Thursday, December 13, 2007
A Cry For Reformation...
As time passes I hear a cry for reformation growing louder. Some of the people don't know what they are calling for but they are tired of living indebted to banks/credit card companies and big businesses. But those are the ones who are "lucky" enough to get approved for credit. Many people in our city/province/country/world are far worse off and something needs to be done. Maybe like with the Protestant Reformation we need someone to stand up and say something and give a direction we need to move to. Unfortunately I am not that person (partially because I want too many drastic changes that would be too "harmful" to things like the "economy" and big business) so with your help (please post suggestions) maybe I can come up with some theses say...ninety five or so and maybe post them on the doors of the provincial legislative building. I don't think it will really do any good even if someone manages to read them before they are ripped down but maybe just maybe someone will read it or hear about it. And if it causes people to think about or question what's going on in this end of the world maybe, just maybe, we can make a difference. I would like to have a positive influence in this world for once and I guess it begins at home, Saskatchewan...
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
To Struggle Against Great Odds, To Meet Enimies Undaunted...
The biggest struggle man can face and perhaps the most important, is the fight against the evil within. It is a life long battle (or atleast it has been for me so far) that can determain the fate of our soul. It is not nessarily the out come of the war but the way in which it is conducted. And inbtween the skimishes take time to enjoy the simple things. Go for a walk, hold someone's hand,cook a meal,listen to music or, maybe, read a poem...
O to make the most jubilant song!
Full of music--full of manhood, womanhood, infancy!
Full of common employments--full of grain and trees.
O for the voices of animals--O for the swiftness and balance of fishes!
O for the dropping of raindrops in a song!
O for the sunshine and motion of waves in a song!
O the joy of my spirit--it is uncaged--it darts like lightning!
It is not enough to have this globe or a certain time,
I will have thousands of globes and all time.
O the engineer's joys! to go with a locomotive!
To hear the hiss of steam, the merry shriek, the steam-whistle, the laughing locomotive!
To push with resistless way and speed off in the distance.
O the gleesome saunter over fields and hillsides!
The leaves and flowers of the commonest weeds, the moist freshstillness of the woods,
The exquisite smell of the earth at daybreak, and all through the forenoon.
O the horseman's and horsewoman's joys!
The saddle, the gallop, the pressure upon the seat, the coolgurgling by the ears and hair.
O the fireman's joys!
I hear the alarm at dead of night,
I hear bells, shouts! I pass the crowd, I run!
The sight of the flames maddens me with pleasure.
O the joy of the strong-brawn'd fighter, towering in the arena inperfect condition, conscious of power, thirsting to meet his opponent.
O the joy of that vast elemental sympathy which only the human soul iscapable of generating and emitting in steady and limitless floods.
O the mother's joys!The watching, the endurance, the precious love, the anguish, thepatiently yielded life.
O the of increase, growth, recuperation,The joy of soothing and pacifying, the joy of concord and harmony.
O to go back to the place where I was born,To hear the birds sing once more,To ramble about the house and barn and over the fields once more,And through the orchard and along the old lanes once more.
O to have been brought up on bays, lagoons, creeks, or along the coast,To continue and be employ'd there all my life,
The briny and damp smell, the shore, the salt weeds exposed at low water,
The work of fishermen, the work of the eel-fisher and clam-fisher;
I come with my clam-rake and spade, I come with my eel-spear,
Is the tide out? I Join the group of clam-diggers on the flats,
I laugh and work with them, I joke at my work like a mettlesome young man;
In winter I take my eel-basket and eel-spear and travel out on foot
on the ice--I have a small axe to cut holes in the ice,Behold me well-clothed going gayly or returning in the afternoon,my brood of tough boys accompanying me,
My brood of grown and part-grown boys, who love to be with noone else so well as they love to be with me,
By day to work with me, and by night to sleep with me.
Another time in warm weather out in a boat, to lift the lobster-potswhere they are sunk with heavy stones, (I know the buoys,)
O the sweetness of the Fifth-month morning upon the water as I rowjust before sunrise toward the buoys,
I pull the wicker pots up slantingly, the dark green lobsters aredesperate with their claws as I take them out, I insertwooden pegs in the 'oints of their pincers,
I go to all the places one after another, and then row back to the shore,There in a huge kettle of boiling water the lobsters shall be boil'dtill their color becomes scarlet.
Another time mackerel-taking,
Voracious, mad for the hook, near the surface, they seem to fill thewater for miles;
Another time fishing for rock-fish in Chesapeake bay,
I one of thebrown-faced crew;Another time trailing for blue-fish off Paumanok, I stand with braced body,
My left foot is on the gunwale, my right arm throws far out thecoils of slender rope,In sight around me the quick veering and darting of fifty skiffs, mycompanions.
O boating on the rivers,The voyage down the St. Lawrence, the superb scenery, the steamers,
The ships sailing, the Thousand Islands, the occasional timber-raftand the raftsmen with long-reaching sweep-oars,
The little huts on the rafts, and the stream of smoke when they cooksupper at evening.
(O something pernicious and dread!Something far away from a puny and pious life!Something unproved! something in a trance!Something escaped from the anchorage and driving free.)
O to work in mines, or forging iron,Foundry casting, the foundry itself, the rude high roof, the ampleand shadow'd space,The furnace, the hot liquid pour'd out and running.
O to resume the joys of the soldier!To feel the presence of a brave commanding officer--to feel his sympathy!
To behold his calmness--to be warm'd in the rays of his smile!
To go to battle--to hear the bugles play and the drums beat!To hear the crash of artillery--to see the glittering of the bayonetsand musket-barrels in the sun!
To see men fall and die and not complain!To taste the savage taste of blood--to be so devilish!To gloat so over the wounds and deaths of the enemy.
O the whaleman's joys!
O I cruise my old cruise again!
I feel the ship's motion under me, I feel the Atlantic breezes fanning me,
I hear the cry again sent down from the mast-head,
There--she blows!Again I spring up the rigging to look with the rest--we descend,wild with excitement,I leap in the lower'd boat, we row toward our prey where he lies,
We approach stealthy and silent, I see the mountainous mass,lethargic, basking,I see the harpooneer standing up, I see the weapon dart from hisvigorous arm;
O swift again far out in the ocean the wounded whale, settling,running to windward, tows me,
Again I see him rise to breathe, we row close again,I see a lance driven through his side, press'd deep, turn'd in the wound,
Again we back off, I see him settle again, the life is leaving him fast,As he rises he spouts blood, I see him swim in circles narrower andnarrower, swiftly cutting the water--I see him die,
He gives one convulsive leap in the centre of the circle, and thenfalls flat and still in the bloody foam.
O the old manhood of me, my noblest joy of all!My children and grand-children, my white hair and beard,My largeness, calmness, majesty, out of the long stretch of my life.
O ripen'd joy of womanhood! O happiness at last!I am more than eighty years of age, I am the most venerable mother,
How clear is my mind--how all people draw nigh to me!What attractions are these beyond any before? what bloom morethan the bloom of youth?
What beauty is this that descends upon me and rises out of me?
O the orator's joys!To inflate the chest, to roll the thunder of the voice out from theribs and throat,
To make the people rage, weep, hate, desire, with yourself,
To lead America--to quell America with a great tongue.
O the joy of my soul leaning pois'd on itself, receiving identity throughmaterials and loving them, observing characters and absorbing them,
My soul vibrated back to me from them, from sight, hearing, touch,reason, articulation, comparison, memory, and the like,
The real life of my senses and flesh transcending my senses and flesh,
My body done with materials, my sight done with my material eyes,
Proved to me this day beyond cavil that it is not my material eyeswhich finally see,
Nor my material body which finally loves, walks, laughs, shouts,embraces, procreates.
O the farmer's joys!
Ohioan's, Illinoisian's, Wisconsinese', Kanadian's, Iowan's,Kansian's, Missourian's, Oregonese' joys!
To rise at peep of day and pass forth nimbly to work,
To plough land in the fall for winter-sown crops,
To plough land in the spring for maize,
To train orchards, to graft the trees, to gather apples in the fall.
O to bathe in the swimming-bath, or in a good place along shore,To splash the water! to walk ankle-deep, or race naked along the shore.
O to realize space!The plenteousness of all, that there are no bounds,To emerge and be of the sky, of the sun and moon and flyingclouds, as one with them.
O the joy a manly self-hood!
To be servile to none, to defer to none, not to any tyrant known or unknown,
To walk with erect carriage, a step springy and elastic,
To look with calm gaze or with a flashing eye,
To speak with a full and sonorous voice out of a broad chest,
To confront with your personality all the other personalities of the earth.
Knowist thou the excellent joys of youth?
Joys of the dear companions and of the merry word and laughing face?
Joy of the glad light-beaming day, joy of the wide-breath'd games?
Joy of sweet music, joy of the lighted ball-room and the dancers?
Joy of the plenteous dinner, strong carouse and drinking?
Yet O my soul supreme!
Knowist thou the joys of pensive thought?
Joys of the free and lonesome heart, the tender, gloomy heart?
Joys of the solitary walk, the spirit bow'd yet proud, the sufferingand the struggle?
The agonistic throes, the ecstasies, joys of the solemn musings dayor night?
Joys of the thought of Death, the great spheres Time and Space?
Prophetic joys of better, loftier love's ideals, the divine wife,the sweet, eternal, perfect comrade?Joys all thine own undying one, joys worthy thee O soul.
O while I live to be the ruler of life, not a slave,
To meet life as a powerful conqueror,
No fumes, no ennui, no more complaints or scornful criticisms,
To these proud laws of the air, the water and the ground, provingmy interior soul impregnable,
And nothing exterior shall ever take command of me.
For not life's joys alone I sing, repeating--the joy of death!
The beautiful touch of Death, soothing and benumbing a few moments,for reasons,
Myself discharging my excrementitious body to be burn'd, or render'dto powder, or buried,
My real body doubtless left to me for other spheres,
My voided body nothing more to me, returning to the purifications,further offices, eternal uses of the earth.
O to attract by more than attraction!
How it is I know not--yet behold! the something which obeys noneof the rest,
It is offensive, never defensive--yet how magnetic it draws.
O to struggle against great odds, to meet enemies undaunted!
To be entirely alone with them, to find how much one can stand!
To look strife, torture, prison, popular odium, face to face!
To mount the scaffold, to advance to the muzzles of guns withperfect nonchalance!
To be indeed a God!
O to sail to sea in a ship!
To leave this steady unendurable land,
To leave the tiresome sameness of the streets, the sidewalks and thehouses,
To leave you O you solid motionless land, and entering a ship,
To sail and sail and sail!
O to have life henceforth a poem of new joys!
To dance, clap hands, exult, shout, skip, leap, roll on, float on!
To be a sailor of the world bound for all ports,
A ship itself, (see indeed these sails I spread to the sun and air,)
A swift and swelling ship full of rich words, full of joys.
Walt Whitman(1819-1892)
A Song of Joys
O to make the most jubilant song!
Full of music--full of manhood, womanhood, infancy!
Full of common employments--full of grain and trees.
O for the voices of animals--O for the swiftness and balance of fishes!
O for the dropping of raindrops in a song!
O for the sunshine and motion of waves in a song!
O the joy of my spirit--it is uncaged--it darts like lightning!
It is not enough to have this globe or a certain time,
I will have thousands of globes and all time.
O the engineer's joys! to go with a locomotive!
To hear the hiss of steam, the merry shriek, the steam-whistle, the laughing locomotive!
To push with resistless way and speed off in the distance.
O the gleesome saunter over fields and hillsides!
The leaves and flowers of the commonest weeds, the moist freshstillness of the woods,
The exquisite smell of the earth at daybreak, and all through the forenoon.
O the horseman's and horsewoman's joys!
The saddle, the gallop, the pressure upon the seat, the coolgurgling by the ears and hair.
O the fireman's joys!
I hear the alarm at dead of night,
I hear bells, shouts! I pass the crowd, I run!
The sight of the flames maddens me with pleasure.
O the joy of the strong-brawn'd fighter, towering in the arena inperfect condition, conscious of power, thirsting to meet his opponent.
O the joy of that vast elemental sympathy which only the human soul iscapable of generating and emitting in steady and limitless floods.
O the mother's joys!The watching, the endurance, the precious love, the anguish, thepatiently yielded life.
O the of increase, growth, recuperation,The joy of soothing and pacifying, the joy of concord and harmony.
O to go back to the place where I was born,To hear the birds sing once more,To ramble about the house and barn and over the fields once more,And through the orchard and along the old lanes once more.
O to have been brought up on bays, lagoons, creeks, or along the coast,To continue and be employ'd there all my life,
The briny and damp smell, the shore, the salt weeds exposed at low water,
The work of fishermen, the work of the eel-fisher and clam-fisher;
I come with my clam-rake and spade, I come with my eel-spear,
Is the tide out? I Join the group of clam-diggers on the flats,
I laugh and work with them, I joke at my work like a mettlesome young man;
In winter I take my eel-basket and eel-spear and travel out on foot
on the ice--I have a small axe to cut holes in the ice,Behold me well-clothed going gayly or returning in the afternoon,my brood of tough boys accompanying me,
My brood of grown and part-grown boys, who love to be with noone else so well as they love to be with me,
By day to work with me, and by night to sleep with me.
Another time in warm weather out in a boat, to lift the lobster-potswhere they are sunk with heavy stones, (I know the buoys,)
O the sweetness of the Fifth-month morning upon the water as I rowjust before sunrise toward the buoys,
I pull the wicker pots up slantingly, the dark green lobsters aredesperate with their claws as I take them out, I insertwooden pegs in the 'oints of their pincers,
I go to all the places one after another, and then row back to the shore,There in a huge kettle of boiling water the lobsters shall be boil'dtill their color becomes scarlet.
Another time mackerel-taking,
Voracious, mad for the hook, near the surface, they seem to fill thewater for miles;
Another time fishing for rock-fish in Chesapeake bay,
I one of thebrown-faced crew;Another time trailing for blue-fish off Paumanok, I stand with braced body,
My left foot is on the gunwale, my right arm throws far out thecoils of slender rope,In sight around me the quick veering and darting of fifty skiffs, mycompanions.
O boating on the rivers,The voyage down the St. Lawrence, the superb scenery, the steamers,
The ships sailing, the Thousand Islands, the occasional timber-raftand the raftsmen with long-reaching sweep-oars,
The little huts on the rafts, and the stream of smoke when they cooksupper at evening.
(O something pernicious and dread!Something far away from a puny and pious life!Something unproved! something in a trance!Something escaped from the anchorage and driving free.)
O to work in mines, or forging iron,Foundry casting, the foundry itself, the rude high roof, the ampleand shadow'd space,The furnace, the hot liquid pour'd out and running.
O to resume the joys of the soldier!To feel the presence of a brave commanding officer--to feel his sympathy!
To behold his calmness--to be warm'd in the rays of his smile!
To go to battle--to hear the bugles play and the drums beat!To hear the crash of artillery--to see the glittering of the bayonetsand musket-barrels in the sun!
To see men fall and die and not complain!To taste the savage taste of blood--to be so devilish!To gloat so over the wounds and deaths of the enemy.
O the whaleman's joys!
O I cruise my old cruise again!
I feel the ship's motion under me, I feel the Atlantic breezes fanning me,
I hear the cry again sent down from the mast-head,
There--she blows!Again I spring up the rigging to look with the rest--we descend,wild with excitement,I leap in the lower'd boat, we row toward our prey where he lies,
We approach stealthy and silent, I see the mountainous mass,lethargic, basking,I see the harpooneer standing up, I see the weapon dart from hisvigorous arm;
O swift again far out in the ocean the wounded whale, settling,running to windward, tows me,
Again I see him rise to breathe, we row close again,I see a lance driven through his side, press'd deep, turn'd in the wound,
Again we back off, I see him settle again, the life is leaving him fast,As he rises he spouts blood, I see him swim in circles narrower andnarrower, swiftly cutting the water--I see him die,
He gives one convulsive leap in the centre of the circle, and thenfalls flat and still in the bloody foam.
O the old manhood of me, my noblest joy of all!My children and grand-children, my white hair and beard,My largeness, calmness, majesty, out of the long stretch of my life.
O ripen'd joy of womanhood! O happiness at last!I am more than eighty years of age, I am the most venerable mother,
How clear is my mind--how all people draw nigh to me!What attractions are these beyond any before? what bloom morethan the bloom of youth?
What beauty is this that descends upon me and rises out of me?
O the orator's joys!To inflate the chest, to roll the thunder of the voice out from theribs and throat,
To make the people rage, weep, hate, desire, with yourself,
To lead America--to quell America with a great tongue.
O the joy of my soul leaning pois'd on itself, receiving identity throughmaterials and loving them, observing characters and absorbing them,
My soul vibrated back to me from them, from sight, hearing, touch,reason, articulation, comparison, memory, and the like,
The real life of my senses and flesh transcending my senses and flesh,
My body done with materials, my sight done with my material eyes,
Proved to me this day beyond cavil that it is not my material eyeswhich finally see,
Nor my material body which finally loves, walks, laughs, shouts,embraces, procreates.
O the farmer's joys!
Ohioan's, Illinoisian's, Wisconsinese', Kanadian's, Iowan's,Kansian's, Missourian's, Oregonese' joys!
To rise at peep of day and pass forth nimbly to work,
To plough land in the fall for winter-sown crops,
To plough land in the spring for maize,
To train orchards, to graft the trees, to gather apples in the fall.
O to bathe in the swimming-bath, or in a good place along shore,To splash the water! to walk ankle-deep, or race naked along the shore.
O to realize space!The plenteousness of all, that there are no bounds,To emerge and be of the sky, of the sun and moon and flyingclouds, as one with them.
O the joy a manly self-hood!
To be servile to none, to defer to none, not to any tyrant known or unknown,
To walk with erect carriage, a step springy and elastic,
To look with calm gaze or with a flashing eye,
To speak with a full and sonorous voice out of a broad chest,
To confront with your personality all the other personalities of the earth.
Knowist thou the excellent joys of youth?
Joys of the dear companions and of the merry word and laughing face?
Joy of the glad light-beaming day, joy of the wide-breath'd games?
Joy of sweet music, joy of the lighted ball-room and the dancers?
Joy of the plenteous dinner, strong carouse and drinking?
Yet O my soul supreme!
Knowist thou the joys of pensive thought?
Joys of the free and lonesome heart, the tender, gloomy heart?
Joys of the solitary walk, the spirit bow'd yet proud, the sufferingand the struggle?
The agonistic throes, the ecstasies, joys of the solemn musings dayor night?
Joys of the thought of Death, the great spheres Time and Space?
Prophetic joys of better, loftier love's ideals, the divine wife,the sweet, eternal, perfect comrade?Joys all thine own undying one, joys worthy thee O soul.
O while I live to be the ruler of life, not a slave,
To meet life as a powerful conqueror,
No fumes, no ennui, no more complaints or scornful criticisms,
To these proud laws of the air, the water and the ground, provingmy interior soul impregnable,
And nothing exterior shall ever take command of me.
For not life's joys alone I sing, repeating--the joy of death!
The beautiful touch of Death, soothing and benumbing a few moments,for reasons,
Myself discharging my excrementitious body to be burn'd, or render'dto powder, or buried,
My real body doubtless left to me for other spheres,
My voided body nothing more to me, returning to the purifications,further offices, eternal uses of the earth.
O to attract by more than attraction!
How it is I know not--yet behold! the something which obeys noneof the rest,
It is offensive, never defensive--yet how magnetic it draws.
O to struggle against great odds, to meet enemies undaunted!
To be entirely alone with them, to find how much one can stand!
To look strife, torture, prison, popular odium, face to face!
To mount the scaffold, to advance to the muzzles of guns withperfect nonchalance!
To be indeed a God!
O to sail to sea in a ship!
To leave this steady unendurable land,
To leave the tiresome sameness of the streets, the sidewalks and thehouses,
To leave you O you solid motionless land, and entering a ship,
To sail and sail and sail!
O to have life henceforth a poem of new joys!
To dance, clap hands, exult, shout, skip, leap, roll on, float on!
To be a sailor of the world bound for all ports,
A ship itself, (see indeed these sails I spread to the sun and air,)
A swift and swelling ship full of rich words, full of joys.
Walt Whitman(1819-1892)
Christmas Charity...
It comes to me that most of the "charities" are run by or some how connected to religious organizations (Christianity being the big one). Are Christians that much more selfless then the rest of us? I think not. I think they do it for several reasons the least of which is a truly selfless act. Whether it's being guilted into giving,bribed into giving (with the "kingdom of heaven" or the like, there are many reasons for what they do but the worst of all is holding their "charity" back from those who aren't (or won't convert to being) Christian. If you want to share what you have with other people (for what ever the reason) that's fine, but DON'T force your beliefs on other people. It's a time of year when people want to share with others the most and giving freely can truely be something special, so give a hand, a loaf, an ear, or a smile to someone who could use it and leave the bribery to the secular world. It looks bad for God to have people who claim to be representivies of Him to act in such ways. Judgement shall come down on you in The End (if you believe in that) and if you believe in a God at all like mine you will be judged most harshly. Be beacons for your religion (whatever it is) by your actions.
Monday, December 10, 2007
A Christmas poem
The day is done, the sun has set
Now drag your weary bones to bed.
Your woman beside you, all tasks fulfilled
This feeling of emptiness lingers still.
When you die, all of you is gone
Life crushes you and nothing lives on.
Death frees you and gives you hope
That all of the oppressors, will be at the end of a rope.
You wanted to change the world, but were too much afraid
With only intentions, no positive changes were made.
Even at this time, the suffering grows
But we are just consumers, that's all that we know.
God damn me and my selfishness, maybe it's me I can't stand
Why am I so weak? Why am I only a man?
Impotent and pathetic, cruel and mean
Someone save us from this brutal machine.
A brilliant fire, a shining star
Come lead us from this filth we created.
Undo the damage, right what is a miss
OR END US
Now drag your weary bones to bed.
Your woman beside you, all tasks fulfilled
This feeling of emptiness lingers still.
When you die, all of you is gone
Life crushes you and nothing lives on.
Death frees you and gives you hope
That all of the oppressors, will be at the end of a rope.
You wanted to change the world, but were too much afraid
With only intentions, no positive changes were made.
Even at this time, the suffering grows
But we are just consumers, that's all that we know.
God damn me and my selfishness, maybe it's me I can't stand
Why am I so weak? Why am I only a man?
Impotent and pathetic, cruel and mean
Someone save us from this brutal machine.
A brilliant fire, a shining star
Come lead us from this filth we created.
Undo the damage, right what is a miss
OR END US
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