THE DRY SALVAGES* (No. 3 of ‘Four Quartets’) by T.S. Eliot I I do not know much about gods; but I think that the river Is a strong brown god—sullen, untamed and intractable, Patient to some degree, at first recognised as a frontier; Useful, untrustworthy, as a conveyor of commerce; Then only a problem…
II Garlic and sapphires in the mudClot the bedded axle-tree.The trilling wire in the bloodSings below inveterate scarsAppeasing long forgotten wars.The dance along the arteryThe circulation of the lymphAre figured in the drift of starsAscend to summer in the treeWe move above the moving treeIn light upon the figured leafAnd hear upon the sodden…
Thursday morning, One of my ancestors might have been a common foot-soldier in service of some Medieval nobleman. In my imagination I am back in time, re-living his life, standing in place on a castle wall. The crossbow is heavy. I look over the countryside from the high vantage point to see the tents…
Arbery, remember that name. I am late to be aware of the killing of Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia. I overheard others in the household conversing about his death. The 25 year old was jogging through a neighborhood, when two armed men, a father and son, pursued him in a pickup. Arbery’s path was obstructed,…
This morning I feel compelled to write about this poem. The poem is entitled “Fool’s Gold.” Since a kid, I’ve been fascinated with fool’s gold. Iron pyrite is the less romantic term for the substance. It mimics the sheen of true gold but is worthless except in the imagination. The title of the…
Saturday, is a first day of the weekend. For most of us, a day for chores, those more involved projects that cannot be included in the routine housekeeping. By routine, I refer to cleanup after the delivered pizza is consumed, or making the bed after you’ve risen into the mornings sunlight. That sounds like…
The glittering dance of brilliants must be strung on that dark thread of sadness which is time. Vernon Scannell (1922-2007) These lines of verse by a British poet came to me as a precise summation of my feelings while absorbing the tune and lyric of Townshend’s anthem/prayer for solidarity, Join Together. Viewing the video,…
Falling in order to rise…… The destruction of received models and forms is necessary in order to clear a space for spontaneous thought to arise. From the cathedral of our own feelings, from the void of the blank canvas, then, comes the space for revelation. We are fragments of an unattainable whole. Meaning is…
DREAMING A WALL by Richard Blanco He hates his neighbors’ flowers, claims hisare redder, bluer, whiter than theirs, believeshis bees work harder, his soil richer, blacker.He hears birds sing sweeter in his trees, tallerand fuller, too, but not enough to screen outthe nameless faces next door that he callsliars, thieves who’d steal his juicier…
The Buddhist in me, really likes these verses. Larkin’s words capture with unemotional observational precision the transience of life. Given the amount of violence, not the TV theatrical variety, but bloody life-wrecking violence in our big cities, and in many places around our world, it is timely to take a step back. You and…
