Monday Music: René and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog After the War (Paul Simon)

Last year I posted a wonderful live version of this Paul Simon tune. Here is the original studio recording accompanied by artwork by René Magritte and including the photo that served as a prompt for Paul Simon to write the song.

 

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Saturday Haiku: Winter Blue Sky

 bare oak branches sway
under a blue winter sky
remnants of a nest

__________________________

Photo by Charles Kinnaird

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"Let Love" (Rumi)

I've been reading Gold, a Rumi translation by Haleh Liza Gafori, and I am quite excited by this new find.

Haleh Liza Gafori is a rare gift for the English-speaking world interested in the poetry of Rumi. She is a poet of Persian descent who speaks Farsi. Born in New York City to Iranian parents, she grew up hearing Persian poetry recited and has been translating various Persian poets for a decade. 

She is a poet who is eminently qualified to convey Rumi's work to us. Her 2022 publication, Gold, is a translation of some of Rumi's ecstatic poetry. Here she offers her English translation and then sings Rumi's verse in the original Farsi. 

  

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Monday Music: Remembering David Crosby

When you see the southern cross for the first time, you know you have crossed into another realm. When you hear David Crosby's harmonies, you know he can transport you to another musical realm.  We lost David Crosby last week. He was 81 years old.

Listen to Jason Isbell's introduction to "Ohio", and you'll see why we remember. RIP David Crosby.

 

David Crosby had been one of the founding members of The Byrds. Here they are on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1965 singing their hit, "Turn, Turn, Turn" (written by Pete Seeger).

 

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Saturday Haiku: January Rain

 

window tightly closed
to the January rains
a robin appears

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Photo by Charles Kinnaird

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War Dogs

 

Rescuers work to free victims from the rubble. (Wojciech Grzedzinski for The Washington Post)

“As the city neared its midnight curfew Saturday, dogs wearing specialized shoes to protect them from injuries were scaling the mound of debris, sniffing for survivors.” (“When Russia bombs a building full of people, this is the aftermath,” by Siobhán O'Grady and Anastacia Galouchka, The Washington Post, January14, 2023)

 

War Dogs

“Man’s best friend” can be trained

to hunt, to guide, to guard,

to keep watch in the night.

There are service dogs and therapy dogs –

all taking their place to enhance the world

where humanity’s footsteps fall.

 

War dogs are trained as scouts,

sentries and messengers.

Some are mercy dogs

who find the survivors.

 

With painful foresight

in times of peace and prosperity,

mercy dogs are prepared for

human devastation.

They are fitted with shoes

to protect them in their search

as they traverse the smoking rubble

and shards

of respectable neighborhoods

devastated by war.

 

In another time,

they would have sniffed out

wounded soldiers.

Today they search

for grandmothers and children.

They seek surviving citizens

who wanted nothing more

than to arise another day

to work an ordinary job,

to hold their children in the evening,

to kiss their loved ones

and joke with their friends.

 

A traumatic day in Ukraine;

war dogs make their way.

They recognize, like Hindu saints,

the sacred light of every person,

looking for those who may have a chance,

finding people who still have breath,

helping humanity piece together what remains.

 

 

                                                  ~ Charles Kinnaird

 

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Music Of A Movement: I've Been Buked and I've Been Scorned/We Shall Overcome

 Here are two videos of songs from the Civil Rights Movement that were among those shared by Dan Rather and Elliot Kirschner in "Music of a Movement."

 

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Saturday Haiku: Wintertime

 the still of winter
brings all the town together
to keep life kindled

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Image: Winter Landscape with Skaters (1608) at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam
Artist: Hendrick Avercamp
Medium: Oil on oak 

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The Life of Poetry

The poet often taps into what Jung called our collective unconscious, giving voice to our humanity and meaning to our struggles.  A good poem, therefore, tells us something we already know. When we read it or hear it we say, “Ah, yes.” An exceptional poem tells us something we are on the verge of knowing. When we read it or hear it, we say, “Oh my!”                                                     
                                                                                                          ~ Charles Kinnaird

Consider Poems for Hungry Minds, available at Amazon. Perhaps some of the poems will make you say, “Ah, yes.” Maybe you will say, “Oh my!”

From the Preface:

This anthology gathers the voices, wisdom, community, fellowship, and longing for a better world through awareness, deep examination, and the joy of poetry. The HIGHLAND AVENUE POETS are a long-standing community of southern poets meeting monthly to workshop, edit and collectively refine their work.

Poetry slows the urgent world and grants a focus on life within it. The discipline practiced by these authors has occasioned a kind of communal joy - poems that reflect a community of compassion for the world.

You are invited within.

*    *    *

To take a peek at the first pages, check out the Amazon site here. 

Books may also be purchased at Barnes and Noble here.

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Monday Music: Old Man (Bluegrass cover)

 The Travelin' McCourys offer a fine bluegrass rendition of Neil Young's "Old Man."

 

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Saturday Haiku: Avian Shadows

Today's haiku was written by guest poet and journalist, Tom Gordon, who also supplied the photo. Tom has other poems in the new anthology, Poems for Hungry Minds.

 even when shadows
swathe its color, a bluebird
brings cheer to my world

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Photo and haiku by Tom Gordon

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A Poem for Epiphany

                                BC: AD

This was the moment when Before
Turned into After, and the future's
Uninvented timekeepers presented arms.

This was the moment when nothing
Happened. Only dull peace
Sprawled boringly over the earth.

This was the moment when even energetic Romans
Could find nothing better to do
Than counting heads in remote provinces.

And this was the moment
When a few farm workers and three
Members of an obscure Persian sect
Walked haphazard by starlight straight
Into the kingdom of heaven.

                                       ~ U.A. Fanthorpe 

 

Ursula Askham Fanthorpe (1929–2009) graduated from Oxford University, after which she taught at Cheltenham Ladies' College for sixteen years. She later worked as a clerk and receptionist at a psychiatric hospital. In 1994, she was the first woman to be nominated to the post of Professor of Poetry at Oxford. Fanthorpe published some twenty books of poetry, and was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

(Re-posted from Dan Clendenin’s blog Journey with Jesus)

Monday Music: A Child Is Born (Tony Bennett and Bill Evans)

 I'm listening to the legendary Tony Bennett with the remarkable Bill Evans 
at the piano and looking ahead to the Feast of the Epiphany.

 

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