Natural Order

Natural Order

All's not as it seems,
precisely that, infamous
momentary bliss,
the taste of lemon
in chocolate gabardine,
a treat from heaven
dropped into middle
ground and I standing with you
at this position,
deep change in the light
as you turn in your windings,
turn in your burnt wings.

April 10, 2010 9:18 PM

"The world of the living contains enough marvels and mysteries acting upon our emotions and intelligence in ways so inexplicable that it would almost justify the conception of life as an enchanted state.

"No, I am too firm in my consciousness of the marvelous to ever be fascinated by the mere supernatural." - Joseph Conrad

Don't try to connect the poem and Lojban. Well, there might be a connection through the title of the poem, sort of. Lojban is a constructed language that is promoted by The Logical Language Group. *click here*

I have never heard of this group and its language. The reason it came up, Rinsa is a word in Lojban, means "greet", and the photo has that name at the bottom. I was looking for "rinsa" to explain the photo and Lojban came up. Rinsa, the photomanipulator did not appear in my Google search.

Lojban is a carefully constructed spoken language designed in the hope of removing a large portion of the ambiguity from human communication. It was made well-known by a Scientific American article and references in science fiction. Lojban has been built over five decades by dozens of workers and hundreds of supporters.

Lojban is a good candidate for human computer interactions because nearly every possible ambiguity has been prevented in so far as possible in the language. That means it can be mapped to number and manipulated by very clear rules of logic. It is therefore far more easily programmable for use in AI research and other computer uses. It is also, like Esperanto, a language that can serve as a common tongue in world communications if enough people decide to use it thus. Further, Lojban is a long term research tool in a number of linguistic questions if only "native speakers" of the language can be created. In the beginning, the linguistic research possibilities served as the impulse to create the language. Because Lojban was created, beginning in the fifties and basically completed with a 1350 word vocabulary in the nineties, it can be seen as a laboratory which reveals brain/mind function in contrast to the other languages which are organic to human culture. Here is what Lojban sounds like

Arrogant Men

An arrogant man -

George Armstrong Custer (December 5, 1839 – June 25, 1876) was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the Indian Wars. Raised in Michigan and Ohio, Custer was admitted to West Point in 1858, where he graduated last in his class. However, with the outbreak of the Civil War, all potential officers were needed, and Custer was called to serve with the Union Army.
Custer developed a strong reputation during the Civil War. He fought in the first major engagement, the First Battle of Bull Run. His association with several important officers helped his career, as did his success as a highly effective cavalry commander. Custer was eventually promoted to the temporary rank (brevet) of major general. (At war's end, he reverted to his permanent rank of captain.) At the conclusion of the Appomattox Campaign, in which he and his troops played a decisive role, Custer was on hand at General Robert E. Lee's surrender.
After the Civil War, Custer was dispatched to the west to fight in the Indian Wars. His disastrous final battle overshadowed his prior achievements. Custer and all the men with him were killed at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876, fighting against a coalition of Native American tribes in a battle that has come to be popularly known in American history as "Custer's Last Stand"

Custer is controversial. In his day he was praised in the press and by many military men as well. However, there were also military men who thought him a buffoon, full of bluster and little substance, and the battle mainly a stupid waste. By today's standards of course, he was a total bigot.

Another Arrogant Man -

I did not ask to be here. I didn't ask to be born.

That was my teenage lament. In those years I was deeply resentful at my lot. I was absolutely lost and my people did not help. I did not understand the comfort they offered and I ran away as much as I could, not being very brave and ashamed with myself for my timidity. I was ugly enough about it that I made my family pay. Later as I found my way toward some kind of awkward emancipation I made them pay even more.

The vestiges of those resentments are still available to me. I still seek to blame sometimes, if not you then some part of me I can cast off like a broken shell.

Of course now, in my best self, I know very well that I asked to be here, in fact demanded it. I am more or less here much like a fellow leaves the hospital "against medical advice". I think I have something to prove by it. I think I will return to God's throne with compelling evidence how He fucked this all up.

Surely, I am an arrogant man.

I am not going to apologize to all you people for my arrogance. How could I? I would not be here like this or any other way without His permission. I already know that in every other way I cannot hope to succeed in my lifework without developing a huge compassion and capacity to love. Only through that can I possibly hold the truth in some holy light.

No One To Blame

I did not ask to be here.
It is not my fault.
Someone is to blame.
I am sure of that, old man.
Is it you to blame?
Your blameworthiness
is truly legendary.
I heard those whispers.
In fact without you
I could not breathe very well
I don't think. I'd gasp
like a stranded fish.

May 25, 2012 3:12 PM

Round Three

Tonight, oddly enough, I was in a discussion about anger. In that discussion I was remembering my fighting style. Let's say you are in an argument with me but you don't escalate with me. All of a sudden you have the "high ground" because you are still at peace. I will pick and pick and will continue at you until finally you explode so you are as distraught as I am. Then we will go a few rounds. I will of course be certain I have won because I knew all along I was right. I will depart at this point because I always have a retreat possible and I will be sure of myself until the chemistry in me eases up. Then I will be in remorse. I will feel horrible and while of course I am still right I will be in a hurry also to return and try for peace because I had no right to pick at you like that. I will be careful to skirt the topic of our contention because it is not polite to point out that you are so wrong. Isn't it just a really difficult life for those of us who are right?

I was taught a while back that I might want to consider if this is the particular hill I want to die on.

Also, here are three questions: is it true? Is it necessary? Is it kind? If an opinion passes all three, then sharing might keep the peace.

So here is a poem written a couple years back...

Round Three

We argue, land blows
get knocked down, stand up again,
crying bitter tears,
and try again, just
demanding our rights again,
wishing this closure
that feels essential
to it all, some monument
to mean crazy pain.

April 9, 2010 5:46 AM

Invitatory

David Anointed By Samuel, the Dura Synagogue, Syria

ca. 1400 CE

Thom writes:
Each week, I post three words. You write something using the words.

Then come back and post a link to the contribution with Mr. Linky (but please, link to the exact post, not your blog, by clicking on the exact post title and paste it to Mr. Linky below). As always, there's no hard-and-fast rule that you have to post on Wednesday.

To link up with this week's Three Word Wednesday *click here*

This week's words:

Flesh; Novice; Sear

David's Invitatory

The flesh speaks for me.
Oh I am but a novice
in the holy work.
Sear the words upon my brow.

You speak, rosy light.
Oh God peel me like new fruit
that I may stand here
free of all my crusty ways.

May 23, 2012 8:50 AM

Liberal Prayer

Dear Lord,

I know that I don't talk to you that much,
but this year you have taken away:
my favorite inventor, Steve Jobs,
my favorite writer, JD Salinger,
my favorite actress, Elizabeth Taylor,
my favorite musician, Clarence Clemons,
my favorite newsman, Mike Wallace
and my favorite singer,Whitney Houston.


I just wanted to let you know
that my favorite radio announcers are Rush Limbaugh and Glen Beck.

Life Patterns

The lost tooth was real in 2010. One day it cracked apart, a molar and its removal was not happy. Some pliers and chisel work were required. I have not had the money to replace it.

Life Patterns

The story I want
to tell is not about me
but about wizards
as they gather near
the oak in high hot summer
and another mage
in those years long gone
more sturdy in his gray dreams
than today's flat ware.
My pulled tooth still aches.

April 9, 2010 8:35 AM

I am happy to report that the phantom aching tooth at the time I wrote the poem has long ago quieted down.

Payback Is Hell

The Circus With the Yellow Clown, 1967, Marc Chagall

The thing about Marc is how many works he has given the world...google his images *click here* and let yourself meditate on his work in page after page of color. You will see, no doubt that his is a language of the heart.

Payback Is Hell

Oh I don't really
know how to go from Russia
to France - perhaps march
west into the guns?

Napoleon's army came
east and then they failed
in the winter snow.
So did the black Nazi slime.
Me, I will pay back
the bastards with work,
with my torrent of color
and my long strange lines.

May 20, 2012 10:55 AM

So the annular eclipse passes my area today in the late afternoon. I read in one source that my area will be left with about 26% of the sunlight in a crescent at maximum. They say it stays bright but goes cold. Unfortunately as is typical of Portland at this time of year, the rain pattern approaches and the clouds are back after many days of sun. How far south must I go? Going south pulls the eclipse toward center so that the remaining sun is a ring around the moon's shadow. Well, old friend, it's just a moon shadow. Who cares anyhow? *sniff*



Posted for The Mag - link *click here*

We Thought We Would Marry

A reverie for this day, an almost true history, a true story nonetheless...in all the parallel worlds that I inhabit, somewhere this is directly true. I had to dredge a bit and then sharpen my recall so this comes from far away. In my current life it is merely an echo. I too have thought we would marry.

We Thought We Would Marry

Stumps of toppled trees
hewn years ago - cut by men
of pioneer stripe -
align my edges,
are lit by the last dim sun
of this evening.
I hear you pass by,
the usual clamor of joy,
your mate in the work,
in the warp, the weft,
the fabric you weave for us,
for all those you love.

‎May ‎17, ‎2012 4:03 PM

Saint Bartholomew by Jusepe de Ribera
1591-1652

"Many of us spend our whole lives running from feeling with the mistaken belief that we cannot bear the pain. But you have already borne the pain. What you have not done is feel all you are beyond the pain." - Saint Bartholomew

St. Bartholomew, 1st. century, one of the 12. All that is known of him with certainty is that he is mentioned in the synoptic gospels and Acts as one of the twelve apostles. His name, a patronymic, means "son of Tolomai" and scholars believe he is the same as Nathanael mentioned in John, who says he is from Cana and that Jesus called him an "Israelite...incapable of deceit." The Roman Martyrology says he preached in India and Greater Armenia, where he was flayed and beheaded by King Astyages. Tradition has the place as Abanopolis on the west coast of the Caspian Sea and that he also preached in Mesopotamia, Persia, and Egypt. The Gospel of Bartholomew is apochryphal and was condemned in the decree of Pseudo-Gelasius. Feast Day August 24.

Bartholomew (Greek: Βαρθολομαίος, transliterated "Bartholomaios") comes from the Aramaic bar-Tôlmay (תולמי‎‎‎‎‎-בר‎‎), meaning son of Tolmay (Ptolemy) or son of the furrows (perhaps a ploughman).

Breaking Dawn

Thom writes:
Each week, I post three words. You write something using the words.

Then come back and post a link to the contribution with Mr. Linky (but please, link to the exact post, not your blog, by clicking on the exact post title and paste it to Mr. Linky below). As always, there's no hard-and-fast rule that you have to post on Wednesday.

To link up with this week's Three Word Wednesday *click here*

This week's words:

Fawn; Juggle; Navigate

Breaking Dawn

Could I navigate
as old I might be there now.
I juggle choices
as if they were balls
in time's Holy Roman air.
The spotted new fawn
hunkers down frozen
hoping I will leave before
the last stars wink out.

May 16, 2012 9:43 AM

Progress

The poem is not very original and yet it is intensely personal. Oddly, that must mean I am pretty much like everyone else. It is over two years old. What has changed? I move less well, have newly developed ailments and all the older ones. Yet the world goes on quite the same. I was once full of dreams. I cannot say exactly that I have lost them but I have let go my iron grip. The nineties changed my world beyond recognition for the third time. The first time the world took that big a turn was in 1966-67. The second time was in 1972-73, and while the world changed beyond recognition, it was really a course correction. The nineties were in their way much more difficult, wiping out the world much like the first time, only I had built so much. In 1967 I had little to lose.

Progress

When I was twenty
three and full of smokey dreams
I would stride along
a colossus down
from the pedestal fashioned
from my opinions.

Now I am sixty
four, and creak along, listen
to my joints speaking
and know so much less
than I intended to know
by this time today.

April 9, 2010 8:10 AM

Pioneer Spirit

Pioneer Spirit

I feel it strongly,
the way you love the layers
left behind, of spring
you have sought among
the rocks astride the old hills
with the changing face
of holy water
in its course.

Sunlit, you stand
in your laced up boots,
buckskin clad, at peace.

April 6, 2010 11:07 AM

"You normally have to be bashed about a bit by life to see the point of daffodils, sunsets and uneventful nice days."
- Alain de Botton

Alain de Botton, FRSL (born Zurich, 20 December 1969) is a Swiss writer, philosopher, television presenter and entrepreneur, resident in the United Kingdom. His books and television programs discuss various contemporary subjects and themes, emphasizing philosophy's relevance to everyday life. At 23, he published Essays In Love (1993), which went on to sell two million copies. Other bestsellers include How Proust Can Change Your Life (1997), Status Anxiety (2004) and The Architecture Of Happiness (2006). In August 2008, he was a founding member of a new educational establishment in central London called The School of Life. In May 2009, he was a founding member of a new architectural organization called "Living Architecture". In October that year, de Botton was appointed an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, in recognition of his services to architecture. In 2011, de Botton was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature (FRSL).

Still Life

Paul Gauguin
Le repas
en 1891

Still Life

Mom set the table
with a knife edge between us
when the dead returned
with off color fruit,
one half eaten, that chewed up
piece you left behind,
while Dad sat outside
as was his new found habit.
It's all a damn fake!
That's what I muttered
down low as I looked askance
at all the children.

May 13, 2012 9:19 AM

Written for The Mag *click here*

Mind Watch

Here is the video that my cousin Patia suggested. It stars Sam Waterston and Liv Ullman and John Heard. It also stars the stellar French countryside around Mont St Michel.

This is a feature length movie in English. Enjoy.

At The Table

At The Table

With my hands, my all,
I explore the island shapes
of your connections,
sweep the longitudes
of your limbs and press my words
deep into the knots
I find inside you.

You are swathed in my clean sheets
and warmed with sweet oil
you glow under me,
under handiwork passed down
to me by other lovers.

April 6, 2010 9:37 AM

"We have to endure the discordance between imagination and fact. It is better to say, "I am suffering," than to say, "This landscape is ugly."
- Simone Weil

Simone Weil 3 February 1909 in Paris, France – 24 August 1943 in Ashford, Kent, England) was a French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist. Weil's whole life was marked by an exceptional compassion for the suffering of others; at the age of five, she refused to eat sugar after she heard that soldiers fighting WWI had to go without. She died from malnutrition during WWII after refusing to eat more than the minimal rations she believed were available to soldiers at the time. After completing her education Weil became a professor. She taught intermittently throughout the 1930s - she took several breaks due to poor health and to devote herself to political activism. Weil was politically active from early childhood: her activism included helping unions to organise and work together collaboratively, involvement with Marxists and Anarchists, fighting in the Spanish Civil War, and spending more than a year working as a labourer so she could better understand the working class. She sometimes gave away almost her entire income and lived in the most frugal of circumstances, though she did occasionally allow herself foreign holidays. Unusually among twentieth century left-leaning intellectuals, she became more religious and inclined towards mysticism as her life progressed, rather than less so. Weil wrote throughout her life, though most of her writings did not attract much attention until after her death. She was later to become the subject of extensive scholarship across a wide range of fields: a meta study from the University of Calgary found that between 1995 and 2012, over 2500 new scholarly works had been published about her. While sometimes described as odd, humourless and irritating, she inspired great affection in many of those who knew her. Albert Camus described her as "the only great spirit of our times".

Resurrection

"I was sitting by the ocean one late summer afternoon, watching the waves rolling in and feeling the rhythm of my breathing, when I suddenly became aware of my whole environment as being engaged in a gigantic cosmic dance. Being a physicist, I knew that the sand, rocks, water and air around me were made of vibrating molecules and atoms, and that these consisted of particles which interacted with one another by creating and destroying other particles. I also knew that the Earth's atmosphere was continually bombarded by showers of cosmic rays . . . but until that moment I had only experienced it through graphs, diagrams and mathematical theories. As I sat on the beach my former experience came to life; I saw cascades of energy coming down from outer space, in which particles were created and destroyed in rhythmic pulses; I saw the atoms of the elements and those of my body participating in this cosmic dance of energy; I felt its rhythm and I heard its sound, and at that moment I knew that this was the Dance of Shiva, the Lord of Dancers worshipped by the Hindus."
- Fritjof Capra
The Tao of Physics

Fritjof Capra (born February 1, 1939) is an Austrian-born American physicist. He is a founding director of the Center for Ecoliteracy in Berkeley, California, and is on the faculty of Schumacher College. Capra is the author of several books, including The Tao of Physics (1975), The Turning Point (1982), Uncommon Wisdom (1988), The Web of Life (1996), and The Hidden Connections (2002).

Resurrection

The toothless goddess
smiles vacantly at my hope.
I am old and smell
bad, smell like cold flesh
from an empty gray coffin.
How I feel sometimes,
how it is this day
of days. It is said of Him,
said He rises up
but I see no sign.

You see through all the whitewash.
God, I miss you so.

April 5, 2010 7:29 PM
Modified May 10, 2012

An Irish Blessing

This blessing has been made into a choral work at least once and I have sung it...

Éire go Brách - 3WW

Thom writes:
Each week, I post three words. You write something using the words.

Then come back and post a link to the contribution with Mr. Linky (but please, link to the exact post, not your blog, by clicking on the exact post title and paste it to Mr. Linky below). As always, there's no hard-and-fast rule that you have to post on Wednesday.

To link up with this week's Three Word Wednesday *click here*

This week's words:

Dampen; Keep; Tremble

Wiki says: "Erin go Bragh is an anglicisation of the Irish phrase Éirinn go Brách in which Éirinn is the dative of Éire (meaning "Ireland"). In standard modern Irish the phrase is Éire go Brách. It is probable that the English version was taken from what was a "dative" context, such as Go bhfanad in Éirinn go brách ("May I stay in Ireland for ever") or Go bhfillead go hÉirinn go brách ("May go back to Ireland for ever")." There is also an alternative source cited claiming that some Irish dialects switch Éirinn for Éire in general grammatical usage (the dative for the nominative).

Erin go Bragh means Ireland Forever

Éire go Brách

I know that Dublin
is entirely too wet, 'twill
dampen your heart, why
stout's found all over.
I keep that in mind, tremble
anticipating
that one day I might
travel Aer Lingus to old
Eire, on fire me boys
for the way it is,
for the way I'll be at home,
what I'm like away.

May 9, 2012 5:38 AM

And I'm not even much Irish...me, I am English married to Dutch (maternal grandparents) and Scottish married to Irish (paternal grandparents). My birth surname is Teague and thus: Teague \te(a)-gue\ as a boy's name is pronounced teig. It is of Irish and Gaelic origin, and the meaning of Teague is "poet, philosopher". Imagine that. Actually, I guess I am as Irish as I am Dutch from my grandfathers, and English/Scottish from my grandmothers.

Here's an amusing recent article: "200 Reasons Not To Leave Dublin"

Padre Pio - Perfect Vision

Padre Pio

Hmmm...in the picture there seems to be an astigmatic halo around Padre Pio's head.

In geometric optics, stigmatism refers to the image-formation property of an optical system which focuses a single point source in object space into a single point in image space.

1. The condition of being affected by stigmata.
2. The state of a refracting or reflecting system in which light rays from a single point are accurately focused at another point.
3. Normal eyesight.

Perfect Vision

Why should I accept
the perfect eyes of the god
over stigmatic
views that twist my world?
I am short sighted, no doubt.
Still, you are my heart.
I see well enough
to see you're better than hope,
better than my dreams.

May 8, 2012 7:43 PM

Saint Pio (Pius) of Pietrelcina, O.F.M. Cap., (25 May 1887 – 23 September 1968) was a Capuchin Catholic priest from Italy who is venerated as a saint in the Catholic Church. He was born Francesco Forgione, and given the name Pius (Italian: Pio) when he joined the Capuchins, thus he was popularly known as Padre Pio. He became famous for his bearing the stigmata. On 16 June 2002, he was canonized by Pope John Paul II. He had therefore passed the test of at least two miracles attributed to his presence and efforts. Bearing the stigmata was not enough. There are many people who bear the stigmata.

After beatification a further miracle is needed before canonization can occur. The investigation of this miracle follows the same course as noted above with regard to beatification. Approved in the diocese of Manfredonia on 23 October 2000, by the Congregation in Rome on 18 December 2000, the miraculous cure of Matteo Pio Colella of San Giovanni Rotondo was accepted by the Holy Father on 20 December 2000. On 28 February 2002 the Decree of Canonization of Padre Pio of Pietrelcina was promulgated by Pope John Paul II and 16 June 2002 set for the rite.

"For the honour of the Blessed Trinity, the exaltation of the Catholic faith and the fostering of the Christian life, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the holy Apostles Peter and Paul, and our own, after due deliberation and frequent prayers for the divine assistance, and having sought the counsel of our Brother Bishops, we declare and define that Bl. Pio of Pietrelcina, is a saint and we enroll him among the saints, decreeing that he is to be venerated in the whole Church as one of the saints. In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit."

Crossing The Street

Crossing The Street

A creature wrapped up in mists,
you are vaguely shaped
but your heart swells and stirs me
as you speak of crows
and other things of shiny note.

As if I had something to say,
as if we met
in the crossing of the street,
and then I bowed
in the old style, doffed my hat.

There are strange new creases
above my brow
where my hat rides in the cool
of evening,
where I press my hand as I begin.

March 31, 2010 8:31 AM
1st verse modified and
one word added to 2nd verse
May 7, 2012 7:18 PM

"Every fact of science was once damned. Every invention was considered impossible. Every discovery was a nervous shock to some orthodoxy. Every artistic innovation was denounced as fraud and folly. The entire web of culture and 'progress,' everything on earth that is man-made and not given to us by nature, is the concrete manifestation of someones refusal to bow to Authority. We would own no more, know no more, and be no more than the first apelike hominids if it were not for the rebellious, the recalcitrant, and the intransigent. As Oscar Wilde truly said, 'Disobedience was man’s Original Virtue.'" - Robert Anton Wilson

Robert Anton Wilson (born Robert Edward Wilson, January 18, 1932 – January 11, 2007), known to friends as "Bob", was an American author and polymath who became at various times a novelist, philosopher, psychologist, essayist, editor, playwright, poet, futurist, civil libertarian and self-described agnostic mystic. Recognized as an episkopos, pope, and saint of Discordianism, Wilson helped publicize the group through his writings and interviews. Wilson described his work as an "attempt to break down conditioned associations, to look at the world in a new way, with many models recognized as models or maps, and no one model elevated to the truth". His goal being "to try to get people into a state of generalized agnosticism, not agnosticism about God alone but agnosticism about everything".

I delighted in his Illuminatus trilogy and his Schrodinger's Cat trilogy. After that I wandered off, not that attuned to his brand of generalized agnosticism...

Yet Another Lame Attempt - A Magpie Tale

A view of the River Irwell offered by R.A.D. Stainforth and Tess Kincaid

I had no inkling of the River Irwell and so I investigated. From Wiki:

The River Irwell is a 39-mile (63 km) long river which flows through the Irwell Valley in Lancashire and Greater Manchester, in North West England. Its source is at Irwell Springs on Deerplay Moor, approximately 1.5 miles (2.4 km) north of Bacup, Lancashire. It is the boundary between Manchester and Salford, and empties into the River Mersey near Irlam. The Irwell is all that remains of the shallow seas that covered most of south-east Lancashire in the Late Carboniferous period, when deposits of mud and sand were laid down. The first recorded human settlements were those of the Celtic tribe, the Brigantes, who farmed the uplands and lower reaches of the river in the late iron age. In AD 79 the Roman Empire conquered these tribes, building forts at the confluences of the Irwell and the rivers Irk and Medlock and naming the town Mamucium.

Mamucium, also known as Mancunium, was a fort in the Roman province of Britannia. Mamucium was garrisoned by a cohort of auxiliary soldiers and guarded the road running from Chester to York. A vicus, or civilian settlement made up of traders and the families of the soldiers, grew outside the fort and was an area of industrial activity. This was the start of the city of Manchester.

Yet Another Lame Attempt

If I opened into
the Mersey and held near you,
old Mamucium,
then I would be known
as I am instead of some
unknown drab poet
dry as dusty bones,
spread on River Irwell's banks
through this sad device.

May 6, 2012 10:33 AM

("I hope I pass the audition." - Ringo Starr)

For the latest The Mag *click here*

Melissa Live - Bring Me Some Water

A friend posted a different version of this song on facebook. Melissa Etheridge, I would never treat you like that!



"The best way to find out things, if you come to think of it, is not to ask questions at all. If you fire off a question, it is like firing off a gun; bang it goes, and everything takes flight and runs for shelter. But if you sit quite still and pretend not to be looking, all the little facts will come and peck round your feet, situations will venture forth from thickets and intentions will creep out and sun themselves on a stone; and if you are very patient, you will see and understand a great deal more than a man with a gun."
- Elspeth Huxley

Elspeth in 1982

Wiki says: Elspeth Joscelin Huxley CBE (née Grant; 23 July 1907 – 10 January 1997) was a polymath, writer, journalist, broadcaster, magistrate, environmentalist, farmer, and government advisor. She wrote 30 books; but she is best known for her lyrical books The Flame Trees of Thika and The Mottled Lizard which were based on her experiences growing up in a coffee farm in Colonial Kenya. Her husband, Gervas Huxley, was a grandson of Thomas Huxley and a cousin of Aldous Huxley.

With My Long Rodent Teeth - Reprise

There is always something. There is. It's enough to tire me out. Some mornings it hardly seems worth it to gnaw through the leather straps.

Grumpy Now

You told me to walk
on water, said that happens
when I find center,
lift my feathered wings,
hold my beak just so and slim
down for God's sake, please.

That's when I got grumpy. Hmphf!

February 9, 2009 9:47 AM
First posted August 29, 2009
Image added April 4, 2012

The Garden - Reprise and Revised

The Garden

At the far, far end
of the gravelled path I placed
a shrine on the rim
of the gulf between
you and me, in the garden
I planted for you.
You remember it
I know, the gated roses
overhead as you
enter and the paths
that wind among the plantings,
the wash of fresh air.

February 15, 2009 9:24 AM
First Posted September 29, 2009
Last line changed April 3, 2012
images added April 3, 2012

My Discomfort - 3WW (The Hangover)

Thom writes:
Each week, I post three words. You write something using the words.

Then come back and post a link to the contribution with Mr. Linky (but please, link to the exact post, not your blog, by clicking on the exact post title and paste it to Mr. Linky below). As always, there's no hard-and-fast rule that you have to post on Wednesday.

This week's words:

Generous; Just; Penalize.

The Hangover

What will happen next
is what I wonder, gazing
into those generous black
eyes that could be mine.
True, I know the ghoul
claiming those eyes, just, unjust,
and bitterly bright
will penalize me.
Please, I do realize times
have certainly changed.

April 2, 2012 4:51 PM
Modified and renamed, April 3, 2012

The Dancer

Exotic Dancers, Paris, c 1880, Gaston Bussière

Wiki writes: Gaston Bussière was a French Symbolist painter and illustrator, born in Cuisery on April 24, 1862 and died at Saulieu on October 29, 1928. He was close to Gustave Moreau. He found inspiration in the theatre works of Berlioz (La Damnation de Faust) as well as William Shakespeare and Wagner. He became in demand as an illustrator, creating works for major authors. He illustrated Honoré de Balzac's Splendeurs et misères des courtisanes published in 1897, Émaux et camées, written by Théophile Gautier, as well as Oscar Wilde's Salomé. He also illustrated several works by Flaubert.

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I am not normally a patron of the clubs, the "titty bars" as some of my friends call them. I have been twice in the last decades and never before that, that I recall. I have a few women friends who have been dancers. They do not share much from those times.

I remember wondering the question that I ask in this poem when I was sitting at the bar connected to the stage, watching the dancer and giving her the dollar bills as was expected. I thought it a strange way to make a living, though it was obviously lucrative. I totally can believe that a few dancers fund a college education that way. I also believe that is not what most of the dancers do. I am convinced there is a higher than normal addiction to drugs and alcohol rate among the so-called exotic dancers.

Portland is a strange town this way... We have many more than usual topless and bottomless establishments. They pretty much all are bottomless because no patrons will go to the topless only, not around here. Certain streets are dotted with these places.

One time years ago, I worked in an engineering firm which had offices in a high rise off one of the avenues where the street walkers plied their trade. We were on the ninth floor, something like that. I worked away from the windows and on the wrong side. Over where we overlooked a couple of the busy corners, someone had set a telescope to spy them out. Men are like this. This office had women in it. Men are like this anyway.

I have never had a hooker. To balance me out, I have a very good friend who has patronized many, though as far as I know, not in many years.

The Dancer

What must it be like
to display on some dim stage
spotlighted privates,
bent over, swaying
to the stuporous pounding
of my gravid heart
just to get paid my
coin and perhaps approval
coming from somewhere?

May 1, 2012 4:45 PM

Sweet Jane and The Nightmare

My friend gjhost dansing* posted a different version of this song on facebook. I choose to share this "official" version here. Somehow, the song led to the horror below. I am not sure but feel I must be in some distress. It would seem so since nothing about the song goes to such a place.

The Nightmare

Oh when did I choose
to stray and lose my station?

I am in descent
into the bleak black
hollow this has placed in me,
the screech of an owl
in the gray moonlight
of my twisted destiny.

I cannot change it.
It does not budge, not
an inch, a fraction. I feel
a scream crack my spine.

April 30, 2012 4:12 PM

The poem invites me to think of Poe or Lovecraft. I wanted to illustrate it with Henry Fuseli's painting The Nightmare but it just doesn't fit. That means I will separate the painting from the poem above, but here it is anyway:

Wiki says:
The Nightmare is a 1781 oil painting by Anglo-Swiss artist Henry Fuseli (1741–1825). Since its creation, it has remained Fuseli's best-known work. With its first exhibition in 1782 at the Royal Academy of London, the image became famous; an engraved version was widely distributed and the painting was parodied in political satire. Due to its fame, Fuseli painted at least three other versions of the painting.

Interpretations of The Nightmare have varied widely. The canvas seems to portray simultaneously a dreaming woman and the content of her nightmare. The incubus and the horse's head refer to contemporary belief and folklore about nightmares, but have been ascribed more specific meanings by some theorists. Contemporary critics were taken aback by the overt sexuality of the painting, which has since been interpreted by some scholars as anticipating Freudian ideas about the subconscious.

*I am not sure I understand why gjhost dansing chooses to spell the name that way on facebook. Perhaps gjhost will explain. I first encountered the name as ghost dansing when I met my friend near the beginnings of this blog of mine. The ectoplasm leaked from one blog to another. Ghost has always chosen to remain above the realm of the sexed and so I take care not to use any misleading words.