On the Poem Not Read by Stephen Gyllenhaal
Naomi's stepmother Sharon, her father Sam, her husband Steve. Today, Good Friday, with a fire in the Hollywood Hills (no one killed thank goodness, fire set by careless teenagers on vacation), Stephen gave a reading in Huntington Beach, Orange County for a poetry organization so filthily compromised I’m not even going to mention its name. Attendant were Steve’s in-laws, while Michael’s and my companion in this adventure was a friend who works near Cedars Sinai and, who, by an astonishing coincidence, turned out to work in the same building—on the same floor—as Stephen’s stepmother-in-law. Here’s Stephen with 89-year-old Sam Achs (Naomi’s maiden name is Achs, not Foner ) and his very pleasant wife, Sharon, who is about Naomi’s age. This was the reading where Stephen finally admitted that his poem, “While Cutting Carrots for Dinner”, was actually his fantasy about stabbing Naomi to death with a kitchen knife . “But I’m not going to read it tonight,” he announced to the b