I wrote this as a comment about Leonard Cohen on someone's blog.. but it got too long and it's too belated.

When I first came to L.A , I decided that after 25 years I should go to a synogogue. My mother had told me and my sister  that she read in her jewish journal that David Mamet goes to this particular synagogue because this rabbi is so wonderful. Well, eventually, we dragged our secular selfs one Saturday.

I soon stood in a modest backyard type lot with Leonard Cohen, Mamet, Lisa Loeb, and  John Favreu.

I must admit I was not that well versed in Leonard's Cohen work at that point.

I'm the type who hates to feel... lesser... so i pretended I didn't know who anyone was. That part of the story gets really good but can't be included here.

 The second time we went there was Mr. Mamet in a squarish beret and he ran out the door and said, " Wea you goin? Stick around."  It turned out that me and sister just went out for a cigarette but Mr. Mamet had noticed our departure and had run out the door. Too cool. Too cool. We stuck around.

One day, I look across the small room outside the temple and I get this sweet gaze and smile from Leonard Cohen. Soon thereafter, he came over and said, " Hi I'm Leonard" I told him that was father's name and we talked about his stint in the Israeli Army.

 We talked at length on a few occassions and he is a sharp minded, funny, and lovely guy. He does have a sort of too young asianish  wife that seems a bit on the scary side but hey... I got nothing bad to say about "Leonard." 

 As for the Synogogue, We soon grew bored of it.  The Rabbi was.... dissillusioning. Religion just wouldn't stick.  We couldn't for the life of us understand how Mamet and Cohen were so taken with this Rabbi.

 Oh yeah, Jennifer Gray was there too and  seemed like a sweetheart but we never spoke as she left early every time. I never  got a chance to tell her that I'd never put her in a corner.

 Favreu seemed like a lonesome grump and it took me 4 times to find out that he was some famous guy. Lisa Loeb brought her own tuna packet to lunch as she loved tuna but feared mercury and this display of so much self regard made me and sister... annoyed.  Me and sister weren't brought up to ever display fear for our health! In short, Lisa Loeb was dead to us.

But, before we fled my sister drew this and gave  Leonard Cohen the original. He seemed to like it but who knows maybe he thought he looks different. He either trashed it or it is hanging in his home as we "speak."

Much more to this story...  A little bit more though the story will eventually lead to a story about cancer and american idol and prayer and miracles and deep dillisionment . In the meantime, I am sure it's shamelesss saturday because I am going to share with you a poem/love letter/dogerell that I wrote to Leonard Cohen but never gave him and never showed another soul till now. It was about him approaching  me etc. It sounds pathetically egotistical and self regarding but since it's shameless Saturday it goes up till it gets deleted and I scurry away to a fetal position etc.

Though I've toiled in obsurity,

Completely,

It is you who introduced yourself to me.

Could you tell I was a poet?

How did you know it ?

Was it my stare?

A stare that said:

That there was a spot

That we both share,

Over in the corner,

Or leaning on a chair

Anywhere.

Sissiphyian  attempts to makes sonorous

the non-sense and

have it sink through through ink,

 or  keyboard, or lead

needing to Capitalize on all this

 uncapitalized dread.

Beauty like the shark

Shows its fin

while its body plows through the dark

filthy confusing mass

Weeds winning over the grass.

Beauty still,

Everywhere

Do  we want to keep this will,

This recovery from devastation

This creative recreation

to

Write it down in stanza,

Haiku,  verse

ryhmless curse?

could you tell I was a poet?

I read your work

I know you are

I’m glad to meet your eyes

 when yours met mine

I hope they saw,

sonnets in disguise.