Listening to the river . . .

It's the Satyr's day . . . the weather in Okieland drives some into the bat cave, what with its ups and downs, warmth and cold. Forecasts indicate the next ten days are in the “ups”

“The mathematician goes mad building his bridge across the infinite. The poet is content to swim the sea.” – G.K. Chesterton

The assassination Wednesday of the chief executive officer of UnitedHealthcare seems to be a cultural moment in which popular fury exploded.over the power big business has over ordinary Americans’ lives. – Heather Cox Richardson in Letters From An American.

Speaking of cultural moments... Today is the 83rd anniversary of the first day of infamy suffered by the United States of America. The Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor all but destroyed the entire Naval Fleet and set the stage for World War II.

Noam Chomsky turns 96 today. The theoretical linguist revolutionized the field of linguistics and related fields, including cognitive psychology and the philosophies of mind and language. He was born in 1928, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

At the River Clarion

… sitting in the river named Clarion

on a water splashed stone

all afternoon listening to the voice

of the river talking.

… you don't hear such voices

in an hour or day,

you don't hear them at all

if selfhood has stuffed your ears.

… I don't know how you get to suspect

such an idea. I only know

that the river kept singing.

– Mary Oliver, “At the River Clarion,” Evidence, Beacon Press, 2009

Listen to the entire poem read by Bianca Lorage