December 29, 2024: "A Word About Transitions," President Jimmy Carter, Moral and Ethical

Some transitions are easy:  the Darrens on Bewitched.  Some transitions are difficult:  President Biden to President-elect Musk . . . I mean Trump.  

Billy Collins says a few things about transitions . . . 

A Word About Transitions

by: Billy Collins

Moreover is not a good way to begin a poem

though many start somewhere in the middle.

Secondly should not be placed

at the opening of your second stanza.

Furthermore should be regarded

as a word to avoid.

Aforementioned is rarely found

in poems at all and for good reason.

Most steer clear of notwithstanding

and the same goes for

nevertheless, however, 

as a consequence, in any event,

subsequently,

and as we have seen in the previous chapters.

Finally's appearance at the top

of the final stanza is not going to help.

All of which suggests (another no-no)

that poems don't need to tell us where we are

or what is soon to come.

For Example, the white bowl of lemons

on a table by a window

is fine all by itself

and, in conclusion, so are

seven elephants standing in the rain.

Today was a difficult transition day.  Earlier this afternoon, I learned the President Jimmy Carter died at the age of 100.  So, we are now transitioning to a post-Jimmy Carter world.  

Jimmy Carter was the first President of the United States I remember.  I was too young for Nixon or Ford to have made any kind of impression on me.  But I remember clearly the Jimmy Carter years, which were marked by long lines at the gasoline pump and the Camp David Peace Accords (for which he won the Nobel Peace Prize), among other things.  

Jimmy Carter was by no means a perfect man or president, and he would have been the first person to admit that.  Humility was a huge part of who he was.  He recognized his mistakes, owned them, and learned from them.  In his post-presidential years, he did remarkable things.  Habitat for Humanity.  The Carter Center.  Books of memoir, religion, and poetry.  He was faithfully married to his wife for 77 years.  

In short, Jimmy Carter was moral, ethical, and honest in his personal life and as President of the United States.  Some people criticize his progressive values and label his four years in the Oval Office as a failure.  My response to such criticisms:  we should be so lucky to have a failure like him as President-elect right now.

I'm not kidding when I say that I hope I can be half the man that James Earl Carter was.  It feels like the Grand Canyon has been filled in or the Mississippi River has dried up.  I know, I know.  People die.  Death and taxes, blah blah blah.

I just wish this particular transition had been gentler, like the shift of light from afternoon to evening,  Or the last minor chord in Irving Berlin's "White Christmas," when we're all reminded of things we used to know.  

So, finally and in conclusion, Saint Marty gives thanks for the life and work of Jimmy Carter, who once said, "The measure of a society is found in how they treat their weakest and most helpless citizens."

Amen, Mr. President.  Amen.

June 6: "When I Am Among the Trees," Price Tags, My Ariel

Mary Oliver's tree lesson . . . 

When I Am Among the Trees

by:  Mary Oliver

When I am among the trees,

especially the willows and the honey locust,

equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,

they give off such hints of gladness.

I would almost say that they save me, and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,

in which I have goodness, and discernment,

and never hurry through the world

     but walk slowly, and how often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves

and call out, "Stay awhile."

The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, "It's simple," they say,

"and you too have come

into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled

with light, and to shine."

Humans love putting values on things and people and places.  Land isn't just land--it's real estate.  People aren't just people--they're assets to employers or churches or communities.  Trees aren't just trees--they're lumber and paper and hardwood flooring.  Everything/one has a price tag.

Mary Oliver sees the value of things a little differently.  It's not about how much money a person earns or the sticker price on a car.  We are all so preoccupied by chasing hope or happiness or fulfillment.  The chase becomes more important than the actual goal.  Say that you've always wanted to visit the Grand Canyon, and you finally get your chance.  Only, you drive by it in a car travelling 100 miles per hour.  No stopping to admire the view or take pictures.  Just speed and glimpses of beauty.

That's what we have to learn from trees, according to Oliver.  Trees don't chase sunlight or rain.  They just stay rooted in place and are filled with light.  They shine with the goodness all around them.

Really, that's what we all came into the world to do, too.  Slow down.  Listen to the leaves.  Find the light.  And shine.  

I'm just as guilty of the next person when it comes to moving too fast.  Most of my days are blurs of activity, from the time I wake up in the morning to the time I collapse on the couch and fall asleep watching some movie I've seen a million times.  I don't stop moving until exhaustion stops me.

But tonight, I slowed down and stopped.  My daughter wanted to see the new live-action The Little Mermaid with her parents and brother.  She grew up watching the animated version over and over.  I think it was because Ariel was the only princess with red hair.  And she was a mermaid.  My daughter has auburn hair, and she's always loved being in the water.  Ariel was her jam. 

As the lights in the theater dimmed and the overture of the film started, my daughter leaned her head on my shoulder and whispered, "Thank you for coming to this with me, Daddy."

That's it.  In the middle of a crowded move theater, I was filled with light.  I shined.

Every once in a while, I need a reminder like this.  Like Oliver says, I am usually so distant from the hope of myself most of the time.  I lose sight of what is really important.  What makes me happy.

Tonight, Saint Marty's daughter was the tree stirring its leaves, calling out, "Stay awhile."  And it was priceless.

March 2: A Puff of Logic, Upheaval, Hope

And now, a little bit about the Babel fish, the translating creature currently residing in Arthur Dent's ear canal . . .

"The Babel fish," said The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy quietly, "is small, yellow and leechlike, and probably the oddest thing in the Universe.  It feeds on brainwave energy received not from its own carrier but from those around it.  It absorbs all unconscious mental frequencies from this brainwave energy to nourish itself with.  It then excretes into the mind of its carrier a telepathic matrix formed by combining the conscious thought frequencies with nerve signals picked up from the speech centers of the brain which has supplied them.  The practical upshot of all this is that if you stick a Babel fish in your ear you can instantly understand anything said to you in any form of language.  The speech patterns you actually hear decode the brainwave matrix which has been fed into your mind by your Babel fish.

"Now it is such a bizarrely improbable coincidence that anything so mind-boggingly useful could have evolved purely by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.

"The argument goes something like this:  'I refuse to prove that I exist,' says God, 'for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing.'

"'But,' says Man, 'the Babel fish is a dead give-away, isn't it?  It could not have evolved by chance.  It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't.  QED.'

"'Oh, dear,' says God, 'I hadn't thought of that,' and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.

"'Oh, that was easy,' says Man, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white and gets himself killed on the next pedestrian crossing.

"Most leading theologians claim that this argument is a load of dingo's kidneys, but that didn't stop Oolon Colluphid making a small fortune when he used it as the central theme of his best-selling book, Well That about Wraps It Up for God.

""Meanwhile, the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation."

There you go.  The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy and the Babel fish prove that God does not exist.  The circular logic is pretty interesting and funny.  People have been trying to prove the existence of God since He created the universe.  The Grand Canyon is proof of the existence of God.  Or it's the result of the Colorado River carving a stream bed into a ditch into a cavern into a canyon over a mile deep in places through thousands of years of erosion.  You can extend the logic.  Who/what created the Colorado River?  Melt from glaciers?  Okay, then who/what created the glaciers?  An Ice Age?  Alright, then who/what caused the Ice Age?  The collision into Earth of a huge asteroid that created a cloud of dust and dirt that lowered the planet's temperature for another thousands and thousands of years and caused a mass extinction.  Okay, then, who/what created the asteroid?  Well, that was the result of collision of two astral bodies in the universe that fragmented and sent pieces of rock to go soaring through the Universe on a collision course with Earth.  So, who/what caused the collision of the astral bodies?  That could have been of an offshoot of the Big Bang, which set into motion the creation of the sun and moon and stars and planets.  You know the next question--who/what caused the Big Bang?  Well, that was caused by the collapsing of matter, a reaction on the atomic level.  Who/what created the atoms?  You see this logic.  Eventually, there will be a "who/what" question that can't be answered.  That's plain logic.

Now, there will be some disciples and readers of this blog who will pick apart my reasoning here.  That's fine.  I'm a questioner, too.  I believe in science.  I don't accept things on face value.  I struggle with my faith all the time.  That's human and understandable.  It's the struggle that deepens belief and understanding.  It does for me, anyway.  It helps me make sense of my life.

I don't know why my life had to change so much these last few weeks.  Don't know the meaning of all this upheaval.  I know the causes:  the healthcare system in the United States.  More specifically, for-profit healthcare.  Whenever big business gets involved in anything, the middle and lower classes will be negatively impacted.  Dem's da facts.  That's the reason the surgery center where I worked closed.  However, there are more existential questions for me to contemplate.

Why is there such struggle in my life at the moment?  One of my friends keeps telling me that she believes something better is coming my way.  I want to believe this.  That goes right along with the idea that everything happens for a purpose.  God has a plan.  As a devout Christian, I'm supposed to believe this.  And I do, in the front of my mind.  In the back of mind, I'm still in a state of panic.

The people I know who seem most spiritual, most connected to God or a higher power, are very happy, centered people.  It's because they have faith.  Believe that God is looking out for them all the time.  Yes, bad things happen in their lives.  Death.  Illness.  Job loss.  The big difference, however, is that they have hope..

That's it.  Hope.  It makes darkness less dark.  Good times more joyful.  Without hope, there isn't a whole lot to look forward to.  I hope that my daughter and son will have happy, fulfilling lives with people who love them.  I hope that Donald Trump will be removed from office.  I hope that I will have bacon for breakfast tomorrow.  Big and small hopes.

That's why I think faith is important.  For my atheist friends, I hope you have faith in humankind to make the world a better place.  For my religious friends, I hope you have faith that God's got your backs, won't abandon you.

Saint Marty will always err on the side of hope.

February 9: Mount Rushmore, Sharon Olds, "His Stillness"

Strange.  I have been looking for pictures of my dad on my cell phone.  I found one, taken at his 90th birthday party this summer.  That's it.

I'm not sure if that is my fault.  He was more than willing to pose for pictures.  Yet, out of over a thousand pictures, I found exactly one good picture of my father.  Maybe I just assumed he was always going to be there, like the Grand Canyon or Mount Rushmore.  Sort of permanent and immovable.

I was wrong.

A poem from Sharon Olds tonight about finding your father in yourself.

Saint Marty is still searching for his father on his phone.

His Stillness

by:  Sharon Olds

The doctor said to my father, "You asked me
to tell you when nothing more could be done.
That's what I'm telling you now."  My father
sat quite still, as he always did,
especially not moving his eyes.  I had thought
he would rave if he understood he would die,
wave his arms and cry out.  He sat up,
thin, and clean, in his clean gown,
like a holy man.  The doctor said,
"There are things we can do which might give you time,
but we cannot cure you."  My father said,
"Thank you."  And he sat, motionless, alone,
with the dignity of a foreign leader.
I sat beside him.  This was my father.
He had known he was mortal.  I had feared they would have
to tie him down.  I had not remembered
he had always held still and kept silent to hear things,
the liquor a way to keep still.  I had not
known him.  My father had dignity.  At the
end of his life his life began
to wake in me.

October 10: Dairy Queen, Joy Harjo, "It's Raining in Honolulu"

It has been a long day of work and student conferences again.  I want a vacation.

England or Greece or Italy sound nice.  I'd even settle for something a little closer--Big Sur or Mount Rushmore or the Grand Canyon.  Heck, I'd even take a trip to Dairy Queen for a Blizzard at the moment. 

On days/weeks like this, I really think back to the time my wife and I spent in Hawaii on our honeymoon.  I remember hiking over a mile of black igneous in Volcano National Park.  It was night, and the stars were like milky clouds of gnats in the sky.  When we reached the edge of a cliff, we looked out across a bay.  Lava was pouring into the Pacific, an orange tongue licking the salt.  And the sound of it hitting the water was deafening.  A Jurassic roar.

Saint Marty needs to go back to Hawaii.

It's Raining in Honolulu

by:  Joy Harjo

There is a small mist at the brow of the mountain,

each leaf of flower, of taro, tree and bush shivers with ecstasy.

And the rain songs of all the flowering ones who have called for the rain

can be found there, flourishing beneath the currents of singing.

Rain opens us, like flowers, or earth that has been thirsty for more than a season.

We stop all of our talking, quit thinking, or blowing sax to drink the mystery.

We listen to the breathing beneath our breathing.

This is how the rain became rain, how we became human.

The wetness saturates everything, including the perpetrators of the second
     overthrow.

We will plant songs where there were curses.

September 4: Poet of the Week, John Ashbery, "My Philosophy of Life"

I just learned this morning that the great poet John Ashbery died yesterday at his home.  He was 90 years old, born the same year as my father. 

Ever since I was infected with the poetry bug, John Ashbery has always been there, like Mount Rushmore or the Grand Canyon.  I know I'm using hyperbole, but he was immense in intellect and poetic beauty.

So, this week, John Ashbery is Poet of the Week.

Saint Marty wishes Ashbery safe travels, and may flights of angels sing thee to thy rest. 

My Philosophy of Life

by:  John Ashbery

Just when I thought there wasn't room enough
for another thought in my head, I had this great idea--
call it a philosophy of life, if you will.Briefly,
it involved living the way philosophers live,
according to a set of principles. OK, but which ones?

That was the hardest part, I admit, but I had a
kind of dark foreknowledge of what it would be like.
Everything, from eating watermelon or going to the bathroom
or just standing on a subway platform, lost in thought
for a few minutes, or worrying about rain forests,
would be affected, or more precisely, inflected
by my new attitude.I wouldn't be preachy,
or worry about children and old people, except
in the general way prescribed by our clockwork universe.
Instead I'd sort of let things be what they are
while injecting them with the serum of the new moral climate
I thought I'd stumbled into, as a stranger
accidentally presses against a panel and a bookcase slides back,
revealing a winding staircase with greenish light
somewhere down below, and he automatically steps inside
and the bookcase slides shut, as is customary on such occasions.
At once a fragrance overwhelms him--not saffron, not lavender,
but something in between.He thinks of cushions, like the one
his uncle's Boston bull terrier used to lie on watching him
quizzically, pointed ear-tips folded over. And then the great rush
is on.Not a single idea emerges from it.It's enough
to disgust you with thought.But then you remember something
William James
wrote in some book of his you never read--it was fine, it had the
fineness,
the powder of life dusted over it, by chance, of course, yet
still looking
for evidence of fingerprints. Someone had handled it
even before he formulated it, though the thought was his and
his alone.

It's fine, in summer, to visit the seashore.
There are lots of little trips to be made.
A grove of fledgling aspens welcomes the traveler.Nearby
are the public toilets where weary pilgrims have carved
their names and addresses, and perhaps messages as well,
messages to the world, as they sat
and thought about what they'd do after using the toilet
and washing their hands at the sink, prior to stepping out
into the open again.Had they been coaxed in by principles,
and were their words philosophy, of however crude a sort?
I confess I can move no farther along this train of thought--
something's blocking it.Something I'm
not big enough to see over.Or maybe I'm frankly scared.
What was the matter with how I acted before?
But maybe I can come up with a compromise--I'll let
things be what they are, sort of.In the autumn I'll put up jellies
and preserves, against the winter cold and futility,
and that will be a human thing, and intelligent as well.
I won't be embarrassed by my friends' dumb remarks,
or even my own, though admittedly that's the hardest part,
as when you are in a crowded theater and something you say
riles the spectator in front of you, who doesn't even like the idea
of two people near him talking together. Well he's
got to be flushed out so the hunters can have a crack at him--
this thing works both ways, you know. You can't always
be worrying about others and keeping track of yourself
at the same time.That would be abusive, and about as much fun
as attending the wedding of two people you don't know.
Still, there's a lot of fun to be had in the gaps between ideas.
That's what they're made for!  Now I want you to go out there
and enjoy yourself, and yes, enjoy your philosophy of life, too.
They don't come along every day. Look out!  There's a big one...