Archive for the ‘iPad art’ category
Hard time focusing (i.e. focusing in hard time)
September 20, 2011Poem To Mariano Rivera, on his 602nd Save
September 19, 2011
To Mariano Rivera, from a New Yorker
Mariano, you’re our man,
you pitch as well as any can.
When you step out upon the field,
the batters know they soon must yield.
Your cutters cut them down to size
as fans, in awe, dissolve in sighs!
Good old Mo, you are our man,
the greatest closer in the land.
(PS – Dear Mariano, sorry for the portrait. It doesn’t infringe on anyone else’s copyright, but it also doesn’t do you justice!)
(PPS – Thanks for all your years of inspiring and cheering New York.)
Unable to Change or Fix Life Poem–Yellow Glads–Grasping At Straws (And Contentment)
September 17, 2011
The political scene seems too grim to even contemplate these days, so turning back to poetry. Poetry! And iPad Art! Although this poem is fairly serious too– Any suggestions, comments, are most welcome, particularly with respect to title.
There
There is so much in life
we cannot change or fix:
your dear friend stacked
with flowers, yellow glads
and lilies white, the green baize
cloth that masks the upturned
earth; the tumor that
takes over a torso, the still
familiar face that can’t digest
the body’s betrayal;
time spent more carelessly
than cash (loose minutes
rarely found in turned-out pockets);
all those difficult years
when contentment was there–
there–there within our grasp if we had just
grasped less; the
flotsam jetsam straws we clung to,
drowning rafts, that
sparkle now in the current of all that’s past,
catching against far shoals, banks, shores–
there–there–there–
(As always, all rights reserved. Karin Gustafson)
(If you are a reader from the wonderful dVerse Poets Pub, the link to the train poem which I should have written and posted today to participate in the Pub is here.)
AND NOW! I am posting this one to the dVerse Poets Pub Open Link night and also to the ver supportive Promising Poets Parking lot (blogspot). Thanks for the opportunity.
Grapes Picture, poem
September 16, 2011
I generally like to be a little upbeat at the beginning of the weekend, but I’ve been reading a lot of kind of dark poetry lately. Many people have a penchant for rather dark poetry, which has led me to write this one.
Grim Poem
There is that
in some of us
that only wants to eat standing
at a kitchen counter.
There is that
that simply cannot
set a table for one,
that sneaks grace
through sidelong dances,
arms stretched around
the ulterior–other’s needs,
moral purpose,
the justification
of simple difficulty: (no pain, no
gain).
The effacement hardly springs
from nobility–our hearts
swell with schadenfreude
well enough, sour
grapes our table wine–but from
what we do not know: how
to be different, how
to be ourselves.
Pick-Up Poem (Not what it sounds like)
September 14, 2011
Sorry, sorry, the title of this post is a bit misleading. The poem is about picking up the phone, not picking up in a bar. However, bloggers like stats; provocativeness improves stats; and well, I’m sure you are picking up the gist of this.
All that said, here’s the poem:
When you don’t pick up
One reason I hate so much
the times you don’t pick up
is that they throw me into
a certain (but I hope distant)
moment in which you are truly gone
or I am gone, when whichever
of us is left will have
no one to call, though perhaps
we will still call–knowing me, I won’t
be able to stop–but we
will have no one to answer, though certainly
you will try out of steadfast love
to answer, and me because I can never
shut up–but still, it will not
be an answer that says,”I’m coming,
I’m almost there,” or if it does, it will
be that rather tricky coming of
the nearly departed, which, of course,
is not what either of us want exactly,
at least
not at this present moment,
which
is why I really do wish
you’d stay near a phone always
so that I could gather up
your sweet hello
every single time I call and know, yes,
that you are coming, yes,
that you are still here.
(All rights reserved.)
Evolving Debate – T-cells, Cancer, Republican Candidates
September 13, 2011
An article, “An Immune System Trained to Kill Cancer,” in yesterday’s New York Times tells of a potential new cancer treatment that reprograms the T-cells (white blood cells) of cancer patients with new genes especially armed to fight cancer.
The article (by Denise Grady) details the work of a team of scientists at University of Pennsylvania, led by Dr. Carl June, and describes the cases of three patients whose last stage cancer was apparently put in partial or full remission due to the treatment.
The treatment relies, amazingly, on an altered HIV-1 virus (the virus that causes AIDS):
“The AIDS virus is a natural for this kind of treatment, Dr. June said, because it evolved to invade T-cells. The idea of putting any form of the AIDS virus into people sounds a bit frightening, he acknowledged, but the virus used by his team was “gutted” and was no longer harmful. Other researchers had altered and disabled the virus by adding DNA from humans, mice and cows, and from a virus that infects woodchucks and another that infects cows. Each bit was chosen for a particular trait, all pieced together into a vector that Dr. June called a ‘Rube Goldberg-like solution” and “truly a zoo.’”
I want to emphasize a couple of important words here. How about ”evolved?” And “DNA?”
I guess I’m still thinking about the CNN Tea Party Republican debate last night at the Florida State Fair. It just seems very strange to me to have leaders talking about their superior approach to health care and education, their closer relationship to smart phones as opposed to pay phones, who also profess not to believe in the theory of evolution, or who are, at least, unwilling to own up to such a belief.
Thank you, Dr. Carl June, and other oncologists involved in this fascinating, and evolving, research.
Republican Tea Party Debate–Smartest Kid in the Class
September 12, 2011
Watching Republican Debate. As at lots of debates, they each are trying very hard to bring the best apple for the teacher (today, the Tea Party.)
Except perhaps for Ron Paul, who is almost painfully consistent here. I’m not sure that I agree with him, but it’s hard not to find him refreshing in his sincerity, willing to see his point through no matter how his audience responds.
11 P.M. 9/11/11
September 11, 2011
11:00 P.M. September 11, 2011.
It feels, somehow, like the start of a new decade.
Who knows what tomorrow may bring?
The only thing we can be sure of is that it won’t be yesterday.
Well, actually, there’s another thing that I personally can be pretty sure of–that I will probably complain about whatever tomorrow does bring, at least a little bit.
But from my perspective–right here, right now, breathing in, breathing out, typing and not-typing, and (okay, okay) with my nose slightly stuffed, stomach slightly cramped (those are some of the current complaints–oh yes, and an occasional pulsation in the ears and I’m also kind of broke), it’s amazing, wonderful.
Hard Landing in Downtown NYC
September 5, 2011
One bummer of living in downtown New York City is that any return home, after time away, necessitates a confrontation with a grim political past, i.e. the old World Trade Center site.
When walking past Ground Zero on a daily basis–late to work, late coming home from work–it is easy enough to pay little attention to it. There are the windows of Brooks Brothers, for example, a store I never seem to enter, but always think I should. (I have this belief–never tries–that if I would just buy a few quality pieces that, unlike all the clothes I get online, really fit, I would never be late for anything again.)
Then there is Century 21 whose sidewalk is jammed with people carrying large bags.
And the fire station. Which is distracting because New York City firemen really are quite good looking. (The calendar doesn’t lie.)
Then there are the streets down by the excavation of the old Deutsch Bank building–they are distracting because I once saw a rat in broad daylight/twilight. Right on the sidewalk.
So on a normal workday, there is plenty to think about other than 9/11.
But on a return from a trip, carrying stuff that makes you walk slowly, it is hard to avoid the sight of all the tourists and, worse, the many cameramen. (One reporter was getting his face powdered today). I am being unfair, I suppose, but the energy feels remarkably like rubbernecking. (The powder-faced reporter had a very ostentatiously curled plastic cord snaking behind one ear.)
I will be very happy when this week is over.
Not stranded in Catskills Anymore. (Darn.)
September 4, 2011
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