PT: Better Late?

FROM THE CORRIDOR

wanting to be hidden,
I wait for the old woman in the bed
half-dead already, though not yet through
with dying, to quiet.
All along the window ledge
dead brown leaves blown across
the yard by a cold wet wind
grip against the glass with clarity
and precision of vein and broken edges.

She used to cry all the time
now she only whimpers and asks
with a voice that grasps like hands,
Are the holidays here?
Not yet, I say. That seems to satisfy
I do not know
and a voice in me wishes her away
or myself gone from this place
I am afraid
seeing myself in this white-lacquered bed
grasping toward strangers.

On Christmas Day the sky clears
and the splash of wind against water
sprawls ice and sighs on sidewalks and doorsteps
the boy brings the paper
which has, beside a picture of African
and American travelers getting out of their
vehicle at Nkongsambe, West Cameroon
a picture of the Branchini Madonna
in a gown of acorns and oak leaves
in punched gold, an altarpiece in gold
brocade most perfectly preserved
and rare
She holds the standing Christ Child
in her arms, the two of them
upheld by seraphim
white doves, cornflowers and marigolds.

The glass glitters with frost
and the air is filled with smoke
Meanwhile, not enticed by such glories
as frost on glass, fragrance of smoke
nor Madonnas
she stirs, waits for the light to go
for the thudding of her heart to stop
for the frock-coated whispered gathering
and I am afraid
seeing myself in the white-lacquered bed
grasping toward strangers


(A true story)

The Branchini Madonna, painted in 1427 by Italian artist Giovanni di Paolo. -- It's clickable!

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Meteor at the Pass

Three times during the night on Sunday my husband and I got up and stood outside looking up and north, watching for meteors from the Perseid shower. As far as we could tell, nothing was happening except for the crickets singing under the stars and a lot of lost sleep....

But my son Deadboy (not his real name) and some friends went up to the top of Guardsman's Pass where it was nice and dark, without any competition from city lights, and one of his friends took this lovely picture!

Thanks for the great photo, @nt!x. (Click it!)

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PT: Thursday Again!

COMING AWAKE

I dreamed of you going away
to Switzerland with a puppet lady
a little Swiss cottage

like something off a clock
stuffed with deer antlers
and hanging puppets

like naked bodies
one or the other of us
behind bars

some kind of zoo
I might have loved you
I said

then came the screaming man
with a crushed hand
I took a brown bag of

leftover potato chips
home to my husband's
children


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A Party! A Party!

We adopted Tinki and Lucky a year and a half ago, when they were three years old, but we never knew when their birthday really was. So we decided to decide when it would be. August 1st. And we baked a cake (honey-banana), and frosted it (Chime ate all the frosting off while we weren't looking!) and Jake found some old candles in the junk drawer (apparently the dogs are 183 years old--although that may be in dog-years). We sang the Happy Birthday song, and blew out the candles. Who could ask for a more celebratory celebration than this???

Then why are Tinki's eyes so red? And why does Lucky look so unhappy?

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PT: Quote of the Day

"Don't shoot the bird
while the bird is flying!"

(Good advice given to my daughter-in-law by her sweet mother, who got it from her father. So, what is your take on this old Philippino proverb?)

Where Have We Been?

We went to the top of the mountains, to Silver Lake, up above the world famous ski resort Solitude, and spent the morning where it is cool and beautiful. We walked around the lake, saw a herd of ducks and dragonflies, climbed on the rocks, and chased squirrels and birds. The river water is cold and fast, fish jump in the lake leaving concentric circles on the surface, Simon climbed up the crevices in the rocks like a long-legged spider monkey, and when the ducks saw Jake, they climbed out of the water and came to greet him. He thought they were in attack mode and hid behind a tree. All in all, it was a lovely morning, and only about 15 minutes away! These pictures are the next best thing to being there!

(All the pics are clickable for a better view. Look for the dragonflies in the clouds!)

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PT: I Only Ask For Now

THE ONE WHO WOULD NOT GO


Grandfather William, Grandmother Thea, James, John Allen,
Lucy Elizabeth and Margaret Ann, everyone gone
with no goodbye from me, I come to you now out of this
pale self where your blood runs, from this slippery dark
where human vanities are wasted, where love and loss
justice, tears and joy are all that matter. Lifted
out of your ghostly twilight, know me your messenger:

I am the little one who waits, the little one
who sits behind locked closets,
in dusty corners where the fence has fallen
into weeds, where the door is shut,
where locks are strong and the keys are lost.
I wait for comets to break in to the place where I am,
for stars to fall, crackling like bonfires,
for the voices that say, finally, "Come out!
Come on out!"

I have never understood courage, never understood
brave men who crowded the crossed cemeteries
in Flanders, in Arlington, in Dresden, in Belfast,
in the Me Kong Delta, the heroes who dared
at Appomattox, at Verdun, at Da Nang and Hue,
the doughboys, yanks, leathernecks, the flyboys and tars
who said, "Kilroy was here," or "Damn the torpedoes,"
or "I shall return." But I have looked down
death's throat, and felt the vomit of fear rise
in my own. It is foul...I know...
I know the real heroes are also the ones
who would not go.

We are from different planets, the brave and I.
Love me now before I die. I am afraid of the dark.
Fill me, fill me with light, fill me with delight,
give me sons, let me feel a full womb, full breasts.
I am afraid to be alone. I am afraid of the dark.

Grandfather, grandmother, father, mother, brother,
lover, husband, friend, touch me now before I go.
Listen to the music of the heart that pumps my blood,
feel the red pulse of my life under the flesh
of my throat. Keep a clock ticking on the kitchen shelf,
keep a light burning in the hall...
I am afraid of the dark... I am afraid...

I do not ask perfection. I do not expect the impossible.
I celebrate breath, I celebrate lovemaking,
the tongue against the skin, I celebrate the sun's coming
and going, the turning of seasons, summer solstice,
autumn equinox, the penetration of comets across
the cosmos, the thrust of meteors.
I do not ask perfection-- no parables of virgins,
no apples without bruise, no unblemished lambs,
no ram in the thicket. I only ask
the possible. I only ask for Now...


(From my book In Willy's House. The little girl with her arms filled with catalogs for making paper dolls is my mother. Colorado, 1918.)
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All Is Well

Come, Come Ye Saints


Come, come, ye Saints, no toil nor labor fear; But with joy wend your way.
Though hard to you this journey may appear, Grace shall be as your day.
'Tis better far for us to strive Our useless cares from us to drive;
Do this, and joy your hearts will swell-- All is well! All is well!

Why should we mourn or think our lot is hard? 'Tis not so; all is right.
Why should we think to earn a great reward If we now shun the fight?
Gird up your loins; fresh courage take. Our God will never us forsake;
And soon we'll have this tale to tell-- All is well! All is well!

We'll find the place that God for us prepared, Far away in the West,
Where none shall come to hurt or make afraid; There the Saints will be blest.
We'll make the air with music ring, Shout praises to our God and King;
Above the rest these words we'll tell-- All is well! All is well!

And should we die before our journey's through, Happy day! All is well!
We then are free from toil and sorrow, too; with the just we shall dwell!
But if our lives are spared again To see the Saints their rest obtain,
Oh, how we'll make this chorus swell-- All is well! All is well!


* So this is what they sang, words written by William Clayton. Please see my July 24, 2006 post for the rest of the story!

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Chopsticks Master

Starfish, Master of All Things Japanese! We all miss him!

My Girl!

Bookworm, my most beautiful of all granddaughters (and my only) is having a fun summer visiting in Japan. I'll be glad when she comes home!

Coaxing the Muse

So. How do you coax the Muse? This is how I do it. Rob Kistner, at Image and Verse, has invited anyone who'd like to share to explain how they view the writing process, how they coax the Muse. I wrote a wonderful piece on his blog, which was trully insightful and lucid, but which for some reason would not post. Anyhow, a picture is worth a thousand words.
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PT: WRITING IN THE DARK

It's not difficult.
Anyway, it's necessary/

Wait till morning, and you'll forget.
And who knows if morning will come.

Fumble for the light, and you'll be
stark awake, but the vision
will be fading, slipping
out of reach.

You must have paper at hand,
a felt-tip pen--ballpoints don't always flow,
pencil points tend to break. There's nothing
shameful in that much prudence: those are your tools.

Never mind about crossing your t's, dotting your i's--
but take care not to cover
one word with the next. Practice will reveal
how one hand instinctively comes to the aid of the other
to keep each line
clear of the next.

Keep writing in the dark:
a record of the night, or
words that pulled you from the depth of unknowing,
words that flew through your mind, strange birds
crying their urgency with human voices,

or opened
as flowers of a tree that blooms
only once in a lifetime:

words that may have the power
to make the sun rise again.


--Denise Levertov

Pudding!

We saw Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix yesterday. The looney girl, Luna Lovegood, uttered the line I want carved in my tombstone:

"Anyway. I'm going to go have pudding."
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PT: Uncanny Resemblance

THE
BUSH
AND
CHENEY
EXPERIENCE
!
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How Much Is A Billion?

a. A billion seconds ago it was 1959.
b. A billion minutes ago Jesus was alive.
c. A billion hours ago we were living in the Stone Age.
d. A billion days ago no one walked the earth on two feet.
e. A billion dollars ago was only eight hours and 20 minutes ago, at the rate our
government is spending it.

(I stole the above from my friend Kenny at Coffee in the Morning, who also stole it from somebody else.)

And, I just read that the boost in troop levels in Iraq has increased the cost of war there and in Afghanistan to 12 billion a month. And, the total for Iraq alone is nearing a half-TRILLION dollars. It makes my head spin, this "burn rate" of billions.

"Think of what $10 billion a month would mean to protecting Americans from terrorism, improving security at our ports and airports, and increasing border security," said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. The US Government's "debt ceiling" is $5.95 TRILLION. (A trillion being a 1 followed by 12 zeros). How much is that, you ask?

5.95 trillion seconds is 188,544 years.
5.95 trillion hours ago the first fossils were being formed.
5.95 trillion meters is the mean radius of the Solar System.
5.95 trillion miles is 1.013 light years--the speed of light being 186,000 miles every second!

I don't know exactly what that 5.95 trillion "debt ceiling" really means, but listen to this: The US National Debt (2001) was $7 trillion + (actually, $7,937,463,000,000). If you had gone into business on the day Jesus was born, and your business lost a million dollars a day, day in and day out, 365 days a year, it would take you until October 2737 to lose a trillion dollars! So, I imagine it would likewise take that long to MAKE a TRILLION dollars....

And yet, the world's 10 biggest oil companies(here read Bush and Cheney among them) were expected to exceed one TRILLION dollars in sales in 2004. In ONE YEAR! You do the math. I can't. No wonder it costs $50 (at least) to fill up our cars.

Is your head spinning?
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Let Freedom Ring!

Long may our land be bright
With freedom's holy light.


It was a good day.

More Cool Summer Pics!

These first three pictures are of my two little Minnesota dudes at the lake. Can you remember filling a bucket with sand ~ the satisfaction of the shovel scooping and emptying, scooping and emptying, the feel of the cold waves lapping at your toes, the sun on your shoulders? Look how the water breaks the sun into shining reflections if itself, a hundred tiny suns floating within your reach!

The last two were taken at Disneyland ~ Chime ringing the pirate ship's bell, and both boys on the Fantasyland carousel. Yes!
Chime is saying to jubilant LIFE with his upraised fist, Yes! I am here! Bring it on! Yes!

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PT: A Summer Poem (especially for Wendy)

Walking Poem


How beautifully the child I carry on my back
teaches me to become a horse.
How quickly I learn to stay
between shafts, blinders, and whips,
working the plough

and the wagon loaded with hay,
or to break out of trot and run
til we're flying through cold streams.
He who kicks my commands
knows I am ten times his size

and that I am servant to small hands.
It is in mowed fields I move best,
watching the barn grow toward me
the child quiet, his sleep piled like hay
on my back as we slip over the dark hill

and I carry the sun away.


--Nancy Willard, "Water Walker."

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For Batman

Here's another very old tree, from Cove Fort, Utah, over 150 years old. They have all these little saplings growing from its roots that they are nurturing, so when the tree dies, they will replant with them!

My great grandpa used to drive a stagecoach from Scipio to Cove Fort back in the day. When one lady passenger complained that it took a pretty poor driver to hit every hole in the road, he is reported to have said, "No ma'm. It takes a damn good driver to hit them all!" This tree was here when he was!
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A Mystery

Who ARE these masked men???

Bookworm and Starfish

...at WAIKIKI BEACH!

Taking Time to Smell the Roses

...something we should all do more of!

Disneyland!

Confessions

(And, check out Ren.Kat at sidestepping real, who has confessed that she....)

The rules come first:

1. Each player starts with 8 random facts/habits about themselves.

2. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their 8 things and post these rules.

3. List 8 people you choose to tag.

4. Leave them a comment telling them they're tagged and to read your blog.



* * * *



1. Like ren.kat, every time I go to a live performance the old thespian in me wants to leap up on the stage and join them. And when the show is over, I always go away with this ache in the pit of my stomach, a hole, a void. But it's not as bad as it used to be.

2. I have been, among other things, a nun (twice) and a stripper. :D

3. I need glasses to read.

4. I eat when I am bored. Or sad. Or happy. It doesn't even have to taste good. Old soda crackers. Cold spaghetti. That sort of thing.

5. Let's see....I have almost as many shoes as Imelda. At least half of them I have not worn for a year or more. Some of them have no mate. (I went through them yesterday and I will get rid of many of them. I will.)

6. My closet is full of things I have not worn since 1979, that no longer fit. (I have a real phobia about keeping things I might need someday.)

7. I am not a willing housekeeper, and I am not a good cook (although I do enjoy eating!)

8. Ummm, I absolutely LOVE quantum physics (even tho' I can't understand most of what I read, I LOVE speculating about 16 dimensions and alternate universes and things existing in two (or more) places at once!)


And the 8 of y'all, with love:
Pris at Songs To A Midnight Sky
Maureen at Raven's Nest
Liz at be present, be here
Dana at sublimation
Chiefbiscuit at As It Happens
Turquoise Cro at Cro Stuff
Pam at Mind Trips
Rose at Live Laugh

(And Ren.Kat, people at the University of Wisconsin-MAdison have found a speck of a zircon crystal believed to be older than dirt, in fact, it is the oldest known piece of earth, at about 4.4 billion years old. So, to answer your question, this is it--the oldest thing ever. Besides me.)

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Wedding Anniversary!

So, it was 43 years ago yesterday, at this very place, where we said our "I will's." And I still will!

There are heroes in the seaweed
There are children in the morning
They are leaning out for love
And they will lean that way forever
...

--Leonard Cohen

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