Little Reviews

Poem for Wednesday and New Year Festivities

2012-02-01T00:01:00.000-05:00

Feeling You Nearby
By Yosano Akiko
Translated by Sam Hamill & Keiko Matsui Gibson

Feeling you nearby,
how could I not come
to walk beneath
this evening moon rising
over flowering fields.

It was only
the thin thread of a cloud,
almost transparent,
leading me along the way
like an ancient sacred song.

--------

The last day of January here involved temperatures in the 60s and a gorgeous evening sky. Before that, I met Hufflepants at the mall -- the first time I'd seen her in weeks, she was in the area for a doctor's appointment -- and we did a bit of admiring jewelry and got frozen yogurt. Then we came back to my house, where we made tea and watched the always-awesome St. Trinians while the cats competed for her attention.

Once she had to go, I finished some work, went for a walk in the gorgeous weather, and had an up and down news day: up in a personal sense as Adam found out that he had won several prizes in Scholastic's photography and graphics contests and Daniel got on Dean's List, down in a political sense as the Komen Foundation decided to screw over women who can't afford mammograms as right-wingers on their board decided to deny funding to Planned Parenthood.

Evening TV included Glee's Michael Jackson episode, which was okay musically (any time Quinn gets her own number I am pleased) and mediocre story-wise (every time Lea Michele is required to show belivable emotion I am unimpressed), then Ringer, which I have missed, though it is still pretty ridiculous (apparently I will watch Buffy and Hornblower in anything). Some more Chinese New Year celebration photos from Lakeforest Mall:

Poem for Tuesday and Black Rock Mill

2012-01-31T00:04:00.000-05:00

A Lover
By Amy Lowell

If I could catch the green lantern of the firefly
I could see to write you a letter.

--------

Happy end of January! I'm sure I've mentioned that winter keeps getting lost around here, which frankly at this point is fine with me since the light is coming back in the evening and improving my mood immensely. On Monday, although it was in the 40s, it was bright and sunny all day, so although I had cats trying to sleep in my lap which made me sleepy in the early afternoon in turn, it was quite a nice day. I don't have a lot to report, since I had to get a bunch of work and chores done, but I don't have complaints either, other than some long distance shenanigans that, to quote Marvin the Paranoid Martian from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, will all end in tears.

Adam went home with his girlfriend after school and Paul picked him up, then we had leftover eggplant casserole for dinner and watched Sunday's Once Upon a Time which I had made us miss for the SAG Awards. Then we watched the Smash pilot which is free on Amazon Prime (I think it's on iTunes too). It's too soon for me to know whether I will love where the story is going and I don't love all the songs written for the show's Marilyn musical, but there was never any chance that I wasn't going to love a show about Broadway starring Anjelica Huston and Debra Messing accompanied by a scruffy-looking Jack Davenport. I enjoyed it immensely -- almost as much as Stephen Colbert stealing his SuperPAC back from Jon Stewart.

Here are some photos of the ruins of Black Rock Mill in Germantown, a grist mill on Seneca Creek that was eventually flooded out:

Poem for Monday and Swain's Lock

2012-01-30T00:11:00.000-05:00

The Swamp Fox
By William Gilmore Simms

We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,
  His friends and merry men are we;
And when the troop of Tarleton rides,
  We burrow in the cypress tree.
The turfy hammock is our bed,
  Our home is in the red deer's den,
Our roof, the tree-top overhead,
  For we are wild and hunted men.

We fly by day and shun its light,
  But, prompt to strike the sudden blow,
We mount and start with early night,
  And through the forest track our foe.
And soon he hears our chargers leap,
  The flashing sabre blinds his eyes,
And ere he drives away his sleep,
  And rushes from his camp, he dies.

Free bridle-bit, good gallant steed,
  That will not ask a kind caress
To swim the Santee at our need,
  When on his heels the foemen press,—
The true heart and the ready hand,
  The spirit stubborn to be free,
The twisted bore, the smiting brand,—
  And we are Marion's men, you see.

Now light the fire and cook the meal,
  The last perhaps that we shall taste;
I hear the Swamp Fox round us steal,
  And that's a sign we move in haste.
He whistles to the scouts, and hark!
  You hear his order calm and low.
Come, wave your torch across the dark,
  And let us see the boys that go.

We may not see their forms again,
  God help'em, should they find the strife!
For they are strong and fearless men,
  And make no coward terms for life;
They'll fight as long as Marion bids,
  And when he speaks the word to shy,
Then, not till then, they turn their steeds,
  Through thickening shade and swamp to fly.

Now stir the fire and lie at ease,—
  The scouts are gone, and on the brush
I see the Colonel bend his knee,
  To take his slumbers too. But hush!
He's praying, comrades;'t is not strange;
  The man that's fighting day by day
May well, when night comes, take a change,
  And down upon his knees to pray.

Break up that hoe-cake, boys, and hand
  The sly and silent jug that's there;
I love not it should idly stand
  When Marion's men have need of cheer.
'Tis seldom that our luck affords
  A stuff like this we just have quaffed,
And dry potatoes on our boards
  May always call for such a draught.

Now pile the brush and roll the log;
  Hard pillow, but a soldier's head
That's half the time in brake and bog
  Must never think of softer bed.
The owl is hooting to the night,
  The cooter crawling o'er the bank,
And in that pond the flashing light
  Tells where the alligator sank.

What! 'tis the signal! start so soon,
  And through the Santee swamp so deep,
Without the aid of friendly moon,
  And we, Heaven help us! half asleep!
But courage, comrades! Marion leads,
  The Swamp Fox takes us out to-night;
So clear your swords and spur your steeds,
  There's goodly chance, I think, of fight.

We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,
  We leave the swamp and cypress-tree,
Our spurs are in our coursers' sides,
  And ready for the strife are we.
The Tory camp is now in sight,
  And there he cowers within his den;
He hears our shouts, he dreads the fight,
  He fears, and flies from Marion's men.

--------

It wasn't as warm on Sunday as it had been on Saturday, but it was bright and sunny, when we retrieved younger son after Hebrew school, we went to Swain's Lock on the C&O Canal. We couldn't remember the last time we'd been there; at the time, there was a boat launch and I think people could even rent bicycles. We walked between the canal and the Potomac River and saw as many animals as people -- a deer, a fox, a raccoon, mallards, a woodpecker -- and when we finally walked back to the parking lot, there was a policeman checking up on a report of two dogs who'd been left locked in a car without the windows open (I am glad they actually follow up on such reports in our county).

I had to fold laundry in the afternoon so for the first time in years I watched the entire broadcast of the US Figure Skating Championships pairs and men's long programs. I had absolutely nothing invested in who won and so I was very happy with the results, which in both cases I thought sent the best skaters by far to Worlds. Adam went ice skating with his girlfriend, so we had peanut soup for dinner (not his favorite but it is mine!) and I made Paul watch the SAG Awards, which I enjoyed greatly -- I had little invested in who won any of the TV categories (though I never mind Boardwalk Empire winning things and I was glad Kathy Bates was even nominated) and I felt bad for Glenn Close going home empty-handed, but I really wanted The Help to kick ass in all its categories, and it did. I would love for it to do as well at the Oscars.

Poem for Sunday and Chinese New Year

2012-01-29T00:05:00.000-05:00

7
By Alistair Noon

I seem so short of decent words for water,
my one good guide over the next three days.
It falls and flows, freezes, melts, forms a border,
then evaporates in the Dead Sea’s haze.
No single terms will sing a pool’s green hue,
the jellyfish-pirated Eastern Med,
dead coral off Kota Kinabalu,
scavengers’ darkness at the ocean bed.
When I find a pond or meet the Pacific
it’s not the light, the warmth, the taste or pressure,
but the fluid things that I make specific --
the place that I name and the shape I measure --
fingers doing their best to comprehend
this sentence we never hear to the end.

--------

Noon's last book was Out of the Cave from 2011.

Saturday was yet another ridiculously warm January day. Younger son needed dress shoes to wear to my niece's Bat Mitzvah next month, so we took him to Lakeforest Mall, which was opening their annual Chinese New Year celebration with a ribbon-cutting and lion dance just after we arrived. We watched a bit of the martial arts and dancing, then went to three shoe stores where we eventually found shoes for him (though not for me, though I did threaten to get black patent leather boots with blue-and-green plaid insets and eight-inch heels). Then we went to the extremely crowded food court, where I had half of a fabulous spinach stromboli and we watched music videos on the overhead screens.

After looking at the photo and art displays, we left the mall and went to the ruins of Black Rock Mill in Germantown, which is part of Seneca Creek State Park. The mill is open to the sky and there's a gate where the door once was, but there are large signs inside explaining the history of the mill and of the area, plus a walking trail up the steep hill behind the mill and across Black Rock Road following Seneca Creek. It was muddy and somewhat slippery but it felt absolutely gorgeous out, and we didn't go home till after sunset since we had to stop at the grocery store.

In honor of the Chinese New Year festivities, we had General Tso's tofu and veggie dumplings for dinner. Then we were going to watch some more X-Files but while we were trying to figure out what we had, Paul put on FX, which had 2012 on, and Adam sat down to watch it, so the rest of us watched too. I had thought that Anonymous was probably Emmerich's most ridiculous movie but 2012 surely must rival it, and even though I still can't figure out how they intended to feed people after the Bad Stuff or ten million other major plot points, I knew exactly who was going to live, who was going to die, who was going to kiss, etc. because the movie is entirely formulaic in that regard.

Poem for Saturday, Farms, If Wishes Were Horses

2012-01-28T00:03:00.002-05:00

Human Atlas
By Marianne Boruch

Because the body really
is Mars, is Earth or Venus or the saddest downsized
Pluto, can be booked, bound, mapped then.
Or rendered like something off the bone, fat just under
the animal skin, to lard,
cheaper, quicker than butter, like stillness
belies restlessness, like every yes
was or will be not, never, no,
                                                  none of that.
A full section in such a book
keeps the skeleton quiet. (So untroubled to be specific, to say
femur, rib, half-minute of splendor,
to stare like that
stops time...) Or slick pages and pages given over
to slow the blood, remake muscle, to un-secret
that most mysterious lymph, its arsenal
of glands under the arm, at groin, at neck, awful
ghost lightning in it. Inscrutable.
                                                            Complete: because
the whole body ends, remember?
But each ending
goes on and on. Complete: because some
minor genius with a pencil, with ink, with drastic color
makes that arm you've known for years
raw, inside out, near wanton run of red vessel and nerve,
once a sin to look, weirdly now,
what should be hidden. Oh, it's garish
                                                               equals austere.
Compute. Does not compute. Tell me.
Then tell me who that
me is, or the
you understood, the any of us, our precious
everything we ever, layer upon
bright layer.

--------

It has not been the most relaxing week around here, but there were a couple of compensations: Emynn gave me an invitation to Pinterest, which is freakin' addictive, and Sfaith alerted me to the fact that the Colin Firth-Keira Knightley short film Steve was finally on iTunes, so I got to see it. Why do I prefer Colin playing a neurotic loser so much to Colin playing a Beautiful Person? (See yesterday's post.) Anyway, on Friday my compensation was going to the mall looking for a longer chain for the pendant I want to wear with my dress to the Bat Mitzvah and getting to play with beads in Brighton, since they're doing a promotion where if you make a wish list you can win the whole thing. I couldn't do this till I finished and posted my review of Deep Space Nine's "If Wishes Were Horses", which is not one of the greats nor even one of the very goods.

We had dinner with my parents and discussed various extended family matters, including the upcoming Bat Mitzvah, my mother's upcoming birthday, and relatives coming to visit each other. Then we came home for Nikita, watched the Caravaggio episode of Simon Schama's Power of Art because the Mammals episode tonight was about mammals who eat each other, then we caught a few minutes of a show about the Bermuda Triangle that mentioned aliens and I got an overwhelming urge to watch The X-Files' "The Unnatural" which most delightfully is on Amazon Prime. I haven't seen the episode in over a decade and it holds up in every way...the baseball, the aliens, the Mulder/Scully shippiness. Here are some photos from the Frederick Festival of the Farm last fall that I only just am getting around to posting:

Poem for Friday and Dress Shopping

2012-01-27T00:03:00.002-05:00

Water
By Ralph Waldo Emerson

The water understands
Civilization well;
It wets my foot, but prettily,
It chills my life, but wittily,
It is not disconcerted,
It is not broken-hearted:
Well used, it decketh joy,
Adorneth, doubleth joy:
Ill used, it will destroy,
In perfect time and measure
With a face of golden pleasure
Elegantly destroy.

--------

I had a very nice Thursday morning and early afternoon, getting a bunch of paperwork done so I could go meet Twistedchick for lunch (to which I was a bit late because my elderly neighbor tripped and fell on the sidewalk just as I was walking out of my house, so I ran back in to get her ice and band-aids and make sure she was all right). Twistedchick brought me a Tarot deck and we had vegetarian Chinese food and a long conversation about family, politics and fandom that continued past lunch and on to coffee and hot chocolate, at which point we decided we should just have lunch again next week.

Then I had to commit the ongoing atrocious act of trying to find a dress for my niece's Bat Mitzvah in two weeks. I'm sure you all know my policy on fashion for myself, which is: unless it's for a play or some other theatrical-type event (Star Trek convention etc.), I refuse to be uncomfortable, let alone in pain. If I ever got invited to the Academy Awards, I'd be going in flats. So I ruled out 3/4 of what I looked at/tried on purely on the basis of comfort, because a Bat Mitzvah not only isn't a theatrical event unless you're the celebrant, but generally involves two hours plus in synagogue followed by several hours at a party that includes dancing. Pretty much everyone at this particular Bat Mitzvah comes from an area where dressing to the nines is the norm for such events, so I'm going to be in the cheapest dress there anyway -- why would I want it to be an uncomfortable cheap dress?

Normally I would just wear something I already own with some jewelry modification or something, but my last many semi-formal events have called for summer clothing so I truly have nothing in my closet, and while I might otherwise wear an out of season dress, since even winter formal dresses can be sleeveless, there will be photos that will be seen by people who literally have only met me the once before in the same dress. Have I mentioned the huge dent in my crush on a certain actor made by his wife's self-aggrandizement as an "eco-warrior" on Twitter? Honey, bragging about your Brazilian waxes and your phone calls to Stella McCartney makes you sound like an insecure woman who wishes she could be a young supermodel, not a fashion provocateur -- and please stop kidding yourself that getting Armani to make you a dress of recycled materials is saving the environment -- getting Armani or anyone to design recycled material dresses for middle- and low-end retail stores would do a hell of a lot more. It isn't like Carey Mulligan's designer dress won't get auctioned and worn again anyway.

Speaking of high fashion, my favorite dress at the Golden Globes by far was Sarah Michelle Gellar's swirly blue confection -- it reminds me of the Whispering Wind Barbie doll dress, hee -- for which nearly every magazine criticized her even though she was by no means the most famous or worst-dressed there, and she said she didn't care because her daughter picked out the dress...this makes me giggle, because of course my favorite dress would be the big flouncy one adored by a little girl, not the supposedly sophisticated fishtail things that made actresses teeter their way up to get awards as if they'd suffered from foot binding.

Urgh, even witnessing the ridiculous behavior of the very rich, fit, and fashionable does not make me feel better about having to be on display even marginally as the aunt of the impending Bat Mitzvah -- normally my body issues are all about healthy weight and skirts that are labeled XXL yet when held up against a size 10 on the same rack have even smaller waists. So there I was, first in Nordstrom then in Macy's, trying on dresses that in some cases said they were 14s but fit like 8s and in other cases said they were 12s but though they fit across my ample butt were designed on top as though women are or should be built like boys. Here are photos of the two most promising candidates, taken in the dressing room with my mobile phone; the one on the left actually has lots of sparkly sequins and isn't as plain as it looks, the one on the right is pretty on the hanger but on me made me feel like a grandmother of the bride or something:

Poem for Thursday, Robbie Burns, Botanic Garden

2012-01-26T00:03:00.000-05:00

A Bard's Epitaph
Robert Burns

Is there a whim-inspired fool,
Owre fast for thought, owre hot for rule,
Owre blate to seek, owre proud to snool,
Let him draw near;
And owre this grassy heap sing dool,
And drap a tear.

Is there a bard of rustic song,
Who, noteless, steals the crowds among,
That weekly this area throng,
O, pass not by!
But, with a frater-feeling strong,
Here, heave a sigh.

Is there a man, whose judgment clear
Can others teach the course to steer,
Yet runs, himself, life's mad career,
Wild as the wave,
Here pause-and, thro' the starting tear,
Survey this grave.

The poor inhabitant below
Was quick to learn the wise to know,
And keenly felt the friendly glow,
And softer flame;
But thoughtless follies laid him low,
And stain'd his name!

Reader, attend! whether thy soul
Soars fancy's flights beyond the pole,
Or darkling grubs this earthly hole,
In low pursuit:
Know, prudent, cautious, self-control
Is wisdom's root.

--------

I have eaten far too much because of the man who wrote that poem, whose 253rd birthday was Wednesday. Paul decided that we should have Vegetarian Haggis (made mostly of lentils, nuts, and veggies, and so vastly better than I imagine actual haggis is though I've never tried it and I never will). Since he was on a roll, he also made Tatties & Neeps (I am not an enormous turnip fan but they were pretty good with all the spices) and just to finish things correctly he made Tipsy Laird with pound cake, vanilla cream pie filling, lots of raspberries, and more Drambuie than I suspect was strictly necessary. So I am as blobby as my cat at the moment.

Otherwise my day involved a bunch of writing, a bunch of laundry, a bunch of e-mails exchanged with my sister since the Facebook alumni group for our elementary school has suddenly exploded with stuff from people we grew up with, discussing colleges with Adam who is being inundated with e-mail and brochures from schools now that he has PSAT scores to get their attention, and watching the Maryland-Duke game which the Terps basketball team has just tragically blown -- or not tragically, as the university sent out messages to students ordering them not to riot joyfully should Maryland win. Here are some photos from the US Botanic Garden's new Plants in Culture exhibit:

Poem for Wednesday and Capitol Seagulls

2012-01-25T00:02:00.002-05:00

Winter
By Walter De La Mare

And the robin flew
Into the air, the air,
The white mist through;
And small and rare
The night-frost fell
Into the calm and misty dell.

And the dusk gathered low,
And the silver moon and stars
On the frozen snow
Drew taper bars,
Kindled winking fires
In the hooded briers.

And the sprawling Bear
Growled deep in the sky;
And Orion's hair
Streamed sparkling by:
But the North sighed low,
"Snow, snow, more snow!"

--------

I spent a delightful Tuesday afternoon with Rachel, whom I have known online for many years but never met in person before now, since she has moved to my state! While she was getting herself here, I went out and got us Indian food, which we ate quickly (with help from my cat who wanted to get in our laps) so we could go see Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, since she hadn't seen it yet and I agreed to see it again, heee. It was the perfect day for it since my morning started with learning that Gary Oldman had received an Oscar nomination -- a bright spot amidst really boring nominations, mostly for movies I hadn't seen, in which neither Benedict Cumberbatch nor Alan Rickman turned up in the Supporting Actor category. My goal for Oscar night is to watch Colin Firth hand Best Actress to Viola Davis...and if she must lose, let it be to Glenn Close, who is so overdue it isn't funny, even though I haven't seen Albert Nobbs.

Anyway, we spent lots of time at my house after the movie yakking while Rosie attempted to plant herself permanently in Rachel's lap and trying to decide whether we wanted to watch a movie and talking about our past fandoms. We ended up deciding that we should watch some Voyager, so we watched the generally well done two-parter Year of Hell and then, because I'd been going on about producers who abuse shippers, we watched "Resolutions." It has easily been a decade since I saw it and oddly I enjoyed it quite a bit; all my residual Janeway/Chakotay rage seems to have dried up. Paul made us all black bean soup and corn bread and Adam told us about his second semester schedule, which he prefers in all ways except that he has all his academic classes in the morning so he can't finish his homework at lunch.

Adam had to watch the State of the Union for his AP Government class, so this year the whole family watched (Daniel was on Gchat). I shall not bother analyzing the speech though I will say that I was impressed with how hard Obama tried to be bipartisan and was therefore surprised by a Republican rebuttal that simultaneously accused Obama of being rabidly partisan while making many of the same exact arguments that Obama did. Sigh. At least Colbert's interview with Maurice Sendak rocked utterly. Here are some photos of one of my favorite aspects of Congress, namely the seagulls that live in the reflecting pool outside of the Capitol Building where Congress convenes:

Poem for Tuesday and Chinese New Year

2012-01-24T00:03:00.000-05:00

Orchard
By H.D.

I saw the first pear
as it fell—
the honey-seeking, golden-banded,
the yellow swarm
was not more fleet than I,
(spare us from loveliness)
and I fell prostrate
crying:
you have flayed us
with your blossoms,
spare us the beauty
of fruit-trees.

The honey-seeking
paused not,
the air thundered their song,
and I alone was prostrate.

O rough-hewn
god of the orchard,
I bring you an offering—
do you, alone unbeautiful,
son of the god,
spare us from loveliness:

these fallen hazel-nuts,
stripped late of their green sheaths,
grapes, red-purple,
their berries
dripping with wine,
pomegranates already broken,
and shrunken figs
and quinces untouched,
I bring you as offering.

--------

The Year of the Water Dragon began here on a cold, rainy Monday where we alternated sleet and heavy patches of fog. We had to take Daniel back to College Park, so Paul came home after his morning phone conferences and we all packed up Daniel and helped him carry his stuff up the four flights of stairs to his dorm room, just minutes after his roommate arrived back as well. I was sad but we'll see him again in a couple of weeks for my niece's Bat Mitzvah and then again a month after that for my mother's birthday, so it's not like he's gone for half a year, at least.

Adam had wanted to go ice skating in the afternoon with his girlfriend, but due to the weather we persuaded them to postpone and picked up the girlfriend to bring her over here (she made me a duct tape purse that is awesome!). We all watched Castle in the Sky together -- well, some of us were working on computers at the same time while others were snuggling and eating popcorn -- and had sweet and sour tofu for dinner in honor of the Chinese New Year. Then we caught up on the last three episodes of this season's Merlin, which I enjoyed enormously (and no one is going to convince me that a canon het couple is ruining the show, I'm quite fond of pretty much everyone with everyone on Merlin).

Since the Lunar New Year festivals at our local libraries and malls are next weekend, I have no actual celebratory pictures for the day. Instead here is my Superpoke penguin celebrating in various Asian settings, since this will be the last Lunar New Year before Google shuts down the game:

Imperial Palace

Superpopo Sushi Shop

Shangri La Temple

Moonlit Japanese Tea Room

Japanese Hot Springs

Inside at Chinese New Year

Lovely Moon Garden

Chinese New Year

Poem for Monday, Football and Flowers

2012-01-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

The World Below the Window
By William Jay Smith

The geraniums I left last night on the windowsill,
To the best of my knowledge now, are out there still,
And will be there as long as I think they will.

And will be there as long as I think that I
Can throw the window open on the sky,
A touch of geranium pink in the tail of my eye;

As long as I think I see, past leaves green-growing,
Barges moving down a river, water flowing,
Fulfillment in the thought of thought outgoing,

Fulfillment in the sight of sight replying,
Of sound in the sound of small birds southward flying,
In life life-giving, and in death undying.

--------

Sunday was Daniel's last day of winter break and he felt like spending it hanging out and packing rather than going on an expedition and having to rush things later, so we finished off a quiet weekend. Adam had gone to work at Hebrew school and then home with my mother for lunch, so we took Daniel to California Tortilla -- then, since Daniel's laptop bag was ripping, I gave him mine and dragged the rest of the family to the last day of Tiara Galleries' 75% off Vera Bradley sale, where I had valiantly resisted buying the Metropolitan laptop bag during the spring pattern launch and now had an excuse (hey, it was under $25 at 75% off). So now he has a nice sturdy laptop bag (which I got from Ngech's place of work a couple of years ago) and I have a pretty one in Buttercup!

We watched most of both thrilling NFL championship games, and though the Ravens-Patriots game did not end the way I wanted, at least it came down to the final 30 seconds (and if the Ravens had to lose, at least they did not lose to Tebow and the Broncos). I rooted for the 49ers but the NFC championship was a very close, very exciting game too, and I'm not sorry the Super Bowl will be a New England-New York rematch. We interrupted the second quarter to watch this week's Downton Abbey, which was okay -- I enjoy the show on a very superficial level, though in a lot of ways I think it's mediocre -- and after the overtime ended we watched a couple of Deep Space Nine episodes since son and I can't do that together again till spring break! Here are some flowers from the conservatory at Longwood Gardens last December:

Poem for Sunday and Ancient Masonic Tradition

2012-01-22T00:04:00.002-05:00

January
By Helen Hunt Jackson

O Winter! frozen pulse and heart of fire,
What loss is theirs who from thy kingdom turn
Dismayed, and think thy snow a sculptured urn
Of death! Far sooner in midsummer tire
The streams than under ice. June could not hire
Her roses to forego the strength they learn
In sleeping on thy breast. No fires can burn
The bridges thou dost lay where men desire
In vain to build.
O Heart, when Love's sun goes
To northward, and the sounds of singing cease,
Keep warm by inner fires, and rest in peace.
Sleep on content, as sleeps the patient rose.
Walk boldly on the white untrodden snows,
The winter is the winter's own release.

--------

This was Saturday's Poem of the Day at The Academy of American Poets.

We had a quiet Saturday morning due to the tiny amount of snow that fell on Friday night, which left ice on the street and walks until around noon when the temperatures went above freezing. Older son slept very late, since he goes back to college on Monday and presumably his days of sleeping till nearly noon will be over; younger son got up to take photos of the snow and to visit friends. After lunch, very much against his will, we dragged older son out to get him a suit to wear to my niece's Bat Mitzvah next month and to get some more pants, since he had perhaps three pairs that fit. He was woeful and when we ran into my oldest friend in Target, I was afraid she was going to call child protective services for the torture we were inflicting on son in the sportswear department.

I have to find a dress for this Bat Mitzvah and am so discouraged by everything I've seen in local stores that I think looking at vintage is in order. Son wanted good pizza while he was home, so we got pizza from the local place he likes and spent the evening watching Blackadder -- the end of the Regency series and most of the WWI episodes. Here are some more photos from the George Washington Masonic Memorial, this time not Washington souvenirs but Masonic symbolism like faux Egyptian relics and things from King Solomon's Temple (including the Holy Grail) as well as some Crusader and Templar items:

Poem for Saturday and Masonic Washington

2012-01-21T00:11:00.000-05:00

The Witch
By Mary Elizabeth Coleridge

I have walked a great while over the snow,
And I am not tall nor strong.
My clothes are wet, and my teeth are set,
And the way was hard and long.
I have wandered over the fruitful earth,
But I never came here before.
Oh, lift me over the threshold, and let me in at the door!

The cutting wind is a cruel foe.
I dare not stand in the blast.
My hands are stone, and my voice a groan,
And the worst of death is past.
I am but a little maiden still,
My little white feet are sore.
Oh, lift me over the threshold, and let me in at the door!

Her voice was the voice that women have,
Who plead for their heart's desire.
She came—she came—and the quivering flame
Sunk and died in the fire.
It never was lit again on my hearth
Since I hurried across the floor,
To lift her over the threshold, and let her in at the door.

--------

I had both kids home on Friday as well as Adam's girlfriend visiting most of the day, so it was a pretty quiet day of me trying to look industrious and failing to persuade them to let me take them clothes shopping (they both need clothes for my niece's Bat Mitzvah next month). The weather reports got worse as the day went on -- first a sleet warning, then a slow warning, and now we have about a quarter inch on the ground with threats of snow continuing on and off for most of Saturday -- so I didn't feel like driving anyway. I posted my review of Deep Space Nine's "Progress" and older son kept linking me to news about SOPA, the Supreme Court copyright decision, Microsoft demanding that the state of Washington legalize gay marriage, Gingrich poll numbers, Obama's support for birth control and various other political issues.

Adam and his girlfriend went out to dinner in downtown Rockville and the rest of us ate with my parents, since older son is headed back to college on Sunday (fabulous Greek food from Ambrosia). Then we came home, fed the cats, retrieved Adam, and watched The Life of Mammals: "Plant Predators" on PBS, which had adorable capibaras and dik-diks and pikas and bats and kangaroo mice. Now we are watching the news, which is forecasting too much snow for some of our preferences and not enough for others. Here are some more photos from the George Washington Masonic Memorial:

George Washington brought this chair from Mount Vernon to the tavern where his Masonic lodge met because he was too tall to fit comfortably into a tavern chair.

Statues of him abound in the Masonic Memorial, this bust paying tribute to his interests in shipping and naval power...

...and this statue in Masonic regalia to his role as the father of our country.

This gallery explores prominent Masons of the American Revolution and Civil War and shows Washington in a replica of his Masonic apron...

...a copy of the one he wore laying the cornerstone of the U.S. Capitol Building.

Another alcove bust showing Washington in front of the Capitol.

This clock stood at Washington's bedside at Mount Vernon. It was stopped at the moment of his death and remains at that time, having been brought to the lodge by Washington's doctor who was also a mason.

The gift shop sells mini Washingtons, Franklins, Louis Armstrongs, and other famous masons.

Poem for Friday and B&O Railroad Ellicott City

2012-01-20T00:04:00.000-05:00

Prayer for My Unborn Niece or Nephew
By Ross Gay

Today, November 28th, 2005, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,
I am staring at my hands in the common pose
of the hungry and penitent. I am studying again
the emptiness of my clasped hands, wherein I see
my sister-in-law days from birthing
the small thing which will erase,
in some sense, the mystery of my father's departure;
their child will emerge with ten fingers,
and toes, howling, and his mother will hold
his gummy mouth to her breast and the stars
will hang above them and not one bomb
will be heard through that night. And my brother will stir,
waking with his wife the first few days, and he will run
his long fingers along the soft terrain of his child's skull
and not once will he cover the child's ears
or throw the two to the ground and cover them
from the blasts. And this child will gaze
into a night which is black and quiet.
She will pull herself up to her feet
standing like a buoy in wind-grooved waters,
falling, and rising again, never shaken
by an explosion. And her grandmother
will watch her stumble through a park or playground,
will watch her sail through the air on swings,
howling with joy, and never once
will she snatch her from the swing and run
for shelter because again, the bombs are falling.
The two will drink cocoa, the beautiful lines
in my mother's face growing deeper as she smiles
at the beautiful boy flipping the pages of a book
with pictures of dinosaurs, and no bomb
will blast glass into this child's face, leaving
the one eye useless. No bomb will loosen the roof,
crushing my mother while this child sees
plaster and wood and blood where once his Nana sat.
This child will not sit with his Nana, killed by a bomb,
for hours. I will never drive across two states
to help my brother bury my mother this way. To pray
and weep and beg this child to speak again.
She will go to school with other children,
and some of them will have more food than others,
and some will be the witnesses of great crimes,
and some will describe flavors with colors, and some
will have seizures, and some will read two grade
levels ahead, but none of them will tip their desks
and shield their faces, nor watch as their teacher
falls out of her shoes, clinging to the nearest child.
This child will bleed
and cry and curse his living parents
and slam doors and be hurt and hurt again. And she will feel
clover on her bare feet. Will swim in frigid waters.
Will climb trees and spy cardinal chicks blind
and peeping. And no bomb will kill this child's parents.
No bomb will kill this child's grandparents. No bomb
will kill this child's uncles. And no bomb will kill
this child, who will raise to his mouth
some small morsel of food of which there is more
while bombs fall from the sky like dust
brushed from the hands of a stupid god and children
whose parents named them will become dust
and their parents will drape themselves in black
and dream of the tiny mouths which once reared
to suckle or gasp at some bird sailing by
and their tears will make a mud which will heal nothing,
and today I will speak no word
except the name of that child whose absence
makes the hands of her parents shiver. A name
which had a meaning.

As will yours.

—for Mikayla Grace

--------

From Gay's Pitt Poetry Series book Bringing the Shovel Down.

I had a lovely Thursday morning -- I slept a bit late, got up to read the paper and go through my e-mail, then went to two Vera Bradley spring launch parties at local stores. The Cottage Monet was giving out Mini Kiss coin purses in the new patterns while supplies lasted -- I got Camellia -- and Tiara Galleries was serving bagels and muffins plus they had their clearance items 75% off for one day only, so I got a Quick Draw bag in English Meadow for under $20. I had planned to pick up lunch while I was out but I ate enough lunch at Tiara Galleries.

Then I got home in time to rouse Daniel, who was going out to lunch with my mother, and to greet Adam, who took his last final of the semester in the morning and arrived with his girlfriend. We discussed SOPA and Rick Perry dropping out of the Republican race, then Daniel came home and we discussed the MegaUpload shutdown and how one of our senators had dropped his sponsorship of PIPA. Adam's girlfriend stayed for dinner and in the evening I watched the DS9 episode I need to review on Friday.

Here are some photo from the B&O Railroad Museum in Ellicott City, which we visited over the weekend with our kids and in-laws, as is becoming an annual pilgrimage. They have a permanent model train display of local railways, a massive model train display updated yearly, and several smaller models put up for the holidays, plus a recreation of the station master's quarters and some historic train cars:

Poem for Thursday, Squirrels, Sherlock

2012-01-19T00:02:00.000-05:00

Funeral Blues
By W.H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling in the sky the message He is Dead,
Put crêpe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever, I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

--------

I was going to keep all my journals silent on Wednesday in solidarity with the internet strike against SOPA and PIPA, but Colin Firth ruined that plan...well, it's not his fault exactly, but his appearances on Craig Ferguson's and Ellen's shows made it necessary for me to follow links to find the video clips. Since I couldn't do much research online or waste much time on the internet, I did a bunch of chores -- rearranged things in my closet, rearranged the DVDs, and folded laundry while watching Voyager's "Remember" since I can watch Voyager for free on Amazon Prime. As I had remembered, it's a very good Holocaust allegory and since there's no Janeway/Chakotay interaction and not a lot of Kate in general, it did not make me want to scream as "The 37s" and "Resolutions" are wont to do.

Evening TV was Harry's Law -- liked the kidneys-for-sale storyline, did not like the Evil Twins. The night before we watched Glee, which I liked less for the storyline than because they let Emma, Mercedes, Santana, and even Tina sing so much more than usual and Rachel so much less, then we watched Sherlock's "The Reichenbach Fall" which I liked better than the other two this season, largely because Freeman's performance was so good, Cumberbatch's wasn't bad but there were so many badly done reaction shots that there was only so much he could do -- spoilers!

I loved the opening sequence with falling "Keep Calm and Carry On" mug and the Crown Jewels, then the rabid misogyny started with Faux Fangirl Journalist and continued at the same clip throughout. Once again, I get that historically the character of Sherlock Holmes is condescending to women and that Sherlock is always the smartest, and John is always the most loyal, and Lestrade is fairly loyal by default, but in a series set in the 21st century there is just no excuse for every other woman being a bitch or a mother or a pathetic love interest. I had no concern that Sherlock would die and I had very little interest in looking for clues that would give away how he outsmarted Moriarty in the end (truly, it made me happy that someone could put Sherlock in his place even for a while, even if it was a psychopath). The producers taunting on Twitter that their fans aren't even clever enough to figure out their gimmicks don't endear me in the least, either.

Here are more squirrel photos because everyone loves squirrels and obviously squirrels love each other. Let's call these two Sherlock and John, just to make certain people I know happy. *g*

Stop SOPA/PIPA

2012-01-18T00:03:00.000-05:00

This journal has no material today in protest of SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act), the bills which will allow the government censor the intenet. I am sure everyone knows that Wikipedia, Mozilla, Wordpress, and hundreds of other sites are going dark today in protest of the bills, which could be used to shut down all material on the web not generated by corporations with big money lawyers -- affecting everything from whether we can get unbiased news reports to how we share our own news and photos with friends. Though the House bill, SOPA, is closer to being stymied, the Senate bill, PIPA, has several dozen co-sponsors. Find out more at http://americancensorship.org and http://www.fightforthefuture.org.

Poem for Tuesday and Forget-Me-Not Factory

2012-01-17T00:04:00.001-05:00

Instead of Losing
By John Ashbery

Anyone, growing up in a space you hadn't used yet
would've done the same: bother the family's bickering
to head straight into the channel. My, those times
crackled near about us, from sickly melodrama
instead of losing, and the odd confusion... confusion.

I thought of it then, and in the mountains.
During the day we perforated the eponymous city limits
and then some. No one knew all about us
but some knew plenty. It was time to leave that town
for an empty drawer
into which they sailed. Some of the eleven thousand
virgins were getting queasy. I say, stop the ship!
No can do. Here come the bald arbiters
with their eyes on chains, just so, like glasses.
Heck, it's only a muskrat
that's seen better years, when things were medieval
and gold...

So you people in the front,
leave. You see them. And you understand it all.
It doesn't end, night's sorcery notwithstanding.
Would you have preferred to be a grownup in earlier times
than the child can contain or imagine?
Or is right now the answer—you know, the radio
we heard news on late at night,
our checkered fortunes so pretty.
Here's your ton of plumes, and your Red Seal Records.
The whole embrace.

--------

We had a fairly quiet holiday Monday after playing local tourists on Saturday and Sunday. We all slept late, and when we got up Dementordelta and I spent an hour looking for Golden Globes coverage with hot photos of Colin Firth, suggesting that the fix may have been in for cable television and analyzing why George Clooney is so fascinated by the size of Michael Fassbender's, um, no-hands golf club. Then we went out for an early lunch at Minerva's Indian buffet, where I ate much too much (chana dal, moong dal, some kind of spicy paneer, gulab jamun, rasgulla) but it was very worth it -- Daniel had said he couldn't get really good Indian in College Park and that was the one restaurant he specifically requested.

We had talked about going out to a movie, but after the Golden Globes the one I most wanted to see was The Help, which is already On Demand, so instead we stayed in and ate caramel cheesecake for dessert courtesy Delta and watched that. It was excellent, a very appropriate movie for Martin Luther King Day, and I had expected it to be more grim than it was; I know there are complaints that it filters black women's experiences through a white storyteller, but I thought Aibileen and Minnie came across as more courageous and in some ways more empowered than the much more privileged white women they worked for. And now that I have seen the movie I am quite annoyed that Streep beat out Davis for Best Actress; I'm sure she's an admirable Margaret Thatcher but what in hell does she need another trophy for?

In the evening we watched the Holyroodhouse episode of "The Queen's Palaces," then the DS9 episode in which Sisko realizes that Kasidy may be a Maquis traitor, then Jon Stewart trying to get secret signals from Stephen Colbert about how he should spend his SuperPAC money. And we are all still delighted that the Ravens won yesterday, though we only saw snatches of the game on the train museum and restaurant TV. Here are some photos from The Forget-Me-Not Factory, Ellicott City's fairy-and-magic emporium with wonderful costumes and beautiful paper goods:

Placeholder for Monday

2012-01-16T00:14:00.002-05:00

I posted the entirety of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s I Have a Dream speech in 2004, if you're looking for a link to it.

I had a glorious Sunday in Ellicott City with my family, Paul's parents, and Dementordelta, visiting the B&O Railroad museum there, the Forget-Me-Not Factory and a couple of other stores, and having dinner at The Rumor Mill with a first cousin of Paul's father (Delta and I split baked brie with fig balsamic compote and tofu tempura).

Then we came home and watched the Golden Globe Awards; I had few strong feelings about who should win, since I've seen almost none of the film nominees and few of the TV shows and was mostly there for the celebrity parade (because Colin Firth always looks good in a tuxedo and should have tried harder to kick Ricky Gervais).

A couple of photos -- will write about my day in more detail later, since we are now watching highlights of Daniel Radcliffe's SNL appearance on YouTube since I missed it live, being a flake, and since tomorrow we are going out for Indian food and possibly to see one of the movies that won an award tonight!

At The Rumor Mill, an Asian fusion restaurant, here are myself, husband, son, penguin, in-laws, and a cousin.

Myself and Delta at the B&O Railroad Museum...

...the Ellicott City branch of the one in Baltimore.

Poem for Sunday and GW Masonic Memorial

2012-01-15T00:02:00.000-05:00

Washington's Monument, February, 1885
By Walt Whitman

Ah, not this marble, dead and cold:
Far from its base and shaft expanding—the round zones circling,
          comprehending,
Thou, Washington, art all the world's, the continents' entire—
          not yours alone, America,
Europe's as well, in every part, castle of lord or laborer's cot,
Or frozen North, or sultry South—the African's—the Arab's in
          his tent,
Old Asia's there with venerable smile, seated amid her ruins;
(Greets the antique the hero new? 'tis but the same—the heir
          legitimate, continued ever,
The indomitable heart and arm—proofs of the never-broken
          line,
Courage, alertness, patience, faith, the same—e'en in defeat
          defeated not, the same:)
Wherever sails a ship, or house is built on land, or day or night,
Through teeming cities' streets, indoors or out, factories or farms,
Now, or to come, or past—where patriot wills existed or exist,
Wherever Freedom, pois'd by Toleration, sway'd by Law,
Stands or is rising thy true monument.

--------

That poem is not about the Washington Monument I visited today, but considering that Walt had a brother named George Washington Whitman I figured it was appropriate anyway. After a quiet morning during which I made PDF files containing the images of my Tarot decks so I can keep them on my Kindle while Adam went to study for his finals with friends, we went to the George Washington Masonic Memorial, which we have been talking about doing for years -- we always see it when we drive into or past Alexandria and after The Last Symbol came out (the memorial appears in it) we said oh, we really should get over there, but it took us till now to do so. The main floor is a lot like the main floor of the Scottish Rite Temple downtown -- lots of marble and huge pillars, and several other floors have reproductions of thrones and items from the Temple of Solomon and the Crusades -- but the lower and middle floors are devoted to George Washington and his history as a Mason, and the ninth floor has an observation deck with spectacular views of Washington, DC.

The enormous bronze statue of George Washington on the main floor of the George Washington Masonic Memorial in Alexandria, Virginia.

Both sides of the Memorial Hall feature murals; this one shows Washington in Masonic regalia, which he actually wore, laying the cornerstone of the U.S. Capitol.

This room is a replica of the original Alexandria Lodge. The chair under plastic in the back, beneath the painting of Washington, was brought by Washington himself, possibly because he was too tall to fit comfortably into the tavern chairs!

The memorial has Masonic souvenirs of Washington like this scrimshaw illustration of him on a whale's tooth...

...and a lock of his hair purportedly taken from his corpse by one of the people who interred him.

There are many statues of Washington inside the memorial in front of painted scenes from his life, such as this one of Mount Vernon.

The view from the top of the memorial is gorgeous. Here are the Washington Monument and Capitol, the two tallest buildings facing across the Potomac River from this part of Alexandria.

And the view of the front of the memorial at street level is gorgeous too.

I went out to the mall in the early evening because I wanted to get one of the free new Brighton bracelets before the latest promotion ended -- last time they ran out quickly -- then we had shish kebabs and watched the NFL playoffs. All I really cared about was that I not have to hear about how much God loves Tim Tebow again, so even though I'm not particularly a fan of the Patriots, I am delighted that God apparently is. I'm sorry New Orleans didn't win but I like San Francisco well enough, and in any case I hoped to be rooting for the Packers next weekend against the victor. Tomorrow I will be rooting for the Ravens but we will be in Ellicott City with my in-laws, so I am hoping that our usual luck in following their games via mobile holds -- I must confess that my TV priority on Sunday is to watch the Golden Globe Awards with Dementordelta!

Poem for Saturday and Ocean on the Radio

2012-01-14T00:05:00.002-05:00

Magnolia
By Gerald Stern

The mayor, in order to marry us, borrowed
a necktie from a lawyer which, on him,
looked stupid and kept his eye on a red pigeon
which somehow got in to coo her disappointment,
if only for the record, though one of the two
witnesses who kicked the red got only what
she deserved and that was that, except that the
rain cooed too, but we didn't give a shit
for we had a bed, for God's sake, with two tin buckets
of blossoms waiting for us; and someone there
of Greek persuasion enacted the dancing though somewhat
lickerish and turned to reading the names of the dead
from World War I the other side of the bandstand
but we didn't care nor did we know her name
nor where she came from or what the necktie or what
our love had to do with it anyhow, mostly nothing.

--------

I had a perfectly lovely Friday. I got up early to work on a review of "The Storyteller", a Deep Space Nine episode that I really think is pretty poor so I didn't worry too much about rushing the review. Then Paul came home at lunchtime and we went downtown to the offices of SiriusXM because we had won tickets to go see Jennifer Cutting's Ocean Orchestra record a live concert for The Village channel. It was absolutely lovely -- much of the music we've heard them perform at Convergence Lab last winter and at the Birchmere a couple of weeks ago, but this is by far the most intimate setting in which we've seen them -- there were perhaps 35 people in the room counting the sound engineers -- and songs like "Fall, Leaves, Fall" and "Time To Remember the Poor" are more overwhelming in such a small space. Lisa had a cold but she sounded gorgeous anyway. Plus I had the unexpected pleasure of seeing Twistedchick at the concert. No photos were allowed in the studio but I snapped a few walking through the SiriusXM corridors -- each channel has its own closed office themed to the music and there are lots of photos and autographs of performers.

We retrieved the kids and had dinner with my parents -- lasagna, which my mother made three of for the beef eaters, the turkey eaters, and the vegetarians -- then came home for Nikita, which is back to being awesome after starting to lose my attention (the regulars were all scattered but they're not any more, and the presence of Alberta Watson is always an excellent thing). After that, we put on PBS and watched Everest: A Climb For Peace, a documentary narrated by Orlando Bloom about a group of climbers including an Israeli and a Palestinian who wanted to conquer Everest together to prove that difficult tasks like ending decades of fighting can be accomplished with teamwork. The Palestinian ended up having to turn back before the summit attempt because of altitude sickness and the South African almost died on the way down -- there were nine climbers of five different faiths, including a Christian American woman and a Buddhist Sherpa from Nepal, led by an atheist from New Zealand. It was quite uplifting apart from the climbing horrors, like people losing fingertips to frostbite.

The King's Speech Tarot

2012-01-13T18:06:00.002-05:00

Poem for Friday, DS9, Baltimore Egyptian Treasure

2012-01-13T00:03:00.001-05:00

The Apparition
By John Donne

When by thy scorn, O murd'ress, I am dead
          And that thou think'st thee free
From all solicitation from me,
Then shall my ghost come to thy bed,
And thee, feign'd vestal, in worse arms shall see;
Then thy sick taper will begin to wink,
And he, whose thou art then, being tir'd before,
Will, if thou stir, or pinch to wake him, think
          Thou call'st for more,
And in false sleep will from thee shrink;
And then, poor aspen wretch, neglected thou
Bath'd in a cold quicksilver sweat wilt lie
          A verier ghost than I.
What I will say, I will not tell thee now,
Lest that preserve thee; and since my love is spent,
I had rather thou shouldst painfully repent,
Than by my threat'nings rest still innocent.

--------

I spent the day with Daniel -- I love his nice long winter break -- apart from having to get some work done in the morning, when he was still asleep anyway. I had to stop at a couple of stores on Rockville Pike so I invited him to Lebanese Taverna with me (I had not had grape leaves or baba ghanoush in weeks) and he played sudoku on his phone while I went into places like Ulta and Tiara Galleries. Then we stopped at CVS to get both kids toothpaste and shampoo -- and once again I forgot my reusable bag, but I retrieved one before paying.

At home we watched a bunch of Deep Space Nine, including "Homefront" and "Paradise Lost" which I hadn't watched since near when they aired. They blew me away -- it was like watching a Star Trek commentary on post-9/11 paranoia except the episodes were filmed before the attacks, one of several cases in which I feel like DS9 correctly predicted things that were going to occur in the early 21st century. On Friday I need to review "The Storyteller," not one of my favorites but I forgot how much Bashir/O'Brien love was in that! Here are some photos from the Walters Art Museum's Ancient Egyptian collection:

Tomorrow Paul is coming home early so we can go see Jennifer Cutting's Ocean Orchestra perform at SiriusXM, for which I won tickets! Woohoo! Now I am watching Colbert announce that he might run for president and turning his SuperPAC over to Stewart...

Poem for Thursday and Baltimore Basilica

2012-01-12T00:01:00.001-05:00

The Definition of Love
By Andrew Marvell

My Love is of a birth as rare
As 'tis for object strange and high:
It was begotten by Despair
Upon Impossibility.

Magnanimous Despair alone
Could show me so divine a thing,
Where feeble Hope could ne'er have flown
But vainly flapped its Tinsel wing.

And yet I quickly might arrive
Where my extended soul is fixt,
But Fate does iron wedges drive,
And always crowds itself betwixt.

For Fate with jealous eye does see
Two perfect Loves; nor lets them close:
Their union would her ruin be,
And her tyrannic power depose.

And therefore her decrees of steel
Us as the distant Poles have placed,
(Though Love's whole World on us doth wheel)
Not by themselves to be embraced.

Unless the giddy Heaven fall,
And Earth some new convulsion tear;
And, us to join, the World should all
Be cramped into a planisphere.

As lines so Loves oblique may well
Themselves in every angle greet:
But ours so truly parallel,
Though infinite can never meet.

Therefore the Love which us doth bind,
But Fate so enviously debars,
Is the conjunction of the Mind,
And opposition of the Stars.

--------

I did work and chores on Wednesday morning while Daniel slept late, again, before going out to lunch with my father. Then I spent several hours of the afternoon working on yet another Silly Tarot Project -- this one entirely the fault of Dementordelta, for which I thank her heartily -- before Daniel got home (after losing many rounds of poker to my father, apparently) and later Adam. While I folded laundry, we watched two episodes of Deep Space Nine including the Bond parody "Our Man Bashir" which was a big hit.

Paul made sweet potato and chick pea shepherd's pie for dinner, which was delicious, then we watched Harry's Law, which had hyped Erica Durance as a woman who thinks she's Wonder Woman, which sounded like David E. Kelley was planning cracky hilarity. In fact it was a very gritty storyline about spousal abuse and Durance was terrific, though the very end of that storyline was lame...and the other case, about a woman trying to gain custody of a gorilla to keep it from being imprisoned in a zoo, was quite moving too. Here are some more photos of the Baltimore Basilica decorated for Epiphany:

Poem for Wednesday and Illuminated Voids

2012-01-11T00:01:00.003-05:00

Feed Me, Also, River God
By Marianne Moore

Lest by diminished vitality and abated
   vigilance, I become food for crocodiles—for that quicksand
   of gluttony which is legion. It is there close at hand—
      on either side
      of me. You remember the Israelites who said in pride

and stoutness of heart: "The bricks are fallen down, we will
   build with hewn stone, the sycamores are cut down, we will
   change to cedars"? I am not ambitious to dress stones, to
      renew forts, nor to match
      my value in action, against their ability to catch

up with arrested prosperity. I am not like
   them, indefatigable, but if you are a god, you will
   not discriminate against me. Yet—if you may fulfill
      none but prayers dressed
      as gifts in return for your gifts—disregard the request.

--------

Most of my Tuesday involved laundry and other chores -- not even folded yet, just had to wash six loads -- with a break to see Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy with Daniel, after making the discovery that his friend Warren, who has his own movie reviewing web site and is often quoted to us, had ranked it the top movie of the year. It remains excellent during a third viewing. Lest you think I'm all about Colin Firth, I should add that Benedict Cumberbatch and Mark Strong have the scenes that haunt me most from the film.

And speaking of Cumberbatch, we watched Sherlock's "Hounds of Baskerville" after the newest episode of PBS's Egypt's Golden Empire which was about Ramses the Great. This was by far my favorite episode of Sherlock largely because there was only one female character of any note and she was neither a bimbo nor a total bitch, though I thought the horror movie structure was effectively done and for once I could enjoy everyone assuming Sherlock and John are a couple.

Here are some more photos from Chul Hyun Ahn's exhibit at C. Grimaldis Gallery in Baltimore, Illuminated Void. In the second one you can see my reflection for scale and in the last one you can see the reflection of one work within the other:

Poem for Tuesday and Downtown Squirrels

2012-01-10T00:06:00.000-05:00

The Decorative Airport Fern Is Not What It Pretends to Be
By Jennifer L. Knox

and it takes me a triple-take to realize its scanning
me, or something near my ear—that must be it. No plant’s
ever complimented my perfume—wait—there it goes
again. Did you see that? [Time passes, drinks] "Sure, I
remember when I thought you were a fern but you were!
Who could blame me?" I tell the what’s now a magnificent
purple tetrahedron, eggplant-sized cilia straining at its corners, just
a hint of ferniness remains in its fingertips—enough to blush.
We hug goodbye. The scent of flowers lingers around me
the next day. Flying home, a decorative airport fern that really
is a decorative airport fern says, "You smell nice." I don’t
believe it, but it's still a happy
ending.

--------

After weeks of delays because she had car issues, I finally got to see Dementordelta! We debated going out to lunch or out to the movies, but we ended up picking up samosas and crepes in the mall after a bit of girly shopping and coming home for a Paul Gross day -- first Passchendaele, which was a lot grittier than I expected (I'd read a review somewhere that the love story was cliched, which I didn't think was the case at all; my only issue was with the heavy handed religious imagery during the battle), then Gunless, which was hilarious (and I didn't even know Callum was in it, that's how uninformed I am).

It snowed all afternoon, though we had only rain forecast and the temperature never got anywhere near freezing -- it only stuck on plants and mulch, not on the street, but though it looked lovely, we got a little nervous late in the afternoon based on the sheer amount that seemed to be falling. However, I convinced Delta to stay and we decided we really needed a New Year viewing of The King's Speech. I would like to report that it is still awesome. In the evening we watched the Windsor Castle episode of The Queen's Palaces on PBS, then the BCS Championship Game. I did not actually care who won the Alabama-LSU game; Alabama is generally one of my least-favorite college teams, but I'm not particularly an LSU fan, they had a home team advantage, and I like things that make the BCS rankings a mess!

We saw several squirrels while we were downtown over the weekend.

Adam stopped to photograph one...

...and promptly found himself being begged for food.

Clearly these squirrels had no fear of humans...

...as apparently even our garbage is a constant food source for them.

Though it looked like they had plenty buried in the mulch...

...and did not mind getting food on their faces.

And look how adorable.

Poem for Monday and Seeing Gertrude Stein

2012-01-09T00:01:00.001-05:00

A Long Dress
By Gertrude Stein

What is the current that makes machinery, that makes it crackle, what is the current that presents a long line and a necessary waist. What is this current.

What is the wind, what is it.

Where is the serene length, it is there and a dark place is not a dark place, only a white and red are black, only a yellow and green are blue, a pink is scarlet, a bow is every color. A line distinguishes it. A line just distinguishes it.

--------

While Daniel once again spent the day mentoring robotics students from his high school, we took Adam downtown to the National Portrait Gallery and Smithsonian American Art Museum, where we went primarily to see The Great American Hall of Wonders and Seeing Gertrude Stein. The former is a collection of art and illustrations of American ingenuity (or at least the belief therein) with an emphasis on "limitless" natural resources like bison and giant sequoia trees and on inventions like clocks and the transcontinental railroad, though there's plenty of ickiness like taxidermy and guns. The latter presents Stein mostly as a public figure -- much of the emphasis is on how she tried to control the narrative of her life, particularly with Alice B. Toklas, though also as an art patron and writer.

Devorah Sperber's portrait of Gertrude Stein is made of more than 5000 spools of thread, inverted through a glass globe.

This is how it looks from across the room, like an upside down abstraction of Picasso's famous painting of Stein.

Here is Gertrude Stein by Jo Davidson. The quote reads, "I was alone at this time in understanding [Picasso], perhaps because I was expressing the same thing in literature."

A room with portraits of Toklas and Stein's early private life together...

...uses the same wallpaper that Stein and Toklas had on the wall of their home.

The exhibit also has many paintings, sculptures, magazine covers, and other illustrations of Stein as well as her own books and theatrical productions.

This is Megatron/Matrix, a huge wall of video screens in the Smithsonian American Art Museum by Nam June Paik that shows images from Korea of both contemporary sports and ancient folk rituals.

And this is the Kogod Courtyard connecting the National Portrait Gallery and American Art Museum.

We picked up Daniel late in the afternoon (having arrived early, we tried to go to a nearby Starbucks but it was closed), then we came home for dinner, Once Upon a Time and the season two premiere of Downton Abbey (yes, I know everyone already downloaded and watched it but it was too many hours for me to deal with and I'm happy to support PBS). Other than Sybil, I still don't have much use for most of the Upstairs characters, but I like the Downstairs characters and am hoping things don't get too soap-opera-ish this longer season; I am enjoying the war storylines more than the romances, I must admit!

Poem for Sunday and Baltimore Art

2012-01-08T00:22:00.002-05:00

Soul
By Cleopatra Mathis

It is not the angel riding a goat,
trying to make him go. It does no work
with refusal or guilt, which loves
only its contorted self. But fancies instead
my terrier's long pink tongue,
how it teases out the bone's marrow,
tasting with all its muscle.

The angel is silver, but so is the goat
and the box on which they perch,
a Victorian gesture in the mansion
where I spent the fall. They have followed
me home, their permanent shine presuming,
while around me, everything withered,
slowly froze, and began its turn
toward white. The snow
is nothing but a great emptiness,
and I'm tired of trying to find a secret there.
But look—one leaf
skittering across the glazed surface
catches its stem to stand upright,
the shape of a hand waving.

--------

Daniel spent almost the entire day at the FIRST robotics kick-off -- apparently Stephen Colbert, will.i.am and the Miami Heat coach did too -- while the rest of us spent a lovely several hours in unseasonably warm Baltimore. We started at the C. Grimaldis Gallery to see Chul Hyun Ahn's absolutely amazing Illuminated Void exhibit, constructed primarily of tinted glass, mirrors and light, creating illusions of great depth, one of which could be stood upon. Then we walked across the center of the Mount Vernon neighborhood to the Walters Art Museum, where we went to see the Faberge eggs and the Egyptian exhibit; there was a Three Kings celebration going on, too, but it was targeted mostly at kids.

From there we walked to the Baltimore Basilica, also known as the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, America's first cathedral begun in 1806, still decorated for Christmas and Epiphany. We came back toward DC to pick up Daniel and I took a walk to watch the gorgeous sunset; it was still nearly 60 degrees. We had toad in a hole for dinner, then watched New Orleans beat Detroit -- a game I would have enjoyed more had one of Adam's friends not come over and behaved completely inappropriately. The Ravens will get to play the Texans next week. Here are a few photos of my day:

Here I am standing on the central piece in Chul Hyun Ahn's exhibit, a dizzying spatial illusion...

...which is actually only this far off the floor.

Then we walked past Mount Vernon's George Washington Monument...

...where we saw the Gatchina Palace Faberge egg...

...and this sculpture of a lion created in Egypt around 360 BCE.

The Basilica in Baltimore was extensively renovated in 2006. Baltimore's Archbishop O'Brien learned last Friday that he will become a Cardinal next month.

This little bird lives in one of the bushes on the grounds of the basilica.

The colors of the sunset were gorgeous back near home.

Poem for Saturday, 'Battle Lines', Lion Cubs

2012-01-07T00:01:00.001-05:00

Acquainted with the Night
By Robert Frost

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain—and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height,
One luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right
I have been one acquainted with the night.

--------

I spent the morning at home with older son, who did not sleep quite as late as the day before (out of bed before noon!) but was still being a slacker in anticipation of getting up early on Saturday for the First Robotics Competition kickoff with other alumni from his high school robotics team. I wrote most of a review of Deep Space Nine's "Battle Lines", which was more complicated than I had anticipated since I recently watched several episodes that come later in the series and had to remember what we learned about Opaka when. Older son had a late lunch with my mother and younger son briefly brought his girlfriend over, then they both went to her house.

It was an unseasonably warm day, mid-50s and sunny, and when I walked in the woods in the late afternoon there were four deer despite several neighbors walking past me with dogs, small children, etc. Three of us had dinner with my parents -- the fourth was still at his girlfriend's -- then we came home to watch Nikita's return and the first two episodes of The Life of Mammals on PBS, which had a fabulous exploration of marsupials and showed hedgehog sex in David Attenborough's London backyard. Speaking of mammals, here are the National Zoo lions -- the adult male, Luke, currently lives alone since his sons are growing up, while the two moms are still teaching their offspring to behave even though some are now growing manes:

Poem for Friday and Winterthur Needlework

2012-01-06T00:01:00.001-05:00

The Day I Saw Barack Obama Reading Derek Walcott's Collected Poems
By Yusef Komunyakaa

Was he looking for St. Lucia's light
to touch his face those first days
in the official November snow & sleet
falling on the granite pose of Lincoln?

If he were searching for property lines
drawn in the blood, or for a hint
of resolve crisscrossing a border,
maybe he'd find clues in the taste of breadfruit.

I could see him stopped there squinting
in crooked light, the haze of Wall Street
touching clouds of double consciousness,
an eye etched into a sign borrowed from Egypt.

If he's looking for tips on basketball,
how to rise up & guard the hoop,
he may glean a few theories about war
but they aren't in The Star-Apple Kingdom.

If he wants to finally master himself,
searching for clues to govern seagulls
in salty air, he'll find henchmen busy with locks
& chains in a ghost schooner's nocturnal calm.

He's reading someone who won't speak
of milk & honey, but of looking ahead
beyond pillars of salt raised in a dream
where fat bulbs split open the earth.

The spine of the manifest was broken,
leaking deeds, songs & testaments.
Justice stood in the shoes of mercy,
& doubt was bandaged up & put to bed.

Now, he looks as if he wants to eat words,
their sweet, intoxicating flavor. Banana leaf
& animal, being & nonbeing. In fact,
craving wisdom, he bites into memory.

The President of the United States of America
thumbs the pages slowly, moving from reverie
to reverie, learning why one envies the octopus
for its ink, how a man's skin becomes the final page.

--------

I had a lovely belated birthday lunch with Vertigo on Thursday at Tara Thai -- we were both pretty busy through December -- and afterward I did some shopping, bringing my new colorful bag that she gave me to Charming Charlie's post-holiday sale (with $5 paua shell necklaces and $7 necklaces with ceramic owls) and to Target (with less exciting shopping like laundry detergent). Did I mention that as of 2012, my state has instituted a five-cent tax on disposable bags not only for grocery stores and pharmacies but everywhere, so while I am used to bringing bags with me into the food store, I am totally unaccustomed to remembering them at clothing stores? I am completely in favor of the tax but I need to make myself remember the bags at places like Charming Charlie!

I believe the Silly Tarot Project is pretty much finished and now I need to decide how to present it -- it's electronic like my Barbie Tarot, not a physical deck like my Star Trek Tarot. Daniel had belatedly gone to lunch with my mother because he didn't get out of bed till well after noon, and Adam stayed after school for tech, so it was just me and the cats for a while before Paul and everyone showed up by dinnertime. We watched the 2007 telefilm of A Room With a View, which was disappointing in every way -- cast can't compare with the 1985 movie, sets not as intricate, and worst of all a terrible framing story stuck on to tell us what happened to Lucy and George after the Great War, which violates both the letter and spirit of the novel.

Here are some photos for Ethel King in particular of the Winterthur exhibit With Cunning Needle, exploring the history of embroidery in the New World and including the Plimoth Jacket (here shown with its reproduction cap and a linen jacket marked with the pattern for embroidery.

Poem for Thursday, DS9, US Botanic Garden

2012-01-05T00:05:00.000-05:00

The Layers
By Stanley Kunitz

I have walked through many lives,
some of them my own,
and I am not who I was,
though some principle of being
abides, from which I struggle
not to stray.
When I look behind,
as I am compelled to look
before I can gather strength
to proceed on my journey,
I see the milestones dwindling
toward the horizon
and the slow fires trailing
from the abandoned campsites,
over which scavenger angels
wheel on heavy wings.

Oh, I have made myself a tribe
out of my true affections,
and my tribe is scattered!
How shall the heart be reconciled
to its feast of losses?
In a rising wind
the manic dust of my friends,
those who fell along the way,
bitterly stings my face.
Yet I turn, I turn,
exulting somewhat,
with my will intact to go
wherever I need to go,
and every stone on the road
precious to me.
In my darkest night,
when the moon was covered
and I roamed through wreckage,
a nimbus-clouded voice
directed me:
"Live in the layers,
not on the litter."
Though I lack the art
to decipher it,
no doubt the next chapter
in my book of transformations
is already written.
I am not done with my changes.

--------

Even though vacation is over, I had a bit of a slacker day with Daniel -- who again slept till nearly noon, allowing me to get done the things I HAD to get done in the morning. Then we went to Bagel City for lunch and to get bagels for the rest of the week, and then we came home and watched Deep Space Nine's "The Way of the Warrior" and "The Visitor," having snuck in most of the third season's highlights over the past couple of days.

I worked on my Silly Tarot Project (which is nearly finished) while watching the episodes; meanwhile Adam got home late because someone set something on fire at tech and they had to clean up. We had ravioli for dinner and watched the Disney A Christmas Carol with Jim Carrey (and Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, and all the other reasons I really watched it) since Paul agreed we should see it before we'd forgotten the holiday season. In that spirit, here are some more photos from the US Botanic Garden's winter displays:

Poem for Wednesday and A Sunset

2012-01-04T00:05:00.000-05:00

I'd Like a Little Flashlight
By Rachel Zucker

and I'd like to get naked and into bed and be hot radiating heat from the inside these sweaters and fleeceys do nothing to keep out the out or keep my vitals in—some drafty body I've got leaking in and out in all directions I'd like to get naked into bed but hot on this early winter afternoon already dusky grim and not think of all the ways I've gone about the world and shown myself a fool, shame poking holes in my thinned carapace practically lacy and woefully feminine I'd like to get naked into bed and feel if not hot then weightless as I once was in the sensory deprivation tank in Madison, Wisconsin circa 1992 I paid money for that perfectly body-temperatured silent pitch dark tank to do what? play dead and not die? that was before email before children before I knew anything more than the deaths of a few loved ones which were poisoned nuts of swallowed grief but nothing of life of life giving which cuts open the self bursting busted unsolvable I'd like to get naked! into the bed of my life but hot hot my little flicker-self trumped up somehow blind and deaf to all the dampening misery of my friends' woe-oh-ohs and I'd like a little flashlight to write poems with this lousy day not this poem I'm writing under the mostly flat blaze of bulb but a poem written with the light itself a tiny fleeting love poem to life hot hot hot a poem that would say "oh look here a bright spot of life, oh look another!"

--------

The first day post-holidays was pretty quiet around here and I have a splitting headache -- combination of weather front, too much sodium over the past couple of days, and both kids having stayed up past 2 a.m. (one to finish homework, the other just because he could and then sleep till noon) and turning lights on and off in the hallway. So this will not be an inspired entry. I did some writing, worked on the silly Tarot project that I started the other day, and ran out to the mall to get to Bath & Body Works' sale ($1.50 mini candles in glass holders). Those were my big accomplishments.

We watched a bit of the Sugar Bowl but mostly we watched two episodes of Egypt's Golden Empire on PBS (in which the rulers treated their people even worse than college football players treat their opponents, but they did build impressive cities and even more impressive tombs -- plus Hatshepsut and Nefertiti had a lot more power than any two women I can name associated with college football. I have loads of zoo, botanic garden, Longwood, Winterthur, and Brookside photos to crop but my brain is not working right tonight so here is a sunset seen while crossing the Potomac last week:

Poem for Tuesday and Spectacled Bears

2012-01-03T00:03:00.001-05:00

Adonais 49-52
By Percy Bysshe Shelley

Go thou to Rome, at once the Paradise,
The grave, the city, and the wilderness;
And where its wrecks like shattered mountains rise,
And flowering weeds, and fragrant copses dress
The bones of Desolation's nakedness
Pass, till the spirit of the spot shall lead
Thy footsteps to a slope of green access
Where, like an infant's smile, over the dead
A light of laughing flowers along the grass is spread;

And gray walls moulder round, on which dull Time
Feeds, like slow fire upon a hoary brand;
And one keen pyramid with wedge sublime,
Pavilioning the dust of him who planned
This refuge for his memory, doth stand
Like flame transformed to marble; and beneath,
A field is spread, on which a newer band
Have pitched in Heaven's smile their camp of death,
Welcoming him we lose with scarce extinguished breath.

Here pause: these graves are all too young as yet
To have outgrown the sorrow which consigned
Its charge to each; and if the seal is set,
Here, on one fountain of a mourning mind,
Break it not thou! too surely shalt thou find
Thine own well full, if thou returnest home,
Of tears and gall. From the world's bitter wind
Seek shelter in the shadow of the tomb.
What Adonais is, why fear we to become?

The One remains, the many change and pass;
Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly;
Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass,
Stains the white radiance of Eternity,
Until Death tramples it to fragments. Die,
If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek!
Follow where all is fled!—Rome's azure sky,
Flowers, ruins, statues, music, words, are weak
The glory they transfuse with fitting truth to speak.

--------

Adam had homework to finish on the last day of spring break (and his girlfriend needed help with a project that took four hours) so we had a quiet holiday Monday. There were a few snow flurries and a great many football games, of which the only one that held my interest for any length of time was the Rose Bowl, which Wisconsin sadly did not win, though I am informed that my Oregon relatives are pleased. I was working on a silly new year project which I half-finished, which was more than I was expecting.

We had hoppin' john for dinner since The Washington Post says that it's lucky to eat for the new year. In the evening after a PBS special on Buckingham Palace that didn't show George VI once during the section on the WWII bombings, older son wanted to watch Robot Chicken -- we got the last season on DVD for Chanukah -- and though it was as usual way too violent, fairly misogynistic and occasionally just plain sick, I cannot stop laughing about the fake trailer for Night at the Museum 3: The Holocaust Museum so I guess I am going to hell.

The National Zoo's spectacled bears are back on display near Amazonia.

Here are the mother and her two cubs...

...with mom supervising as her kids played with a coconut.

The cubs threw it down on rocks to try to crack it open.

Eventually they had broken through the outer husk.

Then they played ball with it for a little while...

...before taking turns eating it.

These bears are from the Andes and apparently unfazed by winter weather, though it was unseasonably warm for most of the weekend.

Poem for Monday and US Botanic Garden

2012-01-02T00:19:00.002-05:00

Through the Coming Year
By Howard Thurman

Grant that I may pass through
the coming year with a faithful heart.
There will be much to test me and
make weak my strength before the year ends.
In my confusion I shall often say the word that is not true and do the thing of which I am ashamed.
There will be errors in the mind
and great inaccuracies of judgment...
In seeking the light,
I shall again and again find myself
walking in the darkness.
I shall mistake my light for Your light
and I shall drink from the responsibility of the choice I make.
Nevertheless, grant that I may pass through the coming year with a faithful heart.
May I never give the approval of my heart to error, to falseness, to vanity, to sin.
Though my days be marked
with failures, stumblings, fallings,
let my spirit be free
so that You may take it
and redeem my moments
in all the ways my needs reveal.
Give me the quiet assurance
of Your Love and Presence.
Grant that I may pass through
the coming year with a faithful heart.

--------

Swiped from Velveteen Rabbi.

We spent the first afternoon of the new year at the US Botanic Garden and walking around the US Capitol. It was drizzling when we left, but the sun was out by the time we got downtown. The lines for the annual holiday train exhibit were very long so we skipped it and went straight to the main conservatory, which always has miniatures of DC buildings made out of natural materials and lots of poinsettias. There's also an exhibit on how plants are used around the world, including lots of herb and spice samples to smell. We left a bit before sunset, when there were dozens of seagulls and some ducks in the Capitol Reflecting Pool and around the Grant Memorial.

This year's new structure in the display of landmark DC buildings is the Bartholdi Fountain which stands in the park next to the US Botanic Garden.

The Botanic Garden conservatory itself has been recreated in miniature...

...as has the White House, complete with Sasha and Malia's swingset.

The Jefferson Memorial, topped by a large gourd, is one of my favorites.

And I love the little bark Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial.

The National Museum of the Native American has the most unusual architecture on the National Mall and in miniature as well.

And I love the little glowing windows of the Smithsonian Castle.

The Washington Monument is not to scale but it is still the tallest of the sculptures.

In the evening we watched Sherlock's "A Scandal in Belgravia," which I disliked only marginally less than last season's episodes and found just as misogynistic as ever. As I've said before, I can put up with women being stereotypical in stories set in the Victorian era, but when a show has been updated to include text messages and mobile phone cameras, there is no excuse for creating an Irene Adler who's much less clever than the one in Guy Ritchie's over-the-top movies and for using cheap sex (visually and in terms of the plot) to sell an episode. I loathe bromance when the male bonding results from treating all women as unworthy of the glorified men, and this show brings that to a level not seen in the old TV shows from which slash was born.

We had dinner with my parents and I half-paid attention to the football games. The Ravens have won the AFC North and will host their playoff game after a week off! The Redskins ended their season terribly, but no big surprise there...all I cared about was that even if the Eagles won, they couldn't make the playoffs. Now I don't have to see Michael Vick for months, though I shall have to root for the Steelers against Tim Tebow.

Poem for New Year's Day and National Zoo

2012-01-01T00:12:00.002-05:00

God Knows
By Minnie Louise Haskins

And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year:
"Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown."
And he replied:
"Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God.
That shall be to you better than light and safer than a known way."
So I went forth, and finding the Hand of God, trod gladly into the night.
And He led me towards the hills and the breaking of day in the lone East.

So heart bestill:
What need our little life
Our human life to know,
If God hath comprehension?
In all the dizzy strife
Of things both high and low,
God hideth His intention.

God knows. His will
Is best. The stretch of years
Which wind ahead, so dim
To our imperfect vision,
Are clear to God. Our fears
Are premature; In Him,
All time hath full provision.

Then rest: until
God moves to lift the veil
From our impatient eyes,
When, as the sweeter features
Of Life’s stern face we hail,
Fair beyond all surmise
God’s thought around His creatures
Our mind shall fill.

--------

That poem was published in 1908 but was made famous by King George VI, who quoted it in his 1939 Christmas broadcast to the people of Britain. The words are engraved on the gates of the King George VI Memorial Chapel at Windsor Castle, where George VI and Elizabeth are buried. And speaking of Bertie and Elizabeth, congratulations to Helena Bonham Carter, who like Colin Firth earlier this year has been made a CBE in the Queen's New Year's Honours list, according to The Telegraph and numerous other sources.

My family spent the last morning of 2011 at the National Zoo. Adam and Maddie went off to do their own thing as soon as we arrived, so we went with Daniel to see the Asian Trail, Bird House, Small Mammal House, Amazonia, Great Cats, Elephant Walk, and various other animals including the spectacled bears which are back on public display on weekends after having babies. The red pandas also had babies in 2011 and they were out climbing together, looking adorable. We had lunch in the Mane Restaurant and came home in the late afternoon.

Daniel and I watched a couple of DS9 episodes while I folded laundry, then we had fake boeuf aux champignons and watched Daleks: Invasion Earth: 2150 AD which Paul was in the mood for (I absolutely refuse to watch any bowl game sponsored by Chick-fil-a). Now we have Dick Clark and Ryan Seacrest on being self-congratulatory. Have a very Happy New Year and best wishes for 2011!

Poem for Saturday and Great Falls

2011-12-31T00:04:00.002-05:00

Turn of a Year
By Joan Houlihan

This is regret: or a ferret. Snuffling,
stunted, a snout full of snow.

As the end of day shuffles down
the repentant scurry and swarm—

an unstable contrition is born.
Bend down. Look into the lair.

Where newborn pieties spark and strike
I will make my peace as a low bulb

burnt into a dent of snow. A cloth to keep me
from seeping. Light crumpled over a hole.

Why does the maker keep me awake?
He must want my oddments, their glow.

--------

We had planned to go to Mount Vernon on Friday, but certain people were moving like slugs in the morning, and by the time I got laundry in and lunch into everyone we decided that it would be better to postpone. So instead we went to Great Falls, where we had intended to replace the national parks pass that expired last month but it turned out that admission to the parking lot was free -- and not ridiculously crowded despite that fact and the fact that it was in the 50s. We went out to Olmsted Island, climbed a bit on the cliffside and walked a bit along the towpath, which is closed past the bridge for repairs.

We had dinner with my parents -- three lasagnas, one for the meat-eaters, one for the poultry-eaters and one for the vegetarians -- and came home to watch the season finale of Sanctuary, which I expected to end as a grisly cliffhanger and was pleasantly surprised at the resolution in every sense. Then we half-watched various bowl games; Oklahoma is beating Iowa in the current one, the Insight Bowl, which is not nearly as memorable a name as the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl. We all think some plumbing manufacturer should sponsor the Toilet Bowl for the two worst teams in college football.

Poem for Friday, Winterthur and Longwood

2011-12-30T00:04:00.003-05:00

At the Fishhouses
By Elizabeth Bishop

Although it is a cold evening,
down by one of the fishhouses
an old man sits netting,
his net, in the gloaming almost invisible,
a dark purple-brown,
and his shuttle worn and polished.
The air smells so strong of codfish
it makes one's nose run and one's eyes water.
The five fishhouses have steeply peaked roofs
and narrow, cleated gangplanks slant up
to storerooms in the gables
for the wheelbarrows to be pushed up and down on.
All is silver: the heavy surface of the sea,
swelling slowly as if considering spilling over,
is opaque, but the silver of the benches,
the lobster pots, and masts, scattered
among the wild jagged rocks,
is of an apparent translucence
like the small old buildings with an emerald moss
growing on their shoreward walls.
The big fish tubs are completely lined
with layers of beautiful herring scales
and the wheelbarrows are similarly plastered
with creamy iridescent coats of mail,
with small iridescent flies crawling on them.
Up on the little slope behind the houses,
set in the sparse bright sprinkle of grass,
is an ancient wooden capstan,
cracked, with two long bleached handles
and some melancholy stains, like dried blood,
where the ironwork has rusted.
The old man accepts a Lucky Strike.
He was a friend of my grandfather.
We talk of the decline in the population
and of codfish and herring
while he waits for a herring boat to come in.
There are sequins on his vest and on his thumb.
He has scraped the scales, the principal beauty,
from unnumbered fish with that black old knife,
the blade of which is almost worn away.

Down at the water's edge, at the place
where they haul up the boats, up the long ramp
descending into the water, thin silver
tree trunks are laid horizontally
across the gray stones, down and down
at intervals of four or five feet.

Cold dark deep and absolutely clear,
element bearable to no mortal,
to fish and to seals . . . One seal particularly
I have seen here evening after evening.
He was curious about me. He was interested in music;
like me a believer in total immersion,
so I used to sing him Baptist hymns.
I also sang "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God."
He stood up in the water and regarded me
steadily, moving his head a little.
Then he would disappear, then suddenly emerge
almost in the same spot, with a sort of shrug
as if it were against his better judgment.
Cold dark deep and absolutely clear,
the clear gray icy water . . . Back, behind us,
the dignified tall firs begin.
Bluish, associating with their shadows,
a million Christmas trees stand
waiting for Christmas. The water seems suspended
above the rounded gray and blue-gray stones.
I have seen it over and over, the same sea, the same,
slightly, indifferently swinging above the stones,
icily free above the stones,
above the stones and then the world.
If you should dip your hand in,
your wrist would ache immediately,
your bones would begin to ache and your hand would burn
as if the water were a transmutation of fire
that feeds on stones and burns with a dark gray flame.
If you tasted it, it would first taste bitter,
then briny, then surely burn your tongue.
It is like what we imagine knowledge to be:
dark, salt, clear, moving, utterly free,
drawn from the cold hard mouth
of the world, derived from the rocky breasts
forever, flowing and drawn, and since
our knowledge is historical, flowing, and flown.

--------

My family spent Thursday in the Brandywine Valley as we have for the past couple of years enjoying the gorgeous landscapes and winter exhibits. We started at Winterthur, which is having its annual Yuletide celebration with exhibits in the library and museum and with the mansion decorated for the holidays -- several Christmas trees reflecting the gardens in various seasons and rooms with the greenery, decorations, and representative foods of both the DuPont family and the American eras represented by the furniture they collected. We had lunch in the visitor center, which has a very good salad bar, and walked all around the grounds, including the chilly and relatively empty Enchanted Woods.

Then we drove to Longwood Gardens in falling snow, though little of it stuck (none on the roads and just enough on the grass to create the impression of a white Christmas, which was lovely). The conservatory is full of poinsettias, lilies, and a variety of Christmas trees including some made of gingerbread men and one in the herb garden made entirely of parsley. The grounds have dozens of lit trees and holiday lights in the treehouses, plus the train display decorated for the holidays. We had dinner in the very crowded but also nicely decorated cafe there since we love their vegetarian chili and baked mac and cheese, then drove home in light snow turning to drizzle. It is late so here are just a few photos of Winterthur and Longwood decorated for the season:

Poem for Thursday, MD Science Center, Brookside Lights

2011-12-29T00:01:00.000-05:00

Heart Condition
By Jericho Brown

I don't want to hurt a man, but I like to hear one beg.
Two people touch twice a month in ten hotels, and
We call it long distance. He holds down one coast.
I wander the other like any African American, Africa
With its condition and America with its condition
And black folk born in this nation content to carry
Half of each. I shoulder my share. My man flies
To touch me. Sky on our side. Sky above his world
I wish to write. Which is where I go wrong. Words
Are a sense of sound. I get smart. My mother shakes
Her head. My grandmother sighs: He ain't got no
Sense. My grandmother is dead. She lives with me.
I hear my mother shake her head over the phone.
Somebody cut the cord. We have a long distance
Relationship. I lost half of her to a stroke. God
Gives to each a body. God gives every body its pains.
When pain mounts in my body, I try thinking of my
White forefathers who hurt their black bastards quite
Legally. I hate to say it, but one pain can ease another.
Doctors rather I take pills. My man wants me to see
A doctor. What are you when you leave your man
Wanting? What am I now that I think so fondly
Of airplanes? What's my name, whose is it, while we
Make love. My lover leaves me with words I wish
To write. Flies from one side of a nation to the outside
Of our world. I don't want the world. I only want
African sense of American sound. Him. Touching.
This body. Aware of its pains. Greetings, Earthlings.
My name is Slow And Stumbling. I come from planet
Trouble. I am here to leave you uncomfortable.

--------

I spent Wednesday afternoon in Baltimore with Hufflepants, Paul, and my kids at the Maryland Science Center, which has an exhibit on Charles Schultz and the natural world entitled Peanuts, Naturally, a terrific IMAX movie about the building of Canada's intercontinental railway (with magnificent vistas of the Canadian Rockies, though the story involves a lot of tragedy) called Rocky Mountain Express, and a planetarium show narrated by Geoffrey Rush on Black Holes. I hadn't seen Hufflepants for months and it was wonderful to catch up! And I loved the Canadian history via trains and Geoffrey explaining the Theory of General Relativity.

On the way home we went to Brookside Gardens for the Garden of Lights and train show in the conservatory, which wasn't nearly as crowded as we feared. We drank hot chocolate and walked through the outdoor light displays, including the "thunderstorm," the sunflowers, and the one Adam and I call the Rainbow Giraffe. We had a coupon for a free Papa John's pizza, so we stopped to pick it up on the way home, then we watched a bunch of third season DS9 episodes including both parts of "Past Tense" which in the wake of the current state of the economy and Occupy Wall Street suddenly seems unnervingly realistic for 2024. So a good day!

Baltimore's Inner Harbor from the staircase in the Maryland Science Center.

The Peanuts exhibit focused on how nature is portrayed in the comics and Schultz's less-than-admirable presentation of the EPA.

Museum staff had a chinchilla, ferret, and ball python for visitors to see and pet.

Younger son took a photo of one of the blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay gallery, which also has diamondback terrapins.

When I posted these photos of Brookside in daylight, I promised a photo of the dragons lit up at night.

To enter the garden people walk through a giant caterpillar.

The thunderstorm has sound effects and a rainbow that lights up afterward.

I hung out with the "bundled" people but unfortunately the fire isn't real.

Poem for Wednesday and Ocean Holiday Concert

2011-12-28T00:04:00.002-05:00

In the Bleak Midwinter
By Christina Rossetti

In the bleak midwinter
Frosty wind made moan,
Earth stood hard as iron,
Water like a stone;
Snow had fallen, snow on snow,
Snow on snow,
In the bleak midwinter
Long ago.

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him
Nor earth sustain;
Heaven and earth shall flee away
When He comes to reign:
In the bleak midwinter
A stable-place sufficed
The Lord God Almighty
Jesus Christ.

Enough for Him, whom cherubim
Worship night and day,
A breastful of milk
And a mangerful of hay;
Enough for Him, whom angels
Fall down before,
The ox and ass and camel
Which adore.

Angels and archangels
May have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim
Thronged the air;
But only His mother
In her maiden bliss
Worshipped the Beloved
With a kiss.

What can I give Him,
Poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd
I would bring a lamb,
If I were a Wise Man
I would do my part--
Yet what I can I give Him,
Give my heart.

--------

Poem because Paul and I are just back from the holiday concert at the Birchmere by Ocean Orchestra and the Washington Revels, which was wonderful in every way. Yet again we ate too much -- the Birchmere has very good food -- before the show, which included the Revels' children's chorus and local harp player Sue Richards as well as most of Ocean Orchestra's regulars and several other guests, plus the Foggy Bottom Morris Men dancing to two of Ocean's songs from Song of Solstice (whose local release party we went to last winter). We got more Chanukah songs at this concert than any other holiday event we've been to this winter -- the Revels did "Shalom Chaverim" in Hebrew and Arabic, plus a Ladino song since the theme of their winter concerts this year is the music of Andalusia -- and performers from both groups did a Mummers Play which was as funny when people missed their cues as when they stuck to the traditional script.

We had a fairly quiet family afternoon in preparation for evening plans -- Adam had friends in and out while waiting for his childhood friend Emiliano, whose mother is a diplomat and who moved back to Venezuela several years ago, yet who is visiting relatives in the area so they all had a reunion, while Daniel decided to take my parents up on their offer of dinner for the last night of Chanukah. In the afternoon we all watched Doctor Who's "The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe" which I liked better than most Eleventh Doctor stories, though it figures that this set of writers concludes yet again that a woman can only be heroic if she's in a maternal-familial role (and what is with Moffat's obsession with giant dollhouses?). Spoilers: There were a couple of lines I liked -- "Oh, grow up, Lily. Fairyland looks completely different." "It's a big universe! Everything happens somewhere." -- and the references to Narnia, which it figures the Doctor would claim as his own just like everything else. But I remain utterly underwhelmed by Smith and most especially by Moffat.

Poem for Tuesday, Sherlock Holmes at Washingtonian

2011-12-27T00:04:00.002-05:00

The Woods in Concord
By Seth Abramson

Down by the oaks tonight
you might still find a musket boys
but stay lively
for the feral cats in the underbrush.
In the forest we carved from a still
greater forest
there was the lesser forest
we lived in.
Have you seen the boys of means
up at the old stone brook,
they will say
you feel pretty narrow
for a good boy. They will ask you
if you fall every night,
and for what. You'll hear the story
of three decades of winter
and worse luck for someone else's
daddy. They will sell what they got
for free
and give up freely
anything no one else would buy.

Down at that tumbledown a boy
might find himself
a black charger with wet haunches—
no, it's a tree. But mark it,
the older ones
whinny, playing older in a fortress
up the canopy,
if we'd wanted to whittle you into
a gun, we could have,
if we'd wanted to light you up, we
could have,
if we'd wanted to strangle you here
in a crib of black twigs and moss
in the grim dark
behind your house, we could have.

--------

Paul has the week off, so since Daniel is home we figured we'd do a bunch of things together we often do at this time of year. The plan for today was a movie, then the winter lights at Seneca Creek State Park, but when we arrived at the park it turned out that the winter lights were closed on Monday, so we'll have to do that later in the week. We took Adam's girlfriend with us and walked around Washingtonian Lake before we went to the theater, which was sold out...as every other movie in the multiplex seemed to be, I've never seen it so crowded. I guess everyone is sick of relatives and overeating!

We all enjoyed Sherlock Holmes: A Game of Shadows a lot. Yes, I know it's crack and not "real" Conan Doyle, but I don't care -- I love the interplay between the characters, I appreciate this Sherlock's awareness of his limitations (I'm sick to death of Sherlock's Sherlock's arrogance) and I love that the women get so much to do (again, in contrast both to traditional interpretations and to Sherlock's contemporary setting with same old misogyny). I am assuming that reports of a certain woman's death have been greatly exaggerated, and she will be back later, or I may be quite aggravated.

Adam is sleeping at a friend's since his early childhood friend from Venezuela is visiting and they are all doing stuff together in the morning. I thought we were going to have Seneca Creek winter lights photos so I took very few elsewhere today. Here are a few of the seagulls, geese, and ducks at Washingtonian Lake, plus one of Daisy suffering woefully in the winter weather.

Poem for Monday and Christmas Sunset

2011-12-26T00:01:00.001-05:00

Cast upon the ground
By Taeko Takaori
Translated By Yuki Sawa

Cast upon the ground
the shadow of my own self
is being walked through
while my back is carrying
the brightness of the moon.

Because the songbird
pauses while flying there is
a ceaseless swaying
of the willow's sheer branches
and a fall of loosened snow.

Now at evening
light accumulates around
a standing crane
and it is only there shining
continues without darkening.

--------

We spent Christmas day in Hanover with my in-laws and my parents. It was a quiet day with an obscene amount of food: bagels, pastries and marzipan stollen for breakfast, then Swedish meatballs, tofurkey, potatoes, cheese, fruit, bread, and many other sides for mid-afternoon dinner, plus a dozen varieties of homemade cookies, candies and other sweets. The sunset as we drove home was spectacular.

Adam was so stuffed that he went to bed just after we got home, as soon as he'd walked the dogs. Since then, Paul, Daniel and I have been watching second season Deep Space Nine episodes -- "The Alternate," "The Maquis," "Crossover" -- all of which are so good that I want to watch the episodes I thought were not so great and see whether they hold up as well. I am not looking forward to Doctor Who's Christmas episode as much!

Poem for Christmas

2011-12-25T00:05:00.001-05:00

Under the Snow
By Robert Collyer

It was Christmas Eve in the year fourteen,
And, as ancient dalesmen used to tell,
The wildest winter they ever had seen,
With the snow lying deep on moor and fell,

When Wagoner John got out his team,
Smiler and Whitefoot, Duke and Gray,
With the light in his eyes of a young man's dream,
As he thought of his wedding on New Year's Day

To Ruth, the maid with the bonnie brown hair,
And eyes of the deepest, sunniest blue,
Modest and winsome, and wondrous fair,
And true to her troth, for her heart was true.

"Thou 's surely not going!" shouted mine host,
"Thou 'll be lost in the drift, as sure as thou 's born;
Thy lass winnot want to wed wi' a ghost,
And that 's what thou 'll be on Christmas morn.

"It 's eleven long miles from Skipton toon
To Blueberg hooses 'e Washburn dale:
Thou had better turn back and sit thee doon,
And comfort thy heart wi' a drop o' good ale."

Turn the swallows flying south,
Turn the vines against the sun,
Herds from rivers in the drouth,
Men must dare or nothing 's done.

So what cares the lover for storm or drift,
Or peril of death on the haggard way?
He sings to himself like a lark in the lift,
And the joy in his heart turns December to May.

But the wind from the north brings a deadly chill
Creeping into his heart, and the drifts are deep,
Where the thick of the storm strikes Blueberg hill.
He is weary and falls in a pleasant sleep,

And dreams he is walking by Washburn side,
Walking with Ruth on a summer's day,
Singing that song to his bonnie bride,
His own wife now forever and aye.

Now read me this riddle, how Ruth should hear
That song of a heart in the clutch of doom
Steal on her ear, distinct and clear
As if her lover was in the room.

And read me this riddle, how Ruth should know,
As she bounds to throw open the heavy door,
That her lover was lost in the drifting snow,
Dying or dead, on the great wild moor.

"Help! help!" "Lost! lost!"
Rings through the night as she rushes away,
Stumbling, blinded and tempest-tossed,
Straight to the drift where her lover lay.

And swift they leap after her into the night,
Into the drifts by Blueberg hill,
Ridsdale and Robinson, each with a light,
To find her there holding him white and still.

"He was dead in the drift, then,"
I hear them say,
As I listen in wonder,
Forgetting to play,
Fifty years syne come Christmas Day.

"Nay, nay, they were wed!" the dalesman cried,
"By Parson Carmalt o' New Year's Day;
Bless ye! Ruth were me great-great grandsire's bride,
And Maister Frankland gave her away."

"But how did she find him under the snow?"
They cried with a laughter touched with tears.
"Nay, lads," he said softly, "we never can know --
"No, not if we live a hundred years.

"There 's a sight o' things gan
To the making o' man."
Then I rushed to my play
With a whoop and away,
Fifty years syne come Christmas Day.

--------

Merry Christmas. We are spending it in Hanover, where we arrived in the afternoon after a very easy drive past grazing cows and geese that don't bother to migrate (the fact that it's above freezing with no hint of snow might have encouraged all the animals to enjoy the sunshine). We stopped at the Utz factory outlet on the way into town to get assorted chips and pretzels on sale for the holidays.

Paul's parents planned to go to the early evening church service, so we ate dinner early -- cheese fondue, both swiss with white wine and cheddar with Guinness, which was utterly delicious -- and watched bits of football, a good day since the Eagles were mathematically eliminated from playoff contention and the Ravens finished an undefeated season at home -- they clinched a playoff spot though for a while it looked like they were going to let Cleveland come back.

After church, Clair and Cinda returned and we had chocolate fondue with cherries, strawberries, bananas, angel food cake, and donut holes and I believe some people are presently watching the Hawaii Bowl. It's more football than can hold my interest but still an improvement over endless repeats of A Christmas Story. Here are a few mostly domestic photos of my Saturday, plus the Utz store:

Poem for Saturday, 'Vortex' & Flowers

2011-12-24T00:05:00.002-05:00

From The Tempest, Act V, Scene I
By William Shakespeare

Where the bee sucks, there suck I:
In a cowslip's bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat's back I do fly
After summer merrily.
Merrily, merrily shall I live now
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

--------

Paul worked from home on Friday, so I had most of my family home for most of the day which was nice. We went out to do a bit of last-minute holiday shopping and managed to encounter little traffic, relatively small lines, even a parking spot with money still on the meter. The rest of my afternoon was spent writing a review of Deep Space Nine's "Vortex", which isn't bad but is actually the least interesting of the DS9 episodes I've watched in the past several days thanks to Daniel who is making me enormously happy by wanting to see the high points of the series.

Adam arrived home with his girlfriend after school, and various other friends of his stopped by to pick her up for dinner, so it was quite loud for a little while. We went to my parents for dinner and Chanukah celebrating -- chicken (well, fake chicken for me) tonight plus latkes and kugel and dessert. Then we came home and watched the DS9 season two opening trilogy -- ironically, I watched it out of order originally because I gave birth to Daniel about an hour before "The Homecoming" aired in 1993 -- and "Necessary Evil." I was not misremembering how extraordinarily good the show was. I still miss it. More photos from the Baltimore Conservatory:

Poem for Friday, Baltimore Poinsettias, Tinker Tailor

2011-12-23T00:02:00.002-05:00

in the decision of a beginning [3]
By Rusty Morrison

No sensation of falling, which suggests that this condition may be flight.
My eyes might be open or not. My coffee poured into a cup or
onto the countertop. This, a ball of saved rubberbands or the thick clot of tremors
I usually keep deep in the drawer that I can trust will stick
when I absent-mindedly forget, and try to open it.
What would it mean for a body to yield?
A use.
That is to say, dew moistens the grass and is gone.
The body moves from out of its past with each glimpse of its own
disappearance, cumulatively. With each drop of rain the earth's atmosphere pelts
its grove of tall cedars and saplings
with equal force. A body
negating itself as an object possessable. To hold one's breath would be to drown
in order to avoid drowning.

--------

I had an absolutely lovely Thursday with Dementordelta, marred only because she had a horrible drive home and knowing that she had a sucky evening makes me sad. We went to downtown Bethesda, went to Baja Fresh for cheese quesadillas for lunch, then went to the movies to see Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. We were sitting in the theater for nearly half an hour when we learned that there had been a leak and the 1 p.m. show had been canceled, so we went to Barnes & Noble for a while, put more money in the parking meter, and went to the 2:30 show for free. I still adore the film, even more so perhaps now that I'm 3/4 through the novel and notice things I might not have had I not started to read it.

Since we were in the mood for more Colin Firth and Mark Strong, we then came back to my house and had chocolate cake that she had brought and watched Fever Pitch (she hadn't seen it and it's not like it was a hardship for me to watch it again). She also brought me a King's Speech tissue box for Chanukah. *g* After she left, Apaulled made pancakes and fake bacon for solstice dinner and Daniel requested Deep Space Nine, which I very happily watched with him -- the pilot and "In the Hands of the Prophets" which are necessary for understanding all the arc episodes of later seasons. Tomorrow hopefully I can show him "Past Prologue" and "Necessarily Evil"! Poinsettias from the Baltimore Conservatory:

Poem for Thursday and Maryland Zoo

2011-12-22T00:06:00.000-05:00

The Feast of Lights
By Emma Lazarus

Kindle the taper like the steadfast star
Ablaze on evening's forehead o'er the earth,
And add each night a lustre till afar
An eightfold splendor shine above thy hearth.
Clash, Israel, the cymbals, touch the lyre,
Blow the brass trumpet and the harsh-tongued horn;
Chant psalms of victory till the heart takes fire,
The Maccabean spirit leap new-born.

Remember how from wintry dawn till night,
Such songs were sung in Zion, when again
On the high altar flamed the sacred light,
And, purified from every Syrian stain,
The foam-white walls with golden shields were hung,
With crowns and silken spoils, and at the shrine,
Stood, midst their conqueror-tribe, five chieftains sprung
From one heroic stock, one seed divine.

Five branches grown from Mattathias' stem,
The Blessed John, the Keen-Eyed Jonathan,
Simon the fair, the Burst-of Spring, the Gem,
Eleazar, Help of-God; o'er all his clan
Judas the Lion-Prince, the Avenging Rod,
Towered in warrior-beauty, uncrowned king,
Armed with the breastplate and the sword of God,
Whose praise is: "He received the perishing."

They who had camped within the mountain-pass,
Couched on the rock, and tented neath the sky,
Who saw from Mizpah's heights the tangled grass
Choke the wide Temple-courts, the altar lie
Disfigured and polluted--who had flung
Their faces on the stones, and mourned aloud
And rent their garments, wailing with one tongue,
Crushed as a wind-swept bed of reeds is bowed,

Even they by one voice fired, one heart of flame,
Though broken reeds, had risen, and were men,
They rushed upon the spoiler and o'ercame,
Each arm for freedom had the strength of ten.
Now is their mourning into dancing turned,
Their sackcloth doffed for garments of delight,
Week-long the festive torches shall be burned,
Music and revelry wed day with night.

Still ours the dance, the feast, the glorious Psalm,
The mystic lights of emblem, and the Word.
Where is our Judas? Where our five-branched palm?
Where are the lion-warriors of the Lord?
Clash, Israel, the cymbals, touch the lyre,
Sound the brass trumpet and the harsh-tongued horn,
Chant hymns of victory till the heart take fire,
The Maccabean spirit leap new-born!

--------

Daniel slept till nearly noon, went out to lunch with my father, and spent the rest of the day playing Skyrim and watching TV with me. Adam went home with his girlfriend after school, did not answer texts about where he was, and got my mother to pick him up because he knew he'd be in trouble if he called me that late in the day to ask for a ride. In other words, both my kids and parents apparently had good days (a better day than LiveJournal's idiot designers, at least, who deserve every word of the fury over their unwanted site changes they're getting).

I watched a DS9 episode ("Vortex") that I need to review, read half of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy which I am glad I didn't read before I saw the movie because le Carré is vastly better even than the miniseries -- don't get me wrong, I loved the film, but the book is really excellent, I had no idea -- then watched the Terra Nova season (and possibly series) finale, which was also very entertaining, as both the writing and the acting have improved a great deal and the dinos are always awesome. Paul got me The Cat's Eye Tarot for Chanukah. And that's all that's worth reporting from here. Maryland Zoo animals last weekend:

Poem for Wednesday, Chanukah, DC Aquarium

2011-12-21T00:06:00.000-05:00

Honorary Jew
By John Repp

The first year, I grated potatoes, chopped onions
& watched. The second year, I fed all but the eggs

into the machine & said I'll do the latkes & did,
my pile of crisp delights borne to the feast by the wife

who baffled me, our books closed, banter hushed,
money useless in the apartment -- house, my in-laws called it,

new-wave thump at one end, ganja reek at the other --
in which she'd knelt to tell the no one who listened

no more no no more no a three-year-old mouthing
the essential prayer. The uncle made rich by a song

stacked three & dug in, talking critics & Koch --
everyone crunching now, slathering applesauce, slurping tea --

talking Rabin & Mehitabel, radio & Durrell,
how a song is a poem or it isn't a song

& vice-versa. Done, he pointed a greasy finger
at me, said You can't be a goy. You -- I say it

for all to hear -- are an honorary Jew!
which, impossible dream, my latkes lived up to

for five more years. Then the wailing.
Then the dust.

--------

Happy Chanukah! I had a fairly quiet Tuesday, spent mostly with Daniel who slept so late that I got all my work done in the morning before he was out of bed. We went to California Tortilla for lunch, where various Star Trek TV Tropes came up, so when we came home I folded laundry and we watched what TV Tropes readers agree are the three finest episodes of Deep Space Nine -- "In the Pale Moonlight," "Duet" and "Far Beyond the Stars" (not having "Necessary Evil" on that list pains me but I'll make sure it's the first one next time).

Adam's girlfriend came home from school with him to do homework, and after they walked the dogs, we went to my parents' for dinner and the first night's candle-lighting. The food was great -- potato latkes, meatballs and meatless balls, kugel, donuts. When we came home, Daniel was playing Skyrim and Adam had work to do, so Paul and I watched Fever Pitch since he'd had to listen to me go on about it. Colin Firth and Mark Strong make adorable football fans. Here are some photos from the National Aquarium on Sunday, including the albino alligator:

Poem for Tuesday, Kiparoo Farm, Kids

2011-12-20T00:07:00.002-05:00

Is is
By Srikanth Reddy

Is is.
There is no distinction between ideology and image.
One.
He records his name on a gold medallion.
Two.
The philosopher must say is.
The world is legion.
The self is a suffering form.
Is is.
Waves rise and fall, but the sea remains.

--------

My Monday was entirely taken up with holiday cards and my kids. I spent the entire morning writing notes, licking envelopes, stamping, return address labeling, sorting by country, and getting the cards ready to be mailed Tuesday morning. In the afternoon I took Adam and his girlfriend to the mall so they could get Secret Santa gifts at Hot Topic and Bath & Body Works (which conveniently allowed me to get to the B&BW eight-hour sale and get my free Wallflowers).

Adam's girlfriend stayed for dinner and came with us to College Park to pick up Daniel, who had his last final this afternoon and whose roommate had already gone home for winter break. It took all of us to carry his computers, TV, laundry and all the rest, but now he is here and we are watching Thor together. Here are photos from Kiparoo Farm during the Frederick Museums by Candlelight open house:

Poem for Monday and Navy Holiday Concert

2011-12-19T00:02:00.001-05:00

An American Takes a Walk
By Reed Whittemore

In the middle of this life's journey
He came, like Dante, on a wood
The notes said stood for error
But in his case stood for good,
Where his art and prowess left him
And let him become a child
To whom the wild seemed milder
Than his old neighborhood.

Had he, with those abandoned
Sons of fatal decrees,
Then been found by a shepherd
And bred up to shepherdese,
Or retrieved, like Dante, by Virgil
And led through circles and seas
To some brighter country beyond
His annotated trees,

He could not have been more cared for.
Nature was awfully kind.
Hell in that motherly habit
Put hell quite out of mind.

How in that Arden could human
Frailty be but glossed?
How in that Eden could Adam
Really be lost?

--------

We spent a lovely Sunday mostly downtown with Adam and his friend Daniel Wigle, whose parents had gotten us all tickets to the U.S. Navy Band Home for the Holidays concert. Since it's difficult to park in that area when there's a big event and expensive for everyone to take the Metro, we drove down early and walked past the White House, the National Chanukah Menorah, and Occupy DC to the branch of the National Aquarium in the Department of Commerce, which currently has a rescued baby albino alligator as well as the usual animals representing various marine sanctuaries and U.S. waterways. There weren't a lot of people for a Sunday afternoon, so we had no trouble watching the tree frogs, stingrays, turtles, sharks, and puffer fish.

Then we walked to DAR Constitution Hall, meeting up with the Wigles and several other friends of theirs (their two younger sons tried to adopt a woman who had a camera they wanted to play with). The concert was lovely, mostly traditional American holiday songs as opposed to religious songs, though they did the Nigerian "Betelehemu" and the Ladino "Ocho Kandelikas" as well as "Auld Lang Syne" too. We picked up Adam's girlfriend on the way home so they could go over math together and had veggie jambalaya for dinner, then watched the Ravens lose to the Chargers -- we missed the Day of Upsets earlier as the Packers lost, the Colts won, and the Redskins managed to beat the Giants which does not actually make me happy since the Eagles won. Now we're watching news coverage of the deaths of Vaclav Havel and Kim Jong Il, which have overshadowed the Iraq pullout, Israeli prisoner swap, and Republicans being infuriating over payroll tax cuts.

The United States Navy Band performed "Ocho Kandelikas" -- the one Chanukah song of the Home for the Holidays concert.

Pairs, trios, and quartets as well as soloists sang the more than 20 songs.

Occasional letters were read to characterize how sailors feel separated from family at the holidays.

The show also featured dancers...

...and a visit from Santa Claus to remind people to support the troops over the holidays.

A sailor sang "Christmas in the Islands" for troops serving in places where it doesn't look anything like a white Christmas.

On the way to and from the concert, we walked past the National Chanukah Menorah...

...and the White House, decorated for Christmas.

Poem for Sunday and Winter in Baltimore

2011-12-18T00:26:00.002-05:00

Goddess of Maple at Evening
By Chard deNiord

She breathed a chill that slowed the sap
inside the phloem, stood perfectly still
inside the dark, then walked to a field
where the distance crooned in a small
blue voice how close it is, how the gravity
of sky pulls you up like steam from the arch.
She sang along until the silence soloed
in a northern wind, then headed back
to the sugar stand and drank from a maple
to thin her blood with the spirit of sap.
To quicken its pace to the speed of sound
then hear it boom inside her heart.
To quicken her mind to the speed of light
with another suck from the flooded tap.

--------

After a relatively quiet morning working on holiday cards, we spent Saturday afternoon in Baltimore's Druid Hill Park at the Howard Peters Rawlings Conservatory and the Maryland Zoo. The former was actually more crowded than the latter, since there's a poinsettia and holiday train display in the indoor garden, whereas the zoo is chilly at this time of year and many of the outdoor animals are off display for the winter, but there were few people at either which was very nice both for seeing the plants and animals and simply for relaxing. Adam even deigned to come with us since they're both great places to take photos.

The conservatory now has a fish food machine so visitors can feed the koi, though one of the huge old cacti has died since we last visited. The train exhibit isn't large but there are three trains running in close proximity and a Barnum & Bailey Circus. Though a significant number of animals in the Africa exhibit at the zoo weren't out, the rest were all quite awake and active -- the sitatunga, cheetahs, leopards, ostriches, penguins, elephants (who were trying to eat the grass outside their enclosure), and lions were all outside, while the chimpanzees were very active in their indoor home and the sifakas had a newborn baby.

One of the snowy owls in the Arctic region of the Maryland Zoo...

...which is also where the polar bears live. (This one woke up when it heard the keeper arriving with food.)

Sharing their enclosure with cormorants who are supposed to be there and seagulls who try to steal their food, the African penguins naturally live in the Africa region...

...as does this sleepy lion, who later got up and walked over to see his mate.

There are currently poinsettias in every area of the Baltimore Conservatory.

In several places they have been arranged to look like red Christmas trees, including this one in the desert room...

...and the one behind me in the orchid room.

They're also all around the model train display.

In the evening we all got haircuts and stopped at the food store for cough drops and assorted other things. We had jacket potatoes for dinner in honor of the Idaho Potato Bowl and I spent the evening working on cards some more, so that's about all the excitement!

Poem for Saturday, The Nagus, Tinker Tailor, Ginter Conservatory

2011-12-17T00:08:00.000-05:00

The Life That I Have
By Leo Marks

The life that I have
Is all that I have
And the life that I have is yours

The love that I have
Of the life that I have
Is yours and yours and yours.

A sleep I shall have
A rest I shall have
Yet death will be but a pause

For the peace of my years
In the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours.

--------

This poem was supposedly used as a code to encrypt messages during World War II, issued to issued French agent Violette Szabo.

I had a very nice Friday. Paul worked from home in the morning so he could get to the post office at an off hour and mail packages to his brothers for Christmas, so we had lunch together after I wrote a review of Deep Space Nine's "The Nagus" (neither my best work nor that of the show's writers). He had the afternoon off, so once we were done with work, we snuck off to see Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in Bethesda, which I had thought we were seeing last weekend for my birthday but the producers only opened it in New York and L.A. for awards eligibility; it's still only in arts houses, which is confusing and frustrating!

It's hard to say too much about Tinker Tailor without spoilers, though I was "spoiled" about the ending from the original miniseries and that didn't have any negative effect on my viewing experience. I don't remember much about the acting in that and I do remember thinking it was a bit slow, so it's not like I had super-high expectations for the film to live up to, and I loved the remake. The acting is superlative -- you all knew I was going to love Oldman and Firth, but I thought Hardy, Strong, and Cumberbatch were all terrific in extremely restrained roles (so much so that John Hurt seems overly emotional by contrast). In some ways it's almost too constrained; the motivations of two key players remain largely obscured, and someone who should be a prime suspect just isn't enough of a presence to be so, despite being played by an excellent actor. But those are nitpicks, and the overall viewing experience is that it's completely gripping without needing explosions, chases, all the crap that clutters most spy movies.

Anyway, more about the film when more people have seen it and I can talk about the ending and the characters I liked best without spoiling everyone. My parents are visiting my sister, so we came home for dinner with Thing Two, though he had a long week and crashed right afterward. We finally watched the "Lancelot du Lac" episode of Merlin, which I really loved and did not find as disturbing as a lot of fans apparently did -- spoilers! Lancelot and Guinevere's infidelity to Arthur is firm Arthurian canon and in this case both of them are under the influence of magic, it's not as irritating as, say, the musical where Ginny is Lance's weakness and she's written more as a whiny girl than a woman forced into an arranged marriage. I do not like when Guinevere say she wants to be Arthur's queen, though, rather than Arthur's wife. I prefer Arthur chasing Merlin around after Merlin teases him about seeing him cry after atoning for killing the Druids in "A Herald of the New Age."

Then we watched Sanctuary, which had so many things that pleased me: magic water, a serpent, a Penn anthropologist, even Helen dealing with the insanity of having to live her life twice. Politics as usual is pissing me off, so here are photos from Lewis Ginter Botanic Garden of the displays in the conservatory based on the book The Old Tree:

Fannish5: Five alternate realities you wish characters could visit.
I am not sure that I understand the question -- I assume this isn't AUs like the ones characters have already visited like Star Trek's mirror universe, but new ones.
1. The Lord of the Rings, the one where Boromir survives and becomes the Steward of Gondor.
2. Harry Potter, the one where Lily Potter doesn't have to die for her son to become the Chosen One.
3. Doctor Who, the one where the Ninth Doctor is still around in the alternate universe where immortal Ten leaves Rose and mortal Ten.
4. Star Trek: Voyager, the one where Seven of Nine never comes on board and Janeway doesn't undergo the personality transplant that follows that contact with the Borg.
5. Pirates of the Caribbean, the one where Elizabeth Swann Turner shows up at the Fountain of Youth and sets everyone straight.

Poem for Friday and Egypt at VMFA

2011-12-16T00:02:00.000-05:00

Your Breath Was Shed
By Dylan Thomas

Your breath was shed
Invisible to make
About the soiled undead
Night for my sake,

A raining trail
Intangible to them
With biter's tooth and tail
And cobweb drum,

A dark as deep
My love as a round wave
To hide the wolves of sleep
And mask the grave.

--------

I have holiday cards! And I would have address labels, but my printer needs ink before I can print them out. So they will go out next week, and the ones going to Europe may be a bit late for Christmas but will be there for the new year with any luck. My cats were pleased about my drive to retrieve the cards and various CVS items because it meant that they were left home alone to sleep on the vents as they pleased, even though it was nearly 60 degrees and the heat wasn't even on. That, and the delivery of various holiday presents, and some fairly dull work, were the major occupations of my Thursday.

I know Facebook is an evil corporation from which we're supposed to be finding ways to wean ourselves, but they keep doing things that suck me in further, like the new Timeline -- I am sure there will be much screaming when it replaces everyone's profile page like there was much screaming about the new home pages (and I still hate that Facebook thinks it knows what my favorite stories should be, and who my best friends are, and that I like Lady Gaga better than Paul Simon which is utterly false), but there is a lot I like about the new home page and I totally love the Timeline. I just had to get that off my chest.

The Virginia Museum of Fine Arts did not allow photography in the Mummy: Secrets of the Tomb exhibit because the items belong to the British Museum, but they had entertaining dressed-up mummies in the gift shops and if you look past the replicas, you can see some of the actual tomb artifacts through the doorways behind them:

A King's Speech Birthday Card from Paul

2011-12-15T12:05:00.002-05:00

Poem for Thursday and Agecroft Hall

2011-12-15T00:04:00.001-05:00

Each year
By Dora Malech

I snap the twig to try to trap
the springing and I relearn the same lesson.
You cannot make a keepsake of this season.
Your heart's not the source of that sort of sap,
lacks what it takes to fuel, rejects the graft,
though for a moment it's your guilty fist
that's flowering. You're no good host to this
extremity that points now, broken, back at
the dirt as if to ask are we there yet.
You flatter this small turn tip of a larger
book of matches that can't refuse its end,
re-fuse itself, un-flare. Sure. Now forget
again. Here's a new green vein, another
clutch to take, give, a handful of seconds.

--------

I spent literally the entire day working on holiday cards and our 2012 Calendar (which required updating a whole bunch of family photos for people's birthdays). Holiday cards for family feature a photo of myself, Paul, Daniel, and Adam at Ellis Island from last January, lovely snowy theme plus Statue of Liberty; calendar features Outer Banks trip, high school graduation, painting with penguins, cherry blossoms, and various other events from 2011. I feel accomplished but also like I've been sitting on my butt all day, mostly because I have.

In other news, October Project is releasing an EP of unplugged versions of songs from their upcoming album for which I have been waiting for nearly a decade, WETA says The Hobbit is coming out a year from today, and a baby kiwi hatched at the National Zoo on my birthday. This is all good news. We had St. Lucia's Day dinner tonight since the bread machine suffered from human error on St. Lucia's Day -- meatless meatballs, lingonberries, yum -- and chocolate pistachio torte that Paul made me for my birthday. He also made me a perfectly wonderful King's Speech birthday card that I will post tomorrow when I have the scans uploaded. Tonight, Yuletide at Agecroft Hall:

Poem for Wednesday and Garden Lights

2011-12-14T00:34:00.001-05:00

Blustery
By Neil Shepard

Blustery 25-below, O Walt, I wouldn't go
And live with animals tonight--
Or anytime soon. How do
They survive in their snowy lairs?
How could I, for that matter, who
Haven't taken the wild Swedish plunge
Every chilly night to thicken my fur layer
By layer, I who doze by the fire
With the phone to my ear,
Doze the whole new year
Listening to my wife in such weird
Zone-warping tropical heat, naked,
Whispering her desire for 50-below,
If it brings her home. That's fur
Of a different nature, Walt, layer
Upon layer of love that glows, grows
Over us like a sun-lit coat.
O we are hothouse flowers, Walt,
Naked and limply alive in a narrow
Equatorial band. Otherwise, we die.
Walt, we must make do
With our lovely human hair.

--------

This was today's Poem-A-Day, from (T)ravel/Un(t)ravel.

I can already tell that I am going to finish December hopelessly behind at everything. I had a list of chores that were supposed to get done on Tuesday from rescheduling a doctor's appointment to shifting my closet so I can get to the winter clothes, but I somehow didn't get either accomplished, nor did I make any headway with holiday cards. Best I can brag about is getting the laundry folded.

This is partly because I was distracted yet again by Colin Firth, this time in Fever Pitch, which I liked so much better than I was expecting considering I'd been told that it was even blokier than the movies based on Hornby's other books -- Colin's character is fairly pathetic and everyone in the film knows it, including him. Plus his hair looks like rumpled bedcovers and he runs around in Arsenal underwear and says he's wished for an Arsenal victory for longer than most people have wished for anything, including winning an Oscar. And Mark Strong plays his best friend.

It was chilly but gorgeous in the afternoon and I saw five deer in the woods. We watched the Glee holiday special, which I disliked as much as last year's -- oh, I loved the retro look and the two domestic boys, and I get that the Christmas show is just a vehicle to sell the Christmas album, but Rachel singing a Christmas song while surrounded by all the trappings of Christmas -- in a multicultural public school with two Jewish kids just in the little glee club, who sigh happily over the Jesus prophecy -- just reminds me why I dislike this season.

Now we are watching more Merlin, which never fails to delight me, both in its Arthur-Merlin-shirtless-bedroom goodness and because I really enjoy both Gwen and Morgana though I wish they'd give the latter more than one emotion this season. I want to say thank you to everyone who sent me birthday greetings -- my birthday and holiday messages and cards are all mixed up together and I can't remember whom I talked to on LJ vs Facebook! Speaking of which, here are some photos from GardenFest on Sunday:

Poem for Tuesday and Richmond in Winter

2011-12-13T00:01:00.001-05:00

Ode to My Hands
By Tim Seibles

Five-legged pocket spiders, knuckled
starfish, grabbers of forks, why
do I forget that you love me:
your willingness to button my shirts,
tie my shoes--even scratch my head!
which throbs like a traffic jam, each thought
leaning on its horn. I see you

waiting anyplace always
at the ends of my arms--for the doctor,
for the movie to begin, for
freedom--so silent, such
patience! testing the world
with your bold myopia: faithful,
ready to reach out at my
softest suggestion, to fly up
like two birds when I speak, two
brown thrashers brandishing verbs
like twigs in your beaks, lifting
my speech the way pepper springs
the tongue from slumber. O!

If only they knew the unrestrained
innocence of your intentions,
each finger a cappella, singing
a song that rings like rain
before it falls--that never falls!
Such harmony: the bass thumb, the
pinkie's soprano, the three tenors
in between: kind quintet x 2
rowing my heart like a little boat
upon whose wooden seat I sit
strummed by Sorrow. Or maybe

I misread you completely
and you are dreaming a tangerine, one
particular hot tamale, a fabulous
banana! to peel suggestively,
like thigh-high stockings: grinning
as only hands can grin
down the legs--caramel, cocoa,
black-bean black, vanilla--such lubricious
dimensions, such public secrets!
Women sailing the streets
with God's breath at their backs.
Think of it! No! Yes:
let my brain sweat, make my
veins whimper: without you, my five-hearted
fiends, my five-headed hydras, what
of my mischievous history? The possibilities
suddenly impossible--feelings
not felt, rememberings un-
remembered--all the touches
untouched: the gallant strain

of a pilfered ant, tiny muscles
flexed with fight, the gritty
sidewalk slapped after a slip, the pulled
weed, the plucked flower--a buttercup!
held beneath Dawn's chin--the purest kiss,
the caught grasshopper's kick, honey,
chalk, charcoal, the solos teased
from guitar. Once, I played
viola for a year and never stopped

to thank you--my two angry sisters,
my two hungry men--but you knew
I just wanted to know
what the strings would say
concerning my soul, my whelming
solipsism: this perpetual solstice
where one + one = everything
and two hands teach a dawdler
the palpable alchemy
of an unreasonable world.

--------

Monday was my catch-up day, except that I spent a lot of it hanging out at the mall with Paul (and, as it transpired, Adam's girlfriend, whom we ran into at the coffee shop) while waiting for our van's tire to be repaired, and I spent two hours figuring out how to hack my Kindle Fire to run Google Books and Google Music without having to root it and lose access to the Amazon cloud (score: Me 2, Kindle 0, am hoping that does not change after the upcoming software update). We found out today that Adam came in third in the Washington School of Photography high school photo contest, which is great news considering that he's only a sophomore. He went to see his girlfriend after tech at school and I finally met her father, having met her grandmother with her in the mall.

Since Adam was out for dinner, we had pizza, then he came home and had some of it too and we all watched Terra Nova which is probably about to get canceled now that it's really interesting. We watched Merlin's "A Servant of Two Masters" -- yes, we are very behind -- while I tried to catch up on birthday correspondence and posts (please please tell me if I managed to miss one). And now we are watching Colbert, who just said, "Newt Gingrich says he's against gay marriage. That explains why it's the only type of marriage he hasn't tried," which does not top Stewart interviewing Ben Franklin about Christmas and saying of the latest Republican debate, "This is awesome! A Mormon gambling with an evangelical over who's the bigger liar!" Here are some photos from my fabulous Sunday in Richmond:

There were no photos allowed in the British Museum's mummy exhibit at the VMFA, so here are myself, Delta and Lin in our sexy 3-D Mummy: Secrets of the Tomb glasses.

And here I am at Agecroft Hall with Father Christmas...

...where Signora Bella balanced on a slack rope while juggling flaming torches.

Plus there was Morris dancing.

Lin, Delta, Paul and I posed in front of the Virginia Is For Lovers sign at the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden...

...and in the conservatory in front of one of the Christmas trees.

The conservatory also had an exhibit of animals and plants based on a children's book, The Old Tree.

And here is the outside of the conservatory with GardenFest reindeer.

Placeholder for Monday

2011-12-12T00:01:00.001-05:00

I spent my birthday (and the 75th anniversary of George VI's accession) in Richmond with Paul, Dementordelta and Lin -- Daniel being busy studying for finals, and Adam being busy first at Hebrew school working as an aide, then at tech dismantling the Blast sets. We started at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, where the British Museum's Mummy: Secrets of the Tomb is currently on exhibit, with a 3D film narrated by Patrick Stewart and dozens of artifacts. We ate lunch in the museum, then went to Agecroft Hall, which was having its Yuletide celebration...the good news being that admission was free and there were many performers on the grounds, the bad news being that there was a very long wait to tour the house, so we skipped that.

In the late afternoon we went to the Lewis Ginter Botanic Garden, which has holiday displays in the visitor center, the conservatory, and all around the grounds. We saw the train and Christmas tree displays, the indoor displays based on The Old Tree, the GardenFest of Lights outdoors, and we had dinner in the tea house. Birthdays in the age of Facebook are wonderful in that I heard from nearly my entire extended family plus many old friends whenever we had to wait in line or drive from place to place. We didn't get home till after 10, so I have not even opened all my presents yet and don't have Paul's birthday card, which he didn't have time to finish, so here is one photo of the fountains and lights at the garden, a few at the end here and more tomorrow when I will also catch up on comments, correspondence, etc.!

Poem for Sunday and Frederick Museums

2011-12-11T00:02:00.001-05:00

To a Locomotive in Winter
By Walt Whitman

Thee for my recitative!
Thee in the driving storm even as now, the snow, the winter-day declining,
Thee in thy panoply, thy measur'd dual throbbing and thy beat convulsive,
Thy black cylindric body, golden brass, and silvery steel,
Thy ponderous side-bars, parallel and connecting rods, gyrating, shuttling at thy sides,
Thy metrical, now swelling pant and roar, now tapering in the distance,
Thy great protruding head-light fix'd in front,
Thy long, pale, floating vapor-pennants, tinged with delicate purple,
The dense and murky clouds out-belching from thy smoke-stack,
Thy knitted frame, thy springs and valves, the tremulous twinkle of thy wheels,
Thy train of cars behind, obedient, merrily following,
Through gale or calm, now swift, now slack, yet steadily careering;
Type of the modern -- emblem of motion and power -- pulse of the continent,
For once come serve the Muse and merge in verse, even as here I see thee,
With storm and buffeting gusts of wind and falling snow,
By day thy warning ringing bell to sound its notes, By night thy silent signal lamps to swing.

Fierce-throated beauty!
Roll through my chant with all thy lawless music, thy swinging lamps at night,
Thy madly-whistled laughter, echoing, rumbling like an earthquake, rousing all,
Law of thyself complete, thine own track firmly holding,
(No sweetness debonair of tearful harp or glib piano thine,)
Thy trills of shrieks by rocks and hills return'd,
Launch'd o'er the prairies wide,across the lakes, To the free skies unpent and glad and strong.

--------

We spent Saturday enjoying Frederick Museums By Candlelight with Paul's parents. We met them at the Brunswick Railroad Museum to see the huge permanent model train exhibit showing the progression from Washington, DC to Brunswick, plus the town's history as the railroad affected it, then we went out to lunch at Brunswick's fabulous Beans in the Belfry, a coffee shop in a former church that also has excellent sandwiches and desserts. From there we drove to the South Mountain Historical Society in Burkittsville, also located in a former church that was used as a Civil War hospital during and after the Battle of South Mountain, where there was a string quartet and lots of snacks. There was even a bit of snow on the ground.

We couldn't be that close to the South Mountain Creamery without stopping to get eggnog, and we also went to see the calves and piglets in the big barn. From there we went to Kiparoo Farm near Middletown, which has a big flock of sheep overlooking the mountains and a studio selling gorgeous homespun yarns and other crafts. At that point we had to come home so Adam could go to work tech at the last night of Blast (and the cast party from which he has not yet returned), so after dinner -- homemade peanut soup and cheese from the creamery -- Paul gave me an early birthday present, Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World on Blu-Ray, so we have just spent the evening watching that plus all the deleted scenes!

Recreation of a holiday scene from a historic Brunswick home at the Brunswick Railroad Museum.

Model trains pass the Montgomery County fair in the historic recreation taking up the top floor of the museum.

Beans in the Belfry is decorated for the season and selling treats like stollen and pfeffernusse.

The cemetery in Burkittsville, made famous by The Blair Witch Project.

Musicians and guests enjoy the afternoon sunshine at the South Mountain Historical Society.

My in-laws pose with Santa in the South Mountain Creamery store.

Beautiful yarn is for sale at Kiparoo Farm...

...made from the wool of the sheep that live there.

Poem for Saturday and Wheaton Park

2011-12-10T00:12:00.000-05:00

I Heard It Said
By Paul Celan

I heard it said, there be
in the water a stone and a circle,
and over the water a word
that places the circle around the stone.

I saw my poplar go down to the water.
I saw how her arm grasped down into the deep.
I saw her roots raised heavenward, begging for night.
I did not hasten to follow her.
I only picked up from the ground that breadcrumb
which has your eye's form and nobility;
I unclasped from your throat the chain of the sayings
and with it bordered the table, where now the crumb lay.

And saw my poplar no more.

--------

Translation from Point and Circumference.

I had a fairly good Friday with some technical problems that I reserve the right to complain about later, particularly since our minivan tire pressure light is on again and it seems like that happens every time the temperature goes up or down ten degrees, requiring a time-wasting trip to get it checked out. The other technical problem was that Amazon.com didn't bother to ship a power adapter with my new Kindle Fire, but I am so happy with how my early birthday present is working that as long as it arrives Monday as Amazon has promised, I will not gripe publicly. I had played with Gblvr's last week at dinner and decided that that was what I was getting with my birthday/Chanukah money. I still adore my Kindle 3 for reading books -- I specifically did not want a backlight, it's why I didn't want a color Nook last year -- but I love having at tablet that I can anchor to my phone when I need 3G and can use with wireless everywhere else, and so far all the Android programs I've loaded (including those I had to sideload) have worked perfectly!

It was cold but pretty all day. I posted a review of "Move Along Home", not a Deep Space Nine episode I had ever wished to revisit. Adam was working tech at Blast and brought his girlfriend home to do her makeup while he walked the dogs, so I talked to her for a while and tried to find eyeliner for her. Paul made fake chicken merlot and we toyed with the idea of going to the movies, but since Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy is only opening in New York and L.A. this weekend we decided to save our money, and I made him watch Mamma Mia because for some horrifying reason I've been in the mood for it all week (Brosnan, Walters, and Skarsgard still can't carry a tune but I forgive everything when all the middle-aged women are dancing through the village singing "Dancing Queen"). Here are Brookside's winter lights in the daytime:

Poem for Friday and Brookside Poinsettias

2011-12-09T00:04:00.000-05:00

From 'Rocket Fantastic"
By Gabrielle Calvocoressi

It's ridiculous what fame
can buy you. Not the beast
but the tiny, frightened
man who brings him
in a cage from Alhambra,
who stands in the doorway
as the three girls finish,
get off the bed and walk down
to the pool, giggling as they pass.
The Bandleader borrowed
a tiger because we saw it
in a reel the studio sent over,
some movie about a prince
that played against the wall
of the upstairs bedroom.
Sometimes a girl would jump
into the pool and the waves
shimmered up. In the movie
the prince brings the tiger
to the castle and it rules
alongside him, "That's not
believable," the Bandleader
said and then, "Don't stop."
And then, "Ah. Right there."
The prince would place his hand
on the tiger's head and grab
his hair in his fist and move
it around. I liked to watch
him start to want things, a wetness
forming in his mind. There were
three girls squealing in the pool
and the waves came up to us
as ripples of light that I passed
my fingers through, "You're blue
with gold stripes," the Bandleader
said, looking up at me
but imagining the tiger beside him
already, before he even
reached for the phone.

--------

I had a very nice morning and would have had a very nice afternoon had I not turned on the radio. I got my work done around noon, and I ran out to Brighton in the mall because they have a promo where if you check in while you're in the store and show the clerk, you get a free charm (a choice of several actually including a penguin, though I already have that one of course), and I also had to pick up a silver sea turtle charm from a freecycler whose parrot had bitten through its chain. On the way home, though, I heard the reports about the shooting at Virginia Tech, and spent the rest of the afternoon following the story until the students had been released from lockdown and the police sounded certain that the shooter had killed himself. Adam got home and watched with me.

By dinnertime I needed fresh air, so I went out for a walk -- it was nearly dark but I still saw three deer in a backyard near the woods -- and came home for dinner, which was supposed to be calzones but the bread maker got set for bread rather than dough by accident, so we had frozen fake chicken sandwiches instead. In the evening we watched all three fall/winter Peanuts specials since we missed Great Pumpkin at Halloween and A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving a couple of weeks ago, then figured we should watch the Christmas show too. Speaking of Christmas, here are some photos of poinsettias in the conservatory at Brookside Gardens last weekend, both in the train display and in the greenhouse:

Poem for Thursday and Brookside Flowers

2011-12-08T00:02:00.000-05:00

Day Lilies
By Rosanna Warren

For six days, full-throated, they praised
the light with speckled tongues and blare
        of silence by the porch stair:
honor guard with blazons and trumpets raised
still heralding the steps of those
        who have not for years walked here
        but who once, pausing, chose

this slope for a throng of lilies:
and hacked with mattock, pitching stones
        and clods aside to tamp dense
clumps of bog-soil for new roots to seize.
So lilies tongued the brassy air
        and cast it back in the sun's
        wide hearing. So, the pair

who planted the bulbs stood and heard
that clarion silence. We've heard it,
        standing here toward sunset
as those gaping, burnished corollas poured
their flourish. But the petals have
        shrivelled, from each crumpled knot
        droops a tangle of rough

notes shrunk to a caul of music.
Extend your palms: you could as well
        cup sunbeams as pour brim-full
again those absent flowers, or touch the quick
arms of those who bent here, trowel in
        hand, and scraped and sifted soil
        held in a bed of stone.

--------

It rained all day Wednesday and I had a headache so I have nothing of interest to report except a headache, lots of local flooding, and being pissed off at the Obama Administration over a host of issues concerning privacy, citizens' rights and most recently Plan B. So have some photos from the Brookside Gardens conservatory last weekend, and I shall try to be more awake and less cranky tomorrow night.

Poem for Wednesday and Art of Fire

2011-12-07T00:08:00.001-05:00

Mosul
By David Hernandez

The donkey. The donkey pulling the cart.
The caravan of dust. The cart made of plywood,
of crossbeam and junkyard tires. The donkey
made of donkey. The long face. The long ears.
The curled lashes. The obsidian eyes blinking
in the dust. The cart rolling, cracking the knuckles
of pebbles. The dust. The blanket over the cart.
The hidden mortar shells. The veins of wires.
The remote device. The red light. The donkey
trotting. The blue sky. The rolling cart. The dust
smudging the blue sky. The silent bell of the sun.
The Humvee. The soldiers. The dust-colored
uniforms. The boy from Montgomery, the boy
from Little Falls. The donkey cart approaching.
The dust. The laughter on their lips. The dust
on their lips. The moment before the moment.
The shockwave. The dust. The dust. The dust.

--------

Tuesday was going to be a quiet work day for me, though everyone else in the house did lots of coming and going around me. The plumber arrived at 8:30 a.m. to fix the toilet in the kids' bathroom, which developed a leak over the weekend. Meanwhile Paul dropped the minivan off because the heater, too, had gone screwy over the weekend, though it turned out just to be that a leaf had gotten caught inside the fan system and they didn't even charge us to fish it out. So my big trip out apart from a quick walk was to retrieve the minivan, after Paul got back from having a tooth crowned and after Adam got back from school but before he went to have dinner and study with friends.

Laundry today was folded while watching Pushing Daisies -- the second episode, in which Kristin Chenoweth sings "Hopelessly Devoted To You" -- and evening TV included Glee, which I was ready to stop watching forever when Quinn was dismissed as only having rich white girl problems and which only barely saved itself by having a song from Evita, though Sectionals were as much of a joke as last year without even being intentionally funny, and there should be legislation passed that if Rachel gets to lead a song, Santana and/or Mercedes do too. I was much, much happier with the It's a Wonderful Life episode of Warehouse 13, lacking all the usual angst and religious overtones and highlighting all the relationships that make me love that show so much.

I feel like I should be quoting Roosevelt tonight but I know it'll be all over Facebook anyway. Secretary of State Clinton's U.N. speech on gay rights is worth reading/watching in its entirety if your local paper/online news source only has bits of it. Some photos from Art of Fire (which had several other artisans from the Maryland Renfaire visiting) during the Countryside Artisans Tour last weekend:

Poem for Tuesday, A Month in the Country, Artisan Animals

2011-12-06T00:01:00.001-05:00

The Hour After
By Sharon Olds

The hour after, when we gaze and doze
and gaze, feels like the central hour
of my life -- the joy before it may be
too enormous to be carried out
into the world. Sometimes we tell each other
things: I want to go inside
your eyes, and dwell. Last night, you held
your eyes open, long into sleep, so I could
swim and swim, I feel filled, still, with that
circumnavigation. I thank you
for your seeds, we smile, I am honored to receive them.
I love for you to know me, I whisper,
to see that knowing deep in your gaze.
Every time we open our eyes
we are married, all the time we doze
we are married -- and every minute of the day
apart, married as if it could be physically demonstrated.
Early in the hour of knowing,
I had exclaimed, suddenly, kneeling between
your legs, and looking up, a moment,
It's like affection! It's very much like
extreme affection! And you'd smiled and softly
laughed. Who knows what it is like,
the play of love, foreplay, gazeplay,
dozeplay, and the play at the center like precious
work. It is like making something --
making what's there visible
and audible. We cry out, we sing,
and then for an hour it is there in the room,
the song. I look into your eyes as if I had been
parted from you for a long time or
were to be parted from you for an endless time.

--------

I spent an awesome day with Dementordelta shopping and eating and watching movies. My synagogue has an annual holiday boutique which we'd visited together last year, so we went again to look at the jewelry, accessories, and gourmet foods (we glanced at the clothes but none of them would have been affordable even if they'd fit). Then we stopped at a local girls' clothing store that has lots of adorable jewelry to get owl, teapot, and lion charms before going to lunch at Lebanese Taverna, where we had fabulous hummus, babaganoush, grape leaves, and cheese dumplings. Back at my house, we watched A Month in the Country -- the other world war-era movie in which Colin Firth plays a stammerer, which also stars Kenneth Branagh and is pretty enjoyable though very British (thank you !), then we decided that my new blu-ray player really needed to be broken in with a viewing of my blu-ray copy of The King's Speech, which I am delighted to report is just as awesome as ever on blu-ray.

In the evening after she had to go home, Paul made Tuscan white bean soup and we watched the second half of Neverland, which was okay, though I must confess that I preferred Disney's animated sequel to this CGI-heavy prequel, even in terms of the women's roles. The boys are trying, but they aren't as memorable as the ones in the Rachel Hurd-Wood/Jason Isaacs Peter Pan. Rhys Ifans is touching at moments, but his character is written just as over-the-top unbelievably as his character in Anonymous. Anna Friel is quite enjoyable, but since there are no adult women in Neverland, I figured she would ultimately be forgettable, which she is. And Tinkerbell and Tiger Lily are as Peter-obsessed as ever. I am out of time so have a cat from Art of Fire and an alpaca from A Paca Fun Farm, which was closed to visitors on Saturday but we didn't know that till we'd driven to the gate:

Poem for Monday and Wheaton Model Trains

2011-12-05T00:11:00.000-05:00

Air Envelope
By Catherine Wagner

A skylight stippled
Wet, scatted
With translucent brown maple seedwings

I'm under that

I wrote it as if it were a poem
And my handy margin
Would profit me.

The notebook margin
Lends to me
Its frugal axis, asking
Nothing, determinist
Of route, but blandly so.

"I didn't know."

Push forward
The bag of skin
Scaffolded animated
And house at the same time

The hinge we turn on
Wrap around night
Becomes day, same page
We're on it.

--------

December thus far has been mild and lovely, and Sunday was no exception. We had a quiet morning while Adam was at Hebrew school in case he needed transportation somewhere; my father drove him home afterward, then he walked the dogs and we took him to school to set up for Blast. So we didn't have lunch till after 1 p.m., by which time we knew there would be Redskins crowds on the Beltway and there were news reports of mass arrests at Occupy DC. Rather than risk getting caught in traffic heading to the arboretum or anywhere downtown, we went to Brookside Gardens, which has its winter lights show in the evening but was nicely uncrowded in the afternoon, and the poinsettias and holiday train displays are much easier to navigate. There's even a miniature conservatory with its own miniature train show inside:

Adam had dinner with Maddie -- again -- so the grownups had sandwiches and macaroni without him, then we caught up on Once Upon a Time, which I am enjoying despite the necessarily cliched characterizations (at least, unlike Grimm, it doesn't have a growing female body count). Then we watched the first part of Neverland, which has some painfully cheesy visuals and some wildly uneven performances but also has Anna Friel as a pirate king and Rhys Ifans as an even more psychologically messed-up Hook than the traditional one. They're clearly trying not to make the Indians into painful stereotypes but they're also not really managing it. Maybe tomorrow. Speaking of stereotypes, the Redskins lost, but in more important news, the Ravens won!

Poem for Sunday and Countryside Artisans

2011-12-04T00:03:00.002-05:00

After Apple-Picking
By Robert Frost

My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there's a barrel that I didn't fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now.
Essence of winter sleep is on the night,
The scent of apples: I am drowsing off.
I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight
I got from looking through a pane of glass
I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough
And held against the world of hoary grass.
It melted, and I let it fall and break.
But I was well
Upon my way to sleep before it fell,
And I could tell
What form my dreaming was about to take.
Magnified apples appear and disappear,
Stem end and blossom end,
And every fleck of russet showing clear.
My instep arch not only keeps the ache,
It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.
I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend.
And I keep hearing from the cellar bin
The rumbling sound
Of load on load of apples coming in.
For I have had too much
Of apple-picking: I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired.
There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,
Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall.
For all
That struck the earth,
No matter if not bruised or spiked with stubble,
Went surely to the cider-apple heap
As of no worth.
One can see what will trouble
This sleep of mine, whatever sleep it is.
Were he not gone,
The woodchuck could say whether it's like his
Long sleep, as I describe its coming on,
Or just some human sleep.

--------

Saturday was one of the days of the Countryside Artisans Winter Tour, so after a somewhat slow morning due to the fact that we were all up late the night before because of Blast, we all had lunch and drove up first to Art of Fire to see glassblowing and the visiting craftspeople who also frequent the Renfaire (Allen Ye Printmaker, Dancing Pig Pottery). Then we tried to stop at A Paca Fun Farm, but they weren't open -- though by the time we discovered that, we had driven by many fields full of curious alpacas and photographed a couple of them. From there we went to Dancing Leaf Farm, where we were bummed to discover that the sheep are out of residence while their enclosure is being repaired, and to Sugarloaf Studio. Everyone had hot cider and cookies, which was very nice.

The beautiful glasswork at Art of Fire...

...shares space with two cats (one friendly, one a hellion).

Dancing Leaf Farm has a large friendly dog in residence...

...and beautiful home-spun yarns -- son bought some for his girlfriend who knits.

The dog, however, was forlorn not to be allowed to eat the gingerbread cookies.

The chickens at Dancing Leaf Farm claimed to be ravenous as well. We were not convinced.

All of the Countryside Artisans are in the vicinity of Sugarloaf Mountain on the county border.

Here we are reflected in one of the ornaments outside Sugarloaf Studio.

Adam went off to work at Blast with his girlfriend around dinnertime, so Paul (whose mom's birthday was Saturday) brought in California Tortilla and we watched the new Celtic Woman concert on PBS -- more pop Broadway than I'd prefer, I wish they'd sing more in Celtic languages and I miss when Orla played the harp, but I always like the vocal arrangements of the songs and it is really nice to see a bestselling group in which none of the lead singers is a size 2. Then we watched a bit of the college football conference championship games before another concert on PBS, this time Paul Simon, which was excellent -- lots from Graceland and So Beautiful or So What but also a lot of older songs. Now we are waiting for Adam to get done partying with the tech crew!

Poem for Saturday and Churchill Blast

2011-12-03T00:04:00.001-05:00

Along with Youth
By Ernest Hemingway

A porcupine skin,
Stiff with bad tanning,
It must have ended somewhere.
Stuffed horned owl
Pompous
Yellow eyed;
Chuck-wills-widow on a biassed twig
Sooted with dust.
Piles of old magazines,
Drawers of boy’s letters
And the line of love
They must have ended somewhere.
Yesterday's Tribune is gone
Along with youth
And the canoe that went to pieces on the beach
The year of the big storm
When the hotel burned down
At Seney, Michigan.

--------

I have spent the evening at Winston Churchill High School for Blast 23, the annual musical revue, whose theme this year was "Believe" which means that the songs included everything from "You Can Do Magic" and "Teach Your Children" to "Born This Way" and the post-Glee inevitable "Don't Stop Believin'." It was enormous fun, had excellent singing and terrific lighting, and Adam (who was on the tech crew along with several of his friends, some of whom were also in the show) had a great time. He's the one doing "Steve Holt" arms in the photo below:

Otherwise all that is worth reporting from my day is that it was a gorgeous afternoon for a walk in the woods and I even saw a chipmunk, though I thought they were hibernating -- the one that was on our deck all summer hasn't put in an appearance in a couple of weeks -- and I posted a review of Deep Space Nine's "The Passenger", which is pretty forgettable unless you're dying to see Julie Caitlin Brown whom I've liked in everything I've seen her in. Have a great weekend!

Poem for Friday and Civil War Trains

2011-12-02T00:09:00.000-05:00

Night Drafts
By Tony Sanders

Polite, intent, no fooling this time, because blasphemy
Doesn't follow Him, but the other way around. How
The silence of churches at bedtime can brighten a day,
A soul's day. How Barbie and Ken dolls from memory
Can lighten a day, even as the bad boats from upriver
Go down river, since that's what they do, move at the speed
We speak of with sublime direction. Don't listen too closely
To the thwack of halyards, don't point in the direction
Of home, when you figure out where that is. The true
Voice that is calling is guttural, lifted from graffiti
Off the walls or snippets of news that nip at your heels
As you rip bread and bless the pigeons. Gosh, onions
Or rhubarb should come to mind at a time like this,
But like the rest of us non-believers you're guilty,
Except for the sanctum of late night radio which winds
Around you like a childhood scarf, the one that was burned
Or snatched away by an older sister. Everything is happy
couched in sadness, or the other way around. The smell
Of pavement after summer rain means something
Significant though you're not sure what. These holding
Patterns we find ourselves in are guaranteed to leave us
Feeling outside of our kitchen quarrel. You never get over
The kitchen quarrel you weren't a part of but settled in,
Like an ice house on a frozen lake. No matter. The radio
Says everything melts by degrees, even you, if you care,
So the ordinary life you lead is ordinary, maybe less,
Maybe more if you light candles, or classy cigarettes
For that matter. Maybe you would like to be Russian,
Maybe the Canadian boat person on the St. Lawrence River,
Maybe just the whoosh of the air as it passed through
The tunnel after the rush-hour subway. You're human, you know,
Like the rest of us, you're stuck with that. Own up to it.

--------

Thursday was a mostly indoor work day for me except when I was driving Adam to and from tech after school and when I was out walking in the lovely late fall weather that arrived this first day of December. So I don't have a lot to report, other than that I can't find my Broadway cast CD of The Scarlet Pimpernel, only the concept album, and Google Music classifies every popular black singer as R&B pretty much regardless of era, instrumentation, or musical style.

Adam brought his girlfriend home to walk the dogs with him (one of the dogs has been diagnosed with incurable cancer, so son has been particularly diligent about seeing them), then went back to school for a full dress rehearsal in the late afternoon. We had mince and tatties (with fake meat) for dinner since we missed celebrating St. Andrew's Day, and watched Deep Space Nine's "The Passenger" which I have no memory of having seen before though I know I did because I reviewed it before. Here are some photos from the Civil War train exhibit at the B&O Railroad Museum:

Poem for Thursday and Potomac River

2011-12-01T00:04:00.000-05:00

Evening Waterfall
By Carl Sandburg

What was the name you called me? --
And why did you go so soon?

The crows lift their caw on the wind,
And the wind changed and was lonely.

The warblers cry their sleepy-songs
Across the valley gloaming,
Across the cattle-horns of early stars.

Feathers and people in the crotch of a treetop
Throw an evening waterfall of sleepy-songs.

What was the name you called me? --
And why did you go so soon?

--------

I did not get a huge amount accomplished on Wednesday but I did get to see lots of people. Vertigo and I had long-standing plans to have lunch, so after a somewhat rushed morning I met her at the Corner Bakery where I had their excellent tomato soup in a bread bowl and we discussed our families, our fandoms, and trips we'd take if someone would only give us many thousands of dollars. Then I stopped in Target to get Cold-eze for various family members and ended up getting us an early Chanukah present -- a Sony 3D Blu-Ray player with wireless and USB, on sale for $3 more than I had seen it online which was a small price to pay for knowing that I can bring it back locally if we can't make it work with our TV/stereo for some reason.

I came home and took a walk, thinking I would see Adam before I went out to dinner with Gblvr who to my delight was in the area, but it turned out that Adam was staying at school for a rehearsal and eating dinner there, so I took Paul with me out to dinner with Gblvr, Sharkie, and the latter's husband, where we compared notes on crazy fans and our even crazier cats. I had to pick Adam up at school after we left, then came home and we watched Harry's Law which included diatribes against thieving bank execs and high school football programs (both of which I agreed with in principle but I don't think it's any coincidence that none of the people on the show victimized by same got very far). From Great Falls on Sunday:

Happy December!

Poem for Wednesday, Sand Shark, Lovespell

2011-11-30T00:01:00.000-05:00

Toothpaste Kids Sunburn
By Jordan Davis

I tell you I will not make any more raids,
The elusive going-elsewhere motherboard

An electrical sound marking stretches
Afternoon is carving into the wood of us,

That's our modern way of saline allegory --
To make gods of times of day. I won't

Cooperate with this love that steals itself
Into a brand name, preferring to abandon

Like feathers or a rocket stage the moves
Traffic up till now couldn't touch. That's me,

That warm breath dying on the neck,
The only chain they couldn't save in the fire

Everybody but the Buddha called
A day at the beach.

--------

Tuesday was rainy, chilly, and uneventful. I had two writing projects that had to be finished and they got finished, so I am feeling accomplished about that. Also, the laundry got folded, though I must blush and admit that while I was scanning On Demand for a costume drama or something with lovely scenery to watch, I came across Lovespell, which I managed NOT to watch when I was watching all of Kate Mulgrew's movies yet did not manage not to watch today. It wasn't bad -- Richard Burton was entertainingly crotchety, though what woman would pick his nephew over him, I can't fathom, and Kate was hilariously over-the-top and tearful, which was in keeping with the overwrought soundtrack.

Adam had tennis late in the afternoon, so since I hadn't been out all day I went to Old Navy for their 75% off sale and came home with two fleece sweatshirts for about $11. We had Mexican food for dinner, a nice contrast to the weather, and watched Glee (which had awesome music including a Cyndi Lauper cover, an Olivia Newton-John cover, and a Melissa Etheridge cover almost making up for the lesbianism-is-for-titillation! idiocy), Ringer (which is simply crack at this point), and Sanctuary (why was it on Tuesday>?!) So after all that background noise -- please don't ask me to explain exactly what Helen did to the computers -- I ran out of photo time. Here, have a sand shark from Calvert Cliffs:

Poem for Tuesday, B&O Legos, Peter Pan

2011-11-29T00:06:00.000-05:00

From 'Tintern Abbey'
By William Wordsworth

Five years have past; five summers, with the length
Of five long winters! and again I hear
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs
With a soft inland murmur. -- Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,
That on a wild secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits,
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
'Mid groves and copses. Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines
Of sportive wood run wild: these pastoral farms,
Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees!
With some uncertain notice, as might seem
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods,
Or of some Hermit's cave, where by his fire
The Hermit sits alone.
These beauteous forms,
Through a long absence, have not been to me
As is a landscape to a blind man's eye:
But oft, in lonely rooms, and 'mid the din
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;
And passing even into my purer mind,
With tranquil restoration: -- feelings too
Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps,
As have no slight or trivial influence
On that best portion of a good man's life,
His little, nameless, unremembered, acts
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust,
To them I may have owed another gift,
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood,
In which the burthen of the mystery,
In which the heavy and the weary weight
Of all this unintelligible world,
Is lightened: --that serene and blessed mood,
In which the affections gently lead us on, --
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul:
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,
We see into the life of things.

--------

I had a lovely Monday. Jules came over with the terribly arduous request that we watch Peter Pan, which she needed to see for a writing project, so I put myself through the difficult task of watching Jason Isaacs being a pirate with fairies that look like they dropped in out of a Maxfield Parrish painting. I adore that movie, and I also got to have lunch with Jules at California Pizza Kitchen, plus a bit of shopping in stores with things that smell good like Lush and Bath & Body Works. Adam stayed late at school for tech so I had lots of time.

Plus Paul worked from home because they're doing construction at his office and his car was in for an oil change, so in the afternoon we went to pick that up, then I took a walk on yet another absurdly warm gorgeous November day whose only drawback was how dark it was by 5 p.m. Evening TV included Terra Nova -- oh I hope they start tying up or at least explaining things before they get canceled for costing too much -- and the lopsided Saints-Giants game, plus Jon Stewart on American trends in pepper spray. Here are some photos of the history of Baltimore in Legos at the B&O Railroad Museum:

Downtown Baltimore, including the Bromo-Seltzer clock tower.

A waterside vendor selling crabs.

Near the Port of Baltimore, a motel with a swimming pool.

BWI Airport (you can tell this is older Baltimore from the lack of flight delays).

I am not entirely sure where this pastoral ruin is -- perhaps in the Walters Museum?

A downtown news chopper with reporter and cameraman.

Prehistoric Baltimore with cavemen...

...and even earlier, with dinosaurs and, er, mermaids.

Poem for Monday and Great Falls

2011-11-28T00:02:00.000-05:00

Garden of Bees
By Matthew Rohrer

The narcissus grows past
the towers. Eight gypsy
sisters spread their wings
in the garden. Their gold teeth
are unnerving. Every single
baby is asleep. They want
a little money and I give
them less. I'm charming and
handsome. They take my pen.
I buy the poem from the garden
of bees for one euro. A touch
on the arm. A mystery word.
The sky has two faces.
For reasons unaccountable
my hand trembles.
In Roman times if they were
horrified of bees they kept it secret

--------

Adam got up early to go to church with his girlfriend and Daniel slept nearly till noon, so Paul and I spent the morning reading and going over some work on the computer. After lunch we took both kids to Great Falls, which had a lot of people because of the gorgeous weather -- hit 70 degrees for the second day in a row, and the Potomac River was gloriously high -- but we had the steep rocky path mostly to ourselves once we got off the Olmsted Island bridges and we saw the most vultures I have ever seen in one place in my life circling over the river. I am sure the Redskins won because we weren't paying attention.

My parents joined us for dinner -- at Daniel's request, we brought in pizza -- then Adam's friend joined us to drive Daniel back to school and help carry his computer and clothes up four flights of stairs. We missed Once Upon a Time, but I watched A Thousand Acres which I hadn't seen since the film was made. King Lear is not my favorite play, but I am not terribly fond of this retelling, and in my defense I would like to announce that I did not know who Colin Firth was when the film was new -- I watched it for Michelle Pfeiffer and Jessica Lange -- the acting is great, but it's a pretty grim movie.

Poem for Sunday and B&O Railroad Museum

2011-11-27T00:20:00.003-05:00

A List of Praises
By Anne Porter

Give praise with psalms that tell the trees to sing,
Give praise with Gospel choirs in storefront churches,
Mad with the joy of the Sabbath,
Give praise with the babble of infants, who wake with the sun,
Give praise with children chanting their skip-rope rhymes,
A poetry not in books, a vagrant mischievous poetry
living wild on the Streets through generations of children.

Give praise with the sound of the milk-train far away
With its mutter of wheels and long-drawn-out sweet whistle
As it speeds through the fields of sleep at three in the morning,
Give praise with the immense and peaceful sigh
Of the wind in the pinewoods,
At night give praise with starry silences.

Give praise with the skirling of seagulls
And the rattle and flap of sails
And gongs of buoys rocked by the sea-swell
Out in the shipping-lanes beyond the harbor.
Give praise with the humpback whales,
Huge in the ocean they sing to one another.

Give praise with the rasp and sizzle of crickets, katydids and cicadas,
Give praise with hum of bees,
Give praise with the little peepers who live near water.
When they fill the marsh with a shimmer of bell-like cries
We know that the winter is over.

Give praise with mockingbirds, day's nightingales.
Hour by hour they sing in the crepe myrtle
And glossy tulip trees
On quiet side streets in southern towns.

Give praise with the rippling speech
Of the eider-duck and her ducklings
As they paddle their way downstream
In the red-gold morning
On Restiguche, their cold river,
Salmon river,
Wilderness river.

Give praise with the whitethroat sparrow.
Far, far from the cities,
Far even from the towns,
With piercing innocence
He sings in the spruce-tree tops,
Always four notes
And four notes only.

Give praise with water,
With storms of rain and thunder
And the small rains that sparkle as they dry,
And the faint floating ocean roar
That fills the seaside villages,
And the clear brooks that travel down the mountains

And with this poem, a leaf on the vast flood,
And with the angels in that other country.

--------

Several of us had to get up early on Saturday because Adam had an emergency orthodontist appointment, but we got very lucky: the retainer wasn't cracked, only the wires were damaged and could be fixed, and since the appointment was at 8:30 a.m. before the mall in which the office is located had opened, Adam and Paul were in and out very quickly. We had plans to meet my in-laws in Baltimore after lunch since we'd expected to spend much of the morning getting impressions made for a new retainer, so we had lots of time to read and hang out while Daniel slept. We saw President Obama's trio of helicopters heading to Towson, where he went to watch his brother-in-law coach basketball; we shall not discuss the horror that was the Terrapins-Wolfpack game.

Paul's parents met us at the B&O Railroad Museum in the roundhouse in Baltimore, where the holiday display had just opened -- lots of snowflake lights hanging from the high roof, model train displays (including a fabulous Lego history of Baltimore) in the center surrounded by historic locomotives and an exhibit on the B&O Railroad during the Civil War, with an interactive map showing the major events of the war in four minutes. We had to get back to drop Daniel off at his high school's annual robotics alumni dinner, so the rest of us ate without him, then Adam went to visit friends and after Daniel got home we watched most of the third season of Blackadder. Now we are discussing the advantages of getting a Mech E/Comp Sci dual degree vs. staying in the Scholars program and getting a Comp E degree, a topic on which I fear I am not the most useful adviser.

The B&O Railroad roundhouse behind the outdoor model train display complete with "Go Ravens" car.

Inside, the roundhouse is decorated for the holidays from the top down...

...including seasonal items around the historic train cars.

Some model trains go around Christmas trees...

...but the centerpiece at the moment is a massive Lego display of a holiday parade in historic Baltimore.

Here are my kids in front of one of the locomotives.

And here are Paul and myself in the Civil War exhibit.

Poem for Saturday and Black Friday

2011-11-26T00:02:00.000-05:00

Balance, onslaught
By Khadijah Queen

after Clare Rojas

(I have a diamond house
with men. I have pierced
men and diamond shoes.
I have shoed horses and
a tilted head. I have a tilted
cart and a flowered scarf.
I have a gray dress and a
hell of a guitar. I play the
guitar and the jukebox jack-
in-the-box gutted brown
bear and canoe landscape. I
play the grayest song and a
cat's yarn game.) I sit in the
forest with a cat and a knife.
(I see the quilted mountains
and long knitted birds. I see
the man limping across the
path of chevrons between
the trees. I sit between trees,
hanging hair and red mouth.
I mouth and sit. The buck
stands by the river. I am in
my paper mask, my wood.)

--------

Post-Thanksgiving Friday around here involved no shopping except a stop in the food store for milk and a stop in the liquor store a few shops down for egg nog. The orthodontist couldn't fit Adam in to fix the retainer till Saturday morning, so while Adam went downtown to museums with his girlfriend, the rest of us had a quiet morning -- I wrote a review of "Dax" -- and ate lunch, then went to Seneca Creek State Park for a bit of a hike. There was nobody else on the trail while we were there and the weather was quite warm, just under 60 degrees, so it was lovely to be walking by the water.

The creek was over its banks in places at Seneca Creek State Park...

...yet quite low and very clear in others.

Fortunately there are bridges over some of the offshoot streams.

pointed out that the stream and stones here looks like an otter.

Daniel found this fallen beehive.

As you can see even in this blurry phone photo, the leaves are mostly down by now too.

We had dinner with my parents and two of my nieces, though it was a bit of a chaotic affair because my sister and her husband had gone out to dinner and my parents had only just arrived home with the girls, while we were running late because Daniel spent the late afternoon fighting with his computer's power supply (which I believe Dell has agreed to replace, since it's making weird noises and the computer is still under warranty). Still, Thanksgiving side dish leftovers are always awesome. Now we're watching Blackadder, who is on a roll with prick jokes.

Poem for Friday and Thanksgiving

2011-11-25T00:01:00.000-05:00

Mayflower
By John Boyle O'Reilly

Thunder our thanks to her -- guns, hearts, and lips!
     Cheer from the ranks to her,
     Shout from the banks to her --
Mayflower! Foremost and best of our ships.

Mayflower! Twice in the national story
     Thy dear name in letters of gold --
     Woven in texture that never grows old --
Winning a home and winning glory!
Sailing the years to us, welcomed for aye;
Cherished for centuries, dearest to-day.
Every heart throbs for her, every flag dips --
Mayflower! First and last, best of our ships.

White as a seagull, she swept the long passage.
True as the homing-bird flies with its message.
Love her? O, richer than silk every sail of her.
Trust her? More precious than gold every nail of her.
Write we down faithfully every man's part in her;
Greet we all gratefully every true heart in her.

More than a name to us, sailing the fleetest,
Symbol of that which is purest and sweetest:
More than a keel to us, steering the straightest,
Emblem of that which is freest and greatest:
More than a dove-bosomed sail to the windward,
Flame passing on while the night-clouds fly hindward.
Kiss every plank of her! None shall take rank of her;
Frontward or weatherward, none can eclipse.
Thunder our thanks to her! Cheer from the banks to her!
Mayflower! Foremost and best of our ships!

--------

We had a very nice, relatively low-key Thanksgiving day despite being woken earlier than we would have wished by cats who were starving. We watched the Macy's parade, which seems to get more commercial every year -- does anyone appear who doesn't have a new CD or movie out or who isn't advertising for something? -- but had some enjoyable music. Eventually we all showered and Paul's parents arrived as we were finishing lunch, so we sat around watching football and chatting while the tofurky cooked -- my mother did the actual turkey for the non-vegetarians so we were responsible for the fake stuff.

I ate waaaay too much -- appetizers included spanakopita, hummus, brie and crackers, and nuts, dinner included stuffing, mashed and sweet potatoes, carrot souffle, cranberry sauce, and pineapple, dessert included two kinds of pie and chocolates -- and sat around chatting with my sister and in-laws while my mother had the kids running all over the house on a scavenger hunt. Eventually we were all too full to eat any more and my in-laws had to drive back to Pennsylvania, so we came home for the end of the Ravens-49ers game, which ended just as we wanted for Baltimore. Younger son did manage to break his retainer playing with friends, so Friday I must see when I can get him in to see the orthodontist (who is located in a mall so I am sort of hoping it will NOT be tomorrow). Hope everyone else has had a lovely holiday, or a lovely Thursday if it's not one where you are -- we will NOT be shopping at midnight!

My kids and their cousins at the table, most with stuffed turkeys on their heads.

Earlier they all posed on the couch at my parents' house.

Younger son being a hipster...

...and all the kids with My Little Pony pinata.

These are some of the stuffed turkeys decorating the table...

...and this is Paul's annual cookie cake, a rush job on the decorations this year because he forgot to make the icing till the last minute. Previous cakes: 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010.

Poem for Thanksgiving, IONA, Blackadder

2011-11-24T00:02:00.001-05:00

This Kind of Grace
By Pattiann Rogers

Let's bless the body before love.
By rights we should, every detail.
We could use water, spring water
or rose, minted or bay rum. A touch
to the shoulders -- bless these. A drop
behind each knee -- sanctify here. A sprinkle
to the belly, yours, mine -- in heartfelt
appreciation.

I could dip my fingers into oil cupped
in my palm, sweet citronella, lavender,
clove, trace your forehead, temple
to temple, the boldness of that warm
stone -- so glorified -- perfume the entire
declaration of your spine, neck
to tail -- so hallowed.

We'd neglect nothing, ankle, knuckle,
thigh, cheek. And for the rapture
of hair, scented with sweat or the spices
of cedary sages and summer pines,
in which I hide my face -- praise
to the conjoining hosts of all
radiant forests and plains.

And imagine how I'd lay my hand,
move my hand carefully on and around
and under each axil and hummock and whorl
between your legs, the magnificent maze
of those gifts -- thanks to the exploding
heavens, thanks to all pulsing suns.

For these cosmic accomplishments:
this delve of your body, a narrow
crevasse leading into earth-darkness;
this assertion of your hands, light
winds lifting, parting, pressing
upon supine grasses; this rise, the tip
of a swollen moon over black hills;
this sweep of union, hawk-shadow
falling fast across the open prairie
into the horizon; for this whole blessed
body, for what we are about to receive
together tonight...truly, ardently,
ecstatically, boundlessly
grateful.

--------

Paul worked from home the day before Thanksgiving so that we could go pick up Daniel -- and both his computers -- from College Park in the early afternoon. The traffic was surprisingly cooperative, slow in spots but not horrible. Daniel wanted to stop at Microcenter to get a new graphics card for his computer, so we did that, since Adam had gone to his girlfriend's house after his half-day of school. The cats are very happy that Daniel is home despite all the boxes in his room!

We had ravioli for dinner and watched several episodes of Blackadder, mostly the second series, though we also watched the Christmas special (which we'd seen before) and Back & Forth so we could see Colin Firth as Shakespeare (getting punched in the name of schoolchildren everywhere, hahaha). Below are a few more photos of IONA playing at the Old Brogue last Sunday evening, including Kathleen Larrick dancing. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, fellow American celebrants!

Poem for Wednesday and King James Bibles

2011-11-23T00:01:00.003-05:00

The Harvest Moon
By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

It is the Harvest Moon!  On gilded vanes
  And roofs of villages, on woodland crests
  And their aerial neighborhoods of nests
  Deserted, on the curtained window-panes
Of rooms where children sleep, on country lanes
  And harvest-fields, its mystic splendor rests!
  Gone are the birds that were our summer guests,
  With the last sheaves return the laboring wains!
All things are symbols: the external shows
  Of Nature have their image in the mind,
  As flowers and fruits and falling of the leaves;
The song-birds leave us at the summer's close,
  Only the empty nests are left behind,
  And pipings of the quail among the sheaves.

--------

Tuesday was a miserable rainy day on which it felt like the sun never really came up. I had work and chores to do. I had a very good time folding laundry, since I was watching the unexpectedly delightful Stone of Destiny, which I'd heard of only because Billy Boyd is in it and whose plot I hadn't known at all (or heard about but thought it was fictional): the theft of the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey in the 1950s by a group of Glasgow students as a symbol of Scottish pride. I enjoyed it immensely and was recording it, but for the third time in a week my DVD burner decided to crash instead of closing the disc. *gnashes teeth*

Gblvr and I had tentative plans to see Breaking Dawn, but neither of us was really in the mood for it -- it was more a tradition thing, we saw the first three Twilight movies together...and before anyone gets going on how Twilight is evil, be warned that I have had to listen all day to the great irony of the very same people who are boo-hooing over Anne McCaffrey and her sexist, heterosexist world declaring that Twilight is bad for girls. Well, guess what, kids, Hermione (who has supportive loving parents and teachers who think she's smart) is not the hero of the Harry Potter books, and Eowyn (who is the daughter of Kings, a shield maiden of Rohan) falls apart over Aragorn until Faramir swoops in to finish her healing -- and I won't even get started on Reboot!Uhura. So leave Bella alone already.

Anyway, having decided that we were not up for the movie, we got Indian food in the mall and walked around looking at costume jewelry and things that smell good (and watched Santa run away and got more See's Candies samples, always a good thing). At home I caught up on last night's Terra Nova -- finally the arc gets going, I just hope it's not too late for the show -- and, since Glee and Ringer weren't on, watched a bit of football and listened to some music. Wednesday both kids are home early for Thanksgiving!

A family Bible with genealogy at the Folger Shakespeare Library's Manifold Greatness: The Creation and Afterlife of the King James Bible.

Elizabeth I's Bishop's Bible.

'The workes of the most high andmightie Prince, James.'

The Humble Petition by the Puritans of Oxford.

Edward Fitchew's 1888 drawing of Hampton Court, where the conference that created the King James Bible was convened.

First Edition King James Bible with Jesus's genealogy.

Scathing Broughton tract condemning KJV.

Newer Bibles influenced by the King James Bible.

Poem for Tuesday and Weekend Culture

2011-11-22T00:01:00.002-05:00

Simulacra
By Ching-In Chen

It's not that the rains have rolled back
up to the ceiling. It's not that the frost has stopped
flirting with the dunegrass. My mother's eyes
are glass: she writes me what she sees there.

Duck waddling highway, sideways
raccoon pus, mutant
sunflower with a yen for fertilizer.

She has no time for wordshit.
Her older sister tells me my mother
doesn't understand much of poetry. Why
am I resistant?

The camera's already been here.

--------

I spent most of Monday with Dementordelta and Colin Firth, beginning in the morning with And When Did You Last See Your Father? (which is sad but not depressing, has great performances from Colin, Juliet Stevenson, and Jim Broadbent, and has the best bathtub scene ever) and My Life So Far (which is adorable and also has great performances though I wanted to smack Colin's character many times). We had cats all over us at lunchtime, so instead of going out we just had bagels and watched Valmont (which remains my favorite version of Les Liaisons Dangereuses in terms of how the female characters are treated, though I think several of the roles are more memorably played in other films). Then we decided we were in the mood for Shakespeare In Love, which the existence of Anonymous improves by comparison without even having to see the latter.

We were feeling lazy because we had a fabulous Sunday beginning at the Folger's Manifold Greatness: The Creation and Afterlife of the King James Bible, an exhibit on the first Bibles in English and its evolution as a religious, literary, and genealogical artifact with many old Bibles and tracts about what an English Bible should be. Then we went to Anglo-Saxon Hoard: Gold from England's Dark Ages, in which more than 100 of the 3500 items found in Staffordshire are on display at the National Geographic Museum along with films about the excavation, research, and possible origins of the buried treasure. We had dinner at the Old Brogue pub where IONA played a set mostly from their new CD Silver, though they also did some wassailing songs in anticipation of the holiday season. Here are a few photos:

Hugh Broughton's tract criticizing the Bishops' Bible, which he claimed Queen Elizabeth I herself disliked, preceded the conference where the King James Bible was planned.

There were no photos allowed of the artifacts or display replicas in the exhibit on the treasures of Mercia. This was the best I could do.

We drove by Occupy DC. It was rainy but that didn't appear to be troubling the protesters.

IONA celebrates its 25th anniversary as a band at the Old Brogue, where we all had cheese strudel and those who ate fish did so.

Placeholder for Monday

2011-11-21T00:30:00.002-05:00

Delta came downtown with me and Paul to see the Staffordshire Anglo-Saxon hoard at the National Geographic Museum, the King James Bible exhibit at the Folger Shakespeare Library, and IONA in concert at their CD release party at the Old Brogue Irish Pub in Great Falls. Then we came home and watched a bunch of documentaries about the Queen Mother, the Jolie Richardson Wallis and Edward movie, and Lindsay Duncan on Merlin. Now I am sleepy so I will link to my Twitter photos and post details tomorrow!

Poem for Sunday and Quiet Saturday

2011-11-20T00:33:00.002-05:00

Joy in the Woods
By Claude McKay

There is joy in the woods just now,
        The leaves are whispers of song,
And the birds make mirth on the bough
        And music the whole day long,
And God! to dwell in the town
        In these springlike summer days,
On my brow an unfading frown
        And hate in my heart always--

A machine out of gear, aye, tired,
Yet forced to go on--for I’m hired.

Just forced to go on through fear,
        For every day I must eat
And find ugly clothes to wear,
        And bad shoes to hurt my feet
And a shelter for work-drugged sleep!
        A mere drudge! but what can one do?
A man that’s a man cannot weep!
        Suicide? A quitter? Oh, no!

But a slave should never grow tired,
Whom the masters have kindly hired.

But oh! for the woods, the flowers
        Of natural, sweet perfume,
The heartening, summer showers
        And the smiling shrubs in bloom,
Dust-free, dew-tinted at morn,
        The fresh and life-giving air,
The billowing waves of corn
        And the birds’ notes rich and clear:

For a man-machine toil-tired
May crave beauty too--though he’s hired.

--------

Paul had a big computer upgrade that he had to oversee for work on Saturday, so we had a pretty quiet day. Adam went with his friends to the vegan Thanksgiving at Poplar Spring Animal Sanctuary, driven by one of their parents, so I spent a lazy morning reading Isherwood's A Single Man which I've had lying in my pile for nearly a year. In the afternoon, we went to Cabin John Park to walk around by the creek and enjoy a very pretty fall afternoon along with many hysterical squirrels trying to track down every acorn before it gets any colder (we have some of those on our deck, too, only they're trying to steal our birdseed).

We had breakfast food for dinner (French toast, eggs, fake bacon) and watched The Voyage of the Dawn Treader since it was on HBO while I was uploading a couple of thousand songs to Google Music, which is my new favorite electronic toy (yes, I know about all the evils of Google but free cloud storage for 20,000 songs on a service that my phone works with already is a very nice thing). Earlier we had the Maryland-Wake Forest game on, but I think we should simply declare the Terps' season over -- I would also be happier if there hadn't been another armed robbery in College Park. Yet again I have no new photos, so here is one of the Ikebana in autumn colors from Longwood Gardens:

Poem for Saturday and Happy Penguins

2011-11-19T00:01:00.001-05:00

Atlantis -- A Lost Sonnet
By Eavan Boland

How on earth did it happen, I used to wonder
that a whole city -- arches, pillars, colonnades,
not to mention vehicles and animals -- had all
one fine day gone under?

I mean, I said to myself, the world was small then.
Surely a great city must have been missed?
I miss our old city --

white pepper, white pudding, you and I meeting
under fanlights and low skies to go home in it. Maybe
what really happened is

this: the old fable-makers searched hard for a word
to convey that what is gone is gone forever and
never found it. And so, in the best traditions of

where we come from, they gave their sorrow a name
and drowned it.

--------

I had a very nice Friday. Paul worked from home since the minivan was at the shop for its seasonal checkup (needed new brake pads and things like that), so we had lunch together. I posted a review of "Q-less", neither Deep Space Nine's nor Q's finest moment, and started work on the dreaded holiday card list -- I shall have to put up a LiveJournal post for addresses from online friends to see what has changed since last year.

In the afternoon, we picked up the van, then picked up Adam and four friends to drive to the restaurants at Washingtonian and Happy Feet 2, which we saw in the same theater though we were forbidden to sit near them. I loved the movie. Like the first one, it has a pretty thin plot about parent-child expectations, and some African penguins have emigrated to Antarctica, but it also has some gorgeous animation of the glories of Earth and the universe, and its theme is about the interconnectedness of life and the dangers of global warming. Plus the music is delightful, and Brad Pitt and Matt Damon play krill in a bromance.

We got home late after dinner at Tara Thai and dropping off Adam's friends, and just watched Iowa State shock Oklahoma State in double overtime, so here is a photo of little blue penguins at the New England Aquarium in 2010:

Poem for Friday and Cypress Swamp

2011-11-18T00:06:00.002-05:00

Didn't Sappho say her guts clutched up like this?
By Marilyn Hacker

Didn't Sappho say her guts clutched up like this?
Before a face suddenly numinous,
her eyes watered, knees melted. Did she lactate
again, milk brought down by a girl's kiss?
It's documented torrents are unloosed
by such events as recently produced
not the wish, but the need, to consume, in us,
one pint of Maalox, one of Kaopectate.
My eyes and groin are permanently swollen,
I'm alternatingly brilliant and witless
-- and sleepless: bed is just a swamp to roll in.
Although I'd cream my jeans touching your breast,
sweetheart, it isn't lust; it's all the rest
of what I want with you that scares me shitless.

--------

Thursday was a less rainy, dark day than Wednesday, though colder. Paul worked from home in the morning while he had phone conferences, so I had company till a bit before lunchtime. He also put fresh seed in the bird feeder, so the cats had company out on the deck -- a very pesky squirrel trying to find a way to get the seeds. I discovered the other day that the version of Google Docs on my Android phone can't open older versions of Google documents, so I spent some time converting anything I thought I might need to open with the mobile app.

Gblvr and I had dinner at the mall and neither of us had our usual -- I had a spinach stromboli, and See's Candy was giving out samples so I had that for dessert, plus Crabtree & Evelyn gave us pomegranate body lotion samples. At home I watched the Q episode of Deep Space Nine, then The Shadow in the North, which I'd downloaded forever ago but somehow managed never to watch till it turned up on Masterpiece Mystery tonight. I like Matt Smith much better in these than I do in Doctor Who, and I like Billie Piper better in this one than Ruby in the Smoke -- will there be any more?

A few more photos from Battle Creek Cypress Swamp, which has a nature center as well as the boardwalk through the cypresses:

Poem for Thursday and Calvert Autumn

2011-11-17T00:02:00.000-05:00

The Wood-Pile
By Robert Frost

Out walking in the frozen swamp one grey day
I paused and said, "I will turn back from here.
No, I will go on farther--and we shall see."
The hard snow held me, save where now and then
One foot went down. The view was all in Straight up and down of tall slim trees
Too much alike to mark or name a place by
So as to say for certain I was here
Or somewhere else: I was just far from home.
A small bird flew before me. He was careful
To put a tree between us when he lighted,
And say no word to tell me who he was
Who was so foolish as to think what he thought.
He thought that I was after him for a feather--
The white one in his tail; like one who takes
Everything said as personal to himself.
One flight out sideways would have undeceived him.
And then there was a pile of wood for which
I forgot him and let his little fear
Carry him off the way I might have gone,
Without so much as wishing him good-night.
He went behind it to make his last stand.
It was a cord of maple, cut and split
And piled--and measured, four by four by eight.
And not another like it could I see.
No runner tracks in this year's snow looped near it.
And it was older sure than this year's cutting,
Or even last year's or the year's before.
The wood was grey and the bark warping off it
And the pile somewhat sunken. Clematis
Had wound strings round and round it like a bundle.
What held it though on one side was a tree
Still growing, and on one a stake and prop,
These latter about to fall. I thought that only
Someone who lived in turning to fresh tasks
Could so forget his handiwork on which
He spent himself, the labour of his axe,
And leave it there far from a useful fireplace
To warm the frozen swamp as best it could
With the slow smokeless burning of decay.

--------

It rained all day Wednesday and I spent most of it indoors, doing work and chores and fighting with my computer and my phone about various ongoing issues, one of which is that my backup program keeps telling me it could not copy one file but will not tell me WHICH file so I have just spent a ridiculous amount of the evening trying to figure out what is going on, whether I have a bad sector or just a corrupted file or overlong file name. So as you can see, much of the day has gotten away from me on trivialities (some more entertaining than others).

Adam went home from school with friends to study and stayed out through dinner, so it was a quiet evening. We watched Harry's Law, which had much too little Harry for my taste and a rather unpleasant B plot to go with the horrific A plot, and we finally caught up on Lindsay Duncan's episode of Merlin, which I didn't think was all that well written despite the ongoing Arthur/Merlin love-fest but made up for that by having Lindsay Duncan leading bigger armies than Camelot has (and Katie McGrath really stepped up her game in scenes with her).

Here are some photos from Calvert Cliffs State Park, all along the path through the woods to the beach:

Poem for Wednesday, The Hours, Red Leaves

2011-11-16T00:12:00.000-05:00

From Leaves of Grass: "A Word Out of the Sea"
By Walt Whitman

Now in a moment I know what I am for -- I awake,
And already a thousand singers -- a thousand songs,
          clearer, louder, more sorrowful than yours,
A thousand warbling echoes have started to life
          within me,
Never to die.

          O throes!
O you demon, singing by yourself -- projecting me,
O solitary me, listening -- never more shall I cease
          imitating, perpetuating you,
Never more shall I escape,
Never more shall the reverberations,
Never more the cries of unsatisfied love be absent
          from me,
Never again leave me to be the peaceful child I was
          before what there, in the night,
By the sea, under the yellow and sagging moon,
The dusky demon aroused -- the fire, the sweet hell
          within,
The unknown want, the destiny of me.

--------

A miracle occurred on Tuesday at about 10:45 a.m.! I arrived at the Motor Vehicle Administration, took a number, and before I could even pull out my book, my number was called! Immediately! I went to the window, expecting to be told that this was only the waiting room for space in the real waiting room, but the woman behind the counter took my photo and my eye test and had me sign a couple of things! In less than ten minutes, I was out of there with my new driver's license, good till the end of 2016!

It was drizzling by the time I got home, but since it was not even 11:30 yet and I'd been anticipating being an hour longer, I have no complaints. My laundry-folding movie for the day was The Hours, which I'd never seen before; I never read the book, and while I mostly love Virginia Woolf, I mostly don't love Nicole Kidman, so that had been a deterrent. And while I didn't particularly love Kidman's performance, which seemed constrained by her makeup -- a prosthetic nose does not a characterization make -- that wasn't what I really disliked about The Hours.

For a film that's supposed to be about three women's experiences, it sure comes off as a story of the poor men who love these crazycakes chicks. Poor Leonard, his entire life devoted to stopping his wife from killing herself! Poor Dan, surviving the war so he can marry his dream girl, only to discover that she doesn't want him or their children! Poor Richie, abandoned by his mother, then forced to stay alive to keep Clarissa sane! The only woman I really appreciated was Clarissa's partner Sally, but she's a sacrificial wife figure; I know nothing about her except that she adores Clarissa and has a job somewhere that we never hear anything about, that doesn't stop her from doing everything to support Clarissa but conveniently gets her out of the house so Clarissa can sob about her mid-life crisis to someone else.

Julianne Moore -- the queen of movies about women in ostensibly heterosexual relationships where one or both partners are really gay -- makes Laura sympathetic to a point. But given what we see of Laura's husband, who's self-absorbed but not cruel or unsympathetic, why couldn't she try saying, "Hey, your domestic fantasy isn't working for me, how about I stop baking cakes and get a job outside the house and we agree not to have any more babies?" We have no reason to believe he wouldn't try to help her find happiness. Leaving her children isn't her only option, and it's presented as abandonment rather than finding herself, considering that a generation later, Clarissa's daughter who never met her own sperm donor father is calling Laura "the monster."

I might forgive all this if we got some insight into Woolf herself -- how her mental illness manifested in her youth, how her parents' early deaths or her childhood sexual abuse influenced her psyche, how much of her genius was drawn from her supposed madness. We hear Richard as a writer as much as we hear Virginia; mostly we see her domestic crises, just as we see with Clarissa who believes that her own life is trivial except in service to Richard's genius. For a movie about women, The Hours feels excruciatingly sexist to me.

Adam brought his girlfriend home to do homework before tennis, where unfortunately I can no longer walk in the woods because it's dark now that the clocks have gone back. My greatest entertainment of the day was seeing Colin Firth naked in a bathtub courtesy Sandra. Glee was on but I only really paid attention when Idina Menzel was singing and when Santana was onscreen; Ringer was much more entertaining but is so convoluted at this point that they better start unraveling their plots ASAP. I am running behind tonight so have some autumn leaves from Calvert County:

Poem for Tuesday and Gorgeous November

2011-11-15T00:02:00.000-05:00

Obviously
By Ben Doller

The curtain is kind

of cool. Hitchcock
liked it. Why

not. Great place

for getting shot
or famous or for

bleeding back

behind the iron
one. The score

diegetic as they

come. Bernard
Herrmann forever

human.

The gowns hanged
in greenroom ligature.

Edith Head never

dead. Great place
for a nail-bomb.

A cold one.

Watch them watch
their watches run

out of wick.

Obviously this opera
sort of sucks

you in or off

your seat. You
see phony fire

and roar it too.

--------

It was a ridiculous 72 degrees on this fine November Monday. As a result, it was very difficult to concentrate on anything complicated. I did various work and chores in the house and took a long walk after lunch, since I had to get ready in the late afternoon for the cross country dinner and awards ceremony. There were several deer shamelessly nibbling ornamental plants in people's backyards and lots of happy squirrels racing back and forth across the paths, apparently confused by the weather.

The cross country dinner was a potluck with everything from Ledo's Pizza and Popeye's Chicken to very good vegetarian entrees like homemade samosas and the chili we brought. But the ceremony was endless -- every senior got to give a speech, some of which went on for nearly 15 minutes, and there were nearly 40 seniors. I ended up leaving after an hour and a half and walking home on one of the most beautiful nights of the year, temperatures still in the high 60s and leaves blowing everywhere.

Adam wasn't back till after 9:30 p.m., so I am hoping his homework gets done; in more entertaining news, one of his friends hacked his Facebook page and implied that I was going to be a grandmother (Daniel pointed out that when girls hack each other's pages, it's generally to say something like "Hi!" while when boys hack each other's pages, it's generally to say something scandalous). I am behind on things, so here are some more photos from Washingtonian Lake yesterday:

Poem for Monday and Washingtonian Lake Wildlife

2011-11-14T00:03:00.000-05:00

From 'Sonnets of a Portrait Painter'
By Arthur Davison Ficke

I am in love with high far-seeing places
That look on plains half-sunlight and half-storm,
In love with hours when from the circling faces
Veils pass, and laughing fellowship glows warm.
You who look on me with grave eyes where rapture
And April love of living burn confessed--
The Gods are good! the world lies free to capture!
Life has no walls. Oh, take me to your breast!
Take me--be with me for a moment’s span!
I am in love with all unveilèd faces.
I seek the wonder at the heart of man;
I would go up to the far-seeing places.
While youth is ours, turn toward me for a space
The marvel of your rapture-lighted face!

There are strange shadows fostered of the moon,
More numerous than the clear-cut shade of day...
Go forth, when all the leaves whisper of June,
Into the dusk of swooping bats at play;
Or go into that late November dusk
When hills take on the noble lines of death,
And on the air the faint astringent musk
Of rotting leaves pours vaguely troubling breath.
Then shall you see shadows whereof the sun
Knows nothing--aye, a thousand shadows there
Shall leap and flicker and stir and stay and run,
Like petrels of the changing foul or fair;
Like ghosts of twilight, of the moon, of him
Whose homeland lies past each horizon’s rim...

--------

Sunday was just as lovely as Saturday in terms of the weather -- a bit overcast but slightly warmer, making it a perfect day to be outdoors -- but Adam had a lot of homework, so instead of hiking on Sugarloaf Mountain as we originally thought we might do, we contented ourselves with a walk around the lake at the Rio complex before a necessary unexciting shopping trip to Target etc. We are now the proud owners of a new bath mat -- our old one having unraveled in the washing machine -- and Deathly Hallows Part II on DVD to complete the set (will have to watch all the extras online, I am not switching to Blu-Ray at this late date).

It's been a fairly quiet evening after the Redskins and Ravens both embarrassed themselves against the Dolphins and Seahawks respectively -- the Eagles lost too, so I'm not bothered, but now the dragging Jets-Patriots game is on and I only got a short break from football for Once Upon a Time and wish I'd insisted on catching up on Merlin. At least they're not going on about Paterno and Penn State today. Here are a few photos from around Washingtonian Lake, where we saw a cormorant -- quite unusual there -- as well as the usual ducks, geese, and songbirds:

Poem for Sunday and Maryland Colors

2011-11-13T00:09:00.002-05:00

To The Memory Of Raisley Calvert
By William Wordsworth

Calvert! it must not be unheard by them
Who may respect my name, that I to thee
Owed many years of early liberty.
This care was thine when sickness did condemn
Thy youth to hopeless wasting, root and stem--
That I, if frugal and severe, might stray
Where'er I liked; and finally array
My temples with the Muse's diadem.
Hence, if in freedom I have loved the truth;
If there be aught of pure, or good, or great,
In my past verse; or shall be, in the lays
Of higher mood, which now I meditate;--
It gladdens me, O worthy, short-lived, Youth!
To think how much of this will be thy praise.

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I am sleepy because I did a lot of walking in the woods on Saturday, first visiting the Battle Creek Cypress Swamp near Prince Frederick, then at Calvert Cliffs State Park, where the cliffs are reached by hiking two miles each way along paths and boardwalks straddling the wetlands and ponds created by beavers (which hikers near us spotted, though the beavers had ducked underwater by the time we reached the spot). The weather was magnificent, around 60 degrees without a cloud in the sky. Leaves were falling like raindrops in a couple of places and the trees were blowing in the breeze, creaking together like Ents. We had a picnic before the long walk down to the beach, where the Chesapeake Bay was too chilly to take our shoes off and do any serious hunting for shark's teeth but it was a perfect afternoon to watch the occasional boats and the lighthouse across the water.

Of course we got stuck in traffic driving home since the Terrapins were playing the Fighting Irish at Fed Ex Field (a game that Maryland lost by 24 points as well as losing their quarterback for the season to a wrist injury; despite being 20 minutes from their home stadium, Notre Dame was considered the home team, wearing golden helmets so shiny that the poor blinded fans will have to shut up about the Terps' colorful state pride uniforms). I generally loathe Nebraska but I did root for them over Penn State today; I feel sorry for the players, but the way the news talks about all the poor victimized people of Happy Valley as though the fans and not the boys are the victims of the behavior of the team leaders makes me queasy. Adam had dinner with friends while Paul and I had eggplant parmesan, then we half-watched the Oregon-Stanford game and now I am going to sleep!