27 March 2009

Friday Poetry - Happy Birthday Robert Frost


Actually his birthday was yesterday, but I'm sure he won't mind.

CARPE DIEM

Age saw two quiet children
Go loving by at twilight,
He knew not whether homeward,
Or outward from the village,
Or (chimes were ringing) churchward,
He waited, (they were strangers)
Till they were out of hearing
To bid them both be happy.
"Be happy, happy, happy,
And seize the day of pleasure."
The age-long theme is Age's.
'Twas Age imposed on poems
Their gather-roses burden
To warn against the danger
That overtaken lovers
From being overflooded
With happiness should have it.
And yet not know they have it.
But bid life seize the present?
It lives less in the present
Than in the future always,
And less in both together
Than in the past. The present
Is too much for the senses,
Too crowding, too confusing-
Too present to imagine.

- Robert Frost

26 March 2009

23 March 2009

I Feel For You ~ Chaka Khan



Happy Birthday Chaka Khan and thank you for one of my favourite Prince covers. You do it so well.

21 March 2009

Saturday morn' cuppa peppermint honey warms me

listening to Time Waits For No One

moments etched in time, these moments without proper names

sitting beside you, thinking about my aging mother

these are the moments I never want to end

While Charlie is keeping time....

20 March 2009

16 March 2009

Happy Birthday Pattie Boyd

In honour of Patti Boyd's lucky St. Patrick's Day birthday (tomorrow) I am uploading these two videos from two of my favourite musicians for which Boyd is said to be the inspiration.




13 March 2009

Belated birthday wishes Jack

In honour of Jack Kerouac's birthday yesterday.




How to Meditate by Jack Kerouac

-lights out-
fall, hands a-clasped, into instantaneous
ecstasy like a shot of heroin or morphine,
the gland inside of my brain discharging
the good glad fluid (Holy Fluid) as
i hap-down and hold all my body parts
down to a deadstop trance-Healing
all my sicknesses-erasing all-not
even the shred of a "I-hope-you" or a
Loony Balloon left in it, but the mind
blank, serene, thoughtless. When a thought
comes a-springing from afar with its held-
forth figure of image, you spoof it out,
you spuff it off, you fake it, and
it fades, and thought never comes-and
with joy you realize for the first time
"thinking's just like not thinking-
So I don't have to think
any
more"

11 March 2009

Uncle Arvin



My mom's big brother passed away on Sunday morning. She told me earlier in the week that he'd been moved to the hospice. He requested no services. He was 76 years old.

I love Uncle Arvin. I never got used to calling him Uncle Frank, as he wanted to be called in his later years. But that is what I heard (in my mind / in my ear?) as I lie waking up, in that half asleep, half awake place, at 8 on Sunday morning, "Frank's gone." That's it. As I pushed away the slumber to contemplate it's meaning, I sorta knew.

My favourite memory of Arvin was the time, oh, I was about 7 or 8, we came over to Memaw's house, and after we walked in Uncle crept from out of the shadows and knocked on the screen door and said to Memaw, "You locking me out?" She had no idea he was coming to see her and she was so surprised. She laughed and cried. It was how I remember his sense of humour, his easy, subtle playfulness, very much like Papaw's. I always love the stories of him spending his halcyon days on the roof of his parents garage and recording the numbers of the airplanes that flew over. And that when he became a small plane pilot and took us all up for a ride, his airplane's call letters included a "W" and the phonetic word for "W" is Whisky which Memaw found no charm in.

I pray for his peaceful passing and for all those who loved him to find strength and peace of mind in having had the privilege of knowing him.



I happened on these three poems on Sunday and I thought they seemed fitting to the day.

The Clock of Life ~Robert H. Smith

The clock of life is wound but once and no man has the power
To tell just when the hands will stop, at late or early hour.

To lose one's wealth is sad indeed, to lose one's health is more,
To lose one's soul is such a loss that no man can restore.

The present only is our own, so live, love, toil with a will,
Place no faith in tomorrow -- for the clock may then be still.


Death ~Harry Scott Holland 1847-1915

Death is nothing at all. I have only slipped away into the next room. I am I, and you are you. Whatever we were to each other, that we still are. Call me by my old familiar name. Speak to me in the easy way that you always used. Put no difference in your tone. Wear no forced air of solemnity or sorrow. Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes we enjoyed together. Pray, smile, think of me, pray for me. Let my name be ever the household word that it always was. Let it be spoken without effect, without the trace of a shadow on it. Life means all the it ever meant. It is the same as it ever was; there is unbroken continuity. Why should I be out of mind because I am out of sight? I am waiting for you, for an interval, somewhere very near, just round the corner. All is well.


I'm Free ~Shannon Moseley

Don't grieve for me, for now I'm free. I'm following the path God chose for me.
I took His hand when I heard Him call. I turned my back and left it all.
I could not stay another day to laugh, to love, to work or play.
Tasks left undone must stay that way. I've now found peace at the end of day.
If my parting has left a void, then fill it with remembered joys.
A friendship shared, a laugh, a kiss; Ah yes, these things I, too, will miss.
Be not burdened with times of sorrow. Look for the sunshine of tomorrow.
My life's been full, I savored much; Good friends, good times, a loved one's touch.
Perhaps my time seems all too brief. Don't lengthen your pain with undo grief.
Lift up your heart and peace to thee. God wanted me now. He set me Free.

09 March 2009

Happy Birthday Robin Trower!



Rather appropriate choice, if I do say so myself. This is much how Robin looked the last time I saw him, a few short weeks before the date of his show, one year ago.

Robin turns 64 today.

03 March 2009

Old Friend...Times is hard...

Woke this morning at 6 am to hard rain. So loud that I awoke a little disoriented, thought my Love had turned on the furnace. And so quiet all around the sound of rain, no cars driving by, that I thought I must have woke too early, surprised to see the clock say 6. But that is how the day started. Even heard some thunder in the distance. And the wind did sorely howl last evening. March has roared in like a lion.

And so after receiving, dispiriting news yesterday, to wit I owe the Feds some $900 and while the good State of California owes me $880 the good state is issuing I.O.U.s to its citizens, I seriously doubt ol' Uncle is going to take an I.O.U. from me. So I'm squeezed in the middle. I got dem ol' middle class blues...

Sing it Warren...