sometimes i rhyme slow
sometimes i rhyme quick
Tuesday, February 18, 2003
'03 doesn't measure up
Different methods of measuring.
In '78 they measured snow after it all settled.
Nowadays, they measure "ongoing" ...
If an inch falls in an hour over, let's say 12 hours, those 12 inches can settle to 8 or 10 ... In 1978 they went by the "settled" amount. Nowadays they calculate as it falls.
In other words, the total of 27.5 from yesterday's storm really didn't "surpass" the total of 27.1 from the storm of a quarter-century ago.
But still ... this wasn't a flurry !!
Different methods of measuring.
In '78 they measured snow after it all settled.
Nowadays, they measure "ongoing" ...
If an inch falls in an hour over, let's say 12 hours, those 12 inches can settle to 8 or 10 ... In 1978 they went by the "settled" amount. Nowadays they calculate as it falls.
In other words, the total of 27.5 from yesterday's storm really didn't "surpass" the total of 27.1 from the storm of a quarter-century ago.
But still ... this wasn't a flurry !!
Excerpts from Letter 1
of Letters to a Soul by Dom Hubert van Zeller, OSB
You mention your discouragement and the sense of failure. You say you are trying to resist the obvious temptation to be discontented and bitter, and that everything you attempt only increases your feeling of inadequacy. But isn't this because you expected a certain kind of success and have not found it? Wouldn't it be better to accept your limitations and be content within them? It is an art in life to put up with being second best. I don't mean that we must make compromises with our weaknesses, but I do think that we have to admit we are mediocrities. To accept the role we have to play, even if it's a small part when we have the talent to play the more important and successful one, is not to invite failure or frustration. It is to submit to the condition of life that God has planned for us. Once we have made this submission -- which is not a lowering of an ideal but on the contrary, because it essentially involves humility, is a raising of the ideal of serving God in truth -- we are less disappointed at the evidence of our inadequacy. Accepting our mediocrity, while all the time trying to make the most of our opportunity, not only brings a certain peace but is what the parable of the talents is all about. So long as we don't bury the insignificant talent, and put the blame on God for its insignificance, we can go on trading with it as effectively as the more talented.
***
More and more as I get older I come to see the wisdom of St Francis de Sales where he says Là où Dieu nous a semés il faut savoir fleurir. But it takes a lot of learning. St Paul taught the same thing : 'I have learned in whatsoever state I am to be content therewith.' Don't you think contentment is about as much as we can hope for? I don't think we can expect happiness -- not as an abiding condition anyway -- so to be reasonably contented with what we have salvaged from the flotsam and jetsam of life is a good for which we should be grateful. All it needs is to trust in God's providence, and to work on the virtue of hope. The important thing is to believe that God has made you what you are, has put you in a particular century in which to do that work. Don't try to break out of the ring of God's providence. By accepting its boundaries, you arrive, paradoxically, at freedom. By banging your head against them you don't get rid of them and you only give yourself a headache.
H. van Zeller, op cit. (Templegate, 1976), pp. 7-9.
of Letters to a Soul by Dom Hubert van Zeller, OSB
You mention your discouragement and the sense of failure. You say you are trying to resist the obvious temptation to be discontented and bitter, and that everything you attempt only increases your feeling of inadequacy. But isn't this because you expected a certain kind of success and have not found it? Wouldn't it be better to accept your limitations and be content within them? It is an art in life to put up with being second best. I don't mean that we must make compromises with our weaknesses, but I do think that we have to admit we are mediocrities. To accept the role we have to play, even if it's a small part when we have the talent to play the more important and successful one, is not to invite failure or frustration. It is to submit to the condition of life that God has planned for us. Once we have made this submission -- which is not a lowering of an ideal but on the contrary, because it essentially involves humility, is a raising of the ideal of serving God in truth -- we are less disappointed at the evidence of our inadequacy. Accepting our mediocrity, while all the time trying to make the most of our opportunity, not only brings a certain peace but is what the parable of the talents is all about. So long as we don't bury the insignificant talent, and put the blame on God for its insignificance, we can go on trading with it as effectively as the more talented.
***
More and more as I get older I come to see the wisdom of St Francis de Sales where he says Là où Dieu nous a semés il faut savoir fleurir. But it takes a lot of learning. St Paul taught the same thing : 'I have learned in whatsoever state I am to be content therewith.' Don't you think contentment is about as much as we can hope for? I don't think we can expect happiness -- not as an abiding condition anyway -- so to be reasonably contented with what we have salvaged from the flotsam and jetsam of life is a good for which we should be grateful. All it needs is to trust in God's providence, and to work on the virtue of hope. The important thing is to believe that God has made you what you are, has put you in a particular century in which to do that work. Don't try to break out of the ring of God's providence. By accepting its boundaries, you arrive, paradoxically, at freedom. By banging your head against them you don't get rid of them and you only give yourself a headache.
H. van Zeller, op cit. (Templegate, 1976), pp. 7-9.
Paul Evdokimov
In the catacombs, the most frequent image is the figure of a woman in prayer, the Orans; she represents the one true attitude of the human soul. It is not enough to say prayers; one must become, be prayer, prayer incarnate. It is not enough to have moments of praise. All of life, each act, every gesture, even the smile of the human face, must become a hymn of adoration, an offering, a prayer. One should not offer what one has, but what one is. ... It translates the message of the Gospel : khaíre, "rejoice and be glad," "let everything that has breath praise the Lord." This is the astonishing lightening of the weight of the world, when man's own heaviness vanishes.
Via Daily Readings in Orthodox Spirituality, ed. P. Bouteneff (Templegate Publishers, 1996), p. 55. Originally appeared in The Sacrament of Love (SVS Press, 1985), pp. 61-63.
In the catacombs, the most frequent image is the figure of a woman in prayer, the Orans; she represents the one true attitude of the human soul. It is not enough to say prayers; one must become, be prayer, prayer incarnate. It is not enough to have moments of praise. All of life, each act, every gesture, even the smile of the human face, must become a hymn of adoration, an offering, a prayer. One should not offer what one has, but what one is. ... It translates the message of the Gospel : khaíre, "rejoice and be glad," "let everything that has breath praise the Lord." This is the astonishing lightening of the weight of the world, when man's own heaviness vanishes.
Via Daily Readings in Orthodox Spirituality, ed. P. Bouteneff (Templegate Publishers, 1996), p. 55. Originally appeared in The Sacrament of Love (SVS Press, 1985), pp. 61-63.
I share this tendency
Over the years, wherever I've been on the political spectrum, right or left or middle, whatever I've thought about religion, etc., I've been driven by one intense and unswerving conviction :
I'm right. Everyone else is wrong.
And if only more people could be like me, the world would be a better place.
The blogger at Doxos, on the occasion of the Sunday of the Pharisee and the Publican, reflects on the pharisaical habit of self-attributed wisdom, virtue, certitude ... accusing himself primarily, but I smile as I recognize myself in what he writes.
With the note that DHR makes on prayer, it might delight him to hear an anecdote about the late Archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey, who, when asked about his prayer-life, described it thus : "I prayed this morning. I talked to God."
For how long?
"I talked to God for one minute. But it took me twenty-nine minutes to get there."
Over the years, wherever I've been on the political spectrum, right or left or middle, whatever I've thought about religion, etc., I've been driven by one intense and unswerving conviction :
I'm right. Everyone else is wrong.
And if only more people could be like me, the world would be a better place.
The blogger at Doxos, on the occasion of the Sunday of the Pharisee and the Publican, reflects on the pharisaical habit of self-attributed wisdom, virtue, certitude ... accusing himself primarily, but I smile as I recognize myself in what he writes.
With the note that DHR makes on prayer, it might delight him to hear an anecdote about the late Archbishop of Canterbury, Michael Ramsey, who, when asked about his prayer-life, described it thus : "I prayed this morning. I talked to God."
For how long?
"I talked to God for one minute. But it took me twenty-nine minutes to get there."
But we have to remember, though
that the really big problem is this oppressive Roman centralism & intransigent liturgical restorationism much deplored by Curly Reinhardt, Commieweasel, Noise of the Fretful, & all the other obstreperous twerps of tallerwince, not excluding ('twould appear) the freewheeling presbyter described here.
The other problem : There's just not enough doing community, being community, having community, eating community, drinking community, breathing community ... taking communnity into the whizzenzimmer, breaking the wind of community ...
Not exactly connected with the complaint at the other weblog, but I've always wondered : These priests who shove the word and the concept of "community" down our throats four hundred ninety-six times per homily -- who seem to think that the primary purpose of the dominical liturgy is social interaction -- what do they think we do the other hundred hours of the week that we're awake? Are we all stylites? Recluses? Cave-dwellers? Hermits? Do we not occasionally bump into other people? Isn't "community" something we always (too often!) have with us? Vocata at non vocata, communitas aderit?
Can't we have one hour or more each week where we take our attention away from each other, and direct it as one praying body toward the sweet Lord Jesus and the holy eucharistic Sacrifice?
Where's the transcendence? Where's the silence?
Incidentally, Bishop Seraphim Sigrist in his book Theology of Wonder has a wonderful meditation [chapter 7] on silence in the liturgy. I wish all Catholic priests could be compelled to read this chapter, & perhaps write it out ten times, or until they have it memorized.
Forgive the underoptimism, but I'm beginning to think that Papa Wojtyla's just about the only living Catholic who's getting things right.
that the really big problem is this oppressive Roman centralism & intransigent liturgical restorationism much deplored by Curly Reinhardt, Commieweasel, Noise of the Fretful, & all the other obstreperous twerps of tallerwince, not excluding ('twould appear) the freewheeling presbyter described here.
The other problem : There's just not enough doing community, being community, having community, eating community, drinking community, breathing community ... taking communnity into the whizzenzimmer, breaking the wind of community ...
Not exactly connected with the complaint at the other weblog, but I've always wondered : These priests who shove the word and the concept of "community" down our throats four hundred ninety-six times per homily -- who seem to think that the primary purpose of the dominical liturgy is social interaction -- what do they think we do the other hundred hours of the week that we're awake? Are we all stylites? Recluses? Cave-dwellers? Hermits? Do we not occasionally bump into other people? Isn't "community" something we always (too often!) have with us? Vocata at non vocata, communitas aderit?
Can't we have one hour or more each week where we take our attention away from each other, and direct it as one praying body toward the sweet Lord Jesus and the holy eucharistic Sacrifice?
Where's the transcendence? Where's the silence?
Incidentally, Bishop Seraphim Sigrist in his book Theology of Wonder has a wonderful meditation [chapter 7] on silence in the liturgy. I wish all Catholic priests could be compelled to read this chapter, & perhaps write it out ten times, or until they have it memorized.
Forgive the underoptimism, but I'm beginning to think that Papa Wojtyla's just about the only living Catholic who's getting things right.
Common thread quiz
We didn't get a blizzard of answers, or even of guesses. KTC wins -- the only entrant, & one who was clever enough to use a search engine -- which was only helpful because, well, great minds think alike.
1. Christmas in French is Noël ...
2. Lauryn Hill's middle name is Noel.
3. And the National Organization of Episcopalians for Life is NOEL.
And that's the common thread! Try this one (perhaps easier?) :
1. The Today Show
2. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
3. Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney
We didn't get a blizzard of answers, or even of guesses. KTC wins -- the only entrant, & one who was clever enough to use a search engine -- which was only helpful because, well, great minds think alike.
1. Christmas in French is Noël ...
2. Lauryn Hill's middle name is Noel.
3. And the National Organization of Episcopalians for Life is NOEL.
And that's the common thread! Try this one (perhaps easier?) :
1. The Today Show
2. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
3. Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney
We beat '78
in terms of total snowfall (27.5") and we may get 3 or 4 more inches later in the day. Right now we're in a lull. If you're in the Boston area, & you have a camera, take lots of pictures !!
And Mitt did the sweater thing !! (Translation : Our governor gave a press conference, in the manner of Michael Dukakis in 1978, in a sweater.)
But trust me, kids -- nothing can beat 1978. We've had some fun things since then, but nothing can beat the sensation of being eight and a half and seeing those two mammoth storms. Nothing can beat no school for nearly a month. All right, we've got a better president, and possibly a better governor now. But '78 was immortal, and this (despite the profusion of snow that surpassed its ancestor) comparatively placid.
Or am I getting old? Or used to it, having seen four of the five largest snowfalls in recorded Boston history?
The April one, six years ago, was fun. Rain turning to six inches of snow predicted -- 25 inches of snow received! Conversation overheard between two cops. "Did you shovel? "I'm gonna use the Italian shovel -- the sun." In April, that can work!
And January of '96 -- with its rapid succession of two (or was it three?) storms between 12 and 18 inches, where snow was piled in Post Office Square as high as, well, the post office!
Any storm where you can walk in the street, where the traffic is exclusively pedestrian, is fun. But nothing beats '78.
in terms of total snowfall (27.5") and we may get 3 or 4 more inches later in the day. Right now we're in a lull. If you're in the Boston area, & you have a camera, take lots of pictures !!
And Mitt did the sweater thing !! (Translation : Our governor gave a press conference, in the manner of Michael Dukakis in 1978, in a sweater.)
But trust me, kids -- nothing can beat 1978. We've had some fun things since then, but nothing can beat the sensation of being eight and a half and seeing those two mammoth storms. Nothing can beat no school for nearly a month. All right, we've got a better president, and possibly a better governor now. But '78 was immortal, and this (despite the profusion of snow that surpassed its ancestor) comparatively placid.
Or am I getting old? Or used to it, having seen four of the five largest snowfalls in recorded Boston history?
The April one, six years ago, was fun. Rain turning to six inches of snow predicted -- 25 inches of snow received! Conversation overheard between two cops. "Did you shovel? "I'm gonna use the Italian shovel -- the sun." In April, that can work!
And January of '96 -- with its rapid succession of two (or was it three?) storms between 12 and 18 inches, where snow was piled in Post Office Square as high as, well, the post office!
Any storm where you can walk in the street, where the traffic is exclusively pedestrian, is fun. But nothing beats '78.
Just between me & my notebook
dreadfully jolly pontifications on poetry,
solemnly trivial jottings on politics :
nonsequiturs, apothegms & bits of stray dialogue ;
culture at its finest
"Perspicuous opacity." Phrase Miss Moore used to praise Gertrude Stein. I like opacity, perspicuous or (as is oftener the case) not.
Democrats are entertaining devils. Republicans do less damage.
It's England o'clock in London.
Can't avoid feeling as if I'm in the home stretch of a very long and tiring baseball season.
Bibliographies. Benedictines. Those awful, awesome Ashbery poems.
If everything had gone according to Hoyle we would've been in & out in half an hour, forty-five minutes tops.
Anything is possible if you don't put your mind to it.
Iambics can get too portentous. Or is that pretentious? A good prose poem keeps things comic. Except for tame James Tate who doesn't page my beeper or make me laugh.
We need more communists in poetry. More subscribers to treason chic. More anti-Mosaic black radicals, more lesbians and porcupines, more angry armadillos. A few more sarcastic minimalists wouldn't hurt. Several dozen ambassadors of the aleatoric. Promiscuous technicians of Sodom, scrupulous harlots from Gomorrah. Tongue-tied confessional charlatans with pierced blue brains. Snail-suckers, lint-spinners & lemon-biting rodhamites. Disreputable professors with marijuana beards (hammer 'staches and sickle sideburns) who know much better than the sweet Lord Jesus how to run the bloody universe. And they all should invade 1600 and jabber of peace. And blather of love. And yak about pretzels. And congratulate themselves on infinite understanding.
Me, I'll take George Ivan, muttering mystic dithyrambs about William Blake and the Eternals shining their light into the days of, what is it, glory and wonder? over the daughtersons of spiteful ephemera.
Everybody plays the fool, sometimes. But the cool fools know it. The vile ones think they're unfailingly wise & impeccably true.
"The truly beautiful, their bodies cannot lie." Where have you gone, Theodore Roethke? Our nation turns its thirsty soul, its irritated mind, its burning eyes, its parched exhausted heart, unto you ...
Language poets, beware! It's the Clement Clarke Moores that get remembered. Say something worth saying. And worth listening to. Ape a trend & you're up Schlitz Creek without an ampersand.
Cummings & Herrick. Fraternal twins, equal in merit, born centuries apart. (I don't care what the usually sagacious Mr H says on the subject.)
dreadfully jolly pontifications on poetry,
solemnly trivial jottings on politics :
nonsequiturs, apothegms & bits of stray dialogue ;
culture at its finest
"Perspicuous opacity." Phrase Miss Moore used to praise Gertrude Stein. I like opacity, perspicuous or (as is oftener the case) not.
Democrats are entertaining devils. Republicans do less damage.
It's England o'clock in London.
Can't avoid feeling as if I'm in the home stretch of a very long and tiring baseball season.
Bibliographies. Benedictines. Those awful, awesome Ashbery poems.
If everything had gone according to Hoyle we would've been in & out in half an hour, forty-five minutes tops.
Anything is possible if you don't put your mind to it.
Iambics can get too portentous. Or is that pretentious? A good prose poem keeps things comic. Except for tame James Tate who doesn't page my beeper or make me laugh.
We need more communists in poetry. More subscribers to treason chic. More anti-Mosaic black radicals, more lesbians and porcupines, more angry armadillos. A few more sarcastic minimalists wouldn't hurt. Several dozen ambassadors of the aleatoric. Promiscuous technicians of Sodom, scrupulous harlots from Gomorrah. Tongue-tied confessional charlatans with pierced blue brains. Snail-suckers, lint-spinners & lemon-biting rodhamites. Disreputable professors with marijuana beards (hammer 'staches and sickle sideburns) who know much better than the sweet Lord Jesus how to run the bloody universe. And they all should invade 1600 and jabber of peace. And blather of love. And yak about pretzels. And congratulate themselves on infinite understanding.
Me, I'll take George Ivan, muttering mystic dithyrambs about William Blake and the Eternals shining their light into the days of, what is it, glory and wonder? over the daughtersons of spiteful ephemera.
Everybody plays the fool, sometimes. But the cool fools know it. The vile ones think they're unfailingly wise & impeccably true.
"The truly beautiful, their bodies cannot lie." Where have you gone, Theodore Roethke? Our nation turns its thirsty soul, its irritated mind, its burning eyes, its parched exhausted heart, unto you ...
Language poets, beware! It's the Clement Clarke Moores that get remembered. Say something worth saying. And worth listening to. Ape a trend & you're up Schlitz Creek without an ampersand.
Cummings & Herrick. Fraternal twins, equal in merit, born centuries apart. (I don't care what the usually sagacious Mr H says on the subject.)
Monday, February 17, 2003
18 inches of snow
and several more inches to come through the night and tomorrow, which should put (can we say it?) The Blizzard of 20-oh-3 into the top five Boston snowstorms, behind Feb. 1978, Feb. 1969, April '97, and Jan. '78 ... maybe even ahead of the January storm (21.4") ...
We should easily beat NYC's 19 inches, and come rather close to Baltimore's 26.
and several more inches to come through the night and tomorrow, which should put (can we say it?) The Blizzard of 20-oh-3 into the top five Boston snowstorms, behind Feb. 1978, Feb. 1969, April '97, and Jan. '78 ... maybe even ahead of the January storm (21.4") ...
We should easily beat NYC's 19 inches, and come rather close to Baltimore's 26.
Irish? Jewish? Scottish? English?
A recent Globe column takes a lighthearted look at the various ethnicities of Massachusetts junior senator John Forbes Kerry -- whose recuperation from recent surgery, we hope and pray, continues apace.
A recent Globe column takes a lighthearted look at the various ethnicities of Massachusetts junior senator John Forbes Kerry -- whose recuperation from recent surgery, we hope and pray, continues apace.
Sticking with Haloscan
... with apologies to the two friendly souls that posted comments on the briefly installed enetation !!
But one of the primary advantages of Haloscan is the ability to see all the most recent posts, regardless of where on the weblog they've been placed, and the ease with which one can delete incivil comments or ban incivil commentators.
Haloscan provides a page listing the IP numbers of banned commentators. Such a page comes in very handy, as I've discovered.
There's a fellow flitting around St Blog's who switch-hits between surnameless pseudonyms, and who has vexed at least three bloggers that I know of. On more than one occasion, the fellow was injudicious enough to leave an email address.
I will provide both pseudonyms, the email address, and the IP identification number(s) to any fellow blogger upon request.
... with apologies to the two friendly souls that posted comments on the briefly installed enetation !!
But one of the primary advantages of Haloscan is the ability to see all the most recent posts, regardless of where on the weblog they've been placed, and the ease with which one can delete incivil comments or ban incivil commentators.
Haloscan provides a page listing the IP numbers of banned commentators. Such a page comes in very handy, as I've discovered.
There's a fellow flitting around St Blog's who switch-hits between surnameless pseudonyms, and who has vexed at least three bloggers that I know of. On more than one occasion, the fellow was injudicious enough to leave an email address.
I will provide both pseudonyms, the email address, and the IP identification number(s) to any fellow blogger upon request.
What is the common thread?
1. Christmas
2. Lauryn Hill
3. Pro-life Episcopalians
Answer (necessarily!) by e-mail. Will post the correct answer within 48 hours of receiving the first "winning" response! We have a winner ... silver & bronze medals still available !!
Oh, yes : in the comment-box a while ago, I asked what Roberta Flack & Al Gore had in common. The answer is Lieberman. Al Gore's running mate in 2000 was Joe Lieberman. "Killing Me Softly ..." was first recorded by Lori Lieberman.
1. Christmas
2. Lauryn Hill
3. Pro-life Episcopalians
Answer (necessarily!) by e-mail. Will post the correct answer within 48 hours of receiving the first "winning" response! We have a winner ... silver & bronze medals still available !!
Oh, yes : in the comment-box a while ago, I asked what Roberta Flack & Al Gore had in common. The answer is Lieberman. Al Gore's running mate in 2000 was Joe Lieberman. "Killing Me Softly ..." was first recorded by Lori Lieberman.
Love & diversity
What they have in common : You can't force love at gunpoint. Roger Clegg's must-must-MUST-must-read at NRO.
Warning : This column may be too rational, too sensible, too sane for some readers out there ... but I suspect those readers have long since stopped visiting ...
Or, to put it another way, diversity's benefits are like love: Love is wonderful, no one is against love, but it cannot be forced. Or like happiness: One is much more likely to reach it if one is not obsessing about finding it. Diversity achieved by bean-counting and quota-mongering is not only not any good, it is worse than colorblind nondiversity.
And to quote myself : Juxtaposition does not necessarily lead to communion.
What they have in common : You can't force love at gunpoint. Roger Clegg's must-must-MUST-must-read at NRO.
Warning : This column may be too rational, too sensible, too sane for some readers out there ... but I suspect those readers have long since stopped visiting ...
Or, to put it another way, diversity's benefits are like love: Love is wonderful, no one is against love, but it cannot be forced. Or like happiness: One is much more likely to reach it if one is not obsessing about finding it. Diversity achieved by bean-counting and quota-mongering is not only not any good, it is worse than colorblind nondiversity.
And to quote myself : Juxtaposition does not necessarily lead to communion.
The induplicable, irreplaceable, invaluable Peggy Noonan
has bought her duct tape and her 10-year-old single-malt Scotch, her asparagus and her crackers. She deflates a few urban legends, kicks the French in the escargots, and praises Dennis Miller for his rare fit of common sense in this, her latest at opinionjournal.com.
has bought her duct tape and her 10-year-old single-malt Scotch, her asparagus and her crackers. She deflates a few urban legends, kicks the French in the escargots, and praises Dennis Miller for his rare fit of common sense in this, her latest at opinionjournal.com.
It's coming ...
The Snow-Storm
by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82)
Announced by all the trumpets of the sky,
Arrives the snow, and, driving o'er the fields,
Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air
Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven,
And veils the farmhouse at the garden's end.
The sled and traveler stopped, the courier's feet
Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit
Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed
In a tumultuous privacy of storm.
Come see the north wind's masonry.
Out of an unseen quarry evermore
Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer
Curves his white bastions with projected roof
Round every windward stake, or tree, or door.
Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work
So fanciful, so savage, nought cares he
For number or proportion. Mockingly,
On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths;
A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn;
Fills up the farmer's lane from wall to wall,
Maugre the farmer's sighs; and, at the gate,
A tapering turret overtops the work.
And when his hours are numbered, and the world
Is all his own, retiring, as he were not,
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art
To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone,
Built in an age, the mad wind's night-work,
The frolic architecture of the snow.
The Snow-Storm
by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82)
Announced by all the trumpets of the sky,
Arrives the snow, and, driving o'er the fields,
Seems nowhere to alight: the whited air
Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven,
And veils the farmhouse at the garden's end.
The sled and traveler stopped, the courier's feet
Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates sit
Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed
In a tumultuous privacy of storm.
Come see the north wind's masonry.
Out of an unseen quarry evermore
Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer
Curves his white bastions with projected roof
Round every windward stake, or tree, or door.
Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work
So fanciful, so savage, nought cares he
For number or proportion. Mockingly,
On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths;
A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn;
Fills up the farmer's lane from wall to wall,
Maugre the farmer's sighs; and, at the gate,
A tapering turret overtops the work.
And when his hours are numbered, and the world
Is all his own, retiring, as he were not,
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art
To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone,
Built in an age, the mad wind's night-work,
The frolic architecture of the snow.
Popular baby names
Really fun search engine and charts of popular names from the Social Security Administration.
Really fun search engine and charts of popular names from the Social Security Administration.
Sunday, February 16, 2003
from Approach to Prayer
by Dom Hubert Van Zeller, OSB (1904-84)
Whatever success there is in the work of restoration depends primarily not upon either penance or prayer but upon the grace of God. It is in Christ that we are restored, not in our own effort. But in order that Christ's merits may be drawn upon, there has to be an element of co-operation on the part of the soul. This co-operation is expressed in the twofold response of penance and prayer.
***
Peace is possible only when the warring elements have agreed to recognize certain rights. The soul can know peace only when the warring elements inside itself have agreed to surrender to God. Where there has been rebellion, the rebels must relearn the grammar of authority; they must begin again.
It is by faith that man works his way back. First by faith in Christ, who grants him adoption into the family of God; second by faith as exercised in prayer. Work, suffering, human relationships -- indeed the whole of life -- is the field of this faith.
***
A man's faith is consequently the measure of his prayer, and his prayer is the sign of his faith and love. Thus the level at which the soul lives is conditioned by the life of faith and the life of prayer.
Just as there can be no prayer where there is no faith, so there can be no supernatural conceptions of God without faith. By the light of reason a man may come to know something about God, but unless this knowledge is informed by the light of faith it will not help him to form a supernatural idea of God. It will not elicit an act of love.
Where the soul's conceptions of God, and of God's dealings with man, are of a material order, the soul's prayer will be of a material order. Where knowledge of Christ is superficial, prayer will be superficial.
Knowledge of Christ is something more than knowledge about Christ, and in order to know him in spirit and in truth the soul must learn to pray in spirit and in truth.
The soul that prays in spirit and in truth learns to live at the level of spirit and truth. The spiritual life is nothing else than this -- the soul allowing itself to be drawn by grace into the deeper knowledge and love of God, who is truth itself.
Van Zeller, op. cit. (Sheed & Ward, 1958), pp. 5-8, passim.
by Dom Hubert Van Zeller, OSB (1904-84)
Whatever success there is in the work of restoration depends primarily not upon either penance or prayer but upon the grace of God. It is in Christ that we are restored, not in our own effort. But in order that Christ's merits may be drawn upon, there has to be an element of co-operation on the part of the soul. This co-operation is expressed in the twofold response of penance and prayer.
***
Peace is possible only when the warring elements have agreed to recognize certain rights. The soul can know peace only when the warring elements inside itself have agreed to surrender to God. Where there has been rebellion, the rebels must relearn the grammar of authority; they must begin again.
It is by faith that man works his way back. First by faith in Christ, who grants him adoption into the family of God; second by faith as exercised in prayer. Work, suffering, human relationships -- indeed the whole of life -- is the field of this faith.
***
A man's faith is consequently the measure of his prayer, and his prayer is the sign of his faith and love. Thus the level at which the soul lives is conditioned by the life of faith and the life of prayer.
Just as there can be no prayer where there is no faith, so there can be no supernatural conceptions of God without faith. By the light of reason a man may come to know something about God, but unless this knowledge is informed by the light of faith it will not help him to form a supernatural idea of God. It will not elicit an act of love.
Where the soul's conceptions of God, and of God's dealings with man, are of a material order, the soul's prayer will be of a material order. Where knowledge of Christ is superficial, prayer will be superficial.
Knowledge of Christ is something more than knowledge about Christ, and in order to know him in spirit and in truth the soul must learn to pray in spirit and in truth.
The soul that prays in spirit and in truth learns to live at the level of spirit and truth. The spiritual life is nothing else than this -- the soul allowing itself to be drawn by grace into the deeper knowledge and love of God, who is truth itself.
Van Zeller, op. cit. (Sheed & Ward, 1958), pp. 5-8, passim.
The Boston Sunday Globe
(specifically, religion editor Michael Paulson) gives us a largely sympathetic portrait of the Apostolic Administrator of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, Bishop Richard Gerard Lennon. The usual suspects get in their usual jibes, but those are brief and almost not worth mentioning. On the whole, a sanely written, fair, balanced, sometimes laudatory & laudable piece of writing.
The article takes note of Bishop Lennon's having conquered a stutter, but not having conquered "a notoriously unmelodic singing voice" -- one which in no wise impairs his love of music!
Link spotted first at the Catholic Blog for Lovers.
(specifically, religion editor Michael Paulson) gives us a largely sympathetic portrait of the Apostolic Administrator of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Boston, Bishop Richard Gerard Lennon. The usual suspects get in their usual jibes, but those are brief and almost not worth mentioning. On the whole, a sanely written, fair, balanced, sometimes laudatory & laudable piece of writing.
The article takes note of Bishop Lennon's having conquered a stutter, but not having conquered "a notoriously unmelodic singing voice" -- one which in no wise impairs his love of music!
Link spotted first at the Catholic Blog for Lovers.
A pair of poetry links
A link to a poem called "Tenebrae" by Paul Celan (1920-70). Note : In English translation (from the German); translator unknown. Part of a website called "Art of Europe." Will have to examine; am considering linking to it in Places Oft.
And from the Academy of American Poets, an ebullient "interview" (conducted by e-mail) with American poet Heather McHugh (b. 1948). McHugh has translated the poetry of Celan into English. She confesses in this essay answer to an interviewer's question(s) to "logophiliacal obsessions," to an enchantment with the etymological, and to a distaste for the merely personal or the pretentiously political. I like much of what she says, and am not put off in the least by the antic punstering that would have been nearly impossible in a conventional interview. Note : the link to Part Two of the interview doesn't work.
A link to a poem called "Tenebrae" by Paul Celan (1920-70). Note : In English translation (from the German); translator unknown. Part of a website called "Art of Europe." Will have to examine; am considering linking to it in Places Oft.
And from the Academy of American Poets, an ebullient "interview" (conducted by e-mail) with American poet Heather McHugh (b. 1948). McHugh has translated the poetry of Celan into English. She confesses in this essay answer to an interviewer's question(s) to "logophiliacal obsessions," to an enchantment with the etymological, and to a distaste for the merely personal or the pretentiously political. I like much of what she says, and am not put off in the least by the antic punstering that would have been nearly impossible in a conventional interview. Note : the link to Part Two of the interview doesn't work.
Chapter
Autumn's revision, brothers, must be bold,
Hatred forsaken, avarice cast aside.
November is austerity's beginning,
Slaying of blisses, end of blithest dream.
All vex and blither, language that explores
Our grandest griefs, pretending to explain.
Transcribe belle mort, bête jaune, invidium.
Our psalmody make plain, our lives make pure.
All words have meaning. Nature's fleeting words
In season, out of season, sermonize :
The Preacher's chasing after wind, Job's woes,
Bitterest balm of perishing and birth.
But have we eyes to see or ears to hear
The messages, the proofs, the pictures plain?
Truth of a time, of every saeculum,
Impinging on the sacred-sordid globe,
Invading groves of plastic, lakes of glass,
To change the page, alter the chronicle
Of hearts and spirits, merrily sad, all souls
Briskly evading their terrible greatest need.
2000
Autumn's revision, brothers, must be bold,
Hatred forsaken, avarice cast aside.
November is austerity's beginning,
Slaying of blisses, end of blithest dream.
All vex and blither, language that explores
Our grandest griefs, pretending to explain.
Transcribe belle mort, bête jaune, invidium.
Our psalmody make plain, our lives make pure.
All words have meaning. Nature's fleeting words
In season, out of season, sermonize :
The Preacher's chasing after wind, Job's woes,
Bitterest balm of perishing and birth.
But have we eyes to see or ears to hear
The messages, the proofs, the pictures plain?
Truth of a time, of every saeculum,
Impinging on the sacred-sordid globe,
Invading groves of plastic, lakes of glass,
To change the page, alter the chronicle
Of hearts and spirits, merrily sad, all souls
Briskly evading their terrible greatest need.
2000
Saturday, February 15, 2003
Solidarity. The Pope. And 14 billion types of vodka.
I have this little Polish phrasebook, one of those five-dollar jobbies that give you just the basics, and if you go to the Restaurant section of this phrasebook, it gives you a little menu of various comestibles & potables you might encounter during your sojourn in Poland. Apparently, the papal homeland is really big on vodka. There are several vodka-related terms in this phrasebook, including :
Cytrynówka : lemon-flavored vodka
Jarzebiak : rowanberry-flavored vodka
Mysliwska : hunters' juniper berry-flavored vodka
Pieprzówka : pepper-flavored vodka
Soplica : flavored, dry vodka
Wisniak : medium-sweet, cherry-flavored vodka
Wisniówka : sweet, cherry-flavored vodka
Wyborowa : dry, clear vodka
Zubrówka : vodka with a blade of bison grass in the bottle
Zytnia : clear, dry vodka
Kieliszek wódki : glass of vodka
:: :: :: :: ::
If I ever need a liver transplant ... remind me not to get it done in Warsaw!
I have this little Polish phrasebook, one of those five-dollar jobbies that give you just the basics, and if you go to the Restaurant section of this phrasebook, it gives you a little menu of various comestibles & potables you might encounter during your sojourn in Poland. Apparently, the papal homeland is really big on vodka. There are several vodka-related terms in this phrasebook, including :
Cytrynówka : lemon-flavored vodka
Jarzebiak : rowanberry-flavored vodka
Mysliwska : hunters' juniper berry-flavored vodka
Pieprzówka : pepper-flavored vodka
Soplica : flavored, dry vodka
Wisniak : medium-sweet, cherry-flavored vodka
Wisniówka : sweet, cherry-flavored vodka
Wyborowa : dry, clear vodka
Zubrówka : vodka with a blade of bison grass in the bottle
Zytnia : clear, dry vodka
Kieliszek wódki : glass of vodka
:: :: :: :: ::
If I ever need a liver transplant ... remind me not to get it done in Warsaw!
Not very encouraging
This charming little chanson (WARNING : bad language) is currently #1 on the BET countdown.
This charming little chanson (WARNING : bad language) is currently #1 on the BET countdown.
True grit
Vinny Gambini : How could it take you 5 minutes to cook your grits when it takes the entire grit-eating world 20 minutes?
Mr. Tipton : Um...I'm a fast cook, I guess.
Vinny Gambini : You're a fast cook? Are we to believe that boiling water soaks into a grit faster in your kitchen than any place on the face of the earth?
Mr. Tipton : I don't know.
Vinny Gambini : Perhaps the laws of physics cease to exist on your stove! Were these magic grits? Did you buy them from the same guy who sold Jack his beanstalk beans?
Vinny Gambini : How could it take you 5 minutes to cook your grits when it takes the entire grit-eating world 20 minutes?
Mr. Tipton : Um...I'm a fast cook, I guess.
Vinny Gambini : You're a fast cook? Are we to believe that boiling water soaks into a grit faster in your kitchen than any place on the face of the earth?
Mr. Tipton : I don't know.
Vinny Gambini : Perhaps the laws of physics cease to exist on your stove! Were these magic grits? Did you buy them from the same guy who sold Jack his beanstalk beans?
If a tune plagues the ear
as Marianne Moore advises
the best thing is to let it forth unhindered. Throw your homework onto the fire! Yes, the Smiths, if you were wondering ...
as Marianne Moore advises
the best thing is to let it forth unhindered. Throw your homework onto the fire! Yes, the Smiths, if you were wondering ...
the girl is only comfortable in her father's presence when her 14-year-old, six-foot-one-inch brother is near
C'est un mystère inexplicable.
C'est un mystère inexplicable.
In case you missed it
... every no[w] and again I'd trot down to Commander Salamander's in Georgetown and get my hair spiked and done in a variety of non-natural, but quite washable colors.
Need we say that this is somewhat at variance with the mental picture we had formulated?
... every no[w] and again I'd trot down to Commander Salamander's in Georgetown and get my hair spiked and done in a variety of non-natural, but quite washable colors.
Need we say that this is somewhat at variance with the mental picture we had formulated?
Psalm 49. Audite haec, omnes.
O HEAR ye this, all ye people; * ponder it with your ears, all ye that dwell in the world;
2 High and low, rich and poor, * one with another.
3 My mouth shall speak of wisdom, * and my heart shall muse of understanding.
4 I will incline mine ear to the parable, * and show my dark speech upon the harp.
5 Wherefore should I fear in the days of evil, * when wickedness at my heels compasseth me round about?
6 There be some that put their trust in their goods, * and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches.
7 But no man may deliver his brother, * nor give a ransom unto God for him,
8 (For it cost more to redeem their souls, * so that he must let that alone for ever;)
9 That he shall live alway, * and not see the grave.
10 For he seeth that wise men also die and perish together, * as well as the ignorant and foolish, and leave their riches for other.
11 And yet they think that their houses shall continue for ever, and that their dwelling-places shall endure from one generation to another; * and call the lands after their own names.
12 Nevertheless, man being in honour abideth not, * seeing he may be compared unto the beasts that perish;
13 This their way is very foolishness; * yet their posterity praise their saying.
14 They lie in the grave like sheep; death is their shepherd; and the righteous shall have dominion over them in the morning: * their beauty shall consume in the sepulchre, and have no abiding.
15 But God hath delivered my soul from the power of the grave; * for he shall receive me.
16 Be not thou afraid, though one be made rich, * or if the glory of his house be increased;
17 For he shall carry nothing away with him when he dieth, * neither shall his pomp follow him.
18 For while he lived, he counted himself an happy man; * and so long as thou doest well unto thyself, men will speak good of thee.
19 He shall follow the generation of his fathers, * and shall never see light.
20 Man that is in honour but hath no understanding * is compared unto the beasts that perish.
O HEAR ye this, all ye people; * ponder it with your ears, all ye that dwell in the world;
2 High and low, rich and poor, * one with another.
3 My mouth shall speak of wisdom, * and my heart shall muse of understanding.
4 I will incline mine ear to the parable, * and show my dark speech upon the harp.
5 Wherefore should I fear in the days of evil, * when wickedness at my heels compasseth me round about?
6 There be some that put their trust in their goods, * and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches.
7 But no man may deliver his brother, * nor give a ransom unto God for him,
8 (For it cost more to redeem their souls, * so that he must let that alone for ever;)
9 That he shall live alway, * and not see the grave.
10 For he seeth that wise men also die and perish together, * as well as the ignorant and foolish, and leave their riches for other.
11 And yet they think that their houses shall continue for ever, and that their dwelling-places shall endure from one generation to another; * and call the lands after their own names.
12 Nevertheless, man being in honour abideth not, * seeing he may be compared unto the beasts that perish;
13 This their way is very foolishness; * yet their posterity praise their saying.
14 They lie in the grave like sheep; death is their shepherd; and the righteous shall have dominion over them in the morning: * their beauty shall consume in the sepulchre, and have no abiding.
15 But God hath delivered my soul from the power of the grave; * for he shall receive me.
16 Be not thou afraid, though one be made rich, * or if the glory of his house be increased;
17 For he shall carry nothing away with him when he dieth, * neither shall his pomp follow him.
18 For while he lived, he counted himself an happy man; * and so long as thou doest well unto thyself, men will speak good of thee.
19 He shall follow the generation of his fathers, * and shall never see light.
20 Man that is in honour but hath no understanding * is compared unto the beasts that perish.
Friday, February 14, 2003
dylanesque comment chez Riddle
the 1970s, continued
Hell, a herd of Winnebagoes, we're givin' 'em away! Or how about a McCullough chainsaw?
Fee. And, for that matter, Midge.
So glad you mentioned Roxy Music/Bryan Ferry ("More than This," 1982). Although Origen tells me he prefers Bryan Adams, for "Cuts Like a Knife."
Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't.
Boomtown Rats for "I don't like Mondays."
Réalisant mon espoir, je me lance vers l'étoile ...
Oh, squidnunc! How in the name of all things Sumnerian could we forget "Roxanne" or "Message in a Bottle"???
And the Schoolhouse Rock ditties!!!!!!!
the 1970s, continued
Hell, a herd of Winnebagoes, we're givin' 'em away! Or how about a McCullough chainsaw?
Fee. And, for that matter, Midge.
So glad you mentioned Roxy Music/Bryan Ferry ("More than This," 1982). Although Origen tells me he prefers Bryan Adams, for "Cuts Like a Knife."
Sometimes you feel like a nut, sometimes you don't.
Boomtown Rats for "I don't like Mondays."
Réalisant mon espoir, je me lance vers l'étoile ...
Oh, squidnunc! How in the name of all things Sumnerian could we forget "Roxanne" or "Message in a Bottle"???
And the Schoolhouse Rock ditties!!!!!!!
Yes, indeed, Sir Kairos ...
That audacious comparison can be found in Letters to Malcolm (I don't have page number, as I don't have the book at hand). And I agree : it's either an incredibly fatuous, or an incredibly Holy, way of looking at things. From my limited & all-too-worldly perspective, it's often difficult to distinguish 'twixt the two.
Go read the Kairos Guy, meditating on the question of whether we can see Christ even in the evil emmer effers of the world.
That audacious comparison can be found in Letters to Malcolm (I don't have page number, as I don't have the book at hand). And I agree : it's either an incredibly fatuous, or an incredibly Holy, way of looking at things. From my limited & all-too-worldly perspective, it's often difficult to distinguish 'twixt the two.
Go read the Kairos Guy, meditating on the question of whether we can see Christ even in the evil emmer effers of the world.
Psalm 77 (KJV)
1: I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
2: In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not: my soul refused to be comforted.
3: I remembered God, and was troubled: I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.
4: Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
5: I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.
6: I call to remembrance my song in the night: I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.
7: Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more?
8: Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore?
9: Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.
10: And I said, This is my infirmity: but I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High.
11: I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old.
12: I will meditate also of all thy work, and talk of thy doings.
13: Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary: who is so great a God as our God?
14: Thou art the God that doest wonders: thou hast declared thy strength among the people.
15: Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.
16: The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee; they were afraid: the depths also were troubled.
17: The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: thine arrows also went abroad.
18: The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven: the lightnings lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook.
19: Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.
20: Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.
1: I cried unto God with my voice, even unto God with my voice; and he gave ear unto me.
2: In the day of my trouble I sought the Lord: my sore ran in the night, and ceased not: my soul refused to be comforted.
3: I remembered God, and was troubled: I complained, and my spirit was overwhelmed. Selah.
4: Thou holdest mine eyes waking: I am so troubled that I cannot speak.
5: I have considered the days of old, the years of ancient times.
6: I call to remembrance my song in the night: I commune with mine own heart: and my spirit made diligent search.
7: Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more?
8: Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore?
9: Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies? Selah.
10: And I said, This is my infirmity: but I will remember the years of the right hand of the most High.
11: I will remember the works of the LORD: surely I will remember thy wonders of old.
12: I will meditate also of all thy work, and talk of thy doings.
13: Thy way, O God, is in the sanctuary: who is so great a God as our God?
14: Thou art the God that doest wonders: thou hast declared thy strength among the people.
15: Thou hast with thine arm redeemed thy people, the sons of Jacob and Joseph. Selah.
16: The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee; they were afraid: the depths also were troubled.
17: The clouds poured out water: the skies sent out a sound: thine arrows also went abroad.
18: The voice of thy thunder was in the heaven: the lightnings lightened the world: the earth trembled and shook.
19: Thy way is in the sea, and thy path in the great waters, and thy footsteps are not known.
20: Thou leddest thy people like a flock by the hand of Moses and Aaron.
Nameless nocturne of the 34th winter
Passages of lucidity. A three-degree wind. And having writ.
Jazz version of "Time After Time," with the orange tears intact. O clock radio, tristful and poignant and utterly benedight.
Rules for Good Living. Post it tomorrow.
Dark speech upon the harp. The doctor in Berlin. La demoiselle de Brooklyn, exultant, tyrannical, supreme.
Eccentric mythologies, and a perpetually disastrous disclosure. Keep the veracities tangled up in traffic.
The publicity is closed on account of weather. Rigid, puritanical, the bright wind scowls. Memorandum to Selwyn : No unncessary rules about adjectives.
A plaintive saxophone makes 1984 immediate. All the proper emotions take attendance, and find themselves present.
When did it all begin, was it with Mrs Watkins and the misconstrued syllabus?
If a tune plagues the ear, unhinder it and give it voice. Uncloister, unlock the song.
It was not enough to live within that golden voice, or under the dominion of those dark brown eyes.
Epiphanies of abject flesh and bone.
Zachary's short lines, as unshrill as a murmur. Secure as a president, modest as a saint. And freezing air apostrophized as the unseen savior.
Those were the days of dead leaves in public parks, alternative lyrics of doom, original disparities. This, the creative world in its rust and splendor. Its tinted agonies and blighted bliss.
Those were the reckless afterthoughts of many a cautious day. And was there a moment when the semblances coalesced, when the things of this world made a prettier kind of sense.
Impossible hopes were nourished by the calendar's slow velocity. Miles of proclivity (read : "possibility") lay ahead. But somewhere along the line, at many junctures, in fact, roadblocks and detours. Obstruction, reclusion, retreat.
Ambitions moribund, frosted burgeonings : is there no chronicle that is not of wasted days?
Back to the diaries of Bardstown & vicinity, to the liturgies of loss, to the great entertainment of grief and forsaken glory. Back to the strange-sounding Now with its dusty radiance, its bleary sobriety.
Make note of the smaller triumphs, the precious renunciations. Make note of all those arduous escapes.
Passages of lucidity. A three-degree wind. And having writ.
Jazz version of "Time After Time," with the orange tears intact. O clock radio, tristful and poignant and utterly benedight.
Rules for Good Living. Post it tomorrow.
Dark speech upon the harp. The doctor in Berlin. La demoiselle de Brooklyn, exultant, tyrannical, supreme.
Eccentric mythologies, and a perpetually disastrous disclosure. Keep the veracities tangled up in traffic.
The publicity is closed on account of weather. Rigid, puritanical, the bright wind scowls. Memorandum to Selwyn : No unncessary rules about adjectives.
A plaintive saxophone makes 1984 immediate. All the proper emotions take attendance, and find themselves present.
When did it all begin, was it with Mrs Watkins and the misconstrued syllabus?
If a tune plagues the ear, unhinder it and give it voice. Uncloister, unlock the song.
It was not enough to live within that golden voice, or under the dominion of those dark brown eyes.
Epiphanies of abject flesh and bone.
Zachary's short lines, as unshrill as a murmur. Secure as a president, modest as a saint. And freezing air apostrophized as the unseen savior.
Those were the days of dead leaves in public parks, alternative lyrics of doom, original disparities. This, the creative world in its rust and splendor. Its tinted agonies and blighted bliss.
Those were the reckless afterthoughts of many a cautious day. And was there a moment when the semblances coalesced, when the things of this world made a prettier kind of sense.
Impossible hopes were nourished by the calendar's slow velocity. Miles of proclivity (read : "possibility") lay ahead. But somewhere along the line, at many junctures, in fact, roadblocks and detours. Obstruction, reclusion, retreat.
Ambitions moribund, frosted burgeonings : is there no chronicle that is not of wasted days?
Back to the diaries of Bardstown & vicinity, to the liturgies of loss, to the great entertainment of grief and forsaken glory. Back to the strange-sounding Now with its dusty radiance, its bleary sobriety.
Make note of the smaller triumphs, the precious renunciations. Make note of all those arduous escapes.
Thursday, February 13, 2003
On the other hand
Butterflies are free, penguins don't fly, Democrats are silly and the French eat snails.
On the other hand. I need a light-weight goose-neck desk-lamp.
On the other hand. If this be surrealism, then make the most of it.
On the other hand. The lady Deborah's newly-minted poetical currency (dithyrambs, postage stamps, lucky charms, screwdrivers & the brown paper-bag with Magritte's mendacious legend) refreshes the pockets of a tired winter day.
On the other hand. Have you ever seen anyone run across a tightrope?
On the other hand. The magician's assistants leave nothing to the imagination.
On the other hand. This garret, this turret, this eyrie, this pied-à-ciel ... it sure could use a fireplace.
On the other hand. Digital semaphore requires agile mittens.
On the other hand. Has anybody here seen Frank?
On the other hand. This is not a beer.
On the other hand. Yes. I agree. I think that what you say is so. I think that what you say is true. I like what you say.
On the other hand. Anything before MTV was the seventies. So give me the night.
On the other hand. On the down low, Nick quotes Hamlet and the Psalms of David. Cruel to be kind. All men are liars.
On the other hand. I loved Paula's countdown. It's eighteen degrees. Above or below, I can't tell.
On the other hand. What if that's where the shoe was?
On the other hand. Miranda's memoranda. Mementoes of misspelled moments.
On the other hand. It behooves me when you say that. There's so much normalcy at stake.
Butterflies are free, penguins don't fly, Democrats are silly and the French eat snails.
On the other hand. I need a light-weight goose-neck desk-lamp.
On the other hand. If this be surrealism, then make the most of it.
On the other hand. The lady Deborah's newly-minted poetical currency (dithyrambs, postage stamps, lucky charms, screwdrivers & the brown paper-bag with Magritte's mendacious legend) refreshes the pockets of a tired winter day.
On the other hand. Have you ever seen anyone run across a tightrope?
On the other hand. The magician's assistants leave nothing to the imagination.
On the other hand. This garret, this turret, this eyrie, this pied-à-ciel ... it sure could use a fireplace.
On the other hand. Digital semaphore requires agile mittens.
On the other hand. Has anybody here seen Frank?
On the other hand. This is not a beer.
On the other hand. Yes. I agree. I think that what you say is so. I think that what you say is true. I like what you say.
On the other hand. Anything before MTV was the seventies. So give me the night.
On the other hand. On the down low, Nick quotes Hamlet and the Psalms of David. Cruel to be kind. All men are liars.
On the other hand. I loved Paula's countdown. It's eighteen degrees. Above or below, I can't tell.
On the other hand. What if that's where the shoe was?
On the other hand. Miranda's memoranda. Mementoes of misspelled moments.
On the other hand. It behooves me when you say that. There's so much normalcy at stake.
Seventies songs, you say?
KTC has posted a list -- here's mine (more than 10!)
"A Horse with No Name," America
"American Pie," Don McLean
Something by Sir Elton ("Goodbye, YBR" mayhap)
Maybe something by David Bowie (the Italian version of "Space Oddity"?)
"I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor
"Rapper's Delight" by the Sugar Hill Gang
Maybe something by Paul McCartney & Wings
All in the Family theme song
"We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions", Queen
"Killing Me Softly ..." Roberta Flack
Springsteen? I'll go with "Blinded by the Light," "Born to Run," "Adam Raised a Cain"
Donna Summer, "On the Radio" merits mention because it always sounded to me like she was saying riddy-oh.
10cc, "The Things We Do for Love"
Oh, yes, Rock the boat (don't rock the boat, baby) ... rock the boat (don't tip the boat over ... ) .. the Hues Corporation
Carpenters! "Top of the World," "Hurting Each Other," "Superstar"
But most especially : Van Morrison's "Moondance."
What, no Bee Gees? ("Stayin' Alive" the strongest candidate ... )
No Debby Boone?
Rollin' at sea, adrift on the waters,
Could it be finally I'm turnin' for home?
KTC has posted a list -- here's mine (more than 10!)
"A Horse with No Name," America
"American Pie," Don McLean
Something by Sir Elton ("Goodbye, YBR" mayhap)
Maybe something by David Bowie (the Italian version of "Space Oddity"?)
"I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor
"Rapper's Delight" by the Sugar Hill Gang
Maybe something by Paul McCartney & Wings
All in the Family theme song
"We Will Rock You/We Are the Champions", Queen
"Killing Me Softly ..." Roberta Flack
Springsteen? I'll go with "Blinded by the Light," "Born to Run," "Adam Raised a Cain"
Donna Summer, "On the Radio" merits mention because it always sounded to me like she was saying riddy-oh.
10cc, "The Things We Do for Love"
Oh, yes, Rock the boat (don't rock the boat, baby) ... rock the boat (don't tip the boat over ... ) .. the Hues Corporation
Carpenters! "Top of the World," "Hurting Each Other," "Superstar"
But most especially : Van Morrison's "Moondance."
What, no Bee Gees? ("Stayin' Alive" the strongest candidate ... )
No Debby Boone?
Rollin' at sea, adrift on the waters,
Could it be finally I'm turnin' for home?
Three cheers for Charles Yancey
via the Globe
"I haven't heard any legitimate reason why the building should not be named after Honan [the late Boston city councillor Brian Honan, who died last summer at 39]. I say, 'If there's a problem, let's discuss it in the Menino Wing of the Hyde Park Library.' "
-- Boston City Councilor, and former council president, Charles C. Yancey, tweaking Boston Mayor Thomas Menino on his ostensible reluctance to rename a branch of the Boston Public Library in Allston after Honan, his late colleague. This morning's Globe reports Menino is no longer showing signs of reluctance, and agrees that the honor would be fitting.
via the Globe
"I haven't heard any legitimate reason why the building should not be named after Honan [the late Boston city councillor Brian Honan, who died last summer at 39]. I say, 'If there's a problem, let's discuss it in the Menino Wing of the Hyde Park Library.' "
-- Boston City Councilor, and former council president, Charles C. Yancey, tweaking Boston Mayor Thomas Menino on his ostensible reluctance to rename a branch of the Boston Public Library in Allston after Honan, his late colleague. This morning's Globe reports Menino is no longer showing signs of reluctance, and agrees that the honor would be fitting.
Pelosi redux
via newsmax.com (scroll down to 2/11)
Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2003 1:28 p.m. EST
Pelosi Denies Invoking Black Rape to Defend Abortion
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is vehemently denying reports that she once defended the practice of abortion by using an anti-black slur.
"I've talked with Ms. Pelosi and it's absolutely not true," her spokesman Brendan Daley told NewsMax.com. "She did not say this to Mr. Dornan."
Pelosi's office was responding to a report in Tuesday's New York Daily News quoting former Congressman Bob Dornan, who said that the top California Democrat once defended abortion to him by asking, "What would you do if one of your daughters was raped by a black man?"
Daley said that Pelosi "doesn't recall saying anything of the kind to him. And she knows that that's not the thing she would say. So she did not say it." [Italics are dylan's.]
The Pelosi aide further maintained that his boss had no recollection of any conversation whatsoever with former Rep. Dornan on the subject of abortion.
An unnamed press aide for Pelosi told the Daily News yesterday that the congresswoman had "no response" to Dornan's allegation, leaving the impression that she was unwilling to dispute his account.
However, Daley told NewsMax, "I talked with the Daily News this morning. At the time when the reporter had called, the young woman he spoke to in our office did not know about this allegation and so therefore did not want to respond."
via newsmax.com (scroll down to 2/11)
Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2003 1:28 p.m. EST
Pelosi Denies Invoking Black Rape to Defend Abortion
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., is vehemently denying reports that she once defended the practice of abortion by using an anti-black slur.
"I've talked with Ms. Pelosi and it's absolutely not true," her spokesman Brendan Daley told NewsMax.com. "She did not say this to Mr. Dornan."
Pelosi's office was responding to a report in Tuesday's New York Daily News quoting former Congressman Bob Dornan, who said that the top California Democrat once defended abortion to him by asking, "What would you do if one of your daughters was raped by a black man?"
Daley said that Pelosi "doesn't recall saying anything of the kind to him. And she knows that that's not the thing she would say. So she did not say it." [Italics are dylan's.]
The Pelosi aide further maintained that his boss had no recollection of any conversation whatsoever with former Rep. Dornan on the subject of abortion.
An unnamed press aide for Pelosi told the Daily News yesterday that the congresswoman had "no response" to Dornan's allegation, leaving the impression that she was unwilling to dispute his account.
However, Daley told NewsMax, "I talked with the Daily News this morning. At the time when the reporter had called, the young woman he spoke to in our office did not know about this allegation and so therefore did not want to respond."
Results of the quiz
Schmies Vocabulary Test -- spotted at Eve's, the Rat's, & at Oblique House
4. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
29. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
65. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
101. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
138. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
161. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
169. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
172. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
174. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
184. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
185. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
You got 189 out of 200 correct.
Schmies Vocabulary Test -- spotted at Eve's, the Rat's, & at Oblique House
4. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
29. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
65. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
101. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
138. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
161. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
169. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
172. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
174. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
184. same ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is opposite
185. opposite ... INCORRECT... the correct answer is same
You got 189 out of 200 correct.
Psalm 121
in the KJ21 version, as episcopalnet.org, the site that provides the 1928 BCP Psalter, is undergoing maintenance until Septuagesima (the 16th) ...
1 I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help!
2 My help cometh from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not permit thy foot to be moved; He that keepeth thee will not slumber.
4 Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD is thy keeper; the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand.
6 The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil; He shall preserve thy soul.
8 The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.
in the KJ21 version, as episcopalnet.org, the site that provides the 1928 BCP Psalter, is undergoing maintenance until Septuagesima (the 16th) ...
1 I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help!
2 My help cometh from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.
3 He will not permit thy foot to be moved; He that keepeth thee will not slumber.
4 Behold, He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
5 The LORD is thy keeper; the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand.
6 The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.
7 The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil; He shall preserve thy soul.
8 The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.
Abusing the President, or, the more things change
Go see Mark Sullivan's splendid compilation of things said about President Lincoln by some of his more critical contemporaries. Don't miss what the Chicago Times said about the Gettysburg Address.
Go see Mark Sullivan's splendid compilation of things said about President Lincoln by some of his more critical contemporaries. Don't miss what the Chicago Times said about the Gettysburg Address.
Wednesday, February 12, 2003
Then was my neophyte
lines 1-24 of 48
Then was my neophyte,
Child in white blood bent on its knees
Under the bell of rocks,
Ducked in the twelve, disciple seas
The winder of the water-clocks
Calls a green day and night.
My sea hermaphrodite,
Snail of man in His ship of fires
That burn the bitten decks,
Knew all His horrible desires
The climber of the water sex
Calls the green rock of light.
Who in these labyrinths,
This tidethread and the lane of scales,
Twine in a moon-blown shell,
Escapes to the flat cities' sails
Furled on the fishes' house and hell,
Nor falls to His green myths?
Stretch the salt photographs,
The landscape grief, love in His oils
Mirror from man to whale
That the green child see like a grail
Through veil and fin and fire and coil
Time on the canvas paths.
from The Collected Poems of Dylan Thomas (New Directions, 1954), p. 78
lines 1-24 of 48
Then was my neophyte,
Child in white blood bent on its knees
Under the bell of rocks,
Ducked in the twelve, disciple seas
The winder of the water-clocks
Calls a green day and night.
My sea hermaphrodite,
Snail of man in His ship of fires
That burn the bitten decks,
Knew all His horrible desires
The climber of the water sex
Calls the green rock of light.
Who in these labyrinths,
This tidethread and the lane of scales,
Twine in a moon-blown shell,
Escapes to the flat cities' sails
Furled on the fishes' house and hell,
Nor falls to His green myths?
Stretch the salt photographs,
The landscape grief, love in His oils
Mirror from man to whale
That the green child see like a grail
Through veil and fin and fire and coil
Time on the canvas paths.
from The Collected Poems of Dylan Thomas (New Directions, 1954), p. 78
A Trappistine compares two pacifists
Once I dipped into an article in The Catholic Worker. I always start from the back, and I didn't know who had written it. It was so vitriolic, I was unhappy with it, then saddened to see it was by Dan Berrigan. So I thought, he is preaching pacifism in a violent frame of mind. I believe he is sincere, but I know you can't be a genuine pacifist, or genuinely helpful, through violence of the mind any more than through violence of the body. I never had that impression with Dorothy Day. She was terribly convinced, terribly dedicated. But she was interiorly calm. She had humor, she could see that other people would usually think she was nuts, but she didn't attack them emotionally for disagreeing. She was dry, extreme, loving, reverent -- a very disarming anarchist, someone in whom protest had not become an identity. I am glad I didn't have her vocation, for it's a rare person who could do what she did, and with such inner freedom.
Miriam Pollard, OCSO, from The Laughter of God : At Ease with Prayer (Michael Glazier, Inc., 1986), p. 111
Once I dipped into an article in The Catholic Worker. I always start from the back, and I didn't know who had written it. It was so vitriolic, I was unhappy with it, then saddened to see it was by Dan Berrigan. So I thought, he is preaching pacifism in a violent frame of mind. I believe he is sincere, but I know you can't be a genuine pacifist, or genuinely helpful, through violence of the mind any more than through violence of the body. I never had that impression with Dorothy Day. She was terribly convinced, terribly dedicated. But she was interiorly calm. She had humor, she could see that other people would usually think she was nuts, but she didn't attack them emotionally for disagreeing. She was dry, extreme, loving, reverent -- a very disarming anarchist, someone in whom protest had not become an identity. I am glad I didn't have her vocation, for it's a rare person who could do what she did, and with such inner freedom.
Miriam Pollard, OCSO, from The Laughter of God : At Ease with Prayer (Michael Glazier, Inc., 1986), p. 111
Left-hand column
To the error503 archives, just below the photo of sir estlin, note the addition of the first eight days of that weblog's existence, when the erroneous, tenebrous, sporadically lucid one was but a babe in the woods at this whole blogging biz. Ah, those halcyon days of yore! The glory and the freshness of a dream!
To the error503 archives, just below the photo of sir estlin, note the addition of the first eight days of that weblog's existence, when the erroneous, tenebrous, sporadically lucid one was but a babe in the woods at this whole blogging biz. Ah, those halcyon days of yore! The glory and the freshness of a dream!
Handpuppets, sockpuppets ... and now ...
not for the squeamish
A Boston Globe article on a twisted, cocksure theatrical troupe whose ... members ... specialize in what they call "the ancient art of genital origami." A good argument for slashing the arts budget?
not for the squeamish
A Boston Globe article on a twisted, cocksure theatrical troupe whose ... members ... specialize in what they call "the ancient art of genital origami." A good argument for slashing the arts budget?
Kenneth Koch (1925-2002)
from "The Seasons," IV : Winter
Oh, from what Arctic bulge
Of everlasting winter slicked by spring
And summer with its meltingness re-formed
Into another shape as fearsome and
Relentless as its former, does there come
A messenger with one would say a hope
To pry conversion from the temperate zones
Convincing them with killing blasts of air
That sempiternal winter would be best
For everything there living? Spring has marked
The one end of this season as has fall
The other, yet, ignoring these, it comes
As it would stay forever. Flying force,
Go back to that sad cemeteried zone
In which you prosper, being there the king,
Unwanted here where soft erupts the rose,
The pear tree blossoms, and the children walk
To playgrounds through the heaps of autumn leaves,
With warm and cool, to each appointed each
A guardian and a limiting effect
Caught in the mild democracy of days.
[ ... ]
Unknowing its harsh powers some lucky young
May find it pleasure purely, and indeed
May all who have the means to keep them warm
For in contrast is pleasure -- the swift sting
Of wind is bound by a fur-coat embrace
In a light-wingèd mix of joy and pain
And few would banish winter from their midst
Could they quell its excess. Amantha slips
Her formal on that shows her shoulders smooth
And white as all that snow. Warm paradox
Of dressing up in winter to be bare
Beneath the glowering chandeliers of heaven
Two instants to the car! And she goes down
The stairs into her waiting date's hired car
And is whisked off to Princeton for a ball
While gentle flakelets flutter in the sky.
Now bold Arcturus weaves for the event
A sudden dreadful thunder that portends
A storm to bring New Jersey to its knees.
from Straits : Poems by Kenneth Koch (Knopf, 1998), pp. 61-62
from "The Seasons," IV : Winter
Oh, from what Arctic bulge
Of everlasting winter slicked by spring
And summer with its meltingness re-formed
Into another shape as fearsome and
Relentless as its former, does there come
A messenger with one would say a hope
To pry conversion from the temperate zones
Convincing them with killing blasts of air
That sempiternal winter would be best
For everything there living? Spring has marked
The one end of this season as has fall
The other, yet, ignoring these, it comes
As it would stay forever. Flying force,
Go back to that sad cemeteried zone
In which you prosper, being there the king,
Unwanted here where soft erupts the rose,
The pear tree blossoms, and the children walk
To playgrounds through the heaps of autumn leaves,
With warm and cool, to each appointed each
A guardian and a limiting effect
Caught in the mild democracy of days.
[ ... ]
Unknowing its harsh powers some lucky young
May find it pleasure purely, and indeed
May all who have the means to keep them warm
For in contrast is pleasure -- the swift sting
Of wind is bound by a fur-coat embrace
In a light-wingèd mix of joy and pain
And few would banish winter from their midst
Could they quell its excess. Amantha slips
Her formal on that shows her shoulders smooth
And white as all that snow. Warm paradox
Of dressing up in winter to be bare
Beneath the glowering chandeliers of heaven
Two instants to the car! And she goes down
The stairs into her waiting date's hired car
And is whisked off to Princeton for a ball
While gentle flakelets flutter in the sky.
Now bold Arcturus weaves for the event
A sudden dreadful thunder that portends
A storm to bring New Jersey to its knees.
from Straits : Poems by Kenneth Koch (Knopf, 1998), pp. 61-62
Tuesday morning at nearly five
Life seems sagacious in these hours before the sunrise, before the coffee and the taken garbage. Here is a silence, monastic and responsible : a luminous darkness that invites the whispered psalm.
Outside it is bitter, and a graceless wind roils the dust and shabby papers of the street, the trees' discarded leaves and the candy wrappers, vivid remnants of culture. Inside is the season of grace, of cordial communion with the saints and angels -- of noble distractions, of the aging but timeless books, of just enough light.
And now for an hour of blessed darkness, an hour or two, before the duties beckon, before the coffee quickens to life, before the sober light arrives, to scrutinize, to notice and reveal what the wholesome night leaves hidden.
Life seems sagacious in these hours before the sunrise, before the coffee and the taken garbage. Here is a silence, monastic and responsible : a luminous darkness that invites the whispered psalm.
Outside it is bitter, and a graceless wind roils the dust and shabby papers of the street, the trees' discarded leaves and the candy wrappers, vivid remnants of culture. Inside is the season of grace, of cordial communion with the saints and angels -- of noble distractions, of the aging but timeless books, of just enough light.
And now for an hour of blessed darkness, an hour or two, before the duties beckon, before the coffee quickens to life, before the sober light arrives, to scrutinize, to notice and reveal what the wholesome night leaves hidden.
Nancy Pelosi vs Bob Dornan on abortion
and a racially insensitive comment from Pelosi. From the New York Daily News (scroll down a wee bit, less than a third of the way).
But, Nancy ... wouldn't that be a hate crime? Oh, well. Of course not. It's not life.
Trent Lott praises Strom Thurmond, it's a national crisis. Liberal Democrat advocates killing innocent black (well, biracial) children, ho hum.
Link spotted at the Rat.
and a racially insensitive comment from Pelosi. From the New York Daily News (scroll down a wee bit, less than a third of the way).
But, Nancy ... wouldn't that be a hate crime? Oh, well. Of course not. It's not life.
Trent Lott praises Strom Thurmond, it's a national crisis. Liberal Democrat advocates killing innocent black (well, biracial) children, ho hum.
Link spotted at the Rat.
Varia et sundria
We should all start going to Orthodox churches until Catholic priests everywhere make solemn vows to stop using the word "community."
I made it through the wilderness. Somehow I made it through.
Peggy Noonan should be Archbishop of Los Angeles. George F. Will, Archbishop of Chicago.
Fr Neuhaus is unknockable.
Brandy is my favorite Cinderella. (A day late -- happy birthday!)
We should all start going to Orthodox churches until Catholic priests everywhere make solemn vows to stop using the word "community."
I made it through the wilderness. Somehow I made it through.
Peggy Noonan should be Archbishop of Los Angeles. George F. Will, Archbishop of Chicago.
Fr Neuhaus is unknockable.
Brandy is my favorite Cinderella. (A day late -- happy birthday!)
Tuesday, February 11, 2003
Festinate omnes, et videte meliora !!
Hasten ye all and see the better things
Mr O'Rama gives us some excellent quotations from Cardinal Ratzinger this day, on the Eucharist and on our Lady.
Hasten ye all and see the better things
Mr O'Rama gives us some excellent quotations from Cardinal Ratzinger this day, on the Eucharist and on our Lady.
Seventeenth-century devotion
And first O Lord I praise and magnify thy name
For the Most Holy Virgin-Mother of God, who is the Highest of thy Saints.
The most Glorious of all thy Creatures.
The most Perfect of all thy Works.
The nearest unto Thee, in the Throne of God.
Whom Thou didst please to make
Daughter of the Eternal Father.
Mother of the Eternal Son.
Spouse of the Eternal Spirit.
Tabernacle of the Most Glorious Trinity.
Mother of Jesus.
Mother of the Messias.
Mother of Him who was the Desire of all Nations.
Mother of the Prince of Peace.
Mother of the King of Heaven.
Mother of our Creator.
Mother and Virgin.
Mirror of Humility and Obedience.
Mirror of Wisdom and Devotion.
Mirror of Modesty and Chastity.
Mirror of Sweetness and Resignation.
Mirror of Sanctity.
Mirror of all virtues.
The Most Illustrious Light in the Church,
Wearing over all her Beauties the Veil of Humility
to shine the more resplendently in thy Eternal Glory.
And yet this Holy Virgin-Mother styled herself but the Handmaid of the Lord, and falls down with all the Glorious Hosts of Angels, and with the Armies of Saints, at the foot of Thy Throne, to worship and Glorify Thee for ever and ever.
I praise thee O Lord with all the Powers and faculties of my Soul; for doing in Her all thy Merciful Works for my sake and the Benefit of Mankind. For uttering the Glorious Word: yea rather Blessed are they that Hear the Word of God, and Keep it. And for looking round about upon Thy Disciples and saying, Behold my Mother and my Brethren. For whosoever shall do the Will of God, the same is my Brother and my Sister and my Mother. Yea for what thou wilt say, Inasmuch as ye have done it to the least of these, ye have done it unto me.
The most unworthy of all thy Servants falleth down to worship Thee for thine own Excellencies; even Thee O Lord, for thine own perfection, and for all those Glorious Graces, given and imparted to this Holy Virgin, and to all thy Saints.
Thomas Traherne (1637-74), as quoted by A. M. Allchin in The Joy of All Creation : An Anglican Meditation on the Place of Mary (Cowley Publications, 1984), pp. 86-87.
And first O Lord I praise and magnify thy name
For the Most Holy Virgin-Mother of God, who is the Highest of thy Saints.
The most Glorious of all thy Creatures.
The most Perfect of all thy Works.
The nearest unto Thee, in the Throne of God.
Whom Thou didst please to make
Daughter of the Eternal Father.
Mother of the Eternal Son.
Spouse of the Eternal Spirit.
Tabernacle of the Most Glorious Trinity.
Mother of Jesus.
Mother of the Messias.
Mother of Him who was the Desire of all Nations.
Mother of the Prince of Peace.
Mother of the King of Heaven.
Mother of our Creator.
Mother and Virgin.
Mirror of Humility and Obedience.
Mirror of Wisdom and Devotion.
Mirror of Modesty and Chastity.
Mirror of Sweetness and Resignation.
Mirror of Sanctity.
Mirror of all virtues.
The Most Illustrious Light in the Church,
Wearing over all her Beauties the Veil of Humility
to shine the more resplendently in thy Eternal Glory.
And yet this Holy Virgin-Mother styled herself but the Handmaid of the Lord, and falls down with all the Glorious Hosts of Angels, and with the Armies of Saints, at the foot of Thy Throne, to worship and Glorify Thee for ever and ever.
I praise thee O Lord with all the Powers and faculties of my Soul; for doing in Her all thy Merciful Works for my sake and the Benefit of Mankind. For uttering the Glorious Word: yea rather Blessed are they that Hear the Word of God, and Keep it. And for looking round about upon Thy Disciples and saying, Behold my Mother and my Brethren. For whosoever shall do the Will of God, the same is my Brother and my Sister and my Mother. Yea for what thou wilt say, Inasmuch as ye have done it to the least of these, ye have done it unto me.
The most unworthy of all thy Servants falleth down to worship Thee for thine own Excellencies; even Thee O Lord, for thine own perfection, and for all those Glorious Graces, given and imparted to this Holy Virgin, and to all thy Saints.
Thomas Traherne (1637-74), as quoted by A. M. Allchin in The Joy of All Creation : An Anglican Meditation on the Place of Mary (Cowley Publications, 1984), pp. 86-87.
Neuhaus
I must resume reading his book on the Seven Last Words, Death on a Friday Afternoon. I notice, in skipping idly ahead of where I left off, that the reader is given the Testament of Dom Christian de Chergé, one of the seven Trappist monks slain at Tibhirine, Algeria in 1996.
It sounds like faint praise to say so, but it is not meant as such. This book is excellent reading for a hospital waiting-room. Perhaps even in the jury-duty waiting room. Heck, it's Fr Neuhaus -- it's excellent reading for anywhere!
I must resume reading his book on the Seven Last Words, Death on a Friday Afternoon. I notice, in skipping idly ahead of where I left off, that the reader is given the Testament of Dom Christian de Chergé, one of the seven Trappist monks slain at Tibhirine, Algeria in 1996.
It sounds like faint praise to say so, but it is not meant as such. This book is excellent reading for a hospital waiting-room. Perhaps even in the jury-duty waiting room. Heck, it's Fr Neuhaus -- it's excellent reading for anywhere!
One Times One
It is axiomatic that no 60-page paperback is worth $12. plus tax. But when the paperback in question comtains 54 poems by Estlin Cummings, and most of them of immortal importance, we begin to wonder. One Times One, the book that Marianne Moore termed "the E. E. Cummings book of masterpieces" has been reissued by Liveright.
In this volume, there are many marvels, of the denunciatory, the natural, the amatory, the celebratory. Many of his best poems -- and best, not merely because they're metrical.
"what if a much of a which of a wind"
"except in your / honour"
"yes is a pleasant country"
"if everything happens that can't be done"
"nothing false and possible is love"
"life is more true than reason will deceive"
"one's not half two. It's two are halves of one"
"o by the by"
"true lovers in each happening of their hearts"
"a politician is an arse upon"
"a salesman is an it that stinks Excuse"
"all ignorance toboggans into know"
"i've come to ask you if there isn't a"
"no man,if men are gods;but if gods must"
(The one about the politician is a couplet, whose lower half is "which everyone has sat except a man" ...)
If you've ever wondered what the fuss is about Cummings, go into the bookstore and, at the very least, leaf slowly through One Times One.
It is axiomatic that no 60-page paperback is worth $12. plus tax. But when the paperback in question comtains 54 poems by Estlin Cummings, and most of them of immortal importance, we begin to wonder. One Times One, the book that Marianne Moore termed "the E. E. Cummings book of masterpieces" has been reissued by Liveright.
In this volume, there are many marvels, of the denunciatory, the natural, the amatory, the celebratory. Many of his best poems -- and best, not merely because they're metrical.
"what if a much of a which of a wind"
"except in your / honour"
"yes is a pleasant country"
"if everything happens that can't be done"
"nothing false and possible is love"
"life is more true than reason will deceive"
"one's not half two. It's two are halves of one"
"o by the by"
"true lovers in each happening of their hearts"
"a politician is an arse upon"
"a salesman is an it that stinks Excuse"
"all ignorance toboggans into know"
"i've come to ask you if there isn't a"
"no man,if men are gods;but if gods must"
(The one about the politician is a couplet, whose lower half is "which everyone has sat except a man" ...)
If you've ever wondered what the fuss is about Cummings, go into the bookstore and, at the very least, leaf slowly through One Times One.
Monday, February 10, 2003
BTW, TMB ...
TMB stands here for "The Mighty Barrister," not for "Third Millennium Bible"
I hope you're not superstitious! Specifically, I hope you're not triskaidekaphobic. Your "Vermont is in Canada, eh?" comment from a few days back was comment #1313 on dylan's haloscan.
You also have comment #1414. What is it with these multiples of 101?
TMB stands here for "The Mighty Barrister," not for "Third Millennium Bible"
I hope you're not superstitious! Specifically, I hope you're not triskaidekaphobic. Your "Vermont is in Canada, eh?" comment from a few days back was comment #1313 on dylan's haloscan.
You also have comment #1414. What is it with these multiples of 101?
John Cardinal Wright
from "Faith and the Theologies"
Theologians are men : the thoughts of men are many and divided. Theological theories set forth aspects, elements, corollaries of the faith. They provide reasonings about the faith. But theologians are not sources of faith nor are their speculations the object of faith.
Jesus Christ is God. The thought of God is one and unites; God's revelations are the object of faith. His Church authoritatively sets forth God's revelation. The Church is not a forum nor a school of theologians and theologies, though she is greatly helped by these in the total work of explaining the faith that she is called to do. The Church is the channel through which God's revelation reaches men, including theologians, so that believers may enjoy the privilege of reflecting on the content of revelation, as do theologians, but may also, and above all else, live in the light of the revelation -- as must all the faithful, including the theologians. Only what the Church teaches authoritatively as the mind and the will of Christ the Lord is the object of faith; all the theologies, even those which most she welcomes as helpful in understanding the faith or blesses as most consistent with the content of faith are secondary and marginal, related to the faith, perhaps, but not to be confused with it.
John Cardinal Wright in The Church : Hope of the World, ed. by Rev. Donald W. Wuerl (Kenosha : Prow Books, 1972), pp. 44-45.
from "Faith and the Theologies"
Theologians are men : the thoughts of men are many and divided. Theological theories set forth aspects, elements, corollaries of the faith. They provide reasonings about the faith. But theologians are not sources of faith nor are their speculations the object of faith.
Jesus Christ is God. The thought of God is one and unites; God's revelations are the object of faith. His Church authoritatively sets forth God's revelation. The Church is not a forum nor a school of theologians and theologies, though she is greatly helped by these in the total work of explaining the faith that she is called to do. The Church is the channel through which God's revelation reaches men, including theologians, so that believers may enjoy the privilege of reflecting on the content of revelation, as do theologians, but may also, and above all else, live in the light of the revelation -- as must all the faithful, including the theologians. Only what the Church teaches authoritatively as the mind and the will of Christ the Lord is the object of faith; all the theologies, even those which most she welcomes as helpful in understanding the faith or blesses as most consistent with the content of faith are secondary and marginal, related to the faith, perhaps, but not to be confused with it.
John Cardinal Wright in The Church : Hope of the World, ed. by Rev. Donald W. Wuerl (Kenosha : Prow Books, 1972), pp. 44-45.
Fulfilled the Sunday obligation
to watch the midday news yesterday. It is an obligation which we are disinclined to shirk.
Even when the news of the world, or of this part of the world, is more than mildly distressing, there is nonetheless an incentive to stay adequately informed on the issues and events of the day.
to watch the midday news yesterday. It is an obligation which we are disinclined to shirk.
Even when the news of the world, or of this part of the world, is more than mildly distressing, there is nonetheless an incentive to stay adequately informed on the issues and events of the day.
He wasn't standing up, he was laying down
Fred Reed on the "enstupidation" of America, the deliberate cultivation, the active encouragement, of semi-literacy.
The header to this post was a line of dialogue in a recent episode of CSI. And even though I went to a high-school (grades seven through twelve) that taught English grammar very well, and taught Latin as a non-elective, and taught modern foreign languages, I was in the tenth grade before I learned the difference between "lie" and "lay."
Of course, that prayer is the culprit. "Now I lay me down to sleep." Which means, "Now, I place myself down to sleep." Which also means, "Now I lie down." Lay : transitive, to place something down. Lie : intransitive, to recline.
Of course, there are other meanings of "lie" (and of "lay") which we shall avoid discussing, for the nonce.
Go read Reed!
Fred Reed on the "enstupidation" of America, the deliberate cultivation, the active encouragement, of semi-literacy.
The header to this post was a line of dialogue in a recent episode of CSI. And even though I went to a high-school (grades seven through twelve) that taught English grammar very well, and taught Latin as a non-elective, and taught modern foreign languages, I was in the tenth grade before I learned the difference between "lie" and "lay."
Of course, that prayer is the culprit. "Now I lay me down to sleep." Which means, "Now, I place myself down to sleep." Which also means, "Now I lie down." Lay : transitive, to place something down. Lie : intransitive, to recline.
Of course, there are other meanings of "lie" (and of "lay") which we shall avoid discussing, for the nonce.
Go read Reed!
Jeff Miller has returned
as The Curt Jester.
And he asks for our prayers for his mother, who died yesterday morning. Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord, and may the perpetual light shine upon her. May she rest in peace.
:: :: :: :: ::
Non solum ... sed etiam ...
The Gospel M*I*N*E*F*I*E*L*D, Kathy the Carmelite's new weblog, has also been added to Places Oft.
as The Curt Jester.
And he asks for our prayers for his mother, who died yesterday morning. Eternal rest grant unto her, O Lord, and may the perpetual light shine upon her. May she rest in peace.
:: :: :: :: ::
Non solum ... sed etiam ...
The Gospel M*I*N*E*F*I*E*L*D, Kathy the Carmelite's new weblog, has also been added to Places Oft.
Joe Fitzgerald
writes today that violence comes not from the presence of guns but from the absence of values.
I'd add, too, the reluctance to give sentences that are proportionate to the gravity of the crime.
But an excellent column : read the words of the shooting victim who indicts "not the bullet, but the attitude that fired the gun." Precisely.
But that insight is often obscured for reasons that are less morally than politically correct.
When white folks shoot black folks, we blame the shooters. When black folks shoot black folks, we blame the guns. And who pays the price for this reluctance to assign culpability? Not people who are living in Winchester or Wellesley.
The first two homicide victims in Boston in 2003 were both black children under the age of 15, the most recent a child in his ninth month in the womb.
writes today that violence comes not from the presence of guns but from the absence of values.
I'd add, too, the reluctance to give sentences that are proportionate to the gravity of the crime.
But an excellent column : read the words of the shooting victim who indicts "not the bullet, but the attitude that fired the gun." Precisely.
But that insight is often obscured for reasons that are less morally than politically correct.
When white folks shoot black folks, we blame the shooters. When black folks shoot black folks, we blame the guns. And who pays the price for this reluctance to assign culpability? Not people who are living in Winchester or Wellesley.
The first two homicide victims in Boston in 2003 were both black children under the age of 15, the most recent a child in his ninth month in the womb.
Sunday, February 09, 2003
Vocative
"Teach me the word
That will conquer the world,
Will plunder, will lay waste,
Dominions of the dull
And kingdoms of the bad."
Silence is learning
Submission to heaven,
Grace's receiving,
Kinesis and virtue
And works of the good.
"Teach me the silence
That will conquer false speech,
Will betray and will scatter
The legions of the proud,
The chattering cheaters."
The holy and honest
Speak little and wisely,
Composed of a faith
That keeps them in concord,
Silent or singing.
© 2000, 2003 by dylan_tm618
"Teach me the word
That will conquer the world,
Will plunder, will lay waste,
Dominions of the dull
And kingdoms of the bad."
Silence is learning
Submission to heaven,
Grace's receiving,
Kinesis and virtue
And works of the good.
"Teach me the silence
That will conquer false speech,
Will betray and will scatter
The legions of the proud,
The chattering cheaters."
The holy and honest
Speak little and wisely,
Composed of a faith
That keeps them in concord,
Silent or singing.
© 2000, 2003 by dylan_tm618
Corrections
Memorandum to all departments. Do we know the difference between a doily and a mantilla? Can we see on the left, the Clare Boothe Luce cravat, and on the right, the Henry Wallace foulard?
The snow has stopped failing. It continues to sit on the curb, parked under the lamppost. Gregarious, Gregorian, it greets the passing stranger with a sunny smile. Not unlike a social-studies teacher en l'an trentiesme de son eage.
The psalters and their psalmodists grimace at the antics of the Musikführerin. You will be tolerant. You will get your facts straight. This is a foreboding.
Thou shalt not compare Episcopalians to Unitarians. Thou shalt not declare dissenters un-dandy. Thou shalt praise the ghost of Chicago. Thou shalt read official documents and practice fine distinctions. Thou shalt genuflect to polyglots. Thou shalt learn the meaning of "symbol." Thou shalt find the thread to be puzzling.
Memorandum to all departments. Do we know the difference between a doily and a mantilla? Can we see on the left, the Clare Boothe Luce cravat, and on the right, the Henry Wallace foulard?
The snow has stopped failing. It continues to sit on the curb, parked under the lamppost. Gregarious, Gregorian, it greets the passing stranger with a sunny smile. Not unlike a social-studies teacher en l'an trentiesme de son eage.
The psalters and their psalmodists grimace at the antics of the Musikführerin. You will be tolerant. You will get your facts straight. This is a foreboding.
Thou shalt not compare Episcopalians to Unitarians. Thou shalt not declare dissenters un-dandy. Thou shalt praise the ghost of Chicago. Thou shalt read official documents and practice fine distinctions. Thou shalt genuflect to polyglots. Thou shalt learn the meaning of "symbol." Thou shalt find the thread to be puzzling.
You can call him the Rev. Al
or you can call him what Peter Beinart of the Jewish World Review calls him. With words that are bracingly unminced.
or you can call him what Peter Beinart of the Jewish World Review calls him. With words that are bracingly unminced.
Vescovabile
A friend of mine, who lives in proximity to a fairly big-name college, recently proferred his opinion that his pastor, la personalité des toutes personalités, was bishop material. The priest in question is about 60, and it probably would have happened by now if it was going to happen at all.
First time I met this shepherd, my friend introduces me by name and location -- a few miles from the parish, not all that far. With more suspicion than curiosity, Monsignor asked, "Well, what are you doing here?" (The perfect response would have been, "Lowering property values.")
My choice for a vescovabile priest is only 34. He shows forth the good Lord Christ as efficaciously and as splendidly as a monstrance. And if it's not his lot to be a bishop, my prayer is that we have bishops like him. He possesses a good-humored orthodoxy, as attractive as it is unapologetic.
A friend of mine, who lives in proximity to a fairly big-name college, recently proferred his opinion that his pastor, la personalité des toutes personalités, was bishop material. The priest in question is about 60, and it probably would have happened by now if it was going to happen at all.
First time I met this shepherd, my friend introduces me by name and location -- a few miles from the parish, not all that far. With more suspicion than curiosity, Monsignor asked, "Well, what are you doing here?" (The perfect response would have been, "Lowering property values.")
My choice for a vescovabile priest is only 34. He shows forth the good Lord Christ as efficaciously and as splendidly as a monstrance. And if it's not his lot to be a bishop, my prayer is that we have bishops like him. He possesses a good-humored orthodoxy, as attractive as it is unapologetic.
I'm not sure
there are too many John Ashbery fans here, and I'm not sure I'm quite an Ashbery "fan" (used to idolize the poet, then turned violently against him, and now I just tolerate him as one of the quirkier and odder literary phenomena out there), BUT
I'm thinking of linking to an interview with Ashbery where he confesses that one of his poems ("The Songs We Know Best" in A Wave) was written to the tune of Peaches & Herb's "Reunited" !!
But that's perhaps the only fun part of the interview. Plus, I don't want to encourage reading of a poet whom I describe as a guilty pleasure. It is a poetry of startlement, but after a while, you begin to expect the startling, and the glee diminishes and the attraction wanes. Still, he'll give you something chuckleworthy every once in a blue moon : "The oxymoron gets his rocks off."
there are too many John Ashbery fans here, and I'm not sure I'm quite an Ashbery "fan" (used to idolize the poet, then turned violently against him, and now I just tolerate him as one of the quirkier and odder literary phenomena out there), BUT
I'm thinking of linking to an interview with Ashbery where he confesses that one of his poems ("The Songs We Know Best" in A Wave) was written to the tune of Peaches & Herb's "Reunited" !!
But that's perhaps the only fun part of the interview. Plus, I don't want to encourage reading of a poet whom I describe as a guilty pleasure. It is a poetry of startlement, but after a while, you begin to expect the startling, and the glee diminishes and the attraction wanes. Still, he'll give you something chuckleworthy every once in a blue moon : "The oxymoron gets his rocks off."
Bad Weather
(being a mad scholastic misadventure in painfully correct rhyme)
It snowed like history in the ears;
The cats and dogs were howling for years.
A timeless airplane once split a rock,
Crashed on the runway at twelve o'clock.
A glacier struck at quarter of two.
A most formal Ice Age did ensue
By hexagonal law. Convention
Yields to the solstice of creation.
It snowed in the mind like chemistry.
The cats and dogs strained their eyes to see
The arctic lips of Art and Reason
In this kaleidoscopic season.
To kiss the shore was intense. Waves, black,
Mounted the snowy sand, left no track,
Quoted bleak surahs, then sighed slow. Their
Sibilance fractured the coastal air.
It snowed like algebra, graphed the earth.
The cats and dogs factored the rebirth
Of blood-spilling skin-breaking despair.
Conic-sectioned snowdrifts killed the air.
Analphabetic veins, intertwined,
Stifled light in the subtracted mind.
Then came a stasis : cranial fright
And heartless vocals. The whole numb night,
It snowed. I cried. Your marble-white face
Was cold in its smooth declining grace.
first version 1986
revised 2003
It snowed like history in the ears;
The cats and dogs were howling for years.
A timeless airplane once split a rock,
Crashed on the runway at twelve o'clock.
A glacier struck at quarter of two.
A most formal Ice Age did ensue
By hexagonal law. Convention
Yields to the solstice of creation.
It snowed in the mind like chemistry.
The cats and dogs strained their eyes to see
The arctic lips of Art and Reason
In this kaleidoscopic season.
To kiss the shore was intense. Waves, black,
Mounted the snowy sand, left no track,
Quoted bleak surahs, then sighed slow. Their
Sibilance fractured the coastal air.
It snowed like algebra, graphed the earth.
The cats and dogs factored the rebirth
Of blood-spilling skin-breaking despair.
Conic-sectioned snowdrifts killed the air.
Analphabetic veins, intertwined,
Stifled light in the subtracted mind.
Then came a stasis : cranial fright
And heartless vocals. The whole numb night,
It snowed. I cried. Your marble-white face
Was cold in its smooth declining grace.
first version 1986
revised 2003
What poetic form are you?
Link to the quiz. Watch those pop-ups!
... and note the deliberate absence of the graphic, because when those pictures don't come up, the text within the picture nonetheless still does, in the red-Xed rectangle, as one immensely long line that throws the template out of whack ...
I know I should be telling you that I'm
A rubai - but perhaps some other time.
It sounds like work, and anyway, it's late -
Unless I sleep, I'll be too tired to rhyme.
Besides, there's plates to clear and cups to clink,
And when that's done I have to sit and think,
Since then it won't be long before I need
To sleep again and eat again and drink.
(If you were not a Rubai you would be Blank Verse.)
:: :: :: :: ::
A jug of bread, a loaf of wine, and I --
I followed the rhyme scheme less travelled by,
FitzGerald's in his Khayyam rendering,
The third line just a little bit awry.
Link to the quiz. Watch those pop-ups!
... and note the deliberate absence of the graphic, because when those pictures don't come up, the text within the picture nonetheless still does, in the red-Xed rectangle, as one immensely long line that throws the template out of whack ...
I know I should be telling you that I'm
A rubai - but perhaps some other time.
It sounds like work, and anyway, it's late -
Unless I sleep, I'll be too tired to rhyme.
Besides, there's plates to clear and cups to clink,
And when that's done I have to sit and think,
Since then it won't be long before I need
To sleep again and eat again and drink.
(If you were not a Rubai you would be Blank Verse.)
:: :: :: :: ::
A jug of bread, a loaf of wine, and I --
I followed the rhyme scheme less travelled by,
FitzGerald's in his Khayyam rendering,
The third line just a little bit awry.
Exactly
From William F. Buckley's latest column :
I have a copy of a private communication. It is written by a close student of rhetoric, and the author writes, "George Bush is a phenomenon: he is the innately nonverbally apt, or deft, speaker who transcends eloquence, [nevertheless] achieving that which is greater in oratory — a plainspoken integrity that unites the emotions and the intellect." Bush replaces, the analyst continues, "mere eloquence with genuine conviction, character, moral courage, and personal goodness."
From William F. Buckley's latest column :
I have a copy of a private communication. It is written by a close student of rhetoric, and the author writes, "George Bush is a phenomenon: he is the innately nonverbally apt, or deft, speaker who transcends eloquence, [nevertheless] achieving that which is greater in oratory — a plainspoken integrity that unites the emotions and the intellect." Bush replaces, the analyst continues, "mere eloquence with genuine conviction, character, moral courage, and personal goodness."
Saturday, February 08, 2003
William Topaz McGonagall, poet and tragedian of Dundee, has been widely hailed as the writer of the worst poetry in the English language.
I may have to add this to Places Oft. See for yourself if the assessment of his opus is justly pronounced.
I may have to add this to Places Oft. See for yourself if the assessment of his opus is justly pronounced.
J. Bottum at the Standard
on the poets vs the First Lady. A bit long, jeeyust a bit, this piece, but generally right on target.
on the poets vs the First Lady. A bit long, jeeyust a bit, this piece, but generally right on target.
Andy Borowitz at JWR
on the French, who remain unconvinced, pending further UN inspections, that there is sufficient evidence of Michael Jackson's having had plastic surgery. Still awaiting the Blix report. Willing to send more nose inspectors.
on the French, who remain unconvinced, pending further UN inspections, that there is sufficient evidence of Michael Jackson's having had plastic surgery. Still awaiting the Blix report. Willing to send more nose inspectors.
Bernard Basset, SJ
Not fifty years ago, the highlight of our Godly week was Church on Sunday, an operation demanding our best clothes. In Church, our prayer was worded by priest and choir, our contribution as good Christian children was to behave ourselves as best we could. This weekly Mass was a peaceful, innocent expression of our submission, less to the Almighty than to our innumerable aunts.
In more recent years, the slant towards informality has been increasing and the oldtime disciplines have disappeared. I myself have heard morning and evening prayer discouraged as a middle-class form of hypocrisy. The case against them ran like this, that they pinned our religion down to certain moments when we should be living our faith every minute of the day. This current, happy-go-lucky approach is found on the parish level in the redoubling of efforts towards community, commitment, Christian charity. The fashion is for group discussion, community singing, offertory processions, kissing, organized liturgically. As to words in prayer, the goal is spontaneity. We are back to the gift of tongues and the tongue is much in favor at the moment, with a slight preference for bad grammar and the use of not too many verbs. Silence is out and private prayer if not actually discouraged has slipped into second place.
Bernard Basset, Let's Start Praying Again (Image, 1973), pp. 21-22.
Not fifty years ago, the highlight of our Godly week was Church on Sunday, an operation demanding our best clothes. In Church, our prayer was worded by priest and choir, our contribution as good Christian children was to behave ourselves as best we could. This weekly Mass was a peaceful, innocent expression of our submission, less to the Almighty than to our innumerable aunts.
In more recent years, the slant towards informality has been increasing and the oldtime disciplines have disappeared. I myself have heard morning and evening prayer discouraged as a middle-class form of hypocrisy. The case against them ran like this, that they pinned our religion down to certain moments when we should be living our faith every minute of the day. This current, happy-go-lucky approach is found on the parish level in the redoubling of efforts towards community, commitment, Christian charity. The fashion is for group discussion, community singing, offertory processions, kissing, organized liturgically. As to words in prayer, the goal is spontaneity. We are back to the gift of tongues and the tongue is much in favor at the moment, with a slight preference for bad grammar and the use of not too many verbs. Silence is out and private prayer if not actually discouraged has slipped into second place.
Bernard Basset, Let's Start Praying Again (Image, 1973), pp. 21-22.
Untitled, 1999
The chancellor of coffee-cups
Is stout and wears a mask of wrath.
He blusters through his coffee-shack
Sentencing phantom miscreants.
Here is a law; there, a fast lock
To keep the knaves in check, forsooth.
This chancellor dispenses rules
Which work like watches, bend like steel :
This is the way the sun must spin.
Without a chuckle, cleansed of quip.
It is obscene that planets dance!
We must be studious, must be plain.
The coffee-kaiser treads the tile
And shouts his edict, heaven take heed!
Rain on the driveway, black as ale :
Sparrows come not to bring good news.
Angels refrain from singing grace
Anywhere near the chancellor's face.
© 1999, 2003 by dylan_tm618
The chancellor of coffee-cups
Is stout and wears a mask of wrath.
He blusters through his coffee-shack
Sentencing phantom miscreants.
Here is a law; there, a fast lock
To keep the knaves in check, forsooth.
This chancellor dispenses rules
Which work like watches, bend like steel :
This is the way the sun must spin.
Without a chuckle, cleansed of quip.
It is obscene that planets dance!
We must be studious, must be plain.
The coffee-kaiser treads the tile
And shouts his edict, heaven take heed!
Rain on the driveway, black as ale :
Sparrows come not to bring good news.
Angels refrain from singing grace
Anywhere near the chancellor's face.
© 1999, 2003 by dylan_tm618
Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose
Prior to the Blizzard of 1978, most weather forecasters predicted 6 inches of snow for the Boston area. We got 27!
For yesterday's storm, we were hearing 1-3 inches, outside shot at 6. We got 12.
Anyway, here's Joe Fitzgerald lamenting New Englanders' lost hardiness when it comes to winter weather. With a fascinating side story about a photographer who didn't want to stay inside, for very good reasons.
Prior to the Blizzard of 1978, most weather forecasters predicted 6 inches of snow for the Boston area. We got 27!
For yesterday's storm, we were hearing 1-3 inches, outside shot at 6. We got 12.
Anyway, here's Joe Fitzgerald lamenting New Englanders' lost hardiness when it comes to winter weather. With a fascinating side story about a photographer who didn't want to stay inside, for very good reasons.
Friday, February 07, 2003
The Gen X Revert
gives us the Catholic version of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl."
Spotted the link at Eve Tushnet's.
Way cool. Way recommended!
gives us the Catholic version of Allen Ginsberg's "Howl."
Spotted the link at Eve Tushnet's.
Way cool. Way recommended!
Titles of poems that may soon appear here
with a brief description of each poem's approximate shape, mood & age
1. Mythology [2000. Obscure poem of dangerous emotion, sometimes flirting with pentameter]
2. Bad Weather [A turbo-dorky poem about heavy snow compared to homework. Written when its author was 16. Deliberately awkward enneasyllabic couplets]
3. Loitering with Intent [2001-ish. Exuberantly surreal prose-poem]
4. Kilmerish Rumination on the Infinite Creativity of the Good Lord God as Contrasted with the Somewhat Nifty but Noticeably Finite Creativity of Human-type Artist-Persons [Oh, I write one of these every day! A rhymed couplet of unimpeachable orthodoxy & metrical correctness]
5. Untitled Poem about the Chancellor of Coffee-Cups [1999. Unrhymed couplets of iambic tetrameter, trying to be Wallace Stevens]
Any preferences based on the titles? Any votes?
I could post the depressing one.
with a brief description of each poem's approximate shape, mood & age
1. Mythology [2000. Obscure poem of dangerous emotion, sometimes flirting with pentameter]
2. Bad Weather [A turbo-dorky poem about heavy snow compared to homework. Written when its author was 16. Deliberately awkward enneasyllabic couplets]
3. Loitering with Intent [2001-ish. Exuberantly surreal prose-poem]
4. Kilmerish Rumination on the Infinite Creativity of the Good Lord God as Contrasted with the Somewhat Nifty but Noticeably Finite Creativity of Human-type Artist-Persons [Oh, I write one of these every day! A rhymed couplet of unimpeachable orthodoxy & metrical correctness]
5. Untitled Poem about the Chancellor of Coffee-Cups [1999. Unrhymed couplets of iambic tetrameter, trying to be Wallace Stevens]
Any preferences based on the titles? Any votes?
I could post the depressing one.
An eagle-eyed correspondent
sends along this link from the Oxford Student of two Novembers ago. Chelsea blasts the Euroweenies!
"The idea that anyone believes America would enter into this conflict capriciously boggles my mind ... the notion that the United States is acting without regard to the Afghan people is offensive" she says.
I might have a bit more to stay about the current or imminent phase of the war, and my strongest qualm on the matter.
Also, might ruminate on why/how/when the Ecclesia, or many within it, developed an almost terminal dovishness. Perhaps with reference to the Spanish Civil War.
sends along this link from the Oxford Student of two Novembers ago. Chelsea blasts the Euroweenies!
"The idea that anyone believes America would enter into this conflict capriciously boggles my mind ... the notion that the United States is acting without regard to the Afghan people is offensive" she says.
I might have a bit more to stay about the current or imminent phase of the war, and my strongest qualm on the matter.
Also, might ruminate on why/how/when the Ecclesia, or many within it, developed an almost terminal dovishness. Perhaps with reference to the Spanish Civil War.
A celebrity theologian in a wintry season
How could Christians be led back to the sacrament of confession? Its practice appears now to be stuck in a serious crisis.
Certainly it is desirable that the sacrament of confession be more widely practiced again. The question is, of course, how. The simple exhortation to go to confession more frequently has to confront nowadays the argument (and the magisterium has to face up to this) that, according to the teaching of the Council of Trent, auricular confession is only necessary when a Christian has objectively and subjectively committed a really grave sin. And here the old practice of confession, which imposed on everyone the obligation to confess at least once a year, was based on a hasty and quite scandalous assumption that the ordinary Christian committed each year at least one mortal sin. Such an allegation is quite untenable.
From Faith in a Wintry Season : Conversations and Interviews with RENAL HARRK in the Last Years of His Life (Crossroad, 1990), pp. 187-8.
:: :: :: :: ::
And how would you define [yourself]?
I am a Catholic theologian who attempts in absolute loyalty to the magisterium of the Church to rethink Catholic teaching. This I can say in all modesty.
op. cit., p. 155
:: :: :: :: ::
If you could speak to President Ronald Reagan, what would you say to him?
I would say that I do not agree with the way he talks about atomic weapons. He speaks about them without shame and as if they were something natural and self-evident.
op. cit., p. 156
:: :: :: :: ::
How do you see the future of the Church in the year 2000?
The Church in the year 2000 cannot be a European Church exported to every imaginable country. It must be a Church in which Christianity has been inculturated according to the specific traits of each culture. So this Church must be decentralized to a much greater extent than the Roman officials now imagine. Speaking to Italians, I would say that that does not mean that the influence of the papacy in the world should disappear, only that the pope's important role (which can become even more important) cannot be developed according to the criteria of Roman centralism.
Canon Law too must be decentralized much more. Freedom must be given to the great churches of Latin America, Africa, and Asia to formulate their own canonical regulations in their own way. That requires much greater freedom than what is envisioned in the new Code of Canon Law. That code, despite some definitely praiseworthy modifications, has fundamentally only restored the old Canon Law.
The liturgy too must be much more decentralized. And finally, there are questions that are, strictly speaking, ethical ones for which answers must be formulated in a new way. To give an example: How in the context of Africa is marriage to be understood, if one is to remain faithful to the will of God and Christ? Such a question will certainly not be answered by those "poor Africans," if we try to impose upon them a pure and simple repetition of European moral teaching about marriage.
op. cit., p. 187
How could Christians be led back to the sacrament of confession? Its practice appears now to be stuck in a serious crisis.
Certainly it is desirable that the sacrament of confession be more widely practiced again. The question is, of course, how. The simple exhortation to go to confession more frequently has to confront nowadays the argument (and the magisterium has to face up to this) that, according to the teaching of the Council of Trent, auricular confession is only necessary when a Christian has objectively and subjectively committed a really grave sin. And here the old practice of confession, which imposed on everyone the obligation to confess at least once a year, was based on a hasty and quite scandalous assumption that the ordinary Christian committed each year at least one mortal sin. Such an allegation is quite untenable.
From Faith in a Wintry Season : Conversations and Interviews with RENAL HARRK in the Last Years of His Life (Crossroad, 1990), pp. 187-8.
:: :: :: :: ::
And how would you define [yourself]?
I am a Catholic theologian who attempts in absolute loyalty to the magisterium of the Church to rethink Catholic teaching. This I can say in all modesty.
op. cit., p. 155
:: :: :: :: ::
If you could speak to President Ronald Reagan, what would you say to him?
I would say that I do not agree with the way he talks about atomic weapons. He speaks about them without shame and as if they were something natural and self-evident.
op. cit., p. 156
:: :: :: :: ::
How do you see the future of the Church in the year 2000?
The Church in the year 2000 cannot be a European Church exported to every imaginable country. It must be a Church in which Christianity has been inculturated according to the specific traits of each culture. So this Church must be decentralized to a much greater extent than the Roman officials now imagine. Speaking to Italians, I would say that that does not mean that the influence of the papacy in the world should disappear, only that the pope's important role (which can become even more important) cannot be developed according to the criteria of Roman centralism.
Canon Law too must be decentralized much more. Freedom must be given to the great churches of Latin America, Africa, and Asia to formulate their own canonical regulations in their own way. That requires much greater freedom than what is envisioned in the new Code of Canon Law. That code, despite some definitely praiseworthy modifications, has fundamentally only restored the old Canon Law.
The liturgy too must be much more decentralized. And finally, there are questions that are, strictly speaking, ethical ones for which answers must be formulated in a new way. To give an example: How in the context of Africa is marriage to be understood, if one is to remain faithful to the will of God and Christ? Such a question will certainly not be answered by those "poor Africans," if we try to impose upon them a pure and simple repetition of European moral teaching about marriage.
op. cit., p. 187
That's the ticket!
Court people's votes by callin' 'em dumb
From today's gossip column in the Herald :
Shades of Hillary Rodham Clinton - Teresa Heinz has become Teresa Heinz Kerry!
That's right. The first lady-wannabe, wife of presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry, has taken a cue from the former occupant of the office and stuck her hubby's surname on her pricey letterhead.
As of today, the ketchup heiress will begin using the Kerry handle.
``She's not going to change her name legally,'' said Heinz Kerry's spokesgal, Chris Black. ``But as the senator campaigns outside Massachusetts and introduces himself to the rest of the country, people found it confusing his wife had a different name. This just makes it clear she's married to him.''
Confusing? You mean, to those dumb reactionaries in the hinterland?
Well, not exactly, but perhaps just atypical of a possible first lady, and slightly off-putting in the echoes of Hillary. It shouldn't matter, but it does. Something akin to bachelorhood being an impediment, or looking as un-Pierce Brosnanish as Steve Forbes.
Remember the sun test of Chris Matthews (finished his book! maybe more to say), and the Wayne/Mellencamp test of d to tha illin'. This JFK doesn't have a ghost of a chance.
Court people's votes by callin' 'em dumb
From today's gossip column in the Herald :
Shades of Hillary Rodham Clinton - Teresa Heinz has become Teresa Heinz Kerry!
That's right. The first lady-wannabe, wife of presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry, has taken a cue from the former occupant of the office and stuck her hubby's surname on her pricey letterhead.
As of today, the ketchup heiress will begin using the Kerry handle.
``She's not going to change her name legally,'' said Heinz Kerry's spokesgal, Chris Black. ``But as the senator campaigns outside Massachusetts and introduces himself to the rest of the country, people found it confusing his wife had a different name. This just makes it clear she's married to him.''
Confusing? You mean, to those dumb reactionaries in the hinterland?
Well, not exactly, but perhaps just atypical of a possible first lady, and slightly off-putting in the echoes of Hillary. It shouldn't matter, but it does. Something akin to bachelorhood being an impediment, or looking as un-Pierce Brosnanish as Steve Forbes.
Remember the sun test of Chris Matthews (finished his book! maybe more to say), and the Wayne/Mellencamp test of d to tha illin'. This JFK doesn't have a ghost of a chance.
Big time personality vibe
from the RENAL HARRK book I took out of the library today, Faith in a Wintry Season, a collection of interviews with the sleb theologian whose name has appeared here too often of late.
The world according to RENAL. Roman centralization : Bad. President Reagan : Needed to be told that atomic weapons are bad. Mind-numbingly boring stuff, sicklied o'er with the pale cast of progressivism. The only attractions are those unintentionally comic moments where he says something absolutely ridiculous with a straight face. A man enamored of his celebrity, all too willing to hold forth to genuflecting reporters on the topic of what the Church should be.
At the beginning of the week, I had no quarrel with RENAL HARRK. Had heard some things, read some things. On balance, good; mistaken on Humanae Vitae. But no quarrel with the man himself. Rather, my primary quarrel was with the petulance of one of his idiotic partisans. HARRK had a more decorous defender, who did not convince me. Reason being, he quoted all these documents, had all the right terminology, but seemed to believe (as some conservatives and all progressives do) that the Church is all about legislation. (The cartographer decides that Vermont is west of New Hampshire.) It's what we say about God that matters, not what God says about us, or hopefully does within us.
Legislation. Why can't we just legislate certain things, and everything will improve, and there will be this bright new springtime after the bitter winter of Roman orthodoxy? See, there's just not enough play in the church, not enough happy mischief. So once we decentralize, whatever that entails, we will have heaven on earth.
This progressive parody of the Holy See as all-intrusive and omni-manipulative. Where does it come from? Does it come from anyone who has really looked at the Church in America in recent years? I can only go, as Meryl Streep said in the dingo movie, on the evidence of my own eyes. And we're not exactly suffering from a surfeit of heavy-handedness, nor from an absence of silliness, of mischief, of trendiness, of -- forgive this rather strong pejorative -- democracy.
After reading, oh, two or three of the interviews in this book, I've got the urge to exorcise my memory with a dose of Fr Straub. Whom I don't especially admire, but I do need a strong antidote.
But while we're on the subject of Roman centralization, why do we have so many problems when we've got a Pope, and Eastern Orthodoxy, without a pope, seems relatively free of the mischief and the dissent and the urge to "update" or to accommodate hoi polloi? Why, if there's this oppressive central government on the RC side, do we have the pastel palazzi and the ALL ARE WELCOME signs? Or is there an oppressive AmChurch government of woolly-headed progressivism where evangelization for the timeless truths is a hanging offense, and should be replaced with "doing community" and the like?
The thoughts of all are invited. The thoughts of many will be entertained.
from the RENAL HARRK book I took out of the library today, Faith in a Wintry Season, a collection of interviews with the sleb theologian whose name has appeared here too often of late.
The world according to RENAL. Roman centralization : Bad. President Reagan : Needed to be told that atomic weapons are bad. Mind-numbingly boring stuff, sicklied o'er with the pale cast of progressivism. The only attractions are those unintentionally comic moments where he says something absolutely ridiculous with a straight face. A man enamored of his celebrity, all too willing to hold forth to genuflecting reporters on the topic of what the Church should be.
At the beginning of the week, I had no quarrel with RENAL HARRK. Had heard some things, read some things. On balance, good; mistaken on Humanae Vitae. But no quarrel with the man himself. Rather, my primary quarrel was with the petulance of one of his idiotic partisans. HARRK had a more decorous defender, who did not convince me. Reason being, he quoted all these documents, had all the right terminology, but seemed to believe (as some conservatives and all progressives do) that the Church is all about legislation. (The cartographer decides that Vermont is west of New Hampshire.) It's what we say about God that matters, not what God says about us, or hopefully does within us.
Legislation. Why can't we just legislate certain things, and everything will improve, and there will be this bright new springtime after the bitter winter of Roman orthodoxy? See, there's just not enough play in the church, not enough happy mischief. So once we decentralize, whatever that entails, we will have heaven on earth.
This progressive parody of the Holy See as all-intrusive and omni-manipulative. Where does it come from? Does it come from anyone who has really looked at the Church in America in recent years? I can only go, as Meryl Streep said in the dingo movie, on the evidence of my own eyes. And we're not exactly suffering from a surfeit of heavy-handedness, nor from an absence of silliness, of mischief, of trendiness, of -- forgive this rather strong pejorative -- democracy.
After reading, oh, two or three of the interviews in this book, I've got the urge to exorcise my memory with a dose of Fr Straub. Whom I don't especially admire, but I do need a strong antidote.
But while we're on the subject of Roman centralization, why do we have so many problems when we've got a Pope, and Eastern Orthodoxy, without a pope, seems relatively free of the mischief and the dissent and the urge to "update" or to accommodate hoi polloi? Why, if there's this oppressive central government on the RC side, do we have the pastel palazzi and the ALL ARE WELCOME signs? Or is there an oppressive AmChurch government of woolly-headed progressivism where evangelization for the timeless truths is a hanging offense, and should be replaced with "doing community" and the like?
The thoughts of all are invited. The thoughts of many will be entertained.
Thursday, February 06, 2003
Also maybe possibly probably
What the heck, I'll do it now. A few of my least favorite things about a few of my favorite things.
I liked the movie Arthur. And I liked A Fish Called Wanda. And I like Frasier.
But I suspect that Arthur was Hollywood's love-letter to a fellow who had run for president the year before, & was seeking reelection to his Senate seat the following year. Plus, it glamorizes addiction. But it's got Gielgud, and it's funny.
Wanda is objected to on political grounds -- all the pro-commie stuff; America as Otto as Rambo-without-a-jockstrap. A few tweakings of the catholica, as well.
Frasier has as a recurring character very effeminate fellow named Gil Chesterton. Why that name?
Oh, I'm just being hopelessly stuffy ... or not?
On the other hand, I love listening to the anchors of WCVB attempt to pronounce Jesuit. It's permissible, I think, not to zhuzhify the "s," but only if, in the British fashion, you make next phoneme is a "y" -- jez you wit. But of course, that sounds a little like iss yew for ishoo. So, here in the colonies, we say jeh zhoo wit. But jeh zoo it is, it seems to me, heterodox.
What the heck, I'll do it now. A few of my least favorite things about a few of my favorite things.
I liked the movie Arthur. And I liked A Fish Called Wanda. And I like Frasier.
But I suspect that Arthur was Hollywood's love-letter to a fellow who had run for president the year before, & was seeking reelection to his Senate seat the following year. Plus, it glamorizes addiction. But it's got Gielgud, and it's funny.
Wanda is objected to on political grounds -- all the pro-commie stuff; America as Otto as Rambo-without-a-jockstrap. A few tweakings of the catholica, as well.
Frasier has as a recurring character very effeminate fellow named Gil Chesterton. Why that name?
Oh, I'm just being hopelessly stuffy ... or not?
On the other hand, I love listening to the anchors of WCVB attempt to pronounce Jesuit. It's permissible, I think, not to zhuzhify the "s," but only if, in the British fashion, you make next phoneme is a "y" -- jez you wit. But of course, that sounds a little like iss yew for ishoo. So, here in the colonies, we say jeh zhoo wit. But jeh zoo it is, it seems to me, heterodox.
Recommended reading
A book by John Cardinal Wright (1909-79) called The Church : Hope of the World (Kenosha : Prow, 1972). Especially for an essay to be found therein, entitled "Faith and the Theologies" (pp. 42-49). Maybe some excerpts upcoming. Among other things, it explains why we don't have to read RENAL HARRK. We may, if we choose, but it's hardly a necessity.
A book by John Cardinal Wright (1909-79) called The Church : Hope of the World (Kenosha : Prow, 1972). Especially for an essay to be found therein, entitled "Faith and the Theologies" (pp. 42-49). Maybe some excerpts upcoming. Among other things, it explains why we don't have to read RENAL HARRK. We may, if we choose, but it's hardly a necessity.
Possibly probably
Am thinking of starting a new recurring feature called Fun with Theologians! or, Stop Playing with your Food for Thought ...
Am still pondering what to say in my post on formalism & personality. Which has been "imminent" since the fourth century. But am also thinking of a post on surrealism. (As you might have guessed, I'm sometimes pro-surrealist. But why? I'm not sure myself.)
Almost posted a disgusting & hilarious excerpt of Stephen Fry yesterday.
I don't like overpriced guppy food.
I do like exuberant Vikings in plaid.
I'm quite tired.
Am thinking of starting a new recurring feature called Fun with Theologians! or, Stop Playing with your Food for Thought ...
Am still pondering what to say in my post on formalism & personality. Which has been "imminent" since the fourth century. But am also thinking of a post on surrealism. (As you might have guessed, I'm sometimes pro-surrealist. But why? I'm not sure myself.)
Almost posted a disgusting & hilarious excerpt of Stephen Fry yesterday.
I don't like overpriced guppy food.
I do like exuberant Vikings in plaid.
I'm quite tired.
Vermont! Vermont! Vermont!
In the comment box of someone else's weblog (a great weblog, by the way), there's a fellow who says that the Church had better "liberalize" its moral theology, or people will stop coming to church. The Spongian "Christianity must change or die" bit. "Well, no one listens to the Church, everyone dissents from teaching A or B or C." That sort of thing. In an attempt to instruct the uninstructable, I posted the following comment as a reponse to his :
100.0% of Catholics are, in some way, sinners. The Church says : Your purpose in life is to be a saint. She even says : You have the right to be a saint! To be free of the slavery of sin. If the Church were ever to stop saying that, it would cease to magnetize, to energize, to inspire, to encourage. (The word-limit on the comment-box prevented me from saying further : In the last century alone, we saw thousands upon thousands of people giving their lives for this Church which some would have us believe is dying. Is this the sort of ardent faith and holy zeal we find in the progressive churches?)
Now, let's suppose that many Catholics are dissenters. So what? Belief in the existence of God would seem to presume that there's a difference between right and wrong, & that we don't decide that difference. Therefore, when the Church tells us that something is wrong, she's not doing so because some hierarchs decided that the thing was wrong. Any more than a cartographer decides, "Hey, why don't I put Vermont just west of New Hampshire!" Vermont is just west of New Hampshire, and certain things are wrong. The Church won't, & shouldn't change to suit demotic whimsies.
In the comment box of someone else's weblog (a great weblog, by the way), there's a fellow who says that the Church had better "liberalize" its moral theology, or people will stop coming to church. The Spongian "Christianity must change or die" bit. "Well, no one listens to the Church, everyone dissents from teaching A or B or C." That sort of thing. In an attempt to instruct the uninstructable, I posted the following comment as a reponse to his :
100.0% of Catholics are, in some way, sinners. The Church says : Your purpose in life is to be a saint. She even says : You have the right to be a saint! To be free of the slavery of sin. If the Church were ever to stop saying that, it would cease to magnetize, to energize, to inspire, to encourage. (The word-limit on the comment-box prevented me from saying further : In the last century alone, we saw thousands upon thousands of people giving their lives for this Church which some would have us believe is dying. Is this the sort of ardent faith and holy zeal we find in the progressive churches?)
Now, let's suppose that many Catholics are dissenters. So what? Belief in the existence of God would seem to presume that there's a difference between right and wrong, & that we don't decide that difference. Therefore, when the Church tells us that something is wrong, she's not doing so because some hierarchs decided that the thing was wrong. Any more than a cartographer decides, "Hey, why don't I put Vermont just west of New Hampshire!" Vermont is just west of New Hampshire, and certain things are wrong. The Church won't, & shouldn't change to suit demotic whimsies.
Wednesday, February 05, 2003
Psalm 6. Domine, ne in furore.
O LORD, rebuke me not in thine indignation, * neither chasten me in thy displeasure.
2 Have mercy upon me, O LORD, for I am weak; * O LORD, heal me, for my bones are vexed.
3 My soul also is sore troubled: * but, LORD, how long wilt thou punish me?
4 Turn thee, O LORD, and deliver my soul; * O save me, for thy mercy's sake.
5 For in death no man remembereth thee; * and who will give thee thanks in the pit?
6 I am weary of my groaning; * every night wash I my bed, and water my couch with my tears.
7 My beauty is gone for very trouble, * and worn away because of all mine enemies.
8 Away from me, all ye that work iniquity; * for the LORD hath heard the voice of my weeping.
9 The LORD hath heard my petition; * the LORD will receive my prayer.
10 All mine enemies shall be confounded, and sore vexed; * they shall be turned back, and put to shame suddenly.
O LORD, rebuke me not in thine indignation, * neither chasten me in thy displeasure.
2 Have mercy upon me, O LORD, for I am weak; * O LORD, heal me, for my bones are vexed.
3 My soul also is sore troubled: * but, LORD, how long wilt thou punish me?
4 Turn thee, O LORD, and deliver my soul; * O save me, for thy mercy's sake.
5 For in death no man remembereth thee; * and who will give thee thanks in the pit?
6 I am weary of my groaning; * every night wash I my bed, and water my couch with my tears.
7 My beauty is gone for very trouble, * and worn away because of all mine enemies.
8 Away from me, all ye that work iniquity; * for the LORD hath heard the voice of my weeping.
9 The LORD hath heard my petition; * the LORD will receive my prayer.
10 All mine enemies shall be confounded, and sore vexed; * they shall be turned back, and put to shame suddenly.
Written in the dark
Wanted : some
books
and a shot of
sympathy
The House of Life,
insinuate,
incarnadine.
An avarice of sleep.
Of bright regard.
Had tender eyes,
the demoiselle of dusk.
Rehearsing love, the beads of avenir.
We seek, forsooth.
Lost solace, stripped of crimp.
Tribute obsidian, mark you,
this be wise.
Supremacy,
minuit, the single
star:
Mischief
collective, wreck
of the soul-
less mob.
2000
Wanted : some
books
and a shot of
sympathy
The House of Life,
insinuate,
incarnadine.
An avarice of sleep.
Of bright regard.
Had tender eyes,
the demoiselle of dusk.
Rehearsing love, the beads of avenir.
We seek, forsooth.
Lost solace, stripped of crimp.
Tribute obsidian, mark you,
this be wise.
Supremacy,
minuit, the single
star:
Mischief
collective, wreck
of the soul-
less mob.
2000
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