Looking at the Random House

Library of Painting and Sculpture,

Leafing along in Volume 2

In Italian Renaissance Painting,

I admire some excellent paintings

Only to find that they're by someone named

Fra Filippo Lippi  

Aha!

So this is the origin of the name of

The Scandinavian new wave group Fra Lippo Lippi  

I think about telling Ofer,

The guy who runs the great import record store in the Village,

The Record Runner,

And who turned me on to Fra Lippo Lippi,

But I don't tell him  

Some weeks later I call Ofer to order some records  

After getting off the phone,

Making out my check and sealing the envelope with the check,

I remember about Fra Lippo Lippi ‑‑

Should I tell Ofer?  

I decide that I will,

So, the next day I photocopy

The pages with Fra's paintings

And the blurb on him

And reopen the envelope,

Including the photocopied stuff before I mail the envelope  

The next day I'm reading

A Piers Anthony science fiction book called "The Ring"  

I'm well towards the end of the book  

I come to an odd passage

Where a judge is giving

The young hero of the story

A long speech involving 18th Century literary greats,

Which doesn't fit into anything in the story to that point  

The hero, Jeff Font, figures that

This must all contain an important message for him

But he can't decipher the cryptic allusions  

In the middle of all of this the judge says

"I don't suppose you are familiar with Fra Lippo Lippi...?"