Poem: Begin

Begin again to the summoning birds
to the sight of the light at the window,
begin to the roar of morning traffic
all along Pembroke Road.
Every beginning is a promise
born in light and dying in dark
determination and exaltation of springtime
flowering the way to work.
Begin to the pageant of queuing girls
the arrogant loneliness of swans in the canal
bridges linking the past and future
old friends passing though with us still.
Begin to the loneliness that cannot end
since it perhaps is what makes us begin,
begin to wonder at unknown faces
at crying birds in the sudden rain
at branches stark in the willing sunlight
at seagulls foraging for bread
at couples sharing a sunny secret
alone together while making good.
Though we live in a world that dreams of ending
that always seems about to give in
something that will not acknowledge conclusion
insists that we forever begin.

                    Brendan Kennelly 

 

 

 

 

 

World Water Day

If there is magic on this planet,
    it is contained in water.

            Loren Eiseley, The Immense Journey

 

 

 

 

 

 

March Madness continued

A few years ago, Kobe [Bryant, duh] fractured the fourth metacarpal bone in his right hand. He missed the first fifteen games of the season; he used the opportunity to learn to shoot jump shots with his left, which he has been known to do in games. While it was healing, the ring finger, the one adjacent to the break, spend a lot of time taped to his pinkie. In the end, Kobe discovered, his four fingers were no longer evenly spaced; now they were separated, two and two. As a result, his touch on the ball was different, his shooting percentage went down. Studying the film he noticed that his shots were rotating slightly to the right.

To correct the flaw, Kobe went to the gym over the summer and made one hundred thousand shots. that's one hundred thousand made, not taken. He doesn't practice taking shots, he explains. He practices making them. If you're clear on the difference between the two ideas, you can start drawing a bead on Kobe Bryant who may well be one of the most misunderstood figures in sports today.

Mike Sager, Esquire Magazine, 2007

March Madness

I would not sell my soul to be playing college ball somewhere in this country tonight, but I would give it long and serious consideration.

Pat Conroy, My Losing Season: A Memoir

 

 

 

 

Drown your shamrock

Once upon a time at a pub, Patrick ordered a whiskey, but was shocked and offended when the bartender’s pour did not fill his glass. He said the man had a devil in his cellar feeding on his dishonesty, so he’d best get his act together. The man immediately changed his ways. Like Scrooge on Christmas Day, he became the guy who filled everyone’s glass to the rim.

Today that story is remembered in the “Drowning of the Shamrock.” Each St. Patrick’s Day at the very end of the night, shamrocks are dunked into the last round of drinks (ideally whiskey) and a toast is offered to St. Patrick, in honor of his preferential option for the full pour.

        Jim McDermott, America, The Jesuit Review, 2022

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's not just basketball

When you think you have done enough, do a little more,
because someone out there is working harder than you.

            Larry Bird, When the Game Was Ours

 

 

 

The ides of March

And they came and said to him, “Teacher, we know that you are sincere, and show deference to no one; for you do not regard people with partiality, but teach the way of God in accordance with truth. Is it lawful to pay taxes to Emperor Caesar, or not? Should we pay them, or should we not?” But knowing their hypocrisy, he said to them, “Why are you putting me to the test? Bring me a denarius [coin] and let me see it.” And they brought one. Then he said to them, “Whose image is this, and whose title?” They answered, “Caesar’s.” Jesus said to them, “Give to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.”

                                12:14-17; Matthew 22:15-22; Luke 20:20-26


Diverse interpreters have speculated for ages about what it is that Jesus is saying belongs to God and should be given to God. Our spiritual virtues perhaps? Our immortal souls? Our tithes? Our life commitments? Our moral conscience? Our conformance to church law? Through history, “give to Caesar” has confused preachers and canon lawyers who apologized for Caesar’s needful claim on much of a Christian’s life.

But mystery writer [Dorothy] Sayers discovered that the dialog poses and solves a riddle. Jesus holds up the Roman coin, asking whose image it bears. Caesar’s image is how we recognize its owner, they reply. Then what belongs to God must have the same proof. What bears God’s image? You and I do: our whole human selves, as Genesis 2 declares. Then give your whole self to God, because you bear God’s image.

                Rick Fabian, Jesus and Paul Woven Together 

Poem: Domestic Bliss

A love affair is something to survive.
This is a relationship -
something to keep tidy.

So my love for you reveals itself
In my exceptionally thorough grocery lists
And I know how much you love me when
You scrub out the shower
Two weekends in a row.

I am a romantic janitor,
Performing constant maintenance
on my happiness.

Give me a kiss.
I just took out the trash
And swept the sidewalk.

                Patrick Califia 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Patience

Being an artist means, not reckoning and counting,
but ripening like the tree which does not force its sap
and stands confident in the storms of spring
without the fear that after them may come no summer.
It does come. But it comes only to the patient,
who are there as though eternity lay before them,
so unconcernedly still and wide.
I learn it daily, learn it with pain
to which I am grateful: patience is everything!

        Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Language

Language is courage:
the ability to conceive a thought,
to speak it, and by doing so to make it true.

    Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses

 

 

 

 

A winning hand

Life is not always a matter of holding good cards,
    but sometimes, playing a poor hand well.

        Dan Millman, Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior

 

 

 

 

 

Treat yourself

One of the secrets of a happy life
    is continuous small treats,
        and if some of these can be inexpensive
            and quickly procured so much the better.

                Iris Murdoch, The Sea, the Sea

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A distinction

Mobilizing is about getting people to do a thing,
    and organizing is about getting people to become
        the kind of people who do what needs to be done.

                Hahrie Han, The New Yorker, October 2024

Spring forward

I object to being told that I am saving daylight
when my reason tells me that I am doing nothing of the kind...
At the back of the Daylight Saving scheme,
I detect the bony, blue-fingered hand of Puritanism,
eager to push people into bed earlier, and get them up earlier,
to make them healthy, wealthy, and wise in spite of themselves.

        Robertson Davies, The Papers of Samuel Marchbanks

 

 

 

 

International Women's Day

 Join the union, girls, 

        and together say  

                Equal Pay for Equal Work.

                            Susan B. Anthony, The Revolution

 

 

 

 

  

Poem: Dear March—Come in—

Dear March—Come in—
How glad I am—
I hoped for you before—
Put down your Hat—
You must have walked—
How out of Breath you are—
Dear March, how are you, and the Rest—
Did you leave Nature well—
Oh March, Come right upstairs with me—
I have so much to tell—

I got your Letter, and the Birds—
The Maples never knew that you were coming—
I declare - how Red their Faces grew—
But March, forgive me—
And all those Hills you left for me to Hue—
There was no Purple suitable—
You took it all with you—

Who knocks? That April—
Lock the Door—
I will not be pursued—
He stayed away a Year to call
When I am occupied—
But trifles look so trivial
As soon as you have come

That blame is just as dear as Praise
And Praise as mere as Blame—

            Emily Dickinson 

The way home

Actually, I doubt that it was "progress" that most interested [physicist] Richard [Feynman]. He was always searching for patterns, for connections, for a new way of looking at something, but I suspect his motivation was not so much to understand the world as it was to find new ideas to explain. The act of discovery was not complete for him until he had taught it to someone else.

I remember a conversation we had a year or so before his death, walking in the hills above Pasadena. We were exploring an unfamiliar trail and Richard, recovering from a major operation for the cancer, was walking more slowly than usual. He was telling a long and funny story about how he had been reading up on his disease and surprising his doctors by predicting their diagnosis and his chances of survival. I was hearing for the first time how far his cancer had progressed, so the jokes did not seem so funny. He must have noticed my mood, because he suddenly stopped the story and asked, "Hey, what's the matter?"

I hesitated. "I'm sad because you're going to die."

"Yeah," he sighed, "that bugs me sometimes too. But not so much as you think." And after a few more steps, "When you get as old as I am, you start to realize that you've told most of the good stuff you know to other people anyway."

We walked along in silence for a few minutes. Then we came to a place where another trail crossed and Richard stopped to look around at the surroundings. Suddenly a grin lit up his face.

"Hey," he said, all trace of sadness forgotten, "I bet I can show you a better way home."

And so he did.

        Danny Hillis, Richard Feynman and The Connection Machine, longnow.org

Flexibility

The willow which bends to the tempest
often escapes better than the oak which resists it.

    Walter Scott, The Works of Sir Walter Scott: The pirate 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm thinking!

It’s not always easy to tell the difference
between thinking and looking out of the window.

        Wallace Stevens, Letters

 

 

 

 

Why there are so few great artists

Waiting is one of the great arts.

        Margery Allingham, The Tiger In The Smoke

 

 

 

 

 

 

March winds

The wind is rising...
    we must attempt to live.

        Paul Valery, Charmes. Le Cimetière Marin

 

 

 

Take it back

We cannot live securely in a world which is not our own,
in a world which is interpreted for us by others.
An interpreted world is not a home.
Part of the terror is to take back our own listening,
to put our ears to our own inner voices, to see our own light,
which is our birthright, and comes to us in silence.

        Hildegard of Bingen, Warrior of Light,
        by Elaine Bellezza, Gnosis magazine, 1991