Saturday, October 5, 2013

Saturday commute xc: bad proceedings on shore





Koloa felt some of the
aftershock that turned
Honolulu and Lahaina in-
to places of decadence,
but it was no overwhel-
ming problem on Kauai.
Dr James W. Smith noted
in his journal in April,
1865, Three whaleships
here at anchor & bad
proceedings expected on
shore. But if bad pro-
ceedings took place,
they could not have 
been too glaring, since
Smith made no mention
of them in later entries.




We can all point to more
than one pandemic which
has been propagated by
discretion in the prac-
tice of medicine. On the
other hand, none of us,
immersed in the great Age
of Indiscretion as we are,
would welcome a breach of
confidentiality from the
caretakers of our woes.

An island - and sometimes
the smaller, the better -
will always seem to be
that grant of confidence
in space, that Dr Smith's
journal was in comment. 
This is renewal as even
the confessional under-
stands it. Homeland se-
curity, if you like. I 
love Kauai for many rea-
sons. It returns to one, 
whenever it's recalled.

































Edward Joesting
Kauai
  The Separate Kingdom
University of Hawaii Press, 1984©





Friday, October 4, 2013

Thursday, October 3, 2013

The papers are full of talk of "no negotiations taking place"






      That's like poor
      Wolfgang Pauli's
      imagining a par-
      ticle beyond de-
      tection. The act
      of physics is in-
      terminably redis-
      tributive. Even-
      tually we notice
      and think it was
      our own idea.






























The report of St Mark






        As he were a tree,
        walking, with what
        should he collide?


























Wednesday, October 2, 2013

Gulping Dickens in my youth





   I used - very reasonably,
   I think - to surmise that
   all injustice could well
   be laid at the door of a
   harsh and anxious break-
   fast.

   A symptom confused as a
   cause, I grant you. But
   it was time to be invad-
   ed by the light of day.



   And, you know, all those
   knowing chuckles of our
   later schoolboy years,
   never meant we disbeliev-
   ed in breakfast.

   They meant we'd seen our
   parity; and they showed
   us that our appetite at 
   morning preserved us in
   even as our feeding nev-
   er could. To be happy to
   be hungry, is a paradox
   that stings one still in
   Dickens.























Tuesday, October 1, 2013

I asked my bookseller what to read without a government



I did, but I asked her
also why she didn't of-
fer valet parking, so
buried is her shop in
a cobbled mews. Admit-
tedly, I was not of a
mood to be realistic,
And I was lucky in my
choice.





     Pierced to the deep rock
     with noon sunlight,
     Fisher Pond
     by nightfall lies
     under a starless sky
     opaque. At their fire
     the lovers want
     if only ... Who,
     the hoot owl calls,
     and later, You,
     he seems to say.
     You, and the fog drifts
     into the campfire.
























Brooks Haxton
They Lift their
  Wings to Cry
  Poems
Blue Mountain
Alfred A. Knopf, 2008©


Monday, September 30, 2013

Just another outing in the sun





  Just another fugitive,
  just another shadow 
  trailing callouses.