Different Slants

Copyright–April 18, 2011 

To Jews and Those Who Want To Be—for just one day:

Happy Gefilte Fish

Happy Afikoman (however you spell that)

Happy Briskett

Happy Parsely…Sage, Rosemary…oops!

Happy Lamb Shank

Happy Strange Wine

Happy Matzoh

Happy Elijah…by now, really drunk

Happy Four Questions

May we be asking them

For Another

Three Thousand Years

Happy Escaping from those Crazy Egyptians

Happy Remember the Ragged Immigrants

Who brought Passover With Them

And Little Else

Hitler’s Dead!

We’re Still Here!

Hah!!!

Happy Passover

Gut Yontiff

Hag Sa-mey-ach

To

Everyone

Who Remembers

Son of Anne & Israel

Brother of Bonnie

Grandson of Rose & Jacob

Grandson of Celia & Nathan

Great-Grandson of Osher & Etta Kasha

Great-grandson of Fannie & Moshe

Great-Great-Grandson of Yeshia

All of them gone

I remain

I write the poems

Publishing News! 

Robert M. Katzman’s Amazing Story:  http://www.differentslants.com/?p=355

© March 2011   

 

There are

Moments in movies

Which is why

There are movies

That can crush your emotions

Like you are being

Slammed

Between

Love and Death

(Read on …)

Robert M. Katzman’s Amazing Story:  http://www.differentslants.com/?p=355

by Robert M. Katzman © February 25, 2011

Hot

Hot

Day

Poor Man

Living in a

Rich Man’s town

Cars stretched out

Like a

Highway to Hell

Gotta get home

I whip around the Mob

Sail around the shoulder

Running for that

Last Green Light

(Read on …)

November 2010 by Robert M. Katzman

Bathed
In
Radiation
At
Year One

I
Have
Been
Endlessly
Waiting

Waiting
For
Death

The cancer
Came to me
At
Eighteen

Changing
Everything

Work
Risk
Love
Plans

All
In the
Shadow
Of:

What Next?
And
When?

All
My
Grandparents
Died

One after another

And
I was
Relieved
They
Didn’t live to
See
Their Grandchild
Die

And
I waited

Waited
For
Death

I met  a girl

We fell in love

I married her

Will
We
Grow
old
Together?

My
Father
Died

I was
Relieved
I
Survived
Him

But
Also
Surprised

My
Mother
Died

I was
Relieved
I
Survived
Her

But
Also
Surprised

My
Sister
Died

Jesus Christ!!

April 2010 (revised 7/25/10

 

Yeah

They say you’ll be fine

They always say that

‘Fine’

 

But where are you, Andrew?

Where are you

Now?

 

We are waiting for you

Waiting for you…

Waiting for the Andrew

Each of us

Knows

 

You are so

Faceted

You know

So many people

Individually

There is no ‘collective’

Andrew

 

To me, you embody

One-on-one

You seem so

Unusually

Able

 

To focus on

Right now

And the

Person

Who

Is with you

In that

Moment

 

You will be fine?

What about all the rest

Of us?

 

There is no singularity in our waiting

 

We

Are many strangers

United

In hopeful

anticipation

 

Marcia,

Your wife

and now

Guardian

 

Your sisters

Your children

Your friends

 

We

Are all

Waiting for you

Andrew

 

We will be fine

Just fine

When you return

 

Come back to us

 

About the writer and his other life in Skokie, Illinois:

Bob Katzman’s Magazine Museum: 100,000 periodicals back to 1576!
Wall of Rock: 50 years of cool Rock periodicals on display & for sale
4906 Oakton St. (8000 north and 4900 west) Skokie, Ill 60077
(847)677-9444 Mon-Fri: 10 am to 5 pm / Weekends: 10 am to 2 pm

Katzman’s Publishing Company site: www.FightingWordsPubco.com
Katzman’s online non-fiction stories: www.DifferentSlants.com

Poetry? For me, writing poetry is not an option.
It’s a response to emotion. Like cigarette smoke,
it’s fast-flowing, shapeless and with little time to capture it.
Writing poetry in an imperative. I say what I feel compelled to say.

I sell my five published books via mail order and accept major credit cards.
I don’t use PayPal. I just talk to people on the phone.
Fast, reliable service. Read my stories and see what you think.
I’m also available for hire to read my true Chicago stories to organizations
and answer all questions. I autograph my books when I sell them.

I am currently seeking an agent to do more readings.
Feel free to call me at the number above.

 

 

 

 

 

Robert M. Katzman   September 9, 2009

A reflective note from Bob Katzman to loyal readers of my non-fiction story blog, www.DifferentSlants.com:

Yeah, I lie on my bed in the dark (carefully, on my back) wondering which Deity I offended and what it will take to appease him/her.  My world is smaller now and filled with silence.  That part, the last part, is not entirely bad.  This morning I’m going to write my long delayed Part 6 of the 7-part Grand Central Station Conversation story about 22 hours in NYC.  It will appear soon.

Remarkably, people still go to read the other previously posted chapters 1 thru 5 on my blog, though I’ve posted nothing for nearly two months. While the story is about melancholy and disorientation as my once familiar past disappears, it is very real and human.  It’s entitled: Cursed by a Tribeca Fortune Teller

Now, with the slow-motion closing of my 20-year old Morton Grove, Illinois back-issue periodical store, Magazine Memories, the loss of my past seems to be accelerating.

My store closed for good last Monday, after 4 weeks of terrible labor removing 3,000 boxes and tons of lumber.  Last Saturday, August 29^th, I fell suddenly from a ladder onto concrete and smashed my left side.  This morning, the hospital told me I fractured two ribs, besides other damage.

I am essentially ok, thanks to modern narcotics, but I have had my own little hell for the past week, or rather Hell 2.0.

So, I am trying to sort things out and figure out my future.

Part 6 of GCSC is a zig-zagging odyssey from the mid-town Jacob Javits Convention Center on the island’s West Side, through lower Manhattan in my quest to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge located near the Lower East Side, one more time.  Part 7 was written long ago because long stories need a strong ending, and when that part crystallized for me, I quickly wrote it down. It will be posted in a couple of weeks if my readers respond to my blog and conclude I’m not dead. Or not completely dead.

To pile on just a bit more to this bizarre moment of my physical, economic and mechanical life, my 1996 Dodge Caravan died in Buffalo Grove on Friday night. While I waited for rescue, a transformer on a power line blew up with a deafening bang, right in front on my eyes, and all the power to that area stopped. I guess I bring my shortage of luck with me, wherever I go.

As the sun went down, I waited and I shivered in my thin shirt. Fall came fast, this year.

When the truly eccentric AAA driver eventually showed up–two hours later!–we got to talking about our lives and when he dropped the car and me at my mechanic’s shop fifteen miles later, he refused my offering of a $5.00 tip, saying that my life was worse than his and he couldn’t take any money from me.  After hearing his sad story, this was an honor I could do without.

As he drove off in the dark, lights blinking, motor gunning, I stared at his red tail lights thinking to myself:

This, is why I don’t write fiction!  

About the writer and his other life in Skokie, Illinois:

Bob Katzman’s Magazine Museum: 100,000 periodicals back to 1576!
Wall of Rock: 50 years of cool Rock periodicals on display & for sale
4906 Oakton St. (8000 north and 4900 west) Skokie, Ill 60077
(847)677-9444 Mon-Fri: 10 am to 5 pm / Weekends: 10 am to 2 pm

Katzman’s Publishing Company site: www.FightingWordsPubco.com
Katzman’s online non-fiction stories: www.DifferentSlants.com

Poetry? For me, writing poetry is not an option.
It’s a response to emotion. Like cigarette smoke,
it’s fast-flowing, shapeless and with little time to capture it.
Writing poetry in an imperative. I say what I feel compelled to say.

I sell my five published books via mail order and accept major credit cards.
I don’t use PayPal. I just talk to people on the phone.
Fast, reliable service. Read my stories and see what you think.
I’m also available for hire to read my true Chicago stories to organizations
and answer all questions. I autograph my books when I sell them.

I am currently seeking an agent to do more readings.
Feel free to call me at the number above.