All of us know people who wouldn't wear an article of clothing that had ever before been touched, let alone worn, by somebody else, and others who could care less.

As I write this column I'm wearing a favorite thrift shop sweater, so . . . This poem first appeared in Minnesota Review.

Emily Rose Cole is from Pennsylvania, and her most recent chapbook is “Love and a Loaded Gun” from Minerva Rising Press.

What Makes a Pearl

When she died, I took my mother's socks,
those fuzzy polka-dotted ones she'd worn

in hospice. I wore them all through winter.

Maybe that's creepy. But is it really so different
from the necklace she willed to me,

that single pearl clinging to its strand of silver?

The necklace isn't creepy. Every day for a year
I hung it over my heart, even in the shower,

even when it felt heavy as a beggar's first coin.

I want to say that having these things was like having a scar
but worse. In winter, socks are as inevitable as scars,

except there's more choice in it: when I was cold,
I chose which socks, and whose.

But I'm wrong. These tokens I harvested
from her deathbed are more like the pearl,

or rather, what makes a pearl:

that piece of sand, the irritant that the nacre
builds itself around, that tiny, everyday object

that, little by little, learns to glow.


American Life in Poetry does not accept unsolicited manuscripts. It is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2018 by Emily Rose Cole, "What Makes a Pearl," from the Minnesota Review, (No. 90, 2018). Poem reprinted by permission of Emily Rose Cole and the publisher. Introduction copyright @2019 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

‘HUSTLERS’ (Rated R)

Whenever a movie is inspired by true events as in the case of “Hustlers,” there is a natural curiosity to learn the backstory of a movie that focuses on the intersection of sexual exploitation, illicit drugs, larceny, greed and power set in the seedy world of strip clubs.

The article “The Hustlers at Scores,” written by Jessica Pressler for New York magazine in 2015, recounts the players in a criminal ring of strippers who drugged men and entertained them at nightclubs while racking up enormous charges on their credit cards.

The arc of criminal activity in “Hustlers” ties into the run up to, as well as the aftermath of, the global financial crisis of 2008 when Wall Street investment banking firms went bankrupt and the mortgage market was blowing up.

At the start of 2007, Dorothy (Constance Wu) is a young woman struggling to make ends meet, to provide for herself and her aging grandma. Working at a strip club may have been an act of desperation but seemed like a golden opportunity to grab a decent sum of cash.

Faced with the reality of a business steeped in graft and corruption, her job was not easy. Club managers, DJs, bouncers and bartenders expected a cut of the earnings, leaving Dorothy all-too-often taking home a meager payday after a long night of stripping.

Adopting the stage name Destiny, her life is forever changed when she meets Ramona (Jennifer Lopez), the club’s top money earner, who is first seen dazzling a crowd of mostly businessmen in suits tossing wads of cash her way as she twirls around the pole with acrobatic ease.

Without any doubt, Ramona is a force to be reckoned with, demonstrating that she’s always in control, knowing just how to tease money out of the hands of her clientele as if she were taking candy from a baby.

For Destiny’s good fortune, the two women form a bond, and Ramona offers a crash course in the various poses and pole moves like the carousel, fireman, front hook and ankle-hook (thanks to the press notes for the nomenclature of stripper movements).

Since her main interest in stripping is financial survival, Destiny finds that mentoring from Ramona, along with another stripper (Cardi B) teaching the art of lap dancing, is the most effective way to overcome her apparent lack of talent for the business.

Forming an enticing duo, Ramona and Destiny start working together in the champagne room to please the Wall Street high rollers with their exotic, seductive moves that are far more suggestive than titillating.

Along comes the Great Recession of 2008 and Wall Street takes a giant hit, thereby turning the previous huge cash flow from the brokers into the hands of the strippers into a mere trickle, causing Destiny and Ramona to go their separate ways.

Ramona goes to work in retail and dreams of creating her own clothing line. Destiny becomes a mother to a baby girl. Neither one is satisfied with an ordinary life that fails them as breadwinners and persons in control.

Becoming innovative to new methods, Ramona and Destiny recruit Mercedes (Keke Palmer) and innocent-looking Annabelle (Lili Reinhart) to frequent upscale bars to target potential male clients.

Crossing the line into illicit activity, the women have the knack of finding wealthy men they hoodwink by spiking their cocktails with ketamine and MDMA so that they will become pliable victims handing over their credit cards.

They have no qualms about maxing out the credit cards in one evening of sexual tease of nearly comatose clients. As one cop is quoted in the magazine article, men “don’t want to admit to being victimized by women.” The result is basically carte blanche for larceny by the strippers.

The game is working really well for the stripper squad until competitors get into the act. As challenges pile on, Ramona recruits other to keep a good thing going, and this is where mistakes are made.

The entrepreneurial spirit of Ramona and her crew eventually runs into serious glitches, and it is certainly a detriment when a junkie like Dawn (Madeline Brewer) becomes a catalyst to their world collapsing when a client offers credible evidence of malfeasance to the police.

Jennifer Lopez may be the big star in “Hustlers,” but the backbone of the story belongs to Constance Wu as her character, at various points, is interviewed by the magazine journalist (Julia Stiles) for her version of the sordid business.

“Hustlers” doesn’t paint an exactly pretty picture of the players. Coming off for the worst, Wall Street dudes are mostly arrogant, crude and ultimately pathetic. The strippers, seemingly disadvantaged and working the system, are hardly angelic.

Though the film is an entertaining look at grubby manipulation and payback, the Jessica Pressler article proves to be an even more fascinating revelation of flawed individuals in pursuit of either hedonistic pleasures or financial gain.

The best bet is to first take in “Hustlers” at the cinema and then read the magazine article that inspired the film.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

MIDDLETOWN, Calif. – This Friday, Sept. 27, you can catch a four band concert featuring a new generation of local and regional alternative, grunge and indie rock bands at the Middletown Art Center.

The performances start promptly at 7 p.m. Doors open at 6:30 p.m.

LuvBug productions in partnership with the Middletown Art Center, is proud to present the event.

“I am super excited to help cultivate a local live music scene which we started last month with the Higher Logic Project”, said LuvBug producer Matthew Barash. “The season change evokes some heavier riffs, which is why we chose this lineup of alternative / indie­ / grunge bands for this Friday’s September concert."

The evening begins with Middletown’s JFK with their feel good groove rock, followed by Death n’ Taxes from Napa and their psychedelic acid rock. The headliner Milk for the Angry, who have been making a splash in the Bay Area with their high-energy alternative grunge will perform after that.

Closing out the evening will be Clearlake’s Wormhead entrancing us with their psychedelic grunge sound. Wormhead recently returned from a tour with Death n’ Taxes throughout Oregon and Washington.

"I'm really excited to be a part of bringing alternative rock to our community”, said Jeremy Cremer, front man for Wormhead. "Growing up here I always wanted to see more cool and different sounding local bands perform, not just strictly hardcore metal and country music.
Indie and alternative rock always felt sort of left out here, and now we're bringing in some new local talent to fill that void."

Be sure to catch this exciting show of emerging bands featuring original music as well as some choice covers. Admission is $10 and there will be a no host bar onsite (must be 21 or older to purchase alcohol). All ages welcome. Kids movies will be screened in back but parents must supervise their children.

For links to music videos of the featured bands visit www.middletownartcenter.org/events.

The MAC is located at 21456 State Highway 175 at the junction of Highway 29 in the heart of Middletown.

The MAC Gallery’s regular hours are Thursday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Friday, 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Saturday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.; and Sunday, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Trailside Park is open dawn to dusk daily and the 14th annual Sculpture Walk will be on view through Oct. 30.

To stay up to date on classes, exhibits and events, and support this valuable Lake County arts and culture resource visit www.middletownartcenter.org.

Although this poem by Patrick Phillips, from American Poetry Review, is dedicated to a person we don't know, "For Paul" conveys feelings we've all experienced.

We don't need to know who "Paul" is. The poem is about sadness and resignation, and all of us have felt like this.

The poet's most recent collection of poems is Elegy for a Broken Machine, published by Knopf.

For Paul

I can see you through the bonfire, with us.
A fifth of Old Crow circling the dark.

Where did that whole life go? In Texas
the chemo inches toward your heart,

things always dwindling to just the two of us,
a crumpled cigarette, a distant car:

our voices, at dawn, so clearly posthumous.
Woodsmoke rising to the ashy stars.

American Life in Poetry does not accept unsolicited manuscripts. It is made possible by The Poetry Foundation, publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2018 by Patrick Phillips, "For Paul," from the American Poetry Review, (Vol. 47, no. 6, 2018). Poem reprinted by permission of Patrick Phillips and the publisher. Introduction copyright @2019 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006.

‘THE GOLDFINCH’ (Rated R)

American author Donna Tartt won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2014 for the 784-page coming-of-age novel “The Goldfinch,” which I did not have time to read before seeing the movie. What’s more, the local bookstore didn’t carry the Cliff’s Notes version.

How to adapt this massive tome into a film story of grief and shame, guilt and obsession, survival and self-invention was left to Academy Award nominee Peter Straughan (the 2011 dramatic thriller “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy”).

The center of “The Goldfinch” is the achingly poignant journey of 13-year-old Theo Decker (Oakes Fegley), who last saw his mother as she was gliding away from him into another gallery of New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.

The non-lineal recounting of Theo’s anxious passage in life results in the opening scene showing a troubled adult Theo (Ansel Elgort) in a hotel room in Amsterdam facing a personal crisis that suggests his life is on the verge of a possible suicidal ending.

Flashing back to the art museum, young Theo finds his life shattered when a terrorist bomb explodes taking the lives of many visitors, including his mother, while destroying priceless works of art.

For the rest of his life, Theo will be haunted by the traumatic event at the museum, as he and his mom should not have been at the museum that day, resulting in his lifelong feeling of survivor’s guilt.

Theo’s mother had been called to his school because her son had gotten into some trouble, but they were early and it was raining, so they ducked into the famous New York museum to look at Dutch masterpieces.

Dutch painter Carel Fabritius’s “The Goldfinch,” portrait of a small bird tethered to its perch on display at the museum, happened to the mother’s favorite. Ironically, the painter died in a 1654 gunpowder explosion that also destroyed most of his work.

While Theo’s gaze was caught by pretty redheaded Pippa (Aimee Laurence), his life was spared. The horrific blast created a gray moonscape of choking dust, debris and death, and in the rubble was the painting of the chained bird.

With his dying breath, an elderly gentleman named Blackwell urges Theo to take the priceless artwork of the goldfinch and deliver his ring to his partner Hobie (Jeffrey Wright) at an antique store.

In Hobie, Theo finds a lifelong mentor who tutors on the fine art of the restoration and dealing of antiques, leading to the adult Theo’s career path that ends up on shaky ground when a slippery art dealer (Denis O’Hare) lodges accusations of forging antiques for sale.

With deadbeat father Larry (Luke Wilson) nowhere in sight, young Theo is placed with the family of one of his school friends, the Barbours, where he forms a bond with Mrs. Barbour (Nicole Kidman), who shares his appreciation of art.

The upper-class Barbour family lives on ritzy Park Avenue, with a patriarch (Boyd Gaines) who seemingly cares only about sailing during the summer months in Maine. On the other hand, the stylish, reserved Mrs. Barbour gradually offers Theo tender affection.

Just when Theo is comfortable in his new home, the estranged dad shows up with his floozy girlfriend Xandra (Sarah Paulson) to take his son to live in a desolate exurb of Las Vegas where surrounding homes are boarded up for foreclosure sales.

Befriended by Russian-born delinquent Boris (Finn Wolfhard), the only boy in the neighborhood, Theo falls into a world of illicit drugs, drinking and smoking, trying to escape a family life marked by his father’s careless disregard and flights of anger.

When tragedy strikes, young Theo decides to flee Sin City, after scraping together enough cash to buy a bus ticket back to New York City, where Hobie is sure to provide shelter.

Reaching adulthood, Theo has held on to the stolen painting, keeping it wrapped in newspaper as a metaphorical reminder of his beloved mother. Yet, the artwork is a secret talisman, which both comforts and torments him.

Meanwhile, Theo achieves financial success as an antiques dealer, dressing fashionably and reconnecting with the Barbour family, and then becoming engaged to Kitsey Barbour (Willa Fitzgerald).

Romantic complications arise when Theo realizes he still has feelings for the now adult Pippa (Ashleigh Cummings), but nothing upends his life more than the chance encounter with adult Boris (Aneurin Barnard) and his ties to the criminal underworld.

Even though lacking familiarity with the source material, I would venture to say that the filmmakers were challenged to distill an expansive story with a lot of characters into a compelling narrative that works for a two and a half hours running time.

And yet, for what seems counterintuitive in regards to the abundance of storylines and potential for prolonged character development, “The Goldfinch” is too often lackluster, plodding and aimless.

Devotees of Donna Tartt’s opus may be curious to see the silver screen adaptation if for no better reason than to contemplate missed opportunities. All things considered, “The Goldfinch” appears to be tethered to its own cinematic limitations.

Tim Riley writes film and television reviews for Lake County News.

LAKEPORT, Calif. – The 1962 drama, “The Miracle Worker,” starring Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke, screens at the Soper Reese Theatre on Tuesday, Sept. 24, at 1 and 6 p.m.

Entry to the film is by donation.

Arthur Penn directed this tense and riveting film version of William Gibson’s play about Helen Keller, a blind and deaf adolescent whose increasingly wild, angry behavior causes her desperate parents to hire teacher Anne Sullivan whose methods are forceful and unusual.

An eight-minute sequence where Sullivan attempts to teach the pupil some manners stands as one of the most electrifying and honest ever committed to film.

Bancroft and Duke both won Academy Awards for their startling, physical performances.

The movie is sponsored by the California Retired Teachers Assn. CalRTA Div. 35. Not rated. Run time is 1 hour and 47 minutes.

The Soper Reese Theatre is located at 275 S. Main St., Lakeport, 707-263-0577, www.soperreesetheatre.com.