Poetry Friday

They ask me why I live in the green mountains.
I smile and don't reply; my heart's at ease.

~ Li Bai from "Question and Answer in the Mountains" (tr. Vikram Seth) ~


[Not really a poetry quote, but it is from a poem, and I think poets need to recognize their green mountains. --KK]

Portion of a scroll painting by Huang Guangwang, courtesy Wikimedia Commons.

Learning

Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous.

~ Confucius ~
Photo by Elmer B. Domingo.

Remembering Pete Seeger

I have sung for Americans of every political persuasion, and I am proud that I never refuse to sing to an audience, no matter what religion or color of their skin, or situation in life. I have sung in hobo jungles, and I have sung for the Rockefellers, and I am proud that I have never refused to sing for anybody.

~ Pete Seeger ~

Agreed!

To me, the smell of fresh-made coffee is one of the greatest inventions.

~ Hugh Jackman ~

Skiing!

Skiing combines outdoor fun with knocking down trees with your face.

~ Dave Barry ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

We’d attribute the NRA’s favorite rock ‘n’ roller’s most recent rant to a bad case of Cat Scratch Fever, but that would be an insult to cats.

~ Janet Allon ~



Photo of Skippy having thoughts of scratching someone © Diane Mayr, all rights reserved.

Door

The door of success is marked "push" and "pull."

~ Yiddish proverb ~
Photo courtesy Library of Congress.

Poetry Friday

It's not for me--religion. It seems like a redundancy for a poet.

~ May Swenson ~

Calories

A gourmet who thinks of calories is like a tart, who looks at her watch.

~ James Beard ~


Photo courtesy Oregon Blue Book.

Art

In any art, you don't know in advance what you want to say--it's revealed to you as you say it.

~ Aaron Siskind ~

The Oscar

The Oscar sits on some shelf above my desk. If there was an earthquake, I could actually be killed by my own Academy Award.

~ Helen Hunt ~

Martin Luther King Day

Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.

~ Martin Luther King, Jr. ~





LBJ Library photo by Yoichi Okamoto, courtesy LBJ Presidential Library.

Sunday's Kat Kwote

The bird-watching bandit
on needle-point paws

~ J. Patrick Lewis from "A Tomcat Is" ~

Photo by A. Davey.

Be Alert

The world is a thing of wonder that requires no faith, but only alert senses, to appreciate.

~ Jeffrey Tayler ~
Photo © Diane Mayr, all rights reserved.

Poetry Friday

Maybe I should write a poem
about all the people who think
they know what I should be writing poems about.

~ Billy Collins from "The Suggestion Box" ~

Graphic Novels

Graphic novels are not traditional literature, but that does not mean they are second-rate. Images are a way of writing. When you have the talent to be able to write and to draw, it seems a shame to choose one. I think it's better to do both.

~ Marjane Satrapi ~

Liberate Your Soul! (Yes, That Is a Command)

The artist produces for the liberation of his soul. It is his nature to create as it is the nature of water to run down the hill.

~ W. Somerset Maugham ~
"Lake Squam from Red Hill" by William Trost Richards (1874), courtesy The Athenaeum.

Ideas and Rabbits

Ideas are like rabbits. You get a couple and learn how to handle them, and pretty soon you have a dozen.

~ John Steinbeck ~

Filling in Spaces

I think you just assume that your memory is just sort of a video playback of your experience, but it's nothing like that at all. It's a complete refabrication of an event and a lot of it is made up, because you're filling in spaces.

~ Charlie Kaufman ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

Posted on George Takei's Facebook page.

Another Type of Fog Today

Technology is so much fun but we can drown in our technology. The fog of information can drive out knowledge.

~ Daniel J. Boorstin ~



Smudge in a fog of kitty love. The image on the screen is by Patrick Girouard, one of his "Unofficial Talk Like a [fill in the blank] Day" series.

Poetry Friday

Poetry is music, and nothing but music. Words with musical emphasis.

~ Amiri Baraka ~
Rest in peace, Amiri Baraka.

Photo courtesy AmiriBaraka.com.

From a Cartoon Master

I actually find a lot of parallels in jazz and cartooning.

~ Gary Larson ~

The Snow!

January brings the snow, makes our feet and fingers glow.

~ Sara Coleridge ~

Nice to Know!

Don't you know that everybody's got a Fairyland of their own?

~ P.L. Travers from Mary Poppins ~

Flamingos

With their pink and crimson plumage, long legs and necks, and strongly hooked bills, flamingos cannot be mistaken for any other type of bird.

~ San Diego Zoo ~

Sunday's Kat Kwote

The steps are a blanched slope,
Up which, with feeble hope,
A black cat comes, wide-eyed and thin;
   And we take him in.

~ Thomas Hardy from "Snow in the Suburbs" ~
Photo by Thiophene Guy.

Cold

If the world seems cold to you, kindle fires to warm it.

~ Lucy Larcom ~
KK: it is very cold, today--at least in the NH part of the world!

Poetry Friday

Haiku is short and small, but is really like a deep pond.

~ Kuniharu Shimizu ~
I took the photo in Derry, NH, on a walk along the rail trail. I doubt if the pond is deep, but it sure is pretty!

Snow!

You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found?

~ J. B. Priestley ~
Photo by blmiers2.

Happy New Year!

Postcard courtesy NYPL Digital Gallery.