Published April 11, 2009 | 
The poem I promised the other day. It works well with the hushed, suspended feeling of Holy Saturday, although there is no evidence whatsoever that Dickinson meant it as an Easter poem.
After great pain, a formal feeling comes—
The Nerves sit ceremonious, like Tombs—
The stiff Heart questions was it He, that bore,
And Yesterday, or Centuries before?The Feet, mechanical, go round—
Or Ground, or Air, or Ought—
A Wooden way
Regardless grown,
A Quartz contentment, like a stone—This is the Hour of Lead—
Remembered, if outlived,
As Freezing persons, recollect the Snow—
First—Chill—then Stupor—then the letting go———Emily Dickinson
Published April 10, 2009 | Emily Dickinson can wait a day. Today Mike Ford would have turned 52.
A poem from the comments at Making Light:
Goetia Naturalis
from “Wolfgang Puck of Pook’s Hill”No one sees us when they dine;
Loudly the forkfuls go past,
A bird and a bottle of wine,
And a tablet goes fizz in a glass.
No one knows that we are there,
They munch without question or pause;
We crouch on the haricots verts,
And lurk like a thief in the sauce.We are the condiments, we,
To julienne, chiffonade, grate;
But set us aside and you’ll see
The void that we leave on your plate.
We sit on the rim of the dish,
The spices nobody can name;
We stand by the meat and the fish,
Some bloke in a toque gets the fame.Eggs folded into a flan,
Sausages steaming in brew;
Chicken stretched on the divan,
How they must love what they do!
Yes — and we seasonings too,
We are as tasty as they;
We are the salt in the stew,
Watch as the chanterelles play.You may think we are not strong;
We know habaneros that are;
Some Worcestershire helps things along,
You know what wasabi is for.
Still we shall sit on the side,
Court-bouillon and bouquet garni;
Your tastebuds will not be denied;
No quarter and no MSG!
A toast to you, and may you feast forever at the right hand of Will Shakespeare.
Published April 9, 2009 | From a poster at FMyLife.com:
See, proofreading does matter. Yes, he’s the one in trouble. But she had to look at the picture.
FMyLife.com allows you to read other people’s miseries and vote on whether they asked for the trouble or their life is indeed fucked. I wish there were a third option for “That’s not so bad.” All the kids complaining because they didn’t get brand-new cars for their sixteenth birthdays? Please.
You can comment on individual posts if you register and log in, but I haven’t bothered, since they allow you to vote without registering.
In addition to the classic sources of embarrassment (parents, kids, banana peels), modern life offers new and horrifying high-tech ways to humiliate each other. Texting or sexting the wrong person is a big one. So is porn on computers at work, at school, at home with the family. And the trend of kids staying home through their early 20s means that parents have to deal with their kids’ sex lives, and vice versa — apparently a traumatic process for all concerned.
It’s an interesting exercise in group morality. Plenty of teenagers (at least, I hope they’re teenagers) post about doing stupid things or playing nasty pranks and then being embarrassed. The vote totals on these posts are overwhelmingly “you deserved it.” The ultimate fail:
As I write this, the vote totals are 137062 to 5584 that the poster deserved that one.
