Earthquake Set Her Poetry in Motion

Men seldom make passes

At girls who wear glasses.

--Dorothy Parker

(1893-1967)

Me thinks there is no bigger cheater

Than the guy who fixed my water heater .

--Geraldine Forer Spagnoli (year of birth unknown)

And to think: Not long ago, Geri Spagnoli, the poet, thought of herself as the underachiever in the family. After all, one daughter is an attorney; the other is an artist who sculpted E.T. for Steven Spielberg. And as for her sister June, well. . .

If Mel Blanc was the Laurence Olivier of voice-over artists, then June Foray is the Katharine Hepburn. She was the voice of Rocket J. Squirrel, the KGB spy Natasha, Witch Hazel and countless commercials. June has such talent she once made manure seem sexy, purring: “Remember: Bandini is the word for fertilizer.”

Geri Forer Spagnoli never had the need to change Forer to Foray. Oh, Geri did a few live TV commercials herself back in the early ‘60s. To the show biz crowd, Geri was June’s sister.

“And what do you do?” June’s friends would ask.

“She gets married,” June would crack of thrice-wed Geri.

So now that she’s “in her 60s” and her latest marriage, to Sam Spagnoli, has lasted 21 years, it must be sweet that Geri may introduce herself as a published poet. Now, it may be true that Geri’s book is self-published, or rather Sam-published, since it was he who assembled the work on home computer. But to read “In the Wake of the Quake” is to be reminded of the whimsy of Ogden Nash and Richard Armour.

A bonus are the doodles of Brian Cole, Geri’s son-in-law. With a couplet about a water-heater cheater, for example, comes a cartoon of the repairman offering his estimate. “$$$$$$$,” he says.

Geri, who lives in Calabasas, sent me a copy of her book a few weeks ago, and after one glance, I dubiously put it aside. My experience with unpublished poets and philosophers has not always been positive. Once in a college English course, a Socrates-on-a-surfboard graced me with a self-published pamphlet of his deep musings. An example: “Ignorance is bliss. No s---. It really is.” That I remember this is, I think, a tribute to something other than its profundity.

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So Geri’s slim volume soon became buried under the daily chaos of faxes, newspapers and more mail. When I did my monthly desk cleaning, I felt like Jed Clampett out shootin’ for some food, when up from the ground come a bubblin’ crude.

Verse, that is. Light verse. Not Texas tea. Poetry.

Actually, Geri’s verse is more refined than crude. To wit:

Before the earthquake did intrude

I went to bed quite in the nude

Now I sleep in sweats instead

For a hasty exit from my bed.

Or this:

Among the experts they debate

Was it six point six

Or six point eight

The Swedes declared it number seven

To me it felt like an eleven

In the era of Beavis and Butt-head, light verse is rarer than a clean joke. Geri has dabbled in the form as long as she can remember, dedicating rhymes to birthdays, anniversaries and other occasions. It wasn’t until the memorable morning of Jan. 17, she says, that the words really started to pour forth. The earthquake was her muse. As Geri observes:

It ‘ s strange that consequences dire

My creativity does inspire

She would fax her ditties to Brian, who would then fax back a corresponding cartoon. Geri’s extended clan had its share of earthquake trouble, but nothing serious enough to keep them from grinning through the adversity. When Geri shared her poems and Brian’s illustrations with friends, they urged her to publish. This was no problem; after all, Sam and Geri had owned a printing business before selling it last year to spend more time riding around on Sam’s motorcycle.

They printed a couple thousand copies. “Sam went crazy,” Geri explains. Only three weeks after the quake, they were done, setting a price of $3.50. It costs to self-publish, after all. Friends would buy several copies to share with other friends. At a beauty salon, one of Geri’s friends showed it to a woman in the advertising racket, who promptly requested several copies. Geri’s sister June gave copies to friends, including some who sit with her on the Board of Governors of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Recently, June received a thank you note.

Dear June,

A necessarily hasty note while I’ve got a few minutes during a taping.

I loved “In the Wake of the Quake!” As did my bride, Felicia . . . Walter is off limning “Einstein” in Princeton and I’ll forward it to him in a day or so.

Your sister’s terrific and so are you . . .

Love, Jack

Fan mail from some flounder? No. That’s Jack as in Lemmon and Walter as in Matthau, whose home was devastated in the quake.

Geri may not be on the best-seller list, but a few hundred copies are floating around now, inspiring chuckles of recognition. Her wisecracking sister now brags about Geri. “She arrived at writing a little bit late,” June says. “But it’s never too late.”

This critic has but one complaint. Fifteen poems and 15 cartoons aren’t quite enough. A paucity of choices should make it easy to pick a favorite, but it doesn’t, and I only have room to share one more. With the end so near, Geri’s own finale seems appropriate, an ode to the way . . .

The Quake has brought out the best in us

Neighbor helping neighbor, in God we trust

So much kindness and all this good feeling

Had warmed up my heart and sent my head reeling

I said “People are nice” as I got on the freeway

I moved over a lane to give a guy leeway

My faith was restored

No more would I scoff

When he gave me the finger

And cut me right off.

Scott Harris’ column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday.