Playground Pastoral

merry-go-round circles
under the trees



swing set, push, smile,
grasping hand



merrily tossed
gentle shadows

Humorous Links

Humor can be such a relief during challenging times. I've recently been getting a good laugh out of these sites.

Shitmydadsays
This caught my attention because I just watched Sunshine Cleaning, which stars Alan Arkin as a grumpy old man (he also played a grumpy old man in Little Miss Sunshine), so I was in the mood to laugh at the exclamations of another foul-mouthed older man.

Petty Petitions
From a "petition to set politics aside long enough to agree on a catchy, non-partisan nickname for Sarah Palin" to a "petition to live every day like it’s your second to last," this blog offers satire at its best.

Stuff White People Like
This blog pokes hilarious, though not mean-spirited, fun at my tribe: the class (more than the race) of folks who listen to NPR, own Apple computers, eat hummus, and attend yoga classes on a regular basis.

Amusing Ourselves to Death
More serious than funny, here's something of a different stripe to make you think twice about too much distraction.

Let Us Now Praise Famous Cliches

Nobody hates cliches more than poets. Yet cliches do what we are trying to do in our poems: create condensed, memorable, useful metaphors. In this fun article in the Boston Globe, writer James Parker takes us through the history and function of cliches, the phrases we (to use a cliche) love to hate.

As Parker points out, "Durable, easily handled, yet retaining somehow the flavor of its coinage, the classic cliché has fought philology to a standstill: it sticks and it stays, and not by accident."

The history of the word cliche comes from old printing techniques... "So the cliché was an object, and a useful one: a concrete unit of communication that minimized labor and sped things up."

Cliches grease the wheels of the government... "An American politician can be off-the-cuff, instinctive, zig-zag, but only if he or she is prepared immediately to make a cliché of it: look at what happened to the word 'maverick' in the last election."

And cliches range from the petty to the profound... "But what of the timeless cliché, the cliché you can steer your course by, the cliché that carries a small freight not just of meaning, but of wisdom?"

The author also chooses two cliches (the one about free lunch and the one about the tango) that describe the range of his "entire psychological and ethical structure." I'll have to think now about what mine would be. And what are yours?

Bibliophile

"Sometimes, I wish I could read faster."

If you can relate to that statement, check out this little animation I found on the website of the Boston Book Festival.

Chinese Moon Festival

Thanks to Daphne Burt (Chaplain at the school where I work) for letting me know that today is the Chinese Moon Festival, or Mid-Autumn Festival. On this day, families eat dinner under the moon, eat mooncakes, pomeloes, and tell the story of Chang’e, the moon maiden.

Some of you may know that my damselfly tattoo was inspired by a theater experience I had (it was more than just being part of the cast) while at Hampshire College. The play was based on the story of Change'e. So... I feel a connection to this day. My journey from cast member to damselfly is a mystical story, not really fit for this brief blog entry, but I wanted to at least acknowledge that ancient and beautiful Chinese myth here.

Blessings to all this day!

Does anybody know what a pomelo is?

Dispatches from the Poet in the Conference Room

Sitting through meetings, trying to focus on all the big, conceptual words, I can't help noticing petals wilting on the apple tree, and the slow trickle of artificial rain from the lawn sprinkler. Richard Hugo said it best: "Think small.... If you can't think small, try philosophy or social criticism." The reverse is also true. If you can't think big, if the words of organizational work plans and economic indicators sound like the wind worrying pine trees on a stormy night, then you must be a poet.

It's Hard to Find the Time...

... to write ...
when "to live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else."
-Emily Dickinson

Quotes of the Month

"Poetry is a rich, full-bodied whistle, cracked ice crunching in pails, the night that numbs the leaf, the duel of two nightingales, the sweet pea that has run wild, Creation's tears in shoulder blades."
- Boris Pasternak

"If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know it is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know this is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?" - Emily Dickinson

Think Positively

How beautiful! The following quote appeared in my inbox this morning, in Rob Bresney's Astrology & Pronoia Newsletter. (If you're not familiar with his Free Will Astrology, you should check it out.) Diane Ackerman is one of those authors whom, even though I haven't actually read an entire book of hers, I like because of the places where she is mentioned or quoted, the titles of her books, and the topics she embraces. It's like she's a friend of a friend. Here's the quote:

"I guess it shouldn't surprise us to find ourselves linked with the stars. Every atom of gold or silver jewelry was created in supernovas. The water we drink, the air we breathe, the ground we walk, the complicated pouch of fluids and salts and minerals and bones we are -- all forged in some early chaos of our sun. I think it was the astrophysicist John Wheeler who remarked that we are the sun's way of thinking about itself."

-Diane Ackerman, A Slender Thread: Rediscovering Hope at the Heart of Crisis

Harry Lost in Translation

Since I'm busy with packing, moving, and setting up my teaching practicum for Goddard, I am again relying on my brilliant outside sources for content. I found this amusing collection in the New York Times today- book jacket summaries and excerpts of unauthorized translations of Harry Potter, translated from the Chinese.

From Harry Potter and the Showdown: "When Harry confronts Voldemort at Azkaban, the Dark Lord tries to win Harry over as a fellow descendant of Slytherin. Harry refuses, and together with Ron and Hermione, kills Voldemort instead. Now what will Harry do about his two girlfriends?"

Talk about efficiency

I am in love with most things Indian. It's been over six years since I returned from visiting my aunt's family in Mumbai, and while the detailed memories are fading, my feelings of fascinated affection and appreciation remain.

I am really busy these days planning my lovely lesbian wedding, AND taking some time off from school (having fun & relaxing takes time, too).

So, instead of sharing my own random thoughts, I want to share this article.

I wish I could get lunch this way!

Irony In Experience

I have yet to explicate here the theory I developed after reading John Cage’s lectures: that reading a published text to oneself is a performance that can never be replicated because the environment is continually acting upon the reader, thus influencing the reader’s experience of the text in that moment…. Well, now I have. That’s basically the theory. I’ll give you some examples from my own life later.

The point is, I just had a very ironic experience of said theory. I was sitting at my work computer during my lunch break, reading an essay about Language Poetry (or, writing in “Open Forms”). The argument goes that Open Forms invite readers to create the meaning of the text along with the author. The author ceases to be an absolute authority in the making of meaning. Personally, I love this idea, even though some people shirk at “experimental” art, calling it the most elitist of all forms. But initially hard to understand in a traditional way isn’t the same as elitist.

Anyway, here I am reading about how to write in ways that don’t constrict readers, and in walks a woman who wants me to hang some posters for her festival. She says, “Ok, how many posters do you guys want?” I say, “I think two would be enough.” “Well,” she tells me, “you usually take three, two for the door and one for somewhere else.” “Well,” I reply, “I guess we’ll take three!”

I couldn’t help laughing to myself. She asked the most closed question possible! The universe is snickering.