PLAY
PLAY
PLAY
^.^
In the vein of the Dixie rendition immediately above:
The Raccoon has now received the official obituary by the Arizona Daily Star, for our Friend For Life,
David James, as follows:
David
Farragut James
|
|
Obituary
·
"DJ--a Sophisticat
forever. Rest . . ."
- Bob Brooks
  David Farragut James
78, of |
|
......................
(Photo from the famed movie, BABETTE'S FEAST, but seems to go with the poem below, especially when one remembers the lines the General spoke)
Sojourns in the Parallel World
We live our lives of human passions,
cruelties, dreams, concepts,
crimes and the exercise of virtue
in and beside a world devoid
of our preoccupations, free
from apprehension—though affected,
certainly, by our actions. A world
parallel to our own though overlapping.
We call it 'Nature: only reluctantly
admitting ourselves to be 'Nature' too.
Whenever we lose track of our own obsessions,
our self-concerns, because we drift for a minute,
an hour even, of pure (almost pure)
response to that insouciant life:
cloud, bird, fox, the flow of light, the dancing
pilgrimage of water, vast stillness
of spellbound ephemerae on a lit windowpane,
animal voices, mineral hum, wind
conversing with rain, ocean with rock, stuttering
of fire to coal—then something tethered
in us, hobbled like a donkey on its patch
of gnawed grass and thistles, breaks free.
No one discovers
just where we've been, when we're caught up again
into our own sphere (where we must
return, indeed, to evolve our destinies)
—but we have changed, a little.
cruelties, dreams, concepts,
crimes and the exercise of virtue
in and beside a world devoid
of our preoccupations, free
from apprehension—though affected,
certainly, by our actions. A world
parallel to our own though overlapping.
We call it 'Nature: only reluctantly
admitting ourselves to be 'Nature' too.
Whenever we lose track of our own obsessions,
our self-concerns, because we drift for a minute,
an hour even, of pure (almost pure)
response to that insouciant life:
cloud, bird, fox, the flow of light, the dancing
pilgrimage of water, vast stillness
of spellbound ephemerae on a lit windowpane,
animal voices, mineral hum, wind
conversing with rain, ocean with rock, stuttering
of fire to coal—then something tethered
in us, hobbled like a donkey on its patch
of gnawed grass and thistles, breaks free.
No one discovers
just where we've been, when we're caught up again
into our own sphere (where we must
return, indeed, to evolve our destinies)
—but we have changed, a little.
..........................
Another one from the Writers Almanac, 10-24-12:
To whom it may concern:
........................
Another one from the Writers Almanac, 10-24-12:
Missive
A friend gave a talk to a women’s church circle yesterday
A friend gave a talk to a women’s church circle yesterday
(see below date)
And I went to hear him;
His subject was his Quaker minister father
And being brought up in rural Iowa and Wisconsin
There were nine children born to this family
and my friend was the middle child
which gave him a perspective of up and down
from the ideal place, sandwiched by six other boys and two girls
When they would go riding in a wagon or a Model A
Sometimes people would stare and silently count
With their fingers, one, two, three, four………
And one of the brothers once leaned out and said,
“There’s NINE of us!”
The parents loved their children greatly;
Times were hard, and struggle to make ends meet
Was a fact of life for the well-knit family
Although the children thought it was just the way life was
Because making do was how everyone else
In their impoverished communities lived too
And their parents did not show much concern;
The father when someone broke a solemn tenet
Sent the child out to cut a switch
And he applied the discipline generously
Which seemed to break his heart
And after awhile it wore on him so hard
That he was doing all this switching
He said to them,
“You ALL go out and cut switches!”
When they came in, puzzled and worried,
The father said, “Now I want you all to
Switch ME! I must be doing something wrong.”
The children complied, though astounded at this turn;
It was uniquely educational for most of them
To apply the lash to their beloved father
Which may have been behind
The creative idea;
Time went along and he still was unable to
Bring about right behaviour from his tribe;
Naughtiness prevailed, it seemed to him,
Too much, so he called the children to formation;
Forlorn, the tender father, caught
In a parenting vortex,
Looked up after holding his head in his hands
For a long silence, searched his nine children’s faces
And asked them, beseechingly,
“Something is wrong here, I can’t seem
To get you to be good! What are we to do?” Whereupon
One little boy said, “We could try whipping you again?”
All those children somehow got college educations
Though the father, who had the gift or oratory,
Only went through eighth grade before having to quit
School and work to support his ailing father’s family
He worked hard at several jobs beside what he got
As a small stipend from his ministry work
And he never complained or let the children
Know how close to the edge he was
My friend in his talk to the church ladies and me yesterday guessed
His father frequently asked the Lord how he was going to make it;
Anecdotal evidence pointed to that: One time the father,
Sometimes given to depression, trudged home through the field
Where he’d been farm-handing - he told his son
Much later in life - and he was anguishing how he was to
Be able to keep going, praying for strength, when all of a sudden,
Whoomp!
A rabbit fell from the sky at his feet.
The father looked at it incredulously; then gazed
Upward, and there, circling above him,
Was a hawk.
[David Zep Dix 10-9-2002]
And I went to hear him;
His subject was his Quaker minister father
And being brought up in rural Iowa and Wisconsin
There were nine children born to this family
and my friend was the middle child
which gave him a perspective of up and down
from the ideal place, sandwiched by six other boys and two girls
When they would go riding in a wagon or a Model A
Sometimes people would stare and silently count
With their fingers, one, two, three, four………
And one of the brothers once leaned out and said,
“There’s NINE of us!”
The parents loved their children greatly;
Times were hard, and struggle to make ends meet
Was a fact of life for the well-knit family
Although the children thought it was just the way life was
Because making do was how everyone else
In their impoverished communities lived too
And their parents did not show much concern;
The father when someone broke a solemn tenet
Sent the child out to cut a switch
And he applied the discipline generously
Which seemed to break his heart
And after awhile it wore on him so hard
That he was doing all this switching
He said to them,
“You ALL go out and cut switches!”
When they came in, puzzled and worried,
The father said, “Now I want you all to
Switch ME! I must be doing something wrong.”
The children complied, though astounded at this turn;
It was uniquely educational for most of them
To apply the lash to their beloved father
Which may have been behind
The creative idea;
Time went along and he still was unable to
Bring about right behaviour from his tribe;
Naughtiness prevailed, it seemed to him,
Too much, so he called the children to formation;
Forlorn, the tender father, caught
In a parenting vortex,
Looked up after holding his head in his hands
For a long silence, searched his nine children’s faces
And asked them, beseechingly,
“Something is wrong here, I can’t seem
To get you to be good! What are we to do?” Whereupon
One little boy said, “We could try whipping you again?”
All those children somehow got college educations
Though the father, who had the gift or oratory,
Only went through eighth grade before having to quit
School and work to support his ailing father’s family
He worked hard at several jobs beside what he got
As a small stipend from his ministry work
And he never complained or let the children
Know how close to the edge he was
My friend in his talk to the church ladies and me yesterday guessed
His father frequently asked the Lord how he was going to make it;
Anecdotal evidence pointed to that: One time the father,
Sometimes given to depression, trudged home through the field
Where he’d been farm-handing - he told his son
Much later in life - and he was anguishing how he was to
Be able to keep going, praying for strength, when all of a sudden,
Whoomp!
A rabbit fell from the sky at his feet.
The father looked at it incredulously; then gazed
Upward, and there, circling above him,
Was a hawk.
[David Zep Dix 10-9-2002]
To whom it may concern:
........................
