Eye chart for dogs, depicting a very large bone at the top, then in rows of diminishing size objects of canine interest like a cat head, ball, dog house, food bowl, fire plug, stick, squirrel, car, and so on. Rt

Argyll is a very unhappy camper thanks to a vet visit for vaccines.

But I got tomsee my favorite bit of wall art there: the eye chart for dogs.

When I was about 11 my mom decreed 1 glass per day, no matter what we drank in it.
Now I understand!

To say nothing of learning to follow its teachings

Weights and Measures "a promise weighs more than a country..." -HA JIN If a promise weighs more than a country, does love weigh more than a promise? Wouldn't I break my word, wrap myself in any flag (stars, or sickle, or rising sun) just to be with you? And how much does a country weigh? Its mountains may be heavy-snow in winter, the dark cuneiform shapes of pinecones in summer, but its streams run lightly through all the fields of our discarded childhoods. Sometimes I think a promise weighs nothing at all, though it can tether you like an invisible kite string. And love? When you leave, it is its absence that is heavy, as heavy as those snow-encumbered mountains.

Another marvelous poem from Linda Pastan’ Traveling Light.

I’m laughing at your Wee Dougie because at that moment he looked like he really was weeing his pants.

It’s why he and his ilk need those big beards.

Even better—I thumbed through the collected poems of Derek Walcott, and they spoke this time. 30 years ago when I bought the volume I couldn’t really take them in.

Not only that, but in clearing out a storage unit, I found a bunch of my poetry collection.
I have to give up 95% of my library because of lack of housing, but I’m hanging onto these as long as possible.

Power went out here at the library, apparently with someone in the elevator. Fire truck is pulling up now.

In the last 18 hours the sky has slung hail, heavy rain, blasting sun, cold wind, balmy breezes, and mini snowballs at me.

I was most surprised by the hail, which fell from clouds that were fleeing eastwards, leaving puffy clouds colored rainbow shades by the sunset, and by the mini snowballs.

Now Thank We All Our God (for the words, not the title)
The Strife is O'er
Oh What Their Joy and Their Glory Must Be
None Other Lamb

Nearly 500 public figures are reading the Bible this week in Washington, D.C. to mark America’s 250th.

You can’t proclaim “love your neighbor” while supporting policies that harm the vulnerable.

The Bible isn’t a prop for national identity.

It’s a call to justice.

The crescent moon and Venus seem to be playing the Pit or the Pendulum together.

“The past is the underside of the future.”
Linda Pastan “Return to Maple 9”

The only possible good I see to it is to amplify how extraordinarily unpopular T is. Consequently, for a man who stakes his brand on popularity, how weak he is.

Credit those doing the work. Not just the big names through which you learn of the work.

If only it were as open as JD’s hubris

I loved Robert Hubbell’s headline: Schrödinger’s Strait

I didn’t know about this statement. I’m impressed by its clarity.

Too bad he doesn’t understand the parable.

The Maypole after Wallace Stevens One must have a mind of spring to regard the cherry tree burdened with blossom; and have been warm for days to behold the boughs of the redbud prickly with color in the glint of the April sun; and not to think of any cruelty in the difficult birthing of so many leaves, to feel only pure elation at the sound of the undulant breeze which is the sound of every garden with a breeze blowing among its flowers, the sound the listener hears, watching the buds which were not quite here a week ago pushing up from oblivion now.

How could I post just one?

Years After the Garden Years after the garden closed on Adam a thousand thousand gardens take its place (hold my hand, I hear the waters rising) roses, lemons, lilac, hemlock, grape. A thousand thousand gardens take its place. Is each an Eden waiting to be lost? Roses, lemons, lilac, hemlock, grape. What was God thinking when he made the apple? Is each an Eden waiting to be lost? Seeds of knowledge, carelessness, and greed. What was God thinking when he made the apple? Did he do it only for the story? Seeds of knowledge, carelessness, and greed— they say the ice cap is already melting. Did he do it only for the story? Meringues of childhood melted on the tongue. They say the ice cap is already melting. The angel still waits with his flaming sword. Meringues of childhood melted on the tongue, but innocence alone will never save us. The angel still waits with his flaming sword: flowers and vegetables, forests tremble. Innocence alone will never save us. How beautiful the world is in the morning. Flowers and vegetables, forests tremble. How beautiful the world is in the morning. Years ago the garden closed on Adam. Hold my hand, I hear the waters rising.

The worse things get the more I need poetry.
From Linda Pastan, Traveling Light

I hate representations like this. I hate them when they're books (looking at you, Harper Lee), I hate them when they're public art, I hate them when they're movies.

I like the winter trees, but it's your space. You hang what gives you the best vibe.

If you start to see a lot of ants on them, look out, bc that’s often a harbinger of aphids.
Ants often farm aphids because they like the sweet sticky sap the aphids produce when they gnaw the tender shoots.

Men who murder their wives then turn the gun on themselves are not having a mental health crisis.
We need to stop giving men an out for their violence against women. It is not about mental health. It is a matter of societal permission to control women, and the moral choices that create permission.

Cluster of Kwanzan cherry blooms

Kwanzan cherry

The Leo/Trump business is actually serious theology, not a UFC match.

Institutions matter.
BUT...many of the ones we rely on were built on unjust foundations that limit how much they can truly be reformed.

So this moment isn’t just about fixing what exists.
It’s about having the courage to build new institutions that are rooted in justice from the start.

This looks really good.
Unfortunately I’m not available then—but maybe you are.