I Am Persuaded

Yeah, chaos is king, but you know that you can't stop, won't stop. 

Уярмлені народи гойдають небо

Немилосердно нас об вічність б’ють:

They beat our snow-covered heads against
eternity, relentlessly, without mercy.
And we still fail to settle a score with
our era and to find the path of truth.
Our grief’s ice-shards grind, bash and
and batter us. The shards of our pain
keep calling us to battle. But all we do is
swim behind ourselves like our own cadavers.
Our fury’s taking our breath away.
You, captive of eternity, go throw yourself
against the wall to win your freedom.
The world’s in agony, but defiant peoples
still shake the lampshade of the sky.
The stinging thorns of their screams
grow to the stars, into the cosmic blackness.

Vasyl Stus.

Talking with the girl

But the girl goes sideways...

The Entire Weight of Existence

Here and Now:

The day comes in strips of yellow glass over trees.

 

When I tell you the day is a poem

I’m only talking to you and only the sky is listening.

 

The sky is listening; the sky is as hopeful

as I am walking into the pomegranate seeds

of the wind that whips up the seawall.

 

If you want the poem to take on everything,

walk into a hackberry tree,

then walk out beyond the seawall.

 

I’m not far from a room where Van Gogh

was a patient—his head on a pillow hearing

the mistral careen off the seawall,

 

hearing the fauvist leaves pelt

the sarcophagi. Here and now

 

the air of the tepidarium kissed my jaw

and pigeons ghosting in the blue loved me

 

for a second, before the wind

broke branches and guttered into the river.

 

What questions can I ask you?

How will the sky answer the wind?

 

The dawn isn’t heartbreaking.

The world isn’t full of love.

Peter Balakian.

#throwbackthursday

Kids cleaned up good for Aunt S' wedding in Orygun last year.

Hoping for the best but expecting the worst

I've long associated this song with freshman year of high school, but turns out it was released in September '84, which was the start of sophomore year.  Memory is funny.

Who waits forever anyway?

Immortality:

Forgotten now her fragile golden beauty,
The tilt of her proud chin;
Her quick bright words, her elfish wistful laughter;
Her dreams of lovely things that might have been.
But not a one has ever yet forgotten
Her one small sin. 

Jewell Bothwell Tull.

Dad said I have to be home by eleven

Aw man, I'm gonna miss Stairway to Heaven!

Deus, in adiutorium meum intende

Vespers:

In your extended absence, you permit me

use of earth, anticipating

some return on investment. I must report

failure in my assignment, principally

regarding the tomato plants.

I think I should not be encouraged to grow

tomatoes. Or, if I am, you should withhold

the heavy rains, the cold nights that come

so often here, while other regions get

twelve weeks of summer. All this

belongs to you: on the other hand,

I planted the seeds, I watched the first shoots

like wings tearing the soil, and it was my heart

broken by the blight, the black spot so quickly

multiplying in the rows. I doubt

you have a heart, in our understanding of

that term. You who do not discriminate

between the dead and the living, who are, in consequence,

immune to foreshadowing, you may not know

how much terror we bear, the spotted leaf,

the red leaves of the maple falling

even in August, in early darkness: I am responsible

for these vines.

By Louise Glück

Они говорят, им нельзя рисковать

Было время, когда НАТО нужно было закрыть небо над Украиной, теперь Украина закрывает небо над Россией

— Ivan Zhdanov (@ioannZH) September 1, 2026

Happy to report that I still got it, baby: was able read that post all by myself without needing Twitter or Google to translate.  So that's nice.  

Wish I could find the time and energy to get back to learning Ukrainian.  Таке життя.

<exits singing, Закрой за мной дверь, я ухожу...>

First day of school and I'm already failing

It was Sadie's first day of Grade 9.  Thankfully, I don't think watching Wrath of Khan is gonna cause her probs in math.

What Are We Living For?

Empty Space:

There were two kingdoms only:

the first of them threw out both him and me.

The second we abandoned.

Under a bare sky

I for a long time soaked in the rain of my body,

he for a long time rotted in the rain of his.

Then like a poison he drank the fondness of the years.

He held my hand with a trembling hand.

“Come, let’s have a roof over our heads awhile.

Look, further on ahead, there

between truth and falsehood, a little empty space.”

Amrita Pritam.

Ticking Away the Moments That Make up a Dull Day

Everything is a conspiracy by the Illuminati to enslave us. Haven't heard a church bell in a while? Well that's cause the frequency of their ringing disrupts the New World Order's mind control rays so they got rid of them to keep us all under their control. It's so obvious! pic.twitter.com/KhT2Ooh49O

— Poker and Politics (@PokerPolitics) August 31, 2026

Well, back in Fletcher, Vermont, if you didn't hear the church bell ring, it was because I didn't wind the clock (happened a couple three times):

No conspiracy there, just forgetfulness...

PS - Brought the kids with me a few times on an individual basis.  They both thought it was cool, but Sadie was rather afraid of the rickety stairs and only went once.

Я жду ответа, больше надежд нету.

First day of school for both my high schoolers tomorrow!