To thine own self be true

“Mandatory” and “tyrants”.
Expect much less personal freedom as we move more toward government control, nationalism, and extremism.
A no-brainer.

Driverless cars for Alberta streets and roads or texting lanes for drivers on Edmonton streets? Bets?

with its former emphasis on traditional school subjects is being systematically gutted in favor of government propagandizing of whatever populist minority fads, select causes and agendas of the day. With the complete surrender to e-technology, kids continue to get dumber and know much less of consequence than 10-15 years ago. They need no longer do homework or study, and the teacher’s role has also been dumbed down to that of a techie manager. Teachers, likewise, no longer need to know anything of consequence before they go out to teach. The shiny fallible machines rule.

is full and goes on Sat., Nov. 26 at Woodcroft library in Edmonton.

Some notes on Poetic Sensibility (by Richard Davies):

Sensibility

 -the ability to be open to, to feel or perceive, and sensitively respond to sensory stimuli and related feelings and ideas

 -implies an awareness, a keen consciousness, discernment (capable of making distinctions and informed choices), and an appreciation developed and created by/in one’s self

 -has to do with inner life, imagination and expression, coherent inwardness, personal choices for living and creating, as well as style

Poetic sensibility would be the unique sensibility a poet has learned, developed, achieved, discovered, practised, expressed, or articulated in and through his/her life and work. It reveals or manifests itself through process, voice, subject matter, and style.

Well, I see the ones who crawl like moles
Who for a front would trade their souls,
A broken mirror’s the only hole for them;
And for you who’d exchange yourselves,
Just to be somebody else,
Pretending things you never felt or meant;
Hey, you don’t live what you defend,
You can’t give so you just bend.

Now if you care what people think,
Like they supplied some missing link;
They’ll just stand back and watch you sink so slow.
They’ll never help you to decide,
They’ll only take you for a ride,
After which they’ll try and hide the fact that they don’t know
What you should do, where you should go,
What you should do, where you should go.

Great social commentary-criticism song of olde by a ’60s folkie. Check out the super vocal arrangement Peter Paul and Mary version on Album 1700 and the rest of the long song’s terrific lyrics online…

(2006: undauntedly starting his comeback after facing bankruptcy; with Anjani signing his last poetry book)

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…Canada Post to publish a commemorative Cohen stamp, the Mint a Cohen coin, and for Columbia to re-release his collected albums with extras in a commemorative boxset. There will be a treasure trove of unreleased to come as well as new documentaries chronicling his life, possibly one by Martin Scorcese. Also, he will likely get the Nobel Prize.

Personally remembered as the most entertaining cool, sneaky villain from Colombo (the cruise ship episode) and as the corrupt boss in Bullitt.

It’s turning into a revolving-door week of obits…

(on left) my father, Delmar (Del) Vernon Davies (1926-1998), in Royal Canadian Navy (Sept. 9, 1943 to Apr. 23, 1946 and–in its Reserve–Sept. 13, 1960 to Sept. 12, 1965). He also served in the Royal Canadian Air Force from Mar. 29, 1951 to Jan. 20,1957 and the Royal Canadian Navy–Reserve–Sept. 13, 1960 to Sept. 12, 1965.

We/they were all young once. Like many other vets, he would have been appalled by ongoing government withdrawal of support for veterans’ health and services. He was a very witty man who loved old movie classics, music, dancing, travel, animals, and Nature. Significantly, he instilled in me a great appreciation of irony, humor, and perspective.

Over 18 years of military service for his/our country. Fondly remembered by Rick, especially around November 11.

(We were all young once. Cohen’s 1963 photo on the back of the U.S. ed. of his first novel The Favorite Game.)

(my rare inscribed copy of a religious poetry collection for a Canadian fan)

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Obit Leonard Cohen, 82, Montreal.
It’s been interesting lately that Cohen had been mentioned as a potential Nobel winner along in the wake of Dylan’s achievement.
He has left us with one more album, just released, You Want It Darker, which expresses his last words to his many fans.

In 1970, there I was onstage at U of W playing several of his songs in a folk music venue; “Bird on the Wire”, “Story of Isaac”, “You Know Who I Am”. Two years before, Judy Collins’ Wildflowers album introduced me to “Hey, That’s No Way to Say Goodbye'” and “Sisters of Mercy”. His music eventually made up the soundtrack of Robert Altman’s awesome McCabe and Mrs. Miller.

Much later, my family went to see him in 1994 at the Jube in Edmonton; what a magical concert with songs from his second-coming albums: I’m Your Man and The Future capped by roses for all the women. (I still remember him saying, around 1967, that he was waiting for women to take over the world.)
And followed him through his Buddhist period on Mt. Baldy where he went to dry out after his 3-wine bottle-a-day habit. And through his broke phase after his woman manager had swindled him (fans were very sympathetic) . To his return to concert stages around the world, bigger and better than ever. A much-beloved legend and icon.

He leaves us with so many great memorable, heartfelt songs: “Suzanne”, “So Long Marianne”, “First We Take Manhattan”, “Take This Waltz”, “Closing Time” and many more. As for a personal favorite, I’ll pick “There Ain’t No Cure for Love” which gets at what motivated so much of his work and his attitudes toward women, love, and romance.

I will conclude, by pointing out the obvious, that his passing will resonate around the world, not just in Canada, and that he was and remains Canada’s greatest poet and songwriter.

All but blind
In his chambered hole
Gropes for worms
The four-clawed Mole.

All but blind
In the evening sky
The hooded Bat
Twirls softly by.

All but blind
In the burning day
The Barn-Owl blunders
On her way.

And blind as are
These three to me,
So, blind to Someone
I must be.

-(the great) Walter de la Mare, “All But Blind”)

One of Nature’s and Life’s great core lessons to help us understand our conflicts and misunderstandings as well as our basic, recurring alienation from others.