dual personalities

Tag: poetry

December 11, 2024

Teach us to number our days*

by chuckofish

Yesterday I spent three hours at the Mini dealer getting my Cooper ready to pass on to DN in a couple of weeks. It is not an unpleasant place to wile away a few hours. Steve, the service “advisor”, checks in from time to time and lets you know how it’s going and that they haven’t forgotten you. The Lounge is well stocked with a fancy coffee machine, water and treats. The TV was set to the Hallmark channel and I had come prepared with my phone and an actual book to read.

I read a good amount of A Day’s Journey by Tim Keesee, which tries to answer the question, “How do you make each day of your brief life count?” Keesee is a Christian and a cancer survivor. I am enjoying it. In each chapter he tells about an encounter with someone who has taught him something about a day well spent. They range from the well-known (Rosario Butterfield, Joni Eareckson Tada) to the unknown. There are a lot of good scripture references and quotes by people I like, such as this poem by Wendell Berry:

Anyway, the key to making a morning at the car dealership a pleasant experience, as with most things, is to be prepared and to have the right mindset. Be prepared to be there longer than expected and you will be pleasantly surprised when they call your name sooner than expected.

So be prepared, read some poetry and don’t forget to have some cash ready when you go to the grocery store and the Salvation Army person is ringing their bell outside the store. Give, give, give. ‘Tis the season.

*Psalm 90:12

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December 3, 2024

Under the wide and starry sky

by chuckofish

We got more snow yesterday and it was very cold. I tell you I am not really ready for this…winter! October was balmy and November wasn’t bad, so digging out the Barbour storm coat was not on my radar. And gloves! Where are my gloves?

At least when it is snowing, it is very quiet in my neighborhood. No leaf blowers!

Anyway, I got a pedicure yesterday, which is something I do now regularly as a result of my chemo-induced neuropathy and getting old. I also scheduled a big trash pickup so that we can get rid of some of the junk in our garage to make room for my SUV which takes up a lot more room than my Mini. And I made a list of all the things I need to get new license plates before heading to the DMV. Oh joy. But I do like that checking-things-off-my-list feeling.

Today we remember Robert Louis Stevenson, Scottish author and poet, who died on this day in 1894 while straining to open a bottle of wine for his wife.

He is buried on a spot overlooking the sea in Samoa where he lived at the time.

Based on Stevenson’s poem “Requiem”, the following epitaph is inscribed on his tomb:

Under the wide and starry sky
Dig the grave and let me lie
Glad did I live and gladly die
And I laid me down with a will
This be the verse you grave for me
Here he lies where he longed to be
Home is the sailor home from the sea
And the hunter home from the hill

I always hear John Wayne’s voice when I read that, because, as you recall, he recites the poem at the funeral of two sailors (Slug and Squarehead) in They Were Expendable (1945). It is a great scene. The Duke does it perfectly and to great effect–

They were just a couple of blue jackets who did their job.

So a toast to Robert Louis Stevenson and to John Wayne and to all the sailors and hunters home from the hill.

Have a good day! Read some poetry.

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November 20, 2024

Casual simplicity

by chuckofish

Yesterday was a perfect fall day and a lovely one wherein to drive down to the city to pick up some “stuff” I won at last week’s auction. Forest Park was beautiful, sparkling in the sunshine. I drove by my old university and sighed contentedly that I no longer work there.

How happy is the little stone
That rambles in the road alone,
And doesn’t care about careers,
And exigencies never fears;
Whose coat of elemental brown
A passing universe put on;
And independent as the sun,
Associates or glows alone,
Fulfilling absolute decree
In casual simplicity.

–Emily Dickinson

I had lunch with a friend and then later in the afternoon the boy and the bud came over while Lottie went to her dance class. We caught up on world events.

Then I had a Historical Society board meeting after dinner–quelle full day! Thankfully such days are not the rule.

And, look, the last rhododendron!

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November 19, 2024

“An’ weary winter comin fast”*

by chuckofish

Yesterday was such a dark, gloomy, rainy November day! Lots of leaves came down. Being Monday, I had a lot to do. C’est la vie. I was happy to see that the Prairie Girls were using their time to good advantage.

Oh Mylanta, cuteness overload.

Today we remember President Abraham Lincoln, who gave the Gettysburg Address at the dedication ceremony for the military cemetery at Gettysburg, PA on this day in 1863. Let’s just take a few minutes and read it:

Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate—we can not consecrate—we can not hallow—this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

Of course, not everyone at the time thought that it was a great speech. The Democrat-leaning Chicago Times observed, “The cheek of every American must tingle with shame as he reads the silly, flat and dishwatery utterances of the man who has to be pointed out to intelligent foreigners as the President of the United States.” Yes, times have not changed. Especially within the ranks of our so-called intellectual elites.

*Robert Burns, “To a Mouse”

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October 30, 2024

“The wind rises… We must try to live!”*

by chuckofish

Today we toast the great, but under-appreciated, writer Conrad Richter, who died on this day in 1968. Isaac Bashevis Singer wrote, “There are in the literature of the world few works of historical fiction that make the reader feel that the writer must have been a witness to what he describes; he was actually there and came back – a transmigrated soul – to tell a story. The Awakening Land is such a work… it would be a great novel in any literature.”

I would heartily concur. Richter wrote short stories and 15 novels. His novel The Town, the last story of his trilogy The Awakening Land about the Ohio frontier, won the 1951 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. His novel The Waters of Kronos won the 1961 National Book Award for Fiction.

A strange, uneasy feeling ran over him. If he had been wrong about his mother in this, might he by any chance have been wrong in other things about her also? Could it be even faintly possible that the children of pioneers like himself, born under more benign conditions than their parents, hated them because they themselves were weaker, resented it when their parents expected them to be strong, and so invented all kinds of intricate reasoning to prove that their parents were tyrannical and cruel, their beliefs false and obsolete, and their accomplishments trifling? Never had his mother said that. But once long ago he had heard her mention, not in as many words, that the people were too weak to follow God today, that in the Bible God made strong demands on them for perfection, so the younger generation watered God down, made Him impotent and got up all kinds of reasons why they didn’t have to follow Him but could go along their own way.” (The Town)

Like all great fiction, his words still speak to us, even seventy-five years after being published.

Well, as you know, I am a great re-reader, so I will reward myself with some Conrad Richter today.

Yesterday the boy came over and fixed our shutters which have been buffeted around by the wind all year and thus we were beginning to look like that house in the neighborhood that looks like it is decorated for Halloween all year. He also took apart the crib which was taking up a lot of room in our spare bedroom and moved it to the garage. I am so grateful to have adult children who are still speaking to me. This is a blessing not everyone can claim.

So re-read an old book, count your blessings and remember:

The steadfast love of the Lord never ceases;
    his mercies never come to an end;
they are new every morning;
    great is your faithfulness.

(Lamentations 3:22)

*Today is the poet Paul Valéry’s birthday (1871-1945)–“Le vent se lève… il faut tenter de vivre !” Read the whole poem here.

4 Comments
October 15, 2024

A leaf in shadow

by chuckofish

Yesterday Ron, my co-editor of the Kirkwood Historical Review, came over to discuss the issue I am currently getting ready to send to the printer and he grumbled about how nippy it was outside. Indeed, the frost will be on the pumpkin very soon! And about time, really. I am ready for nippy.

Today we toast Jane Darwell, the wonderful character actress of 170+ films, who was born on this day in 1879.

I was surprised to learn that she was born in Palmyra, Missouri, the daughter of the president of the Louisville Southern Railroad. You can actually visit her birthplace, which is on the National Register of Historic places. I just saw her in My Darling Clementine (1946) and she was wonderful as always. Other favorites include: Bright Eyes (1934) plus four other Shirley Temple movies, 3 Godfathers (1948), Wagon Master (1950), and her final film, Mary Poppins (1964) as the old Bird Woman. She won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for The Grapes of Wrath (1940).

In October desiringGod is on a 31-day journey with Heroes of the Reformation. Every day they highlight a different hero, such as Thomas Cranmer. Not surprisingly, I am enjoying it a lot.

This is a very hopeful article about preaching the gospel in the wasteland of New England.

Meanwhile, the prairie girls went to the library and Ida was, as usual, too cool for school.

5 Comments
September 10, 2024

Just to be alive on this fresh morning in this broken world

by chuckofish

Mondays are for laundry, putting away toys and puzzles and games, vacuuming up crumbs, and generally getting situated for the week ahead. I also had to catch up with my Bible reading, which I had failed to do over the weekend. Now hear the word of the Lord:

And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. 14 And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord.” (Ezekiel 37:13-14)

Now it is Tuesday. Time for a new ‘to do’ list!

And here’s a poem by Mary Oliver (1935-2019)–today is her birthday: “Invitation”

Oh do you have time
        to linger
                for just a little while
                       out of your busy

and very important day
        for the goldfinches
                that have gathered
                       in a field of thistles

for a musical battle,
        to see who can sing
                the highest note,
                       or the lowest,

or the most expressive of mirth,
        or the most tender?
                Their strong, blunt beaks
                       drink the air

as they strive
        melodiously
                not for your sake
                       and not for mine

and not for the sake of winning
        but for sheer delight and gratitude—
                believe us, they say,
                       it is a serious thing

just to be alive
        on this fresh morning
                in the broken world.
                       I beg of you,

do not walk by
        without pausing
                to attend to this
                       rather ridiculous performance.

It could mean something.
It could mean everything.
It could be what Rilke meant, when he wrote:
You must change your life.

Another busy day!

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August 29, 2024

That pile of broken mirrors

by chuckofish

This week was a scorcher, but par for the flyover course. The forecast for the long weekend is optimistic so we’ll see.

Daughter #2 and her family escaped to Michigan, but they encountered a huge storm halfway through their vacay which knocked out the electricity to 400,000 people and their running water!

C’est la vie. Before the weather catastrophe, my brother and sister-in-law drove over for a short visit…

…and caught up with the comings and goings of Pete the Cat et al.

Yes, the month is winding down. I will toast Jorge Luis Borges again and suggest you read this short story about a man whose father tells him he had “Lunch with Borges” once. It reminded me of my father telling me he sat on Gertrude Stein’s lap as an infant. We know our parents so little really.

As in dreams
behind high doors there is nothing,
not even emptiness.
As in dreams
behind the face that looks at us there is no one.
Obverse without a reverse,
one-sided coin, the side of things.
That pittance is the boon
tossed to us by hastening time.
We are our memory,
we are that chimerical museum of shifting shapes,
that pile of broken mirrors.

This is an interesting reflection on Peer Gynt, showing how a troll becomes a troll. “In 2024, we live in a world of trolls. What is the name for cowardly people who leave hateful comments on the internet? Trolls. Our family’s word for road-ragers? Road trolls. Peer Gynt is a story for today.”

And here’s a heads up that the Church of England remembers John Bunyan with a Lesser Festival on 30 August. I was glad to see that a memorial window to Bunyan was unveiled in the west aisle of the north transept of Westminster Abbey in January 1912. It was erected by public subscription and designed by J. Ninian Comper and shows eight main scenes from the first part of Bunyan’s most famous work The Pilgrim’s Progress. The inscription reads: In memory of John Bunyan. The Pilgrim’s Progress. B.1628. D.1688.

“You are not yet out of reach of the gunshot of the Devil. You have not yet resisted unto death in your striving against sin. Let the Kingdom be always before you, and believe with certainty and consistency the things that are yet unseen. Let nothing that is on this side of eternal life get inside you. Above all, take care of your own hearts, and resist the lusts that tempt you, for your hearts `are deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked.’ Set your faces like a flint; you have all the power of Heaven and earth on your side.”

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August 27, 2024

An air of invincible energy and cheerfulness

by chuckofish

One more week of August! Signs of fall are everywhere!

I continue to unbox the books I hurriedly boxed up last Friday…

I am especially enjoying these books which include articles and reviews from The New Yorker, back when it was a magazine worth reading…

Take for instance Wolcott Gibbs’ review of Guys and Dolls when it opened in 1950. He starts off with this:

I don’t think I ever had more fun at a musical comedy than I had the other night, when an association of strangely gifted men put on a Broadway epic known as Guys and Dolls. There have been loftier moral and aesthetic experiences, like Show Boat and South Pacific; there have been more enduring musical accomplishments, like Porgy and Bess; there have been occasions when the humor was clearly on a more ambitious level, like Of Thee I Sing; there have been sensational individual performances, like practically anything involving Miss Ethel Merman. There has, however, been nothing I can remember that sustained a higher level of sheer entertainment than the operation at the Forty-sixth Street Theatre.

Well.

There are book reviews, television and movie reviews, poetry, fiction, and longer pieces on “the American Scene”, “Artists and Entertainers”, current events, “Characters”, “Curious Developments”, and a lot more. Certainly enough to keep me busy for some time.

I especially enjoyed a long article by Winthrop Sargeant on the poet Marianne Moore, “Humility, Concentration and Gusto”, in the 2/16/1957 issue. I wrote an article about Moore for the Kirkwood Historical Review last year, but I was unaware of this piece in The New Yorker. It is a wonderful in-depth portrait and it reinforces my impression of her. “To some of the more complicated types who frequent literary teas and cocktail parties in…

…well, you understand. I’m afraid they don’t make ’em like Marianne Moore anymore. More’s the pity. Anyway, I am going to aim at exuding an air of invincible energy and cheerfulness. It won’t be easy.

Enjoy your Tuesday!

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August 20, 2024

Days consecrated to the useless*

by chuckofish

My week is off to a quiet start and that is okay with me. I don’t have much going on besides having to do my homework for my Bible Study which starts anew on Thursday.

This week I will also be reading works by Jorge Luis Borges, the Argentine writer, poet and philosopher, whose birthday we celebrate on August 24. Here is a snippet from an interview with William F. Buckley where he speaks about the English language…

I could listen to him talk for hours.

Meanwhile Don’s dahlias are beautiful…

As a member of the Asteraceae family, the dahlia has a flower head that is actually a composite with both central disc florets and surrounding ray florets. Each floret is a flower in its own right, according to Don, but is often incorrectly described as a petal. God’s amazing creation!

I guess things went well on the first day of school…


And here’s a fun fact to know and share: In 1954, Charles Schulz introduced Charlotte Braun to the Charlie Brown cast as a loud-mouthed female character (a role Lucy would later inherit). Readers disliked Charlotte, and she disappeared a few months later after only about 10 times in the strip. 

I have a feeling Charlotte may have hit too close to home for some people (loud-mouthed females). But she’d fit right in now…

Enjoy your Tuesday!

*Jorge Luis Borges, from the poem “That One”

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