Memorial Day

High school band. Memorial Day.
Country cemetery. Marched all the way.
We stood in formation, took off our caps.
Stood with the nation, we played taps

Year before Kennedy, year before King.
Last year I cared about anything.
But for that moment, we were one.
Honoring soldiers

At Arlington.

Notes drifted across the plains.
Swallows signaled oncoming rain.
Station wagons, pickup trucks
Rescued us then turned to rust

We put on new uniforms
Crisp, creased. Tattered, well-worn
Some forget where we come from
Some come to rest

In Arlington

When he was twelve, took my only son
Lost ourselves in the Smithsonian
Then Abraham, above the Mall.
Then raised our hands, touched the wall.

Headstone horizon, eternal flame
Unknown lie with familiar names
Sacrificed daughters and sons
So I could cry

At Arlington.

“Memorial Day”
by Dennis Caraher

What is grass?

A child said “What is the grass?” fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may see and remark, and say “Whose?”

Walt Whitman

Catching Liars

This is about facial micro-expressions.  It reminds me that no matter what you are on the inside, it will leak out to the outside.  No one is that good of a liar.

Catching Liars – Radiolab.

The Suicide Catcher

This is a long article but worth reading.  On a long bridge (6 miles, I believe) in the country of China, a man drives back and forth on a scooter hoping to prevent people from jumping off to their death.  Altruism is fascinating.

The Suicide Catcher: GQ.

Practicing kindness in prison

When the scruffy orange cat showed up in the prison yard, I was one of the first to go out there and pet it. I hadn’t touched a cat or a dog in over 20 years. I spent at least 20 minutes crouched down by the Dumpster behind the kitchen as the cat rolled around and luxuriated beneath my attention. What he was expressing outwardly I was feeling inwardly.

It was an amazing bit of grace to feel him under my hand and know that I was enriching the life of another creature with something as simple as my care. I believe that caring for something or someone in need is what makes us human.

Over the next few days, I watched other prisoners responding to the cat. Every yard period, a group of prisoners gathered there. They stood around talking and taking turns petting the cat. These were guys you wouldn’t usually find talking to each other. Several times I saw an officer in the group — not chasing people away, but just watching and seeming to enjoy it along with the prisoners.

Bowls of milk and water appeared, along with bread, wisely placed under the edge of the Dumpster to keep the sea gulls from getting it. The cat was obviously a stray and in pretty bad shape. One prisoner brought out his small, blunt-tipped scissors, and trimmed burrs and matted fur from his coat.

People said, “That cat came to the right place. He’s getting treated like a king.” This was true. But as I watched, I was also thinking about what the cat was doing for us.

There’s a lot of talk about what’s wrong with prisons in America. We need more programs; we need more psychologists or treatment of various kinds. Some even talk about making prisons more kind, but I think what we really need is a chance to practice kindness ourselves. Not receive it, but give it.

After more than two decades here, I know that kindness is not a value that’s encouraged. It’s often seen as weakness. Instead the culture encourages keeping your head down, minding your own business and never letting yourself be vulnerable.

For a few days a raggedy cat disrupted this code of prison culture. They’ve taken him away now, hopefully to a decent home — but it did my heart good to see the effect he had on me and the men here. He didn’t have a Ph.D., he wasn’t a criminologist or a psychologist, but by simply saying, “I need some help here,” he did something important for us. He needed us — and we need to be needed. I believe we all do.

Caring Makes Us Human : NPR.

Jesus Shaves

You will need to excuse the final 10 seconds but this short story is an amazing illustration of the confusing verbiage that Christians use.  It’s a story about the Easter Bunny but a very funny cultural clash.

David Sedaris is a unique voice on “This American Life” and writer of many books.

YouTube – Jesus Shaves (David Sedaris) meaning of Easter.

The Convert

After one moment when I bowed my head
And the whole world turned over and came upright,
And I came out where the old road shone white.
I walked the ways and heard what all men said,
Forests of tongues, like autumn leaves unshed,
Being not unlovable but strange and light;
Old riddles and new creeds, not in despite
But softly, as men smile about the dead

The sages have a hundred maps to give
That trace their crawling cosmos like a tree,
They rattle reason out through many a sieve
That stores the sand and lets the gold go free:
And all these things are less than dust to me
Because my name is Lazarus and I live.

“The Convert” by G K Chesterton

Nobody likes a wet dog

Nobody here likes a wet dog.
No one wants anything to do with a dog
that is wet from being out in the rain
or retrieving a stick from a lake.
Look how she wanders around the crowded pub tonight
going from one person to another
hoping for a pat on the head, a rub behind the ears,
something that could be given with one hand
without even wrinkling the conversation.

But everyone pushes her away,
some with a knee, others with the sole of a boot.
Even the children, who don’t realize she is wet
until they go to pet her,
push her away,
then wipe their hands on their clothes.
And whenever she heads toward me,
I show her my palm, and she turns aside.

O stranger of the future!
O inconceivable being!
whatever the shape of your house,
however you scoot from place to place,
no matter how strange and colorless the clothes you
may wear,
I bet nobody there likes a wet dog either.
I bet everybody in your pub,
even the children, pushes her away.

“To a Stranger Born in Some Distant Country Hundreds of Years from Now”
By Billy Collins

God’s Close-Up

“This American Life” has become one of my favorite podcasts to check out (along with RadioLab).  It’s worth sitting in your car just to listen to their weekly shows.  Having Netflix gives me access to the two-year series on cable.

Ira Glass tells fascinating stories about humanity.  In this episode, Reporter Nancy Updike tells the story of Ben McPherson, an artist and devout Mormon who’s creating a series of paintings depicting scenes from the life of Jesus Christ. Ben first stages these scenes in an elaborate tableau using props and actors in period costumes. He then lights and photographs them, later using the photos as references for his enormous, lifelike paintings. One of Ben’s problems is that to make the paintings historically accurate, the men must have beards. But Mormonism frowns on facial hair, so Ben searches Utah’s homeless shelters and anarchist cafes for bearded men to use as models.  Very few of these models ever thought about being mistaken for one of Jesus’ disciples but I can’t help but think that a seed is planted in their minds.

The entire season should be downloaded or watched on Netflix.

God’s Close-Up | This American Life.

Is evil more creative than good?

Is evil more creative than good?  I’m not sure.  I can’t say whether the world is getting better or worse but this sort of story reminds me that evil may not be more creative than good but it might be more desperate.

It is probably easier being a hacker than a protector.  As a hacker, you just have to look for cracks.  Finding cracks seems easier than making sure that no cracks exist.

Perhaps this is just a news story worth writing.  A crashed plane in a lettuce field is more interesting that the diligent work that the farmers of the aforementioned lettuce field have exercised in raising their crop; bad stories are more interesting than good stories.

In one of my favorite movies, “The Mission” with Rob DeNiro, at the end (spoiler alert) you see several young children canoeing.  They are alone and too young to be on their own but they are all that are left from their tribe.  But the following Bible verse from John chapter 1 appears, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it”.  In this news story, perhaps it should read: The darkness shades but it could not overcome the light.

In Risky Twist, Using Ultralight Planes To Drop Drugs : NPR.