Joan E. Bauer: Lovers and Other Strangers
We’re all strangers. But after a while,
you get used to it. You become deeper
strangers. That’s a sort of love.
Joan E. Bauer: Brown Skin | Probable Cause
My niece says they’ve raided the carwash.
Her former nanny, a longtime citizen,
afraid to leave home.
Joan E. Bauer: 165 Maybery Road
Salka raises money, gathers affidavits
to bring Jews from Europe to safety, finds jobs
for the newcomers, drives them to Farmer’s Market
on Fairfax, a reminder of the Old World.
Joan E. Bauer: She Kept Her Own Company
Anna May memorably kills a Chinese warlord,
her rapist, with a dagger. On film, couldn’t kiss
or bed a white man. Off-screen, another matter.
Joan E. Bauer: The Man on the Flying Trapeze
He was a gentle man because he knew he could kill someone.
Joan E. Bauer: The Visionary, the Provocateur
Mike Davis grew up Catholic, bullied by rednecks
in Fontana, a place he later called, with affection,
that ‘junkyard of dreams.’
Joan E. Bauer: The Vernacular Landscape
I love how he values words & waits until they grow
hot in his imagination, then OOF FLASH SPAM
Joan E. Bauer: Remembering Sanora Babb
Ray Bradbury knew Babb from a longtime workshop: The author of a promising Dust Bowl novel that editor Bennet Cerf shelved in ‘39, saying— What rotten luck! claiming her work … Continue reading
Joan E. Bauer: The Apple Pan on Pico
When you are seeking greatness, turn to the Apple Pan, a homey 1940s institution imitated everywhere from Duluth, Minn., to Bahrain. — Jonathan Gold, Los Angeles Times food critic, 2013 … Continue reading
Joan E. Bauer: It Takes a Lifetime
They’d both mastered the ‘poetics of place,’
small-town Mississippi and post-war California.
Welty believed & surely Macdonald agreed:
‘No art ever came from not risking your neck.’
Joan E. Bauer: Great Art is for Everyone
Papp was a communist, raven-haired, charismatic,
His mission: free Shakespeare for the people.
He borrwed lights & props, scrounged for costumes.
Even his wife didn’t know Yussef Papirovsky
began as a tough street kid in Brooklyn.
Joan E. Bauer: They Left Chicago Behind
Saul Bellow called Chicago: a prairie city with a waterfront
& the trees he remembers, elms & cottonwoods.
Joan E. Bauer: Dear Federico
Tonight, we’re watching Amarcord,
your dream-mix of homage, fable & satire.
The boisterous half-grown schoolboy Titta,
the fiery father, the long-suffering mother.
Joan E. Bauer: All But Lost
in the small print of NASA history
the story of my father: Harold E. Bauer,
known as Hal, technical director
of that workhorse, the Saturn IV-B.
