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Cleveland Heights Poet Laureate
The Poet Laureate is appointed annually by
Cleveland Heights City
Council during April, National Poetry Month, and
serves for two years. The principal official duty of
the Laureate is to write and present poems for
public events during the term of office. The fourth
Poet Laureate, Gail Bellamy, was appointed by
City Council on Monday, April 20, 2009.
Bellamy is a 20-year resident of Cleveland
Heights. In addition to writing poetry, she is
Executive Editor of Restaurant Hospitality
magazine, and is the author of Cleveland Food
Memories. Here is her first official
poem:
The Meat in a History Sandwich
On the night I first arrive in Cleveland
Heights,
Cedar Hill is slick, shiny as a buckeye in the
rain.
Riding with the realtor, I squint at street
signs,
am tangled in the twists of Overlook
and
Derbyshire,
as we meander through the architecture of the
past.
When we stop, I feel like the meat in a history
sandwich.
I imagine those high-rise silver maples as
saplings,
back when horse hooves clopped like rhythm
blocks down Kenilworth,
when the Cleveland Press heralded the Euclid
Heights Allotment
as 'The Finest Residential Property in
Cleveland'
and the City and Suburban Realty Company
was peddling 'Real Homes for Real People' west
of Superior.
I’m sandwiched in, slathered with the view on
both sides; seeing peeled-away
bark of the sycamores, I recall a relative
revealing layers of detail
about her high school prom held just over there at
The Alcazar in 1942.
All the boys went off to war immediately
afterward.
I envision them ballroom dancing their way to the
recruiter,
marching in swing tune cadence to Glenn Miller’s
Moonlight Cocktail.
I slide along wet leaves on a quarry-slab of a
front walk,
note that the venerable oak door of the old house
has a hairline crack,
so the past can slip through in either direction.
Inside, the heat is cranked up.
I hear laughter in the kitchen, see somebody
assembling sandwiches.
I smell oranges, coffee, and wool sweaters drying
on the radiator,
steaming the windows with contagious coziness
and all the warmth of home.
–Gail Bellamy
For more information about the Poet Laureate
project, visit the Heights Arts website.
OTHER STORIES
Community Improvement Awards/Historic
Preservation Awards
Taylor Road Traffic Signal Removal
Strategic Development Plan Draft
Schoolhouse Lecture Series: The Case of the
Disappearing Mansions
Consumer Confidence Water Report
Cedar Fairmount Transportation & Streetscape
Study
American Recovery and Reinvestment Report
National Registry Lists Grant Deming's ''Forest Hill''
Fifth Third's BillPayer 2000 Service to Cease
Operation
Special Assessment Information
New Feature: Photo Gallery
Block Parties
Historic Images of Cleveland Heights Now Available
Online
2008 Sanitary Sewer Overflow Report
Cleveland Heights Stimulus Funds Report/American
Recovery and Reinvestment Act
City Hall Hours
Cleveland Heights Update on the Stimulus Funds
CH-UH Adult Basic and Literacy Education Program
City Awarded Funds from the Homelessness
Prevention Fund
Electric and Gas Aggregation Programs
H1N1Flu Information
City Council Passes Ordinance Amending the 2009
Budget
Cleveland Heights Government Television Now on
Channel 20
City Allocated Recovery Act Funding
Orange Barrel Alert
Ruffing Montessori School Achieves LEED
Certification
Cleveland Heights Poet Laureate
New! Lost/Found Pet Registry
Publicize Your Event on our Community Calendar!
Top of the Hill Development
RECYCLE YOUR TECHNO-TRASH
Water Rates
Officer Jason D. West Memorial Scholarship
Cities Awarded Funds for Regional Communication
System
Historical Center at Superior Schoolhouse
Register to Vote
Heritage Home Loan Program
Waste Disposal Bags
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