To thine own self be true

What will Meghan Markle get the Queen for Christmas?

(A life and death issue if ever there was one.)

the guy who successfully prosecuted 2 KKKers for the bombing that killed the black kids in church should defeat Moore last night. Given Moore’s track record of multiple alleged sex offences, it’s hard to imagine that God’s word, which he is waiting for before conceding, is likely to be positive.

(Christmas card, older grandson)

“It takes four seasons to know one year.”–Anonymous

“Winter is on my head, but eternal spring is in my heart.”–Victor Hugo

“In the midst of winter, I found there was, within me, an invincible summer.”–Albert Camus

“Inside myself is a place where I live all alone and that’s where you renew your springs that never dry up.”–Pearl Buck

“It matters not how long you live, but how.”–Philip James Bailey

“The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.”–Eden Phillipotts

“The world is but a canvas to the imagination.”–Henry David Thoreau

“Forever is composed of nows.”–Emily Dickinson

“Our truest life is when we are in dreams awake.”–Anonymous

“But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads.”–Albert Camus

“Happiness is a direction, not a place.”–Syndey J. Harris

“With a few flowers in my garden, half a dozen pictures and some books, I live without envy.”–Lope de Vega

“Some people like to make a little garden out of life and walk down a path.”–Jean Anouilh

“There are always flowers for those who want to see them.”–Henri Matisse

“You cannot travel the path until you become the path itself.”–Buddha

“The art of living lies in a fine mingling of letting go and holding on.”–Havelock Ellis

“The real marriage of true minds is for any two people to possess a sense of humor or irony pitched in exactly the same key.”–Pearl Buck

“The person who tries to live alone will not succeed as a human being. The heart withers if it does not answer another heart.”–Pearl Buck

“Freedom is the spine of love.”–Sophia Loren

“Beauty is an ecstasy; it is as simple as hunger.”–W. Somerset Maugham

“Ecstasy is full, deep involvement in life.”–John Lovell

“Develop an interest in life as you see it; in people, things, literature, music–the world is so rich, simply throbbing with rich treasures, beautiful souls and interesting people.”–Henry Miller

“…from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider’s web….we must pick out what is good for us where we find it.”–Pablo Picasso

Christmas–a beautiful word.

Can’t hear it enough in all the radio music. Makes me want to walk the streets shouting “Merry Christmas, one and all!”

Songs like Bachman’s “Takin’ Care of Christmas“–its last verse yet another reminder of Christmas‘s best–helping the poor, needy, and less fortunate; putting others’ needs and plights before our own. So civil and civilized.

No, Christmas does change many people’s attitudes and behaviors for the better. People are more obviously and openly ‘up’– happier, by and large.

Christmas also helps people enjoy and appreciate family. It brings out the spirit of giving and the best gifts of self. (Is there another more positive, more inclusive celebration?)

Christmas–that politically incorrect Western time that grinches and other selfish, agenda-ed individuals loudly protest, want to shut down, and don’t want others to enjoy. (“What an awful, politically incorrect imposition! It should be banned.”)

But listen now. Hear those herald angels rebut, “It’s Christmas, Christmas, Christmas….”

(Keats’ death-mask)

Many, of course, though more for individual poems:

Dickinson
Keats
Shakespeare
Whitman
Frost
Tennyson
Blake
Auden
Lampman (the lone Canadian, for his excellent nature poems–best nature poet Canada ever produced)

Some larger poems of late;
Tennyson’s “In Memoriam”
Wordsworth’s “Ode: Intimations on Immortality”
Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard”
Eliot’s “Four Quartets”

The last contemporary poet who truly interested me was my friend, Edmonton’s Dean McKenzie, who passed away early in 2013. Two of his poem-videos remain online, his 2 CDs are unbelievable, and any of his published poems will change the quality of a reader’s day.

from the past..

(previously posted on December 17, 2013)

Full moon! A found picture and unsent note from Dean McKenzie, The Legend, in 1992.

Spiritus (an Edmonton performance poetry trio): Dean on right, Glen Kirkland in the middle, and me on the left).

Note: “Hail Spiritus! Its genesis takes on even more mythic qualities as our hejira toward truth and beauty continues.” Spiritus had a fabulous, wonderful run over two decades. And I have no doubt that Glen’s and Dean’s hejiras toward truth and beauty continue elsewhere as much as mine does here, likewise.

Very special thanks to Elana Hope Aaserud for finding and sharing this special moment of being–Dean’s gift of self beyond time. Trust Dean-o to speak to her, me, and us from another, transcendent, spiritual dimension. Remarkably, Daddio is still happy, intact and with us this Christmas–giving of himself as always.

(found art installation by RD)

“Otherwise” is a reflective poem by Jane Kenyon in which the poet looks at her life and appreciates various details and aspects–many of them sensuous–knowing that one day her life will be different, greatly circumscribed, limited, or naught at all. In that, an honest, truthful perspective of a person’s life within the limited and limiting whirligig of time, which catches one up as described in Joni Mitchell’s “Circle Game”.

No question most people are caught up, busy, doing much, sometimes for others, often just to make money, with the underlying, recurring, nagging feeling of chasing one’s own tail or someone else’s conventional, “supposed to be that way” plan.

Moving forward is a good thing–progressing and positively changing, while enjoying and appreciating life and others But the rest of it?

Well, these are things each person must answer for him/herself.

I think Kenyon is basically right, though. We must learn to immerse in our passing time and days to find comfort and meaning in the simplest of things–typically those things of no interest to bankers, politicians, administrators, governments, corporations, bosses, and all the people who have agendas for us and are quite prepared to use us for their own self-aggrandizing, egoic ends and schemes.

As I have often remarked, If we don’t look after ourselves, who else will? And, Is “entitlements” necessarily an entirely dirty word? Are we not, each of us, entitled to as much freedom as we can eke out? Are we not entitled, too, to live our lives without always answering to or catering to others? Are we not entitled to whatever solitude, happiness, and transcendence we can personally experience?

These are no small things– the engagements, pleasures, and meanings which will one day no longer be possible as sure as death and taxes. The three things that can spin and end on a dime–such as a fall, a car accident, or sudden, unexpected serious illness.

Living in the here-and-now makes most sense, of course, but one should also keep a weather eye on “Otherwise”, and how sad or tragic it would be not to have said, done, or explored something we really wanted to in our secret lives, our heart of hearts. Those possibilities which tease and haunt us every passing Christmas.

Russia
America
country
false
fake news
fire/d
I /me
big
great

Small, repetitive vocab and simple syntax=small brain=12 Diet Cokes a day, too much McDonalds and KFC and pizza

Twitter: the preferred platform of the limited.