Remembering...
These are people I remember

Inspector General

Irene Cocco

Jack L. Mautino, Sr.

Joe Salsburg

Tom Richards

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Joe Salsburg (1917-1996), my mentor, friend and colleague.

A MEMORIAL POEM FOR JOE SALSBURG

Joe, how do you say good-bye,

Farewell, forever and a day,

How do you bear the agony

And find the words to say

That make life more meaningful

When in silence it slips away?

You asked, how long do I have,

A rhetorical question, true,

And I said, we have an eternity,

The answer you already knew.

Like so many others you taught

Who listened to what you said,

And learned,

I too followed where you led.

Yes, at times you could be exasperating,

Stubborn, impatient, and, some might think, mean;

And yet you wept unashamedly

When students performed at their best in a scene.

When both old and young respond with love,

All barriers to peace disappear between.

Joe, no one prepared a better martini

With just the right mixture of gin and vermouth,

And no one was better at dialect jokes,

Couth or uncouth,

Or gave better line readings that expressed a character's truth.

You with your fabulous radio voice

And mesmerizing presence on a stage,

Who could read any of my poems better than I

And give each a life beyond the printed page,

And who introduced me to computers

Before they became the campus rage,

And who loved good food

Whether Jewish or Indian or Japanese,

And who knew that you face adversity

On your feet and not on your knees,

Who knew that love songs are written

By a sensitive and demanding mind,

And who tested the limits of his tolerance

And ours, thereby strengthening the ties that bind,

Who could light up the darkness around us -

"Magic time" creates its own spell -

You reached deeper into the heart

Than any words of mine can tell,

Joe, you graced our lives,

Our memories are here to stay:

With Shirley, Felice (and Mollie), Jackie, Brett, Shelley, and David,

We've all come a long, long way.

And, of course, your always handy

And irrepressible and affectionate Sandy.

Now, as we celebrate the anniversary of your life

We search for the right words to say

That will make life more meaningful

Forever and a day.

Joe, how do you say good-bye

When you know our love is here to stay...

--ALFRED S. GROH
December 29, 1996

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