Episodes
Monday May 24, 2010
Clock Time
Monday May 24, 2010
Monday May 24, 2010
Another episode from "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Dane Allred".
Clock time
Clocks are a reminder of where we are in our day. I wonder what it must have been like when there were only ten clocks in a village, instead of ten clocks in my kitchen. None of them have the same time. I wonder if listening to the town clock tower ring the parts of each hour gave villagers a comfort of the exactness of time.
I like the movie “The Gods Must Be Crazy”. There is one part where the narrator talks about the concept of time to a Kalahari bushman. There is no Monday, no 8:00 A.M. no quitting time. No deadlines about this hour, this day, this minute. Some things can be done this week; some can wait until next week. No rush hour, no such thing as late to work, no overtime, and no such thing as clocks.
Clocks have been a useful thing to standardize our world. How can you leave Japan at such and such an hour and arrive in New York at a particular time unless there is way to keep track of the seconds, the minutes, the hours and the days.
The atomic clock keeps track of microseconds, and every year or two we have to adjust the “world clock” because the earth doesn’t spin in a orderly and timely manner. It doesn’t know that slowing down a bit screws up our clock, but then, the earth probably doesn’t care if we have to reset our clocks.
Here’s the problem with time. I teach students who are three times younger than me, and I like to play a mind game with time with them. Here’s the scenario. Say I am your teacher and I am 45 years old. If you are 15, then I am three times your age. If you add 15 years to both of our ages, then I will be 60 and you will be 30. I am only twice as old as you. I tell my students, if I live long enough, you will catch up, and maybe even pass me.
I wait for them to try to understand how I can be three times as old, and then only twice as old. They start to fear I might be right, that they would continue to age and pass me by. I even say to them I will patiently wait while eventually they get older than me. They look skeptical.
I don’t really carry a watch. I do have the time on my phone, which is another strange development. When you ask someone what time it is, now instead of looking at their wrists, they dig out the cell phone and tell me the time. One cool feature is that my phone can be updated with the “correct” time. What is the correct time? It’s beamed to my cell phone from some cell tower which gets it from some satellite somewhere or something like that. I still don’t trust it, but it is the “official” time.
It still makes me wonder what happened back in the day. I can see the close approximation of noon – the sun is straight above. You could use a sundial if the sun was shining. I really don’t know when we became so pre-occupied with time, but as we mark the new year, just remember, it’s just an artificial date chosen from all of the available dates we could have begun our calendar with.
If January 1st, is too soon for you, then celebrate the Chinese New Year on the 26th of January. Sorry, that was 2009. The Chinese New Year begins on February 14th in 2010. It can be anytime between late January and late February. It’s the year of the Tiger in case you were wondering.
There are New Year’s celebrations in March, April, in the fall, and there were even two in the Islamic calendar in 2008. Well, not two for them. They had one, but during our year, they had two. See how confusing it can be.
Even worse, if you are paying attention on New Year’s Eve, you will realize many, many people will celebrate the arrival of that fateful hour before you. Time zones are another thing I really wonder about. You step one direction and it’s an hour later or earlier. One step one way or the other and it’s another day? This is why those who are really wise tell us to live in the moment. That way, you’re never late since that moment is now, I mean now, I mean now.
Really, living in the moment means paying attention, and if that means enjoying the tradition of marking a new year, you will have to pay attention to that moment. May your new year bring all the hopes and joys you desire.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece Clock TimeWednesday May 19, 2010
The Plodder's Mile -- Chapter Seven
Wednesday May 19, 2010
Wednesday May 19, 2010
CHAPTER SEVEN
“If I find out someone else has my money,” said Ray to himself, pacing in the rut that was once the carpet, “I’m gonna massage him with the butt of my gun and then shoot him.”
Ray had decided to stay in town and search the tracks for one more day. There really wasn’t a chance of finding the train now, and there was no practical way to search all those miles of track. He had also decided to go back to the town where Tommy was being held tomorrow and watch for evidence to be leaked to the press, like it always was in cases like this. Then he might have an idea if the cops had the money, and he could figure out what to do next.
Ray hated feeling helpless. It reminded him of the days he spent being beat on by his older brothers, who hated being beat by their dad. The pecking order in the Johnson household had ended with him, with the beatings usually getting worse as they were passed down the line.
Even when social services had split up the family and sent Ray to foster homes in the hopes of a better environment, most of the families he ended up with were in it for the money. They didn’t really care about Ray, and they usually had their own kids to prefer to the freeloaders the state had sent. Why else would someone want the kids no one else wanted?
Being cheated out his money just when it was in his grasp, ready to be spent, the golden dreams had been dashed again. Ray was determined that this time, he was going to get what was his, and he didn’t care who had to get hurt in the meantime.
Smitty had some good advice for Jones. There were a couple of ways to handle the investigation, and one was subtle, the other pretty obvious. Jones had decided to do both.
He was on the phone with the local television station. “Paula Rogers, please. This is Greg Jones.”
Paula was one of the local reporters who owed Captain Greg Jones a few favors for the quick and reliable information he had often shared with her. The scoops had made her a local celebrity, and the bigger stations were looking at her for anchor jobs. She knew Greg liked her, and Greg was more than happy to have her attention, if only for his sources. She picked up almost immediately.
“Greg!” He could almost hear the smile over the phone. “What have you got for me now?”
“How do you know I’m not calling you up for a date?” said Jones playfully.
“First”, she said, “you have never called me up for a date yet, and second, last week when I asked you out, you found some kind of paperwork you had to do.”
Now Greg was smiling. She was right. He wasn’t ready to take that step, but she really wanted him to. He knew she wanted him to. But he just couldn’t do it. Even though she had made it a point of “dropping in” every week or so, he still couldn’t work up the nerve. They had been on dozens of dates, all of which she had arranged.
“You’re right, I’m a big chicken,” he chuckled. “So are you ready for the hot tip of the day?”
“If you really did call me every day,” Paula said, “then that really would be something to get excited about.”
Now Jones was blushing. To stop this train of thought in its tracks, he began another conversation about another train. “Did you hear about the bank robber they arrested on the train here in town…?”
It was after lunch. John had been able to spend an entire lunch period talking with the guys he regularly ate lunch with without even raising the topic of money, which usually was a favorite topic around the table. Now John Graham was wondering what he would be able to tell his history classes today that would keep them from sleeping on their desks, and would keep him from thinking about that money.
Today they were scheduled to talk about Watergate and other topics from the ‘70’s, but the distraction of his newfound wealth was beginning to cloud every 30 seconds of thought. He decided to just strike out into the subject and see where his subconscious and the kids in class would lead him.
“So who here knows why we all know Richard Nixon’s name?”
“This is Paula Jones with another WGHH exclusive.” She was looking especially lovely today, thought Greg as he watched her from the sidelines. Her blonde hair flipped up at the ends and made her look much younger than she was, which he was sure was the desired goal.
Greg Jones was a little too shy for his own good, which is probably why he was still single at the ripe old age of twenty-eight. He had been involved with several women, only to be too slow to keep them interested. He had decided it was a personality fault, and that it wasn’t going to change anytime soon. He was not prepared, however, for the unique patience of Paula Rogers.
She had been burned twice by flashy rich guys. Paula had been engaged twice, and had come as close as M-Day minus one month until the last jerk had pulled the plug. She had her sights set on Greg Jones, and while he may not have known it, she was ready to be as patient as was necessary to catch this one. Though she was younger than Greg by a few years, she had much more wisdom than him when it came to catching a mate.
She smiled and looked over at Greg.
“Local Ridgeway police captain Greg Jones has been credited with recovering some of the $100,000 stolen two days ago from the First National Bank in Delan,” she intoned, without a pause, hitch, or hiccup. “Though all of the money has not been recovered, Captain Jones has been recognized by the state authorities for his quick response. Investigations will continue while officers inspect the money that was found for fingerprints.”
Greg was always amazed at the calmness with which Paula delivered the news, even when it involved grizzly details. She was a pro. She was looking into the camera to wrap it up. “We’ll keep you up to date with any new developments here at WGHH, and this has been another Paula Jones exclusive.” She always wrapped with that same tag-line, even when it wasn’t a story exclusive to her. She had explained it to Greg, “Only Paula Jones can have a Paula Jones exclusive.” It made the viewers think they were getting information they couldn’t get at another station, and it was one of the reasons her network had been rated number one since shortly after her arrival. It was the main reason so many other stations wanted Paula Jones to work for them.
Paula handed the microphone off, and took Greg by the elbow and ushered him off to their own little private corner of the office while the camera crew packed up. “So, how was that, boss?”
Greg could feel himself beginning to redden. “Thanks, Paula, that was exactly what I needed. We want whoever robbed the bank to come and try to get the rest of his money.”
Paula looked concerned. “Doesn’t that put you in danger? I mean,” she said, taking both his hands and pulling him to face her, “won’t that robber come armed and dangerous?”
“Well, probably, but I don’t think he’ll come in demanding the money,” Greg explained, pulling her hands down to his side. “We think he’ll just want to find out where it is, and then we can catch him trying to take it. We’ll put some surveillance on the office. I shouldn’t be in danger, but I think I can handle myself. I am a big, strong man, after all, you know.” He puffed up his chest.
She took the invitation to lean over and tousle his hair, with the other hand pressed on his chest. “I know you can handle yourself. I’m just wondering if you can handle a dinner with a friendly reporter.”
Greg blushed now. She was always able to throw him off his guard, just when he thought he was in control. He liked it.
“Sure, let’s go to the T-Bone,” he said, and took her hand, leading her out the door.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece Chapter SevenTuesday May 18, 2010
The Plodder's Mile -- Chapter Six
Tuesday May 18, 2010
Tuesday May 18, 2010
CHAPTER SIX
Ray paced a trail in the cheap motel carpet. He was turning over the details of the day in his head. He had returned to Ridgeway the very next day, less than 24 hours after the train had been here and he had thrown the parcel between the wheels.
Could it have gotten caught in the undercarriage of the train? Did it get ground up into a bunch of zeros and ones? “Nah,” Ray thought to himself, since there would have been something left of the bills if they had been destroyed. But what if they had caught under the train, and had dropped off somewhere between here and this Hicksville where the train had stopped?
Maybe he had walked up and down the wrong part of the tracks, and the money was still sitting somewhere just a mile or so away, waiting patiently for Ray to come back and pack that bundle back to its proper home.
Or maybe someone else had found it first.
Ray knew he could go crazy trying to figure out what could have happened, so he decided to focus on what he would do next. It was time to make another list.
Officer Greg Jones had his own worries, which he tossed around in his mind, wondering how much longer he should ponder the possibilities before he called Smitty and bounced a few ideas off of him. There was definitely something wrong, but to find out what the real problem was would take some careful thinking, and some even more careful investigation. “This’ll be out of my jurisdiction, if I’m lucky” Greg muttered to himself, looking at the bundle which was still sitting on his desk.
“Smitty” Harold Smith had told him the robbery netted the thieves $100,000 or thereabouts. The bundle had $1800 in it, but was clearly designed to look more like $100,000 – or thereabouts. Was it the same robbery? If it was, then where was the rest of the cash?
In most cases, if John Graham had turned in a real stack of $100,000, Greg would have had to turn it over to the state immediately anyway. But the local jurisdiction regulations said he could keep amounts up to $2000 in the local evidence lockers as long as it was verified by at least two officers. His deputy had helped him fill out the proper paperwork and they had both signed off on the amount. State detectives would arrive tomorrow to take the money back to the bank. All the ducks were in a row, but something still didn’t make any sense.
Where was the rest of the money?
Smitty wondered the same question out loud. “So you have 18 one hundred dollar bills, but the package was made to look like it should hold more?”
Jones nodded into the phone, but said, “Yeah, and it’s a pretty good job of making it look like a big bundle of money. If someone was picked up and you found this on their person, you would probably not stop to count the bills until you got back to the station.”
Now Smitty was nodding. “So to you, this looks like it’s meant to mislead us long enough for the real money to escape?”
“Yeah,” said Greg. “But if you guys didn’t find the money on the train, and this was left on the tracks, where’s the rest?”
“I can think of three places,” Smitty intoned, trying to sound superior, like the city cop he was.
“I can think of four,” said Jones.
Smitty was not one to take a challenge lightly, so he started in on his three guesses, hoping to deduce the fourth on his way.
“Okay,” he said, drawing in a breath, “the three I’ve got are one, the money is still on the train somewhere; two, the small guy we didn’t find still has the money; or three, there is another package of money somewhere out there on the railroad tracks.”
Smitty came up empty. Harold Smith had to admit defeat and ask his friend for a fourth possibility. Just as an inkling was coming into his brain, too.
The friend. But Jones beat him to the punch.
“I hate to say this, Smitty,” said Jones as he drew in a quick breath, “but I think we have to watch my friend John Graham, too.”
He had talked about Francis Bacon. Christopher Marlowe’s name came up and the suspicious early death of this great writer came up, too. Woody Allen’s name came up, but only as comic relief to an otherwise deadly boring subject for high school students. John Graham liked to read Woody Allen’s essay called “But Soft…Real Soft” to his classes as a summary of how ridiculous it was that there were people at major universities worldwide who were paid handsome salaries to debate year after year who really wrote plays from 400 years ago. John Graham didn’t care who really wrote the plays, and certainly the students could give a flying leap less who wrote them. But it was one of the things John thought students who had taken a drama class in high school should know before they graduated and pretended to go out into the world trained and ready for the workplace.
But the lecture had the desired effect. He had been distracted, too, and realized that he hadn’t thought about the money for almost an entire hour. Now that class was over, however, his thoughts did return to another aspect of this new adventure in his life. He began to think how cleverly he had handled the entire situation, even planning several scenarios in advance in his mind.
Scenario one. If his police friend Greg Jones decided the money was really at John’s house, and got a search warrant for it, John had hidden the money in so clever a place that he was almost certain no one would ever find it. Result: he could keep the money and spend it slowly over a lifetime.
Scenario two. He became so overcome with guilt at having kept the money that there was no clear way to keep it without going crazy. John had decided that if this happened he would simply take the money to another town and drop it off at the nearest church or charitable organization. With the amount of time he was spending lately contemplating his options, he was smart enough to realize that this could be a distinct possibility. Crazy didn’t seem that far off.
Scenario three. He gets caught with the money, through insanity, as he had imagined before, or through carelessness. He could brag about the money to someone somewhere someday and find himself the center of suspicion. At this point, to plead insanity would not be a bad idea. Then he could return the money and beg forgiveness for his moment of weakness. His church preached repentance and forgiveness at least once a month, and it seemed to him that those with shortcomings were favored by pity at least, and usually respected more later by the congregation for having shown weaknesses.
Scenario four. John Graham knew there was another possibility out there, that there was always the unseen, the unexpected that always showed up and slapped you across the kisser with the Homer Simpson-like “Doh!” that someone who hasn’t thought everything through usually deserves. This was danger waiting to happen. John had once heard a Secretary of Defense call these the “unknown unknowns”. There was nothing you could do about it, so the best defense was not to worry about it. You could worry if you wanted to, but you would still get slapped up side of the head.
“Greg?”
“Yeah, this is Captain Jones.”
Smitty bent over the phone on his desk. “Hey, Greg, Smitty here.”
“Harold!” said Greg, a little too loud.
Harold Smith was trying not to talk too loud, because a major investigation had just fallen into his lap thanks to the help of his good friend in Ridgeway. He didn’t want to share this good fortune with anyone else in the department just now, and when a major event broke here at the office, everyone wanted a piece of the pie for their own claim to fame. “You were right on the money, buddy.”
“It’s from the robbery?” said Jones.
“The serial numbers match the last bills of $100,000. Whoever made the fake package may have had access to the entire amount,” said Smitty. “But why would they make a decoy?
“Maybe they made it on the train to distract us. So what do we do next?”
Smitty paused. “Wait just a minute. Zabronsky just came in the room. I’ll call you right back.”
Smitty had called Jones back earlier in the evening and filled him in on all the details. Unfortunately, there just wasn’t enough on the bank robbery case to work 24/7 on it, so when the next call came in, he was out the door with his partner.
It was way too late for the local gas station lights to still be on, especially when there was no one around watching the place. The police had been called by a guy who stopped for gas and had figured out after pumping it, there was no one to pay. Paranoid about being caught not paying for gas or else feeling his patriotic duty calling, he was still there when Smitty pulled up.
“This doesn’t look right,” he said, getting out of the car.
“Thanks for coming over so fast,” said the nervous customer, waving a twenty in the air. “I pumped my gas, but can’t see anyone to pay.”
Smitty looked around at the gas station, still fully lit though it was long past the posted closing time. One of the sliding glass doors was open, and music was playing inside the booth.
“Maybe the guy is in the john,” Smitty said, motioning to the back building. “Have you checked back there?”
The customer shook his head no, and Smitty motioned for his partner to check it out. Smitty walked over to the booth, and taking the information from the customer, also took his twenty. “Thanks for reporting this, and if there’s anything else we need, I’ll call you at your home number, or come by your house.”
There was no need to keep extra eyes around that would only keep asking stupid questions like, “Could you give me my change from the drawer?” Smitty explained that nothing could be touched until it they figured out what had happened, and that the change from the twenty would be mailed to him.
The now irate customer left muttering something about getting screwed by the cops every time he tried to do something good. Smitty called for another team to come in and help search the area. Then he called the corporate number on the booth to tell them one of their gas stations was unattended.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece Chapter SixSunday May 16, 2010
O Captain My Captain by Walt Whitman
Sunday May 16, 2010
Sunday May 16, 2010
O Captain My Captain
by Walt Whitman
O Captain my Captain! our fearful trip is done,
The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won,
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring;
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up--for you the flag is flung for you the bugle trills,
For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths for you the shores a-crowding,
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head!
It is some dream that on the deck,
You've fallen cold and dead.
My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won;
Exult O shores, and ring O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece O Captain, My CaptainSunday May 16, 2010
The Plodder's Mile -- Chapter Five
Sunday May 16, 2010
Sunday May 16, 2010
CHAPTER FIVE
Officer Greg Jones had a few jobs to complete. But first he had to call his deputy, who was part-time, to come over and help him catalogue the evidence. Regulations said two people had to count money, and even if he wanted to flip through the pile and see if there were more bills inside, he would still have to wait for Larry to arrive.
He worried as he waited that his good friend John may have tainted the evidence, but this still seemed to be a straight-forward robbery, and the serial numbers on the bills would match, or they wouldn’t. It wouldn’t matter once Larry was there if they could reassemble the pile of papers and money to look exactly like it had, because they would take some Polaroids and those could be used as evidence as well.
That would be the next job. He would have to call the store and have the delivery boy bring over some more film. The stuff in the camera was so old Greg doubted it would still work, and delaying any more while they waited for film would destroy the fun of the investigation.
They would together and dissect this package, and try to figure out just what had happened. Why would someone make a bundle that looked like it was a lot of money when it wasn’t? And who had the rest of the money?
Raymond Johnson was not the most patient man in the world. He had once stabbed himself in the hand with a potato pitchfork, and rather than wait for an emergency room technician to pull it back out of his hand, he calmly walked over the concrete step and pulled it out himself. He also pulled dirt back into the wound and had to have intravenous antibiotics for 3 days, but the pitchfork was out. He even went to the doctor down the street and convinced him to sew it up rather than go the next town to the emergency room.
But with $100,000 sitting somewhere out here on the tracks, Ray had developed a patience he had never experienced before. This was his fourth trip down the tracks and he still couldn’t find the bundle. He was pretty sure where the train had stopped, since there were only two road/railroad intersections in the entire town. He knew it was farther south on the tracks than the Ridgeway city limits sign he had seen from the train.
This was the right place, but there was no package. It was beginning to grow dark as Ray tried to think of what would be the next step. Without the money, he could see no future prospects, unless he was to go and rob another bank himself. The fifteen years he had spent in prison for trying to rob a bank by himself had convinced him that it was best to have a partner these days, a front man, and his best front man was enjoying cable TV back at in jail.
Tonight, Ray would have to spend a few dollars on a motel in town. Then he would think about where the money might have gone. One way or another, he was going to find that money.
John Graham was not usually a nervous person. He was able to stand in line at grocery stores while clerks took their own sweet time trying to find the subtotal key on the register. He could sit in traffic that wouldn’t move, no matter how hard the people around him honked, just enjoying the radio. He even liked standing in long lines because it gave him time to notice what the others in line really looked like, and let him wonder where they came from and what the real story behind their lives really was.
But now almost $100,000 was sitting in his house, and John was a guy who didn’t like to break a $20 because the money would then vanish in a matter of hours. He had been daydreaming at work all that day about what he could spend the money on if no one found out he had it.
He had cycled through sports cars, motorcycles, motorized parachute flyers, ultra light airplanes, cruises, hot tubs, house remodeling, expensive watches, fine art, diamonds, rare coins, expensive electronic toys, shoes, suits, and safaris. Then he would chastise himself for even thinking about spending the money since it really wasn’t his and it would probably end up back at the bank safe in the depositors’ accounts.
Then the next cycle would begin, and to relieve the guilt, John would think about what he could by for Reba. Expensive clothes, figurines, exotic trips, jewelry, furs and fast cars. Then another wave of guilt for even considering spending this windfall on such ridiculous extravagances. He should be thinking of college and books for his daughters or their husbands, trust funds for his grand-children, contributions to his church.
Would. Should. Could. John recognized this ridiculous cycle of thinking for what it really was, and thought about the fact that he might not be the best person for God to tempt with such a great temptation. He wasn’t dealing with it very well, and he realized that his preoccupation with this would soon turn into some type of mental disorder, with the end result being an institution. He could almost picture himself being carried away in a straight-jacket muttering “Rings, watches, vacations, tuition. Rings, watches, vacations, tuition….”
It was time to get focused on the matter at hand, and that wasn’t how to spend money that wasn’t really his. It was time to talk about who really wrote Shakespeare’s plays to students who didn’t really care who Shakespeare was.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece Chapter FiveFriday May 14, 2010
Death Be Not Proud by John Donne
Friday May 14, 2010
Friday May 14, 2010
Death Be Not Proud
by John Donne
Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not soe,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill mee.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece Death Be Not ProudWednesday May 12, 2010
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot
Wednesday May 12, 2010
Wednesday May 12, 2010
by T. S. Eliot
S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.
Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question…
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.
And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.
And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair
[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin
[They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”]
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.
For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?
And I have known the eyes already, known them all
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?
And I have known the arms already, known them all
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
It is perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…
I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep… tired… or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.
And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”
And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor
And this, and so much more?
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.”
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous
Almost, at times, the Fool.
I grow old… I grow old…
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.
Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
LITERATURE OUT LOUD
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece The Love Song of J. Alfred PrufrockMonday May 10, 2010
How Do I Love Thee by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Monday May 10, 2010
Monday May 10, 2010
How Do I Love Thee?
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of everyday's
Most quiet need, by sun and candlelight.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Right;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints, I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life! and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
Click on the video below to see the podcast of this poem.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece How Do I Love Thee?Thursday May 06, 2010
Abundance Jan 17 Birthdays
Thursday May 06, 2010
Thursday May 06, 2010
This is the entire broadcast from Jan. 17th.
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Click on the player to hear an audio version of this piece BirthdaysThursday May 06, 2010
Rebirth
Thursday May 06, 2010
Thursday May 06, 2010
Rebirth
The best thing about birthdays is it is a chance to think about beginnings. We all come into the world helpless and dependant. By the time we are old enough to take care of ourselves someone else has invested lots of time and money to make sure we survive growing up. Then we might get a chance to take care of somebody else and help them make it to the point the can take care of another generation. A birthday is a starting point, but it can also be another beginning. It’s a day we can stop and look at the past year and see what we want to do the next year.A rebirth can take place at any time, not just on a birthday. The miracle of rebirth is always present in nature, and an example or two can help us understand the process as it could also occur in us. I’ve recently planted some pine nuts, and they have already sprouted. Even though I planted them upside down, they are correcting my mistake, sending up the main root and turning back into the soil. If we think about the single pine nut and the potential it can have, it makes me wonder what our own potential could be. These pine nuts were for sale at the side of the road, and the guy who sold them to me wanted to roast them. I had other plans. Where a bag of pine nuts could have been a snack, I intend to turn them into a little grove of pine trees in the back yard. I might make some of them in to little bonsai plants, and since I sell stuff on Ebay, they will probably end up somewhere else in the world. They may grow to full size and produce pine nuts of their own.
The dependable way in which seeds sprout and grow into full grown plants is amazing to me. No one can make a seed, but every time we plant a seed, we have the expectation they will grow. We don’t expect them to grow into something different, so maybe here is a lesson for us. Can we grow into something we aren’t, and who decides what we are and are not?
Another exciting example of rebirth is some impatiens flower plants I had in the yard last year. They were really from the year before, and I had kept them alive over the winter and done some cuttings. This isn’t a new plant, but a part of the old plant. These flowers are sensitive to cold, and they have great stems for cutting. I took longer stems, cut them, put some rooting enzyme on them and put them in a new little pot. By spring I had dozens more to plant, and they all came from the same few flowers I dug up in the fall and kept in the greenhouse.
I did the same thing last fall. I dug up quite a few of the second generation flowers to prepare to get a third generation ready for next summer. I was surprised how many plants I had, and they were flowering very well as the snow fell. Unfortunately, the cat bumped the plug for the heater for the greenhouse before I noticed, and it got below freezing for a couple of nights. About two-thirds of the flowers died back to the soil, and the rest just died. The amazing thing is I still have some to work with, and spent the weekend getting them cleaned up and repotted. I should have a record number of bright purple impatiens ready for the spring.
It’s the same with this program. “Abundance” is the root stock of optimism, and I want a little bit of that idea to get planted and nourished in your life. I know when you stop and think about all the things we have to be thankful for in this modern world, your part of this growing idea will flourish, and before we know it, there will be a bounty of thankfulness. I do it in the hopes that I will be truly conscious of giving thanks, and remember to acknowledge the blessings of living in a world where many of us live a standard of living far above the royalty in the past.
Stop at least once each day and pay attention to the wonders all about us, that have become commonplace to us because we wake up every day and they are available to us. A thankful attitude will help you understand how truly blessed we are. Be reborn to the miracle of life every day you are given, because there will be those who weren’t given this gift of one more day. Get out there and grow into the real you today.
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The Complete Collection of
SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS
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