Here is Kinko! Mom took the picture just as she leaped. Super Kinko away! (She is called Kinko because of her bent tail).
Monday, August 31, 2009
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
What's making me laugh today
A security alert recently received:
"Yesterday the Washington University Police apprehended a subject in the WUSTL Library by the name of Raunchy Massey. Mr. Massey claimed to be a"Poet funded by the English Department." I do not believe there is any cause for concern, but I wanted to remind everyone that the University Police Department is available 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week. If you should notice anything out of the ordinary or ever feel that your security is at risk, WUPD can be reached from any Danforth Campus phone by calling 5-5555. If I hear anything further regarding this incident, I will update you via email."
What exactly is the security threat here? Should we beware roving, self-identified poets or just people named "Raunchy"?
"Yesterday the Washington University Police apprehended a subject in the WUSTL Library by the name of Raunchy Massey. Mr. Massey claimed to be a"Poet funded by the English Department." I do not believe there is any cause for concern, but I wanted to remind everyone that the University Police Department is available 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week. If you should notice anything out of the ordinary or ever feel that your security is at risk, WUPD can be reached from any Danforth Campus phone by calling 5-5555. If I hear anything further regarding this incident, I will update you via email."
What exactly is the security threat here? Should we beware roving, self-identified poets or just people named "Raunchy"?
Monday, August 24, 2009
Perspectives on Pregnancy
From ME'AM LO'EZ, Sephardic Jewish commentary on Genesis, published Istanbul 1730.
Disembodying Women: Perspectives on Pregnancy and the Unborn. Barbara Duden, Trans. Lee Hoinacki. Harvard UP, 1993.
"How is the little creature (kryatura) in the belly of its mother? Let your mind imagine that the kryatura, being inside the belly of its mother, can be likened to a twig doubled in half. And some say like a walnut which lies inside a watery skin, with its two hands resting on its breasts, the elbows of its arms lying on its two knees, its two heels drawn up under its backside, its head also on its knees, the mouth closed, the umbilical cord open, since through this it eats what its mother eats and drinks what its mother drinks. And there is no discharge from its body, for otherwise it would kill its mother. And when it is born, what was closed is opened, what was open is closed, for if it were not thus it could not remain living for even an hour. And it has a burning candle near its head, and it sees from one corner of the world to the other, all the while being in the belly of its mother. And in all the life of that person, it never enjoys better days than those."
From Confucian Classics, Chao Song 1991: 318.
"If parents prefer a boy, the mother should use a bow and arrow and ride mares. . . . If the child is to be beautiful, the mother should handle objects made of white jade and observe peacocks. If the child is to be virtuous and capable, the mother should be reading poems and books."
Disembodying Women: Perspectives on Pregnancy and the Unborn. Barbara Duden, Trans. Lee Hoinacki. Harvard UP, 1993.
"How is the little creature (kryatura) in the belly of its mother? Let your mind imagine that the kryatura, being inside the belly of its mother, can be likened to a twig doubled in half. And some say like a walnut which lies inside a watery skin, with its two hands resting on its breasts, the elbows of its arms lying on its two knees, its two heels drawn up under its backside, its head also on its knees, the mouth closed, the umbilical cord open, since through this it eats what its mother eats and drinks what its mother drinks. And there is no discharge from its body, for otherwise it would kill its mother. And when it is born, what was closed is opened, what was open is closed, for if it were not thus it could not remain living for even an hour. And it has a burning candle near its head, and it sees from one corner of the world to the other, all the while being in the belly of its mother. And in all the life of that person, it never enjoys better days than those."
From Confucian Classics, Chao Song 1991: 318.
"If parents prefer a boy, the mother should use a bow and arrow and ride mares. . . . If the child is to be beautiful, the mother should handle objects made of white jade and observe peacocks. If the child is to be virtuous and capable, the mother should be reading poems and books."
Sunday, August 23, 2009
25 Weeks
Song of Your Growing
I've spent so much time thinking of your forming body.
From a few cells into a human figure--
miracle my body automatically performs.
But of your soul--
taken a little flash of spirit from time
immemorial, perhaps like the impulse
of life that generated the first stars.
And then the fuller soul -- perhaps different from spirit,
perhaps created during all of life:
the collective unity, sum of all the parts.
As your bones harden in this sixth month,
so the bedrock of your soul has been set little wanderer.
Your soul imprint will have hugs from Grandma and Grandpa;
wildflowers picked with your mother's barefoot toes.
An evening drive in the rain.
Your father's smiles at an expanding belly.
Time spent above the clouds,
looking down on icebergs broken from Greenland.
A rare, kind St. Louis August.
Bastille Day fireworks.
Tears shed for stolen lilies.
Your first movements at Stonehenge.
The hard question of where to call home.
The quest of a long journey yet unfulfilled.
Reading The Origin of Species, walking over Darwin's gray grave.
Lighting three prayer candles, each from each-before's flame.
A spring conception, a summer quickening, a fall ripening,
a winter birth.
As your cells flow with water from Missouri, Idaho, Paris, London--
Your soul will carry you across the Mississippi, Snake, Seine, Thames
and beyond.
I've spent so much time thinking of your forming body.
From a few cells into a human figure--
miracle my body automatically performs.
But of your soul--
taken a little flash of spirit from time
immemorial, perhaps like the impulse
of life that generated the first stars.
And then the fuller soul -- perhaps different from spirit,
perhaps created during all of life:
the collective unity, sum of all the parts.
As your bones harden in this sixth month,
so the bedrock of your soul has been set little wanderer.
Your soul imprint will have hugs from Grandma and Grandpa;
wildflowers picked with your mother's barefoot toes.
An evening drive in the rain.
Your father's smiles at an expanding belly.
Time spent above the clouds,
looking down on icebergs broken from Greenland.
A rare, kind St. Louis August.
Bastille Day fireworks.
Tears shed for stolen lilies.
Your first movements at Stonehenge.
The hard question of where to call home.
The quest of a long journey yet unfulfilled.
Reading The Origin of Species, walking over Darwin's gray grave.
Lighting three prayer candles, each from each-before's flame.
A spring conception, a summer quickening, a fall ripening,
a winter birth.
As your cells flow with water from Missouri, Idaho, Paris, London--
Your soul will carry you across the Mississippi, Snake, Seine, Thames
and beyond.
Thursday, August 13, 2009
Sunday, August 9, 2009
I want to be back in Paris
Our second day in Paris started when Vincent met us at our hotel. We walked to the base of the Eiffel Tower. It was already extremely crowded, so we wandered through the Parc du Champs de Mars, eventually past Les Invalides and the Ecole Militaire. We ended up near Notre-Dame Cathedral. We had a leisurely lunch together and enjoyed the lovely day. Then outside Notre-Dame I took a picture of Great Grandpa's statue. :) We mused for awhile at the sculptures above the main entrance that show Jesus and the devil weighing the worth of souls (the devil attempts to cheat). Inside Vincent translated the story about an interesting, if grim, statue. It was of "death," depicted as a skeleton in a hooded cloak, holding an hour glass. He gestures to a grieving widow that her time to join her husband (in his casket) is almost near. (Cheery).
Eventually, Vincent needed to leave for his train. I said goodbye to Vincent and began looking around the Rodin Museum. J.D. and Vincent had a quick beer together, and then J.D. joined me inside the Museum. The pictures here are "The Kiss," "Cathedral" (the joined hands), two of mother and child, "Eve," "The Gates of Hell" (near which I have abandoned all hope), and "The Thinker," which was originally going to be called "The Poet" because it was Dante pondering his Divine Comedy over "The Gates of Hell." J.D. and I enjoyed wandering around Rodin's beautiful garden after the Museum closed. It had been a busy day full of walking, but we were both very happy as we made our way home for the evening.
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