Another Week Down

So, this has been the second full week of 2017. So far, not QUITE as shocking as 2016, but still pretty darned depressing.

We have been threatened with ice storm Armageddon, and had temps in the 60s during the past week.

Today is the day we honor Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  If ever we needed a leader like him, we need one now.  We need someone who  can speak truth to the people, and make them hear it.  We are all of us going to have to step up in the next four years and be prepared to say "NO! That is NOT what America is about!  America is NOT about racism, or letting our allies down, or making enemies out of our friends, or honoring our enemies INSTEAD of our friends. "
Keep calling your representatives and Senators, every single time an issue concerns you, let them know you are concerned.  CALL.  That is something the staffers have to deal with, and they will definitely tell their boss about the calls.

I think one reason it has been so easy for a foreign power to encourage us to be divided and hateful is because we have gotten complacent and lazy about our democracy.  We do not involve ourselves, we don't go to city council meetings, or pay much attention to anything our elected officials do, unless it threatens to directly affect our pocketbooks.  Well, friends, the stuff our Congress is talking about doing right now is going to affect ALL of our pocketbooks, big time.  The only ones who will benefit are a few very rich people who will get a nice tax break, while the rest of us stand to lose our health care and the Social Security and Medicare benefits WE'VE been paying for all these years.  Don't let them do it.  Call and voice your concern!

So, enough of that, on to the journal:

January 9, 2017

Today's Lyrics are :

"Because Of
Because of a few songs
Wherein I spoke of their mystery,
Women have been
Exceptionally kind
To my old age.
They make a secret place
In their busy lives
And they take me there.
They become naked
In their different ways
And they say
"Look at me , Leonard
Look at me one last time."
Then they bend over the bed
And cover me up
Like a baby that is shivering."

- Leonard Cohen

Perhaps he found his experience that way -
or perhaps this is a bit in jest-
But sometimes an artist's work will touch us
and we MUST respond
One way or another.

"Naked in their different ways"
again perhaps there are more difficult types of nakedness than the physical.
Sharing our thoughts, our honest thoughts - with another is very scary business.

I grow sleepy
Too weary to wield the pen
So - off to bed
To sleep
Perchance to dream...

January 10, 2017

Today's lyrics of Leonard Cohen are "Bird On A Wire"

This song is so familiar to me, I've heard it so often, that I really have to stop and look at the words.
Though that image of "A drunk in a midnight choir" is one that always makes me smile.
Free, indeed.  No inhibitions.
I don't always see the birds perched on wires around here as free.  They seem to be in rigid formation, all spaced just so - all taking off or landing at the same time.

The images of the baby still born and the beast with his horn "Tearing everyone who reached out" for him, that's an odd and very effective image for me.
Several friends, and even a family member, have had stillborn babies.
It hurts SO much, even when you aren't a family member - the lost dreams for that little one who was loved even though they weren't quite here yet.


January 11, 2017

Today the temperatures are in the 60s, and the sky is blue, streaked with feathery clouds.
The breeze is from the South, the air is moist, for a change.
Yet we are threatened with ice and then cold rain
As soon as the day after tomorrow.
Such a world we live in-
Such a world.

Today's Song lyrics are "Boogie Street"
The whole thing is about how we live in this hustling, bustling, working world, and have so very few so very short - lived reprieves of love and closeness,
and then we're back out in the world -
Back on Boogie Street.

Mr Cohen has said that the respites are tine spent with loved ones, or with a spouse or lover making love -
But to me, the respite sometimes comes in singing

Choir rehearsal tonight was a much needed, sublime experience of losing myself in the blend of our voices in song.

Many of us have been singing together for many years-
These are people I care for - my choir family- we lift our voices in worship and praise, and it is also work, to get the notes right, to get the sound to come out right,
But it is also love -
Love for God, for each other, and for that beautiful music.
We are made new,
Refreshed,
Blessed,
By our time with the music.
 Our voices blend - becoming one voice -


The part of "Boogie Street"  that
most speaks to me is:
"So come, my friends, be not afraid
We are so lightly here
It is in love that we are made;
In love we disappear.
Though all the maps of blood and flesh
Are posted on the door
There's no one who has told us yet
What Boogie Street is for."

The sublime moments seem to be what life is about, yet they are so fleeting and we're - boom- back in cold, hard reality again - back on Boogie Street.

But what he's saying is- these moments of losing ourselves  - in love, beauty, pleasure -
THAT is real life -
and we don't have a clue why all the hustle and bustle of Boogie Street seems so necessary -
No one's told us- are we to learn from it, learn to  do without it - or just endure it?

Perhaps it serves as contrast
so that we may TRULY appreciate those moments of transcendent bliss
When they appear.

January 12, 2017

Today's song lyric is By The Rivers Dark

"By the rivers dark
I wondered on
I lived my life
in Babylon

And I did forget
My holy song.
And I had no strength
In Babylon

By the Rivers dark
Where I could not see
Who was waiting there
Who was hunting me..."

A powerful lyric, and one we seem, unfortunately, to be living out.
Cast into a suddenly foreign place
By our fellow citizens who voted for "change"
They voted for revenge,
But the joke's on  them.
They are getting disaster
And unfortunately,
They will take the rest of us
down with them.
They will not realize until
Far too late
That they sold themselves
Onto Evil's plate,
And they shall be consumed.

However,
I have NOT forgotten
My holy song
That God is LOVE
And if we are of God,
We must conquer fear and hate
With LOVE.
We must fight back
and sing our holy songs
As loudly as we can.
The Spirit sings in all
Who believe
And will amplify our voices
Come, let us sing!

January 13, 2017

Cold
Icy
Slippery
Still we are at work
But tomorrow
Will be a day
To cower
Inside
With a hot beverage
And a good book
In my cozy nook
Where I can watch
The ravenous cold
Work it's icy will
Upon the world.

Today's lyrics
"Came So Far For Beauty"
"I came so far for beauty
I left so much behind
My patience and my family,
My masterpiece unsigned

I thought I'd be rewarded
For such a lonely choice
And surely she would answer
To such a very hopeless voice."


This song details a search for the approval of the desired object "Beauty" - or the attention of someone- and how no matter what the seeker does, his or her suit goes unremarked, ignored.

How often do we pursue some unobtainable, really unnecessary goal - someone's attention, recognition from a certain person or group, self-aggrandizement - how often are we ignored
because we make this pursuit for the wrong reason, or out of purely selfish need.

How often do some think they can buy approval
Only to learn that it really
Must be earned.

I should avoid the Friends shelves.
Yet another book has beguiled me.
I have so many already
Yet to be read
I'll still be reading
Ten years after I'm dead!

January 14, 2017
Today it was cold, but the rain was rain, and did not freeze.
A hawk grabbed a bird on our porch and hauled it across the street to make it his brunch.

It was one of those days when steam from heater and water heater vents streamed toward Texas on the North Wind.

It is also the day that Chelsea Hotel #2 is the Leonard Cohen Song of the day.

It does give one a glimpse of life for performers in the 60s - especially rock stars.

There is a sadness, and a little nostalgia, perhaps, in those words.

Today has been an out of sorts day for me.  I don't feel I've accomplished anything but my workout and a few loads of laundry.

January 15, 2017

A dreary, wet, lazy Sunday.

We went to church
We went out to lunch
Came back home and read
A bunch.
Then I did my elliptical training
Because by then it was REALLY raining.
Got inspired and baked some bread
The kind you eat with tea
Now we're probably too well fed
We'll just have to see

Today's lyrics are "Closing Time "

Such a long piece, and well done.
Brings out the manic
and the melancholy
of the bar scene.
Not that I ever experienced
The bar scene,
But I know those who have,
And I read a lot.
< Intermission...........
And here hath several pages to one another clung,
And thus caused an unintended empty space
To be sprung
Into this journal.

So now I must blather on
And fill this space, else
it be wasted,
And I cannot tolerate
The waste of journal space

Sometimes
The blank page
Seems an  insurmountable
Challenge.
Nothing
Comes to mind
To be placed on
The page.
Other times
The hand cannot
Write fast enough
To keep up
With the flood
Of words-
Perhaps
If one is lucky
In those profuse times
An idea or two
Pops onto the page
Amid the crush
Of words.

Usually
One is not lucky
Words may pour forth
But they are mundane
And pedestrian
No inspiring images
At all.
Having a bit of
That problem
This evening
Though
That rain
Drumming down
Out there
Begs me to do
Something
With it -

For so long
It has been so dry
The plants all threaten
To shrivel up and die
But today
The rains came
And they have been
Steady.
The kind the plants
Will find useful
So there may be hope
Of a garden again
Once Winter thaws
Into Spring.

The rhythms of rain
Are various
Not just the varying
Tempo
Of its fall to the ground,
But many other things
Affect the sound,
Windshield wipers
Whoosh, groan and thump,
Tin roofs
Make for popcorn sounds
Dull thuds come from
The shingle covered wood
Above my head
Splats from overburdened gutters
Spilling over.
But mostly
The gentle, lovely
Murmur
Of rain
Refreshing the earth
Lulling us to sleep
Soaking in deep.
--------------------> and now, back to our show!

"And it's partner found,
It's partner lost
And it's hell to pay when the fiddler stops:
It's CLOSING TIME."

A metaphor for the progression of a relationship, too, I'm sure- much of Mr. Cohen's work is.

Outside, the rain pours down
And I am grateful for a sound 
Roof over my head
And comfortable things
In a comfortable house.
Grateful for food to eat,
And electricity to keep the
House running.

January 16, 2017

Martin Luther King day -
And what an odd day in our National life it is as our president elect continues to say things that leave us in grave danger.  He would abandon our friends in NATO in favor of his man-crush Putin.
Shame on him, and shame on Congress if they let him do this.

At least today the sun came out after a long abscence
I walked outdoors again for the first time in days.
Today's lyrics:
"Coming Back To You"

Indeed this seems like a calling out to his Muse, not a conversation with a real person.  But these days I am so discouraged, it's hard to find inspiration,
Even when handed such
Beautiful words.


Liberty
(C.K.Armistead 1/16/17)

Oh, Lady,
What have we done?
Your torch has gone out,
You're losing your crown;
 We've let ourselves forget
The best things we stood for
And it ain't over yet
But it feels like we're done for.
There's a man hurling hate
At anyone brown
Threatening to close the gate
Threatening to tear it down
We must raise our voices
While we still have them
And say his are not OUR choices
And see if we can stop him
But the way ahead is uncertain
We don't know what to do
He's building an Iron Curtain
And he's drawing it around you.

Humbly submitted for your consideration.  These are rough works, mere jottings, just a discipline to make me revisit them and edit them.  I hope you enjoy them, and that they make you think, and maybe do some writing of your own.