Day: August 3, 2017

Cakes and fuzzy logic

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Mary had made a Christmas cake with marzipan but no white sugar icing.Stan was diabetic so she had opted for a middle way.Like some Zen Buddhists.You don’t either cut it completely nor have a 6-inch layer of icing.No, you find a middle way.Like 5 inches of icing!
Mary like almonds so she went for marzipan with her home ground almonds and some sugar.The raw egg part was worrying but so far nobody had died after eating her cake.Still  if you are dying, enjoy the cake while you can!
Annie arrived for a cup of coffee.
Wow, that cake is large.You will get fat if you eat it
I am not planning to eat it all myself, Mary said merrily.
In fact, if I could find a way of cutting an infinitesimally small piece I could have one every day forever.
Would the cake not shrink  ?asked Annie with a puzzled smile
No, because a real number times an infinitesimal is itself infinitesimal Mary answered.
So it must be zero, Annie decided.
No, said Mary.All of the calculus is based on the idea that they are not zero.Then, at the end, we pretend they are zero and cross them out.It’s like magic or sleight of hand
I thought maths was logic, Annie said in an angry voice, tossing her purple hair over her shoulder.Alas it was a wig so it fell off and Emile  the littl cat, bit it!
Gosh, Annie why are you wearing a wig? Mary asked.
I am involved with a Jewish man so he won’t make love unless I wear a wig.
Surely if he is  Orthodox he should not sleep with you unless you get married.
We can’t get married, Annie said boldly.
Why not?
He is already married….Annie muttered
Well, that seems wrong.
What, being married?
No having an affair.I know Stan is old.Can’t  you find a  single man?
Women can’t go running after men.Men enjoy the chase.They despise women who run after them.
Well, can’t you ask them if they are married?
No, it seems too cheeky, Annie smiled.Anyway, in fuzzy logic you are not either married or single.You are  married to the extent  of some decimal number in between 0  and 1
Some folk are 0.999 married and some are 0.34 married.Others 0.1
But who measures it? God ? It’s not much use.
You have to guess, said Annie.I like Jewish men
How many do you know, Mary asked.
Three, said Annie triumphantly.
You can’t generalise from three, Mary said.
If I test a larger sample I shall never get to find one till I am 99, Annie wept.
Think of the fun, though, Mary said teasingly.And you’d have to travel a  lot as many live in the USA, France and other places including Israel.How do you fancy Bibi Netanyahu?He is married actually!
Annie was silent, then burst out: life is not science nor technology.It’s an art like watercolour painting.Why do you call him Bibi? Do you know him?
Not biblically, Mary said humorously.I’ve never even met him.He’s just   been in the News because of Trumpelstiltschein
Does Bibi know Donald is half German?
No, but the Queen is too.
Where does that take us logically?
Off to Boots to buy some expensive makeup and then to have a manicure and tea in a cafe
If only politicians did this life would be much easier and kinder.
And so say all of us!

Bowing to the wind

Love must be so pliant
like a blade of grass

Bowing to the wind
till the storm has passed.

Love is enigmatic
Like the sphinx’s smile.

Waiting for an answer
Nothing is on file.

Love is often near us
Yet we do not see.

Sometimes where we are
Is just the place to be

I guess I felt elated but it was just my glands

I’m lying on the sofa with your photo in my hand
I found it in a drawer with my T shirts and my tops
I don’t want to marry you.Do you understand?

You were like an answer phone, your speech bored me unplanned
You had a lovely  profile and  your hair had a sweet flop
I’m lying on the sofa with your photo in my hand

At the picture hous , you said you only liked James Bond
You never asked me what I’d like, so I have  to put a stop
I don’t want to marry you.Do you understand?

I  became more beautiful and a reconquest you planned
I am not a lunatic, I’ve still got my grip
I’m dreaming on the sofa with your photo in my hand

I guess I felt elated but it was just my glands
You never gave me coffee ,  you only gave me lip.
I will never marry you.Do you understand?

 

I’m not  a sadomasochist, with a riding crop
But one way or another, your wooing has to stop
I’m lying on the sofa with your photo in my hand
I don’t know why I’ve got it, I’ll rip it into strands

 

 

 

Thursday Doors – Tende

Source: Thursday Doors – Tende

Some amazing photographs here.Please take a  look

Extract

“Tende is a town on the old salt road from Nice in south east France to Piedmont in north west Italy. It is famous for the Vallee des Merveilles, a remote area in the mountains with thousands of carvings from the Bronze Age. The carvings (petroglyphs) were discovered by a British botanist, Clarence Bicknell, in 1881. The best way to visit the town is by the spectacular railway from the Riviera. But to get to the Valley of the Marvels, you need to hike for 8 hours or take a jeep. However, this blog is about the doors in the town.P1300573“

Channeling emotions

Photo0009

https://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/resource/402

https://www.nwp.org/cs/public/print/resource/402

 

Excerpt

Techniques Used in PoetryRefer to

a) “Any Morning” by William Stafford (Nye, 132)
b) “Eating Together” by Li-Young Lee (Dunning et al., 14)
c) “I Ask My Mother to Sing” by Li-Young Lee (Dunning et al., 106)
d) “Emergency Situation” by Hal Sirowitz (Nye, 12)
e) “Forgive My Guilt” by Robert P. Tristram Coffin (Dunning et al., 101)
f) “My Father in the Stacks” by David Hassler (Nye, 7)
g) “Sooner or Later” by Sam Cornish (Dunning et al., 115)

  1. Focus on one specific situation:

    1. a) lying on the couch in the morning
      b) eating dinner
      c) mother and grandmother singing of memories
      d) mother telling son to wear decent underwear
      e) shooting two birds in the wings
      g) a first funeral

    2. Or contrast two specific situations:

    f) child in father’s study; adult in library meeting father

     

  2. Create images in the reader’s mind. Help the reader picture what’s going on. Examples:

    a) “Just lying on the couch and being happy./Only humming a little”
    b) “brothers, sister, my mother who will taste the sweetest meat of the head”
    c) “the waterlilies fill with rain until/they overturn/spilling water into water”
    d) “I dressed you up/as a girl. You were gorgeous. You had curls”
    e) “they ran with broken wings/Into the sea, I ran to fetch them in”
    f) “I’ve grown tall like my father/wandering dark hours of the afternoon/in fields of print, rustling pages”
    g) “Your hands are still in your pockets”

  3. Use original language, perhaps similes and metaphors. Examples:

    a) “Little corners like this, pieces of Heaven/left lying around”
    b) “to sleep like a snow-covered road/winding through pines older than him”
    c) “sing like young girls” and “sway like a boat”
    e) “on golden legs slim as dream things” and “ran like quicksilver”
    f) “in fields of print” and “unwritten lives”

  4. Choose words for their impact, connotation, and sound. Use harsh sounding words for negative impact. Examples:

    a) trouble,” “judge,” “monitor,” “act busy,” “hide,” “frown”
    c) “picknickers running away in the grass,” “I love to hear it sung”
    d) “caught,” “reflection on me,” “bad,” “break,” “poor,” “embarrass me”
    e) “with jagged ivory bones where wings should be,” “two airy things forever denied the air!”
    f) “his bookshelves/dwarfed me,” “wandering,” “silence,” “pass each other”

  5. A strong image can be repeated effectively, sometimes to end the poem.

    e) “They cried like two sorrowful flutes” and “Those slender flutes of sorrow never cease”
    f) “Sometimes he’d pass me a book/if my hands were clean” and “We pass each other, my hands are clean”

 

Postcard 1 by Miklós Radnóti

Postcard 1
by Miklós Radnóti
written August 30, 1944
translated by Michael R. Burch

Out of Bulgaria, the great wild roar of the artillery thunders,
resounds on the mountain ridges, rebounds, then ebbs into silence
while here men, beasts, wagons and imagination all steadily increase;
the road whinnies and bucks, neighing; the maned sky gallops;
and you are eternally with me, love, constant amid all the chaos,
glowing within my conscience — incandescent, intense.
Somewhere within me, dear, you abide forever —
still, motionless, mute, like an angel stunned to silence by death
or a beetle hiding in the heart of a rotting tree.

First They Came for the Jews

by Martin Niemöller

First they came for the Jews
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Jew.

Then they came for the Communists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a trade unionist.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left
to speak out for me.

First They Came For The Muslims

by Michael R. Burch

First they came for the Muslims
and I did not speak out
because I was not a Muslim.

Then they came for the homosexuals
and I did not speak out
because I was not a homosexual.

Then they came for the feminists
and I did not speak out
because I was not a feminist.

Now when will they come for me
because I was too busy and too apathetic
to defend my sisters and brothers?