Li’l Rix stolen again

I think I need some bottled poetry—Neil parked my car down the hill (in the dicier part of the 'hood) and my 1987 Honda Civic Si was stolen. Im trying hard not to be depressed—Neil's Honda was stolen last year, that's why he was driving L'il Rix—but I feel so violated and despondent.

Waiting for the Advil train to arrive

I really did myself in this time—twist & shout—more like scream in pain! I really need a whine & Advil nitecap for lower back pain, pronto. After crawling home, I took a long shower, until all the hot water ran out, now I have wet hair. I'll look like a frizzy-haired banshee with her finger stuck in the light socket come the morn. I don’t care. I can barely stand. Ah, TG for the small mercies of wine and chocolate late at night while waiting at the lumbar station for the Advil train of thought to deliver its dulcet cargo.

From a FB post rev. 3/20

Beannachtaí na Féile Pádraig and it’s back to bed with a virus

This morning I taught art classes to kids in Hunter's Point, then came home and went to bed... The virus is back. Occupational hazard. No partying for me tonight. I weep for Japan, the earthquake, the tsunami, and the massive devastation we now all face. 

Tsunami Warning

I was sound asleep and something woke me at midnight—news of a massive earthquake in Japan, followed by a tsunami. Then I saw the tsunami warning for the rest of us on the Pacific RIm. It's bearing down on Hawaii. I used to have nightmares of being caught in a tsunami. But I needs must return to sleep.

Hawaii orders evacuation of low-lying coastal areas after massive earthquake off Japan triggered a tsunami alert. A Hawaiian reporter said fish were in the Honolulu parking lot (2.3 foot tsunami left them stranded) like TILAPIA??? That must've been some big wave to strand African freshwater fish like that. They escaped from their freshwater ponds in solidarity with the saltwater fishes, or what?

Huge earthquake hit northern Japan, mostly affecting Tokyo and areas north. Felt it in Osaka, however, even though Tokyo is some 250 miles away and the epicenter was even further away than that. An extended rolling feeling, like being on a boat. The footage of the tsunami that hit Sendai is a seriously daunting.

Unimaginable damage and devastation. And now the Fukushima reactors are damaged. Is this the end of the world as we know it? Does it begin with radiation poisoning? Now my nightmares are waking dreams.

a bat flew into the classroom

Apparently I need to add a new category under my rescuer of small animals resume: a bat flew into the morning poetry classroom, like the shadow of a leaf and landed on my poetry folders. I covered him with poetry sheets, and let him out the window where he fell like a leafy shadow.

STACKING WOOD FOR THE COMING WINTER

—For Lynn DeWitt, a second step-cousin in-law, but still family, & to Howard McCord who liked my wood post on FB, urged me to use the names of tools. 

At the dogtail end of summer, in deep August,
when the shadows grew long thin fingers
tinged with indigo verging on violet,
an unmistakable acrid odor of red clay dust 
& bleached oat hay, announced the coming fall.

We had only the enameled Wedgewood stove.
My grannie tightened the lyre-handled bucksaw;
tumped a limb into the arms of the wooden sawhorse
that bucked & groaned as the blade bit deeper.
She raised the gnarled cross-shaped sledgehammer
& a cauliflowered wedge—tools no man wanted—
to split the fresh logs to fit the firebox.
The age-old music of the smithy's hammer & tong
flung small fireflies into the deeper shadows.
There was no one else to lend a hand:
a small child and an old woman raised
their frail shoulders against the coming winter.

One time a shim worked loose from the lever. 
As I raised the hammer up against the darkening sky
it flew off, knocked me in the head. I staggered
under the crucifying blow. Oh, my aching stars!
Glad to be alive, I kept on splitting the wood, 
for she could no longer raise the iron weight.
Bay split like butter, pine fought the wedge,
oak was the most stubborn, but it burned the best.


See also Kindling. I seem to return to the theme again and again

Compliment from Howard McCord on my grandmother poems

Howard McCord said: I enjoyed your post on wood and fires. Old tools-- a froe, a spokeshave, a marlinspike, as good as birds' names.

Cheetos

If I fits, i sitz.

We gave Cheetos the orange cat a saline drip and force-fed him—staving off the grim reaper for one more night. He was quite pissed about being forcefed (a good sign). But he was so dehydrated. Not a good sign. I gave him a cornstarch "bath" and used an old toothbrush to groom him—he liked it a lot, he lovingly stroked the brush. He purrped, attempted a purr, and seemed to feel a little better. Stuck his chin out to be scratched. Nothing like a good scratch under the chin.  

Whaddya mean I can't sleep here? It's a BOX lid.

Ginger cats are the best. Great personalities. Not always the brightest of cats, though. Goofballs. The like to sleep in odd places. Inside a laundry tub. On top of your head. Before we knew he was sick, he took to sleeping on my head, and peeing on my pillow. No cat piss odor, I should've guessed his kidneys were failing.

Got my Garfield & the heater vent. Fluff my water bowl and kibble.

As a starving kitten in the TGal parking lit in Petaluma, he devoured a bag of Cheetos, hence the moniker. My cousin rescued him. Like she needed another cat. We're glad she did, we've had 15 years' worth of kooky kitty antics. He never did catch the red spot.

A potted kitty

Not so good news: Cheetos is in the hospital. Perhaps it's a good sign? (and a big vet bill for my cousin.) We were bracing ourselves for euthanasia. But Zana's orange bruiser, Nails, was able to live to 21—with kidney issues. Ah, so sad to see a dear old friend failing, but hopeful too that he'll come around to greet his 16th birthday in April. Only the night will tell.

Nap, blankie, and my little pony. RIP Orange Man.

2 Baja photos published in Medusa's Kitchen

St. Elmo's Fire In Our Fingertips

Sunset, El Dorado del Mar, San Felipe, BC, Mexico

RIP Juanita Musson

My mom worked as a waitress for Juanita at the Galley in Sausalito. She made Sally Lacy's (Marilyn' Monroe's stand-in) clothes—and many of Juanita's muu-muus too. I remember the fawn and the monkey.

My original story: You rarely got what you wanted at Juanita’s Restaurant, but you got a lot of it

Candy Philpot-Hall Good story and memories for you. My unofficial "Auntie" was Sally Stanford a family friend/ Sunday brunches at Vallhalla were a highlight of my childhood. I loved her parrot Lorretta..it swore like a sailor.

Added 2/2017 from Facebook Memories, a good thing too, as Google later removed my entire memorial post and photos, written in April, 2011, ca 2017. This is another Facebook Memory that at least restored the timeframe. A pity I didn’t think to also post the blog link along with the defunct Picasa links.

• 
  

  

  This is how I remember Sally Stanford.

• Google removed my memorial post of Juanita claiming it Went against community standards. 

Juanita Musson, colorful restaurateur, dies at 87

Juanita Musson, the outrageous and muu-muued former Sonoma Valley restaurateur who 40 or 50 years ago might arrive at a table holding her pet pig or monkey and might answer a patron's complaint by tipping a heaping plate into his lap, died Saturday. She was 87....

After running restaurants from 1953 to 1984 in Sausalito, Sonoma Valley, Contra Costa County's Port Costa, Fairfield and finally Winters in Yolo County, a long-sober and mellowed Juanita returned to Sonoma County more than 25 years ago to retire.
Late San Francisco Chronicle columnist Herb Caen discovered Juanita in Sausalito and wrote multiple times about her overflowing personality and the eggs, slabs of ham and butter-soaked muffins that burdened her plates. Comics and other entertainers — The Smothers Brothers, Jonathan Winters, Bill Cosby, Noel Coward — made their way their across the Golden Gate Bridge following late-night performances in San Francisco.
"She was something else," Tommy Smothers said Saturday night from his home in Kenwood. He remembers being out late with his brother, Dick, and friends in San Francisco in the late &‘50s and going to Juanita's place in Sausalito at 3 or 4 a.m. for breakfast.
"She was the most intimidating personality," Smothers said. He found her also to be charming, fiery and fearless, someone he equates with the likes of Alan Watts and Margot St. James. "There was a naturalness. There was no pretense about them," he said.
"Juanita never tried to hype herself," Smothers said. "Her sense was very in the present. She didn't reminisce very much. She was right there...."
While in Sausalito, Juanita befriended madam and eventual mayor Sally Stanford. Often enough Juanita was asked if she'd worked for Stanford and she'd reply, "I never charged a nickel from a horizontal position."  —read the entire article at the Press Democrat

Save Baja's Cabo Pulmo Reef from Developers

Please protect Baja's only coral reef from being destroyed by developers in Cabo del San Jose. Sign the petition and pass it on.

Pulmo means lung—and this unique northern reef is literally the lung of the Sea of Cortez. It's a singularity. There isn't another reef like it anywhere.

It's a protected marine sanctuary but massive resort development on land will also certainly destroy the reef.

I have snorkeled and swum with whalesharks there and it is a beautiful garden. Coral reefs slowly evolve over millions of years, often with unique species, they're temperature specific.

Raise the water temperature by a degree or two, and the reef dies. Add siltation or pollution—even freshwater runoff to the mix, and it's certain death for the reefs.

The southern regions of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia is dying from the plumes of cloudy, nutrient-laden, pesticide-polluted freshwater runoff and siltation from the recent Queensland floods. It could eventually stress and bleach all the coral and thus jeopardize the health of the entire reef but this will take years for the saga to play out. A slow death punctuated by the unchecked invasion of crown-of-thorns starfish—real reef killers—three years' hence.

By way of example of what can go wrong with tourism and reefs, Hanamua Bay in Hawaii was completely destroyed by tourists tenderly loving it to death while wearing sunscreen (toxic to reefs).

I snorkeled in Hanamua Bay before it was killed with too much affection in the 1970s and 1980s. I revisited it again when it was bleached bone white barren wilderness pounded to death by 3 million loving visitors per year in the 1990s.

I revisited Hanamua Bay again in 2010. After 20 years' protection and vigilant management, Hanamua Bay is only now just BARELY recovering—even with limited access and patrolling park rangers—constantly blowing whistles like referees at snorkelers standing on the reef (touching it kills the reef too). It's still a shade of its former self with only about 10 percent of its original fish and reef population.

This too will be the fate of Cabo Pulmo if the area is developed on a massive scale. That kind of vigilance and protection that brought Hanamua Bay back from the brink of extinction won't happen in Cabo Pulmo if the resort complex is built. And the reef will surely die from overexposure as well as runoff and pollution. Cabo San Lucas already has been destroyed by unchecked development and rampant tourism. Don't let this happen to Cabo Pulmo.

So, sign the petition.
http://www.cabopulmopark.com/thereef.html

• On June 15, 1995, President Zedillo Ponce de Leon declared the 7,111 hectares and waters surrounding Cabo Pulmo, a National Marine Park.
• Cabo Pulmo region was nearly destroyed due to excessive overfishing until 1995 when the area was declared a marine park. The fish populations are returning to a healthy status after 20 years' protection.
• Cabo Pulmo Reef has eight fingers of unusual hard coral reef
• Home to nearly 800 species of marine animals found in the Sea of Cortez, Cabo Pulmo Reef's rich biodiversity is unparalleled 
• Federal enforcement and financial aid is almost non existent and the quest to protect Cabo Pulmo National Park is a burden on the shoulders of the local community—barely 100 residents—who sorely need our help and support.
• Large-scale tourist complexes (like Cabo San Lucas) will cause irreversible damage, especially because of runoff and excessive use of the area

RANDOM LINES

RANDOM LINES

The tree quivers with excitement
A flock of sparrows with lots to say
alighted amid the lemons.

A tree quiveriing
with excitement of wild birds
amid the lemons.          

Upperton is the embodiment
of kindness from the soles of his feet
to the top of his soul.

1/29/11

GRAND PIANO

A grand piano
was found stranded 
on a sandbar
like a beached whale
in Key Biscayne
above the high tideline
stuck in the key of sea
now a fancy perch 
for the seagulls


See piano

3 photos published in Medusa's Kitchen for Burns' Day

Happy Feels Like A Poem

Robert Burns' desk

Robert Burns' house in Dumfries, Galloway

Highland cow, Argyle, Scotland

Poetry Out Loud, Brentwood News

January 19 x 21, 2011 | Brentwood News, Contra Costs Times, San Jose Mercury News (CA)

Author: Trine Gallegos | Page: 3A | Section: News

A RHYME IN TIME: Pandora Bethea is happy about the success of the fourth annual Poetry Out Loud contest. The Deer Valley High event was held earlier this month, and now the Antioch teacher and event coordinator is looking forward to the next level.
From the Poetry Out Loud database, students choose two poems each by masters of poetry and memorized them for the event. Maureen Hurley from California Poets in the Schools and DV's Bethea coached the students in memorization and recitation skills.

The winners were: Taylor Green, first place; Kayla Alexander, second place, and Brandon Harris, third place.

The judging panel featured poets Maria Rosales and Bruce Moody, county Arts and Culture commissioners P.J. Shelton and Darija Walker (and DVHS grad), school board member Walter Ruehlig, and DVco-principals Scott Bergerhouse and Clarence Isadore.

The fourth annual POL contest was dedicated to Ruehlig, a former English teacher, who has served on the panel of judges at DV for two years. "It was in appreciation of his active presence in supporting literary arts for our Antioch youth, and thus promoting the love and beauty of language," Bethea wrote in an e-mail.

The next level is the county contest, which includes all finalists. They'll compete for a chance to represent Contra Costa in the state championship. For the first time, Deer Valley will host the big event, slated for 1 p.m. Feb. 13. CCTV will be on hand to film it the free event.

For more info, e-mail Bethea pandorabethea@antioch.k12.ca.us

Tom Waits

I once made sweet potato fries with Tom Waits at a friend's 50th birthday party in Sebastopol. His daughter used to take art classes with us at the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts. I never really interacted with him much. Seemed to want his space as it were. So we left him alone.

But at the party he was stuck with me as he didn't want to mingle with the other guests as we were appointed the sudden short order cooks. Apparently I was the lesser of two evils. But he was so uncomfortable in my presence that I was uncomfortable too. Even talking about his daughter didn't break the ice. So there we were, starin' mightily hard at the stove, a 1960s model, with its strange coils glowing red like Dr. Caligari eyes, drawing us deeper into the illusion. Discordant Calliope as background music.

But the sweet potato fries, ah, the fries doused with chili powder and lime, were sublime. For a moment we forgot who we were, we smiled and took pleasure in such a simple delight. Tom's sideburns were an odd aubergine hue—a rough henna job. Romeo was bleeding. Sort of like the color of the chili powder sprinkled on the fries. He hid out in the kitchen as the party raged on in the rest of the house. I gave up, and followed the distant music.

2 photos published in Medusa's Kitchen

Touching A Sore Place

David LaFlamme's hands

It's a Beautiful Day musician David LaFlamme was living on the Russian River during the early 1980s, and to make ends meet, he worked at the Flying A gas station next to the River Theater. Yup, he pumped gas into my blue VW Bug—with those delicate violinist's hands worth their weight in gold. His eyes held the edges of the void within their dark depths. All I could do was weep. His hands, his beautiful hands, so like doves.

Rain, rain

It's raining, it's pouring,
the old man is snoring,
he went to bed and he bumped his head
and he couldn't get up in the morning...

Well, now, that's a bit macabre! Like, the old man's in a coma? The dark side of nursery rhymes? He bumped his head in bed, not before he crawled into bed? Sounds like it was a rather dangerous bed as it seems to have finished off the entire family. So did the old man die? An awful lot of head injuries in Mother Goose, who was a bit of a misogynist.  "She whipped them all soundly and sent them to bed" always scared the bejazuz out of me.

Perhaps that third line should go: he bumped his head, and he went to bed. Then we're talking concussion for sure.Or perhaps a brain bleed.

It's raining; it's pouring.
The old woman is snoring.
She went to bed and bumped her head,
And she couldn't get up in the morning. 

It's raining; it's pouring.
The children are snoring.
They went to bed and bumped their heads,
And they couldn't get up in the morning.

But I learned it with this end verse:

Rain, rain go away
Come again some other day.

I'd sing it, but I don't want to jinx the weather.

Does anybody really know what day it is?

Does anybody really know what day it is?

When the Gregorian calendar was adopted by Catholic countries, many holidays related to celestial events got stranded—so there was a 4 to 14-day lag between the old and the new calendar. All this fuss was spurred on as to when the Vernal Equinox actually was (the weather being what it was—unreliable), so one could calculate exactly when Easter fell.


Russia has even more date discrepancies as they had a different calendar yet. The October Revolution was not October 25 but Nov 7. (October 1917 Old Style Julian Calendar (O.S.), which corresponds with 7 November 1917 New Style (N.S.). Gregorian Calendar.) —Wiki 


The "Old Style" Julian calendar was still used for movable feasts (Easter)  in 1918. By then, the calends of  Russia & Greece were off by 13-14 days. Things you need to keep in mind when reading history!

The Julian calendar was a reboot of the Roman Calendar—which was way, way off by the time Caesar was waging war on the Celts and needed to check his day planner to see if it was summer yet. Summer was the traditional time to wage war—coinciding with the time the senate freed the annual warchest. 


So, when reading classical history, one has to keep in mind that all firm Roman dates are off...as compared to the Julian calendar as compared to the Gregorian calendar...and so on.

An extra 11 minutes per year in the Julian calendar caused it to gain three days every four centuries so the observed equinoxes, solstices and seasons were also way off. Wrong time to party and pray serious stressed out the natives and clergy alike.


By 1582, the Julian calendar was off by 10 days, which threw Easter way off! 


Easter is calculated as the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring solstice (lunar calendar). The problem was, that no one really knew what day was actually Sunday, let alone, when the vernal Eqiunox was! So Easter was celebrated in May in Ireland, and as early as March 11 elsewhere—all in the same year!

The Gregorian (Christian) calendar system had to drop some calendar days in order to realign the calendar and the equinox times.

Because of the Protestant Reformation, many countries refused to switch to the Gregorian calendar until much later. Scotland: 1600, England 1752—so all those folk holidays we love—were also off. So you have to factor this info in with medieval folk holiday customs. 


In 1424 (guessing the date here—can't find ref, ) the English attempted to reboot the calendar and about 2 weeks were tossed out of September—causing rioting—not because people were suspicious, but because they were being short-changed—literally! They were paid by the day, but were charged rent by the month. Their landlords thought it was cool. And I'm sure they celebrated with libations.


Another huge roboot of the English calendar occurred in 1751—which was a very short year of 282 days, from 25 March (Lady Day) to 31 December. So if your birthday, or any other important annual event occurred from Jan. 1 to March 24 of 1751, you were out of luck. Or you gained a year.


The year 1752 began on a brand new date, with the new style calendar, on 1 January. It was reported that there were public riots after the massive calendar change, with peasants demanding that their "eleven days" be returned—but it is a story. (See the 1424 story, above). I'm sure there were plenty of irritated folks. But the sun and moon carried on, as always.

The Gregorian calendar isn't quite accurate either; it has to drop three extra leap year days every four centuries on top of the leap year every four years except during the 100 year marker. Got that?

Then there's the Hebrew calendar year which has never been rebooted as far as I know—it's longer by about 6 minutes a year, and so, after several millenia, is COMPLETELY off kilter....So if you're a Bible scholar, well, let's say, nobody really knows what day it is, and I can't even begin to fathom the workings of the Muslim calendar galloping off on a similar bent!  However, my friend Vins assures me that the intercalary month takes care of that pesky 13th moon.

Happy Perihelion Day! Snow in Death Valley

Today it's snowing in Death Valley—that means it's gonna be a riotous spring. This year, even the desert will bloom—it will be painted in pure California gold! Such a rare, riotous sight, snow plows in Death Valley! Snow level, 282 feet below sea level. When the snow melts, and when Badwater Lake returns to its origins, and becomes a mirror of the sky & Telescope Peak, I'd love to be there to witness it. Happy Perihelion Day! Today, tho it be mid-winter, the earth (n. hemisphere) is closer to the sun than any other day of the year.

On New Year's Eve birds fell from the sky

On New Year's Eve, birds fell from the sky. It was reported that some 5000 blackbirds & starling fell from the sky, dead as stones, and littered the roads and sidewalks, and also some 100,000 drumfish died near Beebe, Arizona. Their strange voices, forever silent. And now 500 more blackbirds have also fallen from the sky in LaBarre, Louisiana? They are lining the roads of LeBarre. And now Gilbert, Kentucky, and Beebe, Arkansas. Blackbird singing a dirge in the dead of night. All those broken wings luffing in the breeze. A wandering toxic cloud?—only it seems to be species selective. Someone claimed fireworks Well, it's happening in a lot of places at once. Either that or the series, Flash Forward is real! All the dead birds falling from the sky. Portent of things to come. 2011, the year all the birds died, does not bode well for the new year. It feels like we're medieval Irish & Saxon scribes recording our doomed year in our own Doomsday books...
 
added, rev. 1/18

1/1/11 at 11:11

1/1/11 at 11:11! It'll happen again tonight!

27th annual ART FROM THE HEART silent auction, silk painting

"Russian River 2" 10x10" habotai silk, gutta, dye batik © Maureen Hurley 2011

Art from the Heart

Founded in 1984, Art from the Heart is one of Sonoma County's premiere fundraising events—an evening of fine art, food, and wine where artists and collectors join to support the University Art Gallery. Art from the Heart is a silent auction featuring original works of art in all media donated by professional artists from Sonoma County and the United States. Stays at local inns and hotels, theater  and museum tickets, unique bottles of wine and VIP tasting at local wineries are also included in the auction.

You may bid on my piece Feb 12th at Sonoma State University.SATURDAY, February 12, 6-9 pm: 27th annual ART FROM THE HEART silent auction to benefit the University Art Gallery at SSU. Free Preview Exhibition Wednesday, 11-8; Thursday, 11-4; and Friday, 11-8. For more information, call (707) 664-2295 or go to http://www.sonoma.edu/artgallery

Feb 13: Great to see Joel Bennett again (and his trips to Cuba) and Joe Jaqua—believe it or not, I've known him since I was 17! Joe, Chester Arnold and me were in Marty Stoelzel's painting class at College of Marin for years and years. And Neil acted with Joe's brother at DVC way back when. Small world. 

So the former (Scottish) mayor of Rohnert Park's wife bid on my piece but it went to the woman who runs J wines! A bidding war. I got to meet both of them. Very cool. Got to visit with Stella Monday, Sylvia Seventy and Marsha Connell too—it's been ages. Didn't see Greer Upton (or her piece!). ;-( Too crowded. A great turnout and a great time was had by all. 

added 2/17 

I made several variations.

 

Russian River, finished drawing 9x12

Outline for silk template

Random Word matrixes

I fall for those end of year word matrixes, then wonder why I bothered. Top 10 obsessive words posted were writer, poet, poetry, novelist, gods, love, God, Irish, author, languages, 

My Year in Status is a bit more of a word salad, so I'll pick out the interesting ones.
Being a writer requires an intoxication with language.
Some people become so expert at reading between the lines, they don't read the lines.
I said neither of those lines.

The Little Shits

When I was barely a teenager, my life was held hostage by the wiles of two Shetland fillies who went where they pleased, when they pleased—dubbed the Little Shits by irate neighbors. No corral could hold them. I even tried hobbling them, but they could gallop, hobbled at both ends and with a cross tie. Shackled like prisoners, they still got out to terrorize the neighborhood. I dreaded full moons and the staccato of tiny hooves on pavement. One spring the bigger one disappeared only to return with a colt. So cute! My heart melted all over again but I realized I couldn't deal with a third hellion. Then I was joined by a 4th Shetland—who ran away from a distant neighbor. Then all manner of ungulates began to appear in our lower field. Once a miniature stud horse with his sidekick—a huge horse. I may have been horse crazy but I was overwhelmed trying to feed them all on babysitter's wages.

Lunar eclipse on the Solstice

Would someone please tell the moon she's late for a very important date?

Manual for about 1.5 seconds, auto is too overblown.

 I set my weenie Nikon on manual, forgot to check the F Stop & speed....it was on F400 @ 4.6. Ironically, I blindly pointed the camera shot—and it was the best one of the moon. Of course, there was more light. Even when the eclipse was barely discernible, the amount of light drop off was hug.  

Someday I want a real DSLR camera that has a low F Stop...it kills me to be stuck at F4.5. I tried Hi ISO too, and resorted to P (Auto for the red moon shots as Manual mode completely gave up with so little light. I had to lie down on the steps and hold camera to my forehead and not breathe—the movement is the moon itself. 3-4 second exposures.

I noticed journalists have been complete spazzes in reporting the actual time/date. Not knowing the difference between Greenwich and PST, for example. I'm sitting outside with my laptop. Chilly but noice.

 

It's looking a little nibbly at 6 o clock. And we have lift off!

the little rainbow tutu is the cloud cover—it was pretty thick so I held lens open for nearly 3 seconds...then I had to breathe...phew!

  
I've lost imagery—too much cloud cover. I'm shooting at 1/30th @ 4.5 (can't lower F Stop any lower—digital weenie camera. My poor little camera could barely cope. Seriously socked in now—a mooonbow! Ring around the moon...  

This cloud cover is killing me. I've gone & lost the frickin moon... Lunar eclipse on the shortest day, first time in over 400 years and it's hidden by cloud!

  I was going to use the binoculars to enlarge the camera lens...but one eyepiece came off the binoculars and bounced down the stairs and over the wall. So Neill was rootling around in the bushes for the lens during the time the sky was clear. Very Mutt & Jeff.

I have two very weenie Nikon 8.1 megapixel Coolpix P60s (one's CCD image sensor is better than the other—I keep the other one around as Plan B), and I have an older 7.1 MP Coolpix S200 which Neil was using. The P series, you can control the Fstop and shutter speed (sort of). The Automode was a bust until totality. Then it worked (sort of), but there was so little light, half the time I was shooting blind. 

I set the aperature on Mountain mode—as that gave me the greatest depth of field (focus) but even still, there were a lot of out of focus moons. I found that the 5x optical zoom was necessary—I even used the interpolated zoom vs optical (real lens).

My cameras failed, the noise dots are stars. You can see some of them moving.

I remember once we were on our way to see Tom Stoppard at ACT in SF ca. 1999 and between the buildings, hung a red moon—my digital camera couldn't cope.  

The first total lunar eclipse like this one that I remember circa 1972 or 73, I'd stopped off at the Forest Knolls post office to get the mail and looked up and shrieked—my first thought: it was a dragon's eye, then, blood. In that moment I understood why the Chinese called it a dragon's blood moon. The Aha! And another one circa 1986. Both accidental events. I had no idea they were on the schedule. I do remember earlier eclipses when I was a child—but none where the moon turned red. 

MY GRANDMOTHER’S HANDS

MY GRANDMOTHER’S HANDS

My grandmother’s hands
were torn and speckled with pigment
fair northern flesh burned by the fierce California sun.
A rebellious knotted vein rose up like a stone.
Souvenir from a strand of barbed wire
strung to keep the deer out of the garden.

Her freckles were an archiplelago of islands
adrift on a moon-milk sea.
They were Brendan voyagers in curraghs
headed for the New World
with a warrior phalanx of shields
raised up against a common enemy, the sun.
But they failed to protect her children,
when the melanoma set sail for that country
from which nothing ever returns.

I remember her wide spatulate fingers
that rubbed floursack sheets against the washboard
that mended jeans, made dresses for first day of school
and how I was ashamed they were not store-bought.
I remember the way she weeded the gardens,
dug up the praties, stacked wood for coming winter.

From her, I learned the survival of hands.
No caresses were needed because her love
was as fierce as the sun that burned her skin
as she labored in the garden or at the clothesline
she kept us safe, and provided when no one else would.
As she knelt to pray in the Sunday pew,
the sun shone on that knotted vein
and it was so beautiful—the scarring and freckles,
a skin painting of faith and tenderness.

8/28/10 rev. 12/12/10
Medusa's Kitchen, 2012
From Ellery Akers' workshop, Petaluma, CA, 

POETRY FEEDS Benefit For Share First Oakland Program, 12/12/2010

I read too, no idea where in the program, as I am not listed, Elmaz Abinander did not come, I might have read during his slot.

POETRY FEEDS Benefit For Share First Oakland
Program, 12/12/2010
MC's: Loma Dee Cervantes, Ishmael Reed, Francisco Alarcón
6:00-6:45 pm 

Hall - Feast or Famine Chance Dinner: $5 - $10 meal ticket;

Foyer - Holiday Book and Craft Fair; Instant Publishing Poetry Wall. Come attach or write your latest autographed creation on our paper wall for

"instant publishing." Artist? Add your finest. Conserve space for others.

We will be auctioning and/or raffling off the results at the end of the event.

Sanctuary - Slides and Music Presentations

6:45 pm Sanctuary - Welcome: Lora Dee Cervantes

Invocation: Francisco Alarcon

Opening Remarks by J. Webb Mealy, co-founder and Executive Director of Share First Oakland

Reading of poem by Oakland poet, Reginald Lockett: Lorna Dee Cervantes

7:00 pm First Group with Lorna Dee Cervantes

1-2. Special Presentation: Jack Foley and Adelle Foley
Rafael Jesús González
Nina Serrano
Paul Lobo Portuges
Vicki Vertiz
Cecile Pineda
John Oliver Simon
Lucha Corpi
Special Presentation: Ishmael Reed

7:45 pm Second Group with Ishmael Reed
Tennessee Reed
Timothy Reed
Odilia Galvan Rodriguez
Elmaz Abinader
Ruth Schwartz
Becca Carmona
Sharon Doubiago
Francisco X. Alarcón
Special Presentation: Cherrie Moraga

8:45 pm Raffle / Auction / Donation Drive
Special Music Presentation
Special Presentation: Avotja

8:55 pm Third Group with Francisco Alarcón
Leticia Hernández
Tomas Riley
Javier O. Huerta
Linda Watanabe McFerrin
Cesar A. Cruz Leolol
Blackberri
Trina L. Drotar
Sandy Thomas
Lorna Dee Cervantes

El Mensajero, Lorna Dee Cervantes Hunger reading, 1st Congregational Church, Oakland

12 de diciembre del 2010 | El Mensajero (San Francisco, CA)
comentarios@elmensajero.com

OAKLAND:

Unos 50 poetas y escritores locales, como Francisco X. Alarcón, Lucha Corpi, Ishmael Reed, Reed Tennessee, Lorna Dee Cervantes, Ruth Schwartz, Cecilia Pineda, Maureen Hurley, Jack y Foley Adelle, y más, leerán su obra para alimentar a los más hambrientos de las calles de Oakland. Habrá venta y presentaciones de libros, además de venta de artesanía con tablas de datos y de artesanía. También habrá subastas que serán útiles para donaciones. En la Primera Iglesia Congregacional de Oakland, ubicada en el 2501 de Harrison Street. Este domingo 12 de diciembre. Consulta el sitio en internet: www.sharefirst.org.

Poem and photos published in Medusa's Kitchen

Repent Nothing

• I WAS BORN WITHIN SIGHT

Mythopoetics, or why I write

The Pleasanton Poetry Poet Laureate asked me:
Why does Maureen Hurley write poetry? 

“I grapple with the unconscious dendritic history buried within the personal mythopoetics of my writing while keeping an ear bent to the myriad voices of landscape and memory.”

My poem & photos are up at Meusa's Kitchen blog: 

I WAS BORN WITHIN SIGHT

Me and Dana Teen Lomax CPITS

Me and Dana Teen Lomax, Presidio, David Sibbit's office, CPITS event

CPITS workshop on pocket poems. She won the lavender. It looks like a pot plant.

Dana was my CPITS protégée, I trained her during the 1980s at Mark West School in Santa Rosa, where I had my California Arts Council grants. Poet-teaching became her life's work. Though I've trained many CPITS poets, if I had only one person to choose to pay it forward, it would be Dana.

added 4/24/2016

MIGRATION

              —for Bruce Moody

After the poetry reading, we sit on the balcony
it's sultry for November, real earthquake weather.
The lights of the new bridge glaze the bay
and the train hugging the shore wends its way
along the narrows, sounding a two-chord jazz note.
The frosted pink C&H sign sweetens an indigo sky.
We offer pinot grigio toasts, catching-up with the years,
myriad stars and the Big Dipper whirl above our heads.
Bruce asks, if you had a billion dollars,
where would you go? Not what would you buy.
Death will discharge our debts.
On the far shore of the Carquinez Straits
the new houses ring the hills like fireflies.
Mesmerized by their own beauty

they crowd the shore, a thirsty herd of wildebeasts

waiting for a sacrificial leader to take the plunge
into dangerous waters and force them into the drink.
Perhaps an earthquake will do.

WHY DID THE TOURIST CROSS THE ROAD?

Yearning for another time
we strutted along Petaluma Boulevard,
once the chicken capitol of the world,
and clucked fuck-fuck-fuck-AFF
to a startled gaggle of tourists
aimlessly clogging the sidewalk.
We arm-wrestled them down
to the ground with our eyes.
Reclaimed our turf, and moved on.

Halloween 2010, Petaluma

11/14/2010

Remembering John Prine's Brother at Garbo's

Chicago Sun Times columnist and movie critic, Roger Ebert, wrote "John Prine is the poet of my life. People say he's great, but he's a lot better than that." I recommend reading Roger Ebert's Journal, a column he originally wrote in 1970, "John Prine: American Legend—A Singing Mailman Who Delivers a Powerful Message in a Few Words."

(Ebert's also updated the original story by posting some great John Prine YouTube links. The " Angel From Montgomery" backstory is worth the price of admission.) Bob Dylan once said "Prine's stuff is pure Proustian existentialism." I concur.

I have an interesting John Prine segue too via his brother. Circa 1980, John Prine's brother played John's songs for drinks at our Russian River Writers' Guild Monday Nite Poetry & Prose Reading series at Garbo's bar in Guernewood Park, CA. That's how I first learned to really listen to the words of John Prine's songs as poetry.

Ironically, it was songs—Irish ballads that first led me to writing. But that's another story. Prine always had such good angst-riddled lines: "You've broken the speed of the sound of loneliness...How can you ask about tomorrow?" My kind of lines. I was living in a perpetually warped möbius strip time.

(In the 1980s, we were living under a dark cloud: many of the gay club owners who housed our poetry venues were succumbing to a mysterious disease. Nobody knew what it was. Or its name. But we personally knew the names of the fallen: Peter Pender, the pianist/gold medal figure skater, bridge/chess champ who owned Fife's Resort with partner Hugh Ross, Stumptown Annie's owner, decorated Vietnam Purple Heart veteran, Leonard Matlovich, the first gay man to "come out" while in the military—was no longer looking like Kevin Spacey. It was too much to bear.

There was also my neighbor, handsome Bill Dutra, the original Marlboro Man, his beautiful face ravaged... Note Bene: I can't find info on Bill on the internet but he may have been Christian Haren. The info on Christian (or Chuck) fits—he owned The Chocolate Factory in Guerneville. But I can't find a photo.

Bill showed me an old tear sheet photo of him as the Marlboro Man—which I recognized. Bill told us amazing stories of being an actor, working with John Wayne—how I found out Dr. Kildare was gay—and stories of Key West. So all the pieces fit—just not the name of the Castro Street Cowboy.

I could have confabulated the name—but I've an uncanny memory for details. Whoa! Now I've segued so far from my story, I'm even scaring myself. So sorry. Another story, another time. (The Russian River basin attracted many Hollywood types, Fred MacMurray, Raymond Burr, Irene Dailey all lived in its watershed.)

My personal John Prine favorites were the songs that had recently made the charts. I loved "Paradise," but we all called it " Daddy Won'tcha Take me Back to Muhlenberg County," a song Prine says he wrote for his father. There's some good backstory video on the song here.

When I was a senior in high school in 1969, the town of Paradise, in Muhlenburg County, was drowned by the floodwaters of the Green River when a dam was erected, so barges could get to the Peabody coal fields. All about progress.

BUKOWSKI IN ORANGE

Ever notice how the really orange cats, the ones with the tiger stripes tend to be male? I know, this is supposed to be about the Buk. Bukowski was orange. Nothing to rhyme with that. Savior's a nuisance to live with at home as Joan Baez once said. Not that I lived with him. I was living out of my car at the time. A rusted blue VW Bug. Bukowski was crashing on a friend's couch at a farmhouse by the railroad tracks in Cotati. I was running the poetry center, trying to hide my backstory. Bukowski wanted to lasso a reading but he was always drunk on cheap red wine by 3 PM, and he stank of stale cigarettes. I was recovering from an illness and they called me a China doll, taunting me as they grabbed at me as if in jest because I was pale & wan. Little did they know I was near death's door. Anorexic. An abortion gone south. A river of blood raged in a flood tide. Redredred. The edges of the world closing in. My periphery darkened before the clamping down. And the will to live had something to do with it. But they saw my slender self as desirable. And so they, showing their stripes, grabbed at life, grabbed at me, but I was dead inside. I felt lucky to make it back outside‚ gasping for breath, I doubled over. Puking in the weeds. An orange cat frantically wove his way between my ankles as if to shackle me too. But it was a clear fall day, facing south, the sunshine cradling me. That was before Rohnert Park overran Cotati and there were still vast tracts of adobe fields and blankets of oat hay surrounding the campus. George Rohnert's seed flower beds bloomed in wide ribbons of pink and red. Waiting for the harvest, fields wrapped like a present.

RANDOM NOMADS

RANDOM NOMADS

A painter of hollyhocks

constellations

a treatise of light 

where the laws of departure 

collided with mirrored chaos

 an apricot cloak across the sky 

but a departure of words 

ceaselessly scraping against 

the drama of ink.

Random nomads
A purgatory of treatises
whisper about the pleasures of the heart
a eulogy of delicate pointillism. 

So we have the words
we must shake them out of our heads. 

11/6/2010

Susan Wooldridge workshop

IF I WAS

If I was a container
I would hold the stars closer
If I was a source of light
I would burn at absolute zero
I'd be a constellation of chaos
I would write treatises of surrender
I would be a purgatory of fire
I would whisper an elegy of delicate smoke
against a horizon of bleakness

We need Joycean words to hibernate our shadow souls
Sometimes the words just start writing themselves
Sometimes we're just stuck inside  our own heads.

NICHTALALLOUDI

She was a painter of night-blooming flowers
She made color: apricot, tangerine, cerise

swirling around a dervish of bright pollen.
There was something profound about that act,
the brush spiraling in towards the center like a dancer.
Dawn was a treatise of light, a constellation of fire.
The lake mirrored the feathered cloak of the sky.
It was a departure of worlds, a murmur of words
ceaselessly scraped against a dark drama of ink.
Sometimes the poems just started writing themselves.
She was mesmerized. There was no turning back.

11/6/2010

BALANCE

I am without flagrant words
the family transports 6 million pieces
of angst into every room, the hearth
I am not a bittersweet song of iron tracks
the oncoming train, or stunning constellations
a silver center deep in the mines
or a lone candle by the river
I am the forgotten pointallism
the ears of night listening to blue piano notes
I am the river of singing stones
I am the Apúrimac, while the Andes wept
an ancient glacier of rhythms melting
into dry sobs of the coming summer.

11/6/10