Re-Entry into Society

By Fernando Sorrentino


Translated from the Spanish by Mary Esther Díaz

We spent our honeymoon in Bariloche and returned to Buenos Aires on a Saturday at dusk, eager to spend our first night together in our cozy one-bedroom apartment.
We found a cage in our bedroom.

It looked just like a parrot cage, only larger. It had a round base, nearly 3 yards in diameter, and vertical bars that came together at the top like meridians, forming a pointed dome that touched the ceiling.

To make room for the cage in the bedroom, our bed and our nightstands had been moved into the dining room, where the dining table and its four chairs had been pushed against the wall. It would be hard to open the cabinets, blocked as they were by the bed. Furniture, floors, and walls were badly scratched.

In the cage, there was a pale man with reddish hair. He seemed to be very clean and a bit anachronistic. He was wearing a black, double-breasted suit with gray pinstripes, a white, starched shirt, a dark tie, and well-shined black shoes. He held a gray hat on his knees; it was as clean, old-fashioned, and new as the rest of his person. Those period pieces, which looked newly-made, gave the odd impression of being props, a disguise, or some archaeological reconstruction.

We noticed all this a bit later. At first, Susana and I were shocked. The man waited for us to calm down, then said in a monotone:

“I wasn’t expecting you today. According to my information (he consulted a booklet) you were supposed to return tomorrow night. The time line is quite clear: ‘Friday the Twelfth, induction of the mentees; Saturday the Thirteenth, physical and mental adaptation; Sunday the Fourteenth, arrival of mentors.’ And today, if I’m not mistaken, is Saturday the Thirteenth.”

“You’re right,” I said, “We came back a day early. It’s not very pleasant to be back to work just a few hours after returning home.”
“What’s even less pleasant is receiving guests early. Mr. Rocchi will not be happy about this breach of etiquette, which, by the way, will also upset my plans for the night.”

“Mr. Rocchi? The owner of the real estate firm?”
“Who else? He, personally, made all the necessary arrangements, and they weren’t quick or easy. But Mr. Rocchi believes that all citizens should be extremely zealous about observing the laws and making sure they’re observed by others.”
I decided to set him straight.

“Laws? Which laws are those? And since when does that so-called Mr. Rocchi, a mere businessman, have any right to enforce the law?”

The man continued, still in a monotone:
“You, obviously, are someone who has not yet learned about life. Furthermore, your wedding celebration has prevented you from learning about certain changes introduced in real estate legislation. For example, Mr. Rocchi is now a magistrate. You’re a magistrate, too, within certain limits.”

“Me, a magistrate?” I gave an incredulous chuckle.
“Not quite: more of a magistrate’s assistant.”
“An assistant to Mr. Rocchi, then?”

“It would be unwise of me to get ahead of the official decision. However (and here he lowered his voice) I trust you to keep this information in strictest confidence.”
“And why are you telling me this confidential information?”

“My golden rule, sir, is knowing how to get along. Since we’ll be spending a lot of time under the same roof ….”
“A lot of time under the same roof?!”

“That’s right, sir. I’m older than you by at least 30 years. I have made very little progress; I’m at the lowest rung of the ladder of incarceration: I’m only an inmate. On the other hand, you are a free man who has already achieved the first promotion on the ladder of incarceration: the rank of assistant.”

Susana then exploded:
“I have never heard so much nonsense in my whole life! Simply put, the problem is this, ‘What the hell is this man doing here with his horrible cage in our bedroom?!’ Furthermore, who and why have they taken the bed and nightstands to the dining room, and who will pay for the damage caused by the movers?”

“My dear lady, I cannot condone the abrasive tone of your complaint. There are practical issues here. The bed had to be moved because, otherwise, the cell could not have been installed according to regulations. As for who will pay for the damages, the authorities plan to gather a team of laborers of various trades who will, for a small sum, return your furniture and walls to their original condition. But you asked, what the hell I am doing with my horrible cage here in your room. In turn, I would ask you, do you think I’m here of my own free will? Do you think I like being a prisoner?”

“I don’t care whether you are a prisoner of your own will or someone else’s. All I know is that I want your cage out of our bedroom!”

“It is not a cage. That term carries the disagreeable connotation of captive animals, which is just the opposite of the humanitarian spirit that guides our governmental authorities. Nor is it a cell or a dungeon. Its technical name is re-entry receptacle.”
This correction irritated Susana even more.

“Why should it be in our bedroom? Why in our bedroom? Why in our bedroom? Why? Why? Why?”
“Our Argentinian representatives and senators are very intelligent, educated, industrious, honest, austere, and altruistic people. In light of these virtues, they have ratified new laws that are jointly known as the Social Re-Entry Regulations and that .…”
"Do you expect me to believe,” I interrupted, “that you’re in our bedroom because of some new regulations?”
He placed his hat on his left index finger and, grasping the brim with his right hand, gave it a twirl as he shook his head.

“I am only an inmate. Within the system of incarceration, I fulfill the smallest of roles. You enjoy a rank one notch higher than mine and, in theory, should be better informed about such matters than I. Yet, in practice, it never works that way, as I have been in the system for many years, whereas you have just been admitted. You should be glad for your admittance, but you’re not. This phenomenon is not, by any means, initially present in the majority of people, but it always comes. When you have read the new regulations, you will feel not only joy, but also pride.”

Susana’s hands were balled into fists.
“If you will allow me,” the man added, “I could share some information about the Social Re-Entry Regulations ….”
“I’m anxious to hear them”—his leisurely manner was hard to take.

“The authorities, after examining the old system, found that it did not meet the needs of modern society. Therefore, they did not delay in replacing it with another one based on a consensus of ideas. Are you following ...?”

"Yes, yes, go on,” I said, waving my hand impatiently.
“The Social Re-Entry Regulation is based on two interrelated principles: A and B. The purpose of A is the progressive re-entry of the prisoner into society. The purpose of B is to replace the old system of collective incarceration units with individual incarceration units. Real estate firms distribute the prisoners among new domiciles and, thanks to this policy, the old jails are demolished and replaced by parks and plazas.”

“But why in new domiciles?”
“Old domiciles don’t always have a pleasant appearance and can negatively influence the prisoner’s psyche. On the other hand, a modern prison environment has a very positive effect on his or her re-entry into society. Besides, housing a prisoner brings great joy to the homeowners. It’s as if .…”

“Hang on a second: Susana and I are supposed to be your guards and you’re our prisoner?”
He shook his head in disappointment.

“The authorities no longer use the terms guards and prisoners. They use mentors and mentees, which are words better suited to Principle A of the system: the progressive re-entry of the prisoner into society. Don’t you agree?”
“But I see that both you and the authorities use the term prisoner.”

“Only as a poetic metaphor so the mentors will understand their obligations.”
“Obligations …?”
“Or shall we say, duties. These are simple and few. You need only provide me with food, clothing, medical and psychological assistance, exercise, toiletries, etc., of appropriate quality and quantity. In short, the material accouterments a human being as such deserves. The mentee’s spiritual rehabilitation is also provided for through recreation and information. I’m entitled to newspapers, magazines, books, television, and audio equipment .… Two nights a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, friends of a certain age visit me. These gentlemen enjoy playing cards and dice, and it is expected that you shall offer them an assortment of snacks and beverages.”
“How many people would that be?”

“Never more than eight or ten. Likewise, I have not given up my sex life: on Saturday nights I am visited by Miss Cuqui, a pretty, charming, and educated young woman. A young woman of such merit naturally could never fall in love with me, so you must compensate her for her favors. I’m unaware of the exact fee, as I detest handling anything so banal as money. Instead, I enjoy art and, three times a week (Monday, Wednesday and Friday), I take drum lessons from a young rock musician who enjoys soft music and whose fees are not very high.”

“But,” Susana interrupted, “How are we supposed to manage so many expenses?”
“That's just my luck,” he said, shaking his head. “My other colleagues were housed in homes with good financial backing …. Alas, life can be so unfair …. I would suggest that you document the situation in an official letter, attaching a separate sheet in annex, in original and four copies, on official, sealed paper, which must be signed by a public accountant and a notary. The annex should bear a detailed account of income and expenses so that the mentors can prove financial hardship. The authorities take great pains to resolve any otherwise irremediable problems sustained by the mentors, and they may even be able to give you a mentoring grant.”

He suddenly fell silent, making it clear that he had gone too far by revealing this benefit. I had to ask:
"What does the mentoring grant entail?”

“It entails rights and responsibilities. As to the former, the authorities will try to find you both night jobs. For example, the gentleman could be a railroad employee at one of the suburban commuter railway stations. As for the lady, I don’t think Miss Cuqui would be opposed to initiating her in the art of her ministry. In exchange for these privileges, you will have to attend Comprehensive Mentor Improvement Training. The cost of this training is very low and is offered in the city of Luján.”

“Luján?!” I stammered stupidly. “It’s so far!”
“You are not required to request the grant,” he recovered. Then, with a yawn, he added, “It’s almost dinner time. I don’t have any special preferences; I will eat any kind of food, as long as it is abundant, varied, appropriately spiced, and accompanied by a red wine of excellent quality.”

Susana ran to the kitchen.
“I always take a bath before dinner. Here is the key to the cell.”

He handed me the key through the bars. I opened the door and he emerged. He was carrying a small duffel bag, in marked contrast to his formal dress. And now a paradoxical sense of health, strength, and well-being burst forth from this walking anachronism.

“You needn’t hold on to the key. I keep it to come and go, as I wouldn’t want to be a bother to anyone. Madam!” he called out, “Would you kindly turn up the heater a bit for me, please?”

“And you,” he said as he turned to me, “bring me a clean towel and, in preparation for tomorrow’s activities, don’t forget to buy me a large bottle of shampoo formulated expressly for dyed or tinted hair.”

I did as he said. He draped the towel around his neck. We left the bedroom and stopped in front of the bathroom.

“I would like to remind you that today, Saturday, is the day that Miss Cuqui comes. As shy as she is, it would be unsettling for her to meet with strangers. So, if you please, you and your wife should retire no later than eleven-thirty.”

Resting his hand on the doorknob, he added, “I shall be using the full-size bed. The authorities have failed to notice how very uncomfortable the regulation cot is. Oh, and clean sheets, if you please.”

“Um … and how long will all this … take?”
"You may return between three-thirty and four in the morning. Ring the doorbell once; if there’s no answer, do not ring again. Miss Cuqui is very energetic and, when she finishes her work, I usually fall into a deep and well-deserved sleep. In that case, check back in the morning at ten o’clock sharp – not before because I will still be resting and not after ten, as I usually take my breakfast at ten-fifteen.”

As he entered the bathroom, I managed to ask him:
“How long is your sentence?”
“It’s a life sentence,” he answered, as his words were drowned out by the sound of running bath water.

          In memory of my beloved K.

Jim Jarmusch, who are you?

"If aliens watched us make a film, they would think we were ridiculous,"
- Jim Jarmusch, the New York Times, 1992

In one episode of the Simpsons, they meet Jim Jarmusch to ask him who he is. He replies that he tries to answer that question in his films.
So, watching Jim Jarmusch’s films may lead the viewer to understand who he is.
Who could that be?

A loner, a poet, a musician, a socially-awkward artist, reluctant to the spotlight, determined to create art as long as it takes him, a stranger, a philosopher, and a spiritual creation.
All this is obvious, but who is Jim Jarmusch anyways?

He is a weirdo who embraces weirdness to the fullest. All comments and descriptions of him emphasize the halo that surrounds him everywhere. Longtime friend Tom Waits called him,
“The key, I think, to Jim, is that he went gray when he was 15 … As a result, he always felt like an immigrant in the teenage world. He’s been an immigrant — a benign, fascinated foreigner — ever since.”

Juan A. Suárez described Jim Jarmusch in one of the Contemporary Film Director book series. He wrote that Jarmusch was: "An endearing eccentric slightly at odds with his surroundings whose presence is at once self-effacing and subtly pervasive".

Jarmusch enjoys odd pairings of people who sometimes can’t communicate what and how they feel because they either speak a different language or their backgrounds are entirely different. Isn’t this Jarmusch trying to communicate with people all his life? He is trying to be understood by a world that rarely understands him and treats him with caution, probably leaving the sign “Handle with Care” taped to his forehead.

Jarmusch is not concerned with film time. He wants to approximate real-time as much as possible, whether in an awkward café, a room where someone spends too many nights playing guitar, a bus route, or woods mimicking Purgatory. Jarmusch tries to decipher the time code and what it means in real life or on screen. His films are long shots of people breaking the ice of distant relationships and communication methods that miss the spot. 

Is he simply a filmmaker or a true artist? How does that show in his movies?

French and Japanese cinema has had a significant influence on Jarmusch. It shows in his deep interest in character analysis and the use of black and white. 

Jarmusch’s movies are minimal and austere, strangers on a strange land where nothing is hospitable or inviting. Nothing seems familiar, not the Lower East Side, not Detroit, not Tangier, and not the western town Machine. He is deeply affected by film noir where the traces of a mysterious story where goodness or badness doesn’t matter shows in most of his films. There is no classic good guy/bad guy in a Jarmusch movie, even the ones minding their own business may face a situation where their morality is tested. Still, they don’t end up as heroes or villains but merely humans counting their steps and making the necessary movie one at a time. 

Jarmusch is not concerned with breaking that eerie feeling of otherness. He embraces otherness in his films through his protagonists or -more or less- the lack of an actual hero on whom to build a film. He is fascinated by musicians and music. It is his source of inspiration as most of his movies seem like meditative pieces on life, like lengthy guitar solos or jazz improvisations. 

Viewers don’t feel his films are meticulously-structured narrative-wise, although his command of the technique shows. Listening to actors talk about Jim Jarmusch shows how they feel that it is genuine and unrestrained to be working on a Jim Jarmusch film. Tilda Swinton called it “like Christmas every day”. Johnny Depp described him as “one of his best friends”. Austin Butler mentioned how he discussed red carpet style with him. Iggy Pop explained how trusting he was of Jarmusch’s artistic choices that he asked him to make a movie about The Stooges regardless of his appearance in it.

In his interviews, Jarmusch speaks slowly, taking his time with answers and elaborations. It doesn’t seem like he is in a hurry, and he seems oblivious to the surroundings, the crowd and the attendees matter least to him, and neither does the one interviewing him or engaging him in a discussion. With Jim Jarmusch, one becomes in Jim Jarmusch's land, where senses collide and coalesce to create a feeling and evoke emotion in the viewer. 

However, sometimes, Jarmuschian films may not need to be watched. They can be music compositions on their own. The music takes centerstage more times than often, with soundtracks ranging from grungy electric guitars to ambient electronic music relying heavily on analog synthesizers. 

For Jarmusch, music comes first. A love for a musician or a sound could build an entire movie, which is why his films might seem strange without the soundtrack context. His movies are not for the people who cannot immerse themselves in an artistic experience. 

But since movies have differed gravely in context and content from before, this eccentric artist has seen a surge in popularity with younger audiences who may or may not be looking for a way to disconnect from the average top 10 on a streaming service experience.

Jim Jarmusch may have been the rockstar of American indie filmmakers, but an aloof one at that, the Thom Yorke of the scene, adding his musician status to the mix, Jarmusch chose a life of secrecy rather than bathing in the much-welcomed attention that stars and star makers revel. His identity remained the same throughout his career, and his state of weirdness proved not to be an act, but an authentic personality trait, as his films grew further apart and his filmography grew more eclectic. 

Although his latest film, “The Dead Don’t Die” is an asymmetric, sublime, zombie post-apocalyptic, star-studded tale, it still had some  Jarmusch-ian elements. 

A collector of music, photographs, poetry, and people before starting any project, Jarmusch is the American hunter, going out on expeditions to capture gems that pass unnoticed by others, dismissed as mundane. He is the ultimate hoarder, but a poetic one at that. His career in retrospect was not concerned with the aesthetic star beauty of charisma. 

“Stranger than Paradise” and “Down by Law” had more unknowns than known actors. Iggy Pop made more than one appearance in a Jarmusch movie, and Yasmine Hamdan appeared in a magical scene to steal the spotlight from Tom Hiddleston and Tilda Swinton. 

The thing with Jarmusch is that he experiments with actors all the time. He allows them to surprise him. He retains that curious kid fascinated by art deep and doesn’t let go in favor of the director’s ego. 

Jarmusch dismisses the traditional storytelling structure. Like a jazz musician, he improvises, creates scenes on the spot, and changes dialogue constantly. The ending result is a bit chaotic but within a frame of synchronicity. His style doesn’t overshadow his characters’ triumphs and misgivings, lost as they are in big cities, woods, or within the walls of their own homes, they go on aimless journeys not to follow a dream or set on a hero’s route, like the flow of the river, as they move, stillness would only mean stagnancy and Jim Jarmusch is by no means a static artist.

Jaylan Salah Salman is an Egyptian poet, translator, two-time national literary award winner, animal lover, feminist, film critic, and philanthropist.
She received her BSc in pharmacy in 2011, and has published film criticism articles, short stories, poems, and translations in many websites and offline publications such as “Al Ahram”, “Vagues Visages”, “Synchronized Chaos”, “The Gay Gaze”, “Cinema Femme Magazine”, ” Eye on Cinema” and “Guardian Liberty Voice”. Her first short story collection, “Thus Spoke La Loba”, was published in 2016 by the Egyptian Supreme Council of Culture. Her first poetry collection in English, “Work Station Blues”, was published by PoetsIN, a British publishing house with the purpose of destigmatizing mental illness and supporting international artists. Her debut novel “Bogart Play me a Classic Melody” has made wide critical acclaim and was recently chosen as one of the 32 novels in the “Arab Voices” initiative at the virtual Frankfurt Bookfair in 2020. Her second poetry book “Bury my Womb on the West Bank”, was published in 2021 by Third Eye Butterfly Press and available on Amazon in both ebook and paperback formats. Her second novel “Rita’s Dance” was published in 2022 by Noon for Publishing and available for purchase both in paperback and ebook formats.

ROCKEFELLER CENTER REUNION

It was early winter 1964. In our one-bedroom Bronx apartment, we sat together, my Nana, Mommy, five-year-old sister, nine-year-old brother, and ten-year-old me, about to have ‘Chicken Delight’ which had been delivered to our door by a teenage boy wearing a chicken suit. My brother and I rushed to the door to get a glimpse of him as he handed the dinner boxes to Nana.

The aroma of the peppery spices they used on the breading filled our tiny apartment as she carried the food into our living room. My mouth watered in anticipation. 

The TV was on and in the living room we readied to watch a repeat of the ‘I Love Lucy’ show which aired every Thursday at seven in the evening. Nana handed out the dinner boxes.

Perched on the couch, in her navy-blue pleated skirt and pale blue turtle-neck, Mommy placed her dinner box on the coffee table. She folded her hands in her lap and looked at Nana who sat on the other end of the brown and gold tapestry-covered couch. “We’re having lunch with Monty on Saturday,” Mommy said. 

A piece of fried chicken flew out of Nana’s mouth and landed in her cardboard take-away box, something that was far out of character for my usually graceful grandmother. I could barely catch my breath hearing Mommy’s announcement. See my dad after all these years?

I sat in the brown fake leather easy chair, a wide strip of black masking tape hiding a rip my brother made on its arm a couple of months ago. My legs crossed, my dinner box in my lap, I checked my clothes and hoped a cockroach wouldn’t run across my blouse like it had a few nights before.

“Gloria, you sure you want do that?” Nana asked, her eyes narrowed.

“He said he’d give us money,” Mommy replied. “Finally! But not unless I bring the kids with me.” She rolled her eyes and rubbed the back of her neck. “He’s taking us to lunch at Rockefeller Center. You know, that fancy restaurant overlooking the fountain.”

Nana dabbed her manicured fingers on her white paper napkin, picked off another small piece of chicken, and placed it in her mouth.  Ronnie, my brother, eleven months my junior, sat on the throw rug in front of the coffee table, close to the TV screen because of his lazy eye. He stuffed fries one after the other into his mouth and made a grunting sound.

“Ronnie, slow down,” Nana said. “Move to the side so we can all see the TV.” He wriggled his body to the left, losing a few fries on the rug, then swooped them up and shoved them in his mouth.

The show had started. On the black and white TV, I watched Desi Arnaz (1) open his apartment door and call out in his Cuban accent, “Lucyyyy, I’m ho-ome,” his Fedora hat in one hand, a dark trench coat over his arm. I gazed at the screen crushing on Desi. Lucy got on my nerves, especially when she made goofy facial expressions.

“Who knows if he’ll even show up,” Mommy said. “God-damn viper. Haven’t had a cent from him for two years. Bastard!”

“Gloria! The kids.” Nana scolded, glaring at Mommy at the other end of the couch. Pammy, my five-year-old sister, had complained of a stomachache that afternoon when she got home from kindergarten and was fast asleep, sprawled out on the couch between Nana and Mommy. 

Mommy opened her take-away box and took a bite of the crispy fried chicken. She picked up a French fry, and threw it back in the box, wiping her fingers on her napkin. My mother didn’t eat much. “I need to keep thin and fit, she often commented. “With this petite frame, I have to be careful what I eat.”

In contrast, my Nana loved food, whether home-cooked or good take away. She was short and full-figured. She sat on the couch enjoying the ‘Chicken Delight,’ two napkins spread out on her lap, her red lipstick as fresh as first thing in that morning. She wore a black wool dress with a red sparkly fake gem brooch at her neckline, gray stockings, and black pumps, in the clothes she had worn to work that day. She had a full-time job making fancy hats downtown in the garment district. Although low paid, she always looked nice, her dark hair sprayed and set in a chin length bouffant.

Even at ten years old, I appreciated chic clothes, yearned to look as fashionable as my Nana. I’d need to get a part-time job as soon as I hit my teens was the thought I often had as a young girl, the same desire I’d bring later into adult life.

As I sat in the chair savoring the ‘Chicken Delight,’ the half-rusted metal radiator in the corner of the living room sputtered and creaked, drops of water falling every few seconds onto the wood floor below. In the middle of winter even with the heavy curtains drawn and the radiator turned up ‘full blast,’ it was cold.

Nana glanced over at Mommy. “Well, you technically left him,” she said, and shrugged her shoulders. “It’s five years. You haven’t let him see the kids even once. This visit might be a good thing all-around.”

Nana closed her take-away box and placed it on the lace placemat which sat in the middle of the walnut coffee table. She pulled a crocheted blanket from the back of the couch and placed it over my sleeping sister, who laid on her side, her legs bent in a fetal position, her hands together tucked under one ear. Her long blonde curls were draped over her face, her mouth half open. 

From the easy chair, my eyes traveled across the room where I spotted two copper-colored cockroaches headed down the dimmed narrowed foyer towards the kitchen. It was the downside of living in a Bronx apartment during the fifties and sixties. Cockroaches galore and tiny skinny silverfish bugs I sometimes found in my clothes when I opened the dresser drawer in the morning.  

“So, we’re going to see Daddy?” I asked, keeping my voice low-key. I took a bite of the buttered flaky biscuit that came with my dinner.

“Don’t count your chickens too soon, Becky!” Mommy snapped back, curling her lip. “Right now, that is my plan.” She gave me the facial expression I disliked most on Lucille Ball, the same one I dished back to Mommy on occasion.

My brother’s eyes and ears were glued to the TV. He didn’t seem at all tuned into the conversation around him. We sat in silence for a while, staring at the screen where Lucy and Ethel wrapped chocolates as they came down the conveyer.

“The Christmas tree is up at Rockefeller Center,” I said. “We’ll see it Saturday, right?” My goal was to de-emphasize the excitement I felt bubbling inside at the prospect of seeing Daddy. God, I didn’t want her to change her mind which she often did when it came to important events.

“I suppose we will,” Mommy said, her tone flat.

Nana pressed her lips together in disapproval and looked over at me. “Yes, honey. you’ll see that stunning Rockefeller Center tree. That will be nice.” 

“Comes at a nasty price,” Mommy barked. “Having to see that damn bastard so we can get some money out of him!”

“Gloria! Enough,” Nana said, and stood from the couch to collect the take-away boxes from each of us.

“Any more fries?” my brother asked, emerging from his TV trance.

“You can have your mother’s,” Nana replied. “She doesn’t eat fries.” She picked up Ronnie’s empty container and passed him my mother’s well-stocked one. 

On the TV screen Lucy and Ethel were side by side, bent over the conveyer belt which was moving as fast as a galloping horse. They frantically stuffed chocolates in their mouths and inside their factory uniforms. My brother spit out a French fry, emitting a belly laugh as he dropped more fries onto the throw rug and snatched them up as he rolled around out of control. 

I opened my library book, ‘The Good Earth’ by Pearl S. Buck, and looked at the reading comprehension worksheet where I had to answer questions for my fifth-grade homework assignment. My stomach flooded with butterflies. My mind wondered what it would be like to see Daddy. Would I even recognize him? I remembered that he resembled Cary Grant; tall, handsome, warm dark eyes, that Mommy and Nana referred to him as Monty, that his formal given name was Henry Junior and that he’d been a World War II fighter pilot.

I tried to concentrate on the questions on my worksheet, started to draft possible answers in my head but didn’t attempt to write anything down. I avoided writing in front of my mother unless I was willing to struggle. I was a ‘lefty.’ If she caught me, she’d immediately berate me. Are you possessed by the devil?” she’d say, grab my pencil and push it into what she called the ‘correct’ hand. To steer clear of her angry words, I learned to use my right hand when in her presence, but only when I was forced to write in front of her. When she’d enter a room where I was doing homework or jotting events of the day in my diary, I’d quickly switch hands. That’s how I became semi-ambidextrous.

During Open School Week, which happened twice a year, it was always uncomfortable for me. Mommy spent one full day in my classroom, which meant I had to use my right hand for hours at a time. But there was an upside. Somehow, that developed ability made me feel powerful, flexible, adaptable. Was Daddy a ‘lefty’ like me? I thought as I sat there looking at my school worksheet and listening to the TV show.

Two long days before we’d get to see him. My fingers were crossed. I walked on eggshells with my mother, in a good mood, with no defiance. On Friday, the night before we were scheduled to take the ‘D’ train downtown to Rockefeller Center, crammed in the queen-sized bed between my sister and mother, I thought about what to wear the next day to impress Daddy, make him proud of his eldest child. I had my navy-blue dress coat with the gold buttons. That was a ‘definite,’ and probably my red jumper and soft white mohair sweater underneath. My navy-blue tights and patent leather Mary Jane’s would be a nice complement.

Would he hug me? Kiss my forehead? I ran through a series of questions as I battled to fall asleep so the morning would come quickly. Does he love me? I prayed that my mother wouldn’t change her mind. In the corner of our bedroom, on his cot, my brother made slurping noises as he sucked on his thumb. I didn’t get much sleep that night. I found myself grinning up at the dark ceiling as I imagined seeing my Daddy at Rockefeller Center, running into his arms. It might turn out to be the best day of my life. 

We arrived at the restaurant at Rockefeller Center exactly at 12:30 the time Mommy said we’d meet Daddy at the restaurant. The dining room was spacious, centered with a crystal chandelier, white table cloths and napkins, and lots of silverware on every table. Soft music played, a classical piano solo. Once led to our round table by a pretty woman in a red dress, I noticed that there were so many glasses of all shapes and sizes. I counted ten - double what we needed for five of us.

My mother requested a high chair for my sister who sat between me and my mother. Pammy banged her spoon on the wood tray top. Although five years old and in kindergarten, she acted like a toddler in many ways, truly the baby of our family. I didn’t understand why she needed a high chair for her. It seemed ridiculous to me.

I stared at the menu wondering if I should have the burger or something more elegant but I didn’t know what escargot was or Caesar salad or chicken cordon bleu. I’d likely stick with the cheese burger and fries, hoping the fries weren’t crispy skinny things like I heard they did in France. We weren’t in a French restaurant but the menu sure looked foreign to me. Maybe when Daddy arrived I could ask him to explain some of the weird dishes to me. 

My mother pulled out her make-up mirror and freshened her lipstick, tried to shape a wisp of her dark hair into a curl. She touched a fingertip to her tongue and twisted it around the strand of hair. She looked at her watch. “He’s twenty minutes late. Bum.”

My brother took a pack of chewing gum from his pocket, leapt from his chair and over to the floor to ceiling picture window that swept around the restaurant. We had one of the best tables, and could see the Rockefeller center fountain, the giant Christmas tree, and in front of both, the oval skating rink. I was disappointed that the tree was not yet decorated but then remembered that they wouldn’t have lights and bulbs completely up until the Wednesday after Thanksgiving, still several days to go. 

A waiter dressed in what looked almost like a tuxedo came by and whispered to my mother “Pardon me, but can you have everyone sit in their chairs and not touch the windows with their hands?” He pointed to my brother who was rubbing the window, his thumb wet with spit. “Thank you, Madam,” the waiter said and walked away. My mother ignored his request and tapped her fingers nervously on the table.

“Bastard,” she said under her breath. Thirty minutes late. Her finger-tapping got faster and louder. Pammy wouldn’t stop banging on the high chair tray with her spoon. Ronnie took the chewing gum out of his mouth and stuck it on the window. A woman wearing a fox fur wrap at an adjacent table stopped the conversation she was having with a man with a gray mustache, and looked over at my brother.

“What a rude boy,” she said. The man shrugged.

“Ice skaters,” my brother shouted, jumping up and down.

“This is ridiculous,” my mother said, “I’m taking Pammy to the bathroom. She stood and lifted her out of the high chair. “Becky, stay here!” 

Pammy cried out, “I want sister to take me.” She reached her little hands out to me.

“Becky’s not your mommy,” Mommy said and kneeled down in her Navy-blue pleated skirt to pull up Pammy’s pink knee socks which had sagged down almost to her ankles on the walk from the train station to the restaurant. “Becky doesn’t love you like I do,” Mommy added, giving me a curt smirk.

She took Pammy’s hand and looked over at my brother who was busy pressing his index finger into his chewed wad of gum stuck on the window.

“Ronnie, you need to tinkle?” Mommy called to him.  He nodded, flattened the gum in an oval on the finger-smudged glass and followed behind them. The woman at the other table shot me a dirty look. I got up, picked up my starched white cloth napkin, walked around the table to snatch the grayed gum from the window.

Once I sat back in my chair trying to avoid any more evil-eye from the woman, I turned my head to gaze out the window at the skating rink. I watched as a little boy wearing a red knit cap and long red scarf fell down on the ice. A man picked him up and steadied him, keeping a hold on the boy’s waist from behind as he tried skating again but with parental support; something I often wished I had as a little girl.

I looked down at my Cinderella watch which was three years old, its once pink leather strap faded to a dirty white color. It was 1:09 and Daddy was supposed to have arrived at 12:30. Thirty-nine minutes late. My stomach growled. I turned back to the table to take a sip of water and saw a man walking towards me wearing a brown leather jacket and tan slacks that had little tucks at the waist. His shoes were bark brown a shade darker than his jacket. I thought maybe they were Cordovans, like the ones I had seen in the shoe store window a week before. He was well-dressed yet casual and I liked that. When he reached the table, he smiled, his teeth gleaming, his brown hair shiny, a widow’s peak at the middle of his forehead. He had dark brown eyes that seemed to bulge out just a little. He wasn’t that tall, maybe 5’9” or a bit more, had broad shoulders and was neither fat or thin. Not a Cary Grant look alike but definitely decent enough to be my dad.

He pulled out the chair across from me and stood behind it. “Becky, I presume?”

I nodded and bit my lower lip. My mother appeared at the table. She came up really close to him, my brother and sister behind her.

“You’re a jerk making us wait this long.” She poked her finger several times on the sleeve of his leather jacket.

“Gloria, I got stuck. Alright? Shoot me.” He took off his jacket, put it around the back of his chair and sat down. 

“You’re a loser, Monty.” Picking up my sister in her arms, she came around the table and put Pammy back in the high chair. My brother went back to the window where he had stuck his gum, shrugged when he didn’t see it and rushed back to our table to sit in the velvet blue cushioned chair beside me.

“Are you really our dad?” Ronnie asked.

“I am. And you are Ronald?” Daddy had a deep voice like Rod Serling, the man on The Twilight Zone TV show.

“Nobody calls me that,” my brother made a face like he hated the taste of something. “My name is…”

“Ronnie, that’s what we call him,” Mommy interrupted. “That’s how the god damn world refers to him,” she said, her voice raised, high-pitched. My father looked down at the silverware on the table, opened the cloth napkin, and placed it on his lap.

“You know absolutely nothing about your own kids,” Mommy said.

“Only because of you.” His eyes narrowed. “Five years you didn’t let me near them.”

The waiter approached. “Ahh, everyone is here. Ready to start with some drinks?”

“Gin and tonic for me,” Daddy said.

Mommy shook her head. “Figures.” She looked at the waiter. “I’ll have a soda water with a slice of lime, please. And three lemonades. You have lemonade?” 

“Yes, we do,” the bald-headed waiter replied. “We don’t have a children’s menu here, but you’re welcome to ask for a half order of any entrée at half price or we can also do split dishes.”

I grinned. He was trying to be really nice after a stern request that Ronnie stop with his sticky fingers on the window. The waiter noticed and gave me a wink.

“Any specials?” Daddy asked.

“Yes sir. The ribeye is a specialty on weekends and today served with a red wine mushroom reduction, baby carrots and garlic mashed potatoes. And we also have a second special, Spaghetti Bolognese.

“My lucky day,” Daddy said. “I’ll take the ribeye. Medium rare.”  I noticed his dimples when he smiled which made him look more handsome though not at all like Cary Grant.

My mother seemed flustered that Daddy had won over our waiter. She rolled her eyes and slapped the napkin down on her lap.

“Cheeseburger,” I said, “with French fries.”

“Me too,” Ronnie shouted. 

“And they’ll have their own, no halving needed,” Daddy added.

My sister smacked her spoon on the high chair tray. “You’re our Daddy, she sang out. “Yay, we have a daddy. We have a daddy.”

“I’ll have the chicken piccata,” Mommy said. “No potatoes, just extra vegetables. And my youngest will have a hamburger on a plate, no roll, and no cheese.”

“She doesn’t eat cheese?” Daddy asked.
 
“Pammy doesn’t like any kind of cheese,” I said.

“Oh, that makes sense,” he said. “I’m the same.” I smiled.

Mommy folded her arms across her chest and sat back in the high-backed chair, shaking her head. “You’re worthless as a father,” she said, her tone sharp.

The waiter cleared his throat. "I-I guess we’re all set on lunch selections?” He closed his order pad and picked up our menus. My father nodded, his face red with embarrassment.
 
When the waiter was gone, Daddy tapped his fingers on the table and glared at her, “Gloria, did you have to do that? What’s wrong with you?”

 “So, you have the money with you?” she said. “The thousand you promised?”
 
“Can we have a nice lunch first? Yes, I have the money with me.”
 
My sister threw her spoon on the floor. The busboy arrived with our drinks. I handed Pammy her glass of lemonade, put a straw in it and gave her my spoon. Daddy downed his gin and tonic in two gulps.
 
“You’ve got three kids but you don’t give a crap,” my mother said, her voice loud. 

The woman in the fox fur at the next table looked over at us. Her red painted fingernails were wrapped around her martini glass, her giant diamond ring glimmering. She looked old but her cheeks were rouged and the skin on her face tight.

“Mommy, did you take your pill?” I tried to whisper but the words came out too loud.

“Your pill?” Daddy said. “You do need to calm down.” He tilted his glass, and crunched on an ice cube, shaking his head.

She leaned across the table. “Do you have a clue what it’s like raising three kids on your own?” 

“Do you know what it’s like listening to you?”
 
My chest tightened. I took a few sips of lemonade and a deep breath, hoping things would get better.

The food arrived. It all looked delicious. The French fries were perfect. “Anything else I can get for the table?” the waiter asked.

Daddy raised his glass. “I’ll have another round,” he said. The waiter nodded and left.

“Still a drunk, I see,” Mommy said.

I looked at Daddy, my eyes pleading for him not to react. He didn’t. Instead, he cut into his ribeye. The red juice oozed out on his white plate. We were quiet as we ate our lunch, except for my sister. She poured salt and pepper into her glass of lemonade, and mixed it with the spoon, then took a few slurps before adding more condiments to the mix. She seemed to do this every time we ate out to get attention.

The busboy cleaned off our table at the end of the meal. Daddy had finished his second gin and tonic. Pammy sat in Mommy’s lap tapping the spoon on her sleeve. 

“Let’s have some dessert,” Daddy said. “Gloria, can you order me some coffee? Just going to the toilet.” He got up and half-folded his napkin on the table. I could see the inside of his leather jacket on the back of his chair, a light tan fabric with black airplanes sprinkled across the lining.
 
“Not surprising you need coffee,” my mother said, “with that much liquor."

Daddy came around my side of the table before he went off to the toilet. He tousled my hair and gave me a quick peck on my cheek. “You’re beautiful. So grown up,” he whispered in my ear. I giggled, feeling like a million dollars. He walked away.

Mommy ordered each of us an ice cream sundae.
 
“Extra cherries?” the waiter asked.

My mother shrugged. 

“Yes,” I said, “and Daddy wants coffee.” The waiter nodded. It was a few minutes before our dessert arrived. The busboy lifted a pot to pour coffee for Daddy who hadn’t yet returned. I watched the brown liquid flow down into the white ceramic cup. It seemed to cascade in slow motion. A splash hit the white tablecloth which the busboy tried to wipe away with a small towel. But the dark stain remained.

It had been more than ten minutes since Daddy had left the table. My brother and I finished our sundaes. Mommy put my sister back in the high chair and helped Pammy pick at her sundae. Ronnie went to the window and pressed another wad of gum to the glass. I looked at my Princess watch. It was fifteen minutes, maybe almost twenty since Daddy left the table. 

“Can I eat the two cherries on Pammy’s sundae? I asked. It was my attempt to lighten the mood. I don’t think she heard my question. Her eyes were fixed across the table on Daddy’s empty chair. I noticed her swallow hard and then take a long sip of water.

“Mommy,” I said. “Do you think Daddy’s coming back?” She looked over at me, her eyes brimming with tears.

The waiter placed a black leather folder near the edge of the table, and picked up some plates. He eyed Daddy’s chair and raised his eyebrows, then looked at my mother. “Here’s your bill but please take your time. I hope you all enjoyed lunch,” he said.

“H-he didn’t pay it?” Mommy asked.

The waiter shook his head. “No, he didn’t. But he must be coming back,” he said pointing to the empty chair. “His jacket is still there.”

“I don’t think so,” she muttered. 

The waiter didn’t seem to believe her. “No problem, I’ll return in five minutes or so,” he said and hurried away.

Mommy stood up, grabbed Daddy’s jacket and searched the outside and then inside pockets. She threw the jacket on the seat of the empty chair, and sat back down. Opening her handbag, she pulled out her wallet and extracted money – two $5 bills and three $1 bills. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth.

Is that why Daddy pecked my cheek before he left? He was saying good-bye?

In the high chair, my sister made noise with her concoction of lemonade, pepper and salt. She got up on her knees, reached to the table and snatched up two packets of sugar. After ripping them open, she emptied the contents into the glass, stirred furiously, the metal spoon clanging on the glass. 
 
Even at ten years old I’d sometimes got headaches. The sound of that clanging brought on a dull pain behind my eyes. My mother put her elbows on the table, and dropped her head in her hands. Her shoulders trembled. 

The waiter approached. “He didn’t come back?” he asked gently. Mom looked up, her mouth half open, her eyes in a squint. She was struggling but I didn’t know what to say or do to help. Inside, I was a mess. My thoughts swirled with confusion.

“Madam, would you like to speak privately with our manager?” the waiter asked.

“I-I’m so sorry, she said. “He’s such a jerk.” She exploded, her voice getting louder as she spoke, her head wagging back and forth. “Son of a bitch. Son of a bitch.” She opened her handbag and yanked out the money she had counted earlier. “I don’t have close to seventy-nine dollars.”

The woman at the next table who had chided my brother stared at us. Her red lips were smeared from drinking martinis. She shot us a look of disgust, her eyebrows raised, shook her head and seemed to grin privately to herself.

Our waiter glanced at the woman. He patted Mommy’s hand. “Madam, let’s see what we can do,” he said in a hushed voice. “Please come with me to speak with my manager.” Mommy clutched her handbag and stood up. 

“Would you children like some more lemonade?” The waiter asked.

“Yes,” my brother hooted. “I’m still thirsty.”

As the waiter and my mother walked away, I felt embarrassed, ashamed, like everyone around us was staring. Daddy never did return to the table. In a few minutes Mommy came back, the waiter close behind her. He picked up the black folder containing the bill and pressed it to his chest. “I wish you a happy Thanksgiving and a merry Christmas,” he said, and quickly left. 

Mommy pulled Pammy from the high chair and rushed us out of the restaurant leaving Daddy’s leather jacket on the chair. I wished I would have taken it with me, some proof that he was there. 

We walked the three blocks to the train station and took the “D” train back to the Bronx. Pammy fell asleep on the long seat, her head on my lap, my mother between me and my brother who sucked his thumb and rocked with the motion of the train. Mommy didn’t say a word for the whole forty-five-minute journey. She stared straight ahead, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes slowly opening and closing as if in a trance. 

As the doors slid open at the 125th Street train stop, I placed my hand on top of hers, something I didn’t remember ever doing before. People rushed out. A crowd of teenagers jostled in, laughing and shouting, taking all the vacant seats around us. A few of them stood holding onto the leather straps hanging from the train car ceiling.  

The doors banged shut. I kept my hand on my mother’s clasped hands and moved my fingers gently back and forth. In that crowded train car, maybe for the first time in my life, I wanted her to know that I was there for her. 

Footnotes

(1) From the 1930s until the mid 1970s, Desi Arnaz, born Desiderio Alberto Arnaz de Archa III (1917-1986), achieved prominence first as a musician and later in film and television. After leaving Cuba in 1933 due to the arrival of the Batista government, Desi and his mother fled to Miami where his father later joined them.

Desi Arnaz joined Xaiver Cugat‘s band in 1934 and toured with the group before striking out on his own. Earning renown as the “Miami Rhumba King,” the musician and eventual bandleader went north to perform in New York nightclubs. Later in life, Arnaz taught classes in studio production and acting for television at San Diego State University. He also served as the United States ambassador to Latin America under Richard Nixon. Arnaz’s autobiography, A Book, was published in 1976.

(2) When the Great Migration from Puerto Rico to the mainland began in the 1940s, thousands of Puerto Ricans settled in the South Bronx. Between 1946 and 1950, over 100,000 Puerto Ricans arrived in New York City paving the way for the city’s first sizeable Hispanic population yet still considerably less than 1% of New York City’s population at the time. Today the Bronx is a predominately Hispanic/Latino borough with 54.8% of the population identifying as such.

Linda S. Gunther is the author of six published suspense novels: Ten Steps From The Hotel Inglaterra, Endangered Witness, Lost In The Wake, Finding Sandy Stonemeyer, Dream Beach and most recently in 2021, Death Is A Great Disguiser.

Her short stories have been featured in numerous literary publications. Linda’s passion for travel and continuous learning fuels her fire to create vivid fictional characters and unforgettable story lines.

Strange Chaos

I was born into a world
of strange chaos
a planet built for gypsies
and sojourners
and those who chase
vagabond dreams
Everyone following their own voice
dancing awkwardly
to rhythms that possess
the soul

A world where dogs wear sweaters
and children freeze to death
in the streets
The American Dream
the stuff that nightmares
are made of
where evil is rewarded
and good is mocked 
an existence of opposites 
and danger
where the vulnerable
get caught in the dark
out in the 
cocaine rain
with devils looking for shelter
and angels scoring weed
the sirens wail endlessly
but get lost in the noise
camouflaged with the silent sounds
of shattered dreams and lost hope
lovers that come to the end
of their rope
love is a luxury
faith is a gamble
when your life is in shambles
in this world of strange chaos
where everyone has the copyright
on truth
and the affluent get to rewrite history
and erase 
race
and erase you
Thanks for playing
but you’re the wrong color
your pigmentation is the wrong shade
for this nation they are creating
or attempting to recreate
built on hate and fear
they love the food
they just don’t love you
Still, you take the chance
and they send you back
over the fence
Who do we go to
Where is our aid
thought I’d reach out to my neighbors
but I don’t know their names
All the doors are locked
and their doorbells
scan my face
“just leave the package on the doorstep
then turn and walk away”
All I want is some friendship
all I need is some grace
I keep looking for mana
to fall down with the rain
but it never came
and now the shelters are closed
the devils have taken their place
and I keep on walking 
thankful for the voices in my head
that have become my best friends
but they keep asking for things
that I can’t afford to give
What is the going price on a human soul
that’s been out in the cold
spiritual frostbite
and feels nothing no more
I’m sleepy but I’m woke
this strange chaos
ain’t no joke
It’s all I can do
to stay afloat
the GPS is broke
I know where home is
I just don’t know how to go
From point a to point b
Oh, say can you see
that I’m crying out 
willingly
from a modern world
that is still in the stone age
smearing the ink on every page
written by the tender hearted
outsmarted
by those who have no conscience
nor soul
selling our faith to the lowest bidder
just to feel 
like we belong
Yes, I was born into this world
of strange chaos
the world that I call
home

My Chicanismo

The neighborhood
where it all begins
where it all began
Everything I’ve ever needed to know
I learned 
in the neighborhood

Chicanos
we call it the barrio
not only khakis and Stacy’s
but our kind of Chicanismo, too
blue jeans, Chucks,
and whatever shirt
was clean enough to wear

I wasn’t any different than you
rice and beans
on the stove
although we also had days of
fish sticks, tuna sandwiches,
and banana pudding
tortillas with cheese
and chocolate milk
my personal breakfast of champions

I didn’t realize I was different
until you told me I was 
creating the void inside
and a loss of identity 
that still lives and breathes today

“You speak Spanish?”
“I thought you were Anglo!”
“You hardly have an accent!”
“But you have green eyes”
“You’re so light skinned!”
“You’re not Catholic?”  “What’s a Methodist?”
“You put ketchup on your tamales?”
“You’re not a REAL Mexican!”

What am I, then?  Who am I?
Mexican?  American?  Tejano?
Latino?  Hispano?  Chicano?  Latin/X?

Am I even here?  Do I exist at all?
Am I “real?”

I thought I was always just “me”
I wasn’t trying to be anything

I thought I just “was”

I believed I was one of you
in the neighborhood
where barrio blood 
is thicker than mole
I was never made aware of
the criteria required
to be one of you
one of “us”
I didn’t know the things 
we had in common
made us legitimate
Chicanos, Hispanos,
or whatever
things like taking mom an egg
from the fridge 
and not Tylenol
when we had bad headaches
tacos, telenovelas
speaking loudly with our hands
art, music, poetry 
faith
pictures of Jesus everywhere
and cheap drugstore art
in the house
coffee and pan dulce


I went to church
and everyone else 
in the world around me
went to Mass
Pre-destined to be
a dreamer
struggling in school
with my head in the clouds
visions of guitars
and cheering fans
waking up to bad grades
and esteem issues
like you
only wanting acceptance
needing love
searching for me
in you
but the lens is warped
and the image is inaccurate
compromised
and the club isn’t accepting
any new versions of its members
at this time
now, from son to father to
grandfather,
I have always only been “me”
I don’t wear green contact lenses
I don’t see the world in green

my skin’s pigmentation 
the shade of ancestors
I never knew
but tattooed me with 
their truth
my pre-mature gray hair 
a maternal inheritance
and my grandfather’s crown

whoever I am
whatever I am
the color of my soul
is Brown
my spirit sings the songs 
of our border people 
my soul was baptized in the waters
of the Rio Grande River
my eucharist is also
blood and blue corn
can’t we just have communion
can’t you see that I’m your brother
whatever color the box says
I come in

don’t look at my face
listen to my voice
I speak your language
I sound like you
speaking truth, love, 
and hope
despite the struggles and hardships
we all face
I fall and rise
and rise again
just like you
with the sounds of guitars
and accordions softly playing
in the background
shuffling over the bean pods
from the Mesquite trees
that fall at my feet

I believe in Jesus Christ
and the practice of curanderismo
the lives of the saints
and the existence of brujas
that there is poetry in every moment
and a song in every heartache
I am sold on the idea that passion
between two lovers
and love is the best chance
that any of us has for peace in the world
Who am I?  What am I?

I am a human being and God’s beloved creation.
I am an American of Mexican decent.
I am Chicano. I am a border child.
I am Tejano.
I am green-eyed and light skinned.
I like salsa and ketchup on tamales
and tortillas with butter
I am a lover and a revolutionary
a sinner saved by grace

I am your brother
and without a doubt
one of “you”

one of “us”

Roberto Rocha is the author of Tamarindo Dreams: A Collection of Barrio Poetry. He is a native of the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas, where most of the inspiration for his writing comes from.

Ballad of the Checkerboard 

A white man wearing judges’ robes 
was standing in the midst of all that brown, 
next to some rabble rousers, all incensed.
These firebrands came to speak up for the brown Garcia family, 
although they did not know the murdered man. 
These instigators were the only other whites, 
as far as I could tell, 
although I thought they were a bit inane, 
these open carry types. 

They caused a real ruckus. 

These fatuous fools started chanting 
while another white man dressed in uniform 
standing upright, by the podium, 
told them to please consider shutting up. 
The browns looked on, shamed-faced. 
But the poor white trash bellowed they would never quiet down. 
Never give their floor to freedom without guns.

The white man judged again, 
told them to suppress their thoughts or go away, 
yet seeming to confuse his words, 
he roared: go back to your own country, 
where it is that you belong. 

Was he speaking to the browns or to the whites?
. 
Lucky it was City Hall I guess, 
and folks were calmer overall
than any other place where riots take a turn…
The whites resumed to yell and scream: 
but we are white, we are supreme,
we do belong here: 
what of you? 

The browns looked onward, 
shunning the clashing clique,
lamenting no one came to mourn 
their son their brother their lover friend.
This refuse only came to make a point of their big guns, 
using poor folks’ murders to lay some blame. 

But still, they could not take away the grief unfolding 
of that sorrowful brown hued girl, 
her four young children grasping at her skirts, 
crying for their own lost daddy, 
their loved and lost best friend. 

Oh my.

Fishing in the Green

Two bleached blond heads standing by 
the midst of green-manicured lawns 
gently sloping the golf balls 
peeking near a hole-in-one.

Erect and standing tall, boy and girl 
look over the vast verdant sea 
searching for blue, a blue dot in that endless jade 
where they can dip their poles into: 
long, thin, expert poles 
with string ready at the bite to get that fish…
but in the green? 

Close by the boy’s shiny steel-blue truck 
pridefully shining in the sun stands still, 
holding all that fishing gear, 
the buckets to keep the fish once they’ve bitten their bait,
the bait to tantalize the fish… 
but wait: 
in the green? 

Innocence spreads the smiles of boy and girl 
as they search high and low for a spot of blue
wishing to find in that glorious green, 
that shining viridian splendor, 
that artificial semblance of nature. 
Yet near the gleaming azure pickup
bulging with its equipment gifted by mommy and daddy
to that blond boy and girl 
who innocently search for that spot of blue 
within the chartreuse expanse, 
there is another truck, 
beat up, rusted, brown or red or dirty conch
with equipment falling out its sides:
vacuum cleaners, tires, metal boxes to fix 
every handyman’s troubles. 

The brown-headed couple divide and conquer.
The olive-skinned female shoulders the vacuum, 
her long shining braid glistening in the sun. 
She trudges up the grand entryway of an imposing mansion 
next to the green. 
The swarthy, bronzed fellow departs, 
leaving his partner at the door of this dynasty, 
her vacuum cleaner upright
as he heads to the golf course 
to begin his work in the rising heat. 

Weary even before the start of day
the woman rings the doorbell, ready for labor.
Next to the manicured golf club, 
Next to the rolling hills brandished in turquoise,
next to the hole-in-one, she smiles sadly 
at the white woman opening the door to let her in. 
Already inside the clipped and pared golf club, 
looking beyond the gentle slopes wielding in sage
next to the hole-in-one, the man scoffs bleakly 
at the teal expanse his lawn mower must travel today. 

All the while the two bleached blond heads
beam at each other, at the splendor of a beautiful day, 
at the unnatural beauty of their gargantuan golf dream, 
at the perfect presents their mommy and daddy bequeathed them,
today –
their erect and shiny fishing poles – 
a bit misfit in that sea of green. 

Friends 

Friends, whimsy of time slipping by
not grasping its fading flight. 
Cafecito sipped slowly while we chatter, 
laughing at the girl & boy in that telenovela 
we missed during yesterday’s 30-minute session 
while we gossiped endlessly… 
Can’t recall the soap opera’s name 
yet I remember the delicious secrets we discussed 
while watching all that nonsense:  
our children’s angst and joys, 
our woes at getting so much work done against the grain—
orals taken, PhD drafts finalized,
recommendation letters always pending. 
We thought we were indestructible, you and I, 
our friendship would outlast it all—  
absent husbands and Disney World and whining kids, 
swimming pools and sandy beaches with doctoral theses 
and comprehensives sinking our deliberations…

I see a passing Facebook reference to one exquisite child, 
a woman now: I cannot distinguish one daughter from the other. 
Do you have the same trouble with mine? 
Was I that good a friend if I cannot recognize your children all grown up? 
One husband divorced, school completed, job evaporated, country ousted. 
New life underway: me not in it. 
Life goes on. You went to another post. I left too. 
Who were we to say that life would hold us close? 
Or did all those grad school years belie my dream of friendship?

I got your Christmas card today wishing me a Merry Merry. 
Picture perfect card with all the trimmings of a life fulfilled: 
grandchildren now, striking family, stunning home by a lovely lake. 
New husband, not the one you fancied in our youthful innocence.
But our dreams, our ideals? 
Long ago we were the best of friends; yet now? 
When I drink my cafecito I often think of you, 
and that telenovela we never finished.

Matrimony 

Meandering annals traipsing rings in measures of nonsensical yesterdays at last, we realize too late the passage of time:
thirty-seven years of happiness and pain and love within existence
rambling through the years fumbling along, acquiring experience
including our bounty, our existential plight, our joy in being,
mooning over our love our children our pain our physical angst
only to realize, laughingly, what we knew the minute we met, that 
nothing can replace our love – not money, not physical goods, not ethereal wants –
you are the only one for me, as I am for you: always in resilience … 

© Everyday Celebration 2021

The Three Fates

It’s strange this feeling of emptiness
Nothing going nothing doing
Life goes back and forth.
Desires like the heavy clock tick forward,
backward
tolling into circumstance.

The wanderer does not hear the wife’s lament
But he cries into the night
That she is right:
And so it goes.
And so I'm done.

Life is a …
Sita singing blues?

The frost born sea
Scrapes naked shoulders bare.
Yet I howl the full moon barren
in my unprotected sin
and pray the ice melts storms of wickedness to
liberate my lips
so I can shear my trespassed dreams,
Embroidering infinity thrice over,

one tick forward, one tick back, one tick...

The socks slide down
the knees get scraped.
The elbow grease gets waxed.

Oh the teaching makes no sense
When nothing gains in knowledge
When no one knows what happens
When not one soul can fathom love.

And so I sit alone tick-tocking socks
And stitching bookends
like the three fates making time.
 
An interpretation, not a translation
(because translation is never poetry)

Los tres destinos

Es extraño este sentimiento del vacío.
Nada camina, nada se hace:
la vida va y viene.
Deseos como el pesado reloj avanzan,
hacia delante, hacia detrás
doblando a las circunstancias.

El vagabundo no escucha el lamento de su esposa.
Pero le llora a la noche
que tiene ella la razón:
y así continúa todo.
Y así termina todo.
La vida es una …
Sita cantando “blues”?

El mar parido de los hielos
raspa hombros descarnados.
Sin embargo, aúllo a la estéril luna llena 
en mi pecado descubierto
y rezo que el hielo derrote las tormentas de maldad
y libere a mis labios secos
para esquivar mis traspasados sueños,
bordando el infinito tres más veces,
una marca hacia adelante, una marca hacia detrás, una marca...

Los calcetines se deslizan hacia abajo,
me raspo las rodillas.
El que nunca llora, nunca mama. 
Pero no hay sentido en la enseñanza
cuando nada gana recompensa,
cuando nadie sabe lo que pasa,
cuando ninguna alma puede comprender amor.

Y así me siento sola haciendo tictac de los calcetines
Y punteando sujetalibros
como tres destinos tejiendo infinitud.

Being an academic not paid enough for my trouble, I wanted instead to do something that mattered: work with asylum seekers. I advocate for marginalized refugee families from Mexico and Central America. Working with asylum seekers is heart wrenching, yet satisfying. It is also quite humbling. My labor has eased my own sense of displacement, being a child refugee, always trying to find home.

In parallel, poetry is my escape: I have published in The Raving Press, Indolent Books, the Laurel Review, Shenandoah, and many other anthologies and journals, both in the US and internationally, online and in-print. My poetry in translation with its accompanying photography has been featured in art fairs and galleries as well. Peregrina, only in Spanish, was just published by Ediciones Valparaiso this June 2022. 

I hope you like my art; it is a catharsis from the cruelty yet ecstasy of my work. Through it, I keep tilting at windmills. 

When the Stars First Came Out - Carmen & Bidu

       AS THE YOUNG SOPRANO CONCLUDED THE LAST OF HER ENCORES AND WAS savoring the applause of an appreciative public gathered to hear her command performance at the White House in Washington, D.C., then-President Franklin Delano Roosevelt enthusiastically approached the fragile-looking figure before him. Looking past the adoring crowd, FDR complimented Bidu Sayão on a most enjoyable concert program.

       In the same breath, President Roosevelt casually proposed to the foreign-born singer an immediate American citizenship — most likely a calculated gesture on his part, motivated by his administration’s bold dedication to the upcoming policy of the “good Northern neighbor.”

       Obviously flattered by her host’s generous offer, the gracious Bidu politely declined. “Thank you, Mr. President,” she was acknowledged to have replied. “But I am a Brazilian artist and would like to die as one.” The date was February 1938.

       A little over a year later, on May 17, Broadway producer Lee Shubert, of the Shubert Brothers Theatrical Company, was preparing to greet another Brazilian artist, one whose ship had just pulled into Boston harbor, with her band, luggage, and retinue in tow. She was scheduled to make her U.S. stage debut, in Beantown, in Shubert’s 1939 musical revue The Streets of Paris, a show that featured the local appearance of comedy duo Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. The Brazilian artist’s name was Carmen Miranda.

       Disembarking from the S.S. Uruguay, she was met by a horde of big-city newspaper reporters, all eager to record the spontaneous comments of this sizzling Latin sensation. Carmen did not disappoint them. Her first words to the waiting crowd were reported to have been, “I say money, money, money! I say twenty words in English. I say yes and no. I say hot dog! I say turkey sandwich and I say grapefruit… I know tomato juice, apple pie, and thank you.”
 
       These two radically distinct responses, and seemingly unrelated occurrences, would come to denote to the Brazilian artistic community at large that, for a precious lucky few, living and working in North America — even while earning fame and fortune on her streets and in her theaters — would prove to be a most illusory pursuit. They would also serve to teach multi-talented Brazilian nationals some valuable life lessons in the world outside their native land; that the pains and compromises, glories and frustrations, triumphs and, ultimately, disappointments all such artists regularly endured for their art were no substitute for the loss of their individual identity.

       To paraphrase a line from Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If,” rare were the artists that could keep their own heads, when all about them others were losing theirs. And there exist no finer examples of this than the stories of these two marvelous Brazilian singers.

       Certainly, the old truism that “good things come in small packages” was never more so than in describing the physically compact yet vocally alluring attributes of the lovely Bidu Sayão and the electric Carmen Miranda. In reverse proportion to their small stature, they were the central figures in Brazilian opera and popular entertainment for the better part of thirty years.

       Formally trained in Brazil and in Europe, and deeply influenced by Polish tenor Jean de Reszke and by her second husband, the Italian baritone Giuseppe Danise, Bidu Sayão was Brazil’s most well-known classical vocal export — and every inch an opera star of the first magnitude.

       Although christened Balduína de Oliveira Sayão after her paternal grandmother (a name that she grew to despise), the singer would forever be known by the simple nickname of “Bidu.” Indeed, simplicity and restraint, in matters both personal and professional, were to become the hallmarks of her fame.

       She was born on May 11, 1904, in Rio de Janeiro, to a socially prominent upper-class family, which relocated to the beachfront district of Botafogo when Bidu was but four years old. Tragically, her father died shortly thereafter, thus depriving her of a masculine role model and leaving the poor girl to her own juvenile devices.

       Playful and tomboyish, with a unique flair for fun and mischief, the incorrigible Bidu was never to attend public school with the other children of her age group; she was instead to receive private tutoring at her mother’s home up through the age of sixteen. But the independence and resourcefulness she first exhibited in her youth would later manifest themselves on the operatic stage in many of her most memorable comic parts, specifically those of Susanna in The Marriage of Figaro, Adina in The Elixir of Love, and Rosina in The Barber of Seville.

       Soon after her father’s untimely demise, Bidu’s older brother would assume his rightful place as the family patriarch, but the real seat of power would always remain with her sainted mother, Maria José. Significantly, the absence of a strong male figure in her formative years may well have been one of the root causes of Bidu’s early marriage to a man three times as old as herself.

       Yet even before this situation came about, the choice of a theatrical profession for a society debutante from Rio de Janeiro (she had thought about becoming an actor or a concert recitalist) was much frowned upon at the time by the privileged upper stratum. Recalling the event some years later, Bidu commented that, “Going on the stage was absolutely out of the question for a girl born to a respectable family.” This aspect of her early life struggles was charmingly captured in a 1940s comic-book depiction of her life entitled Boast of Brazil (1). In it, the young fourteen-year-old is shown being scolded by her parents (the father’s death a decade before notwithstanding) about her “wrongheaded” career decision; and told, in no uncertain terms, how disgraceful it would be “for any well-brought up Brazilian girl even to consider such a thing.”

       Not to be dissuaded, the typically resilient teenager pleaded with her uncle, Dr. Alberto Costa, to take up her cause. As a result, the musically inclined Costa became instrumental in swaying the mother’s opinion about a potential singing career for her daughter, having earlier arranged for his niece to take private lessons from Romanian soprano Elena Theodorini, a former star of La Scala — who personally thought the girl too immature, and the voice too small, for such a serious undertaking.

       Nevertheless, Bidu persevered. With patience, practice, and stubborn persistence, she managed to survive Theodorini’s rigorous voice sessions. This led to her informal 1916 debut at Rio’s Theatro Municipal in the Mad Scene from Donizetti’s Lucia di Lammermoor, an appearance that would permanently put to rest the question of a career in the theater.

       Theodorini’s resolute decision in 1918 to retire from teaching and return to her native country coincided with the end of the First World War. It also gave cause for the adventurous Bidu to accompany her instructor back to the European mainland, the first time the blossoming prima donna had ever been away from her close-knit family. Not to fear, as her mother Maria José stood close by as a chaperone throughout her years there. According to Bidu, “As time went by, my mother adjusted herself to the fact that there was no real stigma attached to opera singers, having met many charming ones.”
       
       Moreover, the time she spent abroad was indeed fruitful. With the aid of various individuals in strategic places, Bidu applied for and was admitted to Jean de Reszke’s famed vocal school in Nice, France, where she was the only one of his personally handpicked pupils to have hailed from Latin America. The still elegant Polish tenor had been a principal lead with New York’s Metropolitan Opera Company long before Caruso’s debut there; and was a fixture at the house for many years prior to his own retirement in 1904. He would be the next to take on the role of surrogate father to the Brazilian novice, helping to refine and perfect her diction, and instructing her in the long-lost art of French singing style and vocal technique:

"De Reszke had an extraordinary ability to evaluate the text, integrating it to the music until they became one. This was to be of enormous help to me when I took on many of the Debussy scores. I never sang the role of Ophelia in Hamlet by Thomas, but her dazzling mad scene, which became a must on my concert programs, became a real part of me, so many were the times he made me go over it, concentrating on the words’ essence and producing sounds that would enhance them."

       After the death of de Reszke in 1925 and Theodorini’s own passing the year after, Bidu was forced to seek assistance elsewhere in planning for her operatic future. With her mother’s permission, she journeyed to Italy for the express purpose of establishing contact with former diva Emma Carelli and her husband, the impresario Walter Mocchi, whom she had previously heard about while living in Brazil. Together, the couple ran the Teatro Costanzi (later changed to the Teatro Reale) in Rome, and, since 1910, Mocchi had also been responsible for the opera performances at Rio’s Theatro Municipal, as well as the fall seasons at the Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

       Mocchi took quite a fancy to the young Brazilian beauty, as did his soprano wife. Suitably impressed by the little songbird’s talents, Signora Carelli referred her to Italian maestro Luigi Ricci for training in operatic repertoire; and, on March 25, 1926, Bidu Sayão made her European debut at the Costanzi as Rosina in The Barber of Seville, later adding Gilda in Verdi’s Rigoletto, Carolina in Domenico Cimarosa’s Il Matrimonio Segreto (“The Secret Marriage”), and Elvira in Bellini’s I Puritani to her growing list of stage roles. Her success in the Italian capital soon paved the way for Bidu’s triumphant return to the Brazilian one: she reappeared in Rio de Janeiro, as Rosina, Gilda, and Carolina, in July of that year.

       In the meantime, Mocchi had gone ahead and booked her for several more seasons at the Theatro Municipal in São Paulo, where he had accepted the management’s offer of a full-time directorship. Bidu went on to perform there in a variety of works, including fellow Brazilian Carlos de Campos’ Um Caso Singular (“A Singular Affair”) and the opera Sister Magdalena (1926) by, of all people, her uncle Alberto Costa, a sentimental payback of sorts for his having served as the family intermediary ten years prior.

       How much Mocchi’s new position had to do with the singer’s extended local engagement, however, is not known, but it soon became a situation ripe with romantic speculation. Irrespective of the rumors that might have been generated by the physical proximity of these two individuals, fate would inevitably thrust them even closer together.
 
       Mocchi and Carelli separated sometime before 1927, when he and Bidu took up their relationship. Then, in August 1928, Emma Carelli was involved in a fatal car accident in Italy. Her sudden death left a personal void in the busy professional life of Walter Mocchi, who now looked to Bidu for consolation. It would be easy to suggest that her subsequent 1929 marriage to the much older Mocchi was a relatively stable one, but the enormous forty-year difference in their ages proved a difficult gap for Bidu to close. She later admitted her mistake, claiming: “I have always searched for my father in the husbands that I married.” They, too, separated after a time, and were finally divorced in 1937.

       Bidu would at last meet her prospective soul mate in the person of Italian opera star Giuseppe Danise. It was during a 1935 performance of Rigoletto at the San Carlo Opera House in Naples, quite possibly in one of the many moving numbers they had so often sung together at rehearsal, that soprano and baritone decided to transform their budding emotional relationship into a permanent love duet. The couple officially tied the knot in 1947 and would remain constantly devoted to each other until Danise’s own departure from this world on January 4, 1963. He was twenty-two years her senior.

       Amazingly enough, Bidu Sayão was a close contemporary of another popular Brazilian entertainer: the exceptionally gifted and vibrantly captivating Maria do Carmo Miranda da Cunha, better known by her professional moniker as Carmen Miranda.
 
       Born in the town of Marco de Canavezes, district of Porto, in Portugal on February 9, 1909, Carmen came to Brazil, along with her mother and older sister Olinda, when she was not yet one. She grew up in the city of Rio de Janeiro, at about the same time that Bidu was learning to climb trees in her backyard. Her parents dubbed her “Carmen” (thanks to her music-loving uncle, Amaro) in honor of the Spanish protagonist made famous by Bizet’s opera, or so the story goes. Otherwise, her connection to the art form was minimal, if nonexistent.

       She was not, as some of the early publicity about her indicated, the offspring of a well-to-do family. Quite the contrary: her father, José Maria Pinto da Cunha, who arrived in Brazil ahead of his loved ones, had no discernible profession, although his background as a farm hand apparently telegraphed his low-born status. His main sideline, however, was as a barber (paradoxically, not of Seville). Out of necessity, her mother, Maria Emilia, became a laundress in Rio. She later managed a boarding house in the city, all to make ends meet. But whatever the family’s financial condition had been, the naturally plucky and irresistible personality that characterized the young Portuguese immigrant was already in evidence. Little Carmen left no doubt as to what her future aspirations might be: She would tell anyone within earshot that she was predestined by the entertainment gods for a career in the movies.

       Like most working-class youngsters in Brazil at the time, Carmen was forced to quit school at an early age to go into the business community, holding down a variety of menial low-paying jobs, including one as a chatty hatmaker, and another as a “singing” store clerk, which resulted in her being verbally chastised by her boss for deliberately distracting her co-workers.

       Luckily for her (and for the Brazilian labor market), Carmen was snapped up by the local radio stations, among them the widely heard Rádio Mayrink Veiga, after simultaneously cutting her first records for the Brunswick label in September 1929. Her first major hit was the march tune, “Taí, eu fiz de tudo pra você gostar de mim” (“There, you see? I did it all to make you fall for me”), recorded in January 1930.



       She eventually landed a contract with RCA Victor, later with Odeon-Brazil and American Decca. Other song numbers followed in quick succession, including the best of such acknowledged songwriters as Assis Valente, Lamartine Babo, Joubert de Carvalho, André Filho, and Synval Silva. Her large, recorded repertoire of popular songs, ditties, march tunes, sambas, tangos, and other more obscure material from the period would reach into the literal hundreds.

       Some revisionist authors have tried to describe her early singing style as a carioca version of Elvis Presley — that is, of a poorly educated white person with a modicum of musical talent, who happened to have incorporated the soul and substance of West African black descendants into her entertainment vocabulary and, in the process, made them virtually her own.

       While the jury may be out on Elvis, it was an unfair indictment in the case of Carmen Miranda. In the first place, she was neither poorly educated or untalented, nor was she a “pale” imitator of a prevailing ethnic trend; and, in the second, the growth of marcha, chorinho, maxixe, and modinha — and especially samba during Carnival time — had already spurred many of Brazil’s native-born talents to write down and interpret these myriad forms as far back as 1915, most strikingly by composers Ernesto Nazareth, Francisca “Chiquinha” Gonzaga, Pixinguinha, and Heitor Villa-Lobos, to name only a few; and still later by the likes of Noel Rosa, Ary Barroso, João de Barro, and the Bahian-born Dorival Caymmi. Carmen’s particular genius was in taking the basic raw material found in this multitude of musical styles and thoroughly reinvigorating the form: by applying to it her unique blend of crystal-clear vocalism, rapid-fire verbal patter, and razor-sharp rhythm. This would ultimately lead to her creation of a black-white composite of the streetwise baiana figure, an endearing (and somewhat stylized) cultural by-product of Northeastern Brazil, one that was accessible to even the most sophisticated of theater-going audiences.

       She would embellish this character further in her later domestic and Twentieth Century-Fox film work, but for now she strived hard to concentrate on her nightclub routines with younger sister Aurora, an equally talented sibling with artistic aspirations of her own. The two of them would appear frequently throughout the 1930s at the Cassino da Urca in Rio, usually backed by the Bando da Lua (“The Moon Bunch”) combo and other guest performers.

       Such bubbling effervescence as Carmen seemed to exude should have been a veritable shoe-in for the budding Brazilian film industry; and true to form, she soon appeared in her first feature, the documentary O Carnaval Cantado de 1932 (“The Carnival Sung in Rio in 1932”), although she herself sang in only one musical number, “Bamboleô” by André Filho. A Voz do Carnaval (“The Voice of Carnival”) was released the following year, along with several other titles: Alô, alô Brasil (co-starring Aurora) and Estudantes (“Students”), featuring popular radio singer Mario Reis, both from 1935; Alô, alô Carnaval (1936) with an all-star cast headed by Francisco “Chico” Alves, Dircinha Batista, and Barbosa Júnior; and the mega-production Banana da Terra (“Fruit of the Earth,” 1939), where Carmen introduced moviegoers to her now-familiar Bahian alter ego.

       All if not most of the examples cited above of early Brazilian cinema have been lost or, more correctly, have deteriorated over the years due to detrimental exposure to the elements. Only a small fragment of Banana da Terra remains. It depicts a youthful Carmen Miranda, surrounded by striped-shirted male dancers from the Cassino da Urca, in composer-lyricist Dorival Caymmi’s song, “O que é que a baiana tem?” (“What does the Bahian have?”). Carmen took her cue (along with the design and makeup of her costume) from the number’s lively lyrics, which describe the native Bahian’s outfit and accessories in excruciating detail

What does the Bahian have?
What does the Bahian have?
A torso of silk she has (yes)

An earring of gold she has (yes)
A necklace of pearls she has (yes)
The finest of jewels she has (yes)
A gown made of lace she has (yes)
A bracelet of gold she has (yes)
Her dress is superbly pressed (yes)
Her sandals the very best (yes)
And charm like no other has
So like the baianas have

(English translation by the Author)

       During one of her many flamboyant performances at the Urca, the legend goes that visiting American impresario Lee Shubert became smitten with young Carmen at first sight and decided to hire the flashy entertainer “on the spot” for his Broadway mounting of The Streets of Paris, to premiere in New York in the autumn of 1939. In fact, Shubert had been receiving frequent communiques about her talent for many months prior to his actual arrival in Rio de Janeiro. Nevertheless, what he saw on the evening of February 15, 1939, at the Cassino da Urca nightclub, convinced him that previous reports of her extraordinary abilities had not been exaggerated (even if he understood little of what was being sung).

       The stage was now set for the Hollywood phase of Carmen Miranda’s showbiz career — a midstream course correction neither as readily accepted, nor as openly welcomed, by fellow Brazilians as her “O que é que a baiana tem?” period had been.

       That most formidable of early twentieth-century classical musicians, Italian conductor Arturo Toscanini, would once again influence the course and direction of Brazilian opera (that is, in a manner of speaking) by his fortuitous intervention in the burgeoning North American career of soprano Bidu Sayão. There exist several versions of their fabled encounter; but suffice it to say that the notoriously demanding maestro may have been moved by the Brazilian singer’s sensitive portrayal of the consumptive Violetta Valéry in Verdi’s La Traviata (which she first sang in Brazil), given in the mid-1930s at Milan’s historic Teatro alla Scala, where Toscanini once served as musical director.

       The conductor had been looking for “a special, ethereal voice” for some time. At a formal reception for the diva in early 1936, at Town Hall in Manhattan, maestro Toscanini introduced himself to Bidu, and, while reminiscing about her La Scala appearances, he immediately piqued her musical interest in a work she had not previously performed in: French composer Claude Debussy’s poetic cantata, La Damoiselle Élue (or “The Blessed Damozel”), originally written for heavier dramatic soprano, a voice category the normally stratospheric coloratura was unaccustomed to singing in. Undaunted by the challenges inherent in this offbeat proposal, Toscanini offered to coach la piccola brasiliana in the difficult piece. He even recommended an alternative higher key for her comfort, for which he likewise supplied a revised vocal score:

I am sending you the high notes that I think ought to be suitable. They aren’t difficult because they more or less follow the orchestra’s melodic line. You are a good enough musician to adapt immediately to these few changes. With my most cordial greetings, Arturo Toscanini 

       Needless to say Bidu was hooked by this rare chance to work with the notorious Italian taskmaster, and willingly swallowed the bait. With the experienced hand of Arturo Toscanini leading her and then-mezzo (later soprano) Rose Bampton, and the New York Philharmonic-Symphony Orchestra, along with the New York Schola Cantorum Singers at their disposal, Bidu Sayão made an auspicious Carnegie Hall debut in the Debussy work on April 16, 1936, to rave reviews in the press:

Sayão captures the plaintive, mysterious atmosphere of LA DAMOISELLE ÉLUE. Conveying the purity of the vocal line, the innocence of the character, and the tenderness of Debussy’s setting of Rossetti’s poem, Sayão is an ideal interpreter of this music. Toscanini referred to her singing as “just like a dream, an angel, from the sky.”

       [Her voice], if light, was one of pronounced sweetness; silky and caressing when used at its best.

       Taking advantage of the increased exposure these Manhattan concerts had provided, Bidu spent the next several seasons commuting to and from her native Brazil, and her soon-to-be-adopted North American homeland. “It was Danise who was totally responsible for my American career,” she insisted. “In 1936 he persuaded me to accompany him to New York and he introduced me to Signor Bruno Zirato, who [had been Caruso’s private secretary and] was very influential at the Philharmonic.” In the meantime, Bidu gave innumerable performances on both continents, but paid particular attention to Brazilian shores, by some accounts appearing in as many as two hundred different locations spanning the length and breadth of the country.

       Upon her return to the States, the board of the Metropolitan Opera, at Toscanini’s insistence (and through the machinations of Signor Danise, who “knew his way around, for he had appeared over four hundred times at the Metropolitan”), tapped the busy soprano to make her debut in a part not generally associated with South American artists: that of Jules Massenet’s wholly and beguilingly Gallic young heroine, the beautiful and coquettish Manon Lescaut.

       Although he himself no longer had any direct involvement in running the company, maestro Toscanini nonetheless proved relentless in persuading the Met Opera’s stodgy management to take on the Brazilian nightingale for this plum assignment — even though Manon went far beyond the kind of limited vocal fireworks Bidu was then capable of producing, nor was it yet a regular staple of her core repertoire.

       Fortunately for the Met, the singer had been slowly expanding her roster of parts to encompass the more lyrical aspects of such roles as Violetta in La Traviata, Juliette in Gounod’s Roméo et Juliette, and Mimì in Puccini’s La Bohème, even before she had met her second husband, Giuseppe Danise. It was to Danise’s credit, therefore, that he was able to confidently guide his young protégée along this productive path and stretch her usual list of comical soubrette parts by including more “dramatic” vocal opportunities. Admittedly, this opened up fresh avenues for Bidu to explore, now that she had been performing ad infinitum the same well-worn roles of Gilda, Rosina, and Susanna over the entire length of her career — even though audiences still flocked to see her in them.

       With her authentic French diction and remarkable ability to breathe theatrical life into increasingly complex characters, Bidu was ideally poised to conquer the environs of North America, just as she had done in Europe and Latin America some ten years earlier.

       Finally, on February 13, 1937, on a cold and wintry Saturday afternoon (a national radio broadcast, at that), the captivating thirty-two-year-old Brazilian diva stepped out from behind the golden curtain and into the warm glow of the stage at the old Metropolitan Opera House, on Broadway and Thirty-Ninth Street, to bask in a well-deserved ovation for her premier performance in Massenet’s opera Manon. She delivered what many of her staunchest supporters would come to regard as her most elaborately prepared, most fully realized, and most passionately heartfelt portrait to date.



       In addition to the chilly weather, there was a last-minute cast change in one of the leads: that of her compulsive lover, the Chevalier des Grieux. “It was supposed to have been [Belgian tenor] René Maison,” Bidu recalled some years later for The New York Times, but it turned out not to be the case. “He was sick, but they didn’t tell me, because they didn’t want to make me nervous. So I stood looking and looking, and I was getting nervous [all the same] because I didn’t see him. Then a strange man greeted me! I almost fell down! When there was a [free] moment, he said, ‘Hello, I’m Sidney Rayner.’ I said, ‘I’m Bidu Sayão,’ even though I think he already knew that, and we went on from there.”

       Notwithstanding the impromptu nature of the proceedings, the broadcast came off as scheduled. Manon would go on to become her third most requested role (twenty-two appearances in all) during her extensive Met Opera tenure, lagging behind only Susanna and Mimì (forty-six performances each), and Violetta (with twenty-three), in number of times sung. 

       It is noteworthy to point out that opera soprano Bidu Sayão had established a firm foothold on the legitimate Broadway stage two years and four months before Carmen Miranda was to do so; and a full three years prior to Carmen’s own footprints were to be permanently enshrined on Hollywood’s immortal Walk of Fame. 

The High Price of Fame in Brazil

       THEY BOOED. THE AUDIENCE HAD ACTUALLY BOOED. IT WAS UNHEARD OF, absurd, to say the least — yet it was true. But how could such a thing have happened in Rio, and, most distressingly of all, to Bidu Sayão, the operatic sweetheart of the Southern Hemisphere?

       Five months after her earlier appearance at the Theatro Municipal, the stylish Brazilian singer’s debut at the Metropolitan Opera House had caused a major stir; it was labeled the surprise hit of the 1936-1937 season. “Miss Sayão triumphed as a Manon should,” wrote New York Times music critic Olin Downes of her mid-winter debut, “by manners, youth and charm, and secondly by the way in which the voice became the vehicle of dramatic expression.” “Any conjecture as to how Sayão’s small but perfectly produced voice would fare in the great spaces of the Metropolitan [was] speedily allayed,” raved Paul Jackson in Saturday Afternoons at the Old Met. “Her affinity for the French style…and a decade’s experience in European houses enabled her to set foot on the Met stage with a portrayal fully formed.”

       The company chose Bidu to assume the repertory of the recently retired Spanish soprano Lucrezia Bori. And within weeks of her initial engagement, she was assigned the lead role of the consumptive Violetta Valéry in La Traviata, followed quickly by her first Mimì in La Bohème. “She was an unmatched Norina, Zerlina, and Adina,” continued Mr. Jackson. “Sayão’s Violetta is a vivid creation and exceedingly well sung throughout… She turns the coloratura of the first act into a dramatic device just as Verdi intended…”

       With many U.S. opera companies on hiatus until the fall, that previous year (1936) Bidu had been free to enjoy the warmer waters of her tropical port city and its own extensive concert and opera-going season. Her ambitions there were modest, in the extreme: to please her many fans and admirers, as she had been doing for the past six seasons, at Rio de Janeiro’s Theatro Municipal.

       She had lately appeared as Rosina in the opera The Barber of Seville. Bidu was also scheduled to sing Verdi’s Violetta, along with Lakmé in Delibes’ eponymously titled work, and, in honor of the one-hundredth anniversary of Carlos Gomes’ birth, the part of Cecília in Il Guarany. In prior seasons, Bizet’s Carmen had been a popular attraction, which once starred the celebrated Italian mezzo Gabriella Besanzoni, a past veteran of many a South American production of the work and a mainstay at the Municipal since 1918.

       Described as “badly-behaved and impertinent” by the Met’s one-time director Giulio Gatti-Casazza, the high-strung Besanzoni had lucked into a society marriage with Brazilian industrialist Henrique Lage back in 1925. This tended to keep the temperamental diva anchored to the capital, with the Theatro Municipal serving as her homeport. Upon leaving the stage in 1939, Ms. Besanzoni turned to teaching to take up her spare time. As an instructor, it was widely rumored the Roman native was a superior judge of vocal talent — one of her prize pupils would turn out to be the carioca baritone Paulo Fortes.

       In all, there was ample evidence to suggest the August 1936 performances of Gomes’ Il Guarany in Rio would be a far from routine affair, if not a fairly exciting one. What actually transpired onstage could not by any means be considered unexpected; but the passage of time, muddled individual motives, and even sketchier personal recollections have a way of blurring the finer details of how and why certain events took shape. The indisputable facts, though, were these: Unable to cope with Bidu’s recent string of successes, the feisty mezzo-soprano organized a demonstration by the members of her claque to boo the little prima donna into submission, and on her home turf. Besanzoni “had been a magnificent singer,” claimed Bidu, in a 1973 interview for Veja magazine, “the best Carmen I have ever seen. Although she was no longer performing, she was insanely jealous of anyone who appeared [at the Municipal].”

       Besanzoni’s boisterous negative campaign fizzled, however, as the entire theater soon got wind of the plot. After Cecí’s moving act two ballata, “C’era una volta un principe” (“Once upon a time there was a prince”), the audience erupted into a steady stream of applause that purportedly drowned out the noisy offenders, who proceeded to beat a hasty retreat from the peanut gallery, Madame Besanzoni among them.

       Badly shaken by the incident, Bidu was overheard to have declared that she would refuse all future offers to sing in Rio de Janeiro — and, for that matter, in Brazil, too. Despite claims to the contrary, the soprano rethought her earlier position and thankfully returned to her native land on several occasions near the end of the 1940s, appearing in La Bohème, Roméo et Juliette, Manon, and Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande. “In any case,” Bidu explained years later to Veja, “this was a minor incident, with little importance that I recall without a trace of anger because I have never been jealous of anyone.”

       She gave her last complete performance at the Theatro Municipal in 1950, as Mimì in La Bohème; but after that painful Guarany she would most heartily concede to becoming a full-fledged member of the Metropolitan Opera’s roster of artists, the only one from South America.

       Aside from the poor reception in Rio, there were other, more valid justifications for her decision to depart for “friendlier” Northern corridors, one of which was to be closer to Metropolitan Opera baritone Giuseppe Danise, the long-awaited love of her life; but the main reason was the volatile political situation of pre-World War II Europe.

       For Bidu, this did not necessarily translate into a moratorium on her stepping onto Brazil’s stages, but it did pose a serious threat to anyone bound for European opera houses, regardless of national origin. As it was, the escalating global conflict had put a severe damper on most foreign classical pursuits, in essence restricting the coloratura and other paid professionals to the safer environs of North America for the duration of the conflict. Still, the sad truth remained that Bidu Sayão was hurt, and it showed in her avoidance of Brazil as a routine layover spot.

       As for Besanzoni, she would stay noticeably closed-mouth on the subject of her actions on that particular evening. We can only speculate, at this point, as to her convoluted reasoning behind them. They had a lot to do with the perceptive singer’s suspicion of an unofficial snub by the Metropolitan Opera during the 1919-1920 season, a period in which she was asked to take on many of the same roles as the house’s resident work-horse, the stalwart Austro-Hungarian artist Margarete Matzenauer.

       According to various accounts, Besanzoni became convinced that her Teutonic rival had somehow bribed the claque to despoil her every Met Opera appearance. Curiously, reviews from that time seem to corroborate this notion: There is a marked indication that an organized and clearly exaggerated favoritism for Ms. Matzenauer was at the heart of the anti-Besanzoni faction. And, in the Italian’s own blunt assessment of events, “the ‘German’ did everything in her power to prevent me from being hired by the Metropolitan.”

       Her past ill treatment in the Manhattan press, plus the unfavorable reaction of Met Opera audiences, might well have gone a long way toward fanning the mezzo’s future flames of envy with regard to Bidu’s growing popularity. We may never know for certain, but Madame Besanzoni’s overly paranoid sensibilities do serve to explain some of the later green-eyed behavior attributed to her, and unreasonably extended to the tiny Brazilian warbler.

       As bad as the experience of being booed in Rio’s Theatro Municipal may have been for Bidu, it was nothing compared to the cold shoulder offered by her own callous countrymen to Brazil’s cultural ambassador of the war years, the exciting (and excitable) Carmen Miranda.
 
       The flashy entertainer’s runaway success on the New York stage during the 1939-1940 Broadway show seasons (her official “start date” was June 19, 1939) had only begun to whet the appetites of post-Depression era audiences starved for more novel and adventuresome theater fare. César Ladeira, one of Rio’s best-known radio announcers, also found himself in the Big Apple, broadcasting the remarkable news of Carmen’s triumphant debut on the Great White Way to all of Brazil.

       Accounts from that period reported that traffic had stalled outside the Broadhurst Theatre where she was appearing. In fact, the streets were virtually clogged with noisy automobiles. Carmen and her band (which included a young musician named Aloysio de Oliveira, who became not only the up-and-coming star’s interpreter and spur-of-the-moment guide, but also her live-in lover) were huddled together at an all-night restaurant, waiting for the early edition of The Daily Mirror to arrive.

       The first of the headlines pronounced producer Lee Shubert’s The Streets of Paris a dud, but it praised Carmen Miranda’s participation to high heaven: “A new and grandiose star is born who will save Broadway from the slump in ticket sales caused by the popularity of the New York World’s Fair of 1939,” wrote notoriously opinionated columnist Walter Winchell. Next, from John Anderson in the New York Journal-American: “Carmen Miranda stopped the show!” And then, from The New York Post’s Wilella Waldorf: “You could see the whites of her eyes from row twenty-five!” And from theater critic Brooks Atkinson for The New York Times: “The heat that Carmen generated last night may well blow out the city’s heating-and-air-conditioning system this winter!” The final, four-star banner, however, came from Earl Wilson of the Daily News: he proclaimed Carmen Miranda to be the “Brazilian Bombshell,” a nickname she would be stuck with for the remainder of her American career.
 
       Indeed, Carmen’s initial Broadway outing segued directly into her U.S. film debut in the musical comedy Down Argentine Way, which starred Betty Grable and Don Ameche. Released in early 1940, this first of several Twentieth Century-Fox Technicolor productions featuring the exotic performer was an immediate smash hit with enchanted movie audiences. Initially, because of contractual commitments that included three or more shows a night, with brief runs to and from the New York World’s Fair and Shubert’s adamant refusal to let her leave for Hollywood, the studio sent a camera crew to New York in order to capture Carmen and Bando da Lua during a break in the action.

       Whether she played Argentines, Cubans, Mexicans or Brazilians, movie fans clamored for more of Carmen Miranda; and the Fox Studios wisely obliged, signing the lively songstress to a generous six-figure salary (her clashes with lecherous studio head, Darryl F. Zanuck, were an awkward  “highlight” of her years there); it would soon make her the highest paid female entertainer in the United States. “Hollywood, it has treated me so nicely,” Carmen was quoted as saying, “I am ready to faint. As soon as I see Hollywood, I love it!”

       But just before her West Coast film career took off in earnest, Carmen and her Bando da Lua paid a return visit to Brazil — and to the Cassino da Urca, the Rio de Janeiro nightspot that was the site of their earliest stage triumphs. Expecting to be greeted as they had been in the States, that is, with wide-open warmth and fully appreciative affection, they could not have been more confounded by the chilly atmosphere that waited for them inside.

       There have been many theories put forth for Carmen’s overly cool reception at the Urca: from the unusually stuffy society crowd present, which included the wife of conservative strongman, President Getúlio Vargas (rumored to be one of the singer’s former lovers but long since disproved by writer-journalist Ruy Castro); to the range of material chosen for the affair, an innocuous combination of sambas and Carnival march favorites peppered with Tin Pan Alley pop tunes.

       A perfect example of the type of song that drew such ire from audiences in Brazil can be sampled in a revealing sequence from 1944’s Greenwich Village. In it, the star comes on to deliver a minor Leo Robin-Nacio Herb Brown number, “Give Me a Band and a Bandana.” Abruptly shifting gears, Carmen slips into an ebullient rendition (complete with exaggeratedly rolled r’s) of Dorival Caymmi’s “O que é que a baiana tem?” along with a slower tune, “Quando eu penso na Bahia” (“When I Think of Bahia”) by songwriter Ary Barroso. A minute later, she reverts back to bands and bandanas.



       From that same motion picture, we have Carmen’s sizzling opening number, “I’m Just Wild About Harry,” by the team of Eubie Blake and Noble Sissle, with additional interpolations (mostly, nonsense phrases in lightning-fast Portuguese) courtesy of Aloysio de Oliveira: 

Oh, I’m just wild about
Samba, batucada, Carnaval e café
Por macumba, viramundo e uma figa de Guiné
And Harry’s wild about
Eu quero uma baiana com sandália no pé
E mandar um vatapá com um pouco de acarajé
The heavenly blisses
Of his kisses
They fill me with ecsta-
Se gosta de baiana é pra mim de colher

He’s sweet like peppermint candy
And just like honey from the 
Bebi a cachaça a granel
Por mim ele apanhava papel
I’m just wild about Harry
Pois ele é um ioiô que gosta dessa iaiá
E é louquinho por uma samba lá na praça Mauá
He’s just wild
Anda louquinho por mim
He’s nuts!
Sujeito louco como ele eu nunca vi
About me!

(Copyright © 1921 by M. Whitmark & Sons / 
  Portuguese lyrics by Aloysio de Oliveira) 
  
       The sudden transition from Carmen’s heavily accented American English to free-flowing Brazilian Portuguese — and back again — is still quite jarring, even to modern-day ears. One can only imagine the shock it must have engendered in Brazilian audiences upon their hearing this contextual mishmash. In all probability, she most likely gave the folks at the Urca a fair and reasonable representation of the kinds of tunes that had bowled over hard-to-please New Yorkers.

       There were other motives for her poor showing, one of them being a persistent and troublesome cold that dogged her every time she traveled by boat. Another was the casino’s use of an unfamiliar orchestra behind her onstage, instead of her usual six-man lineup. In any event, these paltry explanations fail to provide a truly satisfying glimpse into the ambivalent feelings conveyed by that Rio nightclub audience toward the baffled diva.
 
       Ostensibly, a common enough fate had befallen Carmen that had also been shared by Bidu Sayão, (Antônio) Carlos Gomes, and several other of their fellow citizens, particularly when confronted with their own notable achievements away from Brazilian soil: that of a tangible and totally unwarranted resentment for having made it big abroad without their country’s approval or consent — as if these were absolutely necessary to affirm one’s position at home, or anywhere else, for that matter.

       As anthropologist Roberto da Matta once observed about former soccer player Pelé, “To be successful outside of Brazil is considered a personal offense to Brazilians.” This simple yet insightful analysis was never more accurate than when applied to the seesawing musical endeavors of Carmen Miranda. After that critically panned appearance, the dejected singer and her band withdrew for a two-month rest, a period principally taken up by the group to revamp its basic song structure into something that more closely resembled an overt form of social commentary.

       With that in mind, Carmen emerged from her isolation brandishing a buoyant new number, “Disseram que voltei americanizada” (“They say that I came back Americanized”) by songwriters Vicente Paiva and Luiz Peixoto, in the faces of previously unresponsive patrons. A cracklingly lyrical defense of her supposed conversion to American ways — and mockery of some distinctly Brazilian ones — this cleverly written topical ditty was a huge hit in Rio. It accomplished the desired effect of re-catapulting the star to the top of her seaside area stomping-ground: 

They say that I came back Americanized
Loaded down with money
That I am filthy rich
That I can no longer stand the sound of the pandeiro
And that I bristle when I hear the cuíca
And they say that I’m always busy with my hands
And there’s a rumor going around
That I have no more spice, no more rhythm, no more anything,
And all the bangles that I used to wear don’t exist anymore, not one
But why are you throwing all this bitterness at me?
How could I come back Americanized?
I was born with the samba and live where it is played
Where it is sung all night long, that old samba beat.
In the street where the hustlers are, they are my favorites,
I still say ‘eu te amo,’ and never ‘I love you.’
As long as there is Brazil, whenever it is mealtime,
I still order shrimp soup laced with cucumbers.

(English translation by the Author) 

       But the damage to her unshakeable self-esteem had been done. Had she really turned her back on her own people? Had she abandoned the poor favelados (“slum dwellers”) she had so sympathetically sung about, for the easy money and get-rich-quick schemes of greedy North American capitalists? Had she also sold off her highly prized charms so cheaply to New York audiences for a fleeting grasp at personal gain, as they all claimed she had? None of these charges were true, of course, but the negative aspersions that continued to be cast at Carmen while she was holed up in Rio would only serve to strengthen her iron-willed resolve to pin her future career hopes on wartime America.

       Disappointingly, the remainder of her Hollywood-film output would consist of a mixed-bag of garish Technicolor® spectacles (That Night in Rio, 1941; Week-End in Havana, 1941; Springtime in the Rockies, 1942; Greenwich Village, 1944), ridiculous tutti-frutti headgear (The Gang’s All Here, 1943), and uninspired comedic romps (Four Jills in a Jeep, 1944; Something for the Boys, 1944; Doll Face and If I’m Lucky, 1946; followed by Copacabana with comedian Groucho Marx, 1947; A Date With Judy and Nancy Goes to Rio, 1948), culminating in an ignoble guest effort in the 1953 Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis haunted-house spoof Scared Stiff. While they proved financially lucrative at the box office, these projects were eminently unworthy of her talents, which extended past her familiar, hip-swinging milieu to fashioning and designing her own elaborate wardrobe, footwear, and headgear.

       In spite of the risk to her carefully constructed image, the mid-career tradeoff of her Latin-based musical livelihood for the uncertainty of Los Angeles’ fickle film community was a chance that Carmen Miranda was only-too-willing to take, and never given enough credit for having done so. In giving up her uniquely Brazilian identity for an all-purpose, stereotypical compilation of ersatz Latinate femininity, she acquired a definitive degree of international recognition, along with a hefty amount of notoriety, as that infamous snapshot of Carmen without her underpants would plainly show. Moreover, the drastic modulation of her inbred Brazilianness, mingled with the bland indifference her compatriots had detachedly shown her at Cassino da Urca, deeply affected Carmen’s inner psyche and helped to erode what little pride she had left in her American accomplishments.

       These, in turn, would serve as the absorbing subject matter of numerous posthumous books, articles, and publications — in addition to a revelatory cinematic study, Carmen Miranda: Bananas Is My Business (1994), by Brazilian filmmaker Helena Solberg about the entertainer’s later life struggles with fame. Highlighted by a whirlwind 1947 marriage to minor American movie producer David Sebastian (whom she met on the set of Copacabana); a longtime dependence on uppers and downers; an abortion and miscarriage; alcohol abuse (a carryover from husband David); depression, hypochondria, electroshock therapy, and more, Carmen’s mounting personal misfortunes would combine to bring about her complete mental and physical breakdown sometime in December of 1954. The prescribed method of treatment involved a four-month period of rest and recuperation in Brazil — her first trip there in fourteen years, spent reacquainting herself with relatives and old friends, and slipping in and out of seclusion at the Copacabana Palace Hotel in Rio de Janeiro.

       She returned the following April to the U.S. to quickly resume her busy nightclub and television schedule — too quickly, some would say (thanks to David Sebastian and his persistent transcontinental telephone calls), leading to a silent heart attack as she finished taping a strenuous dance sequence for The Jimmy Durante Show on August 4, 1955.†
 
       Later on, at her Beverly Hills mansion and in the early morning hours of August 5, her lifeless body was found by husband David and her mother, Dona Maria. Carmen had expired prematurely at forty-six, the victim of cardiac arrest due to occlusion of the coronary arteries.

Carmen Miranda’s shocking end and tumultuous Rio de Janeiro funeral produced a staggering outpouring of grief in the country — a vivid example of pent-up guilt feelings for the way the Brazilian nation had treated the dearly departed movie icon when she was alive. Accompanied by David Sebastian and her mother, Carmen’s body was flown to Rio for burial in the famed Cemitério de São João Batista (Cemetery of St. John the Baptist) in the neighborhood of Botafogo (2), in accordance with the star’s wishes.
  
       It also struck a foreboding chord with Bidu Sayão, Brazil’s other international musical exponent, and a fervent friend and follower of the once energetic entertainer. Only a month before Bidu had suffered the loss of her first husband, the late impresario Walter Mocchi, recently interred in a Rio cemetery. And, in a manner of speaking, she had witnessed the slow and steady passing of her own Met Opera career, what with her having to contend with a regime change at the company she had so long been associated with.

       The new administration, put in place in October 1950, was headed by crusty general manager Rudolf Bing. Bing was peculiarly unreceptive to the popular Brazilian singer’s request to perform in Pelléas et Mélisande, one of her Gallic specialties. In his book The Last Prima Donnas, Italian author, critic, and publicist Lanfranco Rasponi termed Bidu’s performance in the work as revelatory: “[S]he was perfectly cast [as Mélisande], for she conveyed the evanescent mystery of this lost creature with a voice that was like gossamer.” Mr. Bing it seemed had an aversion to the standard French repertoire (he also had another singer in mind for the part). But his firm support of Verdi and Puccini, and outright backing of the Mozart canon, gave Bidu renewed hope that she would be given a fair stab at some of the meatier items on the Met’s operatic dinner-plate of works.

       Such was not to be. She sang in only four performances of La Bohème, the last of which, dated February 26, 1952, was her good-bye to the old house. It was followed two months later by a final April 23rd appearance on tour, in Boston, as Manon, the role of her Met debut.

       “I am proud,” she would later remark, “and I did not want to wait until I was asked to leave.” It was commented on at the time that Bidu Sayão had left the Metropolitan at the top of her form, and with few regrets. “At the end of my career I appeared in San Francisco as Margherita in Mefistofele and as Nedda [in Pagliacci], but by then I was willing to take risks, for I was about to put an end to my activities.”

       Cutting back on her operatic appearances, she limited all future engagements to the concert hall, but wallowed joyfully in her newly acquired freedom away from the lyric stage. In the same year as Carmen Miranda’s wedding in Beverly Hills, Bidu and her husband, Giuseppe Danise, purchased a home in Lincolnville, off the coast of Maine and reminiscent of her family’s littoral abode in Botafogo. They called it Casa Bidu. After her retirement from the Met, she and Danise would spend considerable time there together, interspersed with occasional side visits to New York City and the Ansonia Hotel, where the couple stayed when they were in town.

       But more shattering news would arrive in January 1957: Arturo Toscanini — mentor, admirer, adviser, and steadfast supporter — died at his home in Riverdale, New York, at the ripe old age of eighty-nine. This was too much for the sensitive soprano to bear, as she now resolved to terminate her singing career before the year was out.

       “That decision,” Bidu admitted to reporter Maria Helena Dutra, in that December 1973 interview for Veja magazine, “came about as well because my ninety-year-old mother had been extremely ill. And my husband complained constantly of being left alone because I was leading a gypsy lifestyle. I felt then that my family needed to come first.”

       In 1958, Bidu bid a fond farewell to concertizing, in the same historic location (Carnegie Hall), singing the same lyrical showpiece (Debussy’s La Damoiselle Élue), and with the same orchestral forces (the New York Philharmonic) as those of two decades prior, when she was first introduced to North American audiences by the incomparable Italian-born Toscanini; except that on this occasion, the program in question was in the capable hands of a noteworthy Belgian, the conductor André Cluytens. He would solemnly assist Bidu in drawing a final curtain on the predominantly classical cycle she had begun for herself back in the spring of 1936.

       “It’s hard to quit,” she told The New York Times, “one feels so empty. But how much better to do it when the public remembers you well. Rosa Ponselle did it. Bori did it. Not many do. Now I could smoke, stay up late at parties, and catch a cold.” Reminiscing about those years to Veja, Bidu admitted that, for a while, she lived with her “past glories, surrounded by journalists.” When she finally called it quits, “all of a sudden there was this tremendous void” in her life, but the choice was made, and she em-braced it with open arms.

       Within a few years of that defining concert, second husband Giuseppe Danise would join the celestial ranks of the other prominent figures in Bidu’s life: uncle Alberto Costa, soprano Elena Theodorini, tenor Jean de Reszke, Madame Emma Carelli, impresario Walter Mocchi, maestro Arturo Toscanini, and composer Heitor Villa-Lobos, a lifelong collaborator and close personal acquaintance. All had made incalculable contributions to her profession and art. While each had received their just rewards, Bidu would continue to be feted, honored, and fawned over, for years to come, by ardent aficionados both here and in her native land.

       With all that she had seen and done in her field of choice, what was there left to say about Brazil’s most exalted opera personality? Taking note of her award-winning 1945 Columbia Records rendition of Villa-Lobos’ Bachianas Brasileiras No. 5; and her elevated status as a major interpreter of that composer’s works, along with those of the less familiar-sounding Hernani Braga, Henri Duparc, Gabriel Fauré, Reynaldo Hahn, and Francisco Mignone, Bidu’s stage and recorded milestones went far beyond the norm for a native-born classical performer of her time.

       In fact, there was no denying, or even downplaying, her importance as a pivotal player in the development and spread of opera in-and-around the Brazilian landscape. Although some critics would go so far as to admit that her (and Carmen Miranda’s) peak period of activity spanned the length of U.S. involvement in the Second World War — with its emphasis on the Good Neighbor Policy and the resultant rationing of the gene pool of foreign artists (and with Bidu having failed to appear in her native land between the years 1937 and 1952) — they were not supported by the evidence.

       “I get offended when people tell me that I’m not patriotic,” she told Veja magazine. “I’ve always represented my country with much dignity.” But what was it that made the little diva so endearing to opera buffs? What carefully guarded secret had she possessed that so inspired the loyalty and admiration of even the most hardened of music critics?

       On the whole, it can be added that in almost every respect the lovely lyric singer exuded that rare and indecipherable star quality known as charisma. Added to her matchless stage deportment, it manifested itself in the purity and ease with which she projected her small but penetrating instrument; marvelously self-contained within a miniature yet finely sculpted frame; and perfectly suited for the nobility and majesty of only the most theatrical of dramatic contrivances — chiefly, the opera.

       With her usual, self-effacing modesty, soprano Bidu Sayão saliently and quite succinctly summed up her own precious vocal artistry in a 1989 broadcast interview for New York radio station WQXR-FM:

"I had something appealing, I don’t know what. The sincerity of my singing. I give my heart. I give my soul. I give myself."

       She gave of herself one last time, when, in 1995, the Beija-Flor Samba School of Nilópolis invited the elderly but still determined petite grande dame of grand opera to appear in the annual Rio Carnival parade. Bidu’s life story had been transformed into the school’s theme for that year, and she was more than happy to oblige as it provided the bona fide Brazilian charmer with a pretext for visiting Cidade Maravilhosa (Marvelous City*) once again.

       Her attire was that of a typical Northeastern baiana, the only conceivable dress she could have worn under the circumstances — and a most fitting tribute to the memory of Carmen Miranda in her prime. With that simple gesture, two hitherto incompatible entertainment forms had, for one brief instant, successfully melded into a singularly grandiose public display. For what is Carnival and opera, anyway, if not outsized representations of all that we would like for reality to be?

       Characteristically, the nonagenarian Bidu stole the show.

On March 12, 1999, after a brief illness, soprano Bidu Sayão permanently left the world spotlight. She died at Penobscot Bay Medical Center in Rockport, Maine, two months short of her ninety-fifth birthday.

       Her death brought to a quiet close a most remarkable chapter in Brazilian music history, one that Bidu had so conspicuously made her own. “[D]uring her career days, she held audiences in the palm of her hand,” remembered Schuyler Chapin, ex-Commissioner for Cultural Affairs in New York and a former general manager of the Metropolitan Opera Company. “Whether on the opera stage, the concert hall, a living room, or just in conversation…she was, hands down, one of the public’s favorites.” But the length of an individual’s physical life does not necessarily translate into longevity in the public’s mind, especially where it concerned the new and unconventional in music.

       Alas, few of the current generation of Brazil’s knowledgeable music lovers have even heard of Bidu Sayão, much less been made aware of her past accomplishments. Yet, ever more enthusiastic disciples of Música Popular Brasileira have become enthralled all over again by the flashing eyes, the free-flowing arm movements, and the fluttering vocal lines of that too-short-lived curio named Carmen Miranda. A major re-appraisal of her work appears imminent and overdue and is sure to follow in the wake of this modern re-evaluation.

       In the brief time she spent with us, Carmen’s musical and entertainment legacy had apparently won out over — or even surpassed — soprano Bidu’s now overlooked ones. Indeed, the entertainer’s tragic, un-foreseen death and subsequent re-acceptance into contemporary Brazilian cultural society can be read, should we choose to, as the final triumphant victory over her earlier career adversity. ☼

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

CREATIVE CONSULTANT, WRITER, COLLABORATOR, TEACHER, LECTURER, PLAYWRIGHT, and translator JOSMAR LOPES has over fifty-plus years of exposure to — and love for — the opera, movies, musical theater, soccer, popular music, classic drama, and the performing and fine arts. Although his professional career has been focused primarily on the financial services, medical devices, and retail services industries, his heart has always been with the arts.

A native of São Paulo, Brazil, Josmar immigrated to New York in 1959 at an early age. Growing up in the Bronx and Manhattan, he was privy to a wide range of artistic and cultural activities. Josmar received his Bachelor of Arts degree in History from Fordham University, with a concentration in Art History, Theology, Philosophy, and European and Medieval History. He earned a Certificate in Management Practices from New York University, and Diplomas in Paralegal Education (also from New York University) and Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL) from the New School for Social Research

More recently, Josmar has developed a number of cultural-exchange projects, including a musical-dramatic play about Carmen Miranda entitled Bye-Bye, My Samba (Adeus, batucada); Mio Caro Giacomo (My Dear Giacomo), a seriocomic look at Italian opera composer Giacomo Puccini and the problems he faced in writing and staging the opera Madama Butterfly; and Bronx Boy (currently in development), a fictional account of a Puerto Rican family growing up in the South Bronx.

In the midst of this blizzard of activity, Josmar still finds time to dabble in his favorite subjects, i.e., watching and analyzing movies, contributing articles to his blog Curtain Going Up! (Reviews by Josmar Lopes) and listening to the Metropolitan Opera radio broadcasts.