First Skating Party
Dozens of kids circle
the worn wooden floor
on old rental
skates,
and none of them wear
helmets or pads,
so when they
collide
or fall or stop themselves
by the simple technique
of steering
straight
into the cinder-block barrier,
you can feel the pain
of the
parents
who watch from booths
by the concession stand;
they know their
children
have bones of balsa
and skin that tears
as easily as a
napkin,
but they can do nothing
except yell, Be Careful!
and
make hand gestures
to slow down
—Slow
Down!—
as the ones they love
strobe past them
faster and
faster
just beyond their reach.
"First Skating Party" by Joseph Mills from The Miraculous
Turning. © Press 53, 2014
^,^
For My Son, Reading Harry Potter
How lovely, to be lost
as you are now
in someone else's thoughts
an imagined world
of witchcraft, wizardry and clans
that takes you in so utterly
all the ceaseless background noise
of life's insistent pull and drag soon fades
and you are left, a young boy
captured in attention's undivided daze,
as I was once
when books defined a world
no trouble could yet penetrate
or others spoil, or regret stain,
when, between covers, under covers,
all is safe and sure
and each Odysseus makes it home again
and every transformation is to bird or bush
or to a star atwinkle in some firmament of light,
or to a club that lets you, and all others, in.
Oh, how I wish for you
that life may let you turn and turn
these pages, in whose spell
time is frozen, as is pain and fright and loss
before you're destined to be lost again
in that disordered and distressing book
your life will write for you and cannot change.
as you are now
in someone else's thoughts
an imagined world
of witchcraft, wizardry and clans
that takes you in so utterly
all the ceaseless background noise
of life's insistent pull and drag soon fades
and you are left, a young boy
captured in attention's undivided daze,
as I was once
when books defined a world
no trouble could yet penetrate
or others spoil, or regret stain,
when, between covers, under covers,
all is safe and sure
and each Odysseus makes it home again
and every transformation is to bird or bush
or to a star atwinkle in some firmament of light,
or to a club that lets you, and all others, in.
Oh, how I wish for you
that life may let you turn and turn
these pages, in whose spell
time is frozen, as is pain and fright and loss
before you're destined to be lost again
in that disordered and distressing book
your life will write for you and cannot change.
^,^
66
love is more thicker than forget
more thinner than recall
more seldom than a wave is wet
more frequent than to fail
it is most mad and moonly
and less it shall unbe
than all the sea which only
is deeper than the sea
love is less always than to win
less never than alive
less bigger than the least begin
less littler than forgive
it is most sane and sunly
and more it cannot die
than all the sky which only
is higher than the sky
more thinner than recall
more seldom than a wave is wet
more frequent than to fail
it is most mad and moonly
and less it shall unbe
than all the sea which only
is deeper than the sea
love is less always than to win
less never than alive
less bigger than the least begin
less littler than forgive
it is most sane and sunly
and more it cannot die
than all the sky which only
is higher than the sky
It's the birthday of poet E.E.
Cummings (books by this author), born Edward Estlin Cummings in
Cambridge, Massachusetts (1894). His father was a Harvard professor, and
Cummings grew up in a privileged and happy household — he said, "As it was my
miraculous fortune to have a true father and a true mother, and a home which the
truth of their love made joyous, so — in reaching outward from this love and
this joy — I was marvelously lucky to touch and seize a rising and striving
world." At times he rebelled against the strict Christian morality and academic
world of his parents. He wrote in one early poem: "the Cambridge ladies who live
in furnished souls / are unbeautiful and have comfortable minds." He said, "I
led a double life, getting drunk and feeling up girls but lying about this to my
Father and taking his money all the time."
He graduated from Harvard, enlisted in the Ambulance Corps, and then moved to Greenwich Village to write poetry. His Harvard friend John Dos Passos used his influence to find a publisher for Cummings's first book of poems, Tulips and Chimneys (1923). Cummings complained that the editor cut the manuscript down from 152 poems to 66, and took out the ampersand in the title to write out the word "and." One critic said that his poems were "hideous on the page," and another corrected all his punctuation when she quoted him. He continued to publish books, but 12 years after his first collection of poems had come out, Cummings was still unable to find a publisher for his newest manuscript. He ended up self-publishing it with financial help from his mother — he titled it No Thanks (1935) and dedicated it to the 14 publishing houses who had rejected the book.
Slowly, his fame grew. His Collected Poems (1938) was a big success, but his six-month royalty checks were small — one for $14.94, another for $9.75. His mother still gave him a monthly check to help pay his living expenses. He started giving poetry readings, and by the last decade of his life, Cummings was a celebrity. His poetry readings were hugely popular, sold-out events — he packed venues from college campuses to theaters. He charmed his audiences — reading energetically, lingering on individual words, striding around the stage as he spoke, and timing his readings to the second. In 1957, he read to a crowd of 7,000 in Boston. During a reading at Bennington College in Vermont, the huge crowd of students greeted him by reciting his poem about Buffalo Bill en masse. The crowds were so enthusiastic that Cummings had to establish what he called "rules of engagement": he refused to autograph books or attend dinners or other social functions. He sometimes sneaked out after readings by what he called a "secretbackentrance." Young women came up to him on the streets of New York to give him bouquets of flowers, or left them on the doorstep of his Greenwich Village apartment. By the time of his death in 1962, he was the second most widely read poet in America, after Robert Frost.
He graduated from Harvard, enlisted in the Ambulance Corps, and then moved to Greenwich Village to write poetry. His Harvard friend John Dos Passos used his influence to find a publisher for Cummings's first book of poems, Tulips and Chimneys (1923). Cummings complained that the editor cut the manuscript down from 152 poems to 66, and took out the ampersand in the title to write out the word "and." One critic said that his poems were "hideous on the page," and another corrected all his punctuation when she quoted him. He continued to publish books, but 12 years after his first collection of poems had come out, Cummings was still unable to find a publisher for his newest manuscript. He ended up self-publishing it with financial help from his mother — he titled it No Thanks (1935) and dedicated it to the 14 publishing houses who had rejected the book.
Slowly, his fame grew. His Collected Poems (1938) was a big success, but his six-month royalty checks were small — one for $14.94, another for $9.75. His mother still gave him a monthly check to help pay his living expenses. He started giving poetry readings, and by the last decade of his life, Cummings was a celebrity. His poetry readings were hugely popular, sold-out events — he packed venues from college campuses to theaters. He charmed his audiences — reading energetically, lingering on individual words, striding around the stage as he spoke, and timing his readings to the second. In 1957, he read to a crowd of 7,000 in Boston. During a reading at Bennington College in Vermont, the huge crowd of students greeted him by reciting his poem about Buffalo Bill en masse. The crowds were so enthusiastic that Cummings had to establish what he called "rules of engagement": he refused to autograph books or attend dinners or other social functions. He sometimes sneaked out after readings by what he called a "secretbackentrance." Young women came up to him on the streets of New York to give him bouquets of flowers, or left them on the doorstep of his Greenwich Village apartment. By the time of his death in 1962, he was the second most widely read poet in America, after Robert Frost.
Source: Keillor's Writers Almanac
^,^
[Photo courtesy of historian John Schoenknecht who did a series on Waukesha's family grocery stores.
Paul holds a food ad from Kaske's dated 1940, showing then prices]
An old friend, Paul Kaske
died last week of complications of Alzheimers.
Paul was a rough and ready kid with me at the Sunday School
of the 1st Cngregational UCC, a life-long butcher who
learned the trade from his grocer/meat market operator parents
- Hawley and mother Doris -
at the Kaske Corner Grocery, Grand Ave and Harrison Street,
Waukesha.
Paul inherited the store when his father Hawley died
and continued the family operation for decades himself.
Eventually he retired and sold the store which is now a Mexican restaurant.
Paul kept his hand in the butchering work after retirement
cutting meat for a chain supermarket.
We wrote this of him in the raccoon:
http://raccoonnews.blogspot.com/2013/03/raccoons-must-eat-everything-ends-bear.html
scroll down to the part about Paul
Another friend and old customer of Kaske's
is 'Xanadu' Carman, who wrote the following about Paul's passing:
Paul holds a food ad from Kaske's dated 1940, showing then prices]
An old friend, Paul Kaske
died last week of complications of Alzheimers.
Paul was a rough and ready kid with me at the Sunday School
of the 1st Cngregational UCC, a life-long butcher who
learned the trade from his grocer/meat market operator parents
- Hawley and mother Doris -
at the Kaske Corner Grocery, Grand Ave and Harrison Street,
Waukesha.
Paul inherited the store when his father Hawley died
and continued the family operation for decades himself.
Eventually he retired and sold the store which is now a Mexican restaurant.
Paul kept his hand in the butchering work after retirement
cutting meat for a chain supermarket.
We wrote this of him in the raccoon:
http://raccoonnews.blogspot.com/2013/03/raccoons-must-eat-everything-ends-bear.html
scroll down to the part about Paul
Another friend and old customer of Kaske's
is 'Xanadu' Carman, who wrote the following about Paul's passing:
>"So many memories we have of the Grocery and for that dear family.
Paul used to deliver groceries when I was too rushed to get to the store or had
a sick child who needn't go out. I'm so glad he is at rest now. Sweet
man....ssc"<
Family mom and pop grocery stores and pretty much a thing of the distant past.
Kaske's was embedded in, invested in the people of the old neighborhood
where I too once lived. The love was mutual.
^.^
Six Cheerful Couplets on Death
Most things won't happen, Larkin said,
But this one will: We will be dead.
The saddest thing, in each context,
Is knowing that we could be next.
Some take the bus, some take the train,
Some die in sleep, the rest in pain
But of one thing we can be sure:
All die imperfect, each impure
Some wishing that they had been better,
Others worse, but no one deader.
Shoes left, like Buddhists, at the door:
Those won't be needed anymore.
.JPG)
Rest those hands in peace, Paul
Blessings to the family
But this one will: We will be dead.
The saddest thing, in each context,
Is knowing that we could be next.
Some take the bus, some take the train,
Some die in sleep, the rest in pain
But of one thing we can be sure:
All die imperfect, each impure
Some wishing that they had been better,
Others worse, but no one deader.
Shoes left, like Buddhists, at the door:
Those won't be needed anymore.
Rest those hands in peace, Paul
Blessings to the family
