Wallace Stevens: "The Planet on the Table"

The Planet on the Table

Ariel was glad he had written his poems.
They were of a remembered time
Or of something seen that he liked.

Other makings of the sun
Were waste and welter
And the ripe shrub writhed.

His self and the sun were one
And his poems, although makings of his self,
Were no less makings of the sun.

It was not important that they survive.
What mattered was that they should bear
Some lineament or character,

Some affluence, if only half-perceived,
In the poverty of their words,
Of the planet of which they were part.

The Practice of the Wild: Documentary on Gary Snyder, November 14 on KQED

A  recent documentary on poet Gary Snyder, The Practice of the Wild, is airing on KQED tomorrow, Sunday, November 14 at 1 pm. It will also replay at 7 pm. The documentary features archived footage and interviews, which are interwoven into a conversation between Snyder and poet and novelist Jim Harrison, as the two walk the hills of the Hearst ranch in San Simeon.

Here's the San Francisco Chronicle review.

Get out in front...and pretend it's a parade

I wasn't sure if anyone would be taking photos yesterday, and since Debi wasn't with me, I figured I better take a few of my own...

...which is not to imply that I was utterly without cohorts

...because even those who still had to work were wearing black and orange,

...as well as sundry other folk.

 If you can't tell who is who,

...you haven't been paying attention all this time.

And there will be no point in trying to explain all the sub-plots to you now.

Nobody was particularly in a hurry to get anywhere.

But by dusk, the busy streets...

...had returned to normal.

Whatever normal might mean in a City as wacky and beautiful as this.

Stephen Fry on language

The video below is not only fun—but might help us freshen and delight in our own language more, too.

Stephen Fry Kinetic Typography - Language from Matthew Rogers on Vimeo.