Dear Blog,
Happy hundreth post!
*confetti and streamers and funny party sounds*
So I thought I'd give you a present.
One Hundred things that are in my life now in no particular order.
1. This Poem:
Under the Piano
Kenneth Weisner
For Kit
There is nothing better than listening
to Debussy's Claire de Lune,
under your piano.
Students who are leaving you
go under their last day
and listen to you
play for them.
It's how you say goodbye.
The piano sits in the corner
of the small carpeted front room,
a Baldwin baby grand
next to my Grandmother's hundred-year-old
German side table with lions' paws.
You have them dive right back there
into the dark corner
beneath the bass strings. In a way,
a piano is a horrifying thing;
this black angel's coffin
could come thumping down
and kill someone.
You and a student rode it out there
during the big quake;
a bookshelf full of music
smashed the bench,
stopping inches from the keys.
When I arrived home yesterday,
you were playing Rachmaninoff's Prelude in G Minor.
I don't know why - I didn't even break stride -
just went right under
to close my eyes awhile
after a long day.
I love this part...a dramatic downward run
proclaims its minor key, some triumph in exile, turned
sumptuous, rising back upwards now....
And though I am not your student,
and you are not saying goodbye,
how good it is that you are playing
now for me! sprawled on the old carpet
appreciating every heady consonance
but also every jangling overtone
and percussive distortion,
the hilarious volume and vivid harmonics;
no, not even a kiss can do this.
And as in love,
even the mistakes are glorious,
blunt thunder.
And then when you go a long time without missing a
note,
how marvelous-what a miracle-
transported by virtuosity
into the composer's heart, or is it your heart?
or is it my own?
Oh, terrible exile;
wonderful life.
And such a private place, sacred; the piano
filling the sky.
So the wonder
mixes with the love, music, and privacy
to form
shameless ecstacy,
a fortune so difficult to find these days
in nature, the Church, politics
or even the theater.
It may not be God, but I feel loved,
you feel loved.
All the better because neither
the machine nor the interpreter
is perfect,
but the resulting chaos might be
the best thing in life.
And having married the piano player
many stormy years ago,
now, without sentimentality but in
the presence of
Rachmaninoff-
so much meaning-
and hearing the wonderful sense
in the sound, mouth set in its slight smirk,
so used to being disappointed at the world...
I for once do the logical thing:
nothing - just lie there
and weep through the whole recap and coda,
silently, shamelessly, for the ecstacy of it.
2. I feel silly for saying this, but learning to love Bach has deepened my love for Rachmaninoff. They just don't make music like that anymore.
3. Speaking of music, I went out on a limb the other night (er, morning actually heh.) and listened to Jason Mraz. =D "I'm Lucky" and "I'm Yours". Just my kind of happiness.
4. Athanasius and the book Jesus in Trinitarian Perspective. Presentations, presentations, presentations! It's going to be really great, if I can get it down on paper without descending into meaningless mutterings.
5. The Incarnation. The Trinity. The Atonement.
6. All those beautiful and wonderful people who I've been blessed to be friends with. A thousand thank yous for making life so blessed. Where would I be without you?
7. My family. They're awesome. I must work on not taking them for granted.
8. What is music? The problem that I run into when trying to define music is that all my descriptions also apply to other forms of art... Just throwing it out there now.
9. Ever notice how sapped of energy and strength when you go for a few days without devotions? Today I woke up really sick (literally). Didn't want to read Bible. I know this sounds horrible but it's like medicine, it won't always taste good, but it's the only thing that heals you. So far this week I've been able to go through Romans and Collosians. Both are wonderful wonderful letters. I only add the note about them being medicinal because it's my problem.
10. My cousin Aaron. Enough said. Go look.
11. Okay this is going to be a ridiculously long post, so if you've had enough (I have, I'm going to take a break, but you won't know that) go and do what you should be doing. =]
12. I'm not a very interesting person! Yes! Epiphany! I think that's a all-too-common misconception we have about ourselves. I've heard it termed exceptionalism. I want to be normal in the good sense of the word. "Well done thou good and faithful servant..."
13. Loving requires (at least in this state) emotions. There's no off switch. Dr. Jensen has written an excellent post on the whole thing here.
14. Learning to Love rightly is hard!
15. In Christianity it's a religion of paradox. I think Chesterton says a ton about this in Orthodoxy, but just this week, I've been really fascinated by the tension that exists between the equal Persons of the Trinity who also exist in set relations to each other.
16. All those blogs on the side. They're all really great. Go read Mr. Bartel's blog. It's Evanger Fireside. He doesn't post often, but when he does, it's worth 100 of my posts (that's a horrible understatement).
17. Speaking of Mr. Bartel, I need to get into more poetry. I've got two lovely volumes of major British writers. Sigh. I should be working on Presentation outlines.
18. Laguna Beach is lovely and Beautiful. The Zinc Cafe nearby is delicious.
19. I'll just throw in something about Ian in here. Ian is...well, he's Ian. How do you describe someone so uniquely funny and quirkily inappropriate at times? It's not everyday that you meet a name-misprounouncing (although we've gotten better in this aspect have we not?), homer marathoning, titan of heretical ideas who can also kick my bottom in Super Smash to boot! I look forward to knowing you better very much. =]
20. Speaking of Reynolds, I'm afraid to add my voice to the chorus of praise for every person of this wonderful family (it would be very scratchy and out of tune). How is there so much beauty packed into one family?!
21. But love starts with those nearest to you and the first step in loving is to love those around me.
22. This is basically a continuous spew of thoughts broken with random numbering eh?
23. College...AHHHHHH!!! I don't know what I want to do with my life! Tell me! I like how Montesquieu distinguished between two kinds of motivators in a person. The need to be led and the need to lead. I should have a more assertive say in it, since I will be the one living it...
24. I am a singularly indecisive person yes?
25. You can only know a person as much as they choose to be known.
26. Blogs might just be evil in that they seperate me from you, dear reader and give the semblance of intimacy. The trick is to keep in mind that contact with real people and having real conversations is more important than this.
27. I love getting books in the mail. It makes my day.
28. Books I want to get to:
Brothers Karamazov, Esolen's translation of Dante, The Figure of Beatrice, Other Charles Williams stuff, C.S. Lewis stuff, etc.
29. Okay, why did I even say I'd do 100? For the sake of your sanity friend, go do what you need to do.
30. I don't know about you, but I'm tired of hearing myself talk about myself. Maybe that's why I do so much quoting on this blog.
31. Moral of number thirty one? You are not an interesting person, if you want to be well liked, talk to other people about things outside of the self. Friendship is about something, Eros is about someone.
32. Speaking of C.S. Lewis' Four Loves, I need to finish that, I don't understand the Eros chapter...but that's hardly Lewis' fault.
33. So, ideas? Questions? Why do we sleep?
34. Why do I have the complete works of Mozart on CD and yet never find the time to listen to them?
35. You don't own a book just because it's on your shelf.
36. I thought this was pretty funny, "Despite the cost of living, have you noticed how popular it is?"
37. I will fight tooth and nail to get Dante for presentations next semester. Not. even. kidding.
38. What does the lover see in the beloved? Loving involves a who and and why. Who do you love and why? Can you love without answering these?
39. Go read Andrew Murray's book, Humility. It will reshape all your ideas about being a Christian.
40. My idea of a dream home is a cottage in Virginia in the Fall by a lake with lots and lots of books a warm fireplace and a steinway D. =D
41. But don't take that last one seriously.
42. We don't have enough faith in God. He's not just some cosmic key finder "Thank you Jesus! I found my car keys!".
43. Who is God?
44. If your still here, I pity you. Either you're bored stiff or you have no self control. I'm going with the former.
45. I am never ever putting you through this kind of thing again my poor blog.
46. I can't TAKE IT ANY LONGER!
Moral of this post: The World doesn't revolve around me! THANK GOD!
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Monday, October 27, 2008
Rachmaninoff's Psychiatrist
I rejoice in the fact that this book exists.
I am excited that I own it.
I feel very affectionate about this poem because 1) it is the expression of another who loves Rachmaninoff as well 2) it puts into words a little of what all Rachmaninoff Lovers feel.
Therefore, without further ado:
Rachmaninoff's Psychiatrist
Diane Ackerman
I'm listening to Rachmaninoff's
Piano Concerto No. 2,
which he dedicated to Dr. Dahl,
the psychiatrist who guided him
through the straights of fever,
not long after Sergei had heard
his own first symphony played.
Horrified by its many defects
which seemed a sewage of noise,
he had fled the hall, ashamed,
a quagmire of self-doubt.
We cannot know all the sounds
Dahl and he exchanged,
but rubbing one word against another,
Dahl gradually restored
Sergei's confidence. History tells
that Dahl used affirmations
and auto-suggestion:
"You will compose again."
"You will write a piano concerto."
"You will write with great facility."
Repeated until the words saturated
His gift from head to fingers.
In truth, nothing can kill a gift,
but it may become anemic
from great shock or stress-
a sprain of the emotions will do,
or a traffic accident of the heart,
or a failure dire as a clanging bell.
For two years, Dahl worked
on Sergei's shattered will.
at last he collected up his senses
in a burst of blood fury
and composed his triumphant
2nd Piano Concerto,
full of tenderness and yearning,
beguiling melodies, raging passion,
and long sensuous preludes
to explosive climaxes,
frenzy followed by strains
of mysticism and trance.
Loaded with starry melodies,
it was a map of his sensibility,
and a wilderness rarely known
-the intense life of an artist
seen in miniature, with rapture expressed
as all-embracing sound.
Will you tell me if you know,
how Dahl might have received
such a gift? I cannot imagine it.
With hugs and shared enthusiasm?
With an austere thank you?
In his private moments, did he weep
at the privilege allowed him?
For a time he held the exposed heart
of a great artist, cupped his hands
around it like a flame, blew gently,
patiently, until it flared again.
For that, he earned the blessings
of history, and soothed millions
of hungry souls he would never meet.
Listening to Rachmaninoff's
concerto today, intoxicated by its fever,
I want to kiss the hands of Dahl,
but he is beyond my touch or game.
Allow me to thank you in his name.
Indeed. Thank you Dr. Dahl.
I am excited that I own it.
I feel very affectionate about this poem because 1) it is the expression of another who loves Rachmaninoff as well 2) it puts into words a little of what all Rachmaninoff Lovers feel.
Therefore, without further ado:
Rachmaninoff's Psychiatrist
Diane Ackerman
I'm listening to Rachmaninoff's
Piano Concerto No. 2,
which he dedicated to Dr. Dahl,
the psychiatrist who guided him
through the straights of fever,
not long after Sergei had heard
his own first symphony played.
Horrified by its many defects
which seemed a sewage of noise,
he had fled the hall, ashamed,
a quagmire of self-doubt.
We cannot know all the sounds
Dahl and he exchanged,
but rubbing one word against another,
Dahl gradually restored
Sergei's confidence. History tells
that Dahl used affirmations
and auto-suggestion:
"You will compose again."
"You will write a piano concerto."
"You will write with great facility."
Repeated until the words saturated
His gift from head to fingers.
In truth, nothing can kill a gift,
but it may become anemic
from great shock or stress-
a sprain of the emotions will do,
or a traffic accident of the heart,
or a failure dire as a clanging bell.
For two years, Dahl worked
on Sergei's shattered will.
at last he collected up his senses
in a burst of blood fury
and composed his triumphant
2nd Piano Concerto,
full of tenderness and yearning,
beguiling melodies, raging passion,
and long sensuous preludes
to explosive climaxes,
frenzy followed by strains
of mysticism and trance.
Loaded with starry melodies,
it was a map of his sensibility,
and a wilderness rarely known
-the intense life of an artist
seen in miniature, with rapture expressed
as all-embracing sound.
Will you tell me if you know,
how Dahl might have received
such a gift? I cannot imagine it.
With hugs and shared enthusiasm?
With an austere thank you?
In his private moments, did he weep
at the privilege allowed him?
For a time he held the exposed heart
of a great artist, cupped his hands
around it like a flame, blew gently,
patiently, until it flared again.
For that, he earned the blessings
of history, and soothed millions
of hungry souls he would never meet.
Listening to Rachmaninoff's
concerto today, intoxicated by its fever,
I want to kiss the hands of Dahl,
but he is beyond my touch or game.
Allow me to thank you in his name.
Indeed. Thank you Dr. Dahl.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Grateful...But Worried
From The Imitation of Christ:
"Thou hast not yet resisted unto blood."
(Thomas A Kempis, Third Book, section 19, pg. 200)
I am grateful that no one is waiting to inflict unimaginably horrible tortures upon me for being a Christian. (Been reading Eusebius' History of the Church)
I am worried over the fact that I would probably deny my Lord if that were ever to happen.
How do we strengthen our faith so that we achieve a state where "perfect Love casts out all fear"?
From Shakespeare:
"Come, lady, die to live. This wedding day..."
(Much Ado About Nothing, Act IV.1.253)
There's so much meaning packed into that line...
The Bloodless Martyrdom.
Actual Martyrdom.
Being a Christian in general.
Needless to say, there are more ways to die than one.
"Thou hast not yet resisted unto blood."
(Thomas A Kempis, Third Book, section 19, pg. 200)
I am grateful that no one is waiting to inflict unimaginably horrible tortures upon me for being a Christian. (Been reading Eusebius' History of the Church)
I am worried over the fact that I would probably deny my Lord if that were ever to happen.
How do we strengthen our faith so that we achieve a state where "perfect Love casts out all fear"?
From Shakespeare:
"Come, lady, die to live. This wedding day..."
(Much Ado About Nothing, Act IV.1.253)
There's so much meaning packed into that line...
The Bloodless Martyrdom.
Actual Martyrdom.
Being a Christian in general.
Needless to say, there are more ways to die than one.
Saturday, October 18, 2008
Pushing Daisies
Is officially my favorite TV show. Ever.
I fell in love with this show since the first episode.
Quirky, Witty, and Wonderfully Romantic.
*Happy Sigh*
...okaaaaaaaay
It's just so excellently done!
And it's soooo much cleaner than almost anything else you see on TV.
It's hard to describe how endearingly adorable and funny and just plain loveable this show is.
It's like Romantic Pie (with Ice Cream!) for the soul.
It basically goes like this, there's this pie maker who has an uncanny ability to raise people from the dead. But they can only be alive for one minute before something else has to die. What's more, if the person he touches back to life gets a second touch from him, they're dead...again...for good. And so it turns out that his childhood sweet heart gets murdered and he brings her back to life. They pretty much fall head over heels for each other and so he can't bear to put her back to sleep. Which means that they can never touch even though they're madly in love with each other.
Oy! I can almost hear the sappiness running like a faucet! =]
I love this show!
Heres a good review from Amazon.com:
Pushing Daisies is many things at once: detective show, romantic comedy, whimsical fantasy and above all, a story about a guy who bakes pies and has the ability to bring dead people back to life. Somehow all of these things come together to make one of the most enjoyable, funny and bittersweet shows to come along in a long time. A lot of that magic comes from the near-perfect casting - Lee Pace (The Fall, Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day) as Ned the Piemaker is wonderfully reserved and adorably neurotic; his facial expressions alone provide some of the most moving and hilarious moments in the series. Anna Friel as Charlotte "Chuck" Charles, Chi McBride as Emerson Cod and Kristin Chenoweth as Olive Snook round out the regulars at the Pie Hole and veteran actresses Swoosie Kurtz and Ellen Greene are great as Chuck's eccentric aunts whose passions include synchronized swimming, amateur ornithology and rare cheeses. Pushing Daisies exists in a world where people regularly break out into song to express their feelings, where death is never gory and usually played for comic effect, and where every color on screen is richly saturated and vibrant, creating an oddly timeless Edward Scissorhands-like world.
Bryan Fuller, the creator of cult favorites Dead Like Me and Wonderfalls has perfected his style with Pushing Daisies; this series has a broader appeal than the previous shows. Each imaginatively produced episode has such snappy writing paired with ghoulish sensibilities, heart wrenching romance and classic caper-style crime fighting, making every moment completely un-missable. The DVD release of Season One contains all nine original episodes and a behind-the-scenes featurette. ---Kira Canny
Online Episodes here:
I fell in love with this show since the first episode.
Quirky, Witty, and Wonderfully Romantic.
*Happy Sigh*
...okaaaaaaaay
It's just so excellently done!
And it's soooo much cleaner than almost anything else you see on TV.
It's hard to describe how endearingly adorable and funny and just plain loveable this show is.
It's like Romantic Pie (with Ice Cream!) for the soul.
It basically goes like this, there's this pie maker who has an uncanny ability to raise people from the dead. But they can only be alive for one minute before something else has to die. What's more, if the person he touches back to life gets a second touch from him, they're dead...again...for good. And so it turns out that his childhood sweet heart gets murdered and he brings her back to life. They pretty much fall head over heels for each other and so he can't bear to put her back to sleep. Which means that they can never touch even though they're madly in love with each other.
Oy! I can almost hear the sappiness running like a faucet! =]
I love this show!
Heres a good review from Amazon.com:
Pushing Daisies is many things at once: detective show, romantic comedy, whimsical fantasy and above all, a story about a guy who bakes pies and has the ability to bring dead people back to life. Somehow all of these things come together to make one of the most enjoyable, funny and bittersweet shows to come along in a long time. A lot of that magic comes from the near-perfect casting - Lee Pace (The Fall, Miss Pettigrew Lives For a Day) as Ned the Piemaker is wonderfully reserved and adorably neurotic; his facial expressions alone provide some of the most moving and hilarious moments in the series. Anna Friel as Charlotte "Chuck" Charles, Chi McBride as Emerson Cod and Kristin Chenoweth as Olive Snook round out the regulars at the Pie Hole and veteran actresses Swoosie Kurtz and Ellen Greene are great as Chuck's eccentric aunts whose passions include synchronized swimming, amateur ornithology and rare cheeses. Pushing Daisies exists in a world where people regularly break out into song to express their feelings, where death is never gory and usually played for comic effect, and where every color on screen is richly saturated and vibrant, creating an oddly timeless Edward Scissorhands-like world.
Bryan Fuller, the creator of cult favorites Dead Like Me and Wonderfalls has perfected his style with Pushing Daisies; this series has a broader appeal than the previous shows. Each imaginatively produced episode has such snappy writing paired with ghoulish sensibilities, heart wrenching romance and classic caper-style crime fighting, making every moment completely un-missable. The DVD release of Season One contains all nine original episodes and a behind-the-scenes featurette. ---Kira Canny
Online Episodes here:
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
Good Talking and an Arguement
Sometimes I wish I could talk more.
Seriously.
This sounds odd for those who know me (my mouth hardly ever stops moving). Allow me to explain.
There are multiple ways of talking.
Talking for the fun of it: Some would call this wit or friendly banter.
Talking for dialectic: The pursuit of Truth through words.
Talking for emptiness: Words to fill the gaps in our lives.
Talking for instruction: "Let him who has ears to hear, hear this"
And then there's
Talking for communication:
This last one, I rarely (if ever) get to do. I think we've all known those times. The worries and cares of life seem to melt into the background and you are brought (drawn perhaps?) into the presence of another Soul. Where even the words seem to be just barely necessary. And I don't mean those awkward silences where the need to say something seems to overpower the importance of anything said. No, I mean the times when "lifetimes burn in a moment" and even the silences between our words have a life to them. How much more would we love people if we could only communicate with them? When the veils of flesh and speech seem all but transparent, ah, there lies an aspect of Beauty. How much more humble we would be if we could but glimpse the glory of another soul created in God's Image?
But today's a Wednesday, life rushes on like a steady stream. Of course, this communication is entirely possible through the dialectic but I find these moments only come when you don't look for them. When everyone in the house is asleep and we two can stare into the dark and the universe is opened. Or on a long drive back from nowhere and the headlamps of a distant car are all that disturbs the moonlit land scape. Miles upon miles of pregnant silence. Solitude embued with deepest knowledge.
"That was a way of putting it - not very satisfactory:
A periphrastic study in a worn-out poetical fashion,
Leaving one still with the intolerable wrestle
With words and meanings..."
So, I wish I could talk more. But (oh, oh) how? Ironically, you can't even seek it.
"Where then, are we to go now?
Why, forward of course.
But which way is up?"
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without Love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
Whisper of running streams, and winter lightning.
The wild thyme unseen and the wild strawberry,
The laughter in the garden, echoed ecstacy
Not lost, but requiring, pointing to the agony
Of death and birth.
You say I am repeating
Something I have said before. I shall say it again.
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,
You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstacy.
In order to arrive at what you do not know
You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possess
You must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are not
You must go through the way in which you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where you are is where you are not."
From Ash Wednesday:
"I rejoice that things are as they are and
I renounce that blessed face
And renounce the voice
Because I cannot hope to turn again
Consequently I rejoice, having to construct something
Upon which to rejoice
And pray to God to have mercy upon us
And I pray that I may forget
These matters that with myself I too much discuss
Too much explain
Because I do not hope to turn again
Let these words answer
For what is done, not to be done again
May the judgement not be too heavy upon us."
I think it's safe to say that I like Eliot. ;)
"For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business"
...Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment...
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter.
Old men ought to be explorers
Here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion
Through the dark cold and empty desolation
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
Of the petrel and the porpoise. In my end is my beginning."
"Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God...to a virgin...and the virgin's name was Mary. And coming in, he said to her, 'Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.'
But she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. The angel said to her, 'Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God.'
'And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end...For nothing wil be impossible with God.' And Mary said, 'Behold, the bondslave of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word.' And the angel departed from her."
Can someone please tell me why I just quoted all of that?!
I am so, so weird...=P
Seriously.
This sounds odd for those who know me (my mouth hardly ever stops moving). Allow me to explain.
There are multiple ways of talking.
Talking for the fun of it: Some would call this wit or friendly banter.
Talking for dialectic: The pursuit of Truth through words.
Talking for emptiness: Words to fill the gaps in our lives.
Talking for instruction: "Let him who has ears to hear, hear this"
And then there's
Talking for communication:
This last one, I rarely (if ever) get to do. I think we've all known those times. The worries and cares of life seem to melt into the background and you are brought (drawn perhaps?) into the presence of another Soul. Where even the words seem to be just barely necessary. And I don't mean those awkward silences where the need to say something seems to overpower the importance of anything said. No, I mean the times when "lifetimes burn in a moment" and even the silences between our words have a life to them. How much more would we love people if we could only communicate with them? When the veils of flesh and speech seem all but transparent, ah, there lies an aspect of Beauty. How much more humble we would be if we could but glimpse the glory of another soul created in God's Image?
But today's a Wednesday, life rushes on like a steady stream. Of course, this communication is entirely possible through the dialectic but I find these moments only come when you don't look for them. When everyone in the house is asleep and we two can stare into the dark and the universe is opened. Or on a long drive back from nowhere and the headlamps of a distant car are all that disturbs the moonlit land scape. Miles upon miles of pregnant silence. Solitude embued with deepest knowledge.
"That was a way of putting it - not very satisfactory:
A periphrastic study in a worn-out poetical fashion,
Leaving one still with the intolerable wrestle
With words and meanings..."
So, I wish I could talk more. But (oh, oh) how? Ironically, you can't even seek it.
"Where then, are we to go now?
Why, forward of course.
But which way is up?"
"I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without Love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.
Whisper of running streams, and winter lightning.
The wild thyme unseen and the wild strawberry,
The laughter in the garden, echoed ecstacy
Not lost, but requiring, pointing to the agony
Of death and birth.
You say I am repeating
Something I have said before. I shall say it again.
Shall I say it again? In order to arrive there,
To arrive where you are, to get from where you are not,
You must go by a way wherein there is no ecstacy.
In order to arrive at what you do not know
You must go by a way which is the way of ignorance.
In order to possess what you do not possess
You must go by the way of dispossession.
In order to arrive at what you are not
You must go through the way in which you are not.
And what you do not know is the only thing you know
And what you own is what you do not own
And where you are is where you are not."
From Ash Wednesday:
"I rejoice that things are as they are and
I renounce that blessed face
And renounce the voice
Because I cannot hope to turn again
Consequently I rejoice, having to construct something
Upon which to rejoice
And pray to God to have mercy upon us
And I pray that I may forget
These matters that with myself I too much discuss
Too much explain
Because I do not hope to turn again
Let these words answer
For what is done, not to be done again
May the judgement not be too heavy upon us."
I think it's safe to say that I like Eliot. ;)
"For us, there is only the trying. The rest is not our business"
...Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment...
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter.
Old men ought to be explorers
Here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion
Through the dark cold and empty desolation
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
Of the petrel and the porpoise. In my end is my beginning."
"Now in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God...to a virgin...and the virgin's name was Mary. And coming in, he said to her, 'Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.'
But she was very perplexed at this statement, and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. The angel said to her, 'Do not be afraid, Mary; for you have found favor with God.'
'And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name Him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High; and the Lord God will give Him the throne of His father David; and He will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and His kingdom will have no end...For nothing wil be impossible with God.' And Mary said, 'Behold, the bondslave of the Lord; may it be done to me according to your word.' And the angel departed from her."
Can someone please tell me why I just quoted all of that?!
I am so, so weird...=P
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Silliness in Torrey
Heh, we can't be serious all the time! Some funny tidbits:
Me: Nooooooooooo! It can't be! No it's true, Disneyland is EVIL!
Mr Buhler: Really?! Why?
Me: Well the classical underworld was called Dis and it's the name of the city in the Inferno. Dis - ney land? Coinkidink? I think not!
Mr. Buhler: *Chuckle* Silly Mr. Choo, Disneyland isn't evil, it actively combats evil. You see, the archaic form of "no" is "nay" and a variant spelling would be "ney". So it's actually Dis - ney land, the land where we defy evil and say "NAY!" to all of Hell.
=]
Mr. Bartel: Guys (Mr. Chavira, Mr. Diaz, me) if an attractive woman came up to you and said, "God told me to become romantically involved with you, would you believe her? What would you say?
Mr. Chavira and Mr. Diaz: ............
Me: "PRAISE GOD!!"
ah....you had to be there. ;)
Me: Nooooooooooo! It can't be! No it's true, Disneyland is EVIL!
Mr Buhler: Really?! Why?
Me: Well the classical underworld was called Dis and it's the name of the city in the Inferno. Dis - ney land? Coinkidink? I think not!
Mr. Buhler: *Chuckle* Silly Mr. Choo, Disneyland isn't evil, it actively combats evil. You see, the archaic form of "no" is "nay" and a variant spelling would be "ney". So it's actually Dis - ney land, the land where we defy evil and say "NAY!" to all of Hell.
=]
Mr. Bartel: Guys (Mr. Chavira, Mr. Diaz, me) if an attractive woman came up to you and said, "God told me to become romantically involved with you, would you believe her? What would you say?
Mr. Chavira and Mr. Diaz: ............
Me: "PRAISE GOD!!"
ah....you had to be there. ;)
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