Poetry reading

His hair stood out like fuse wire in a rage

His eyes gleamed like the sun trapped in a cage

As he read his poem I was impressed

By the gift of words he has been blessed.

The women were enraptured as they gazed

His poetry was as complex as a maze.

His voice played on my heart I was well used.

Music is the food of love,I mused.

And poetry is our music,our music and our guide

If we cannot listen,out hearts will shrink and die

Why even try to write a sonnet?

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You must want to write  before you begin but maybe a sonnet is not for a complete beginner.Indeed you may not know what it is.That means you’ve not read much and it does puzzle many  writers and teachers who are sent poetry written by keen amateurs who have never read a poem for years.You can start easy with ballads and simople verse.

Writing a sonnet is a challenge and it took me afew  years to even try.However it is a very good form for expressing grief,love aand the pains of life.If you read Shakespeare you know the best.But even if ours are not so good,writing is beneficial to our hearts and souls and it can connect us to other similar people all over the world for huge numbers of people do write as a hobby.I  found that out on a website with a big membership.I think people in the USA so more keen to write than people here in the UK.Sometimes we sit and watch TV for hours but it’s more fun and pleasure to write or draw or make something like a lovely meal or some good quality cakes with less sugar and purer ingredients.All of these can connectus to others whereas passive acticity is a kind of death of overdone.

The best part about writing poems is that it seems to make it easier for us  to understand  poems we read either modern or classic and to admire the brilliance of the metaphysical poets [ my love] or enjoy the humour of Pam Ayres or the Englishness of Betjeman or the wonders of Russian poetry written under severe strictures in Stalin’s time

Reading Lawrence Le Shan

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawrence_LeShan

For many years I have enjoyed the writings of Le shan.Recently I discovered that he had written a book about Evil.He also treated people with cancer for many years.I admire him

I am reading it slowly.I recommend,Alternate Realities from which some of his terminology comes.His book in Meditation is the best I have ever found.I was reading it as I was on a train going to my father in law’s funeral and a beautiful image cane to my mind

http://artquotes.robertgenn.com/auth_search.php?authid=6217

http://artquotes.robertgenn.com/auth_search.php?authid=6217

Lawrence LeShan -A man will be effective to the degree that he is able to concentrate! Concentration is not basically a mode of doing but above all a mode of Being. (Lawrence LeShan)

Levinas,books etc

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I have received several books now written by or about Levinas.As you guess,they are quite hard so my time is taken up reading.The most hopeful one,The          Cambridge Guide,is not here yet.but I think it will be more understandable than the others to an ignorant person like myself. I am unsure what I’ve done but this  is coming out very much to one side so I shall just say.Hello and continue with my studies.I like this shy lion picture.

PS.Just got the Cambridge Guide and it looks quite approachable.

What love has loss revealed?

 An old poem

Image

 

When I saw you waiting in that cafe
I knew you would be mine.
You were handsome, smiling,funny..you were specially designed.
You looked like men I’d only dreamed about in all those years before.
I’m so broke up,so broke up;you don’t love me anymore.

I saw you on the station as I came from out the train.
You wore an old green parka to protect you from the rain.
I wanted to be one with you,to make a Love entire;
But all you did was give me       pain too bad be endured

You walked away so quickly,I could not see you long.
I wish I had a big guitar to draw you back with song.
I looked at where you disappeared;what love has loss revealed?
I wish I could just lay down on this floor and keep my face concealed.

Railway stations sadden me, for I know we’ll never meet .
I won’t cry more ,for tears are running almost to my feet.
I walk fast looking straight ahead past that entrance gate,
I pretend that you have missed your train,that work was running late

I count from one and one up to a thousand and many more–
But I know for sure it's far too late; you have closed that heavy door.
You are hiding in a dungeon
You are covered with white steel
But I know you had a heart and you must surely feel.I lost all my illusions, and then I lost some more.
I wish I could lay down and die,right here on this floor

Levinas

BionSexual healingvivian-gornick_0hannaarendtsudomenica16ye8TillichMargaretDrabbleBW75wittgensteinMunch-studio-Getty95002154I have got another book by Levinas.I am planning to spend a few days reading and meditating…so i should have much to write about next week.I am very affected by the notion of the meaning of how encounter another and how ethics is the primary essence of philosphy

Currently reading when pussy lets me

ImageMy Unwritten  Books  by  George Steiner…I am enjoying this much more than when read his work ten years ago

The Golden Baby          by  Margaret Drabble…….Good but  too similar to all her later works.

How it all began   by Penelope Lively…Wonderful like all her books

I am really surprised /pleased about the number of people reading here

Drabble

Margaret Drabble when young

When I moved from books to Philosophy I was not expecting a lot of readers but I have had far more than I thought and so I have continued again after I thought I’d stop.So as I have thought before,people do like serious reading  and thinking about thinking.

I shall try to put on more about books too.I am reading the latest Margaret Drabble this week,The pure gold baby.It seems very light reading after Heidegger and co.Which is nice..

I would like to discover an introduction to modern literary crticism as i find it hard to get into.I am unsure if it needs to be so difficult….

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I have enjoyed thinking,thoughtfulness and related topics

I have enjoyed thinking,thoughtfulness and related topics.I still am not satisfied.That is good because I shall carry on reading and thinking while goin through  winter.

I feel sorry it’s so hard for a layperson to find books which they can understand….with some effort but not too much.Evening classes are scarce when once they were common and cheap.And maybe Art or Music is better than study.

 

Trust the unknown force that grew you,

Trust in God and fly away
Trust in God and fly away (Photo credit: Martin Gommel)

Trust the unknown force that grew you,
From the joining of two cells.
Act of love, of self giving,
Thus to grow a newer self.

 

Trust the dark,the unseen aspects
Of the life we all do live.
Trust that there is wisdom elsewhere,
To your emptiness to give.

 

Wait in patience for the time
When inspiration comes at last
Trust in darkness,silence,lowness.
Opposition forms the cross.

 

Pain is bearable in lowness,
Like the worm in earth I dwell.
When I look I see the sunrise

 

And I trust all shall be well.

 

The Natural Depth in Man

http://reflight.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/wilson-van-dusen-1-looking-at-madness.html

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Wilson Van Dusen was a very interesting man.Some of his views I am unsure of but his book,The Natural Depth in Man,shows how much we don’t see normally when we look at others.

He was a mystic in a sense.And he worked with people with severe disturbances.His definition of  madness that it renders the person useless.Also introspection is bad when one is in a vulnerable state.. better to do useful,practical tasks like sweeping the floor.And always be polite.In other words,stay in touch with others and this world.

Philosophy blogs

http://leiterreports.typepad.com/blog/

A little hard but good and worth noting

Terry Eagleton reviews ‘The God Delusion’ by Richard Dawkins · LRB 19 October 2006

Amin Mughal امین مغل's avatarAmin Mughal Links

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n20/terry-eagleton/lunging-flailing-mispunching
An old piece of writing by Terry Eagleton, but it would be useful to read it in the context of the raging debate between reason and faith.

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Top book blog

Top book blog

This is highly thought of by many literary journals

HOW BLOGGING CAN HELP A WRITER

Georgee eliot

http://janefriedman.com/2011/08/24/blogging-for-writers/

This is a very good blog to have a look at at the weekend

for any  aspiring writer

Plath’s therapist was not actually trained as a pyschoanalyst

http://www.salon.com/2004/11/29/plath_therapist/

I know that psychoanalysts are not meant to tell patients what to do.So I was surprised this one did.. like telling her to get a divorce.Now I discover she had not even undergone her own analysis.

Make sure your therapist  is trained if you need one

I looked up Levinas’s life

I found quite a good  short  account of the main outlines of Levinas’ life and work here.How very ironic he studied with Heidegger.His ideas seem very different from the philosophy I have studied before.I am well read but have only just heard of him when reading about Peter Lomas.I feel he may be very important in this world we now dwell in.I am unsure if I can understand his writing but have ordered a book by colin Davis

Reading like a writer

“I’ve always found that the better the book I’m reading, the smarter I feel, or, at least, the more able I am to imagine that I might, someday, become smarter.”
Francine Prose, Reading Like a : A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them

This book is fascinating whether or not you are writer

Chekhov improves your social skills but only if you read him!

Apparently reading high brow novels increases your empathy and understanding of others more than reading chick lit or nonfiction does.

Please click on “novels”above

Why I gave up reading

I used to enjoy library books
I read both day and night.
Then when I looked around me

I saw a horrid sight.

The house was filled with dust and dirt.
The sink was full of pots.
My hair was dirty and my face
Had broken out in spots.

So now I feel the need to clean
And polish all the brass.
I wash my hair  ‘most every night.
Oh,what a clever lass.

My husband likes my new approach
As he had felt ignored.
He toiled all day long  cooking books
and wished to be restored.

I wash him with my  best rose soap.
I dry him with my towel.
And then we have a discussion
On, whether Y’s a vowel.

We go to bed and kiss and hug.
We recall  bad times we  late endured.
And then we dream of pie and mash

Until our ills are cured.