Introduction
This is a collection of urban poems—or maybe poems of an urban mind. Someone called me an “accessible writer,” and that’s probably true. I want to take the reader with me on my journeys. Largely autobiographical and confessional, or founded on observation and reaction, most of my poems were written during 2001 and 2002, when I took a sabbatical from teaching so I could return to writing and art. It was the year that my city, as I knew it, came apart. The collection has been augmented in recent years on my blog, The Cerebral Jukebox.
I was born in New York City and have lived here all my life. I was
raised in Stuyvesant Town, a middle-class housing development on
the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Right after World War II, at a
time when there was a severe housing shortage, many veterans were
able to find affordable housing in this new, eighty-acre apartment
complex, built where aging tenements once stood. For better or
worse, these one hundred look-alike pink buildings molded me. The
uniformity was bland, yet comforting; I was one of many children
lucky enough to grow up in this midcity haven.
In the first grade, I began writing my own lyrics to television show
theme songs: Kukla, Fran and Ollie, The Howdy Doody Show,
Rootie Kazootie. I collected the prizes in cereal boxes and mailed
away for special offers touted on the backs of comic books. I always
wanted a piano but never got one, so I sang and accompanied myself
on my mother’s egg slicer. I watched Queen Elizabeth’s coronation
on a small black-and-white television screen—while suffering from
the worst stomach virus on earth.
My childhood spirit was fed by Orange Humorettes, fifteen-cent
pizza slices, greasy square knishes from Koburn’s Deli, and penny
candy. I played with yo-yos, tops, dolls, and hula hoops. My shelves
were filled with board games; Monopoly and Candy Land were
favorites. I occupied myself drawing chalk games on sidewalks. I
made skully caps from the bottle tops of Myer 1890 Ginger Ale or
Mott’s Prune Juice, filling the caps with melted Crayola Crayons.
My world was shaped by the Tompkins Square Branch of the New
York Public Library, subways (which were often elevated), Dick
Clark, pop music, and anything else in the collective memory of the
baby boomer age of innocence.
The Cerebral Jukebox is the player that reflects my memories on
gray-matter disks.
Mine never stops playing.
Susan Margulies Kalish
New York City
2010