dual personalities

Tag: poetry

August 17, 2021

Leaving the cities of the plain

by chuckofish

I have been off the academic merry-go-round now for six or so weeks, we’ve thrown our big party and things are finally winding down around here.

This poem by the seventeenth poet Henry Vaughan (1621-95) seems appropriate to the mood.

Retirement

Fresh fields and woods! the Earth’s fair face,

God’s foot-stool, and man’s dwelling-place.

I ask not why the first Believer

Did love to be a country liver?

Who to secure pious content

Did pitch by groves and wells his tent;

Where he might view the boundless sky,

And all those glorious lights on high;

With flying meteors, mists and show’rs,

Subjected hills, trees, meads and flow’rs;

And ev’ry minute bless the King

And wise Creator of each thing.

I ask not why he did remove

To happy Mamre’s holy grove,

Leaving the cities of the plain

To Lot and his successless train?

All various lusts in cities still

Are found; they are the thrones of ill;

The dismal sinks, where blood is spill’d,

Cages with much uncleanness fill’d.

But rural shades are the sweet fense

Of piety and innocence.

They are the Meek’s calm region, where

Angels descend and rule the sphere,

Where heaven lies leiger, and the dove

Duly as dew, comes from above.

If Eden be on Earth at all,

‘Tis that, which we the country call.

*The painting is by John Constable. The cities of the plain are the five cities—Sodom, Gomorrah, Admah, Zeboiim, and Zoar—thought to be located near the southern end of the Dead Sea. The narrative of Genesis 14:1associates these five cities and locates them in the Valley of Siddim, the Dead Sea. 

7 Comments
July 27, 2021

“I keep an inventory of wonders”*

by chuckofish

We think a lot about the passing of time and this was a shocker:

Yes, the album was released on May 26, 1967–54 years ago. And WWI was only 50 years before that. Western culture had changed a lot in those 50 years, but think about how much it’s changed in the past 54 years.

As usual, I am trying to escape our crumbling culture by reading something uplifting. Currently I am re-reading Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry. This novel has much to say about the passage of time and people living in community.

As I have told it over, the past visible again in the present, the dead living still in their absence, this dream of time seems to come to rest in eternity. My mind, I think, has started to become, it is close to being, the room of love where the absent are present, the dead are alive, time is eternal, and all the creatures prosperous. The room of love is the love that holds us all, and it is not ours. It goes back before we were born. It goes all the way back. It is Heaven’s. Or it is Heaven, and we are in it only by willingness. By whose love, Andy Catlett, do we love this world and ourselves and one another? Do you think we invented it ourselves? I ask with confidence, for I know you know we didn’t.

Frederick Buechner calls it “the Room called Remember.”

The past and the future. Memory and expectation. Remember and hope. Remember and wait. Wait for him whose face we all of us know because somewhere in the past we have faintly seen it, whose life we all of us thirst for because somewhere in the past we have seen it lived, have maybe even had moments of living it ourselves. Remember him who himself remembers us as he promised to remember the thief who died beside him. To have faith is to remember and wait, and to wait in hope is to have what we hope for already begin to come true in us through our hoping. Praise him.

Anyway, I highly recommend both Wendell Berry and Frederick Buechner.

And, of course, there’s always Jorge Luis Borges…

In the golden afternoon, or in
a serenity the gold of afternoon
might symbolize,
a man arranges books
on waiting shelves
and feels the parchment, the leather, the cloth,
and the pleasure bestowed
by looking forward to a habit
and establishing an order.
Here Stevenson and Andrew Lang, the other Scot,
will magically resume
their slow discussion
which seas and death cut short,
and surely Reyes will not be displeased
by the closeness of Virgil.
(In a modest, silent way,
by ranging books on shelves
we ply the critic’s art.)
The man is blind, and knows
he won’t be able to decode
the handsome volumes he is handling,
and that they will never help him write
the book that will justify his life in others’ eyes;
but in the afternoon that might be gold
he smiles at his curious fate
and feels that peculiar happiness
which comes from loved old things.

June, 1968

*Wendell Berry, Sabbaths 2016

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July 1, 2021

“So from today I’m travellin’ light. “*

by chuckofish

Yesterday morning they were cutting down trees somewhere in my neighborhood and grinding up the branches into mulch for hours on end. That has to be one of the most stressful sounds one can be forced to listen to I think. I mean it’s not like having your apartment building collapse underneath you, but seriously, I loathe it.

Anyway, I took out my latest book purchase, Selected Poems by Jorge Luis Borges, and started to read.

Camden, 1892

The smell of coffee and the newspapers,
Sunday and its lassitudes. The morning,
and on the adjoining page, that vanity—
the publication of allegorical verses
by a fortunate fellow poet. The old man
lies on a white bed in his sober room,
a poor man’s habitation. Languidly
he gazes at his face in the worn mirror.
He thinks, beyond astonishment now: that man
is me, and absentmindedly his hand
touches the unkempt beard and the worn-out mouth.
The end is close. He mutters to himself:
I am almost dead, but still my poems retain
life and its wonders. I was once Walt Whitman.

JLB is just so great. Here is an interesting interview with him on Firing Line in 1977. I can’t imagine anyone today having such an intelligent conversation on television. I have to hand it to Buckley who just lets him talk. He asks some questions to pull him back on track, but he isn’t concerned with inserting himself.

I watched a good movie the other night–The Fugitive Kind (1960)–an adaption of Tennessee Williams’s play Orpheus Descending. It stars Marlon Brando, Anna Magnani and Joanne Woodward and is directed by Sidney Lumet. It is your typical overwrought Williams story of gothic southern proportion, but I still enjoyed it.

The characters are compelling, the acting is very good, and it is certainly better than anything new you will find on Netflix or Amazon Prime. And I forget how handsome and appealing Marlon Brando was in his prime.

I went to a third retirement party on my final day at work yesterday and was hugged a lot. I felt very appreciated and loved. I was asked a million times what my plans are and I thought I really needed an answer, so I started saying, “I’m joining the circus.” The truth is I have no plans. I want to enjoy every day and read a lot of poetry by Jorge Luis Borges and watch Marlon Brando movies. I think that is okay.

“Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” –Corrie Ten Boom

*Johnny Mercer

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June 22, 2021

“Now is the high tide of the year”*

by chuckofish

Today is the birthday of American fashion designer Bill Blass (June 22, 1922 – June 12, 2002) who was born and raised in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Did you know that during WWII he was assigned the 603rd Camouflage Battalion, whose mission was to deceive the German Army into believing the Allies were positioned in fake locations, for example, by using dummy tanks? He served in this unit at several major operations including the Battle of the Bulge and the Rhine River crossing. For some reason, this knowledge made me happy.

Tomorrow is the birthday of dancer/choreographer Bob Fosse June 23, 1927 – September 23, 1987).

Since we just recently watched The Pajama Game (1957), it might be time to find Damn Yankees (1958) which Fosse also choreographed and danced in. (Side note: I saw Damn Yankees at the Muny Opera back in 1969. Ray Walston was in it, but I’m not sure about who played the other parts.) I haven’t seen the movie in a million years, if ever. Here is Bob in My Sister EIleen (1955).

Now I’m exhausted. Kids, don’t try this at home.

Well, the year is almost half over. I am almost retired. Life barrels on like that proverbial runaway train. But this is really great: “…and for heaven’s sake (not a joke) stop thinking about yourself all the time.” Indeed.

*James Russell Lowell, “June”

7 Comments
June 1, 2021

“Would you like to swing on a star/ Carry moonbeams home in a jar”*

by chuckofish

I do love a three day weekend!

I will note that yesterday was Clint Eastwood’s 91st birthday. Do you have a favorite Clint Eastwood movie? Well, do you, Punk? I actually do not, but this one will do.

We watched Run Silent, Run Deep (1958) in honor of Memorial Day. It is my favorite submarine movie and features a great performance by Clark Gable. Don Rickles is also in the movie. (He actually served in the U.S. Navy during World War II, on a motor torpedo boat tender.)

This article makes a strong point. “And in this way we see the challenge before us. There may have been times in the past when it took concerted effort to see and experience immorality; today it takes concerted effort to avoid seeing it. “

Tomorrow I am taking a few days off and heading east to visit daughter #2 and this little gal.

We will be celebrating her first birthday! Unbelievable, c’est vrai?

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:
So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;
So be it when I shall grow old,
Or let me die!
The Child is father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

–William Wordsworth

Wish me luck on my travels. I haven’t flown since 2018. Yikes.

*Johnny Burke / Jimmy Van Heusen

4 Comments
May 18, 2021

The bird is safest in its nest

by chuckofish

It rained yesterday and last night. Things will clear up, but probably not before Thursday.

Maybe the rain will wash away the pollen which is wrecking havoc with my allergies. I have a sore throat and runny nose and lots of work to do. No fun.

Stay, stay at home, my heart, and rest;

Home-keeping hearts are happiest,

For those that wander they know not where

Are full of trouble and full of care;

       To stay at home is best.

Weary and homesick and distressed,

They wander east, they wander west,

And are baffled and beaten and blown about

By the winds of the wilderness of doubt;

       To stay at home is best.

Then stay at home, my heart, and rest;

The bird is safest in its nest;

O’er all that flutter their wings and fly

A hawk is hovering in the sky;

       To stay at home is best.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
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May 7, 2021

“Find beauty wherever you are.”

by chuckofish

We are thinking about Mother’s Day and we wish all mothers and grandmothers and lovely aunts a happy day. We will be celebrating with the boy and his family on Saturday night so that daughter #3 can spend Sunday with the wee babes doing fun things all day. We’ll FaceTime with daughter #2 and Baby Katie on Sunday.

Here’s a poem by May Sarton that reminds me of my mother:

For My Mother

Once more
I summon you
Out of the past
With poignant love,
You who nourished the poet
And the lover.
I see your gray eyes
Looking out to sea
In those Rockport summers,
Keeping a distance
Within the closeness
Which was never intrusive
Opening out
Into the world.
And what I remember
Is how we laughed
Till we cried
Swept into merriment
Especially when times were hard.
And what I remember
Is how you never stopped creating
And how people sent me
Dresses you had designed
With rich embroidery
In brilliant colors
Because they could not bear
To give them away
Or cast them aside.
I summon you now
Not to think of
The ceaseless battle
With pain and ill health,
The frailty and the anguish.
No, today I remember
The creator,
The lion-hearted.

Today is Truman Day in Missouri, honoring Harry S Truman, the only U.S. president born in our great state. Anyway, I thought I would share one of the videos daughter #1 has been working on for Small Business Month in MO. I think the woman in this story articulates very well how I feel about living in the Midwest–“a pretty good simple life”–which is to say, a good goal to have. You have to find the beauty wherever you are. If you look, it is there.

“But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that. Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.”

1 TIMOTHY 6:6–10

I watched a good movie the other night: The Great Debaters (2007) (on Hulu), directed by and starring Denzel Washington. I had never heard of it, but I trust Denzel not to be in a terrible. movie. It is based on the true story of Melvin B. Tolson, a professor at the (historically black) Wiley College in Texas. In 1935, he inspired students to form the school’s first debate team, which, in a nearly-undefeated season, sees the first debate between U.S. students from white and Negro colleges and ends with an invitation to face Harvard University’s national champions. Inspiring and true.

Have a great weekend! Call your mother.

The painting is by Hugh Cameron (1835-1918).

4 Comments
May 4, 2021

Come, ye rains, then if ye will

by chuckofish

There is May in books forever;

May will part from Spenser never;

May’s in Milton, May’s in Prior,

May’s in Chaucer, Thomson, Dyer;

May’s in all the Italian books:—

She has old and modern nooks,

Where she sleeps with nymphs and elves,

In happy places they call shelves,

And will rise and dress your rooms

With a drapery thick with blooms.

Come, ye rains, then if ye will,

May’s at home, and with me still;

But come rather, thou, good weather,

And find us in the fields together.

–Leigh Hunt, May and the Poets

We are at peak lushness here in flyover country. Can’t wait for the Iris to pop!

I am back to reading Jorge Luis Borges:

That One 

Oh days devoted to the useless burden
of putting out of mind the biography
of a minor poet of the Southem Hemisphere,
to whom the fates or perhaps the stars have given
a body which will leave behind no child,
and blindness, which is semi-darkness and jail,
and old age, which is the dawn of death,
and fame, which absolutely nobody deserves,
and the practice of weaving hendecasyllables,
and an old love of encyclopedias
and fine handmade maps and smooth ivory,
and an incurable nostalgia for the Latin,
and bits of memories of Edinburgh and Geneva
and the loss of memory of names and dates,
and the cult of the East, which the varied peoples
of the teeming East do not themselves share,
and evening trembling with hope or expectation,
and the disease of entymology,
and the iron of Anglo-Saxon syllables,
and the moon, that always catches us by surprise,
and that worse of all bad habits, Buenos Aires,
and the subtle flavor of water, the taste of grapes,
and chocolate, oh Mexican delicacy,
and a few coins and an old hourglass,
and that an evening, like so many others,
be given over to these lines of verse.

5 Comments
April 27, 2021

Unlatching the door to the canary’s cage

by chuckofish

We had one more fun day with daughter #2 and Katiebelle. We stuck to our plan of going to the zoo between Zoom meetings,

but then our plans fell apart in the afternoon. We found out the hard way that our local custard station hasn’t opened for the season yet, Club Taco is closed on Monday, Hacienda had a 25 minute wait at happy hour and so on. We finally went home and daughter #1 made Margaritas the old fashioned way (in the blender). We ordered takeout from Dewey’s and the OM picked it up. Splendid.

Life is too short to sweat the small stuff.

Today daughter #2 and Katie are heading home to DN and we are very sad 😭, but we will see them soon.

And here’s a poem by Billy Collins:

If ever there were a spring day so perfect,
so uplifted by a warm intermittent breeze

that it made you want to throw
open all the windows in the house

and unlatch the door to the canary’s cage,
indeed, rip the little door from its jamb,

a day when the cool brick paths
and the garden bursting with peonies

seemed so etched in sunlight
that you felt like taking

a hammer to the glass paperweight
on the living room end table,

releasing the inhabitants
from their snow-covered cottage

so they could walk out,
holding hands and squinting

into this larger dome of blue and white,
well, today is just that kind of day.

4 Comments
April 16, 2021

The wondrous chant of the gray-brown bird

by chuckofish

This weekend we are babysitting the wee twins twice! Lucky for me, daughter #1 is coming home to assist.

Did you see that the oldest Medal of Honor recipient died last week? He sounds like he was quite a guy. He reminds me of the sergeant in Glory for Me. “My first concern when I was a platoon sergeant was my men,” Charles Coolidge told the Congressional Medal of Honor Society. “I didn’t care what happened to me, but I wanted to protect my men, under any circumstances. I always referred to them as my men — not anybody [else’s], not the company’s. They were strictly my men, and I’d do anything for them.”

Here is an interesting article from the currrent issue of True West magazine, “The Santa Fe Trail Beckoned the Mosty Brothers.” Albert Mosty, it turns out, worked for our ancestor, rancher John Wesley Prowers! He kept a journal and illustrated it. Check it out! It includes this nice photo of JWP.

Here are Paul Zahl’s movie pics for April, Part II. In the small (Episcopal) world department, PZ mentions our old friend Fred Barbee, who baptized daughter #2 oh so many years ago. Fred, besides being a priest at our old church, was also the editor for many years of The Anglican Digest. I did not know that his favorite movie was One Foot in Heaven (1941)!

Here is a fun movie quiz: So you think you know the Oscars? Personally I don’t, because I haven’t watched the Oscars for years and I can’t answer questions after the 1990s. I am so old, I can remember when Bob Hope hosted them.

But not old enough to remember this!

Today is the birthday of the great Henry Mancini (1924 – 1994). We will toast him tonight and play some of our cool Mancini LPs. What is a cocktail, after all, without a little Mancini?

Please note that yesterday was the anniversary of the death of Abraham Lincoln in 1865. So here in remembrance are the first three stanzas of When Lilacs First by the Dooryard Bloomed:

1
When lilacs last in the dooryard bloom’d,
And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night,
I mourn’d, and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

Ever-returning spring, trinity sure to me you bring,
Lilac blooming perennial and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.

2
O powerful western fallen star!
O shades of night—O moody, tearful night!
O great star disappear’d—O the black murk that hides the star!
O cruel hands that hold me powerless—O helpless soul of me!
O harsh surrounding cloud that will not free my soul.

3
In the dooryard fronting an old farm-house near the white-wash’d palings,
Stands the lilac-bush tall-growing with heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
With many a pointed blossom rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love,
With every leaf a miracle—and from this bush in the dooryard,
With delicate-color’d blossoms and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
A sprig with its flower I break.

(Read the whole poem here.)

Have a good weekend. Take a walk around the neighborhood–the azaleas are blooming!

O God, whose Son Jesus is the good shepherd of thy people: Grant that when we hear his voice we may know him who calleth us each by name, and follow where he doth lead; who, with thee and the Holy Spirit, liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

-BCP

3 Comments