Poem: This Be The Verse

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
    They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
    And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn
    By fools in old-style hats and coats,
Who half the time were soppy-stern
    And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man.
    It deepens like a coastal shelf.
Get out as early as you can,
    And don’t have any kids yourself.

 

                    Philip Larkin 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Juneteenth

I'm not gonna help nobody get something my negroes don't have.
If I'm gonna die, I'll die now right here fighting you, if I'm gonna die.
You my enemy.
My enemies are white people, not Viet Congs or Chinese or Japanese.
You my opposer when I want freedom.
You my opposer when I want justice.
You my opposer when I want equality.
You won't even stand up for me in America for my religious beliefs,
and you want me to go somewhere and fight,
but you won't even stand up for me here at home.

        Muhammad Ali in 1967 statement on television,
        on refusing to register for the draft and fight in the Vietnam War 

In pursuit of the profound

Transformation comes more from pursuing
        profound questions than seeking practical answers.

                    Peter Block, The Answer to How is Yes

 

 

 

 

 

All the world's a stage

New York is the city where the future comes to rehearse.

       Mayor Ed Koch, New York Times, 1986

 

 

 

 

Bloomsday

James Joyce’s friends used to say
that even though he had lost his faith,
he never ceased to be a Jesuit.

        Leo Damrosch, Storyteller: The Life of Robert Louis Stevenson

 

 

 

 

 

Harder than you think

It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious.

            Alfred North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Grace

Imperfection is the prerequisite for grace.
Light only gets in through the cracks.

           Philip Yancey, What's So Amazing About Grace?