So Long It's Been

Gotlieb, Phyllis (1926 - 2009)

Original Text

Phyllis Gotlieb, The Works: Collected Poems (Toronto: Calliope Press, 1978): 58-59.

Fibonacci found the significance of

1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 ...,

they explain

the way seeds spiral in the sun

flower and pine scales

twist in the cone

I tell you LYNDHURST 8325

means the house my aunt moved from in 1942

and I remember the cousins who said 20 years ago:

call us when you 're in town, the number 's

ILLINOIS 8-3713

but I forget their names

SO LONG IT'S BEEN

1time to clear the silent

2sullen round of numbers stacked in my

3brainracks

4 clear HOWARD 0141 where the one

5armed man lived next door and Mrs. Goldfarb

6with her slipstraps slid on her fat pink arms

7 clear

8HARGRAVE 8375 where the park sweeps below the railing

9and Broadview Ave, on a foggy day a ship's

10deck sailing a sea of limbo washed with

113 old skaters 7 tennis players and a shattered

12rubbydub

13 GERRARD 6715 Good evening Century Theatre

14Goodbye Mrs Gersten, Miss Fernandez, Miss Fleuhrer &

15all burglars anonymous uncaught who tied up my

16father & stole the safe, or his lunch, or sometimes

17even $$$$

18 clear GERRARD 2222 (too) easy to remember Call

19me anytime Mr Wallace walks me in the schoolyard &

20knowing does not tell me my grandmother

21 LAKESIDE 0007

22never liked flowers because they reminded her of

23funerals: how many roses from hers have I found

24cracking the backs of Uncle Nissel's

25SCHUYLER 4-7767 old encylopedias?

26 clear GROVER 9595

27where I pulled the kid cousin's braids, ate

28knishes, and cried: yes, he 's dead, he died this

29morning

30 numbers that lived in me clear clear clear no

31answer, nobody lives

32there any more

my ghost directories are

yellowpage clear through, the

crossroads of the past

are one-way thoroughfares

Notes

0] Fibonacci: Leonardo Pisano Fibonacci (1170-1250), a mathematician who discovered the sequence in which each number is the sum of the two preceding numbers. Back to Line

9] Broadview Ave: a north-south thoroughfare in east Toronto. Back to Line

13] otherwise known as The Music Hall, Toronto. Back to Line

28] knishes: Yiddith term for baked or fried dough pieces stuffed with cheese, meat, or fruit. Back to Line

Publication Start Year

1969

Publication Notes

Ordinary, Moving. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1969.

RPO poem Editors

Ian Lancashire

RPO Edition

2002

Rhyme

unrhyming