Somerville Mayor Emeritus Gene Brune.

By Gene Brune

I recently learned that The Boston Strangler is being filmed once more in the surrounding Boston communities, bringing back memories of my minor, but exciting, association with the Boston Strangler.

During the 1960’s to 1979, I was working as a structural steel miscellaneous iron draftsman. I actually started out right here in Somerville in the engineering department of Groisser and Schlager Iron Works, which I am sure few Somerville residents still remember. It was located on Washington Street where Coble Hill Elderly Housing has been located since the 1980’s.

(The opinions and views expressed in the commentaries and letters to the Editor of The Somerville Times belong solely to the authors and do not reflect the views or opinions of The Somerville Times, its staff or publishers)

By Dr. Ian Halim

There is a myth that the mighty titan Prometheus betrayed Zeus by stealing fire and giving it to humans. In the ancient tale, the gift of fire allows humans to begin learning different crafts. To humankind, Prometheus came to represent a kind of tutor, the divine patron of the arts and sciences. But Zeus saw things differently and punished the great titan for his theft, ordering him chained to a rock, and commanding an eagle to tear out his liver again and again. Each time Zeus’s eagle ripped out Prometheus’s liver, the organ would regenerate, only to be pecked out again.

Congratulations to all our local public servants who were sworn in for new or additional terms this week. We especially congratulate our new mayor, Katjana Ballantyne. She will have her hands full, but we are confident that she will do an exceptionally fine job. Let’s wish all of them the best and hope that they serve all of our interests as fairly and effectively as possible.

The Somerville YMCA (Somerville Y) is pleased to announce they are actively working to secure a site to build a new YMCA in Somerville. The new facility will allow the YMCA to provide transformational programs, services, and opportunities to an ever-broadening cross-section of the Somerville community. To assist this effort, the Economic Development Division of the City of Somerville, which support new entities and nonprofit organizations in their search for Somerville locations, is aiding the process.

In spite of the vastly divergent range of opinions held by all of us here in Somerville and in our neighboring communities, we can unite in the spirit of hope and bipartisanship as we congratulate and honor those who took their respective oaths of office this week.

It is so easy to sit back and play “armchair quarterback” as our city officials wrestle with the day-to-day and long-term issues that impact our lives to greater or lesser degrees. We can question and kibitz and complain until we are blue in the face. At the end of the day, it is those men and women who have taken up the burden of leadership who must deliver on their promise to serve our best interests in the most efficient and productive ways possible.

Eagle Feathers #244 – The Forgotten

By Bob (Monty) Doherty

It wasn’t long ago that a stately animal worked as a lifeline to our civilization transforming communication, farming, construction and power. He has been with us for over 4,000 years working alongside man sharing his strength and stamina.

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Review by Off the Shelf Correspondent Denise Provost

Translating poetry, perhaps even more than writing poetry, is a labor of love. It is also a prickly intellectual and linguistic task, posing unanswerable questions at every turn. Not just each line of poetry, but every word presents a judgement call; each poem a series of seemingly impossible choices.

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After retiring from Brandeis faculty, Karen Klein returned to studying modern dance and began writing contemporary lyric poetry. She performed for eight seasons with Across the Ages Dance and 15 seasons with Prometheus Dance Elders Ensemble. Her poems have been published online and in print, read on radio and television, and choreographed for dancers. The first use of her poems as structure for dance performance appeared in Prometheus Dance Company’s full-length, evening production Desiderare in 2011 and 2012. In 2016 she founded teXtmoVes, a collaborative of poets, dancers, and musicians; teXtmoVes has performed steadily since then, most recently at Starlight Square, Cambridge. Klein continues to study dance, to perform, and to write poems. She is a member of Steeple Street Poets and the Bards.

Hello residents of Somerville and Happy New Year. I am speaking to you, as I have for the past two years, from a remote location due to the Covid-19 pandemic.  While we continue to combat this crisis, there are many things to be grateful for in the new year.