Poem for Wednesday and Glen Echo Trains

The Children's Hour 

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 

Between the dark and the daylight,

      When the night is beginning to lower,

Comes a pause in the day’s occupations,

      That is known as the Children’s Hour.

I hear in the chamber above me

      The patter of little feet,

The sound of a door that is opened,

      And voices soft and sweet.

From my study I see in the lamplight,

      Descending the broad hall stair,

Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra,

      And Edith with golden hair.

A whisper, and then a silence:

      Yet I know by their merry eyes

They are plotting and planning together

      To take me by surprise.

A sudden rush from the stairway,

      A sudden raid from the hall!

By three doors left unguarded

      They enter my castle wall!

They climb up into my turret

      O’er the arms and back of my chair;

If I try to escape, they surround me;

      They seem to be everywhere.

They almost devour me with kisses,

      Their arms about me entwine,

Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen

      In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine!

Do you think, O blue-eyed banditti,

      Because you have scaled the wall,

Such an old mustache as I am

      Is not a match for you all!

I have you fast in my fortress,

      And will not let you depart,

But put you down into the dungeon

      In the round-tower of my heart.

And there will I keep you forever,

      Yes, forever and a day,

Till the walls shall crumble to ruin,

      And moulder in dust away!

-------- 

I had a busy, chatty Wednesday, first with all three of my good high school friends -- one had computer issues and one had snow, but everyone made it to chat, though I saw two of them and the daughter of the third when I was in Maryland last week -- and then, after lunch, with Kristen and Laurie before watching the first hour of the extended edition of The Return of the King. 

We took a walk in the late afternoon (it's already dark before 5 p.m., boo) but the geese and ducks were at the beach, and after Indian food for dinner, we watched Secrets of Great British Castles, which was very enjoyable, though it reminded me that it's been too many years since I've been to the UK. Here are photos from Brookside Gardens' train show, which has a recreation of old Glen Echo Park:

Greetings from Wheaton

We got up on Sunday just before the hotel breakfast ended. Adam came down to meet us, then he and Haley packed up Pepper and their things to drive to New England. So we said goodbye to them, then headed out to Brookside Gardens. The park is set up for the annual winter lights show and the train display in the conservatory, so although the lights weren't turned on while we were there, we got to see the trains and Glen Echo Park recreation as well as the remaining chrysanthemums and fall flowers. 

The weather was chilly but the rain had stopped, so we had an uncrowded afternoon. It was Pokemon Community Day, so I also caught many Pikipeks and evolved some shiny jewel-tone Toucannons before we headed to my parents' house, from which we all went to Gregorio's and met my friend Linda and her husband (who's my father's doctor too). My parents treated us all to dinner, after which we went back to their house for leftover Thanksgiving desserts (I was too full for more than a piece of mini pecan pie). 

Poem for Tuesday and Glen Echo Glass

Ode To Pity
By Jane Austen

1

Ever musing I delight to tread
The Paths of honour and the Myrtle Grove
Whilst the pale Moon her beams doth shed
On disappointed Love.
While Philomel on airy hawthorn Bush
Sings sweet and Melancholy, And the thrush
Converses with the Dove.

2

Gently brawling down the turnpike road,
Sweetly noisy falls the Silent Stream--
The Moon emerges from behind a Cloud
And darts upon the Myrtle Grove her beam.
Ah! then what Lovely Scenes appear,
The hut, the Cot, the Grot, and Chapel queer,
And eke the Abbey too a mouldering heap,
Cnceal'd by aged pines her head doth rear
And quite invisible doth take a peep.

--------

Cheryl was still in town on Monday morning recovering from Awesome Con, so she came over late in the morning and we watched Now You See Me because we're going to see the sequel next week when it comes out. Then we got Lebanese Taverna for lunch and ate it while watching Paul Mazursky's Tempest with Cassavetes and Rowlands (plus a very young Molly Ringwald and Sam Robards in their first roles) because I found out she had never seen it and I adore it even if it's a little dated.

When Paul was done with work in the late afternoon, we all went to the mall to see Love and Friendship. We were the only people in the theater, meaning we could laugh as loudly as we wanted, which we did a lot because it's hilarious and the performances are all delightful, especially Beckinsdale's -- and it's nice to see a Jane Austen adaptation that really isn't judging any of the women badly! Afterward we went to Noodles & Co. for dinner. Some photos of glassblowing at Glen Echo on Sunday:

Poem for Monday, Washington Folk Festival, Les Mis

The Universal Prayer
By Victor Hugo
Translated by Henry Highton

Come, child, to prayer; the busy day is done,
  A golden star gleams through the dusk of night;
The hills are trembling in the rising mist,
  The rumbling wain looms dim upon the sight;
All things wend home to rest; the roadside trees
Shake off their dust, stirred by the evening breeze.

The sparkling stars gush forth in sudden blaze,
  As twilight open flings the doors of night;
The fringe of carmine narrows in the west,
  The rippling waves are tipped with silver light;
The bush, the path—all blend in one dull gray;
The doubtful traveller gropes his anxious way.

Oh, day! with toil, with wrong, with hatred rife;
  Oh, blessed night! with sober calmness sweet,
The sad winds moaning through the ruined tower,
  The age-worn hind, the sheep's sad broken bleat—
All nature groans opprest with toil and care,
And wearied craves for rest, and love, and prayer.

At eve the babes with angels converse hold,
  While we to our strange pleasures wend our way,
Each with its little face upraised to heaven,
  With folded hands, barefoot kneels down to pray,
At selfsame hour with selfsame words they call
On God, the common Father of them all.

And then they sleep, and golden dreams anon,
  Born as the busy day's last murmurs die,
In swarms tumultuous flitting through the gloom
  Their breathing lips and golden locks descry.
And as the bees o'er bright flowers joyous roam,
Around their curtained cradles clustering come.

Oh, prayer of childhood! simple, innocent;
  Oh, infant slumbers! peaceful, pure, and light;
Oh, happy worship! ever gay with smiles,
  Meet prelude to the harmonies of night;
As birds beneath the wing enfold their head,
Nestled in prayer the infant seeks its bed.

--------

Sunday was the second day of the Washington Folk Festival, which we had to miss last year while moving older son to Seattle. Ocean Orchestra opened the day on the Potomac Palisades Stage with a wonderful set featuring songs I've loved by them for years which will finally be on an album coming out in a few months. We also saw the Celtic fiddle group Maelstrom, some glassblowing, some pottery-making, and a great many crafts!

















We'd brought a picnic which we ate at the tables in Glen Echo Park, and we walked over the new bridge on the old trolley tracks. Since it was on the way, we stopped at the Bethesda Co-op to get wine, gnocchi, fruit, sesame sticks, and veggie Italian sausage, plus at Giant to get cat food. Then, after veggie burgers for dinner, we watched Les Misérables (yes, the Jackman/Crowe version, shut up) in honor of the date!

Poem for Tuesday, Folk Festival, Beauty and the Beast

In the Happo-En Garden, Tokyo
By Linda Pastan

The way a birthmark
on a woman's face defines
rather than mars
her beauty,

so the skyscrapers--
those flowers of technology--
reveal the perfection
of the garden they surround.      

Perhaps Eden is buried
here in Japan,
where an incandescent
koi slithers snakelike

to the edge of the pond;
where a black-haired
Eve-san in the petalled
folds of a kimono

once showed her silken body
to the sun, then picked a persimmon
and with a small bow
bit into it.

--------

Most of my Monday was too boring to describe -- suffice to say it involved lots of chores and not enough sunshine, though when I was out there the bunnies were peeking out to nibble the grass. Daniel is back at work in College Park, Adam is at beach week where apparently he has had lots of barbecue, ice cream, and sun, and the cats want constant attention since they aren't here. This makes jewelry repair difficult, as little paws get in the way.

Beauty and the Beast came back on the air on Monday night, and since for some incomprehensible reason the CW has renewed it even though its ratings have been abominable and, worse, it has nearly been unwatchable, I put it on. From a show that started with a focus on three women of color whose love lives were tangential to their friends and careers, the episodes have devolved to failing the Bechdel test. More from the Washington Folk Festival:


Lulu's Fate on the Yurt Stage.


The Foggy Bottom Morris Men...


...and the Rock Creek Morris Women.


Angela and myself by the roses behind the Bumper Car Pavilion...


...which hosts the festival craft show...


...where one can buy wonderful locally-made soaps, jewelry, bird feeders, wind chimes, and tie-dye shirts among other things.


Jennifer Cutting's Ocean Orchestra on the Potomac Palisades Stage: Jennifer, Lisa Moscatiello, Rico Petruccelli, Stephen Winick, and Andrew Dodds...


...and me and Paul with Steve and Jennifer by the carousel.

Poem for Monday and Washington Folk Festival

A Book Of Music
By Jack Spicer

Coming at an end, the lovers
Are exhausted like two swimmers.  Where
Did it end?  There is no telling.  No love is
Like an ocean with the dizzy procession of the waves’ boundaries
From which two can emerge exhausted, nor long goodbye
Like death.
Coming at an end.  Rather, I would say, like a length
Of coiled rope
Which does not disguise in the final twists of its lengths
Its endings.
But, you will say, we loved
And some parts of us loved
And the rest of us will remain
Two persons.  Yes,
Poetry ends like a rope.

--------

Daniel wanted to sleep late on his day off, so we left him and went to meet Angela and Kevin plus her mother at the Washington Folk Festival at Glen Echo Park. It was wonderful as always -- we went to see Ocean Orchestra, which always opens Sunday morning on the Potomac Palisades Stage, then we visited the craft display in the Bumper Car Pavilion, ate lunch in the picnic area, and stopped on the way to go retrieve Daniel to say hi to some friends and because Laura Baron's singing was so gorgeous:


Foggy Bottom Morris Men


Jennifer Cutting's Ocean Orchestra


And the delightful Jennifer Cutting herself


Angela with one of HourGlass Creations' capes


With our menfolk outside the Bumper Car Pavilion craft show


Some of the crafters worked while they displayed their wares


Laura Baron with Pat Quinn


Me with Ocean Orchestra's Stephen Winick and Jennifer Cutting

We had to get home early enough in the afternoon for Daniel to get some time behind the wheel; he is coming home from College Park on the weekends this summer so he can get his driver's license before he graduates from college. Then we caught the end of the Orioles game, which they won partly because Machado hit a grand slam, had dinner, and took Daniel food shopping before dropping him off at his apartment. Adam reports that they spent all day at the beach in Rehoboth and barbecued for dinner!

Placeholder for Monday

Had an awesome Sunday first at the Washington Folk Festival, where Adam was volunteering and where the rest of us went with Delta (Ocean Orchestra opened the festivities, we had lunch at the picnic tables listening to bluegrass, bought tie-dyes and roll-on perfume, visited the Puppet Theatre and museum, and walked around the amusement park ruins and glassblowing studio. Then we went downtown to the National Gallery of Art to see the Diaghilev and the Ballets Russes exhibit, which is awesome -- paintings, costumes, music, lots of video of ballets. Came home, watched The Best Offer and The Next Three Days, and now I am showing Delta the first season of Arrested Development. More when I am caught up!

Poem for Saturday, Phoneography, Crossover, Olympics

In This Light
By Matt Hart

nothing and nothing
gets by you, but I get
so distracted
that my notice
has been put on notice
for birds and for traffic
For instance,
the constant
slap of the sound
of waves
against gutters
gets by me
Grass stain on my hands
from falling down
at the hospital
gets by me Physics
Sequined dresses
The Olympics get by me
Meanwhile,
the mountains are,
so far, only distant,
and some days
I am even making my way
through them
with my pants on,
which is lucky,
though at other junctures
sunflowers and pine tree
needles my arms
in full blossom
as you appear
around a corner
kaleidoscopically
The day looking up
between us
pink clouds

--------

From today's Poem-A-Day at Poets.org.

We had a nice Friday -- Paul worked from home, so I had most of the family around for most of the day. Adam went running and biking, Daniel told us all about Google Fiber, I wrote a review of Deep Space Nine's "Crossover", always great fun to watch (the only thing hotter than Kira/Kira being Kira/Sisko).

We had an early dinner with my parents, then went with them to the Phoneography exhibit at Photoworks in Glen Echo Park. Adam had two photos in the exhibition and they had a reception with judge Andrea Dylewski and other staffers at Photoworks (plus chocolate, yay).











Then we came home to watch the Olympics opening ceremonies, which had many highlights -- Kenneth Branagh reading Shakespeare, J.K. Rowling reading J.M. Barrie, ROWAN ATKINSON FOR THE WIN, the Queen making a James Bond film. And I loved the celebration of the NHS with all the children and feting of the working class. Have they kicked Mitt Romney out yet?