Ruthless Rhythms: Poems

I wrote my first poem on March 28, 1963, when I was seventeen years old. Exactly four days after my father was finally released from prison to bury my grandfather, who, after a futile seven years of waiting, died of a sudden heart attack. I couldn’t cry. My tears turned into small, sharp icicles that stabbed my soul, and I promised myself I’ll revenge his death. The poems that followed, still in Hungarian, perfectly mirrored my fear of separation, loss of love, and trust. I wrote about the miracle of first love and the painful separation, and about the struggle to fit into a new culture, learn a new language, while digesting the painful past, which caused nightmares. The earlier poems are translations from Hungarian. The others are written directly in English, and I hope I captured the essence of my new experiences and feelings. The poems cover almost fifty years of my life, my love, friendship, children, gains and losses, including the loss of our son Leslie, at age 45 in 2017-he died in a boating accident in New Zealand where he was living with his wife and two small sons. The poems follow my journey through life. My motto had been all along to live in such a way, where in the end I’ll not have any regrets. We travelled, we laughed and cried, created and shared many happy memories. The title RUTHLESS RHYTHM came to mind when I was first forced to face up to my new life in a new country, and how the upheaval shook me to the core, forcing me to re- evaluate my life and attitude.