June 27, 2014

Another significant song posted

     In the Autumn of 1975, I was driving down the San Diego Freeway in Orange County listening to an LA rock station. The DJ hyped this great new record; I thought it was hyped until I heard Bruce Springsteen' "Born to Run". Next payday I bought the record.Twenty-some years later my wife and I sat in the 14th row at Madison Square Garden listening to it again!
     "Thunder Road"- the lyrics can stand alone as poetry. They address the dilemma of what people can do when their options dwindle and they hesitate at taking the "one last chance to make it good somehow".  We all have been there, and not only when we are ten years or so out of high school.
    Enjoy!
     http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=


Saturday, June 21, 2014

This will be the first of an occasional posting of a song I really enjoy. Townshend's cover of the English Beat's "Save it For Later" makes me wish I learned more music (there is a poem about that on this blog).The cover is unlike the original. What impresses me is the rising intensity with a minimum of instrumentation. Since I could not compose music, if anyone out there has the opposite dilemma, please contact me and maybe we can collaborate!

The picture is from Townshend's book, "Who I Am". He writes extremely well. How many rock legends use the word "solipsism"> While he does not gloss over his shortcomings, he reflects on his creative inspirations, thereby avoiding writing about binge after binge after another binge.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSWdug1HiCg


Thursday, June 19, 2014

"Fifty Years On" has been selected for inclusion in Words on Fire of Vers Libre:

 https://plus.google.com/u/0/communities/100551969939319159386/stream/9e496bfe-d783-4e26-adae-989d95970d94  

   They have graciously picked me a few times, and I am with some excellent poets.

My poem is also on Soundcloud

 https://soundcloud.com/arthur-turfa-1/fifty-years-on

Wednesday, June 11, 2014

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Arthur-Turfa-Poems-of-Times-and-Places-Reflected/293732337470677?ref_type=bookmark

Please visit my Facebook writer page and like! Thanks!

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Check out my Soundcloud list! https://soundcloud.com/arthur-turfa-1/sets/arthur-turfa

N.B. The Western Pennsylvania accent lives on years after I moved away! But it has been softened!

Published again in Altpoetics!  http://altpoetics.wordpress.com/2014/05/31/two-poems-by-arthur-turfa/
31 May 2014  Thanks so much!

Thursday, June 5, 2014

http://altpoetics.wordpress.com/   Two of mine appear here! My second time being published here!

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Weekends at Woolworth’s

For $18.49 a week
I got to spend my Weekends at Woolworth’s:
Sundays not included because of the
Blue laws in and around Philadelphia.

Friday nights and all day on Saturday
To avoid a conflict with a school night
And ruin my grades, or so the folks said.
Actually I would have had the choices
Anyway of Penn State, Temple, or Nam.

Mr. Fox, the cool assistant manager,
Told us about his tour of duty there
As we waited for customers to come
And check out so they could beat the traffic.
Heading both ways along Germantown Pike.

Miss Fogg, her frosted blond wig attempting
To disguise her five decades on this earth
Handed out our pay envelopes with cash
And told us where we were supposed to work.

Fridays on the upper level, two men
Regularly bought lots of plastic flowers.
Saturdays spent on the lower level
Talking with Linda from the Ancilla
Domini Academy wondering
If Vatican II would help me date her
And learning men’s wear from suave Mr. Knox.

Friends would stop by sometimes or I would see
Them during my hour-long meal break as
I passed on the 10% lunch counter discount
To head to Sal’s Steaks and Wee Three Records
Who had much cooler albums anyway.

A few weeks after the Mall fire
Water damage closed the lower level
And the upper level became crowded,
A real shambles for the next couple months.

Fully expecting they would lay me off,
On Saturday night a petulant man
Fired me for the inability to remove
Slushy black scuff marks without use of solvent
From the speckled linoleum floor.

Trudging to my Dad’s station wagon as
The first one in the family to be fired,
In adolescent anger I told him.
Dad suggested that the manager
could go to hell; much relieved, I concurred.
Thus ended my last weekend at Woolworth’s.


"Priestdaddy" by Patricia Lockwood

         I know some authors who write memoirs. In my opinion, it's a tricky genre unless the author is gifted, because unless the reade...