Peg Duthie's Blog, page 24

so full of Now

This morning's subject line comes from Glenn McKee's Late Fragment. McKee's life included working as a UU minister and performing at slams (in his 60s), though it is the title that captured my attention, since I have told my own minister and several other potential decision-makers that I want Raymond Carver's Late Fragment printed in the program of my memorial service.

(My church has a "Wishes at Time of Death" form that the senior pastor keeps on file. Should any of you like to see it in the course of getting such things organized, if you have not done so for yourself, message or e-mail me and I will send you a copy. Speaking as someone who needs to update her other directives; one of the most liberating bits of advice I received in my 30s was from a friend who pointed out that such documents ought to be reviewed and updated every five years or so anyway, as circumstances and relationships and preferences evolve. Realizing that the documents should be treated as a snapshots rather than engravings into stone helped me get on with designating executors and beneficiaries and other arrangements. And while I don't expect my nearest and dearest to require those forms anytime soon, Stuff Happens, and I have had what-do-you-want-me-to-do-if discussions with at least two dear-to-mes within the past month because Stuff Doesn't Stop Happening and I happen to be the person the medicos and/or lawyers are likeliest to call should a bad-case-scenario come to pass. Plus, that earthquake in my parents' native province, cancer diagnoses and permutations among friends and acquaintances -- had I any delusions of immortality or other exemptions to begin with, the universe would have blasted them clear out of the water by now. [And I haven't been able to cherish such delusions since I was five, when I vividly dreamt both of being shot to death and of a future self incarcerated in prison without any knowledge of me-in-this-life. Yes, it does skew your world-view when your brain inflicts that on you before you've even gotten out of preschool.])

But, yesterday was in fact terrific -- the kind of day I dreamed about enjoying when I was small. I spent the morning completing my Memphis Open albums and reports for Tennis Buzz, with mashed neeps for breakfast, along with leftover trout from Thursday night's dinner at Prima. I headed across town to vote in a primary, and then stopped at a department store with a gift card, which I used on a new set of steak knives. I also tried on a dress on clearance: the fabric had caught my eye as perfect for an event I'm attending in May, but, alas, the cut did not flatter my body:



Still, considering it as a possibility brightened my day, as did the knowledge that I don't have to score a new dress for the event; there are several tried-and-true standards in my closet that would fit the bill. I had another gift certificate in hand for Sally's, where I picked up lipsticks and a sharpener to supplement my currently-too-purple supply, and yet another rebate for Three Brothers, where the sandwich and "signature drink" were delicious, the conversation near me faintly but not distractingly intriguing, and the newspapers and magazines plentiful:



On my way home, I stopped at the library to pick up a picture book, and at Woodland Wine Merchant for their weekly tasting. I didn't care for the beers in this week's sampler, but picked up cider and sake while chatting with Tyler, one of my favorite associates. At home, there was time with the dog and time with a friend, and glossy magazines, and a poem I finished and submitted a few minutes ago.

It is 63 F right now and the birds are singing oh so sweetly and merrily. I am short on sleep and soon going back to bed. That too is a luxury, and I am grateful.

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what to glean, what to save, what to send

My week so far has included the rejection of eight poems (though one was a near-miss) and some aggravation (both of the near-to-firing-a-firm kind and the dammit-I-left-my-badge-on-the-piano variety), not to mention truly atrocious fantasy tennis results. But, I seem to be providing pleasure to assorted Kei Nishikori fans, there was plenty of butter and black pepper to mash into the neeps I boiled for supper, and I'm closing my evening with a glass of Beaujolais (slightly rough, but sanding down a bit of jag as I sip) and assorted phrases for pieces.

Also, Rattle published a poem on Sunday, both in text and audio form: "Look at that, you son of a bitch"

I also keep meaning to mention "Some Who Wander Become Lost," which the SFPA posted online a few months ago.

My calendars contain crossouts and calculations. So, for that matter, do the cards and scraps of paper containing what I might write or shape next. In the meantime, there are roses everywhere -- I saw some near a curb on Valentine's Day, just as I was about to cross White Station Road:



The back of the card I picked up was blank. It has me wondering about roses not sent. It brings back memories of roses I have sent, and thrown, and pressed, and attempted to propagate (not yet successfully). Not every Emily Dickinson poem pairs up well with "Yellow Rose of Texas" ("So much of Heaven has gone from earth"? No), but it's not as if the ghosts of Amherst or Austin ever insisted on that. Perhaps the roses really want to grow. Perhaps the mallows will survive this morning's freezing fog. There is more than snow between the glass and the huge roses. There is more to work than work. Earlier this week, a colleague and I talked about trading plants later this year -- succulents for peppers. The dog knocked over one of my pots while I was away, and happily hoovered up asparagus stubs two nights ago. Cleaning. Digging. Dreaming.

A name for a new rose: Mozart.
That's what I'd call the first rose on the moon,
If I got there to grow it.

-- Robert Nye, "Travelling to My Second Marriage on the Day of the First Moonshot"

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yearning across the centuries

More often than not, it cheers me up when a Vaughan Williams setting is included among the opening hymns. This morning started with the Down Ampney tune, with verses by Bianco da Siena (died c. 1434), translated by Richard Frederick Littledale (1833-1890) with further alterations by the hymnal editors:

Come down, O Love divine,
seek thou this soul of mine,
and visit it with thine own ardor glowing;
O Comforter, draw near,
within my heart appear,
and kindle it, thy holy flame bestowing.

O let it freely burn,
till earthly passions turn
to dust and ashes in its heat consuming;
and let its glorious light
shine ever on my sight,
and clothe me round, the while my path illuming.

And so the glory strong,
for which the soul will long,
shall far outpass the power of human telling;

for none can guess its grace,
till we become the place
wherein the holy Spirit makes a dwelling.

First UU Nashville sanctuary, September 2015

The Story for All Ages featured Moses arguing with God about returning to Egypt, and the pastor spoke at length about astronaut Edgar Mitchell during her sermon. Between those two points, the worship associate read Neruda's Keeping Quiet and the chamber choir sang Malcolm Daglish's setting of Wendell Berry's "To the Holy Spirit":

O Thou, far off and here, whole and broken,
Who in necessity and in bounty wait,
Whose truth is light and dark, mute though spoken,
By Thy wide grace show me Thy narrow gate.

Cheekwood, December 2015

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delightfully amiss

heedless of
the hockey down the street
crocus shoots



The same yard, a week and a day earlier:



It was rather creepy hearing the branches creak and groan under the weight of so much snow.

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keeping something alive

at least for a while longer:



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a vocation of agony

At church this morning, div school student Sara Green read some passages from Martin Luther King Jr.'s "Beyond Vietnam" speech, delivered in 1967. Two excerpts:

Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government’s policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one’s own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover, when the issues at hand seem as perplexing as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict, we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty. But we must move on.

Some of us who have already begun to break the silence of the night have found that the calling to speak is often a vocation of agony, but we must speak. We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak. And we must rejoice as well, for surely this is the first time in our nation’s history that a significant number of its religious leaders have chosen to move beyond the prophesying of smooth patriotism to the high grounds of a firm dissent based upon the mandates of conscience and the reading of history. Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movement, and pray that our inner being may be sensitive to its guidance. For we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us.

The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit, and if we ignore this sobering reality, we will find ourselves organizing “clergy and laymen concerned” committees for the next generation. They will be concerned about Guatemala and Peru. They will be concerned about Thailand and Cambodia. They will be concerned about Mozambique and South Africa. We will be marching for these and a dozen other names and attending rallies without end unless there is a significant and profound change in American life and policy...

This is the role our nation has taken, the role of those who make peaceful revolution impossible by refusing to give up the privileges and the pleasures that come from the immense profits of overseas investments. I am convinced that if we are to get on to the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a thing-oriented society to a person-oriented society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights, are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, extreme materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.

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photo challenge: 100 untimed books - 52: haunting

http://upperrubberboot.tumblr.com/post/123904555213

My parents' wedding album:





Lynda Hull's poetry:



Oh phantoms.
Oh the many lives that have fountained through
my own. Soon, soon, I shall stop upon that platform

& you will meet me there, the world rosegray beyond
the scalloped tops of buildings & we shall seek
that thing which shines & doth so much torment us.

-- "The Window"

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photo challenge: 100 untimed books - 51

Prompt 51: another country

The stamp album I kept as a kid:



These stamps came from pen pals, I think:



Unrelated: headline glimpsed on MSN/NYT a minute ago -- "Socialite Murder Inquiry Reveals Black Market in Hay"

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putting teeth onto/into things?

100 untimed books prompt 50: no idea how I feel

Well, I have mixed feelings about Bobby Flay. I viscerally dislike the whole Throwdown caboodle.

That said, the man likes horses, he seems to support progressive candidates, and I like what I've read about him as a working chef and talent assessor.

For that matter, I have mixed feelings about the Great Chefs--Great Cities book. It was comped to me around 20 years ago, and I've used it more as a flower press than a cooking reference. Most of the recipes are fussier than I'll ever bother with even on a weekend. But I enjoy reading the chef bios, and sometimes looking them up on the net to see where they are now (Jody Adams in particular).



Prompt 52: biting


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some splooshes of Amontillado

That's what went into the version of wild rice and mushrooms (recipe by Shellie Holmes, adapted by Ligaya Mishan) I cooked tonight. I used half the mushrooms and butter specified and added onions.

For the tuna steaks, I used a Bobby Flay recipe as a starting point for the marinade/sauce, simplifying it to what I had in terms of ingredients and energy: about two cups of red wine, a tablespoon of ancho powder, salt, pepper, allspice, honey, and garlic. I also ladled some of the sauce over the steamed broccoli.

100 untimed books prompt 49: closer



On page 25, there is a list of common salamanders. There's a poem or three lurking within the names: Smallmouth. Tiger. Hellbenders. Mudpuppies. Dusky...

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