’Twas the (200th) Night Before Christmas
...when A Visit from St. Nicholas was first published. Anonymously and in a local newspaper.
It would take nearly twenty years before Clement Clark Moore would come forward to acknowledge authorship of that poem, now more commonly known as The Night Before Christmas. It is arguably the best known of American verses of all time. Yet he had written it, not for publication, but for the delight of his children (shades of a Lewis Carroll who was yet to celebrate even an un-birthday). A family member had submitted it to the newspaper unbeknownst to him.
With Christmas once again rapidly approaching, and with my having recently passed by Clement Clark Moore Park in the Chelsea area of Manhattan, it got me to thinking, just who was this guy with this tripod of a name that falls so trippingly on the tongue? And what about that poem?
Googling him later that night, I would read that he might not even be the real author. Heresy! It has been suggested by some, including an expert on textual content analysis, that Henry Livingston Jr. really wrote it. Whoever that was. Though there has never been any physical evidence to prove this theory.
Yet even if that turned out to be true, Mr. Moore’s name would still not be taken off that playground in Chelsea. Turns out he was a "1%-er" who owned a humongous amount of real estate in the neighborhood, including an estate that the city had to cut through when it started laying out its street grid in the area. Moore fought it tooth and nail, but then having lost, did ok dividing up land lots and selling them to well-heeled New Yorkers.
He was a professor of classics at the General Theological Seminary, a staunch Episcopalian, and a writer whose works included, of all things, a tome entitled A Compendious Lexicon of the Hebrew Language. This might all further explain his reluctance to originally claim authorship of a poem that spoke of “a right jolly old elf,” and then throwing in a belly/jelly rhyme for good measure.
Yet whoever did write A Visit from St. Nicholas—and I’d bet my antlers it was Moore…
Moore's re-imagined story, is one that had its roots in the Fourth Century based on an early Christian bishop of Greek descent who would give gifts to children at Christmas time.
“… is largely responsible for the conception of Santa Claus from the mid-nineteenth century to today, including his physical appearance, the night of his visit, his mode of transportation, the number and names of his reindeer and the tradition that he brings toys to children. Prior to the poem, American ideas about St. Nicholas and other Christmastide visitors varied considerably.”
—The New York Times, December 25, 1930
An inspired sprightly poem by a wealthy dour academian, is as unlikely a story as a sleigh ride through a winter night’s sky. A ride that Rudolph wouldn't come along to guide, until 116 years later in 1939. But that my children is a story for another Christmas. Nighty night.
Quote of the Month
A Senior Descending into Starbucks
“Abandon all hope ye who enter here.”
—Dante Inferno; Canto III
When silence was golden in the mid-century days
of coffee
in the American right and might
to coffee
in the hospitality of dropping by
for coffee
to that percolation in syncopation…
Maxwell House:
Good to the last drop…
we guzzled in privacy absent the buzz
of a beehive of strangers;
the pulsation of those taking meetings
discussing long shot proposals
in a make-believe office
and those interviews at adjacent tables
whereupon
an eavesdropping wizened one wants to interject:
“Ah jeez, don’t say that,
you just blew the job.”
The restroom open
to those with the code
is cracked by the homeless
who drop by to crap.
Daily.
A school is in session
with a tutor force-feeding
irregular verbs to tattooed teens
so bare in their cluelessness,
they’re, “I’m like, wow.”
In the cacophony among the coffee
the extraterrestrials are still agog
with the New Age ring tones
the orgasmic tase on Vibrate
Apple apps harvested this fall
they keep phoning home
amidst the alleged music
a few decibels beyond
the permutations and combinations
of repeated concoctions
built on shallow syrups and false foams
announced in Rocket J. Squirrel voices...
“A venti Caramel Macchiato—skim;
sugar free/extra shot/extra hot/extra foam.”
You can't handle extra foam!
Laptops continue sucking the life
out of space and time
their place at the table of eternity
as the lines like the universe
keep expanding
as the customers like distant relatives
keep coming and staying—
meanwhile
off somewhere in the lap of Mother Earth
growers keep planting and planting
pickers keep picking and picking
from which marketers keep spewing out
NEW PRODUCT EXPERIENCES
while closing down some circles
in which
the fires had dwindled beneath
their monolithic urns.
Upon further sipping
before slipping further
into a realm of past tense
in these said to be the golden years
someone is still in the goddamn restroom.
—Ron Vazzano
Word of the Month
A Reprise of a Reprise of a Christmas Past
Thirteen years ago, I had what I called at the time, an existential eBay moment. It was triggered by the appearance on my screen of a plaything from last mid-century. When a so-called vintage toy is in working condition, with no parts missing and in its original box, it can get a bit pricey in bidding situations. Which turned out to be the case here.
But what would you pay for an object that even the mere sight of, is enough to transport you to a Christmas day almost fifty years ago? Or whatever day in your life that holds a special place? Not to mention the chance to own said object …hold it in hand... see if some muscle memory kicks in?
I’ve often said, if you’re going to take a trip back in time, bring back some evidence of the journey. Emerging as if from out of the twilight zone, here it was:
"HASBRO ATOMIC SUBMARINE TORPEDO TOY
IN ORIGINAL BOX!!!!
The box has super graphics and is in good condition (it has a small stain on one end where the $3.98 price has been written).The toy is in good condition. The toy is complete including boats and torpedoes in the original sealed plastic bag. The instructions are also included. This is a very NICE RARE TOY!!!"
Upon being out-bid, I responded with a counteroffer.
And another.
And still another.
And a plague on the house of the unknown bastard driving up the price. I now had to have this at all costs. What probably cost Hasbro, not more than pocket change when it first made this thing in 1959.
At this point, I suppose a back story is in order.
1965… Grandma's house… a second home... Christmas day.
The family is gathered. All those we love are still alive. An uncle, assuming the role of Santa Claus, gives presents to the kids. I don't remember what I got, but my ten-year-old cousin received that “atomic submarine.”
To put it gently, this cousin was, and still is, a delicate sort—not that there's anything wrong with that. And not exactly the type given to firing steel-ball torpedoes at plastic boats in cardboard water. I on the other hand—reaching the upper teens—was. And though perhaps too old to still be playing with toys, spent a part of the afternoon on the day of the birth of Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace, sinking yellow enemy ships—"Take that you 'bleeping bleeps'!"
After that day, I never played with, nor even saw that toy again. After all, it was never mine to begin with. That is, until the futuristic year of 2010.
And as to what I paid for it? I’ll never tell ("Loose lips sink ships!"). But it was exceeded, exponentially, in emotional value. And it even held up on the entertainment end as well. Long since on Medicare, and with the aid of glasses, I could peer through the periscope and score some direct hits. After a few tries, of course.
Hardly on a par with Proust's Madeleine cookie, yet how to explain how something like a plaything out of a tiny piece of time, can stay so long at the fair. Maybe it’s the Peter Pan syndrome? Maybe it’s just me? A fair question when meandering this far out of the present tense.
It is now almost sixty years since that Christmas day, brought home thirteen years ago by way of the internet. A go-to place in which we can indulge in this sort of time travel; play games with time. Which is only fair, since time always seems to be playing games with us.
On Little Cat Feet
after Carl Sandburg
In a Tijuana church,
its hand-painted windows
doing their best
to resemble stained glass,
fading and chipping,
let in more light.
Ron Vazzano
finito
muse-letter \’myüz-‘le-tər noun
1: a personal message, inspired by a muse of one's own creation, in the course of which, the sender becomes absorbed in thought, especially turning something over in the mind meditatively and often inconclusively.
2: a letter from one who envisions oneself as a poet as such, "musing" on that which is perceived to be news, or newsworthy, usually in some ironic or absurd way.
pre 2019