Portofino Gives Me Eyes

About the Book

A grouping of poems that precede the author’s time as a chaplain and reflect his late twenties, a time when outer beauty seemed real and reassuring. Memory in detail (someti mes great detail) off ered and offers consolations. The child in us says be happy, so the adult says I will try.

The word Portofino itself looks like a series of portholes, but it also hearkens back to the delfini (dolphins) who go there. It (Portofino) became a sanctuary as well as vacati on place for me. I was there at different times of year, finding much of what I felt I needed to find. I wasn’t planning on mentioning them but the Papardelle con Funghi, the Carpaccio, the Focaccia da Recco, all of these and other specialties were quite nourishing too!

About the Author

The hand of the poet is a ti me-travelling hand, creati ng symbols that cross boundaries but sti ll derive from their environment energy - Times Square, the Improv, the Red Parrot, Warren Robertson’s Theatre Workshop, The Delegate’s Lounge - and so it is appropriate that the poet’s photo-portrait may be 20 or 30 years old smiling at ti me. Across the street from where I live is the sign “Twenti eth Century Garage” catapulti ng me back in ti me to the century of my birth. Locati on: Lenox Hill Hospital. All the details of one’s life being sati sfactual, yet through re-arrangement poeti cally one comes up with a diff erent design.