Here’s why you should go out today and buy a least one book of poetry. You need to keep Billy Elliot (and other poets) supplied with pencils. From his book, “Taking Off Emily Dickinson’s Clothes.”
Advice to Writers
Even if it keeps you up all night,
wash down the walls and scrub the floor
of your study before composing a syllable.
Clean the place as if the Pope were on his way.
Spottlessness is the niece of inspiration.
The more you clean, the more brilliant
your writing will be, so do not hesitate to take
to the open fields to scour the undersides
of rocks or swab in the dark forest
upper branches, nests full of eggs.
When you find your way back home
and stow the sponges and brushes under the sink,
you will behold in the light of dawn
the immaculate altar of your desk,
a clean surface in the middle of a clean world.
From a small vase, sparkling blue, lift
a yellow pencil, the sharpest of the bouquet,
and cover pages with tiny sentences
like long rows of devoted ants
that followed you in from the woods.
Sunday, April 03, 2011
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7 comments:
Excellent poem from a book with an hilarious title! Thank you!
And thank you for the "bear mud oven" story. Went to Los Osos Valley Nursery today later than one would have wanted, 4:00. I thought everything would have been more or less cleared away and all we really wanted to see was the oven itself anyway. Well, not only was the oven adorable and still warm, but there was still pizza left! It was delicious!
WOW - haven't been there for a while, but it is clear that a HUGE effort is in progress for sprucing it up - it looked lovely! So of course I had to get some geraniums - big shipment just in, really nice stuff ) and I ought to know - I worked 15 1/2 years in a home and garden center).
I hope you got there Ann!
I did get there and got some photos but now my computer (again) is having problems internally with downloading the pics for some unknown and unfixable problem (so sayeth my computer guru. It's an old XP so likely just wearing out.) So will try to figure out another way to get he pics and story of the Pizza-in done.
and, yes, weren't those geraniums great looking!
Good luck in finding a fix and I hope your photos still also live in your camera or phone!
(There were some great protea type plants too! Well, I'll be back, that's for sure!)
Finally managed to retrieve some of the pics and posted the Part III. But the glitches likely remain, but now the question: is it the camera's chip? or the Computer's program. Gaaagghhh.
Weren't those proteas amazing? And, yes they have really cool stuff there.
Does the camera have a removable memory card? You may be able to use a cardreader to download.
As noted in the previous posting: chip (memory card) is o.k. It's the camera that's dying -- not completing it's task so we ended up with some "half" pictures.
Bummer. Hope you can find a camera bargain somewhere! Good luck!
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