http://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2009/01/author-john-updike-dies-at-age-76.html

Did you get yourself some dinner?
asks the no-food man,
hungry head and dirty bed,
friendly look on the face of this no-friend man.

I don’t have any money,
says the no-cash man,
ripped jeans and bloody knees,
stride stumbled on this stagger-step man.

I seen Fireball give you some last night,
says the no-bath man,
flannel shirt and pony tail,
Branson ball cap on the head of this no-vacation man.

You say he gave me some money?
asks the ‘nother-drink man,
open chops and soiled mop,
gaze of wonder on the face of this no-shave man.

Hell yeah, gave you five bucks (where’s your five bucks?),
replies the no-shit man,
runny nose and grizzled cheeks,
glance of knowing in the eyes of this no-family man.

Fireball’s good people,
says the no-home man,
stocking cap and green army jacket,
old work boots on the feet of this no-job man.

I like to think of this one as a companion to the last. A kind of “other side of the hill” sort of thought.

Homebrew

Yesterday the glass carboy in the closet
gurgled and belched the smell of yeast
through the whole house—
but today its aroma finally smacks of booze.

We ran, you and I, as soon as we got home last night,
to the room we decided would be dark and cool,
our soon-to-be-born son’s closet—
to check on the progress of our Sunday work together.

Staring at the twirling and bubbling,
we were amazed at the activity
in the mix we combined—
much like the kicks in your belly.

Mardi Gras

I guess the note on the table says it all.
I’m at home, but you’re asleep,
and the best I can do
is pray.
While I worked and talked and laughed
about coffee and music and booze,
you cried.

Rickshaws drive drunk frat boys
and topless women from bar to bar tonight.
And Andrew couldn’t believe
I don’t smoke pot.
But if I did, would I believe
we have a family?

Would I forget the silent gobbet on the monitor,
the no motion, the no heartbeat, the no joy?

Tonight’s the last chance
for merrymaking
before we enter the season of solemnity.
And the one thing you want
is the one thing I can’t seem to make.

Okay, so I want to be a writer or whatever. And occasionally I write. The problem I’ve had, however, is in having an audience to read what I write. So I don’t really know how bad I suck or how royally I rule. Just last week, I attended my first critique session. Went pretty well, I think. But then I thought, Hot dang, I’ve got all these well-read friends on the blog that maybe might be willing to serve as critics for me as well.

So what do you say?  

And maybe you’ve got some things you’d like others to read, too. Could we have a category where we post “Works in Progress” or some such thing? Perdy good idea if you ask me.

Guess I’ll start. Tell me what you think. And although I’m willing to discuss the subject matter of whatever I post, I’d like the discussion to go past that and also to focus on the form, the structure. Like, does it work or not. I know I’m not dealing with literary critics here; but those types are useless anyway. It’s you all, the common reader, and your response that I’m most interested in. Here’s a poem I wrote the other day:

[...]

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93250786&ft=1&f=1001

Ok, get ready. Are you set? Swallow your coffee or you will spit it all over your keyboard.

Link.

A few years ago the Swiss added to their national constitution a provision requiring “account to be taken of the dignity of creation when handling animals, plants and other organisms.” No one knew exactly what it meant, so they asked the Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology to figure it out. The resulting report, “The Dignity of Living Beings with Regard to Plants,” is enough to short circuit the brain.

A “clear majority” of the panel adopted what it called a “biocentric” moral view, meaning that “living organisms should be considered morally for their own sake because they are alive.” Thus, the panel determined that we cannot claim “absolute ownership” over plants and, moreover, that “individual plants have an inherent worth.” This means that “we may not use them just as we please, even if the plant community is not in danger, or if our actions do not endanger the species, or if we are not acting arbitrarily.”

Hat tip: Rachel Lucas

The plant community.

Who called it? I’ll tell you who. A guy named Gilbert called it in 1904, and I will quote his work at excessive length because I find the entire thing so side-splittingly funny. G. K. Chesterton, in his work of satire, The Napolean of Notting Hill:

The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children’s games from the beginning, and will probably do it till the end, which is a nuisance for the few people who grow up. And one of the games to which it is most attached is called “Keep to-morrow dark,” and which is also named (by the rustics in Shropshire, I have no doubt) “Cheat the Prophet.” The players listen very carefully and respectfully to all that the clever men have to say about what is to happen in the next generation. The players then wait until all the clever men are dead, and bury them nicely. They then go and do something else. That is all. For a race of simple tastes, however, it is great fun.

For human beings, being children, have the childish wilfulness and the childish secrecy. And they never have from the beginning of the world done what the wise men have seen to be inevitable. They stoned the false prophets, it is said; but they could have stoned true prophets with a greater and juster enjoyment. Individually, men may present a more or less rational appearance, eating, sleeping, and scheming. But humanity as a whole is changeful, mystical, fickle, delightful. Men are men, but Man is a woman.

[...]

I’ve mentioned on here several times the name Bede Griffiths. He, as I’ve written before, was a Catholic monk who started a Christian monastery in the Hindu, ashram style. And while I knew he was a student and life-long friend of C.S. Lewis, I just learned recently a most surprising tidbit about their friendship.

Anyone who has studied the lives of Lewis and/or Tolkien has probably learned of the role Tolkien played in Lewis’ conversion: Lewis, an agnostic, becomes friends with Tolkien, a Christian, who convinces Lewis that all the world’s myths point to and look for their final fulfillment in Christ, the True Myth.

And another part of the Lewis-conversion story I’ve always liked is this as told by Joseph Pearce:

It was a discussion between Barfield, Lewis, and Alan Griffiths, one of Lewis’s pupils, which was to prove instrumental in edging Lewis closer to conversion. Barfield and Griffiths were lunching in Lewis’s room when Lewis happened to refer to philosophy as ‘a subject’. ‘It wasn’t a subject to Plato,’ Barfield retorted, ‘it was a way.’

[As Lewis related later], “The quiet but fervent agreement of Griffiths, and the quick glance of understanding between these two, made me realize my own frivolity. Enough had been thought, and said, and felt, and imagined. It was about time something should be done.”

…[And as Owen Barfield remembered], “Lewis, Griffiths, and I went for long walks together. We talked a good deal about theology. I was at that time an agnostic, I suppose, and when three people go off to walk together times come when two go off to talk to each other. I was with Griffiths and I told him I was an agnostic and we got talking about being damned and some remark he made elicited the reply in me that ‘in that case I suppose that I am damned’. And I’ll never forget the calm, collected way he turned around and said, ‘But of course you are’. This amused Lewis very much of course when I told him afterwards.”

Griffiths’ vocation as a monk efffectively excluded him from the intellectual rough and tumble of Oxford life, although he and Lewis continued to correspond regularly. Barfield, on the other hand, played an important part in the intellectual circle surrounding Lewis and Tolkien at Oxford. This group of essentially like-minded people became known as the Inklings.

This Alan Griffiths character later became a Benedictine monk and recieved the name Bede. He also was influenced much by Chesterton to become an adament distributist. He also was a correspondant with Thomas Merton and Basil Pennington. Anyway, this may not seem all that interesting to ya’ll, but I found it all fascinating. The connections among folks I read and admire continue to intrigue me.

When I read the following, especially the first section with the phone message, I felt so very sad.  How many people are waiting for a phone call like that?  How many people’s lives have been so harsh and devastating, that when they did recieve it, they’d say something like “I knew it!”

[the following an excerpt from 'This Person', a story in the new Miranda July book No one belongs here more than you.]

Someone is getting excited.  Somebody somewhere is shaking with excitement because something tremendous is about to happen to this person.  This person has dressed for the occasion.  This person has hoped and dreamed and now it is really happening and this person can hardly believe it.  But believing is not an issue here, the time for faith and fantasy is over, it is really really happening.  It involves stepping forward and bowing.  Possibly there is some kneeling, such as when one is knighted.  One is almost never knighted.  But this person may kneel and receive a tap on each shoulder with a sword.  Or more likely, this person will be in a car or a store or under a vinyl canopy when it happens.  Or online or on the phone.  It could be a e-mail re: your knighthood.  Or a long, laughing, rambling phone message in which every person this person has ever known is talking on a speakerphone and they are all saying, You have passed the test, it was all just a test, we were only kidding, real life is so much better than that.  This person is laughing out loud with relief and playing the message back to get the address of the place where every person this person has ever known is waiting to hug this person and bring her into the fold of life.  It is really exciting, and it’s not just a dream, it’s real.

They are all waiting by a picnic table in a park this person has driven past many times before.  There they are, it’s everyone.  There are balloons taped to the benches, and the girl this person used to stand next to at the bus stop is waving a streamer.  Everyone is smiling.  For a moment this person is almost creeped out by the scene, but it would be so like this person to become depressed on the happiest day ever, and so this person bucks up and joins the crowd. 

Teachers of subjects that this person wasn’t even good at are kissing this person and renouncing the very subjects they taught.  Math teachers are saying that math was just a funny way of saying “I love you.”  But now they are simply saying it, I love you, and the chemisty and PE teachers are also saying it, and this person can tell they really mean it.  It’s totally amazing.  Certain jerks and idiots and a–holes appear from time to time, and it is as if they have had plastic surgery, their faces are disfigured with love.  The handsome a–holes are plain and kind, and the ugly jerks are sweet, and they are folding this person’s sweater and putting it somewhere where it won’t get dirty.  Best of all, every person this person has ever loved is there.  Even the ones who got away.  They hold this person’s hand and tell this person how hard it was to pretend to get mad and drive off and never come back.  This person almost can’t believe it, it seemed so real, this person’s heart was broken and has healed and now this person hardly knows what to think.  This person is almost mad.  But everyone soothes this person.  Everyone explains that it was absolutely necessary to know how strong this person was.  They…have little medals that they are pinning on this person; they are badges of great honor and strength.  The badges sparkle in the sunlight and everyone cheers.

 

http://www.wikihow.com/Get-out-of-a-Car-That%27s-Hanging-over-a-Cliff

 

I may have mentioned this publication before, but it is one of the smartest, most intelligent cultural commentaries I’ve ever read.

www.stopsmilingonline.com

 Their website is updated every day with new reviews and new stories, and they interview the most fascinating people in music, film, literature, art, and more. 
Each issue focuses in on a different topic, so the last three issues have been; The Midwest Issue, The British Issue, and The Documentary Issue.

I have never been so impressed by any magazine, and the depth and level of interest they maintain is astounding.