READING POETRY AT RIVER POINT

        I volunteered to read poems to the residents of River Point, a new assisted living facility just a mile from our home. At one time I'd thought about bringing my mom from Santa Monica and situating her there, so I could visit her every day, not just talk to her on the phone. But that's not going to happen. My mom is living at Ocean House in Santa Monica, across the street from the beach, where she can feed the seagulls every day.

        So today when I arrived at River Point I went into a small activity room, with a lovely view of acres of wild green grass bordering the Guadalupe River, and spent time with two new residents: Louis, 96 years old, the same age my dad would be if he hadn't died two years ago, and a woman in wheel chair whose name I forget.

        Both had just moved in three weeks ago. They participate in any activities that get them out of their rooms. Louis was dressed all in blue. Until a few months ago he was still golfing, then suddenly his left leg got weak and he couldn't walk. He uses a wheel chair now and asked for a pillow, to sit on a regular chair. "Because you're bony, like me," I said which made him laugh.

        The heavy lady was on the phone, so I waited until she was done, and leafed through a magazine. I have trouble focusing my ears when there are other sounds going on around me.  Louis waited patiently. When the lady hung up she apologized, saying there had been "another death in the family."

        I told them I was a poet and read several of my students' poems. Then I read them "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, the poem commissioned for the base of the Statue of Liberty.  After I read it Olivia, the activity coordinator joined us and we had a discussion about ancestors.

        Louis' great grandparents came from Germany and settled in Texas several generations ago. He had many interesting stories to recount. Olivia added her own story – her father's family included a freed slave and a slew of red-haired Irish; her mother's family is Mexican and part Native American.

        Olivia had to run off to do something and so I told Louis and the lady in the wheel chair about how my parents met and married in 1941. Louis and his wife were married 70 years until her passing last year. 

        Olivia returned and took me into the "Memory Care" wing which is for patients with Alzheimer's and other forms of dementia. There was no small meeting room just a big open space with horrible acoustics.  She situated me in a chair and the residents gathered around me. One woman said she was a retired English teacher, so I said, "Sit by me!"

        One of the women had a caregiver. The rest seemed to be on their own. Some were in their own worlds, but others were able to focus on me. A man in a red sweater rolled his wheel chair up close, as he had a hard time hearing me. I had a hard time too. The workers were talking so loud, I had to practically shout to drown them out.

        I decided to read "The Spider and the Fly" because it's dramatic and I enjoy playing the parts of the spider and the fly. The retired English teacher knew many of the lines.

        Then I read my "Ode to My Stapler" and the fellow in the red sweater said, "I don't understand why you're here and what I'm supposed to do."

        I said, "I'm the entertainment! I'm supposed to entertain you!" and a woman across from me who had been staring vacantly looked me in the eye and chuckled.

        The retired teacher liked my poem but the man in the red sweater asked again what he was supposed to do.  I chose a few poems by students from a CPITS anthology. These were more "poetic," meaning less linear and didn't follow a logical progression. I think the residents liked them.

        But the workers on the phone and talking to each other were just too loud. I got up and told them, "This isn't working out, I can't yell over you."

        I was disappointed that they didn't say they'd try to be quiet. I told the residents I'm going to a writers' retreat in West Texas next week and I'll tell them about it the next time I come back.

        The retired teacher said, "That's lovely." I squeezed her arm and bid adieu to my audience.  Outside the wind was whipping. The last of today's rainclouds were vanishing, leaving the sky a bright, shocking blue.