Without leaning to either side, bring your ears into alignment with your shoulders.

Open your eyes only halfway and fix your attention on the tip of your nose.

Rest your tongue on the roof of your mouth.

Throw away your body and your life.

Looking from the inside, your self has no mind.

Forget also about your connections with others.

Looking from the outside, there is no mind anywhere to be found.

If random thoughts should occur to you unexpectedly, let them go straight away. Do not follow them. This is the essential technique of zazen.

~ Mugai Nyodai (d. 1298)
( Zen Sourcebook Traditional Documents from China, Korea, and Japan )

- Ikkyu (1394-1481)

Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we’ll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.

Look ’round, the Frenchman loves its blaze,
The sturdy German chants its praise,
In Moscow’s vaults its hymns are sung
Chicago swells the surging throng.

Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we’ll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.

It waved above our infant might,
When all ahead seemed dark as night;
It witnessed many a deed and vow,
We must not change its colour now.

Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we’ll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.

It well recalls the triumphs past,
It gives the hope of peace at last;
The banner bright, the symbol plain,
Of human right and human gain.

Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we’ll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.

It suits today the weak and base,
Whose minds are fixed on pelf and place
To cringe before the rich man’s frown,
And haul the sacred emblem down.

Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we’ll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.

With heads uncovered swear we all
To bear it onward till we fall;
Come dungeons dark or gallows grim,
This song shall be our parting hymn.

Then raise the scarlet standard high.
Within its shade we’ll live and die,
Though cowards flinch and traitors sneer,
We’ll keep the red flag flying here.

~ Jim Connel(1889)

My treasure is the cloud on the peak
The moon over the valley
Travelling east or west
Light and free on the one road
I don’t know whether I’m on the way
Or at home.

~ Muso Soseki (1275-1351)

~ Anurag Mathur

~ Stonehouse

The storm, the shifter of shapes, drives on
across the woods and across time,
and the world looks as if it had no age:
the landscape like a line in the psalm book,
is seriousness and weight and eternity.

What we choose to fight is so tiny!
What fights us is so great!
If only we would let ourselves be dominated
as things do by some immense storm,
we would become strong too, and not need names.

When we win it’s with small things,
and the triumph itself makes us small.
What is extraordinary and eternal
does not want to be bent by us.
I mean the Angel who appeared
to the wrestlers of the Old Testament:
when the wrestler’s sinews
grew long like metal strings,
he felt them under his fingers
like chords of deep music.

Whoever was beaten by this Angel
(who often simply declined the fight)
went away proud and strengthened
and great from that harsh hand,
that kneaded him as if to change his shape.
Winning does not tempt that man.
This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively,
by constantly greater beings.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

~ Ryokan (1758-1831)

Send in your skeletons
Sing as their bones come marching in…again
They need you buried deep
The secrets that you keep are at the ready
Are you ready?
I’m finished making sense
Done pleading ignorance
That whole…defense

Spinning infinity, boy
The wheel is spinning me
It’s never-ending, never-ending
Same old story

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
You’re the pretender
What if I say I will never surrender?

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
You’re the pretender
What if I say that I’ll never surrender?

In time our soul untold
I’m just another soul for sale… oh, well
The page is out of print
We are not permanent
We’re temporary, temporary
Same old story

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
You’re the pretender
What if I say that I’ll never surrender?

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
You’re the pretender
What if I say I will never surrender?

I’m the voice inside your head
You refuse to hear
I’m the face that you have to face
Mirrored in your stare
I’m what’s left, I’m what’s right
I’m the enemy
I’m the hand that will take you down
Bring you to your knees

So who are you?
Yeah, who are you?
Yeah, who are you?
Yeah, who are you?

Keep you in the dark
You know they all pretend

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
You’re the pretender
What if I say that I’ll never surrender?

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
You’re the pretender
What if I say that I’ll never surrender?

What if I say I’m not like the others?
(Keep you in the dark)
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
(You know they all… pretend)
You’re the pretender
What if I say I will never surrender?

What if I say I’m not like the others?
(Keep you in the dark)
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays
(You know they all… pretend)
You’re the pretender
What if I say I will never surrender?

So who are you?
Yeah, who are you?
Yeah, who are you?

~ lyrics from the Foo Fighters

“Slay them all. God will know his own.”

~ attributed to Abbot Arnold Amaury before the massacre of Béziers during the Albigensian Crusade,

Black as the devil,
hot as hell,
pure as an angel,
sweet as love.
~ Charles Maurice de Talleyrand

I have not padded through the Taj Mahal,
barefoot, listening to the space between
each footfall picking up and putting down
its print against the marble floor. But I

skimmed flat stones across Black Moss on a day
so still I could hear each set of ripples
as they crossed. I felt each stone’s inertia
spend itself against the water; then sink.

I have not toyed with a parachute cord
while perched on the lip of a light-aircraft;
but I held the wobbly head of a boy
at the day centre, and stroked his fat hands.

And I guess that the tightness in the throat
and the tiny cascading sensation
somewhere inside us are both part of that
sense of something else. That feeling, I mean.

- Simon Armitage

- Linji Yixuan
.

- Elbert Hubbard

- Tao Te Ching

The Master responded: “Put everything aside and only study death. Always study death, free yourself from death, and when death really comes you will not be flustered. In order to save others, knowledge is necessary. For your own salvation, however, whatever knowledge you have grasped becomes your enemy. Just be mindless as earth; recite the nenbutsu (praise to Amida Buddha) and study death.”

Suzuki Shosan (1579 –1655)
From Warrior Zen – The Diamond-hard Wisdom Mind of Suzuki Shosan

What else should he be set for, with his staff?
What, save to waylay with his lies, ensnare
All travellers who might find him posted there,
And ask the road? I guessed what skull-like laugh
Would break, what crutch ‘gin write my epitaph
For pastime in the dusty thoroughfare,

If at his counsel I should turn aside
Into that ominous tract which, all agree,
Hides the Dark Tower. Yet acquiescingly
I did turn as he pointed: neither pride
Nor hope rekindling at the end descried,
So much as gladness that some end might be.

For, what with my whole world-wide wandering,
What with my search drawn out thro’ years, my hope
Dwindled into a ghost not fit to cope
With that obstreperous joy success would bring,
I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring
My heart made, finding failure in its scope.

As when a sick man very near to death
Seems dead indeed, and feels begin and end
The tears and takes the farewell of each friend,
And hears one bid the other go, draw breath
Freelier outside (”since all is o’er,” he saith,
“And the blow fallen no grieving can amend”;)

While some discuss if near the other graves
Be room enough for this, and when a day
Suits best for carrying the corpse away,
With care about the banners, scarves and staves:
And still the man hears all, and only craves
He may not shame such tender love and stay.

Thus, I had so long suffered in this quest,
Heard failure prophesied so oft, been writ
So many times among “The Band”–to wit,
The knights who to the Dark Tower’s search addressed
Their steps–that just to fail as they, seemed best,
And all the doubt was now–should I be fit?

So, quiet as despair, I turned from him,
That hateful cripple, out of his highway
Into the path he pointed. All the day
Had been a dreary one at best, and dim
Was settling to its close, yet shot one grim
Red leer to see the plain catch its estray.

For mark! no sooner was I fairly found
Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two,
Than, pausing to throw backward a last view
O’er the safe road, ’twas gone; grey plain all round:
Nothing but plain to the horizon’s bound.
I might go on; nought else remained to do.

So, on I went. I think I never saw
Such starved ignoble nature; nothing throve:
For flowers–as well expect a cedar grove!
But cockle, spurge, according to their law
Might propagate their kind, with none to awe,
You’d think; a burr had been a treasure-trove.

No! penury, inertness and grimace,
In some strange sort, were the land’s portion. “See
Or shut your eyes,” said Nature peevishly,
“It nothing skills: I cannot help my case:
‘Tis the Last Judgment’s fire must cure this place,
Calcine its clods and set my prisoners free.”

If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk
Above its mates, the head was chopped; the bents
Were jealous else. What made those holes and rents
In the dock’s harsh swarth leaves, bruised as to baulk
All hope of greenness? ’tis a brute must walk
Pashing their life out, with a brute’s intents.

As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair
In leprosy; thin dry blades pricked the mud
Which underneath looked kneaded up with blood.
One stiff blind horse, his every bone a-stare,
Stood stupefied, however he came there:
Thrust out past service from the devil’s stud!

Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,
With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,
And shut eyes underneath the rusty mane;
Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;
I never saw a brute I hated so;
He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

I shut my eyes and turned them on my heart.
As a man calls for wine before he fights,
I asked one draught of earlier, happier sights,
Ere fitly I could hope to play my part.
Think first, fight afterwards–the soldier’s art:
One taste of the old time sets all to rights.

Not it! I fancied Cuthbert’s reddening face
Beneath its garniture of curly gold,
Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold
An arm in mine to fix me to the place
That way he used. Alas, one night’s disgrace!
Out went my heart’s new fire and left it cold.

Giles then, the soul of honour–there he stands
Frank as ten years ago when knighted first.
What honest men should dare (he said) he durst.
Good–but the scene shifts–faugh! what hangman hands
In to his breast a parchment? His own bands
Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and curst!

Better this present than a past like that;
Back therefore to my darkening path again!
No sound, no sight as far as eye could strain.
Will the night send a howlet or a bat?
I asked: when something on the dismal flat
Came to arrest my thoughts and change their train.

A sudden little river crossed my path
As unexpected as a serpent comes.
No sluggish tide congenial to the glooms;
This, as it frothed by, might have been a bath
For the fiend’s glowing hoof–to see the wrath
Of its black eddy bespate with flakes and spumes.

So petty yet so spiteful! All along
Low scrubby alders kneeled down over it;
Drenched willows flung them headlong in a fit
Of mute despair, a suicidal throng:
The river which had done them all the wrong,
Whate’er that was, rolled by, deterred no whit.

Which, while I forded,–good saints, how I feared
To set my foot upon a dead man’s cheek,
Each step, or feel the spear I thrust to seek
For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard!
–It may have been a water-rat I speared,
But, ugh! it sounded like a baby’s shriek.

Glad was I when I reached the other bank.
Now for a better country. Vain presage!
Who were the strugglers, what war did they wage,
Whose savage trample thus could pad the dank
Soil to a plash? Toads in a poisoned tank,
Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage–

The fight must so have seemed in that fell cirque.
What penned them there, with all the plain to choose?
No foot-print leading to that horrid mews,
None out of it. Mad brewage set to work
Their brains, no doubt, like galley-slaves the Turk
Pits for his pastime, Christians against Jews.

And more than that–a furlong on–why, there!
What bad use was that engine for, that wheel,
Or brake, not wheel–that harrow fit to reel
Men’s bodies out like silk? with all the air
Of Tophet’s tool, on earth left unaware,
Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth of steel.

Then came a bit of stubbed ground, once a wood,
Next a marsh, it would seem, and now mere earth
Desperate and done with; (so a fool finds mirth,
Makes a thing and then mars it, till his mood
Changes and off he goes!) within a rood–
Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark black dearth.

Now blotches rankling, coloured gay and grim,
Now patches where some leanness of the soil’s
Broke into moss or substances like boils;
Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in him
Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim
Gaping at death, and dies while it recoils.

And just as far as ever from the end!
Nought in the distance but the evening, nought
To point my footstep further! At the thought,
A great black bird, Apollyon’s bosom-friend,
Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing dragon-penned
That brushed my cap–perchance the guide I sought.

For, looking up, aware I somehow grew,
‘Spite of the dusk, the plain had given place
All round to mountains–with such name to grace
Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen in view.
How thus they had surprised me,–solve it, you!
How to get from them was no clearer case.

Yet half I seemed to recognise some trick
Of mischief happened to me, God knows when–
In a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, then,
Progress this way. When, in the very nick
Of giving up, one time more, came a click
As when a trap shuts–you’re inside the den!

Burningly it came on me all at once,
This was the place! those two hills on the right,
Crouched like two bulls locked horn in horn in fight;
While to the left, a tall scalped mountain . . . Dunce,
Dotard, a-dozing at the very nonce,
After a life spent training for the sight!

What in the midst lay but the Tower itself?
The round squat turret, blind as the fool’s heart
Built of brown stone, without a counterpart
In the whole world. The tempest’s mocking elf
Points to the shipman thus the unseen shelf
He strikes on, only when the timbers start.

Not see? because of night perhaps?–why, day
Came back again for that! before it left,
The dying sunset kindled through a cleft:
The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay
Chin upon hand, to see the game at bay,–
“Now stab and end the creature–to the heft!”

Not hear? when noise was everywhere! it tolled
Increasing like a bell. Names in my ears
Of all the lost adventurers my peers,–
How such a one was strong, and such was bold,
And such was fortunate, yet each of old
Lost, lost! one moment knelled the woe of years.

There they stood, ranged along the hillsides, met
To view the last of me, a living frame
For one more picture! in a sheet of flame
I saw them and I knew them all. And yet
Dauntless the slug-horn to my lips I set,
And blew. “Childe Roland to the Dark Tower came.”

~ Robert Browning(1855.)

What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls’ brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

~ Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)

All that we are arises with our thoughts.

With our thoughts we make the world.

- Bhudda

He drowsed and was aware of silence heaped
Round him, unshaken as the steadfast walls;
Aqueous like floating rays of amber light,
Soaring and quivering in the wings of sleep.
Silence and safety; and his mortal shore
Lipped by the inward, moonless waves of death.

Someone was holding water to his mouth.
He swallowed, unresisting; moaned and dropped
Through crimson gloom to darkness; and forgot
The opiate throb and ache that was his wound.
Water—calm, sliding green above the weir.
Water—a sky-lit alley for his boat,
Bird- voiced, and bordered with reflected flowers
And shaken hues of summer; drifting down,
He dipped contented oars, and sighed, and slept.

Night, with a gust of wind, was in the ward,
Blowing the curtain to a glimmering curve.
Night. He was blind; he could not see the stars
Glinting among the wraiths of wandering cloud;
Queer blots of colour, purple, scarlet, green,
Flickered and faded in his drowning eyes.

Rain—he could hear it rustling through the dark;
Fragrance and passionless music woven as one;
Warm rain on drooping roses; pattering showers
That soak the woods; not the harsh rain that sweeps
Behind the thunder, but a trickling peace,
Gently and slowly washing life away.

He stirred, shifting his body; then the pain
Leapt like a prowling beast, and gripped and tore
His groping dreams with grinding claws and fangs.
But someone was beside him; soon he lay
Shuddering because that evil thing had passed.
And death, who’d stepped toward him, paused and stared.

Light many lamps and gather round his bed.
Lend him your eyes, warm blood, and will to live.
Speak to him; rouse him; you may save him yet.
He’s young; he hated War; how should he die
When cruel old campaigners win safe through?

But death replied: ‘I choose him.’ So he went,
And there was silence in the summer night;
Silence and safety; and the veils of sleep.
Then, far away, the thudding of the guns.

- Siegfried Sassoon

WWI poem quoted on Numb3rs

Light rain, the mountain forest
Is wrapped in mist,
Slowly the fog changes
To clouds and haze.
Along the boundless river bank,
Many crows.
I walk to a hill overlooking the valley
To sit in zazen.
- Ryokan (1758-1831)

- chinese proverb

- chinese proverb

“Look at this gateway! Dwarf!” I continued, “it hath two faces. Two roads come together here: these hath no one yet gone to the end of.

This long lane backwards: it continueth for an eternity. And that long lane forward—that is another eternity.

They are antithetical to one another, these roads; they directly abut on one another:—and it is here, at this gateway, that they come together. The name of the gateway is inscribed above: ‘This Moment.’

But should one follow them further—and ever further and further on, thinkest thou, dwarf, that these roads would be eternally antithetical?”—

“Everything straight lieth,” murmured the dwarf, contemptuously. “All truth is crooked; time itself is a circle.”

- Friedrich Nietzsche, 1844-1900
“Thus Spake Zarathustra”

- Rutger Hauer as ‘Batty’ in Blade Runner

When I am dead, my dearest,
Sing no sad songs for me;
Plant thou no roses at my head,
Nor shady cypress tree:
Be the green grass above me
With showers and dewdrops wet;
And if thou wilt, remember,
And if thou wilt, forget.

I shall not see the shadows,
I shall not feel the rain;
I shall not hear the nightingale
Sing on, as if in pain:
And dreaming through the twilight
That doth not rise nor set,
Haply I may remember,
And haply may forget.

- Christina Rossetti (1783-1854)

- Andrew Marvell (To his Coy Mistress)

Your faith was strong but you needed proof
You saw her bathing on the roof
Her beauty and the moonlight overthrew her
She tied you
To a kitchen chair
She broke your throne, and she cut your hair
And from your lips she drew the Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

You say I took the name in vain
I don’t even know the name
But if I did, well really, what’s it to you?
There’s a blaze of light
In every word
It doesn’t matter which you heard
The holy or the broken Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah

I did my best, it wasn’t much
I couldn’t feel, so I tried to touch
I’ve told the truth, I didn’t come to fool you
And even though
It all went wrong
I’ll stand before the Lord of Song
With nothing on my tongue but Hallelujah

Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah, Hallelujah
Hallelujah

- Leonard Cohen

- Thomas Wyatt

‘And how does one learn that?’

‘By letting go of yourself, leaving yourself and everything yours behind you so decisively that nothing more is left of you but a purposeless tension’

- Eugen Herrigel from Zen in the Art of Archery

- Hung Chih

If I go to church on Sunday, then just shimmy down on Monday, ‘Taint nobody’s biz-nes if I do if I do.

If my friend ain’t got no money and I say take all mine, honey, ‘Taint nobody’s biz-ness if I do, do, do, do.

If I give him my last nickel and it leaves me in a pickle, ‘Taint nobody’s biz-ness if I do, if I do.

- Bessie Smith (words and music by Porter Grainger and Everett Robbins)

- Dylan Thomas (1914-1953)  in Under Milkwood

Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness.

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

- George Santayana (1863 – 1952)

- Yoda

And if I pass this way again, you can rest assured
I’ll always do my best for her, on that I give my word
In a world of steel-eyed death, and men who are fighting to be warm.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

Not a word was spoke between us, there was little risk involved
Everything up to that point had been left unresolved.
Try imagining a place where it’s always safe and warm.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

I was burned out from exhaustion, buried in the hail,
Poisoned in the bushes an’ blown out on the trail,
Hunted like a crocodile, ravaged in the corn.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

Suddenly I turned around and she was standin’ there
With silver bracelets on her wrists and flowers in her hair.
She walked up to me so gracefully and took my crown of thorns.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

Now there’s a wall between us, somethin’ there’s been lost
I took too much for granted, got my signals crossed.
Just to think that it all began on a long-forgotten morn.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

Well, the deputy walks on hard nails and the preacher rides a mount
But nothing really matters much, it’s doom alone that counts
And the one-eyed undertaker, he blows a futile horn.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

I’ve heard newborn babies wailin’ like a mournin’ dove
And old men with broken teeth stranded without love.
Do I understand your question, man, is it hopeless and forlorn?
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

In a little hilltop village, they gambled for my clothes
I bargained for salvation an’ they gave me a lethal dose.
I offered up my innocence and got repaid with scorn.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

Well, I’m livin’ in a foreign country but I’m bound to cross the line
Beauty walks a razor’s edge, someday I’ll make it mine.
If I could only turn back the clock to when God and her were born.
“Come in,” she said,
“I’ll give you shelter from the storm.”

- Bob Dylan 

As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness.

No man is an island, entire of itself…any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.

- John Donne (1572-1631)
Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions, Meditation XVII

Or back to oak trees in the spring
When you unloosed my hair and kissed
The head that lay against your knees
In the leaf shadow’s amethyst.

And still another shining place
We would remember — how the dun
Wild mountain held us on its crest
One diamond morning white with sun.

But I will turn my eyes from you
As women turn to put away
The jewels they have worn at night
And cannot wear in sober day.”

- Sara Teasdale (1884-1933)

Tenno, confused, had no instant answer. He realized that he was unable to carry his Zen every minute. He became Nan-in’s pupil, and he studied six more years to accomplish his every-minute Zen.

( found at ashidakim.com )

[See post to listen to audio]

Observe it calmly, carefully, and objectively; when you master this, you will clearly see that the mind’s consciousness moves in a flow, like a current of water, like heat waves rising endlessly.

- Hongren (602-675)

“The forceps of our minds are clumsy forceps, and crush the truth a little in taking hold of it.”

- H. G. Wells

Turn the mind in upon itself
And contemplate the inner radiance.

- Sir Walter Scott.

- Plato

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

- Andrei Tarkovsky, 1986

To shake off the dust of human ambition
I sit on moss in Zen robes of stillness,
While through the window,
In the setting sun of late autumn,
Falling leaves whirl and drop to the stone dais.

- Tesshu Tokusai (1366)

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion, finely diced
1 apple, diced
1 tablespoon curry powder
1 teaspoon brown sugar
500g premium beef mince
1 and 1/4 cups water
2 teaspoons cornflower (for thickening)
1 tablespoon chopped sultanas
5 sheets shortcrust pastry
1 egg (beaten)
garam masala to taste

Method:

Heat oil in saucepan, add onion and apple.
Stir over medium heat until onion is soft.
Add curry powder and sugar, stir over heat for another minute.

Add beef to saucepan and brown.
Stir in cup of water and bring to boil.
Reduce heat and simmer for 20 minutes.
Blend cornflower with remianing water and stir into mixture
Add sultanas and stir until mixture boild and thickens
Set aside to cool to room temperature

Using a 7cm round cutter cut the pastry sheets and line patty pans with half the rounds
Brush edges with egg
Spoon the cooled meat filling into the pastry cases
Cover the meat filling with the other rounds and press edges together firmly
Make a smal slit in the top of each pie to let the steam escape
Brush with egg

Bake in a moderate oven (180C or 160C in a fan forced oven) for 20 minutes or until the crust is well browned.

Serves: This recipe makes about 36 mini pies

I thought this was a Bjelke-Petersen-ism from the 1970s however I found it in a book of Scottish sayings.

‘Twas a summer’s day in winter
The rain was snowing fast,
As a barefoot girl with shoes on,
Stood sitting on the grass.

‘Twas evening and the rising sun
Was setting in the west;
And all the fishes in the trees
Were cuddled in their nests.

The rain was pouring down,
The sun was shining bright,
And everything that you could see
Was hidden out of sight.

The organ peeled potatoes,
Lard was rendered by the choir;
When the sexton rang the dishrag
Someone set the church on fire.

“Holy smokes!” the teacher shouted,
As he madly tore his hair.
Now his head resembles heaven,
For there is no parting there.

- Charles McCabe

- Dave Barry

DSC04559_glenn_mcgrath

Originally uploaded by RaeA.

“When the angels add my days and say my time is up
I’ll say to them now hold on please there’s one thing you forgot
I know each man must leave this world behind when he gets called
But we had a deal that you won’t count the days I watched the bat & ball

And the angels, they’ll know where to find me
There’s no place I’d rather be
Right behind the bowlers
They’ll know where to find me, ten rows back with sunburnt knees
Right behind the bowler’s arm”

- Paul Kelly

- Bertrand Russell

Ingredients:

2 sheets of puff pastry

6 Eggs

2 slices of ham

half a capsicum

4 cherry tomatoes

mustard powder, salt and pepper for seasoning

Method:

Pre-heat a moderate oven

Get a muffin pan and prepare it for pastry, the silicon one’s need nothing, others might need to be lightly oiled/greased.

Cut the sheets of pastry to fit inside the muffing holes. on mine I just cut the sheets into 4, and fold them so they fit. Don’t cut off the excess, just leave it stand outside.

Finely slice the ham and capsicum, and tomatoes.

Put a slice of tomato in the base of each pasty cup.

Evenly divide the ham and capsicum between the cups, put half in the botom, and keep the rest for after putting the egg in.

Break an egg into each pastry case.

Add the remaining capsicum, ham, and a pinch of mustard powder, and use a skewer to stir them in and break up the yolk.

Float the remaining slices of cherry tomato on top. Salt and pepper to taste.
Place in oven and cook until firm all the way through, and puff pastry has crisped up – about 15-20 minutes.

Serve as a breakfast treat or with a salad for dinner

Does the bamboo distinguish the clever or dull, the deluded or enlightened; does the flower differentiate between shallow and deep, the wise and stupid?

Though flowers bloom year after year, not everyone who sees them gains enlightenment.

Bamboo always gives off sounds, but not all who hear them become enlightened.

- Dogen 1200-1253

Ingredients

Dressing
3 tablespoons of palm sugar, grated.
3 tablespoons fish sauce
1.5 tablespoons of lemon juice or lime juice
1.5 tablespoons of tamarind water
1 hot red chilli, deseeded & finely chopped

Method
To make dressing, dissolve palm sugar in fish sauce and combine with remaining ingredients.

Combine all salad ingredients in a bowl, toss with dressing & serve on chopped cos lettuce base on serving platter.
Garnish with crispy fried shallots & coriander sprigs.

Red shallots can be substituted with red onions, but flavour will be less intense.

Always grate palm sugar if using in recipes that don’t require heating. If you cut with a knife the larger pieces of sugar will be harder to dissolve.

Serves 4

modified from a recipe from the James Street Cooking School

Stand forth,John Keats! On earth thou knew’st me not;
Steadfast through all the storms of passion,thou,
True to thy muse,and virgin to thy vow;
Resigned,if name with ashes were forgot,
So thou one arrow in the gold had’st shot!
I never placed my laurel on thy brow,
But on thy name I come to lay it now,
When thy bones wither in the earthly plot.
Fame is my name. I dwell among the clouds,
Being immortal,and the wreath I bring
Itself is Immortality. The sweets
Of earth I know not,more the pains,but wing
In mine own ether,with the crownéd crowds
Born of the centuries.-Stand forth,John Keats!

ee cummings

- John Keats

“To make the Hippocrates special soup, the following vegetables should be thoroughly washed, not peeled, but into cubes, covered with water, and cooked for two hours. Put everything through a food mill; allow only fibers and peels to remain. The result is a thick, creamy soup.”

- 1 medium celery knob (root). If celery root is not in season, substitute 3 or 4 stalks of branch celery.
- A small amount of parsley
- 1-1/2 lbs of tomatoes (more if desired during the summer season)
- 2 medium onions
- 1 medium parsley root (rarely available; omit if not)
- 2 small leeks (if not available , substitute 2 additional medium onions)
- several cloves of garlic
- 1 lb of potatoes

Edgar Watson Howe

1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
1 tablespoon of ammonia or bleach
1 cup of water

Leave the lid screwed on one of the drink bottles, remove the lid from the other and then cut it off at the shoulder.

Make a hole in the body of the intact bottle the same size as the neck of the one that has ben cut and place it into the hole like a funnel.

The cup shape that remains exposed will be the entrance to the trap. Mix the water vanilla essence and bleach together and pour the solution through the hole. Hang the trap from a tree near tomatoes or other plants.

The mixture of the vanilla esence and water will attract the fruit fly into the bottle from which they cannot escape.

They will be killed by the bleach or ammonia.

Sometimes I see me as old manatee
Headin south as the waters grow colder
Tries to steer clear of the hum-drum so near
It cuts prop scars deep in his shoulder
But thats how it goes (thats how it goes), right to the end
Though his bodys quite flexible, that barnacle brain dont bend

Chorus:
Im growing older but not up
My metabolic rate is pleasantly stuck
Let those winds of time blow over my head
Id rather die while Im livin than live while Im dead

(instrumental)

Now dont get me wrong
This is not a sad song
Just events that I have happened to witness
And time takes its toll as we head for the poll
And no one dies from physical fitness
So what the hell, well take it right to the end
As the days grow more complicated the nightlife still wins

Chorus:
Im growing older but not up
My metabolic rate is pleasantly stuck
Let those winds of change blow over my head
Id rather die while Im living than live while Im dead
Let those winds of time blow over my head
Id rather die while Im living than live while Im dead

Jimmy Buffett (1980)

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/14/growing-older-but-not-up/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/12/paranoid/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/12/paranoid/#comments Mon, 11 Sep 2006 21:20:57 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/12/paranoid/ Paranoid? Probably. But just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean there isn’t an invisible demon about to eat your face.

- Storm Front by Jim Butcher

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/12/paranoid/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/06/back-in-the-saddle-again/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/06/back-in-the-saddle-again/#comments Wed, 06 Sep 2006 02:57:48 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/06/back-in-the-saddle-again/ I’m back
I’m back in the saddle again
I’m back
I’m back in the saddle again

Ridin’ into town alone
By the light of the moon
I’m looking for ole’ Sukie Jones
She crazy horse saloon
Barkeep gimme a drink
That’s when she caught my eye
She turned to give me a wink
That’d make a grown man cry

I’m back in the saddle again
I’m back
I’m back in the saddle again
I’m back

Umm…come easy, go easy
Alright ’til the rising sun
I’m calling all the shots tonight
I’m like a loaded gun
Peelin’ off my boots and chaps
I’m saddle sore
Four bits gets you time in the racks
I scream for more

Fools’ gold out of their mines
The girls are soaking wet
No tongue’s drier than mine
I’ll come when I get back

I’m back in the saddle again
I’m back
I’m back in the saddle again
I’m riding, I’m loading up my pistol
I’m riding, I really got a fistful
I’m riding, I’m shining up my saddle
I’m riding, this snake is gonna rattle

I’m back in the saddle again
I’m back
I’m back in the saddle again
I’m back

Ridin’ high
Ridin’ high
Ridin’ high already

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/06/back-in-the-saddle-again/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/04/no-illusions/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/04/no-illusions/#comments Sun, 03 Sep 2006 23:42:59 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/04/no-illusions/ When you see reality,
no illusions can confuse you;
when you develop stability,
things cannot shake it or take it away.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/09/04/no-illusions/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/27/resistance-is-futile/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/27/resistance-is-futile/#comments Sun, 27 Aug 2006 02:51:36 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/27/resistance-is-futile/ We are the Borg.

Lower your shields and surrender your ships.

We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own.

Your culture will adapt to service us.

Resistance is futile.

- Star Trek : First Contact

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/27/resistance-is-futile/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/16/good-companions/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/16/good-companions/#comments Wed, 16 Aug 2006 00:51:52 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/16/good-companions/ Association with good companions is a serious recommendation of the ancient sages.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/16/good-companions/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/13/lift-up-the-mountain/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/13/lift-up-the-mountain/#comments Sat, 12 Aug 2006 19:04:56 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/13/lift-up-the-mountain/ So it is said that the earth lifts
Up the mountain without
Knowing the mountain’s
Stark steepness.

A rock contains jade without
Knowing the jade’s flawlessness.

This is how truly to leave home.

- Hongzhi Zhengjue (1091-1157)

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/13/lift-up-the-mountain/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/09/try-not/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/09/try-not/#comments Wed, 09 Aug 2006 12:40:12 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/09/try-not/ Try not. Do… or do not. There is no try.

- Yoda

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/09/try-not/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/08/youth-wasted-on-the-young/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/08/youth-wasted-on-the-young/#comments Mon, 07 Aug 2006 23:34:05 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/08/youth-wasted-on-the-young/

DSC03588-happy kids

Originally uploaded by RaeA.

“Youth is a wonderful thing. What a crime to waste it on children.”

- George Bernard Shaw

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/08/youth-wasted-on-the-young/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/03/imgp0913-maher-200-love-100/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/03/imgp0913-maher-200-love-100/#comments Thu, 03 Aug 2006 08:35:59 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/03/imgp0913-maher-200-love-100/

IMGP0913 maher 200 love 100

Originally uploaded by RaeA.

A peaceful spot is Pipers Flat. The fold that live around
They keep themselves by keeping sheep and turning up the ground
But the climate is erratic and the consequences are
The struggle with the elements is everlasting war
We plough and sow and harrow, then sit and pray for rain
And then we all get flooded out and have to start again
But the folk are now rejoicing as they ne’er rejoiced before
For we’ve played Molongo at cricket and McDougal topped the score

Molongo had a head on it and challenged us to play
A single innings match for lunch, the losing team to pay
We were not great guns at cricket, but we couldn’t well say no
So we all began to practise and we let the reaping go
We scoured the Flat for ten miles round to muster up our men
But when the list was totaled we could only number ten
Then up spoke big Tim Brady, he was always slow to speak
And he said, “What price McDougal who lives down at Coopers Creek?”

So we sent for old McDougal and he stated in reply
That he’d never played at cricket, but he’d half a mind to try
He couldn’t come to practice – he was getting in his hay
But he guessed he’d show the beggars from Molongo how to play
Now, McDougal was a Scotchman, and a canny one at that
So he started in to practise with a paling for a bat
He got Mrs Mac to bowl to him, but she couldn’t run at all
So he trained his sheep dog Pincher how to scout and fetch the ball

Now, Pincher was no puppy, he was old and worn and grey
But he understood McDougal, and – accustomed to obey
When McDougal cried out “Fetch it!” he would fetch it in a trice
But, until the word was “Drop it!” he would grip it like a vice
And each succeeding night they played until the light grew dim
Sometimes McDougal struck the ball – sometimes the ball struck him
Each time he struck the ball would plough a furrow in the ground
And when he missed the impetus would turn him three times round

The fatal day at last arrived – the day that was to see
Molongo bite the dust or Pipers Flat knocked up a tree
Molongo’s captain won the toss and sent his men to bat
And they gave some leather hunting to the men of Pipers Flat
When the ball sped where McDougal stood, firm planted in his track
He shut his eyes and turned him round and stopped it with his back!
The highest score was twenty two, the total sixty six
When Brady sent a Yorker down that scattered Johnson’s sticks

The Pipers Flat went in to bat, for glory and renown
But, like the grass before the scythe, our wickets tumbled down
Nine wickets down for seventeen with fifty more to win
Our captain heaved a sigh, and sent McDougal in
“Ten pounds to one you’ll lose it!” cried a barracker from the town
But McDougal said, “I’ll take it mon!” and planted the money down
Then he girded up his moleskins in a self reliant style
Threw off his hat and boots and faced the bowler with a smile

He held the bat the wrong side out and Johnson with a grin
Stepped lightly to the bowling crease and sent a “wobbler” in
McDougal spponed it softly back and Johnson waited there
But McDougal crying “Fetch it!” started running like a hare
Molongo shouted “Victory!” He’s out as sure as eggs
When Pincher started throught the crowd and ran through Johnson’s legs
He seized the ball like lightening then he ran behind a log
And McDougal kept on running while Molongo chased the dog!

They chased him up, they chased him down, they chased him round and then
He darted through the slip-rail as the scorer shouted, “Ten!”
McDougal puffed, Molongo swore, excitement was intense
As the scorer marked down twenty, Pincher cleared a barbed wire fence
“Let us head him!” shrieked Molongo, “Brain the mongrel with a bat!”
“Run it out! Good old McDougal!” yelled the men from Pipers Flat
And McDougal kept on jogging and then Pincher doubled back
And the scorter counted “Forty” as they raced across the track

McDougal’s legs were going fast, Molongo’s breath was gone
But still Molongo chased the dog – McDougal struggled on
When the scorer shouted “Fifty!”, then they knew the chase would cease
And McDougal gasged out “Drop it!” as he dropped within his crease
Then Pincher dropped the ball and as instinctively he knew
Discretion was the wiser plan, he disappeared from view
And as Molongo’s beaten men exhausted lay around
We raised McDougal shoulder high and bore him from the ground

We bore him to McGinnis’s where lunch was ready laid
And filled him up with whisky punch for which Molongo paid
We drank his health in bumpers and we cheered him three times three
And when Molongo got its breath Molongo joined the spree
And the critics say they never saw a cricket match like that
When McDougal broke the record in the game at Pipers Flat
And the folk are jubilating as they never did before
For we played Molongo cricket and McDougal topped the score!

Thomas E. Spencer

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/08/03/imgp0913-maher-200-love-100/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/29/the-first-principle/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/29/the-first-principle/#comments Sat, 29 Jul 2006 13:39:42 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/29/the-first-principle/ When one goes to Obaku temple in Kyoto he sees carved over the gate the words “The First Principle”. The letters are unusually large, and those who appreciate calligraphy always admire them as being a mastepiece. They were drawn by Kosen two hundred years ago.

When the master drew them he did so on paper, from which the workmen made the large carving in wood. As Kosen sketched the letters a bold pupil was with him who had made several gallons of ink for the calligraphy and who never failed to criticise his master’s work.

“That is not good,” he told Kosen after his first effort.

“How is this one?”

“Poor. Worse than before,” pronounced the pupil.

Kosen patiently wrote one sheet after another until eighty-four First Principles had accumulated, still without the approval of the pupil.

Then when the young man stepped outside for a few moments, Kosen thought: “Now this is my chance to escape his keen eye,” and he wrote hurriedly, with a mind free from distraction: “The First Principle.”

“A masterpiece,” pronounced the pupil.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/29/the-first-principle/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/24/a-pinch-of-dirt/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/24/a-pinch-of-dirt/#comments Mon, 24 Jul 2006 08:52:16 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/24/a-pinch-of-dirt/ “Eat a pinch of dirt before you die”

- anon

My scottish grandmother used to say this but I’ve never worked it out. Do you need to eat a pinch of dirt before you die? Does eating a pinch of dirt cause you to die?

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/24/a-pinch-of-dirt/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/20/the-last-leap/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/20/the-last-leap/#comments Thu, 20 Jul 2006 00:14:46 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/20/the-last-leap/ All is over! fleet career,
Dash of greyhound slipping thongs,
Flight of falcon, bound of deer,
Mad hoof-thunder in our rear,
Cold air rushing up our lungs,
Din of many tongues.

Once again, one struggle good,
One vain effort; — he must dwell
Near the shifted post, that stood
Where the splinters of the wood,
Lying in the torn tracks, tell
How he struck and fell.

Crest where cold drops beaded cling,
Small ear drooping, nostril full,
Glazing to a scarlet ring,
Flanks and haunches quivering,
Sinews stiff’ning, void and null,
Dumb eyes sorrowful.

Satin coat that seems to shine
Duller now, black braided tress,
That a softer hand than mine
Far away was wont to twine,
That in meadows far from this
Softer lips might kiss.

All is over! this is death,
And I stand to watch thee die,
Brave old horse! with ‘bated breath
Hardly drawn through tight-clenched teeth,
Lip indented deep, but eye
Only dull and dry.

Musing on the husk and chaff
Gather’d where life’s tares are sown,
Thus I speak, and force a laugh
That is half a sneer and half
An involuntary groan,
In a stifled tone –

“Rest, old friend! thy day, though rife
With its toil, hath ended soon;
We have had our share of strife,
Tumblers in the mask of life,
In the pantomime of noon
Clown and pantaloon.

“With the flash that ends thy pain
Respite and oblivion blest
Come to greet thee. I in vain
Fall: I rise to fall again:
Thou hast fallen to thy rest –
And thy fall is best!”

- Adam Lindsay Gordon

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/20/the-last-leap/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/18/romeo-and-juliet-act-i-prologue/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/18/romeo-and-juliet-act-i-prologue/#comments Tue, 18 Jul 2006 05:03:05 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/18/romeo-and-juliet-act-i-prologue/ Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life;
Whole misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury their parents’ strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark’d love,
And the continuance of their parents’ rage,
Which, but their children’s end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/18/romeo-and-juliet-act-i-prologue/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/17/throw-your-voice/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/17/throw-your-voice/#comments Mon, 17 Jul 2006 06:20:34 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/17/throw-your-voice/ “Just because your voice reaches halfway around the world doesn’t mean you are wiser than when it reached only to the end of the bar.” – Edward R. Murrow

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/17/throw-your-voice/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/16/the-mind-roams-in-heaven/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/16/the-mind-roams-in-heaven/#comments Sun, 16 Jul 2006 09:14:30 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/16/the-mind-roams-in-heaven/ Sometimes the mind is still.
There is no anxiety, and the heart is clear throughout.
Then it is said that even though the body is in the human realm, the mind roams in heaven. 

However in one day an ordinary person transmigrates countless times, during which he rarely keeps the human mind, much less roams in heaven.

- Master Torei (1721-1792)

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/16/the-mind-roams-in-heaven/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/15/terrain/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/15/terrain/#comments Sat, 15 Jul 2006 00:43:55 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/15/terrain/ There are different kinds of terrain in nature. Some terrain is easily accessible, some is entrapping, some temporizing, some constricted, some precipitous and some distant.What terrain is accessible? Ground that is easy for both your troops and the enemy’s to move across is called accessible terrain. If you enter the accessible region, you should first take high and sunny positions and keep your supply routes unimpeded. This is convenient for you to fight with the enemy.

- Sun Tzu

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/15/terrain/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/10/winter-beef-stew/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/10/winter-beef-stew/#comments Mon, 10 Jul 2006 03:44:23 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/10/winter-beef-stew/ I always like to make a beef stew during winter. Its a great solid warmer and the left-overs are great for lunch.

Ingredients:

500g chuck or topside beef
tablespoon olive oil
1/2 brown onion
2 large carrots
1/2 litre good stock
3 large washed potatoes
handful diced pumpkin
400g Borlotti Beans
cupful of cauliflower chopped.
Recipe:

Cube the beef into 1-2cm cubes. I prefer them larger but my family likes them smaller.

In a large saucepan add a tablespoon of olive oil.

Add the cubed beef and cook until sealed. Add the onion in large chunks and let it caramelise during the process.

Add the stock so it covers the beef, bring it to the boil, and then turn it down to simmer.

Add one potatoe. I prefer to leave the skins on as this helps to stop the potatoe turning into starch.

Add the carrots cut into decent sized pieces.

Cook for 2 hours on simmer, then add the other carrot, and the rest of the potatoe.

Cook for half an hour then add the pumpkin

Cook for half an hour then add the borlotti’s and the cauliflower.

Cook for half an hour on simmer then turn off.

The early potato will thicken the sauce, while the latter additions maintain their integrity. If you cutt the meat too small it will almost have disappeared by this stage.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/10/winter-beef-stew/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/09/small-hut/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/09/small-hut/#comments Sun, 09 Jul 2006 08:23:39 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/09/small-hut/ The white clouds
On the mountain tops
Poke halfway into this thatched hut
I had thought too cramped
Even for myself

- Koho Kennichi (1241-1316)

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/09/small-hut/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/07/242/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/07/242/#comments Fri, 07 Jul 2006 00:16:57 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/07/242/

1. Serenity
After a flashback to Zoe’s and Mal’s days in the wars six years previous, we cut to the modern day where the Serenity crew is running a salvage operation on a deserted ship and are forced to flee with the cargo when the Alliance show up. Their buddy Badger refuses to buy the cargo so they head off to the rim worlds after picking up three passengers: Book, Simon, and Dobson. En route someone sends a signal to the Alliance and it turns out to be Dobson, an undercover Federal agent, who arrests Simon but is glad to take the whole crew in. He shoots Kaylee before being captured, and Simon forces Mal to flee in return for his doctoring services. When Mal investigates Simon’s cargo he finds a naked woman.
The naked woman is Simon’s sister River, a government test subject he helped to escape. After ducking a dreaded reaver ship, Mal tries and cuts a deal with Patience, an old “friend” but suspects a trap. Patience tries an ambush but the team escapes just as the Reavers return and the Federal agent breaks loose. Mal shoots the agent dead and Wash manages to duck the Reavers. at the end Mal decides to take on all three of his remaining passengers full-time.

2. The Train Job
Serenity continues to travel through space conducting illegal runs across the star system, which is under the control of The Alliance. A powerful and fearsome mobster named Adelei Niska demands that the crew of Serenity pull a train robbery. The train is carrying medical supplies for a community, and Reynolds and Zoe get held on suspicion. They get free with Inara’s help but realize they were tricked and try to return Niska’s money. His henchman isn’t too happy, but Mal “persuades” the next guy to take the money back. Meanwhile, two blue-handed, black-suited operatives close in on River.

3. Bushwhacked
On a salvage mission aboard a drifting colony ship, the Serenity crew find signs that the crew were killed by the cannabalistic Reavers. They find one survivor, but things take a turn for the worse when an Alliance ship looking for an unspecified Firefly-class ship with brother-and-sister stowaways shows up and takes them in.

4. Shindig
On the planet Persephone the crew are contacted by their old “friend” Badger the ruthless crimelord to transport some goods on behalf of a local lord. While at a ball to arrange a transport job with the lord, Mal defends Inara’s honor when her current customer insults her. By local custom he unintentionally challenges her date, Atherton Wing, to a duel.

5. Safe
On a planet, Simon is kidnapped by locals who need a doctor, while River is threatened with burning as a witch.

6. Our Mrs. Reynolds
While completing a job on a backwater world, Mal is married to a village girl without his knowledge. The girl, Saffron, gets onboard and the crew does not find her until they’re already in the air. Mal is not sure what to do with her, but Zoe thinks she is dangerous.

7. Jaynestown
Serenity sets down at the mudder colony of Canton where it turns out Jayne is a hero for having dropped a bunch of money there years ago that he and his partner Stitch stole from the local magistrate. The drop was unintentional but Jayne doesn’t turn down the attentions. Meanwhile, Kaylee and Simon dance, River rewrites Book’s bible, and Inara beds the magistrate’s son, a virgin.

8. Out of Gas
In a delirious state after Serenity’s engine explodes, draining the ship of its oxygen supply, Mal has a series of flashbacks about how he came to own Serenity and form his crew.

9. Ariel
The crew visit the planet Ariel because Inara needs to receive an annual Companion physical. The crew is offered a surprising job by Simon: in return for stolen medicine he wants them to get him into a hospital to use a high-end scanner to diagnose River. Simon devises a plan – Kaylee and Wash browse through the local dump and find parts to make an imitation emergency vehicle so the crew can get into the hospital posing as EMTs. Simon and River pose as corpses with the aid of a drug Simon has. While Mal and Zoe round up some medicine, Jayne stays with River and Simon, who are unaware he has ratted them out to the Alliance in return for money. Jayne rushes Simon through the examination and on the way out Jayne, Simon, and River are caught by the Alliance. Jayne is betrayed by the Alliance and becomes a prisoner himself. They manage to escape as the Men With Blue Hands arrive and ruthlessly execute anyone who had contact with the Tams. Mal and Zoe end up saving their friends and Simon makes a big deal about Jayne fighting, thinking he was trying to save River and himself. Mal realizes that Jayne leaked the information about Simon and River to the alliance and tosses Jayne in the airlock. Jayne admits to doing so and Mal decides to let Jayne off the hook. In the end, Inara returns, and Simon begins “healing” River.

10. War Stories
Jealous of Zoe’s relationship with Mal, Wash insists (thanks to a bit of scheming) that he go with Mal to try to sell some of the medical supplies the crew stole from the Alliance. In the middle of the deal Mal and Wash are kidnapped by men working for Niska the crime lord, who wants revenge against Mal for the botched train heist. He tortures Mal and Wash until Zoe shows up offering money in exchange for the prisoners. Niska says that the money is only enough for one person and Zoe chooses Wash. Wash realizes that Mal’s antagonizing him while they were being tortured was to help keep him alive and kicking. This inspires him to do everything he can to help Zoe rescue Mal from Niska. The rest of the crew jump on board to save the Captain. Meanwhile Inara extends her services to a council member. To the crew of Serenity’s surprise, it’s a woman. And Simon continues to treat River with some of the medicine he stole but she suffers the occasional relapse as well as displays a penchant for blind-shooting.

11. Trash
Saffron (from “Our Mrs. Reynolds”) returns – after Mal breaks up her current gig, she convinces him and the crew to help out with a “perfect crime” that isn’t. The crime: go to Bellerophon and steal a criminal’s prototype laser gun from his collection. The plan: Saffron and Mal sneak in and dump the gun down the trash, bypassing security, and the Serenity crew grab it from the disposal system. Of course, this is Saffron, and thigns don’t quite turn out as planned… Meanwhile, Simon figures out Jayne betrayed them (in “Ariel”) and the two have words.

12. The Message
An old war comrade of Mal’s and Zoe’s, Tracey, mails his corpse to them. He also leaves a message asking them to deliver his body to his family. Some men claiming to be with the Alliance are on the trail of the body and catch up to them demanding the body. The crew can’t find anything on Tracey’s corpse, but as they prepare to cut it open, Tracey comes back to life. He explains he is smuggling super-organs in his own body. They flee to the planet with the men in hot pursuit and eventually/supposedly agree to give up Tracey. Tracey gets wind of the plan and makes a break for it with Kaylee as a hostage – they shoot him down and Mal reveals they were going to send the officer off since he’s out of his jurisdiction and on a personal mission with no authority. Then Tracey dies and they deliver his body for real this time.

13. Heart of Gold
The crew of the Serenity are in for a gunfight when one of Inara’s companion colleagues asks for their help. The Serenity crew defends a bordello from a gunslinger who got a prostitute pregnant and now intends to collect the child; Mal falls for the bordello’s madam.

14. Objects in Space
A bounty hunter boards the Serenity to capture River for the Alliance.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/07/242/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/05/julius-caesar-act-3-scene-2/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/05/julius-caesar-act-3-scene-2/#comments Wed, 05 Jul 2006 08:55:30 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/05/julius-caesar-act-3-scene-2/ Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him;
The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interréd with their bones,
So let it be with Caesar…. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answered it….
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest,
(For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all; all honourable men)
Come I to speak in Caesar’s funeral….
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man….
He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse: was this ambition?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And, sure, he is an honourable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke,
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, not without cause:
What cause withholds you then to mourn for him?
O judgement! thou art fled to brutish beasts,
And men have lost their reason…. Bear with me;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause till it come back to me.

- Mark Anthony

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/05/julius-caesar-act-3-scene-2/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/god-and-the-artist/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/god-and-the-artist/#comments Tue, 04 Jul 2006 11:22:01 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/god-and-the-artist/ Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better. – Andre Gide

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/god-and-the-artist/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/macbeth-act-iv-scene-i-the-witches/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/macbeth-act-iv-scene-i-the-witches/#comments Tue, 04 Jul 2006 11:17:19 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/macbeth-act-iv-scene-i-the-witches/ First Witch: Thrice the brinded cat hath mew’d.

Second Witch: Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.

Third Witch: Harpier cries ‘Tis time, ’tis time.

First Witch: Round about the cauldron go;
In the poison’d entrails throw.
Toad, that under cold stone
Days and nights has thirty-one
Swelter’d venom sleeping got,
Boil thou first i’ the charmed pot.

ALL: Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch: Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL: Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Third Witch: Scale of dragon, tooth of wolf,
Witches’ mummy, maw and gulf
Of the ravin’d salt-sea shark,
Root of hemlock digg’d i’ the dark,
Liver of blaspheming Jew,
Gall of goat, and slips of yew
Silver’d in the moon’s eclipse,
Nose of Turk and Tartar’s lips,
Finger of birth-strangled babe
Ditch-deliver’d by a drab,
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add thereto a tiger’s chaudron,
For the ingredients of our cauldron.

ALL: Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Second Witch: Cool it with a baboon’s blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.

[Enter HECATE to the other three Witches]

HECATE: O well done! I commend your pains;
And every one shall share i’ the gains;
And now about the cauldron sing,
Live elves and fairies in a ring,
Enchanting all that you put in.

[Music and a song: 'Black spirits,' &c]

[HECATE retires]

Second Witch: By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes.
Open, locks,
Whoever knocks!

[Enter MACBETH]

MACBETH: How now, you secret, black, and midnight hags!
What is’t you do?

ALL: A deed without a name.

MACBETH: I conjure you, by that which you profess,
Howe’er you come to know it, answer me:
Though you untie the winds and let them fight
Against the churches; though the yesty waves
Confound and swallow navigation up;
Though bladed corn be lodged and trees blown down;
Though castles topple on their warders’ heads;
Though palaces and pyramids do slope
Their heads to their foundations; though the treasure
Of nature’s germens tumble all together,
Even till destruction sicken; answer me
To what I ask you.

First Witch: Speak.

Second Witch: Demand.

Third Witch: We’ll answer.

First Witch: Say, if thou’dst rather hear it from our mouths,
Or from our masters?

MACBETH: Call ‘em; let me see ‘em.

First Witch: Pour in sow’s blood, that hath eaten
Her nine farrow; grease that’s sweaten
From the murderer’s gibbet throw
Into the flame.

ALL: Come, high or low;
Thyself and office deftly show!

[Thunder. First Apparition: an armed Head]

MACBETH: Tell me, thou unknown power,–

First Witch: He knows thy thought:
Hear his speech, but say thou nought.

First Apparition: Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! beware Macduff;
Beware the thane of Fife. Dismiss me. Enough.

[Descends]

MACBETH: Whate’er thou art, for thy good caution, thanks;
Thou hast harp’d my fear aright: but one
word more,–

First Witch: He will not be commanded: here’s another,
More potent than the first.

[Thunder. Second Apparition: A bloody Child]

Second Apparition: Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth!

MACBETH: Had I three ears, I’ld hear thee.

Second Apparition: Be bloody, bold, and resolute; laugh to scorn
The power of man, for none of woman born
Shall harm Macbeth.

[Descends]

MACBETH: Then live, Macduff: what need I fear of thee?
But yet I’ll make assurance double sure,
And take a bond of fate: thou shalt not live;
That I may tell pale-hearted fear it lies,
And sleep in spite of thunder.

[Thunder. Third Apparition: a Child crowned,
with a tree in his hand]

What is this
That rises like the issue of a king,
And wears upon his baby-brow the round
And top of sovereignty?

ALL: Listen, but speak not to’t.

Third Apparition: Be lion-mettled, proud; and take no care
Who chafes, who frets, or where conspirers are:
Macbeth shall never vanquish’d be until
Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinane hill
Shall come against him.

[Descends]

MACBETH: That will never be
Who can impress the forest, bid the tree
Unfix his earth-bound root? Sweet bodements! good!
Rebellion’s head, rise never till the wood
Of Birnam rise, and our high-placed Macbeth
Shall live the lease of nature, pay his breath
To time and mortal custom. Yet my heart
Throbs to know one thing: tell me, if your art
Can tell so much: shall Banquo’s issue ever
Reign in this kingdom?

ALL: Seek to know no more.

MACBETH: I will be satisfied: deny me this,
And an eternal curse fall on you! Let me know.
Why sinks that cauldron? and what noise is this?

[Hautboys]

First Witch: Show!

Second Witch: Show!

Third Witch: Show!

ALL: Show his eyes, and grieve his heart;
Come like shadows, so depart!

[A show of Eight Kings, the last with a glass in
his hand; GHOST OF BANQUO following]

MACBETH: Thou art too like the spirit of Banquo: down!
Thy crown does sear mine eye-balls. And thy hair,
Thou other gold-bound brow, is like the first.
A third is like the former. Filthy hags!
Why do you show me this? A fourth! Start, eyes!
What, will the line stretch out to the crack of doom?
Another yet! A seventh! I’ll see no more:
And yet the eighth appears, who bears a glass
Which shows me many more; and some I see
That two-fold balls and treble scepters carry:
Horrible sight! Now, I see, ’tis true;
For the blood-bolter’d Banquo smiles upon me,
And points at them for his.

[Apparitions vanish]

What, is this so?

First Witch: Ay, sir, all this is so: but why
Stands Macbeth thus amazedly?
Come, sisters, cheer we up his sprites,
And show the best of our delights:
I’ll charm the air to give a sound,
While you perform your antic round:
That this great king may kindly say,
Our duties did his welcome pay.

[Music. The witches dance and then vanish,
with HECATE]

MACBETH: Where are they? Gone? Let this pernicious hour
Stand aye accursed in the calendar!
Come in, without there!

[Enter LENNOX]

LENNOX: What’s your grace’s will?

MACBETH: Saw you the weird sisters?

LENNOX: No, my lord.

MACBETH: Came they not by you?

LENNOX: No, indeed, my lord.

MACBETH: Infected be the air whereon they ride;
And damn’d all those that trust them! I did hear
The galloping of horse: who was’t came by?

LENNOX: ‘Tis two or three, my lord, that bring you word
Macduff is fled to England.

MACBETH: Fled to England!

LENNOX: Ay, my good lord.

MACBETH: Time, thou anticipatest my dread exploits:
The flighty purpose never is o’ertook
Unless the deed go with it; from this moment
The very firstlings of my heart shall be
The firstlings of my hand. And even now,
To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done:
The castle of Macduff I will surprise;
Seize upon Fife; give to the edge o’ the sword
His wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls
That trace him in his line. No boasting like a fool;
This deed I’ll do before this purpose cool.
But no more sights!–Where are these gentlemen?
Come, bring me where they are.

]]> http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/04/macbeth-act-iv-scene-i-the-witches/feed/ 0 http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/03/brown-penny/ http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/03/brown-penny/#comments Mon, 03 Jul 2006 11:09:34 +0000 Rae http://www.raeallen.net/blog/2006/07/03/brown-penny/ I WHISPERED, “I am too young,”
And then, “I am old enough”;
Wherefore I threw a penny
To find out if I might love.

“Go and love, go and love, young man,
If the lady be young and fair.”
Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
I am looped in the loops of her hair.

O love is the crooked thing,
There is nobody wise enough
To find out all that is in it,
For he would be thinking of love

Till the stars had run away
And the shadows eaten the moon.
Ah, penny, brown penny, brown penny,
One cannot begin it too soon.

- William Butler Yeats (1910)

Did you see the Bush below you sweeping darkly to the Range,
All unchanged and all unchanging, yet so very old and strange!
While you thought in softened anger of the things that did estrange?
Did you hear the Bush a-calling, when your heart was young and bold:
“I’m the Mother-Bush that nursed you! Come to me when you are old?”

In the cutting or the tunnel, out of sight of stock or shed,
Did you hear the grey Bush calling from the pine-ridge overhead:
“You have seen the seas and cities – all is cold to you, or dead -
All seems done and all seems told, but the grey-light turns to gold!
I’m the Mother-Bush that loves you! Come to me now you are old?”

- Henry Lawson (1922)

- Isaac Newton

- Edward Abbey

- Hongzhi Zhengjue (1091-1157)

DSC00556 – Cliff Edge

Originally uploaded by RaeA.

When you just sit,
you are free from the five sense desires
and the five hindrances.

- Dogen (1200-1253)

- Shinsho

(on the occassion of Australia advancing in the World cup)

a ball lover
is our god
a soccer player
he is
the whole universe
his field
the planets,
the stars,
our earth
all shuttling
through space
like balls
shove from
one corner
to the other

our heads,
our eyes,
the balls
that the gods
give us
to play
all
the games
in his world

the moon
in its
lunar journey
round and round
good and bad
too come
in a circle

what goes around
comes around
kindness begets kindness
do bad and
it comes back
in a circle
cos our god
is a lover of
a ball game

start walking anywhere
in the universe
and you get back
to your own place
cos our god
loves the circle game
the circle game
the circle game

- john tiong chunghoo

And cause I have to sorrow, in a land so young and fair,
To see upon those faces stamped the marks of Want and Care;
I look in vain for traces of the fresh and fair and sweet
In sallow, sunken faces that are drifting through the street
Drifting on, drifting on,
To the scrape of restless feet;
I can sorrow for the owners of the faces in the street.

In hours before the dawning dims the starlight in the sky
The wan and weary faces first begin to trickle by,
Increasing as the moments hurry on with morning feet,
Till like a pallid river flow the faces in the street
Flowing in, flowing in,
To the beat of hurried feet
Ah! I sorrow for the owners of those faces in the street.

The human river dwindles when ’tis past the hour of eight,
Its waves go flowing faster in the fear of being late;
But slowly drag the moments, whilst beneath the dust and heat
The city grinds the owners of the faces in the street
Grinding body, grinding soul,
Yielding scarce enough to eat
Oh! I sorrow for the owners of the faces in the street.

And then the only faces till the sun is sinking down
Are those of outside toilers and the idlers of the town,
Save here and there a face that seems a stranger in the street,
Tells of the city’s unemployed upon his weary beat
Drifting round, drifting round,
To the tread of listless feet
Ah! My heart aches for the owner of that sad face in the street.

And when the hours on lagging feet have slowly dragged away,
And sickly yellow gaslights rise to mock the going day,
Then flowing past my window like a tide in its retreat,
Again I see the pallid stream of faces in the street
Ebbing out, ebbing out,
To the drag of tired feet,
While my heart is aching dumbly for the faces in the street.

And now all blurred and smirched with vice the day’s sad pages end,
For while the short `large hours’ toward the longer `small hours’ trend,
With smiles that mock the wearer, and with words that half entreat,
Delilah pleads for custom at the corner of the street
Sinking down, sinking down,
Battered wreck by tempests beat
A dreadful, thankless trade is hers, that Woman of the Street.

But, ah! to dreader things than these our fair young city comes,
For in its heart are growing thick the filthy dens and slums,
Where human forms shall rot away in sties for swine unmeet,
And ghostly faces shall be seen unfit for any street
Rotting out, rotting out,
For the lack of air and meat
In dens of vice and horror that are hidden from the street.

I wonder would the apathy of wealthy men endure
Were all their windows level with the faces of the Poor?
Ah! Mammon’s slaves, your knees shall knock, your hearts in terror beat,
When God demands a reason for the sorrows of the street,
The wrong things and the bad things
And the sad things that we meet
In the filthy lane and alley, and the cruel, heartless street.

I left the dreadful corner where the steps are never still,
And sought another window overlooking gorge and hill;
But when the night came dreary with the driving rain and sleet,
They haunted me — the shadows of those faces in the street,
Flitting by, flitting by,
Flitting by with noiseless feet,
And with cheeks but little paler than the real ones in the street.

Once I cried: ‘Oh, God Almighty! if Thy might doth still endure,
Now show me in a vision for the wrongs of Earth a cure.’
And, lo! with shops all shuttered I beheld a city’s street,
And in the warning distance heard the tramp of many feet,
Coming near, coming near,
To a drum’s dull distant beat,
And soon I saw the army that was marching down the street.

Then, like a swollen river that has broken bank and wall,
The human flood came pouring with the red flags over all,
And kindled eyes all blazing bright with revolution’s heat,
And flashing swords reflecting rigid faces in the street.
Pouring on, pouring on,
To a drum’s loud threatening beat,
And the war-hymns and the cheering of the people in the street.

And so it must be while the world goes rolling round its course,
The warning pen shall write in vain, the warning voice grow hoarse,
But not until a city feels Red Revolution’s feet
Shall its sad people miss awhile the terrors of the street
The dreadful everlasting strife
For scarcely clothes and meat
In that pent track of living death — the city’s cruel street.

- Henry Lawson (July 1888)

When she I loved looked every day
Fresh as a rose in June,
I to her cottage bent my way,
Beneath an evening-moon.

Upon the moon I fixed my eye,
All over the wide lea;
With quickening pace my horse drew nigh
Those paths so dear to me.

And now we reached the orchard-plot;
And, as we climbed the hill,
The sinking moon to Lucy’s cot
Came near, and nearer still.

In one of those sweet dreams I slept,
Kind Nature’s gentlest boon!
And all the while my eyes I kept
On the descending moon.

My horse moved on; hoof after hoof
He raised, and never stopped:
When down behind the cottage roof,
At once, the bright moon dropped.

What fond and wayward thoughts will slide
Into a Lover’s head!
“O mercy!” to myself I cried,
“If Lucy should be dead!”

- William Wordsworth (1799)

We fail to recognize it because
Of delusion of mind;

To know the essence of Mind
Seek the teachings of the enlightened.

- Hui-neng (638–713)

Our Andy’s gone to battle now
‘Gainst Drought, the red marauder;
Our Andy’s gone with cattle now
Across the Queensland border.

He’s left us in dejection now;
Our hearts with him are roving.
It’s dull on this selection now,
Since Andy went a-droving.

Who now shall wear the cheerful face
In times when things are slackest?
And who shall whistle round the place
When Fortune frowns her blackest?

Oh, who shall cheek the squatter now
When he comes round us snarling?
His tongue is growing hotter now
Since Andy cross’d the Darling.

The gates are out of order now,
In storms the “riders” rattle;
For far across the border now
Our Andy’s gone with cattle.

Poor Aunty’s looking thin and white;
And Uncle’s cross with worry;
And poor old Blucher howls all night
Since Andy left Macquarie.

Oh, may the showers in torrents fall,
And all the tanks run over;
And may the grass grow green and tall
In pathways of the drover;

And may good angels send the rain
On desert stretches sandy;
And when the summer comes again
God grant ’twill bring us Andy.

- Henry Lawson (1888 )

No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and he’s not the same man.

Heraclitus – (c.535 – 475 BC)

After all, the only fact you are sure of is that you are.

The “I am” is certain. The “I am this” is not.

Struggle to find out what you are in reality.

- Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Deep and dissolving verticals of light
Ferry the falls of moonshine down. Five bells
Coldly rung out in a machine’s voice. Night and water
Pour to one rip of darkness, the Harbour floats
In the air, the Cross hangs upside-down in water.

Why do I think of you, dead man, why thieve
These profitless lodgings from the flukes of thought
Anchored in Time? You have gone from earth,
Gone even from the meaning of a name;
Yet something’s there, yet something forms its lips
And hits and cries against the ports of space,
Beating their sides to make its fury heard.

Are you shouting at me, dead man, squeezing your face
In agonies of speech on speechless panes?
Cry louder, beat the windows, bawl your name!

But I hear nothing, nothing…only bells,
Five bells, the bumpkin calculus of Time.
Your echoes die, your voice is dowsed by Life,
There’s not a mouth can fly the pygmy strait -
Nothing except the memory of some bones
Long shoved away, and sucked away, in mud;
And unimportant things you might have done,
Or once I thought you did; but you forgot,
And all have now forgotten – looks and words
And slops of beer; your coat with buttons off,
Your gaunt chin and pricked eye, and raging tales
Of Irish kings and English perfidy,
And dirtier perfidy of publicans
Groaning to God from Darlinghurst.
Five bells.

Then I saw the road, I heard the thunder
Tumble, and felt the talons of the rain
The night we came to Moorebank in slab-dark,
So dark you bore no body, had no face,
But a sheer voice that rattled out of air
(As now you’d cry if I could break the glass),
A voice that spoke beside me in the bush,
Loud for a breath or bitten off by wind,
Of Milton, melons, and the Rights of Man,
And blowing flutes, and how Tahitian girls
Are brown and angry-tongued, and Sydney girls
Are white and angry-tongued, or so you’d found.
But all I heard was words that didn’t join
So Milton became melons, melons girls,
And fifty mouths, it seemed, were out that night,
And in each tree an Ear was bending down,
Or something that had just run, gone behind the grass,
When blank and bone-white, like a maniac’s thought,
The naphtha-flash of lightning slit the sky,
Knifing the dark with deathly photographs.
There’s not so many with so poor a purse
Or fierce a need, must fare by night like that,
Five miles in darkness on a country track,
But when you do, that’s what you think.
Five bells.

In Melbourne, your appetite had gone,
Your angers too; they had been leeched away
By the soft archery of summer rains
And the sponge-paws of wetness, the slow damp
That stuck the leaves of living, snailed the mind,
And showed your bones, that had been sharp with rage,
The sodden ectasies of rectitude.
I thought of what you’d written in faint ink,
Your journal with the sawn-off lock, that stayed behind
With other things you left, all without use,
All without meaning now, except a sign
That someone had been living who now was dead:
“At Labassa. Room 6 x 8
On top of the tower; because of this, very dark
And cold in winter. Everything has been stowed
Into this room – 500 books all shapes
And colours, dealt across the floor
And over sills and on the laps of chairs;
Guns, photoes of many differant things
And differant curioes that I obtained…”

In Sydney, by the spent aquarium-flare
Of penny gaslight on pink wallpaper,
We argued about blowing up the world,
But you were living backward, so each night
You crept a moment closer to the breast,
And they were living, all of them, those frames
And shapes of flesh that had perplexed your youth,
And most your father, the old man gone blind,
With fingers always round a fiddle’s neck,
That graveyard mason whose fair monuments
And tablets cut with dreams of piety
Rest on the bosoms of a thousand men
Staked bone by bone, in quiet astonishment
At cargoes they had never thought to bear,
These funeral-cakes of sweet and sculptured stone.

Where have you gone? The tide is over you,
The turn of midnight water’s over you,
As Time is over you, and mystery,
And memory, the flood that does not flow.
You have no suburb, like those easier dead
In private berths of dissolution laid -
The tide goes over, the waves ride over you
And let their shadows down like shining hair,
But they are Water; and the sea-pinks bend
Like lilies in your teeth, but they are Weed;
And you are only part of an Idea.
I felt the wet push its black thumb-balls in,
The night you died, I felt your eardrums crack,
And the short agony, the longer dream,
The Nothing that was neither long nor short;
But I was bound, and could not go that way,
But I was blind, and could not feel your hand.
If I could find an answer, could only find
Your meaning, or could say why you were here
Who now are gone, what purpose gave you breath
Or seized it back, might I not hear your voice?

I looked out my window in the dark
At waves with diamond quills and combs of light
That arched their mackerel-backs and smacked the sand
In the moon’s drench, that straight enormous glaze,
And ships far off asleep, and Harbour-buoys
Tossing their fireballs wearily each to each,
And tried to hear your voice, but all I heard
Was a boat’s whistle, and the scraping squeal
Of seabirds’ voices far away, and bells,
Five bells. Five bells coldly ringing out.
Five bells.

- Kenneth Slessor

I love a sunburnt country
A land of sweeping plains
Of ragged mountain ranges
Of droughts and flooding rains
I love her far horizons
I love her jewel sea
Her beauty and her terror
The wide brown land for me

The stark white ring barked forests
All tragic to the moon
The sapphire misted mountains
The hot gold hush of noon
Green tangle of the brushes
Where lithe lianas coil
And orchids deck the tree tops
And ferns the warm dark soil

Core of my heart, my country
Her pitiless blue sky
When sick at heart around us
We see the cattle die
But then the grey clouds gather
And we can bless again
The drumming of the army
The steady soaking rain

Core of my heart, my country
Land of the rainbow gold
For flood and fire and famine
She pays us back threefold
Over the thirsty paddocks
Watch, after many days
The filmy veil of greenness
That thickens as we gaze

An opal hearted country
A wilful, lavish land
All you who have not loved her
You will not understand
Though earth holds many splendours
Wherever I may die
I know to what brown country
My homing thoughts will fly.

- Dorothea Mackellar

Kamal is out with twenty men to raise the Border side,
And he has lifted the Colonel’s mare that is the Colonel’s pride:
He has lifted her out of the stable-door between the dawn and the day,
And turned the calkins upon her feet, and ridden her far away.

Then up and spoke the Colonel’s son that led a troop of the Guides:
“Is there never a man of all my men can say where Kamal hides?”
Then up and spoke Mahommed Khan, the son of the Ressaldar,
“If ye know the track of the morning-mist, ye know where his pickets are.
At dusk he harries the Abazai-at dawn he is into Bonair,
But he must go by Fort Bukloh to his own place to fare,
So if ye gallop to Fort Bukloh as fast as a bird can fly,
By the favor of God ye may cut him off ere he win to the Tongue of Jagai,
But if he be passed the Tongue of Jagai, right swiftly turn ye then,
For the length and the breadth of that grisly plain is sown with Kamal’s men.
There is rock to the left, and rock to the right, and low lean thorn between,
And ye may hear a breech-bolt snick where never a man is seen.”

The Colonel’s son has taken a horse, and a raw rough dun was he,
With the mouth of a bell and the heart of Hell, and the head of the gallows-tree.
The Colonel’s son to the Fort has won, they bid him stay to eat-
Who rides at the tail of a Border thief, he sits not long at his meat.

He ’s up and away from Fort Bukloh as fast as he can fly,
Till he was aware of his father’s mare in the gut of the Tongue of Jagai,
Till he was aware of his father’s mare with Kamal upon her back,
And when he could spy the white of her eye, he made the pistol crack.
He has fired once, he has fired twice, but the whistling ball went wide.
“Ye shoot like a soldier,” Kamal said. “Show now if ye can ride.”

It ’s up and over the Tongue of Jagai, as blown dust-devils go,
The dun he fled like a stag of ten, but the mare like a barren doe.
The dun he leaned against the bit and slugged his head above,
But the red mare played with the snaffle-bars, as a maiden plays with a glove.
There was rock to the left and rock to the right, and low lean thorn between,
And thrice he heard a breech-bolt snick tho’ never a man was seen.

They have ridden the low moon out of the sky, their hoofs drum up the dawn,
The dun he went like a wounded bull, but the mare like a new-roused fawn.
The dun he fell at a water-course-in a woful heap fell he,
And Kamal has turned the red mare back, and pulled the rider free.

He has knocked the pistol out of his hand-small room was there to strive,
“‘T was only by favor of mine,” quoth he, “ye rode so long alive:
There was not a rock for twenty mile, there was not a clump of tree,
But covered a man of my own men with his rifle cocked on his knee.
If I had raised my bridle-hand, as I have held it low,
The little jackals that flee so fast, were feasting all in a row:
If I had bowed my head on my breast, as I have held it high,
The kite that whistles above us now were gorged till she could not fly.”

Lightly answered the Colonel’s son:-”Do good to bird and beast,
But count who come for the broken meats before thou makest a feast.
If there should follow a thousand swords to carry my bones away,
Belike the price of a jackal’s meal were more than a thief could pay.
They will feed their horse on the standing crop, their men on the garnered grain,
The thatch of the byres will serve their fires when all the cattle are slain.
But if thou thinkest the price be fair,-thy brethren wait to sup,
The hound is kin to the jackal-spawn,-howl, dog, and call them up!
And if thou thinkest the price be high, in steer and gear and stack,
Give me my father’s mare again, and I ‘ll fight my own way back!”

Kamal has gripped him by the hand and set him upon his feet.
“No talk shall be of dogs,” said he, “when wolf and gray wolf meet.
May I eat dirt if thou hast hurt of me in deed or breath;
What dam of lances brought thee forth to jest at the dawn with Death?”
Lightly answered the Colonel’s son: “I hold by the blood of my clan:
Take up the mare for my father’s gift-by God, she has carried a man!”

The red mare ran to the Colonel’s son, and nuzzled against his breast,
“We be two strong men,” said Kamal then, “but she loveth the younger best.
So she shall go with a lifter’s dower, my turquoise-studded rein,
My broidered saddle and saddle-cloth, and silver stirrups twain.”

The Colonel’s son a pistol drew and held it muzzle-end,
“Ye have taken the one from a foe,” said he; “will ye take the mate from a friend?”
“A gift for a gift,” said Kamal straight; “a limb for the risk of a limb.
Thy father has sent his son to me, I ‘ll send my son to him!”

With that he whistled his only son, that dropped from a mountain-crest-
He trod the ling like a buck in spring, and he looked like a lance in rest.
“Now here is thy master,” Kamal said, “who leads a troop of the Guides,
And thou must ride at his left side as shield on shoulder rides.
Till Death or I cut loose the tie, at camp and board and bed,
Thy life is his-thy fate it is to guard him with thy head.
So thou must eat the White Queen’s meat, and all her foes are thine,
And thou must harry thy father’s hold for the peace of the border-line.
And thou must make a trooper tough and hack thy way to power-
Belike they will raise thee to Ressaldar when I am hanged in Peshawur.”

They have looked each other between the eyes, and there they found no fault,
They have taken the Oath of the Brother-in-Blood on leavened bread and salt:
They have taken the Oath of the Brother-in-Blood on fire and fresh-cut sod,
On the hilt and the haft of the Khyber knife, and the Wondrous Names of God.
The Colonel’s son he rides the mare and Kamal’s boy the dun,
And two have come back to Fort Bukloh where there went forth but one.
And when they drew to the Quarter-Guard, full twenty swords flew clear-
There was not a man but carried his feud with the blood of the mountaineer.
“Ha’ done! ha’ done!” said the Colonel’s son. “Put up the steel at your sides!
Last night ye had struck at a Border thief-to-night ‘t is a man of the Guides!”

Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the two shall meet,
Till Earth and Sky stand presently at God’s great Judgment Seat;
But there is neither East nor West, Border, nor Breed, nor Birth,
When two strong men stand face to face, tho’ they come from the ends of the earth

- Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936)

Now this Mike was the dad of a ten year old lad,
Plump, healthy, and stoutly conditioned;
He was strong as the best, but poor Mike had no rest
For the youngster had never been christened.

And his wife used to cry, “If the darlin’ should die
Saint Peter would not recognise him.”
But by luck he survived till a preacher arrived,
Who agreed straightaway to baptise him.

Now the artful young rogue, while they held their collogue,
With his ear to the keyhole was listenin’,
And he muttered in fright, while his features turned white,
“What the divil and all is this christenin’?”

He was none of your dolts, he had seen them brand colts,
And it seemed to his small understanding,
If the man in the frock made him one of the flock,
It must mean something very like branding.

So away with a rush he set off for the bush,
While the tears in his eyelids they glistened
“Tis outrageous,” says he, “to brand youngsters like me,
I’ll be dashed if I’ll stop to be christened!”

Like a young native dog he ran into a log,
And his father with language uncivil,
Never heeding the `praste’ cried aloud in his haste,
“Come out and be christened, you divil!”

But he lay there as snug as a bug in a rug,
And his parents in vain might reprove him,
Till his reverence spoke (he was fond of a joke)
“I’ve a notion,” says he, “that’ll move him.”

“Poke a stick up the log, give the spalpeen a prog;
Poke him aisy — don’t hurt him or maim him,
“Tis not long that he’ll stand, I’ve the water at hand,
As he rushes out this end I’ll name him.

“Here he comes, and for shame! ye’ve forgotten the name
Is it Patsy or Michael or Dinnis?”
Here the youngster ran out, and the priest gave a shout
“Take your chance, anyhow, wid “Maginnis”‘!”

As the howling young cub ran away to the scrub
Where he knew that pursuit would be risky,
The priest, as he fled, flung a flask at his head
That was labelled “Maginnis’s Whisky”!

And Maginnis Magee has been made a J.P.,
And the one thing he hates more than sin is
To be asked by the folk, who have heard of the joke,
How he came to be christened “Maginnis”!

A.B. Paterson

The great path is clearly before your eyes,
But the ignorant who are deluded
And confused cannot recognize it.
It is in one thought of the mind.
So why search for it elsewhere?

- Pao-chih

Grant McLennan was one of the great Aussie songwriters. I went off to university in 1974, a 1600 km train trip down the Queensland coast, and made the same trip up and back each year. As a result his song Cattle and Cane rang particular bells.

I recall a schoolboy coming home
through fields of cane
to a house of tin and timber
and in the sky
a rain of falling cinders
from time to time
the waste memory-wastes
I recall a boy in bigger pants
like everyone
just waiting for a chance
his father’s watch
he left it in the showers
from time to time
the waste memory-wastes
I recall a bigger brighter world
a world of books
and silent times in thought
and then the railroad
the railroad takes him home
through fields of cattle
through fields of cane
from time to time
the waste memory-wastes
the waste memory-wastes
further, longer, higher, older

“Cattle and cane” by Grant W. McLennan

ps. Came across this great article by Robert Forster 

Hail Far-strider who came forth from Heliopolis, I have done no falsehood.

Hail Fire-embracer who came forth from Kheraha, I have not robbed.

Hail Nosey who came forth from Hermopolis, I have not been rapacious.

Hail Swallower of shades who came forth from the cavern, I have not stolen.

Hail Dangerous One who came forth from Rosetjau, I have not killed men.

Hail Double Lion who came forth from the sky, I have not destroyed food-supplies.

Hail Fiery Eyes who came forth from Letopolis, I have done no crookedness.

Hail Flame which came forth backwards, I have not stolen the god’s offerings.

Hail Bone-breaker who came forth from Heracleopolis, I have not told lies.

Hail Green of Flame who came forth from Memphis, I have no taken food.

Hail You of the cavern who came forth from the West, I have not been sullen.

Hail White of teeth who came forth from the Faiyum, I have not transgressed.

Hail Blood-eater who came forth from the shambles, I have not killed a sacred bull.

Hail Eater of entrails who came forth from the House of Thirty, I have not committed perjury.

Hail Lord of Truth who came forth from Maaty, I have not stolen bread.

Hail Wanderer who came forth from Bubastis, I have not eavesdropped.

Hail Pale One who came forth from Heliopolis, I have not babbled.

Hail Doubly evil who came forth from Andjet, I have not disputed except concerning my own property.

Hail Wememty-snake who came forth from the place of execution, I have not fornicated with a child.

Hail You who see whom you bring who came forth from the House of Min, I have not misbehaved.

Hail You who are over the Old One who came forth from Imau, I have not made terror.

Hail Demolisher who came forth from Xois, I have not transgressed.

Hail Disturber who came forth from Weryt, I have not been hot-tempered.

Hail Youth who came forth from the Heliopolitan nome, I have not been deaf to words of truth.

Hail Foreteller who came forth from Wenes, I have not made disturbance.

Hail You of the altar who came forth from the secret place, I have not hoodwinked.

Hail You whose face is behind him who came forth from the Cavern of Wrong, I have neither misconducted myself nor copulated with a boy.

Hail Hot-foot who came forth from the dusk, I have not been neglectful.

Hail You of the darkness who came forth from the darkness, I have not been quarrelsome.

Hail Bringer of your offering who came forth from Sais, I have not been unduly active.

Hail Owner of faces who came forth from Nedjefet, I have not been impatient.

Hail Accuser who came forth from Wetjenet, I have not transgressed my nature, I have not washed out the picture of a god.

Hail Owner of horns who came forth from Asyut, I have not been voluble in speech.

Hail Nefertum who came forth from Memphis, I have done no wrong, I have seen no evil.

Hail Tempsep who came forth from Busiris, I have not made conjuration against the king.

Hail You who acted according to your will, who came forth from Tjebu, I have not waded in water.

Hail Water-smiter who came forth from the Abyss, I have not been loud-voiced.

Hail Prosperer of the common folk who came forth from your house, I have not reviled mankind.

Hail Bestower of good who came forth from the Harpoon nome, I have not been puffed up..

Hail Bestower of powers who came forth from the City, I have not made distinctions for myself.

Hail Serpent with raised head, who came forth from the cavern, I am not wealthy except with my own property.

Hail Carrier-off of His Portion who came forth from the Silent Land, I have not blasphemed God in my city.

151. Images in the Sand
Three months after a possessed Gul Dukat killed Jadzia Dax and sealed the wormhole, life on Deep Space Nine has changed. Kira, the acting commander, is upset when Admiral Ross informs her that the Romulans will set up a station office, while Sisko has retreated to Earth to contemplate a way of contacting the Bajoran Prophets
the aliens who reside within the wormhole. When the vision of a woman’s face, buried in the sand, appears to Sisko, he sketches her, and Jake recognizes her from one of his grandfather’s photos.

152. Shadows and Symbols
Sisko meets Ezri, the new host of the Dax symbiont, before departing Earth for the planet Tyree with his father, Joseph, and son Jake. Ezri wished to accompany them on their search for Bajor’s mythical Orb of the Emissary, which Sisko has been led to believe exists. Back at the station, Kira prepares a blockade to stop the Romulans, who have placed weapons on a Bajoran moon. On a Klingon ship, Worf, O’Brien, Bashir, and Quark embark on a mission of their own: to destroy a Dominion shipyard, thus securing a place for the spirit of Worf’s dead wife Jadzia in the sacred Klingon afterlife of Sto-vo-kor.

153. Afterimage
In addition to coping with the memories of her “past lives,” Ezri Dax must deal with the range of reactions her presence generates. Kira awkwardly tries to make conversation; Sisko is happy to have his old friend back; Quark flirts with her; and Worf, pained by the memory of his dead wife Jadzia, which Ezri’s presence provokes, makes it clear he wants nothing to do with her. Elsewhere, Garak inexplicably collapses and is rushed to Bashir’s care.

154. Take Me Out to the Holo-Suite
Vulcan Captain Solok brings his starship to Deep Space Nine for repairs made necessary from combat skirmishes. Convinced his all-Vulcan crew is the finest in the fleet, he challenges former classmate and longtime rival Sisko to a baseball game on the Holosuite. With only two weeks to whip his team into shape, Sisko vows he’s going to beat Solok – even though Jake is the only other person residing on the station who has ever played baseball.

155. Chrysalis
A group of genetically enhanced humans, once under Bashir’s care, escape from their medical facility home in the hopes that the doctor
who himself was genetically engineered as a child
can cure their friend Sarina. Her enhancements left her in a catatonic state, and Bashir attempts an untried procedure on her brain that initially appears to have no effect. However, a few days later, Sarina speaks for the first time.

156. Treachery, Faith, and the Great River
Odo is lured to a secret meeting site, where he finds himself face to face with Weyoun, the Vorta leader of the enemy Dominion. Weyoun announces that he’s decided to defect and, in exchange for asylum, he promises to provide valuable information that could help the Federation win the war. After the two board Odo’s Runabout, the ship is hailed by the Cardassians. Odo is shocked when the monitor displays Weyoun standing beside Damar.

157. Once More Into The Breach
To Worf’s surprise, he is paid a visit by Kor, an aging Klingon war hero. Kor admits that his ambition has earned him countless enemies, and that consequently he has been unable to secure the command of a ship. Worf promises to find him a miltary command, and approaches General Martok with the request–which is angrily refused. Martok explains that years earlier Kor had denied Martok officer status because he was descended from a common house. Undaunted, Worf appoints Kor as a third officer on the Ch’Tang, Martok’s flagship, where he is treated with awe by the crew–much to Martok’s chagrin.

158. The Siege of AR-588
While making a supply run to the front lines, on the barren planet AR-558, Sisko encounters Starfleet troops that have been decimated during their five-month occupation of the largest Dominion communications array in the sector. If they can figure out how it works, Starfleet will be able to tap into Dominion transmissions. In addition to daily skirmishes with the enemy, the shell-shcoked forces are constantly threatened by “Houdinis”
anti-personnel mines that “hide” in subspace, then explode without warning. Determined to help commanding officer Nadia Larkin and her troops, Sisko stuns his crew by announcing that they’re staying at the site indefinitely.

159. Covenant
Vedek Fala, a Bajoran monk and Kira’s former teacher, pays her an unexpected visit. He gives Kira a crystal which transports her to Empok Nor, where, to her horror, she is met by her old enemy Dukat–a Cardassian who oversaw the occupation of Bajor. He is now the leader of a Bajoran religious faction which worships the Pah-wraiths–the corporeal enemies of Bajor’s prophets. Dukat want Kira to join his followers on the abandoned Cardassian space station.

160. It’s Only a Paper Moon
After losing his leg in battle, a somber Nog returns to the space station to recuperate. The crew try their best to cheer him up, but the young ensign is struggling, both emotionally and physically, to cope with his disability, even though his new biosynthetic leg works perfectly. After pushing away those who try the most diligently to help, Nog decides to take his medical leave in the Holosuite world of 1962 Las Vegas lounge singer Vic Fontaine.

161. The Prodigal Daughter
Sisko is furious when he learns O’Brien has vanished while on a secret trip to New Sydney, where he was searching for the widow of a criminal named Bilby, whom he befriended while undercover. Because Ezri’s family owns a mining operation in the system, Sisko asks her to help find O’Brien. Ezri returns home, where she’s reunited with her domineering mother, Yanas Tigan – a shrewd business woman – and her brothers Norvo and Janel, who work for the business.

162. The Emperor’s New Cloak
Grand Negus Zek, the ruler of the Ferengi empire and paramour to Quark and Rom’s mother, disappears while on a business trip to the Alternate Universe. Ezri’s counterpart from the universe delivers word that Zek is a prisoner of the evil Alliance and will be killed unless Quark can secure a cloaking device, which renders a ship invisible. Quark and Rom steal one from a Klingon vessel, then accompany Ezri back to the Alternate Universe to retrieve Zek.

163. Field of Fire
A young lieutenant named Ilario is found dead in his quarters. An investigation reveals he was shot by a TR-116 rifle, a weapon developed but never mass-produced by Starfleet. Meanwhile, Ezri confronts one of Dax’s previous incarnations in a dream: Joran, a self-professed murderer, urges Ezri to channel his disturbing memories and enable him to assist her in apprehending Ilario’s killer. When Ezri awakens, she learns that a second murder has occurred.

164. Chimera
Odo returns from a conference with an unexpected guest: a Changeling who tracked and boarded his Runabout. Odo recognizes him as one of “the hundred” shapeshifters who were, like himself, sent out as infants into the galaxy to learn about other species. Back at the station, Sisko warily releases the visitor to Odo’s custody. The Changeling, known as Laas, queries Odo about their unique species – with which Laas has made no contact since his infancy – and “the Link,” a Changeling ritual that allows shapeshifters to meld with one another and thereby form a single, sentient collective entity.

165. Badda-bing, Badda-bang
While relaxing in Vic Fontaine’s Las Vegas holosuite lounge, O’Brien and Bashir are surprised by the arrival of mobster Frankie Eyes, who announces that he has bought Vic’s hotel. After he fires Vic, the crew learns that Frankie was created by Vic’s designer. Upset by Frankie’s behaviour, and by the knowledge that the lounge’s atmosphere will now change, the crew desides it must rid him from the program. But he must be eliminated in a way what is period-specific to Fontaine’s era: 1962. The task takes on greater urgency when Vic is beaten up.

166. Inter Arma Enim Silent Leges
On the eve of Dr. Bashir’s departure for a conference on the Romulan homeworld, he’s visited by Sloan, the director of Section Thirty-one, a secret and unsanctioned extremist entity within Starfleet Intelligence. Sloan asks a reluctant Bashir to gather information on the Romulan leadership. Bashir reports the request to Sisko, who worries that although Starfleet Command has officially condemned Section Thirty-one, someone in its membership may actually be protecting the group. After consulting with Admiral Ross, Sisko advises Bashir to play along with SLoan in order to determine Sloan’s motivations.

167. Penumbra
As Sisko revels in the purchase of Bajoran land, where he hopes to finally build his dream house, word reaches the station that Worf is missing in action after a fierce battle with the Dominion. Due to strategic concerns, Sisko calls off the search party before Worf can be found. Overcome by memories of Jadzia’s life with Worf, Ezri steals a runabout and goes in search of Worf herself.

168. ‘Til Death Do Us Part
Kai Winn arrives at the station to “assist” Sisko with his wedding, and he admits the Prophets warned he would face a great trial in his future. Later, Winn has a long-awaited vision from the Prophets, who reveal that a “Guide” will soon visit her; the Prophets hope that, together, the two will lead Bajor’s Restoration. Shortly before Sisko tells Kasidy that they must call off their wedding, Dukat, surgically altered to look like a Bajoran, appears of the Promenade.

169. Strange Bedfellows
Worf and Ezri are beamed aboard a Jem’Hadar ship, where the Female Shapeshifter and Thot Gor, the respective leaders of the new Dominion-Breen alliance, prepare to sign a treaty designed to destroy the Federation and end the war. However, Damar objects to signing it because of concessions, made to Thot Gor, which could harm Cardassia. Meanwhile, Kai Winn and Dukat seal their bond by pledging to restore Bajor – even if the Emissary stands in their way.

170. The Changing Face of Evil
The crew’s relief at Worf and Ezri’s safe return is tempered by reports that the Breen have attacked Starfleet Headquarters on Earth. While Dominion and Breen commanders exult in their sneak attack, their supposed ally – Cardassian leader Damar – secretly plots to free his homeland from Dominion occupation. Meanwhile, on Bajor, Dukat tells Kai Winn she must release the Pah-wraiths – the corporeal enemies of her people’s gods – from the planet’s fire caves by reading the ancient forbidden text of the Kosst Amojan.

171. When It Rains
Eager to aid Damar’s rebel movement on his homeworld against the Dominion, Sisko orders Kira to put her antipathy for the Cardassian aside and train his staff in resistance tactics. Bashir asks Odo to assist in his medical project by donating the Changeling-equivalent of a skin sample. On Bajor, Kai Winn studies the forbidden text of the Kosst Amojan to learn how to release the evil Pah-wraiths. Hoping to ease Cardassian sentiment against the Bajoran Kira, Sisko gives her a Starfleet commission and uniform.

172. Tacking Into The Wind
While Kira reviews tactical plans with the Cardassian Resistance leaders, Odo returns from a mission, weakened by the disease that’s ravaging his race. At the station, Bashir works through the night, trying to find a cure for Odo, while Sisko reproves Chancellor Gowron for reckless attacks which left General Martok injured. Back at the revel headquarters, Kira, eager to discover why the Federation’s Klingon ships aren’t damaged by Breen-Dominion technology, proposes stealing the enemy’s weaponry so that the Federation can engineer a countermeasure.

173. Extreme Measures
Bashir and O’Brien capture an agent from Section 31 and probe his mind in a search for the cure to Odo’s disease.

174. The Dogs of War
With the Cardassian resistance movement crushed, Kira, Damar, and Garak find themselves trapped behind enemy lines. Meanwhile, Grand Nagus Zek announces his retirement and plans to name Quark his successor.

175. What You Leave Behind
As the war careens toward a final showdown on Cardassia, Sisko’s definitive action as the Emissary draws near.

- Pao-chih

2 apples, peeled (I prefer Granny Smiths)
1 cup caster sugar
1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup chopped walnuts
1 egg
125g. canola spread (soft)
1 tablespoon olive oil

Recipe

1. Pre-heat oven to 180deg.C. Put muffin cases in a 12 cup muffin tin

2. Dice apples into small pieces (cut around the core) and mix in a bowl with the caster sugar. Let the bowl sit, covered, for about 30 minutes.

3. Mix flour and spices into a large bowl and add the walnuts. Add canola spread, egg and apples and mix together.

4. Spoon into muffin cases.

5. Place pan in oven and bake for about 15 minutes for the large muffins, less time for the smaller size.

6. Test with a skewer then turn onto a wire rack to cool.

Ingredients:

• 2 cups of dessicated coconut
• 200ml sweetened condensed milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla essence
• 1/2 teaspoon almond essence

Method:

1. Mix all ingredients in a large mixing bowl
2. pre- heat oven to 160°C
3. place aluminium foil over a flat baking tray and grease lightly

Place teaspoons of the mixture on the foil teasing the tops into a peak (the kiss)

4. place the tray in the oven for 8-10 minutes or until they start to turn a golden colour
5. remove tray and allow the kisses to firm up by cooling on the tray for half an hour.

Keeping quality:
The kisses keep very well particularly in a sealed container, however don’t expect them to last

No. 2
It’s pointless to try to change the system. Opposing it simply makes it stronger.

No. 3
What you do is pointless. You can be replaced from one day to the next by any cretin sitting next to you. So work as little as possible and spend time (not too much, if you can help it) cultivating your personal network so that you’re untouchable when the next restructuring comes around.

No. 4
You’re not judged on merit, but on whether you look and sound the part. Speak lots of leaden jargon: people will suspect you have an inside track

No. 5
Never accept a position of responsibility for any reason. You’ll only have to work harder for what amounts to peanuts.

No. 6
Make a beeline for the most useless positions, (research, strategy and business development), where it is impossible to assess your ‘contribution to the wealth of the firm’. Avoid ‘on the ground’ operational roles like the plague.

No. 7
Once you’ve found one of these plum jobs, never move. It is only the most exposed who get fired.

No. 8
Learn to identify kindred spirits who, like you, believe the system is absurd through discreet signs (quirks in clothing, peculiar jokes, warm smiles).

No. 9
Be nice to people on short-term contracts. They are the only people who do any real work.

No. 10
Tell yourself that the absurd ideology underpinning this corporate bullshit cannot last for ever. It will go the same way as the dialectical materialism of the communist system. The problem is knowing when …

Traditional Aussie song

Click Go The Shears

Out on the board
The old shearer stands,
Grasping his shears
In his thin bony hands;
Fixed is his gaze on
A bare-bellied yoe,
Glory if he gets her,
Won’t he make the ringer go.

Chorus:
Click go the shears boys,
Click, click click,
Wide is his blow
And his hands move quick,
The ringer looks around
And is beaten by a blow,
And curses the old snagger
With the bare-bellied yoe.
Chorus:

In the middle of the floor
In his cane bottomed chair
Sits the boss of the board
With his eyes everywhere,
Notes well each fleece as
It comes to the screen,
Paying strict attention
That it’s taken off clean.

Chorus:

The colonial experience man,
He is there of course,
With his shiny leggin’s on.,
Just got off his horse,
Gazes all around him like
A real connoisseur,
Scented soap and brilliantine
And smelling like a whore,

Chorus:

You need:

• 1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
• 2 cups grated cheddar cheese
• 2 eggs
• 1/2 cup milk
• salt and pepper to taste
• 3 or 4 cherry tomatoes
• fresh herbs (parsley, oregano, basil, chives)
• ham

Method:

1. Mix flour, cheese, eggs, milk, herbs, ham and salt and pepper together in large bowl.
2. Slice the cherry tomatoes and fold into the mixture
3. Place large spoonfuls into greased muffin tins.
4. Bake 210 C for 10 mins.
5. Remove from oven an allow to stand

Makes 12 medium muffins
Serve with sour cream for best effect.

Getting crazy on the waltzers but it’s the life that i choose
Sing about the sixblade sing about the switchback and a torture tattoo
And I been riding on a ghost train where the cars they scream and slam
And I don’t know where I’ll be tonight but I’d always tell you where I am

In a screaming ring of faces I seen her standing in the light
she had a ticket for the races just like me she was a victim of the night
i put a hand upon the lever said let it rock and let it roll
i had the one arm bandit fever there was an arrow through my heart and my
soul

and the big wheel keep on turning neon burning up above
and i’m just high on the world
come on and take a low ride with me girl
on the tunnel of love

it’s just the danger when you’re riding at your own risk
she said you are the perfect stranger she said baby let’s keep it like this
it’s just a cake walk twisting baby step right up and say
hey mister give me two give me two cos any two can play

and the big wheel keep on turning neon burning up above
and i’m just high on the world
come on and take a low ride with me girl
on the tunnel of love

well it’s been money for muscle another whirligig
money for muscle and another girl i dig
another hustle just to make it big
and rockaway rockaway

and girl it looks so pretty to me just like it always did
like the spanish city to me when we were kids
oh girl it looks so pretty to me just like it always did
like the spanish city to me when we were kids

she took off a silver locket she said remember me by this
she put her hand in my pocket i got a keepsake and a kiss
and in the roar of the dust and diesel i stood and watched her walk away
i could have caught up with her easy enough but something must have made me
stay

and the big wheel keep on turning neon burning up above
and i’m just high on the world
come on and take a low ride with me girl
on the tunnel of love

and now i’m searching through these carousels and the carnival arcades
searching everywhere from steeplechase to palisades
in any shooting gallery where promises are made
to rockaway rockaway from cullercoats and whitley bay out to rockaway

and girl it looks so pretty to me like it always did
like the spanish city to me when we were kids
girl it looks so pretty to me like it always did
like the spanish city to me when we were kids

- Dire Straits

Chorus:
That´s when sport was a sport
And groovin´ was groovin´
and dancin´ meant everything
We were young and we were improvin´
laughtin´ laughtin´ with our friends
Holding hands meant somethin´ baby
Outside the club cherry bomb
Where our hearts were really thumpin´
say yeah yeah yeah
Say yeah yeah yeah

The winter days they last forever
And the weekends went by so quick
We ridin´ around this little country town
We were goin´ nuts, girl, out in the stick
One night me with my big mouth
A couple guys had to put me in my place
When I see those guys these days
We just laugh and say
Remember when

Chorus:
That´s when sport was a sport
And groovin´ was groovin´
and dancin´ meant everything
We were young and we were improvin´
laughtin´ laughtin´ with our friends
Holding hands meant somethin´ baby
Outside the club cherry bomb
Where our hearts were really thumpin´
say yeah yeah yeah
Say yeah yeah yeah

Seventeen has turned thirty-five
I´m surprised that we´re still livin´
if we´ve done any wrong
I hope that we´re forgiven
Got a few kids on my own
And some days I still don´t know
What to do
I hope that they´re not laughtin´ too
Loud, when they hear me talkin´ like this to you

Chorus:
That´s when sport was a sport
And groovin´ was groovin´
and dancin´ meant everything
We were young and we were improvin´
laughtin´ laughtin´ with our friends
Holding hands meant so much baby
Outside the club cherry bomb
Where our hearts were really thumpin´
say yeah yeah yeah
Say yeah yeah yeah

- John Mellencamp

I was blue, just as blue as I could be
Ev’ry day was a cloudy day for me
Then good luck came a-knocking at my door
Skies were gray but they’re not gray anymore

Blue skies
Smiling at me
Nothing but blue skies
Do I see

Bluebirds
Singing a song
Nothing but bluebirds
All day long

Never saw the sun shining so bright
Never saw things going so right
Noticing the days hurrying by
When you’re in love, my how they fly

Blue days
All of them gone
Nothing but blue skies
From now on

I should care if the wind blows east or west
I should fret if the worst looks like the best
I should mind if they say it can’t be true
I should smile, that’s exactly what I do

Well you wave your hand and they scatter like crows
They have nothing that will ever capture your heart
They’re just thorns without the rose
Be careful of them in the dark
Oh, if I was the one you chose to be your only one
Oh baby can’t you hear me now, can’t you hear me now

Will I see you tonight on a downtown train
Every night it’s just the same, you leave me lonely now

I know your window and I know it’s late
I know your stairs and your doorway
I walk down your street and past your gate
I stand by the light at the four-way
You watch them as they fall, oh baby they all have heart attacks
They stay at the carnival, but they’ll never win you back

Will I see you tonight on a downtown train
Where every night, every night it’s just the same, oh baby
Will I see you tonight on a downtown train
All of my dreams they fall like rain, oh baby on a downtown train

Will I see you tonight on a downtown train
Where every night, every night it’s just the same, oh baby
Will I see you tonight on a downtown train
All of my dreams just fall like rain, all on a downtown train
All on a downtown train, all on a downtown train
All on a downtown train, a downtown train

- Tom Waits 1985

There’s a dead man walking
And he’s wearing my shirt
Dead man walking
And he’s feeling my hurt.

There’s a dead man walking
And he’s wearing my hair
Dead man walking
He don’t want to care

There’s a dead man walking
He looks through my eyes
Dead man walking
See’s no sunny skies

There’s a dead man walking
And he’s wearing my skin
Knows where I come from
Don’t care where I’ve been

©Rae Allen

My favourite train songs are in no particular order:

1. People get Ready by Curtis Mayfield. A lot of people will say this isn’t a train song but more of a metaphor, but it certainly has that rattling train feel to it.

2. Folsom Prison Blues by Johnny Cash. Though sung by one of the greats of country music, the man in black gives it a great blues treatment.

3. Downtown Train by Tom Waits. Its had a few covers and one of my favourites is by Everything but The Girl, however the moody Tom Waits version is the best.

more to come.

When I was just a baby
My mama told me, “Son,
Always be a good boy
Don’t you ever play with guns”
But I shot a man in Reno
Just to watch him die
When I hear that lonesome whistle
I hang my head and cry

Well I bet there’s rich folks eating
In a fancy dinin’ car
I bet they’re taking mushrooms
And smokin’ big cigars
Well I know I had it comin’
I know I can’t be free
Those people keep movin’
And that’s what tortures me

If they free me from this prison
If that railroad train was mine
You bet I’d move it on
A little farther down the line
Yeah, far from Folsom Prison
That’s where I want to be
Well those people keep movin’
Goddammit, that’s what tortures me

If they’d free me from this prison
If that railroad train was mine
You bet I’d move it on
A little farther down the line
Yeah, far from Folsom Prison
That’s where I want to be
Well those people keep movin’
Goddammit that’s what tortures me

- Johnny Cash

Ingredients:

• 3 cups self-raising flour
• 45 grams butter
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup full-cream milk

Method:

1. Put the self-raising flour and the salt in a bowl.
2. Cut the chilled butter into small pieces then, using the tips of your fingers, rub it into the flour until it has the consistency of breadcrumbs.
3. Add a little milk and ‘mash’ the flour mixture into the milk with a fork. Keep adding small amounts of milk and continue to combine with the flour.
4. Remove the dough and knead two or three times to form a ball of light dough.
5. Flatten to about 1.5 cms and cut out small circles with a scone cutter.
6. Glaze the top of the scones with milk.
7. Bake in a 220°C oven for 12 minutes.
8. Cool slightly on a wire rack.

Tips:

1. Use a scone cutter and don’t twist them. This motion will ’seal’ the sides of the scone dough and prevent it from rising.
2. You can use knives to mix the butter into the flour.

Got on a lucky one
Came in eighteen to one
I’ve got a feeling
This year’s for me and you
So happy Christmas
I love you baby
I can see a better time
When all our dreams come true

They’ve got cars big as bars
They’ve got rivers of gold
But the wind goes right through you
It’s no place for the old
When you first took my hand
On a cold Christmas Eve
You promised me
Broadway was waiting for me

You were handsome
You were pretty
Queen of New York City
When the band finished playing
They howled out for more
Sinatra was swinging,
All the drunks they were singing
We kissed on a corner
Then danced through the night

The boys of the NYPD choir
Were singing “Galway Bay”
And the bells were ringing out
For Christmas day

You’re a bum
You’re a punk
You’re an old slut on junk
Lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed
You scumbag, you maggot
You cheap lousy faggot
Happy Christmas your arse
I pray God it’s our last

I could have been someone
Well so could anyone
You took my dreams from me
When I first found you
I kept them with me babe
I put them with my own
Can’t make it all alone
I’ve built my dreams around you

- The Pogues

This is my favourite Christmas carol

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

- Robert Frost

Love me tender love me true
All my dreams fulfilled
For my darlin’ I love you
And I always will

Love me tender love me long
Take me to your heart
For it’s there that I belong
And we’ll never part

Love me tender love me dear
Tell me you are mine
I’ll be yours thru all the years
Till the end of time

- Elvis Presley, 1956

Song on “Crossing Jordan” tonight

released as a single in September 1956, but not on an album until March 1958

Then took the other, as just as fair
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that, the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
two roads diverged in a wood, and I –
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

- Robert Frost

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretch’d in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed-and gazed-but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

- William Wordsworth. 1770-1850

Chorus
’cause I want to live like animals
Careless and free like animals
I want to live
I want to run through the jungle
The wind in my hair and the sand at my feet

I’ve been having difficulties keeping to myself
Feelings and emotions better left up on the shelf
Animals and children tell the truth they never lie
Which one is more human
There’s a thought now you decide

Compassion in the jungle
Compassion in your hands yeah
Would you like to make a run for it
Would you like to take my hand yeah

Chorus

Sometimes this life can get you down
It’s so confusing
There’s so many rules to follow
And I feel it
’cause I just run away in my mind

Superstars and cannonballs running through your head
Television freak show cops and robbers everywhere
Animals and children tell the truth they never lie
Which one is more human
There’s a thought now you decide

Compassion in the jungle
Compassion in your hands yeah
Would you like to make a run for it
Would you like to take my hand yeah

Repeat chorus to fade

- Savage Garden

Your breath is sweet
Your eyes are like two jewels in the sky.
Your back is straight, your hair is smooth
On the pillow where you lie.
But I don’t sense affection
No gratitude or love
Your loyalty is not to me
But to the stars above.

One more cup of coffee for the road,
One more cup of coffee ‘fore I go
To the valley below.

Your daddy he’s an outlaw
And a wanderer by trade
He’ll teach you how to pick and choose
And how to throw the blade.
He oversees his kingdom
So no stranger does intrude
His voice it trembles as he calls out
For another plate of food.

One more cup of coffee for the road,
One more cup of coffee ‘fore I go
To the valley below.

Your sister sees the future
Like your mama and yourself.
You’ve never learned to read or write
There’s no books upon your shelf.
And your pleasure knows no limits
Your voice is like a meadowlark
But your heart is like an ocean
Mysterious and dark.

One more cup of coffee for the road,
One more cup of coffee ‘fore I go
To the valley below.

- Bob Dylan

So people get ready
There’a a train to jordan
Picking up passengers
Coast to coast
Faith is the key
Open the doors and board them
There’s hope for all
Among those loved the most

There ain’t no room
For the hopeless sinner
Whom would hurt all mankind
Just to save his own
Have pitty on those whose
Chances grow thinner
For there is no hiding place
Against the kingdom’s throne

People get ready
There’s a train a commin’
You don’t need no baggage
You just get on board
All You need is faith
To hear the diesels hummin’
You don’t need no ticket
You just thank the lord

- Curtis Mayfield

So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girdled round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree;
And here were forests ancient as the hills,
Enfolding sunny spots of greenery.

But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A savage place! as holy and enchanted
As e’er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced:
Amid whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s flail:
And ‘mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale the sacred river ran,
Then reached the caverns measureless to man,
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean:
And ‘mid this tumult Kubla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war!

The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves;
Where was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!

A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw:
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song,
To such a deep delight ‘twould win me
That with music loud and long
I would build that dome in air,
That sunny dome! those caves of ice!
And all who heard should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed
And drunk the milk of Paradise.

- Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Ingredients:

• 1 cup self-raising flour
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup rolled oats
• 1 cup dessicated coconut
• 125g canola spread or butter
• 1 tablespoon golden syrup

Method:

1. Put the butter and the golden syrup in a microwavable jug , melt and mix
2. In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, oats and coconut while dry.
3. Add the butter and golden syrup mixture.
4. Grease a baking tray and drop spoonfuls onto the tray, leaving lots of room for the biscuits to spread.
5. Bake in slow oven for 20 minutes.
6. Remove from the oven and they will still be a little soft but will harden and brown on the tray.

On the nights that I would ride,
She would listen for my spurs.
Throw those big doors open wide,
Raise them laughing eyes of hers.
How those hours would get to flyin’,
All too soon I’d hear her sighing,
In her little sorry tone:
“Mi amor mi corazon.”

Haven’t seen her, haven’t seen her since that night
I can’t cross the line no more
They want me for a gamblin’ fight
Like as not it’s better so
Still I always kind of missed her
Since that last sad night I kissed her
Broke her heart, lost my own
Adios, mi corazon
Broke her heart, lost my own
Adios, mi corazon
Adios, mi corazon
Adios, mi corazon.

What the lights mean

5 Lower lights:

WHITE Steady – Fine
WHITE Half second flashes – Windy
WHITE 2 second flashes – Clearing

RED Steady – Rain
RED Half second flashes – Strong winds & rain
RED 2 second flashes – Showers

Four top lights

Steady – No change
Falling – Cooler
Rising – Warmer

He stayed not for brake and he stopped not for stone,
He swam the Eske river where ford there was none,
But ere he alighted at Netherby gate
The bride had consented, the gallant came late:
For a laggard in love and a dastard in war
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.

So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall,
Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and brothers, and all:
Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword,
For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word,
‘Oh! come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?’

‘I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied;
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide
And now am I come, with this lost love of mine,
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.
There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,
That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.’

The bride kissed the goblet; the knight took it up,
He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup,
She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh,
With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.
He took her soft hand ere her mother could bar,-
‘Now tread we a measure!’ said young Lochinvar.

So stately his form, and so lovely her face,
That never a hall such a galliard did grace;
While her mother did fret, and her father did fume,
And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet and plume;
And the bride-maidens whispered ”Twere better by far
To have matched our fair cousin with young Lochinvar.’

One touch to her hand and one word in her ear,
When they reached the hall-door, and the charger stood near;
So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung,
So light to the saddle before her he sprung!
‘She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and scaur;
They’ll have fleet steeds that follow,’ quoth young Lochinvar.

There was mounting ‘mong Graemes of the Netherby clan;
Fosters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran:
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee,
But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did they see.
So daring in love and so dauntless in war,
Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?

- Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832)

Now this Mike was the dad of a ten year old lad,
Plump, healthy, and stoutly conditioned;
He was strong as the best, but poor Mike had no rest
For the youngster had never been christened.

And his wife used to cry, “If the darlin’ should die
Saint Peter would not recognise him.”
But by luck he survived till a preacher arrived,
Who agreed straightaway to baptise him.

Now the artful young rogue, while they held their collogue,
With his ear to the keyhole was listenin’,
And he muttered in fright, while his features turned white,
“What the divil and all is this christenin’?”

He was none of your dolts, he had seen them brand colts,
And it seemed to his small understanding,
If the man in the frock made him one of the flock,
It must mean something very like branding.

So away with a rush he set off for the bush,
While the tears in his eyelids they glistened-
“‘Tis outrageous,” says he, “to brand youngsters like me,
I’ll be dashed if I’ll stop to be christened!”

Like a young native dog he ran into a log,
And his father with language uncivil,
Never heeding the “praste” cried aloud in his haste,
“Come out and be christened, you divil!”

But he lay there as snug as a bug in a rug,
And his parents in vain might reprove him,
Till his reverence spoke (he was fond of a joke)
“I’ve a notion,” says he, “that’ll move him.”

“Poke a stick up the log, give the spalpeen a prog;
Poke him aisy-don’t hurt him or maim him,
‘Tis not long that he’ll stand, I’ve the water at hand,
As he rushes out this end I’ll name him.

“Here he comes, and for shame! ye’ve forgotten the name-
Is it Patsy or Michael or Dinnis?”
Here the youngster ran out, and the priest gave a shout-
“Take your chance, anyhow, wid ‘Maginnis’!”

As the howling young cub ran away to the scrub
Where he knew that pursuit would be risky,
The priest, as he fled, flung a flask at his head
That was labelled “Maginnis’s Whisky”!

And Maginnis Magee has been made a J.P.,
And the one thing he hates more than sin is
To be asked by the folk, who have heard of the joke,
How he came to be christened Maginnis!

- Andrew Barton ‘Banjo’ Paterson

And an answer came directed in a writing unexpected,
(And I think the same was written in a thumbnail dipped in tar)
‘Twas his shearing mate who wrote it, and verbatim I will quote it:
“Clancy’s gone to Queensland droving, and we don’t know where he are.”

In my wild erratic fancy visions come to me of Clancy
Gone a-droving “down the Cooper” where the western drovers go;
As the stock are slowly stringing, Clancy rides behind them singing,
For the drover’s life has pleasures that the townsfolk never know.

And the bush hath friends to meet him, and their kindly voices greet him
In the murmur of the breezes and the river on its bars,
And he sees the vision splendid of the sunlit plains extended,
And at night the wondrous glory of the everlasting stars.

I am sitting in my dingy little office, where a stingy
Ray of sunlight struggles feebly down between the houses tall,
And the foetid air and gritty of the dusty, dirty city
Through the open window floating, spreads its foulness over all.

And in place of lowing cattle, I can hear the fiendish rattle
Of the tramways and the buses making hurry down the street,
And the language uninviting of the gutter children fighting,
Comes fitfully and faintly through the ceaseless tramp of feet.

And the hurrying people daunt me, and their pallid faces haunt me
As they shoulder one another in their rush and nervous haste,
With their eager eyes and greedy, and their stunted forms and weedy,
For townsfolk have no time to grow, they have no time to waste.

And I somehow fancy that I’d like to change with Clancy,
Like to take a turn at droving where the seasons come and go,
While he faced the round eternal of the cashbook and the journal -
But I doubt he’d suit the office, Clancy, of “The Overflow”.

- A.B. “Banjo” Paterson
(1864 – 1941)

The Bulletin, 21 December 1889.

I Met a traveller from an antique land
Who said:
Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter’d visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp’d on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock’d them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

P. B. Shelley

The Bridegroom’s doors are opened wide,
And I am next of kin ;
The guests are met, the feast is set :
May’st hear the merry din.’
He holds him with his skinny hand,
`There was a ship,’ quoth he.
`Hold off ! unhand me, grey-beard loon !’
Eftsoons his hand dropt he.

The Wedding-Guest is spell-bound by the eye of the old seafaring man, and constrained to hear his tale.
He holds him with his glittering eye–
The Wedding-Guest stood still,
And listens like a three years’ child :
The Mariner hath his will.
The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone :
He cannot choose but hear ;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.

`The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared,
Merrily did we drop
Below the kirk, below the hill,
Below the lighthouse top.

The Mariner tells how the ship sailed southward with a good wind and fair weather, till it reached the Line.
The Sun came up upon the left,
Out of the sea came he !
And he shone bright, and on the right
Went down into the sea.

Higher and higher every day,
Till over the mast at noon–’
The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast,
For he heard the loud bassoon.

The Wedding-Guest heareth the bridal music ; but the Mariner continueth his tale.
The bride hath paced into the hall,
Red as a rose is she ;
Nodding their heads before her goes
The merry minstrelsy.

The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast,
Yet he cannot choose but hear ;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.

The ship driven by a storm toward the south pole.
`And now the STORM-BLAST came, and he Was tyrannous and strong :
He struck with his o’ertaking wings,
And chased us south along.

With sloping masts and dipping prow,
As who pursued with yell and blow
Still treads the shadow of his foe,
And forward bends his head,
The ship drove fast, loud roared the blast,
The southward aye we fled.

And now there came both mist and snow,
And it grew wondrous cold :
And ice, mast-high, came floating by,
As green as emerald.

The land of ice, and of fearful sounds where no living thing was to be seen.
And through the drifts the snowy clifts
Did send a dismal sheen :
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken–
The ice was all between.

The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was all around :
It cracked and growled, and roared and howled,
Like noises in a swound !

Till a great sea-bird, called the Albatross, came through the snow-fog, and was received with great joy and hospitality.
At length did cross an Albatross,
Thorough the fog it came ;
As if it had been a Christian soul,
We hailed it in God’s name.

It ate the food it ne’er had eat,
And round and round it flew.
The ice did split with a thunder-fit ;
The helmsman steered us through !

And lo ! the Albatross proveth a bird of good omen, and followeth the ship as it returned northward through fog and floating ice.
And a good south wind sprung up behind ;
The Albatross did follow,
And every day, for food or play,
Came to the mariner’s hollo !

In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud,
It perched for vespers nine ;
Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke white,
Glimmered the white Moon-shine.’

The ancient Mariner inhospitably killeth the pious bird of good omen.
`God save thee, ancient Mariner !
From the fiends, that plague thee thus !–
Why look’st thou so ?’–With my cross-bow
I shot the ALBATROSS.

PART II
The Sun now rose upon the right :
Out of the sea came he,
Still hid in mist, and on the left
Went down into the sea.

And the good south wind still blew behind,
But no sweet bird did follow,
Nor any day for food or play
Came to the mariners’ hollo !

His shipmates cry out against the ancient Mariner, for killing the bird of good luck.
And I had done an hellish thing, And it would work ‘em woe :
For all averred, I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow.
Ah wretch ! said they, the bird to slay,
That made the breeze to blow !

But when the fog cleared off, they justify the same, and thus make themselves accomplices in the crime.
Nor dim nor red, like God’s own head, The glorious Sun uprist :
Then all averred, I had killed the bird
That brought the fog and mist.
‘Twas right, said they, such birds to slay,
That bring the fog and mist.

The fair breeze continues ; the ship enters the Pacific Ocean, and sails northward, even till it reaches the Line.
The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
The furrow followed free ;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.

The ship hath been suddenly becalmed.
Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt down,
‘Twas sad as sad could be ;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea !

All in a hot and copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.

Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion ;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.

And the Albatross begins to be avenged.
Water, water, every where,
And all the boards did shrink ;
Water, water, every where,
Nor any drop to drink.

The very deep did rot : O Christ !
That ever this should be !
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea.

About, about, in reel and rout
The death-fires danced at night ;
The water, like a witch’s oils,
Burnt green, and blue and white.

A Spirit had followed them ; one of the invisible inhabitants of this planet, neither departed souls nor angels ; concerning whom the learned Jew, Josephus, and the Platonic Constantinopolitan, Michael Psellus, may be consulted. They are very numerous, and there is no climate or element without one or more.
And some in dreams assuréd were
Of the Spirit that plagued us so ;
Nine fathom deep he had followed us
From the land of mist and snow.

And every tongue, through utter drought,
Was withered at the root ;
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.

The shipmates, in their sore distress, would fain throw the whole guilt on the ancient Mariner : in sign whereof they hang the dead sea-bird round his neck.
Ah ! well a-day ! what evil looks
Had I from old and young !
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.

PART III
There passed a weary time. Each throat
Was parched, and glazed each eye.
A weary time ! a weary time !
How glazed each weary eye,
When looking westward, I beheld
A something in the sky.

The ancient Mariner beholdeth a sign in the element afar off.
At first it seemed a little speck,
And then it seemed a mist ;
It moved and moved, and took at last
A certain shape, I wist.

A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist !
And still it neared and neared :
As if it dodged a water-sprite,
It plunged and tacked and veered.

At its nearer approach, it seemeth him to be a ship ; and at a dear ransom he freeth his speech from the bonds of thirst.
With throats unslaked, with black lips baked,
We could nor laugh nor wail ;
Through utter drought all dumb we stood !
I bit my arm, I sucked the blood,
And cried, A sail ! a sail !

A flash of joy ;
With throats unslaked, with black lips baked, Agape they heard me call :
Gramercy ! they for joy did grin,
And all at once their breath drew in,
As they were drinking all.

And horror follows. For can it be a ship that comes onward without wind or tide ?
See ! see ! (I cried) she tacks no more !
Hither to work us weal ;
Without a breeze, without a tide,
She steadies with upright keel !

The western wave was all a-flame.
The day was well nigh done !
Almost upon the western wave
Rested the broad bright Sun ;
When that strange shape drove suddenly
Betwixt us and the Sun.

It seemeth him but the skeleton of a ship.
And straight the Sun was flecked with bars,
(Heaven’s Mother send us grace !)
As if through a dungeon-grate he peered
With broad and burning face.

And its ribs are seen as bars on the face of the setting Sun.
Alas ! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)
How fast she nears and nears !
Are those her sails that glance in the Sun,
Like restless gossameres ?

The Spectre-Woman and her Death-mate, and no other on board the skeleton ship.
And those her ribs through which the Sun
Did peer, as through a grate ?
And is that Woman all her crew ?
Is that a DEATH ? and are there two ?
Is DEATH that woman’s mate ?

[first version of this stanza through the end of Part III]
Like vessel, like crew !
Her lips were red, her looks were free, Her locks were yellow as gold :
Her skin was as white as leprosy,
The Night-mare LIFE-IN-DEATH was she,
Who thicks man’s blood with cold.

Death and Life-in-Death have diced for the ship’s crew, and she (the latter) winneth the ancient Mariner.
The naked hulk alongside came,
And the twain were casting dice ;
`The game is done ! I’ve won ! I’ve won !’
Quoth she, and whistles thrice.

No twilight within the courts of the Sun.
The Sun’s rim dips ; the stars rush out :
At one stride comes the dark ;
With far-heard whisper, o’er the sea,
Off shot the spectre-bark.

At the rising of the Moon,
We listened and looked sideways up !
Fear at my heart, as at a cup,
My life-blood seemed to sip !
The stars were dim, and thick the night,
The steerman’s face by his lamp gleamed white ;
From the sails the dew did drip–
Till clomb above the eastern bar
The hornéd Moon, with one bright star
Within the nether tip.

One after another,
One after one, by the star-dogged Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang,
And cursed me with his eye.

His shipmates drop down dead.
Four times fifty living men,
(And I heard nor sigh nor groan)
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
They dropped down one by one.

But Life-in-Death begins her work on the ancient Mariner.
The souls did from their bodies fly,–
They fled to bliss or woe !
And every soul, it passed me by,
Like the whizz of my cross-bow !

PART IV
The Wedding-Guest feareth that a Spirit is talking to him ;
`I fear thee, ancient Mariner !
I fear thy skinny hand !
And thou art long, and lank, and brown,
As is the ribbed sea-sand.

(Coleridge’s note on above stanza)
I fear thee and thy glittering eye,
And thy skinny hand, so brown.’–
Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-Guest !
This body dropt not down.

But the ancient Mariner assureth him of his bodily life, and proceedeth to relate his horrible penance.
Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea !
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.

He despiseth the creatures of the calm,
The many men, so beautiful !
And they all dead did lie :
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on ; and so did I.

And envieth that they should live, and so many lie dead.
I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away ;
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.

I looked to heaven, and tried to pray ;
But or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.

I closed my lids, and kept them close,
And the balls like pulses beat ;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea and the sky
Lay like a load on my weary eye,
And the dead were at my feet.

But the curse liveth for him in the eye of the dead men.
The cold sweat melted from their limbs, Nor rot nor reek did they :
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.

An orphan’s curse would drag to hell
A spirit from on high ;
But oh ! more horrible than that
Is the curse in a dead man’s eye !
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.

In his loneliness and fixedness he yearneth towards the journeying Moon, and the stars that still sojourn, yet still move onward ; and every where the blue sky belongs to them, and is their appointed rest, and their native country and their own natural homes, which they enter unannounced, as lords that are certainly expected and yet there is a silent joy at their arrival.
The moving Moon went up the sky, And no where did abide :
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside–

Her beams bemocked the sultry main,
Like April hoar-frost spread ;
But where the ship’s huge shadow lay,
The charméd water burnt alway
A still and awful red.

By the light of the Moon he beholdeth God’s creatures of the great calm.
Beyond the shadow of the ship, I watched the water-snakes :
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.

Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire :
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam ; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.

Their beauty and their happiness.
He blesseth them in his heart.
O happy living things ! no tongue
Their beauty might declare :
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware :
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.

The spell begins to break.
The self-same moment I could pray ;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.

PART V
Oh sleep ! it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole !
To Mary Queen the praise be given !
She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven,
That slid into my soul.

By grace of the holy Mother, the ancient Mariner is refreshed with rain.
The silly buckets on the deck,
That had so long remained,
I dreamt that they were filled with dew ;
And when I awoke, it rained.

My lips were wet, my throat was cold,
My garments all were dank ;
Sure I had drunken in my dreams,
And still my body drank.

I moved, and could not feel my limbs :
I was so light–almost
I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blesséd ghost.

He heareth sounds and seeth strange sights and commotions in the sky and the element.
And soon I heard a roaring wind :
It did not come anear ;
But with its sound it shook the sails,
That were so thin and sere.

The upper air burst into life !
And a hundred fire-flags sheen,
To and fro they were hurried about !
And to and fro, and in and out,
The wan stars danced between.

And the coming wind did roar more loud,
And the sails did sigh like sedge ;
And the rain poured down from one black cloud ;
The Moon was at its edge.

The thick black cloud was cleft, and still
The Moon was at its side :
Like waters shot from some high crag,
The lightning fell with never a jag,
A river steep and wide.

The bodies of the ship’s crew are inspired, and the ship moves on ;
The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet now the ship moved on !
Beneath the lightning and the Moon
The dead men gave a groan.

They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose,
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes ;
It had been strange, even in a dream,
To have seen those dead men rise.

The helmsman steered, the ship moved on ;
Yet never a breeze up-blew ;
The mariners all ‘gan work the ropes,
Where they were wont to do ;
They raised their limbs like lifeless tools–
We were a ghastly crew.

The body of my brother’s son
Stood by me, knee to knee :
The body and I pulled at one rope,
But he said nought to me.

But not by the souls of the men, nor by dæmons of earth or middle air, but by a blessed troop of angelic spirits, sent down by the invocation of the guardian saint.
`I fear thee, ancient Mariner !’
Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest !
‘Twas not those souls that fled in pain,
Which to their corses came again,
But a troop of spirits blest :
For when it dawned–they dropped their arms,
And clustered round the mast ;
Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths,
And from their bodies passed.

Around, around, flew each sweet sound,
Then darted to the Sun ;
Slowly the sounds came back again,
Now mixed, now one by one.

Sometimes a-dropping from the sky
I heard the sky-lark sing ;
Sometimes all little birds that are,
How they seemed to fill the sea and air
With their sweet jargoning !

And now ’twas like all instruments,
Now like a lonely flute ;
And now it is an angel’s song,
That makes the heavens be mute.

It ceased ; yet still the sails made on
A pleasant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.

[Additional stanzas, dropped after the first edition.]
Till noon we quietly sailed on, Yet never a breeze did breathe :
Slowly and smoothly went the ship,
Moved onward from beneath.

The lonesome Spirit from the south-pole carries on the ship as far as the Line, in obedience to the angelic troop, but still requireth vengeance.
Under the keel nine fathom deep,
From the land of mist and snow,
The spirit slid : and it was he
That made the ship to go.
The sails at noon left off their tune,
And the ship stood still also.

The Sun, right up above the mast,
Had fixed her to the ocean :
But in a minute she ‘gan stir,
With a short uneasy motion–
Backwards and forwards half her length
With a short uneasy motion.

Then like a pawing horse let go,
She made a sudden bound :
It flung the blood into my head,
And I fell down in a swound.

The Polar Spirit’s fellow-dæmons, the invisible inhabitants of the element, take part in his wrong ; and two of them relate, one to the other, that penance long and heavy for the ancient Mariner hath been accorded to the Polar Spirit, who returneth southward.
How long in that same fit I lay,
I have not to declare ;
But ere my living life returned,
I heard and in my soul discerned
Two voices in the air.

`Is it he ?’ quoth one, `Is this the man ?
By him who died on cross,
With his cruel bow he laid full low
The harmless Albatross.

The spirit who bideth by himself
In the land of mist and snow,
He loved the bird that loved the man
Who shot him with his bow.’

The other was a softer voice,
As soft as honey-dew :
Quoth he, `The man hath penance done,
And penance more will do.’

PART VI
FIRST VOICE
`But tell me, tell me ! speak again,
Thy soft response renewing–
What makes that ship drive on so fast ?
What is the ocean doing ?’

SECOND VOICE
`Still as a slave before his lord,
The ocean hath no blast ;
His great bright eye most silently
Up to the Moon is cast–

If he may know which way to go ;
For she guides him smooth or grim.
See, brother, see ! how graciously
She looketh down on him.’

The Mariner hath been cast into a trance ; for the angelic power causeth the vessel to drive northward faster than human life could endure.
FIRST VOICE
`But why drives on that ship so fast,
Without or wave or wind ?’

SECOND VOICE
`The air is cut away before,
And closes from behind.

Fly, brother, fly ! more high, more high !
Or we shall be belated :
For slow and slow that ship will go,
When the Mariner’s trance is abated.’

The supernatural motion is retarded ; the Mariner awakes, and his penance begins anew.
I woke, and we were sailing on
As in a gentle weather :
‘Twas night, calm night, the moon was high ;
The dead men stood together.

All stood together on the deck,
For a charnel-dungeon fitter :
All fixed on me their stony eyes,
That in the Moon did glitter.

The pang, the curse, with which they died,
Had never passed away :
I could not draw my eyes from theirs,
Nor turn them up to pray.

The curse is finally expiated.
And now this spell was snapt : once more
I viewed the ocean green,
And looked far forth, yet little saw
Of what had else been seen–

Like one, that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And having once turned round walks on,
And turns no more his head ;
Because he knows, a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.

But soon there breathed a wind on me,
Nor sound nor motion made :
Its path was not upon the sea,
In ripple or in shade.

It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek
Like a meadow-gale of spring–
It mingled strangely with my fears,
Yet it felt like a welcoming.

Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship,
Yet she sailed softly too :
Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze–
On me alone it blew.

And the ancient Mariner beholdeth his native country.
Oh ! dream of joy ! is this indeed
The light-house top I see ?
Is this the hill ? is this the kirk ?
Is this mine own countree ?

We drifted o’er the harbour-bar,
And I with sobs did pray–
O let me be awake, my God !
Or let me sleep alway.

The harbour-bay was clear as glass,
So smoothly it was strewn !
And on the bay the moonlight lay,
And the shadow of the Moon.

[Additional stanzas, dropped after the first edition.]
The rock shone bright, the kirk no less, That stands above the rock :
The moonlight steeped in silentness
The steady weathercock.

The angelic spirits leave the dead bodies,
And the bay was white with silent light,
Till rising from the same,
Full many shapes, that shadows were,
In crimson colours came.

And appear in their own forms of light.
A little distance from the prow
Those crimson shadows were :
I turned my eyes upon the deck–
Oh, Christ ! what saw I there !

Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat,
And, by the holy rood !
A man all light, a seraph-man,
On every corse there stood.

This seraph-band, each waved his hand :
It was a heavenly sight !
They stood as signals to the land,
Each one a lovely light ;

This seraph-band, each waved his hand,
No voice did they impart–
No voice ; but oh ! the silence sank
Like music on my heart.

But soon I heard the dash of oars,
I heard the Pilot’s cheer ;
My head was turned perforce away
And I saw a boat appear.

[Additional stanza, dropped after the first edition.]
The Pilot and the Pilot’s boy, I heard them coming fast :
Dear Lord in Heaven ! it was a joy
The dead men could not blast.

I saw a third–I heard his voice :
It is the Hermit good !
He singeth loud his godly hymns
That he makes in the wood.
He’ll shrieve my soul, he’ll wash away
The Albatross’s blood.

PART VII
The Hermit of the Wood,
This Hermit good lives in that wood
Which slopes down to the sea.
How loudly his sweet voice he rears !
He loves to talk with marineres
That come from a far countree.

He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve–
He hath a cushion plump :
It is the moss that wholly hides
The rotted old oak-stump.

The skiff-boat neared : I heard them talk,
`Why, this is strange, I trow !
Where are those lights so many and fair,
That signal made but now ?’

Approacheth the ship with wonder.
`Strange, by my faith !’ the Hermit said–
`And they answered not our cheer !
The planks looked warped ! and see those sails,
How thin they are and sere !
I never saw aught like to them,
Unless perchance it were

Brown skeletons of leaves that lag
My forest-brook along ;
When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow,
And the owlet whoops to the wolf below,
That eats the she-wolf’s young.’

`Dear Lord ! it hath a fiendish look–
(The Pilot made reply)
I am a-feared’–`Push on, push on !’
Said the Hermit cheerily.

The boat came closer to the ship,
But I nor spake nor stirred ;
The boat came close beneath the ship,
And straight a sound was heard.

The ship suddenly sinketh.
Under the water it rumbled on, Still louder and more dread :
It reached the ship, it split the bay ;
The ship went down like lead.

The ancient Mariner is saved in the Pilot’s boat.
Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound,
Which sky and ocean smote,
Like one that hath been seven days drowned
My body lay afloat ;
But swift as dreams, myself I found
Within the Pilot’s boat.

Upon the whirl, where sank the ship,
The boat spun round and round ;
And all was still, save that the hill
Was telling of the sound.

I moved my lips–the Pilot shrieked
And fell down in a fit ;
The holy Hermit raised his eyes,
And prayed where he did sit.

I took the oars : the Pilot’s boy,
Who now doth crazy go,
Laughed loud and long, and all the while
His eyes went to and fro.
`Ha ! ha !’ quoth he, `full plain I see,
The Devil knows how to row.’

And now, all in my own countree,
I stood on the firm land !
The Hermit stepped forth from the boat,
And scarcely he could stand.

The ancient Mariner earnestly entreateth the Hermit to shrieve him ; and the penance of life falls on him.
`O shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man !’
The Hermit crossed his brow.
`Say quick,’ quoth he, `I bid thee say–
What manner of man art thou ?’

Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched
With a woful agony,
Which forced me to begin my tale ;
And then it left me free.

And ever and anon through out his future life an agony constraineth him to travel from land to land ;
Since then, at an uncertain hour, That agony returns :
And till my ghastly tale is told,
This heart within me burns.

I pass, like night, from land to land ;
I have strange power of speech ;
That moment that his face I see,
I know the man that must hear me :
To him my tale I teach.
What loud uproar bursts from that door !
The wedding-guests are there :
But in the garden-bower the bride
And bride-maids singing are :
And hark the little vesper bell,
Which biddeth me to prayer !

O Wedding-Guest ! this soul hath been
Alone on a wide wide sea :
So lonely ’twas, that God himself
Scarce seeméd there to be.

O sweeter than the marriage-feast,
‘Tis sweeter far to me,
To walk together to the kirk
With a goodly company !–

To walk together to the kirk,
And all together pray,
While each to his great Father bends,
Old men, and babes, and loving friends
And youths and maidens gay !

And to teach, by his own example, love and reverence to all things that God made and loveth.
Farewell, farewell ! but this I tell
To thee, thou Wedding-Guest !
He prayeth well, who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.

He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small ;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all.

The Mariner, whose eye is bright,
Whose beard with age is hoar,
Is gone : and now the Wedding-Guest
Turned from the bridegroom’s door.

He went like one that hath been stunned,
And is of sense forlorn :
A sadder and a wiser man,
He rose the morrow morn.

1797-1798, first version published 1798, 1800, 1802, 1805; revised version, including addition of his marginal glosses, published in 1817, 1828, 1829, 1834.
(proofed against E. H. Coleridge’s 1927 edition of STC’s poems and a ca. 1898 edition of STC’s Poetical Works, “reprinted from the early editions”)

Home is the hunter from the hill:
Fast in the boundless snare
All flesh lies taken at his will
And every fowl of air.

‘Tis evening on the moorland free,
The starlit wave is still:
Home is the sailor from the sea,
The hunter from the hill.

A.E. Housman

Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds:

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree’s shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,
The rude Forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed,
The cock’s shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care:
No children run to lisp their sire’s return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share,

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bow’d the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the Poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave,
Awaits alike th’ inevitable hour:-
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Nor you, ye Proud, impute to these the fault
If Memory o’er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Can storied urn or animated bust
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can Honour’s voice provoke the silent dust,
Or Flattery soothe the dull cold ear of Death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;
Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway’d,
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre:

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of time, did ne’er unroll;
Chill Penury repress’d their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathom’d caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country’s blood.

Th’ applause of list’ning senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o’er a smiling land,
And read their history in a nation’s eyes,

Their lot forbad: nor circumscribed alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined;
Forbad to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride
With incense kindled at the Muse’s flame.

Far from the madding crowd’s ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learn’d to stray;
Along the cool sequester’d vale of life
They kept the noiseless tenour of their way.

Yet e’en these bones from insult to protect
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck’d,
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

Their name, their years, spelt by th’ unletter’d Muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply:
And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being e’er resign’d,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing lingering look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
E’en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
E’en in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who, mindful of th’ unhonour’d dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;
If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate, –

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn;

‘There at the foot of yonder nodding beech
That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high.
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

‘Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
Muttering his wayward fancies he would rove;
Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,
Or crazed with care, or cross’d in hopeless love.

‘One morn I miss’d him on the custom’d hill,
Along the heath, and near his favourite tree;
Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

‘The next with dirges due in sad array
Slow through the church-way path we saw him borne,-
Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay
Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn.’

The Epitaph

Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth
A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown.
Fair Science frowned not on his humble birth,
And Melacholy marked him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompense as largely send:
He gave to Misery all he had, a tear,
He gained from Heaven (’twas all he wish’d) a friend.

No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode
(There they alike in trembling hope repose),
The bosom of his Father and his God.

By Thomas Gray (1716-71).

Between the sob and clubbing of gunfire
Someone, it seems, has time for this,
To pluck them from the shallows and bury them in burrows
And tread the sand upon their nakedness;

And each cross, the driven stake of tidewood,
Bears the last signature of men,
Written with such perplexity, with such bewildered pity,
The words choke as they begin -

‘Unknown seaman’ – the ghostly pencil
Wavers and fades, the purple drips,
The breath of wet season has washed their inscriptions
As blue as drowned men’s lips,

Dead seamen, gone in search of the same landfall,
Whether as enemies they fought,
Or fought with us, or neither; the sand joins them together,
Enlisted on the other front.

Kenneth Slessor
Written in 1944.

- Xue Xuan (1389-1464)

- Master Fu (497-569)

- Bodhidharma (d. 533)

- Chiyo-Ni (1701-1775)

- Dogen

- Hyakuchi (1748-1836)

- Soseki (1867-1916)

Coming around a bend, they met a lovely girl in a silk kimono and sash, unable to cross the intersection.

“Come on, girl” said Tanzan at once. Lifting her in his arms, he carried her over the mud.

Ekido did not speak again until that night when they reached a lodging temple. Then he no longer could restrain himself. “We monks don’t go near females,” he told Tanzan, “especially not young and lovely ones. It is dangerous. Why did you do that?”

“I left the girl there,” said Tanzan. “Are you still carrying her?”

- Han-shan Te-ch’ing (1546-1623)

Therefore the wise release the mind
To be independent and free.

– Fu Shan-hui (487-659)

- Linji (d. 867)

- Ikkyu (1394-1481)

- Tao-te Ching

- Chia Tao (779-843)

- Ji Aoi Isshi

- Tao Kai

- Han-shan Te-ch’ing (1546-1623)

- Hongzhi (1091-1157)

- Ryokan (1758-1831)

- Hakuin (1686-1768)

– Wang Wei

- Seng-ts-an (d.606)

- Huai-nan-tzu

- Altar Sutra

- Han-shan

– Hongzhi Zhengjue (1091–1157)

- Tao Yuan Ming (365–427)

- Hui-neng (638-713)

- Jakushitsu (died 1368)

- Yun-K’an Tzu

Rest yourself in oneness with things
and all barriers will disappear

– Seng Ts’an

Wang Wei (701-761)

- Nityananda

- Su Shih (1073)

- Bankei (1622-1693)

What can these things
have to do with you
becoming free?

- Te-shan (780-865)

Every thought is pulled out along the smooth,
polished stones, disappearing
downstream in the frothy current.

The mind keeps on making more thoughts
until it sees that they are
all being carried away downstream;
until it realizes that they
are all vanishing,
dissolving into an unseen point.

Then it won’t bother for awhile.

- Ji Aoi Isshi

- Ji Aoi Isshi

- Ni Tsan (1301-1374)

- Keizan Jokin

- Ryokan (1758-1831)

- Lao-tzu

- Ryushu Shutaku (1308–1388)

– Pai-chang (720–814)

- Han-shan

- Shide (8th century)

- Reizan (1411)

- Daito Kokushi

- Fa Yen (885–958)

- Shinkage-ryu

- Ryokan (1758-1831)

- Shinkage

Yet in attachment blossoms fall, and in aversion weeds spread.

-Reizan

- Hongzhi Zhengjue

- Bankei

-Tao Te Ching

I often wonder if this is the zen equivalent of “you can never go back”

- Genjo Koan

- Saigyo (1118 – 1190)

- Ryokan (1758-1831)

- The Dharmapada

Stay on the path,
put one foot in front of the other
- that is all.

There is joy in the struggle.

- PT Sudo

If you start to practice zazen,
you will begin to appreciate
your beginner’s mind.

It is the secret

- Hui Neng (638-713)

- Kakuan (1100-1200)

- Chugan Engetsu