Don's Blog Bob Dylan 12-18-21

Bob Dylan's lyrics won him a Nobel Prize several years ago. Here is one of his songs that you may not know.
I have never been a fan of Bob Dylan's voice so here is an exceptional rendition of the song by Miley Cyrus.
My favorite stanza goes

"But I'll see you in the sky above,
In the tall grass, in the ones I love,
You're gonna make me lonesome when you go."

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwje6cXZnoPvAhUBVN8KHdidDQUQ3ywwAHoECAIQAg&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DI2wvaWTTmz8&usg=AOvVaw1-EfBbCdnnJCljked9rBl9

Don's Blog - Casualty by Seamus Heaney 12-17-21

For some time I have been looking at the issue of violence .This poem is out of season but then violence is never in season.

In the poem "Casualty", Seamus Heaney elegizes a 'drinking  friend' who has been lost in the vicious cycle of violence in Northern Ireland in the 1970's.

For background, on January 30, 1972, later called Bloody Sunday, British troops killed13 unarmed Catholic civil rights marchers in Derry, Northern Ireland. That week the Catholic Provisional IRA declared a curfew to honor the dead. On Wednesday of that week Heaney's friend,Louis O'Neill, broke his own group's curfew to go out drinking and was killed by a bomb in a crosstown bar. He was a casualty to the violence of his own people. The issue of what to do about violence is unanswerable but its need to be addressed is unquestionable.

"Casualty" by Seamus Heaney

I

He would drink by himself

And raise a weathered thumb

Towards the high shelf,

Calling another rum

And blackcurrant, without

Having to raise his voice,

Or order a quick stout

By a lifting of the eyes

And a discreet dumb-show

Of pulling off the top;

At closing time would go

In waders and peaked cap

Into the showery dark,

A dole-kept breadwinner

But a natural for work.

I loved his whole manner,

Sure-footed but too sly,

His deadpan sidling tact,

His fisherman's quick eye

And turned observant back.

Incomprehensible

To him, my other life.

Sometimes, on the high stool,

Too busy with his knife

At a tobacco plug

And not meeting my eye,

In the pause after a slug

He mentioned poetry.

We would be on our own

And, always politic

And shy of condescension,

I would manage by some trick

To switch the talk to eels

Or lore of the horse and cart

Or the Provisionals.

But my tentative art

His turned back watches too:

He was blown to bits

Out drinking in a curfew

Others obeyed, three nights

After they shot dead

The thirteen men in Derry.

PARAS THIRTEEN, the walls said,

BOGSIDE NIL. That Wednesday

Everyone held

His breath and trembled.

II

It was a day of cold

Raw silence, wind-blown

surplice and soutane:

Rained-on, flower-laden

Coffin after coffin

Seemed to float from the door

Of the packed cathedral

Like blossoms on slow water.

The common funeral

Unrolled its swaddling band,

Lapping, tightening

Till we were braced and bound

Like brothers in a ring.

But he would not be held

At home by his own crowd

Whatever threats were phoned,

Whatever black flags waved.

I see him as he turned

In that bombed offending place,

Remorse fused with terror

In his still knowable face,

His cornered outfaced stare

Blinding in the flash.

He had gone miles away

For he drank like a fish

Nightly, naturally

Swimming towards the lure

Of warm lit-up places,

The blurred mesh and murmur

Drifting among glasses

In the gregarious smoke.

How culpable was he

That last night when he broke

Our tribe's complicity?

'Now, you're supposed to be

An educated man,'

I hear him say. 'Puzzle me

The right answer to that one.'

III

I missed his funeral,

Those quiet walkers

And sideways talkers

Shoaling out of his lane

To the respectable

Purring of the hearse…

They move in equal pace

With the habitual

Slow consolation

Of a dawdling engine,

The line lifted, hand

Over fist, cold sunshine

On the water, the land

Banked under fog: that morning

I was taken in his boat,

The Screw purling, turning

Indolent fathoms white,

I tasted freedom with him.

To get out early, haul

Steadily off the bottom,

Dispraise the catch, and smile

As you find a rhythm

Working you, slow mile by mile,

Into your proper haunt

Somewhere, well out, beyond…

Dawn-sniffing revenant,

Plodder through midnight rain,

Question me again.

Candids at Christmas Time 12-15-21

Here is our new tablecloth with a small Jan-decorated Christmas tree, vase, wine bottle, and gourd with dried celosia.

A lit-up Mabel is dressed in my mom's opera gown - festive.

Early this morning noticed that the kids are growing up.

They are still quite inquisitive.

Don's Blog The Thinker as Poet

Todays offering requires time and thought but can be rewarding. The German philosopher Martin Heidegger approached 'thinking'
something as a 'being with' or a 'dwelling in' the subject. He searched not for answers but rather a deeper path to the next question.

Dons Blog - Only a little bird knows and she's not talkin' 12-13-21

In the days when garden's are dreaming I will be providing fare in another form.
The first one is a poem, Unter der Linden, written by Walther von der Vogelweide,
a medieval German poet and singer of love songs (Minnesinger).

Under the lime tree

Under the lime tree
On the heather,
Where we had shared a place of rest,
Still you may find there,
Lovely together,
Flowers crushed and grass down-pressed.
Beside the forest in the vale,
Tandaradei,
Sweetly sang the nightingale.

I came to meet him
At the green:
There was my truelove come before.
Such was I greeted —
Heaven's Queen! —
That I am glad for evermore.
Had he kisses? A thousand some:
Tandaradei,
See how red my mouth's become.

There he had fashioned
For luxury
A bed from every kind of flower.
It sets to laughing
Delightedly
Whoever comes upon that bower;
By the roses well one may,
Tandaradei,
Mark the spot my head once lay.

If any knew
He lay with me
(May God forbid!), for shame I'd die.
What did he do?
May none but he
Ever be sure of that — and I,
And one extremely tiny bird,
Tandaradei,
Who will, I think, not say a word.

Don's Blog - Neighborhood Drama 12-7-21

Jan and I were having a chili dinner last night when we could no longer hear each other talk. There was a
loud rumbling sound like a locomotive over our head. And then it didn't stop and it went on for more than 10 or more minutes.
We knew what it was from the last time - a helicopter was circling right over us with the noise getting
louder and then slightly less loud and then louder again and it just kept on. The last time it happened was several years ago
and the police were searching for some perpetrators.

About this time we got a call from our friends on the other side of the County Park next door. They said they weren't sure what
was going on but there was the helicopter and multiple lights flashing in the park around the Frank Lloyd Wright House and the surrounding woods. They wanted to make sure we were all right and suggested we lock our doors. Jan called next door to let them know.
Our next door neighbor had been out in the freezing cold on his back patio smoking and having a glass of wine. A young girl came running by and disappeared into the park. He called the Kirkwood Police who responded immediately. He talked to them and found out that the girl was a 12 year old runaway. The helicopter continued to circle using its very bright searchlight as those on the ground combed the woods behind our house (using my paths) using bright flashlights.

Using searcher dogs the police were able to find the girl unharmed in a rest room of the nearby St. Gerard Church. Everyone was relieved. That's all we found out so far. Its interesting how quickly the situation in our heads changed from possible danger to us to concern for a young runway girl whose name we did not recognize. What a drama on Pearl Harbor Day.

Then we finished dinner as the neighborhood.

Don's Blog Calvatia gigantea 11-6-21

Calvatea gigantea is commonly known as a giant puffball. It is found in meadows, fields, and deciduous woods. I found this one near the creek bed and was amazed.

• 

It was so large that I brought a ruler with me to measure - it was a 6"  ball. As you can see someone "has been

eating my porridge" - I will bet it was a white tail deer.

 The inside of mature giant puffballs is greenish brown, whereas the interior of immature puffballs is white. Though large white mushrooms are edible when they are young you will not see me dead eating one. The fruiting body of a puffball mushroom will develop within the period of a few weeks and soon begin to decompose and rot, at which point it is dangerous to eat. Unlike most mushrooms, all the spores of the giant puffball are created inside the fruiting body. Large specimens can easily contain several trillion spores which are yellowish, smooth, and very small in size.

Visitors-Halloween 10-31-21

For Sunday morning brunch we had Kristi and Gus Joseph who are both in residency at different hospitals 

in Chicago. We were unable to go to their wedding in Florida this spring so it was great to catch up with them.

They are a delightful and energetic pair.

They were introduced to our Halloween Princess - Mabel but did not see her at night. You may

recognize that Mabel is wearing my mother's ball gown.

Rockwoods Reservation 11-1-21

Jan and I drove out to Rockwoods Reservation on a cool fall day. It is off of Highway 109 north of Eureka.

We took the quarry trail where we had all learned to rappel years ago with Lee's Explorer Post. The sign told us that today

we are not allowed to do anything in the reservation and expressly mentions bouldering, climbing and rappelling as strictly forbidden.

I hate places with signs where what you can't do far outnumbers what you can do.

Despite orders from  the Conservation Rangers we loved the Quarry trail.

The colors were spectacular as we approached the rock

outcroppings.

The leaves were falling. Here is a leaf from a red mulberry tree.

And our rappelling rock was still there.

The moss was extraordinary.

What a great day!

Final Flower for the Day Cosmos 11-2-21

We will end our twelfth year of Flower for the Day with the graceful and delicate Cosmos. In the sunflower family

cosmos has what it takes for success - amazing color, ease of growth, deer resistance, longevity, and an ontological 

feel. 

Swaying in the breeze

A bright and cheery — Ohayo!

Cosmos makes my day

  Lucy King