One day, on earth

   I know better than to try

   to relinquish or to cure 

   my incongruousness in the

   connected world, for I in-

   herited an open space, re-

   served within plain sight

   to be discovered.

Who launched a thousand questions

I've seen some of the films of Olivier Assayas,

and some more of those of Juliette Binoche, for

whom he created The Clouds of Sils Maria in 2014,

just released by Criterion in dvd. I knew nothing

of the actor depicted in this still shot from the

same movie, her character watching the screening

of another movie, shot in monochrome in the 20's.

She is the most compelling screen presence in my

experience since Jeanne Moreau, whose extravagant

interior resources constantly redefine a surface

of such charismatic allure that it is thrillingly

exhausting to assimilate their diversity and con-

tradictions in real time. Juliette Binoche draws

many of them; others, she ripostes with an almost

sovereign indulgence. But Kristen Stewart was the

Dynamo, Binoche the Virgin in Assayas' reverie on 

collaboration in the arts, and she places a small 

film, for me, alongside the best of Orson Welles.

If it were his Othello, she would be his Micheál

Mac Liammóir; his Chimes at Midnight, his Moreau.

But the Moreau everyone will remember spontaneous-

ly, in watching Clouds of Sils Maria, is the one

who ran the legs off Jules et Jim for Truffaut,

and keeps his name the most beloved since Renoir.

Olivier Assayas

  Director and 

  Screenwriter

The Clouds of Sils Maria

Studio Canal et al, 2014©

Henry Adams

Mont St Michel and Chartres

1905

Princeton University Press, 1981©

Blitz

   One morning she was woken by

   the thud of leather top boots

   on stone stairs, by scrambling,

   by oaths. Soon after, she heard

   something rattle the brickwork

   up her chimney, smelled the 

   burning. Before she knew it 

   was no more than a chimney fire,

   she was frightened but, when the

   other girls told her she stood

   at the door, an overcoat over

   her naked body. A fireman, black-

   ened by soot and water, smiled

   brilliantly at her as he came

   downstairs .. Ever since she'd

   had a soft spot for firemen.

John Constable

Seascape Study with

  Rain Cloud

1827

Royal Academy, London

Henry Green

1905 - 1973

Caught

Chatto & Windus, 1943

New York Review Books, 2016©

Becalmed

The latest oration of the Great 

Innocent has left sufficient num-

bers of our betters in dark con-

fusion, to warrant an influx of

fresh air. Especially do the mes-

merised seem to have been captiv-

ated by a dark suit, a Yale tie

(and God knows, by what license),

and the poignant sight of a Gold

Star family being split on stage,

as proof positive of a remission

of sins, and auguries of a fol-

lowing wind.

Laurent is the surviving brother

of this sort of Naval officer, in

a disproof of command tactics re-

sulting in his "loss" by friendly

fire. Of course this is routine in

amphibious operations, the "risk"

our Great Innocent's mouthpiece

continuously presses to our ear,

as some hot air of famine for our

sail.

Yes. The State is now an endear-

ing sloop of our Great Innocent's

recreations, so that as a father

denounces any retreat behind the

destruction of his son, a widow

may be solicited to be his guest

at some Wagnerian apotheosis in 

the House of Ryan.

Who knew, who struck the fathoms

for the depths that he would go?

Cosumnes River Preserve antagonizes the President

It has the impertinence to bear

protection by a Waters of the

United States rule of 2015, ap-

plying to unnavigable waters --

unknowable to the Constitution's

Commerce Clause, hence of no leg-

itimate national interest in the

ingenuity of Originalist claptrap.

Worse, obviously, it bears the

protection of executive action

based in irrefutably urgent fact,

by an African-American President.

It is an integral refuge of the

California watershed. It is life-

giving, life-sustaining, and pre-

carious. The health and character

of every species sheltered in its

resource draw its benefits. Most 

infuriating, it is beautiful.

California Bureau of Land
  Management
Bob Wick
  photography


Juliet Eilperin and
  Abby Phillip
Trump to Direct Rollback
  of Obama Era Water Rule
  Tuesday
The Washington Post
February 27, 2017©

Nicely done

The Sergeant-at-Arms having

made note of the Executive's

arrival, the Speaker enter-

tained a motion to adjourn,

which, being seconded by ac-

clamation, brought the pro-

ceedings to a dignified close.

And so to dinner on his fate.

We go home now x

The frost is gone from the meadow grass in the early mornings.

      Maybe, somewhere, the nymphs and graces are dancing ..

Undoubtedly, it is just as well

that the experience of the nat-

ural world has suggested to so

many people a sense of seeing

something a genius has position-

ed; it is just as well, because

some marvelously opened minds

have bent themselves to sharing

this impression, in works which

seem to me to show undying life

of their own. For me, a greater

pleasure for the senses in the

natural world is the impression

that someone else has seen this,

too, tasted it or felt it; and

then to go indoors, which is

to say, into this understanding, 
is to know the nymphs and graces
where they live.

David Ferry

Of No Country I Know

  New and Selected Poems

  and Translations

  Horace

  Odes I, iv

  [fragment]

op. cit.

Ever forget what you were going to say?

Ah, yes, practice, practice

and we, too, might make it

to Carnegie Hall. It must be

said that our Great Innocent

has certainly seemed to have

prevailed in his battle with

stage fright, by the simple

expedient of reversing rôles,

excoriating his remarks with

his own voice. But now he ar-

rives at the netherest of in-

fernal gates, Capitol Hill, 

to emit such sounds all over

again. We had only one, lin-

gering reservation of anxiety

for him, born of occasional

distraction by multi-tasking -

but what was I going to say?

For, improvisation and the
Great Innocent are not the
most salubrious of combina-
tions. History has noticed.
He might have begged us, for
example, to stay tuned last
week for a crescendo of ven-
geance on the 9th Circuit's
ruling against his policing
farce, only to swerve off-
noggin with frettings about
his interlocutory magnitude.
He doesn't need a script, he 
he needs a valet de chambre. 

Ah, but seated just above
him, all will be provided.
Or, what's a Paul Ryan for,
if not to keep a guy on his
mark, to fulfill his part?
A delicate whisper, is all.

There'll be no forgetting
what to say, at taxcutting
time, no sweet idylls in
Crimea, while bankers lie
weeping in their chains.