Roger Wright – Chicago

“Just take a vacation. Simple. Right? The Hamptons. The Cape. The Ocean. It’s August. Just go!”

That’s what the TV talking head expert bleats out when he’s asked, “What should people do about the roiling stock market?”

And then the host, God bless you Judy Woodruff, tries again. She asks him, “But what about normal everyday people? What should they think about all this? What should they do?”

Again the expert says “Relax. Take a vacation.”

He blathers on another minute or so. And then Judy, seeing that subtle hints will not work with this blow hard, ends it with, “And of course we need to remember how many of our viewers can’t afford to take a vacation.”

August is now the month when the wealth gap sticks out on the national consciousness like a red, raw pus filled sore.

So for those who don’t have a vacation. Those too busy finding work to have a vacation. . . .

I remember this morning walking west on Grace to get the newspaper. It’s early. A summer morning just a bundle of golden promise.

There he is.

It’s him. Walking west with the sun. The Tin Man.

Haven’t seen him in awhile. He’s obviously worked all night, though I have no clue just what the work could be. He is dressed in a faded silver tux. As if the circus just left town and he missed the train.

This is 6:30 in the morning. He is the color of tin. Walking down Grace. Even his skin is the color of tin. The only other color, a green plastic bottle of 7-Up that swings along in his left hand. Everything else is a grey, weary tin.

His eyes a silent story of a hard, hard night.

No vacation for him. But of course he does have a song. Because we all do.

So as I pass his downcast eyes, I hear from either my head or his:

When a man’s an empty kettle he should be on his mettle,

And yet I’m torn apart.

Just because I’m presumin’ that I could be kind-a-human,

If I only had heart.

I’d be tender – I’d be gentle and awful sentimental

Regarding Love and Art.

I’d be friends with the sparrows …

and the boys who shoots the arrows

If I only had a heart.

Picture me – a balcony. Above a voice sings low.

Wherefore art thou, Romeo?

I hear a beat….

How sweet.

Just to register emotion, jealousy – devotion,

And really feel the part.

I could stay young and chipper

and I’d lock it with a zipper,

If I only had a heart.

The great Jack Haley, the Tin Woodsman from the Wizard of Oz. That’s who’s singing.The brilliant songsmith Harold Arlen. That’s who wrote the song.

I wonder if that song could maybe be like The Tin Man’s vacation?

And with that question, Arlen’s song connects to another song. As songs can do.

The story that came before this next song hits first.

She was a secretary banging out tunes in the Brill Building in New York City. He was studying to be a pharmacist. One of their songs, “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?” was sold. She wrote the music. He wrote the lyrics. And when news of the sale went down, they rented a limo to drive them off to some new life. Soon after that they wrote this next song.

This next song that offers a vacation.

For anyone.

For everyone.

Listen to the part where this next song says,

Right smack dab in the middle of town,

I found a paradise that’s trouble proof.

Listen to The Drifters sing Carole King’s song.

And enjoy your vacation.

Pay no attention to the man screaming into the hot August night wind on the gritty streets of Chicago’s Uptown neighborhood.

Can’t make out what he’s saying? Ignore that man. He’s crazy.

Pay attention to the fact that you are in an ancient Spanish castle.

It’s designed to put you inside an ancient Spanish castle. The Aragon Ballroom. First stop on President Obama’s 50th birthday fund raiser slash birthday tour.

Inside the Aragon Ballroom, where the President rolled up his sleeves and stoked the fires of the crowd last night, if you were to look up, you’d see the twinkling elegant stars in the elegant courtyard of a grand Spanish castle.

That grand Spanish castle was the vision of Andrew and William Karzas when they opened their Aragon Ballroom, in the shadow of the El Train, on Lawrence Avenue at Winthrop St. on a hot July night in 1926.

The Karzas Brothers knew exactly what they were doing. Their $2 million dollar palace was 4 stories high. Patterned Spanish style brickwork, terra cotta design for the exterior. Two stately promenades lined with opulent draperies and hung with oil paintings flanked the room and connected a Grand Salon on one end and three stages on the other. A maple dance floor built on a cushion of felt and cork accommodated 5,000. Access to the dance floor was on the plushest carpeting of the day. And the staircase sported statues of two giant plaster dragons to guard all who passed.

Building on the success of their south side Trianon Ballroom; the Aragon was more than a dance hall. It was a social statement; communicating that the earlier saloon-like dance halls that populated the rough and raw streets of Chicago, could now give way to a new standard in refinement. In short, Chicago was no longer a rough and wild frontier town. And truth told, it was, like the Trianon, a social statement colored by the fact that inside it’s walls, all were not welcome.

Architectural racism.

No one said that. No one could prove it. It can be argued. But it wasn’t. We can be subtle about our sins here Chicago.

While the south side clubs of Bronzeville were blending African American spirituals and blues into what would become jazz, led by the likes of King Oliver and his young friend Louis Armstrong; the more “refined tones” of popular white orchestras whose names have been lost in the mists of musical history would be the ones drifting out on to Lawrence Avenue from the stately Aragon Ballroom.

The orchestras of Freddy Martin, Wayne King and Dick Jurgens were Aragon regulars. And all had large followings at the time. Familiar names?

Nope.

This is the haunted ghost of a building where the President began last night’s celebration. Inside on the Karzas Brothers stage. While outside, right across from Uptown’s Peoples Church, that street man kept screaming. A silent scream. No one really heard him.

And the hot August night went on.

At its peak, the Aragon was bringing in 18,000 people a week. And that didn’t include all the concerts broadcast across the Midwest by radio station WGN.

Through the 1920’s, 30’s and 40’s, the management’s style of keeping true to that vision of “refinement” kept the crowds coming. Crowds of the “right” kind of people.

Floorwalkers stopped anyone who tried to jitterbug or any of the other wilder dances that grew popular through the years.

This was a time when all public dancing was considered by many to be evil. And the grand opulence of the Aragon helped change that view. The Aragon didn’t just have slower paced music. It had chaperones.

But time, and television, took its toll.

A 1955 fire started next door and did serious damage. And the era was over. William Karzas sold the building for less than it cost him to build.

For a brief stint, the next owners tried ice-skating. Then in 1966, the “Discothèque” craze shimmied in from New York and the Aragon became “The Cheetah Club.” After that died, there was a brief try at returning the Aragon to it’s former Big Band Glory. But that fizzled too.

Then came rock and roll. The Grateful Dead, Jethro Tull, The Allman Brothers and even blues legend BB King played the Aragon.

But as the economics of rock and roll changed, moving to stadiums, the boom rock and roll years gave way to the Aragon’s latest new life as a center of Hispanic entertainment. Current owners Viva Entertainment now open up the venue for corporate and private parties. And, on occasion, English speaking acts, including the legendary Bob Dylan, will appear at The Aragon.

And of course, now the President.

It’s become a familiar routine, the President coming home. Every few months. The throbbing train of black military helicopters taking off from O’Hare, skimming the treetops, barreling along above our house to Soldier Field on the lake. Then a caravan of black SUV’s. This time into our neighborhood. To the Aragon. Last time I was in there, I believe it was to see The Marshall Tucker Band. All of whom are probably in rock and roll retirement homes. I remember beer was involved.

But the silent screams of that street guy outside last night, they weren’t there. Back then he wasn’t screaming.

Which is why I kept listening to what he was screaming, as I stood outside with him on the sidewalk while the President had his party under the twinkling electric Spanish stars inside. I kept listening till I finally heard what he was screaming.

“Mr. President, the way to do what’s right is NOT to split the difference between good and evil.”

That’s what I heard the man scream. I had to listen carefully. Had to think about it. Because it sounds simple, but it’s not. So I listened harder. And I heard it again.

“Mr. President, the way to do what’s right is NOT to split the difference between good and evil.”

And after he screamed it one more time, I looked around to see if anyone else had heard. To see if anyone else understood.

But I found I did not know.

She’s my kid by choice.

She lost the baby.

So I wept

She’s my kid by choice

In some parallel universe.

Beyond right now.

Walks with her, so small, hoisted up on my shoulders

Summer vacations, golden moments, crying nights and dorky boyfriends

Till that one guy finally came around and I nodded yes.

She’s my kid by choice.

I said it. I told her.

If I ever had been blessed with a daughter

I would want her to be you.

Couldn’t tell you why. No clue.

I guess I get to know, because of her—

That you really can’t explain why your kid is your kid.

You should see her when she smiles.

If I ever had been blessed with a daughter

I would want her to be you.

Once I told her parents that.

And saw the danger signals flare up in their eyes.

Good for you, I thought.

That’s the way I would want everyone.

To look out for my kid.

So may the words do their best to be loving arms.

Show my burning wild desire to take away her pain

I send along the song. Just the song.

Because you should hear the way my kid can sing.

Hard times, come again no more.

Sang only for

My kid by choice

Of her I am so proud.

Last time I saw old President Obama? It was right around the fourth of July. I don’t remember the year. Get to be my age and, well I’m not sure if its that I don’t remember things like what year it was, or if I just don’t care. But I do remember it was hot. Baking hot summer. Now this was a long, long time after his years running things had passed. And no one could understand why he’d spend so much time in Chicago. Gets hot here. And it also gets pretty cold.

If I had me a house in Hawaii like he does? Not sure if I’d spend all my days here.

Aw who am I kiddin. Yes I would. Home is home.

For me? It’s the Lathrop Homes. Right here on the river. Right where I am telling you this story this very second.

Now I am old enough to remember when the river was a sewer. Old Man Emanuel. He’s been the Mayor now long as I can remember. He changed that. Now we got two places to go. We got the Lake, of course. And we got the river. And if you would have told me back then that kids would be swimming in the river, that there’d be fish you could eat from that river, that there’d be boats come slicing through that water like some sort of July 4th parade, if you would have told me that years ago? I would have called you crazy.

But here I am. Right out back of my place in Lathrop. Now Lathrop, that I knew about. That was not a surprise. Kind of a secret everybody knew. Place was called a housing project. Back when Riverview, the big amusement park used to be cooking and crawling with lights and crowds and a tunnel of love and a parachute drop and a million people every summer, back then, people mostly shied away from Lathrop, which was right next door to Riverview.

Lot of people didn’t know that the very same men who designed all the fancy places on Lake Shore Drive, designed Lathrop. That Jens Jensen, best damn landscape architect that ever lived, that he made sure anybody who lived here had a garden, had trees. Fact is that 18% of the land here is open space. So Lathrop was like a piece of gold that nobody polished for a long, long time.

But that changed. Now I live here and I love it.

Old President Obama, he looked like he loved coming through here too. Course he was surrounded by about a million grandkids. All of them helping with the wheel chair. Helping him roll in through the grass where I was sitting. Where we were all sitting. My neighbors. Me. Lovin the summer.

So the little Obama parade got him on that boat. I read that he really loved that boat. Nothing made him smile like being out on that boat going up and down the river.

I wasn’t always smiling during those eight years he was in charge. Didn’t like a whole lotta things he did. Didn’t like the company he kept. Didn’t like it when it seemed he’d never fight back.

I wasn’t workin then. After 20 years working, I could not get a job to save my life. Everybody I knew—it was the same for lots of us. And the folks who had jobs? Most times they were just whatever they could get. I think that’s why it took so long for things to get better. All these people doing things they just weren’t very good at. That’ll get to you after awhile.

But it changed. Eventually it changed. And things got better. Round that time I started to write. And I never stopped. Then finally after doing that for about 10,000 hours, someone started paying me for it.

And I been fine ever since.

Old Mr. Obama? I guess what he did, well, I guess what happened cause of him is that people started thinking differently about things.

People started thinking that the way to make things better for everybody wasn’t just to make some folks richer.

People started thinking that everybody really did have a right to be healthy.

That when some folks went hungry, we all went hungry.

That anybody should be able to marry anybody they wanted. That one sounds like the easiest. Most obvious. Not sure if I remember this right, but I think it even took Mr. Obama a while to figure that one out.

All in all though, he did good.

So I got to say it’s kind of an honor to sit here in my chair on the banks of this green and growing river and watch this parade.

Right now. As I write this. His family all around him, they are helping him on the boat. 3 or 4 of them going with. Just to make sure he’s OK as he goes floating down the river. I see he’s got a book in his hands. He’s still doing about 4 things at the same time. Reading, listening, talking, watching.

And they’re turning on some music for him to take down that river. Joe Williams. I’ll be damned. Looks like he remembered Joe Williams. Man does have taste. Nobody sang a song like Joe Williams. I read where “Here’s to Life” is one of ole President Obama’s favorites. Mine too.

I wish everybody could hear Joe Williams sing that song.

We’ll be hearing it right here on the banks of the Chicago River as the boat gets ready to sail. But it sure would be good if everybody could hear it.

Maybe if I write about it, everybody will.

Boats getting ready. Everybody’s waving. Lots a smiling. Lots of laughing. Happy 4th a July they’re singing out. Waving some more and look! Look at that!

Old President Obama. He looked right up here where I am sitting and he waved and he smiled right at me!

How about that!

Today. As a soft, grey rain swept clean the sleepy streets of Chicago’s early morning rhythm, the Poetry Foundation prepared for the housewarming party to its brand new home.

After almost a century of being a renter, Poetry Magazine, and the umbrella organization, The Poetry Foundation can now throw open the doors to it’s sweeping 22,000 square foot building, and say to the world, ‘We own our own home.’

Designed by Chicago architect John Ronan, the building does what poetry does, provides a place to think and speak and reflect on the world differently.

Of course, writing about Poetry is akin to dancing about architecture. There is an element of absurdity in even attempting such a thing. So one can first turn to facts. But then reciting facts about poetry can easily fade into the steady stream of background noise that populates so much of the inboxes of our souls. Like for example: The building houses a performance area, a 35,000 volume library and an exhibition gallery. Quick show of hands. How many read that last sentence and thought “So?”

Scores of words will be devoted to the money angle on this story. By last count, there were 32 poets across the world that actually had a lot of money. But the Poetry Foundation has a whole lot of money. Supplied by an heiress to the Eli Lilly drug fortune.

And finally, there’s the fact that there are a few famous poets. Garrison Keillor and Billy Collins will be here soon to headline the dedication ceremonies.

And all those facts are well and good. Fodder for the tired old arguments about all the ways that art and commerce should get along with each other.

But it’s when you leave the city rhythms and wander into the garden of Poetry’s new home that the real story starts to unfold. You’ve come early to the ceremony. Your search is for the voices that will not be giving speeches today. The spirits who have come back to see what we’ve done with the world they’ve left behind. You start listening. You listen harder then you ever imagined you could listen. And as the blurry images of poetry’s real history start to take shape on the benches in the garden that surrounds you, there is first a quiet woman pouring over some numbers on a piece of paper. Studying them intently. Harriet Monroe. Founded the magazine in 1912. Touching the tip of her pencil to her tongue. ‘If I get 100 people to dedicate $50 a year for the first 5 years . . .’ and she ends up getting 108 people.

That first issue—the one in the picture. Look at who was featured. Ezra Pound. He’s here today too. Sitting on his bench in the garden, marveling at the height of the buildings surrounding this oasis of calm and center of curiosity.

That man in the business suit, holding a small jar that he places on the bench beside him. Wallace Stevens. Poetry Magazine contributor and Vice President of Claims for Hartford Insurance. Both. And that a combination like that exists in one person is a marvel.

But the wild prairie fire soul clearing his throat on the bench behind you, Carl Sandberg, has no time for guys in suits, as he starts to sing out:

“Hog Butcher for the World,

Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,

Player with Railroads and the Nation’s Freight Handler;

Stormy, husky, brawling,

City of the Big Shoulders:

They tell me you are wicked and I believe them, for I

have seen your painted women under the gas lamps

luring the farm boys.

And they tell me you are crooked and I answer: Yes, it

is true I have seen the gunman kill and go free to

kill again.

And they tell me you are brutal and my reply is: On the

faces of women and children I have seen the marks

of wanton hunger.

And having answered so I turn once more to those who

sneer at this my city, and I give them back the sneer

and say to them:

Come and show me another city with lifted head singing

so proud to be alive and coarse and strong and cunning.

Flinging magnetic curses amid the toil of piling job on

job, here is a tall bold slugger set vivid against the

little soft cities . . . .”

Sandburg, interrupted then by the wild eyed Nelson Algren who had just wandered in late, looks up from the bench to his picture at the typewriter at the top of this page right here, shrugs, and cries out, “This is a home? Maybe now I can be loved in my home. Like when I said,

“The Pottawattomies were much too square.

They left nothing behind but their dirty river.

While we shall leave, for remembrance, one rusty iron heart.

The city’s rusty heart that hold’s both the hustler and the square.

Take them both and holds them there.

For keeps and a single day.

And as Algren roars, crying out for his home, I look around a filling in all the benches in the garden, I see a virtual parade of poetic giants: T.S. Eliot, Langston Hughes, James Merrill, Gwendolyn Brooks.

All of them having filled the pages of Poetry Magazine.

I pull a copy of the magazine out of my back-pack, just to have it in my hands. It arrives at my house each month. Always a surprise, because money does not arrive at my house every month. But the magazine does. And I devour that magazine like a meal wrapped in gratitude.

The garden is almost full now. I remember this from the poet Steven Orlen:

“Now everything is real;

There is a beginning and an ending.

The end is like a dream in which

You’ve found friends who understand.”

From inside the building, Poetry Magazine’s Chris Wiman, the Editor, and Don Share, the Senior Editor, wander out into the garden, at a distance their talk is animated. They’re laughing.

In that laughter, echoes of Wiman’s poem “Given a God More Playful,” one of my favorites.

The rain lets up as the spirits all come to attention. Sitting up straighter on their benches. Harriet Monroe gives a slight nod.

The poet Check Stetson once wrote “Poetry is a short memory overload, do it right and the imagery floods the senses.”

In the Poetry Garden in Chicago, surrounded by the spirits who built the soul of this building, every sense is alive, ready, waiting, challenging.

Curious.