Pioggia povera e preziosa

Erica Dorf would have turned 97 today.  She worked for decades as the artists' booking agent for Avery Fisher Hall.  For a few years in the 1950s, she served as personal secretary to Gypsy Rose Lee.  Erica was also responsible for producing the English subtitles on many of the classic Italian films of the mid-20th century.

SPARKLING EYE

                                    Erica Tagliabue Dorf, 1918-2007

Rain falling on your birthday, Erica;

after an August drought

these gray skies float

down water lifelines, pioggia

povera e preziosa.

Your green & copper

wooden cabinet

like something out of old Ferrara

still stands guard quietly

in the dining room;

out of the city’s boom

& boffo, to this rustic hideaway.

Memory is mother of the arts.

You were a hidden matrix

deep in that beehive-vortex

(10 W. 66th) where music starts

up from the frescoed scene –

that Lincoln Center fount

of gaiety in sound, that

plummet of gravity & Balanchine;

ferrying Fellini to his grand entrance

or steering Isaac Stern

toward the stage, you were

the dancing master’s high romance –

sparkling eye of the champagne

della vita. In your wide

Gypsy glass, hide

me now, Rose – the globe’s your reign.

9.10.15