Joel Solkoff

Joel Solkoff Poems

Joel Solkoff Biography

ABOUT ME 2019 ABOUT ME UPDATE In 1976 while researching a book on international food policy, I interviewed Secretary of agriculture Earl Butz. I was 28 years old and had just had surgery to remove a lump under my right arm. My physician had left a message on my telephone answering machine. Before leaving my Capitol Hill apartment, I checked the messages and there were several–increasingly frantic–from Dr. Amiel Segal. Not wanting to be late for my appointment, I called from USDA’s South Building where I was instantly put through to my physician who insisted I immediately come into his office. I asked why. Dr. Segal said he could not tell me over the phone. “What’s so important that you can’t see me right now? ” I said, “I have an interview with the Secretary of Agriculture in ten minutes; he’s more important than you.” That is how I found out I had cancer. The interview progressed smoothly in an altered like state. Afterward, following surgery, friends and relatives rushed to my hospital bed convinced I would die shortly. I have come to regard agriculture policy in much the same fashion as the widow of the Winchester rifle fortune regarded continual work on her San Jose Winchester Mystery House. As long as the work continued without cease–her fortune-teller predicted–she would never die. I have maintained a more liberal approach than the fortune-teller insisted upon–fathering two daughters, greeting the approach of a granddaughter, publishing books on other subjects–including housing policy and surviving cancer. Throughout it all, I maintain the superstitious belief that as long as I continue to research and write about the politics of agriculture I will live forever. Currently, I am at work on a blueprint for economic policies that will insure that no one in the world dies of starvation. As I write,20 million people are in danger of doing so; every ten minutes, a child in Yemen dies needlessly for want of food. http: //www.joelsolkoff.com/book-store/books/the-politics-of-food/ One consequence of the treatment for cancer that saved my life was that radiation permanently damaged my spine. For over twenty years, I have been a paraplegic–not in a wheel chair but in a battery-powered mobility device which takes me so rapidly to my destination that friends and strangers on the street comment on the speed which takes me from hither to yon. A frequent comment is, “If you don’t slow down, they will take your license away.” Unfortunately, my “license” is valid only in a limited zero-tolerance world. For equality–equality in jobs, housing, wooing women–I experience discrimination comparable to that of African-Americans in Selma, Alabama in 1963. The segregation I experience is one that destroys talent and imprisons within a society unaware (as James Baldwin described it so well) that limits not only the oppressed but the oppressor. Hence, I not only passionate about feeding the hungry, I am also passionate about disability rights. [Catch me if you can.] https: //www.youtube.com/watch? v=dlC6iVJ7M1g&t=5s Interests: Author of The Politics of Food and Learning to Live Again: My Triumph Over Cancer http: //www.joelsolkoff.com/book-store/books/learning-to-live-again-my-triumph-over-cancer/ http: //www.joelsolkoff.com/book-store/books/the-politics-of-food/ ++++ My name is Joel Solkoff. I am basically an optimistic guy. I am a paraplegic. Webster’s Tenth College edition defines paraplegia as: “paralysis of the lower half of the body with involvement of both legs.” I get around on a POV scooter. Indeed I have restored the original front wheel drive scooter that got me into mobility equipment when I so badly needed it. http: //www.joelsolkoff.com/about-me/ _______________________________________________________)

The Best Poem Of Joel Solkoff

Forty For Melissa Lyon

FORTY for Melissa Lyon

" Music that I heard with you was more than music/"
—Conrad Aiken

The winding corridor brought us together
In the 1919 rubber factory
Where painted mice find salvation in baseboard images of home.

Slowly, we took the freight elevator to breakfast late or lunch early.
We touched along a route reminiscent perhaps of an old Jerusalem
Wherein the finding isakin to the stations of the cross
Revealing options.

The options include you playing your harp
At a wedding or cocktail party or yoga opening
The music of David, Mozart, and meditation.

More options provide a training program
For home ownership silent enlightenment
For creation of a family for you and Mr. X.

2

Later you chalk my name and title upon the studio door
Before the entrance is sealed.

You return to 1956 with a Gaga guitar song
And brochures on fishing from a Lycoming bank center
Then to the clarity of that sphere.

Selah.

3

Now that you are 40 you will live forever
Beautiful in a special little house in the woods
Your retreat providing access, hope, and joy.

Selah.

- Joel Solkoff
Lycoming County Pennsylvania
July,2019

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