Blind poet and grammarian ABOUT AND BY THE AUTHOR When I finished with high school, the Depression was there; <BR> Employment was ailing and gasping for air,<BR> So, college was out, cardboard innersoles in,<BR> Jogging unheard of, and everyone thin.<BR> So, when ego was finally trampled to dust,<BR> I took any old job. One does what one must. <BR> As a second-maid then, unwilling but able,<BR> I learned how to set a magnificent table,<BR> With roses and candles and finger-bowls, too.<BR> Oh, well, I can laugh and, believe me, I do!<BR> Now let’s jump ahead to dictation and phones,<BR> To dating and dancing, house-hunting and loans – <BR> To a time when the pill was still bucking bad weather,<BR> And our children, all five, arrived too close together.<BR> With no time on my hands and no coins in my purse,<BR> I taught myself how to write lyrical verse.<BR> By the time I was publishing, safe in my stride,<BR> Traditional poetry sickened and died. <BR> I had thirty-one years with the love of my youth,<BR> Now I wasn’t yet seedy nor long in the tooth.<BR> With my kids out of school, it was my turn at last.<BR> I took courses in Cleveland and Athens and passed!<BR> With lyrical poetry dead in its grave,<BR> I then turned to art and the solace it gave, <BR> And when I got good, when I started to sell,<BR> My eyesight betrayed me. Oh, dammit to hell!<BR> And so I crocheted, and my work covered acres.<BR> I gave afghans away ’til I ran out of takers.<BR> Now talking books cheer me; I won’t go ’round the bend.<BR> I can read with my ears and still laugh with a friend. <P> © Eliana Liatti Beam <P> Read full biography of Eliana Liatti Beam at <A HREF="http://www.elianabeam.com/about.htm">http://www.elianabeam.com/about.htm</A>