Poem for Monday and Elm Park Eagles

The Eagle 

By Alfred, Lord Tennyson 

He clasps the crag with crooked hands;

Close to the sun in lonely lands,

Ring'd with the azure world, he stands.

The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;

He watches from his mountain walls,

And like a thunderbolt he falls.

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My Monday as usual involved laundry and sorting photos from the weekend, plus some other chores and a bit of screaming at idiots on the internet -- at least election day is tomorrow and I won't have to listen to any more voting-related bullshit. It was over 65 degrees, so a really nice day for a long walk.

We caught up on last night's episodes of The Gilded Age, as overwrought as ever, and Maigret, wondering if the two storylines converge. Now we're watching the start of the new season of Lupin, which has too many evil women but the production is good. The bald eagles we saw in Elm Park last weekend: 

Greetings for Halloween

Quick post after several hours out: first at Elm Park for Pokemon Go Chandelure Mega Raid Day with the local group, during which we also saw falling leaves, swimming geese, racing squirrels, and a pair of bald eagles -- the first ones we've seen since leaving Redmond -- then in Fitchburg with Adam and Haley, to whom we brought pumpkin chili and with whom we gave out candy to local kids, ate cookies from my parents, carved a jack-o'-lantern and toasted the pumpkin seeds, walked across the street to see Haley's sister and her husband, and made ghost in the graveyard bowls. Now we're home watching Ohio State hopefully about to lose to USC! Happy November, don't forget to change your US clocks.

Poem for Friday and Elm Park Fall

Autumn Fires 

By Robert Louis Stevenson 

In the other gardens

And all up the vale,

From the autumn bonfires

See the smoke trail!

Pleasant summer over

And all the summer flowers,

The red fire blazes,

The grey smoke towers.

Sing a song of seasons!

Something bright in all!

Flowers in the summer,

Fires in the fall!

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We had rain most of Friday, though it stopped long enough in the afternoon to take a long walk and enjoy the neighborhood leaves. I did a bunch of computer work in the morning, and in the afternoon I went to the post office in Holden to mail a couple of packages. Tonight's Guardians-Rays game was postponed due to rain. 

That meant we could binge a whole bunch of episodes of The Diplomat, which is maybe less believable than previous seasons but still so, so enjoyable -- great actors with great chemistry and snappy dialogue; beautiful mansions, gardens and government buildings; it feels like sort of a dark inverse of The West Wing. Delayed from yesterday, here are photos of the fall color and birds that I took in Elm Park:

Poem for Thursday and Renaissance Faire Music

A Musical Instrument 

By Elizabeth Barrett Browning 

I. 

What was he doing, the great god Pan, 

    Down in the reeds by the river ? 

Spreading ruin and scattering ban, 

Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, 

And breaking the golden lilies afloat 

    With the dragon-fly on the river. 

II. 

He tore out a reed, the great god Pan, 

    From the deep cool bed of the river : 

The limpid water turbidly ran, 

And the broken lilies a-dying lay, 

And the dragon-fly had fled away, 

    Ere he brought it out of the river. 

III. 

High on the shore sat the great god Pan, 

    While turbidly flowed the river ; 

And hacked and hewed as a great god can, 

With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed, 

Till there was not a sign of a leaf indeed 

    To prove it fresh from the river. 

IV. 

He cut it short, did the great god Pan, 

    (How tall it stood in the river !) 

Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, 

Steadily from the outside ring, 

And notched the poor dry empty thing 

    In holes, as he sate by the river. 

V. 

This is the way,' laughed the great god Pan, 

    Laughed while he sate by the river,) 

The only way, since gods began 

To make sweet music, they could succeed.' 

Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, 

    He blew in power by the river. 

VI. 

Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan ! 

    Piercing sweet by the river ! 

Blinding sweet, O great god Pan ! 

The sun on the hill forgot to die, 

And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly 

    Came back to dream on the river. 

VII. 

Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, 

    To laugh as he sits by the river, 

Making a poet out of a man : 

The true gods sigh for the cost and pain, — 

For the reed which grows nevermore again 

    As a reed with the reeds in the river. 

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My Thursday started early because I had a 9 am semiannual physical (with the PA because after the doctor canceled on me last week, she had no openings till the end of November and I have prescriptions I need renewed before then, though I really liked the PA and she spent more time with me than most doctors ever have). In the afternoon I went with Paul to his eye doctor, though I walked to That's Entertainment and then to Elm Park to enjoy the animals and fall color for an hour. 

In between we watched most of the Guardians victory while working on our computers, and now we're watching what's probably the end of the Dodgers season after my Thursday night chat and the start of the new season of The Diplomat, which is enormous fun to watch, four main actors at the top of their game and with great chemistry. Because of chat, I didn't have time to upload my park photos, so here are some of the musicians and musical instruments from Mystic Rhythms at King Richard's Faire:

Poem for Wednesday and Elm Park Squirrels

The Mountain and the Squirrel 

By Ralph Waldo Emerson 

The mountain and the squirrel

Had a quarrel,

And the former called the latter

"Little prig."

Bun replied,

"You are doubtless very big;

But all sorts of things and weather

Must be taken in together

To make up a year

And a sphere.

And I think it no disgrace

To occupy my place.

If I'm not so large as you,

You are not so small as I,

And not half so spry:

I'll not deny you make

A very pretty squirrel track.

Talents differ; all is well and wisely put;

If I cannot carry forests on my back,

Neither can you crack a nut."

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I had a chatty Wednesday with two of my high school friends, then with Laurie and Cel around watching the first half of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (the good half of the movie). It was a surprisingly warm day, in the 70s, so also a really nice day for walking. We watched some of the Dodgers-Brewers game around dinner. 

Most of my evening TV was the season premiere of VisionQuest, which is fantastic; the visuals call back to WandaVision is lovely ways, James Spader's performance is a work of art, the use of music is great, Philomena Cunk is villain-adjacent! Then we watched Slow Horses, really mediocre this season. Squirrels of Elm Park: 

Poem for Monday and Tower Hill Fairies

The Fairies 

By William Allingham 

Up the airy mountain,

Down the rushy glen,

We daren’t go a-hunting

For fear of little men;

Wee folk, good folk,

Trooping all together;

Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl’s feather!

Down along the rocky shore

Some make their home,

They live on crispy pancakes

Of yellow tide-foam;

Some in the reeds

Of the black mountain-lake,

With frogs for their watchdogs,

All night awake.

High on the hill-top

The old King sits;

He is now so old and grey

He’s nigh lost his wits.

With a bridge of white mist

Columbkill he crosses,

On his stately journeys

From Slieveleague to Rosses;

Or going up with music

On cold starry nights,

To sup with the Queen

Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget

For seven years long;

When she came down again

Her friends were all gone.

They took her lightly back,

Between the night and morrow,

They thought that she was fast asleep,

But she was dead with sorrow.

They have kept her ever since

Deep within the lake,

On a bed of flag-leaves,

Watching till she wake.

By the craggy hillside,

Through the mosses bare,

They have planted thorn trees

For pleasure, here and there.

Is any man so daring

As dig them up in spite,

He shall find their sharpest thorns

In his bed at night.

Up the airy mountain,

Down the rushy glen,

We daren’t go a-hunting

For fear of little men;

Wee folk, good folk,

Trooping all together;

Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl’s feather!

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I had a lot of laundry after dressing up over the weekend for fairs, and I did no other chores the past couple of days, so Monday mostly involved catch-up on those things. It was a pretty day, warmer because of the post-tropical storm air, so I did get a nice walk in, and we hung out with our neighbors for a little while before dinner. 

The late afternoon and evening have been all about baseball, though neither team I rooted for (the Dodgers and Rays) managed to win, though I have nothing against the Brewers or Guardians. Some photos from the Weekend of Wonder at the New England Botanic Garden at Tower Hill to celebrate Fairy Hollow: crafts, wand-making, owl visitors!

Greetings from Fairy Hollow

Quick post after a nice afternoon with Adam and Haley at Tower Hill Botanic Garden, which is having a Weekend of Wonder to go with its Fairy Hollow exhibition of fairy houses -- with live music, craft vendors, a beer garden, visiting owls, and various other fun. We walked around to see the changing leaves and fall flowers in the magnificent afternoon weather.

 

In the late afternoon we stopped at CVS and Shaw's and went to Panera for dinner, then we came home for the Guardians-White Sox game. Unfortunately the White Sox didn't win, but it ended early enough for us to watch the modern masterpiece Water Park Shark, which needs less plot and more sharks but is still ridiculous enough to be fully entertaining!