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| Cozy Autumn by Rita Kónya |
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She philosophically noted dates as they came past in the revolution of the year . . . her own birthday; and every other day individualized by incidents in which she had taken some share. She suddenly thought one afternoon, when looking in the glass at her fairness, that there was yet another date, of greater importance to her than those; that of her own death, when all these charms would have disappeared; a day which lay sly and unseen among all the other days of the year, giving no sign or sound when she annually passed over it; but not the less surely there. When was it? Why did she not feel the chill of each yearly encounter with such a cold relation? . . . some time in the future those who had known her would say: 'It is the ——th, the day that poor Tess Durbeyfield died'; and there would be nothing singular to their minds in the statement. Of that day, doomed to be her terminus in time through all the ages, she did not know the place in month, week, season or year.
from Chapter 15
of Tess of the d'Urbervilles: A Pure Woman
by Thomas Hardy
“Oh God, midnight’s not bad, you wake and go back to sleep, one or two’s not bad, you toss but sleep again. Five or six in the morning, there’s hope, for dawn’s just under the horizon. But three, now, Christ, three A.M.! Doctors say the body’s at low tide then. The soul is out. The blood moves slow. You’re the nearest to dead you’ll ever be save dying. Sleep is a patch of death, but three in the morn, full wide-eyed staring, is living death! You dream with your eyes open. God, if you had strength to rouse up, you’d slaughter your half-dreams with buckshot! But no, you lie pinned to a deep well-bottom that’s burned dry. The moon rolls by to look at you down there, with its idiot face. It’s a long way back to sunset, a far way on to dawn, so you summon all the fool things of your life, the stupid lovely things done with people known so very well who are now so very dead – And wasn’t it true, had he read somewhere, more people in hospitals die at 3 A.M. than at any other time . . .” (p 58)
from Something Wicked This Way Comes
by Ray Bradbury
Additional Autumnal Ray Bradbury:
The Halloween Tree ~ Moundshroud
The Pedestrian ~ from Dandelion Wine
1. When someone recently dead appears in your dreams, it is not necessarily because they have come with a message for you from the other side, but more likely because you have something to tell them.
2. When someone from your past appears in your dreams, they are probably a stand - in for someone in your present. If that's me in the blue sweater, what message am I trying to tell myself? What is the message from my psyche?
The Last Chance
The myna bird speaks
of love. His whistle
cuts into the bone
ears of a whitetail's
head stuffed above
the bar.
Fifty miles the county's
dry. You stop here
to tell yourself
go home but hear
the black experience
of a goddamned bird
whose hello sucks
at the marrow
of your bones.
You wonder how a soul
can pass from
his beak and break
upon your face, split
the whiskers you grew
to be wise in. You wonder
at his avalanche of words,
the last drink you took,
the dance on your skin
you can't beat time to.
You wonder, but you
do not ask. You
listen hard with
your cracking eyes.
He asks about your life.
You tell him lies
while he preens
a feather, lets it drop.
Your life is sour
on the glass. Crow
made the earth and all
things therein, brought fire.
This bird's a ghost
you tell your sins.
Nobody is listening.
Outside the sun falls
into the brittle grass.
by Jim Barnes (b 1933)
in Sundown Explains Nothing, 2019 (p 139 - 40)
Additional posts: FN & QK & KL
They Sit Together on the Porch
They sit together on the porch, the dark
Almost fallen, the house behind them dark.
Their supper done with, they have washed and dried
The dishes–only two plates now, two glasses,
Two knives, two forks, two spoons–small work for two.
She sits with her hands folded in her lap,
At rest. He smokes his pipe. They do not speak,
And when they speak at last it is to say
What each one knows the other knows. They have
One mind between them, now, that finally
For all its knowing will not exactly know
Which one goes first through the dark doorway, bidding
Goodnight, and which sits on a while alone.
By Wendell Berry
"Of all God's creatures, there is only one that cannot be made slave of the leash. That one is the cat. If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve the man, but it would deteriorate the cat."
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| The Two Friends
Daniel Ridgeway Knight (American, 1839 - 1924) |
Walking
A big October morning,
the village church-bells,
the road along the ridge,
the chestnut burr and sumach,
the hills above the bridge
with autumn colors glow.
Now we strike a steady gait,
walking towards the future,
letting past and present wait,
we push on in the sun,
Now hark! Something bids us pause . . .
But we keep on a walking,
’tis yet not noon-day,
the road still calls us onward,
today we do not choose to die
or to dance, but to live and walk.
[ellipses in original]
Charles Ives (1874 – 1954)
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| Chicago: City of Peace
NO KINGS ~ October 18, 20025 |
Thanks Laura! Although we wish it were not so, the unnerving material appears to be never - ending, and it seems that pointing out the obvious is a necessary task. Sigh. Evenso, I will take a break from it, for a few weeks at least, and clear my head.
Megan, thanks so much for your vote of confidence. Your kind words re-energize me to keep on pointing out the obvious in the hopes that one day we will stem the tide of craziness!
Warren G. Harding's speeches “leave the impression of an army of pompous phrases moving over the landscape in search of an idea; sometimes those meandering words would actually capture a straggling thought and bear it triumphantly, a prisoner in their midst, until it died of servitude and overwork.” ~William Gibbs McAdoo
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| Afternoon Tea (1910)
Richard E. Miller (American, 1875 – 1943) |
"The last days of the holiday, like fairy gold counted in the sunlight, disappeared as fast as they were numbered. The shining wealth of summer that had been theirs to squander dwindled to a few dull-gleaming days. Ruth, Naomi, Rachel, and Phoebe began to to spend them with the distraught recklessness of those who see the end of the world. A day was ransomed to climb the hill, and a morning to revisit the scene of Naomi's accident" (181 - 82).
from The Exiles
by Hilary McKay
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Henri-Edmond Cross (French, 1856 – 1910) |
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If I Could Tell You
Time will say nothing but I told you so,
Time only knows the price we have to pay;
If I could tell you I would let you know.
If we should weep when clowns put on their show,
If we should stumble when musicians play,
Time will say nothing but I told you so.
There are no fortunes to be told, although,
Because I love you more than I can say,
If I could tell you I would let you know.
The winds must come from somewhere when they blow,
There must be reasons why the leaves decay;
Time will say nothing but I told you so.
Perhaps the roses really want to grow,
The vision seriously intends to stay;
If I could tell you I would let you know.
Suppose all the lions get up and go,
And all the brooks and soldiers run away;
Will Time say nothing but I told you so?
If I could tell you I would let you know.
Wystan Hugh Auden (1907-1973)
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| Church of St. Thomas Becket ~ Skeffington, England
"Skeffington was Rafferty's mother's maiden name." |
Sonnet #43
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
by Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950)
from her collection
The Ballad of Harp-Weaver and Other Poems
More poems: QK & FN & KL
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| Vintage Postcard ~ Nora Paterson |
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| Willard Marvin Carriker
Born 102 years ago today: July 18, 1923 - June 27, 1987 |
