Enough, Enough with the Drumbeat! ~ by Hénock Gugsa

Enough, Enough with the Drumbeat!
~ by Hénock ~

================================
 
Alright, alright. Give me a break
Stop all that drumbeat, I've had enough
Keep your "360", keep it "All In"
And who needs anyone's "Last Word"
Or a "Situation Room" with a breathless Wuff?

Please, no "Eleventh Hour" and nothing "For the Record"
I prefer "Last Week Tonight" or a Bee's "Full Frontal"
Don't go "Out Front", no "TRMS", and no "Hardball"
"Morning Joe" is pukey, and all of FOX to boot
Just gimme "Time", "Newsweek", "WaPo" or Wall Street Journal!

"Still I Rise" - by Maya Angelou

 Still I Rise

by 
Maya Angelou

================ 
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops.
Weakened by my soulful cries.

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

" En hiver la terre pleure; ..." ~ Victor Hugo

En hiver la terre pleure
Poème de VICTOR HUGO
~~~~~~ **** ~~~~~~

En hiver la terre pleure ;
Le soleil froid, pâle et doux,
Vient tard, et part de bonne heure,
Ennuyé du rendezvous.

Leurs idylles sont moroses.
Soleil ! aimons ! Essayons.
O terre, où donc sont tes roses ?
Astre, où donc sont tes rayons ?

Il prend un prétexte, grêle,
Vent, nuage noir ou blanc,
Et dit : C'est la nuit, ma belle !
Et la fait en s'en allant ;

Comme un amant qui retire
Chaque jour son coeur du noeud,
Et, ne sachant plus que dire,
S'en va le plus tôt qu'il peut.

Focus! - by Gray Pilgrim

*** Focus! ***
by 
Gray Pilgrim
==========
The only thing you really need ... 'Focus'.   All else will follow ....
My dear mind, what do you seek
Stay still for a while and look inside
For the peace you seek
Is within your own reach

You feel weighed down by the past
Disappointments, regrets and guilt
Why keep clinging to the unchangeable
Let go of it and feel feather light

Cease the flow of thoughts
Concentrate at a point
Visualize a placid lake
Undisturbed by the flow of time

Focus on this moment
That's all you need to do
Snap back into this very moment
That's all that you need to concentrate upon

We can't go back and change anything
But we make a different future
If only we focus on giving
All that we have got into 'Now'.

Apparitions ~ by William Butler Yeats

Apparitions
~William Butler Yeats~ BECAUSE there is safety in derision
I talked about an apparition,
I took no trouble to convince,
Or seem plausible to a man of sense.
Distrustful of thar popular eye
Whether it be bold or sly.
Fifteen apparitions have I seen;
The worst a coat upon a coat-hanger.    I have found nothing half so good
As my long-planned half solitude,
Where I can sit up half the night
With some friend that has the wit
Not to allow his looks to tell
When I am unintelligible.
Fifteen apparitions have I seen;
The worst a coat upon a coat-hanger.  When a man grows old his joy
Grows more deep day after day,
His empty heart is full at length,
But he has need of all that strength
Because of the increasing Night
That opens her mystery and fright.
Fifteen apparitions have I seen;
The worst a coat upon a coat-hanger.   

           

The Purist - by Ogden Nash

The Purist
- by Ogden Nash -
================== 
I give you now Professor Twist,
A conscientious scientist,
Trustees exclaimed, "He never bungles!"
And sent him off to distant jungles.
Camped on a tropic riverside,
One day he missed his loving bride.
She had, the guide informed him later,
Been eaten by an alligator.
Professor Twist could not but smile.
"You mean," he said, "a crocodile." 

 

From: "The Philosopher’s Stone" - by Hans Christian Andersen

 

From:  "The Philosopher’s Stone"
- by Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) - 
=============================
Now she heard the following words sadly sung,—
“Life is a shadow that flits away
In a night of darkness and woe.”

But then would follow brighter thoughts:
“Life has the rose’s sweet perfume
With sunshine, light, and joy.”

And if one stanza sounded painfully—
“Each mortal thinks of himself alone,
Is a truth, alas, too clearly known;”

Then, on the other hand, came the answer—
“Love, like a mighty flowing stream,
Fills every heart with its radiant gleam.”

She heard, indeed, such words as these—
“In the pretty turmoil here below,
All is a vain and paltry show.”

Then came also words of comfort—
“Great and good are the actions done
By many whose worth is never known.”

And if sometimes the mocking strain reached her—
“Why not join in the jesting cry
That contemns all gifts from the throne on high?”

In the blind girl’s heart a stronger voice repeated—
“To trust in thyself and God is best,
In His holy will forever to rest.”

But the evil spirit could not see this and remain contented.

"Down by the Salley Gardens" - by William Butler Yeats

  Down By the Salley Gardens
   by William Butler Yeats
~~~~~~~~~ // ~~~~~~~~~   Down by the salley gardens
   my love and I did meet;
She passed the salley gardens
   with little snow-white feet.
She bid me take love easy,
   as the leaves grow on the tree;
But I, being young and foolish,
   with her would not agree.
In a field by the river
   my love and I did stand,
And on my leaning shoulder
   she laid her snow-white hand.
She bid me take life easy,
   as the grass grows on the weirs;
But I was young and foolish,
   and now am full of tears.    

"Down by the Salley Gardens" sung by Maura O'Connell      and Karen Matheson

"Nothing Is Too Small ..." - by Mary Oliver

 

Nothing Is Too Small Not To Be Wondered About
- by Mary Oliver - *

Nothing Is Too Small Not To Be Wondered About
The cricket doesn't wonder
     if there's a heaven
or, if there is, if there's room for him.
It's fall. Romance is over. Still, he sings.
If we can, he enters a house
     through the tiniest crack under the door.
Then the house grows colder.
He sings slower and slower.
     Then, nothing.
This must mean something, I don't know what.
     But certainly it doesn't mean
he hasn't been an excellent cricket
     all his life.

 -------------------------------------------------
   *[ Mary Oliver, from her collection Felicity ]

"Lesson" - by Forrest Hamer

 

"Lesson" *
by Forrest Hamer ==== /// ====

It was 1963 or 4, summer,
and my father was driving our family
from Ft. Hood to North Carolina in our 56 Buick.
We'd been hearing about Klan attacks, and we knew

Mississippi to be more dangerous than usual.
Dark lay hanging from the trees the way moss did,
and when it moaned light against the windows 
that night, my father pulled off the road to sleep.

Noises
that usually woke me from rest afraid of monsters 
kept my father awake that night, too, 
and I lay in the quiet noticing him listen, learning
that he might not be able always to protect us

from everything and the creatures besides;
perhaps not even from the fury suddenly loud
through my body about his trip from Texas
to settle us home before he would go away

to a place no place in the world
he named Viet Nam. A boy needs a father
with him, I kept thinking, fixed against noise
from the dark.

________________________________________

* Copyright 1995 by Forrest Hamer
 

Two or Three - by John Keats

Two or Three
by

 John Keats
///===///

Two or three Posies
With two or three simples--
Two or three Noses
With two or three pimples--
Two or three wise men
And two or three ninny's--
Two or three guineas--
Two or three raps
At two or three doors--
Two or three naps
Of two or three hours--
Two or three Cats
And two or three mice--
Two or three sprats
At a very great price--
Two or three sandies
And two or three tabbies--
Two or three dandies
And two Mrs.------
Two or three Smiles
And two or three frowns--
Two or three Miles
To two or three towns--
Two or three pegs
For two or three bonnets--
Two or three dove eggs
To hatch into sonnets.

Brother and Sister - by Lewis Carroll

BROTHER and SISTER

- Lewis Carroll -
/////// #### ///////

 “Sister, sister, go to bed!
Go and rest your weary head.”
Thus the prudent brother said.
 
 “Do you want a battered hide,
Or scratches to your face applied?”
Thus his sister calm replied.

“Sister, do not raise my wrath.
I’d make you into mutton broth
As easily as kill a moth”

The sister raised her beaming eye
And looked on him indignantly
And sternly answered, “Only try!”

Off to the cook he quickly ran.
“Dear Cook, please lend a frying-pan
To me as quickly as you can.”

“And wherefore should I lend it you?”
“The reason, Cook, is plain to view.
I wish to make an Irish stew.”
“What meat is in that stew to go?”
“My sister’ll be the contents!”
“Oh.”
“You’ll lend the pan to me, Cook?”
“No!”

----------------------------------------
Moral: Never stew your sister.

Plaisir d'amour - de Jean-Pierre Claris De Florian

Plaisir d'amour
 Poème de Jean-Pierre Claris De Florian

~~~~~~~ **** ~~~~~~~

Plaisir d'amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d'amour dure toute la vie.

J'ai tout quitté pour l'ingrate Sylvie,
Elle me quitte et prend un autre amant.
Plaisir d'amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d'amour dure toute la vie.

Tant que cette eau coulera doucement
Vers ce ruisseau qui borde la prairie,
Je t'aimerai, me répétait Sylvie ;
L'eau coule encore, elle a changé pourtant !

Plaisir d'amour ne dure qu'un moment,
Chagrin d'amour dure toute la vie.

"an ever-fixèd mark" (Sonnet 116) - by William Shakespeare

"an ever-fixèd mark" (Sonnet 116) 

- by William Shakespeare -

~~~~~~~ /// ~~~~~~~

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove.
O no! it is an ever-fixèd mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out ev'n to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

À Bas Ben Adhem - by Ogden Nash

 À Bas Ben Adhem
- by Ogden Nash -

My fellow man I do not care for.
I often ask me, What's he there for?
The only answer I can find
Is, Reproduction of his kind.
If I'm supposed to swallow that,
Winnetka is my habitat.
Isn't it time to carve Hic Jacet
Above that Reproduction racket?

To make the matter more succint:
Suppose my fellow man extinct.
Why, who would not approve the plan
Save possibly my fellow man?
Yet with a politician's voice
He names himself as Nature's choice.

The finest of the human race
Are bad in figure, worse in face.
Yet just because they have two legs
And come from storks instead of eggs
They count the spacious firmament
As something to be charged and sent.

Though man created cross-town traffic,
The Daily Mirror, News and Graphic,
The pastoral fight and fighting pastor,
And Queen Marie and Lady Astor,
He hails himself with drum and fife
And bullies lower forms of life.

Not that I think much depends
On how we treat our feathered friends,
Or hold the wrinkled elephant
A nobler creature than my aunt.
It's simply that I'm sure I can
Get on without my fellow man.

"the great escape" - by Charles Bukowski

the great escape
by Charles Bukowski
~~~~~ *** ~~~~~

listen, he said, you ever seen a bunch of crabs in a
bucket?
no, I told him.
well, what happens is that now and then one crab
will climb up on top of the others
and begin to climb toward the top of the bucket,
then, just as he’s about to escape
another crab grabs him and pulls him back
down.
really? I asked.
really, he said, and this job is just like that, none
of the others want anybody to get out of
here. that’s just the way it is
in the postal service!
I believe you, I said.

just then the supervisor walked up and said,
you fellows were talking.
there is no talking allowed on this
job.

I had been there for eleven and one-half
years.

I got up off my stool and climbed right up the
supervisor
and then I reached up and pulled myself right
out of there.

it was so easy it was unbelievable.
but none of the others followed me.

and after that, whenever I had crab legs
I thought about that place.
I must have thought about that place
maybe 5 or 6 times

before I switched to lobster.

==============================================
“the great escape” by Charles Bukowski from Sifting Through the Madness for the Word, the Line, the Way. © Ecco Press, 2004.

Once There Was a Man - by Stephen Crane

Once there was a man 

by

Stephen Crane

**** ~~~~~~~ ****

Once there was a man --
Oh, so wise!
In all drink
He detected the bitter,
And in all touch
He found the sting.
At last he cried thus:
"There is nothing --
No life,
No joy,
No pain --
There is nothing save opinion,
And opinion be damned." 

Après l'hiver - de Victor Hugo

Après l'hiver
Poème de VICTOR HUGO

N'attendez pas de moi que je vais vous donner Des raisons contre Dieu que je vois rayonner ; La nuit meurt, l'hiver fuit ; maintenant la lumière, Dans les champs, dans les bois, est partout la première. Je suis par le printemps vaguement attendri. Avril est un enfant, frêle, charmant, fleuri ; Je sens devant l'enfance et devant le zéphyre Je ne sais quel besoin de pleurer et de rire ; Mai complète ma joie et s'ajoute à mes pleurs. Jeanne, George, accourez, puisque voilà des fleurs. Accourez, la forêt chante, l'azur se dore, Vous n'avez pas le droit d'être absents de l'aurore. Je suis un vieux songeur et j'ai besoin de vous, Venez, je veux aimer, être juste, être doux, Croire, remercier confusément les choses, Vivre sans reprocher les épines aux roses, Être enfin un bonhomme acceptant le bon Dieu. Ô printemps ! bois sacrés ! ciel profondément bleu ! On sent un souffle d'air vivant qui vous pénètre, Et l'ouverture au loin d'une blanche fenêtre ; On mêle sa pensée au clairobscur des eaux ; On a le doux bonheur d'être avec les oiseaux Et de voir, sous l'abri des branches printanières, Ces messieurs faire avec ces dames des manières.

"February" - by Margaret Atwood

"February" 

- by Margaret Atwood -

Please click inside the blue box to enlarge

The Summer Day - by Mary Oliver

The Summer Day
by 

Mary Oliver
///// === /////

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?

======================================

TPO's comment:
I like the serenity in this poem. I am happy that "idleness" is cast in a very favorable light. Living in the moment and then from moment to moment makes very good sense to me now in my old age.