Leon Freilich, Poet

For Park Slope’s own poet laureate, most things are better said in verse. We caught up with Leon Freilich to talk poetry and Park Slope.

You say that “Light verse is [your] medium For the war on tedium.” Can you explain?

For a skeptic like me, excessive seriousness hides pomposity and pretension—balloons just begging to be exploded.  Glad to oblige.

How did you get into poetry?

Poems distill the best of language and emotional thought. And light verse, the class cutup of poetry, tweaks the words of everyday along with exotic doings into a new vision, a comic vision of things gone cockeyed and coocoo.

What do you do when you’re not writing up short poems?

I write long light-verse poems. Not to be heavy about it, I've come up with sheer epics—call them schlepics—about such matters as the necessity of having Yogi Berra deliver the State of the Union speech before Congress, Brooklyn's need to secede from "the city" and its outer-borough cousin Manhattan, and how Henry Hudson, otherwise unlucky (crew members set him adrift, never to be found) came to sail up the very rivers that bears his name.

Who are some of your favorite poets?

The master of light verse is Lord Byron, always laughing at everyone around him and himself.  Lesser masters of the art include W. H. Auden, Ogden Nash, Richard Armour and the redoubtable Stephen Sondheim. There are few—more great poems have been written in English than good light verse. That leaves little competition of opportunity for me!

Where are we most likely to spot you around the Slope?

I haunt Starbucks on Seventh Avenue, seated among the tippy-tapping would-be screenwriters.  I walk around Prospect Park twice before breakfast, and then am surprised to find it's time for lunch. I'm a regular at the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music concerts.  You've seen me driving my heap around and around hunting for that most elusive of urban treasures, a legal parking spot good for more than 90 minutes.

What’s your favorite Slope restaurant?

Don't ask.  Every time I fall in love with a restaurant it up and folds. Moutarde seemed to but then came out of its death spin.  Of course I loved its first iteration, which resulted in its serving as a French eatery of postwar Paris where Julia Child (in the movie about her [Julie and Julia]) confides to her husband she has but one passionate interest—eating.  This leads to her studying Gallic—not garlic—cooking.  Writer/director Nora Ephron said no current Paris restaurant looked as authentic as Brooklyn's Moutarde. The owner was so proud, he promptly modernized the decor to match Paris's now-glitzy cafes.

What do you love/hate most about living in Park Slope?

The people. They're liberal and tolerant and brainy and articulate. And then, the Slope is The Complete Town, containing everything a large city offers, only closer and cozier. It's the perfect microcosm—shops, doctors, lawyers, cobblers, omni-mechanics, lit and artistic practitioners, moms and dads. And of course the abundance of sturdy, wide-load strollers. Only the parking's hateful.  But then what excuse do any of us have for owning an unnecessary car?

Why do you think the neighborhood has become stereotyped the way it has?

Envy, impure and simple. It's the city section that works, and—proof positive—no Sloper

willingly leaves.

How has the neighborhood changed since you first moved here?

Since I relocated from Brooklyn Heights here 26 years ago—drawn by PS 321 and its principal, Mr. Casey—it's become even more of a family community, which is all to the good. And when the kids grow up, many stay close to Mom and Dad by moving into the junior Slope, either Prospect Heights or Fort Greene.

Can you write us a poem about Park Slope?

I've written many about P.S.  Take a look:

THE HOUSE ON GARFIELD PLACE

The brownstone just around the corner

Now sports a brilliant fuchsia flair,

Alarming dogs and stopping traffic

On foot, on wheels and in the air.

Park Slopers talk about the building,

Exchanging snarky real-estate jokes

Concerning the home that's become an attraction

Except for the hapless next-door folks.