Jane Kenyon, "The Needle"

Grandmother, you are as pale
as Christ's hands on the wall above you.
When you close your eyes you are all
white - hair, skin, gown. I blink
to find you again in the bed.

I remember once you told me
you weighed a hundred and twenty-three,
the day you married Grandfather.
You had handsome legs. He watched you
working at the sink.

The soft ring is loose on your hand.
I hated coming here.
I know you can't understand me.
I'll try again,
like the young nurse with the needle.

10 for 4/9

Playlist : Now

1. The White Tie Affair - Take It Home
2. Kings of Leon - Use Somebody
3. K'naan - T.I.A.
4. Guns 'n' Roses - Since I Don't Have You
5. Cold War Kids - Hospital Beds
6. The Gaslight Anthem - The '59 Sound
7. Tiger Army - Rose of the Devil's Garden
8. Thursday - Telegraph Avenue Kiss
9. Johnny Cash ft. Joe Strummer - Redemption Song
10. The Eli Young Band - Always the Love Songs

Portraits of Vladimir Nabokov

Tasty Links

Ever wonder what would happen if Ann Coulter, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, or that chick from the Vagina Monologues ran the NEA? The LA Time sure does! The interviewees actually run a pretty fair polemical spectrum on the pertinent issues surrounding the government's arts agency. Most telling are: the varieties of opinions on whether the NEA should resume and increase grants to individual artists, or continue the fairly fresh policy of granting primarily to institutions and organizations. In a close second, the fearful rampancy of the delusion that rolls of benjamins can convince the American public that art has any kind of common relevance. No one trusts your voice? Buy a megaphone!

Speaking of wacky ideas, what reservation is Stanley Fish on and where the hell is he wandering?

Thanks to Slate Magazine's David Plotz, who drops the bombshell that "OMG guys I just realized the Bible is the foundation of the past 2,000 years of our Judeo-Christian Western culture!!!!"

Lastly, a pair of interesting pieces on the rise and fall of the dueling Volkschus, Adidas and Puma from ESPN's Soccernet and Das Spiegel!

Birthday Wish List

My birthday, apparently, will blossom in two days.
My wish list, for any would-be benefactors:

(1) Seersucker.
(2) A lil' ESV study time.
(3) Some verse for all seasons.

Almanac Interview

You can hear me utter the word "like" an astonishing number of times during an interview on Amanda Mae Meyncke's lovely radio show, Almanac.

Links for the Week

Four tasty links to provoke your appetites:

"Is Food the New Sex?"

Mary Eberstadt makes a tantalizing survey sketch of a hypothesized switcheroo between our food and sexual mores in the past decades. Fifty years ago, where food ethics quietly lingered in a dim broom closet, a set of cultural standards demarcating sexual boundaries enlisted the active support of the common woman. Now, Eberstadt argues, these roles have reversed...but will a persistent concern for social problems and research damn the epoch of thoughtless, convenient sex as thoroughly as the age of thoughtless, convenient food?

Battier the Outlier

Another excellent piece of NYTimes sports journalism profiles the Houston Rockets' Shane Battier as a complete anomaly in the world of professional basketball, who also ironically serves as the poster-manchild for the burgeoning effort to translate the "Moneyball" practice of statistical analysis from baseball to basketball. Beyond providing a window into the fascinating and wholly unique Battier, Michael Lewis also pushes against the fundamental ethos we have about success and perception in team sports, while obliquely begging intriguing questions about faith in ideological process and practice.

Sex, Lies, and Journalism in Portland

An uneven analysis of the controversy currently engulfing Portland's mayor, Sam Adams, who recently admitted to an improper relationship with a then-teen intern. A tired story, save for the lemon twist: Adams wasn't chasing skirts, but well-pressed and fitting trousers. How does the sexual orientation of the first openly gay mayor of an American metropolis alter our sense of impropriety or outrage? Should it? Ought standards even be consistent?

"Reading the Signs"

Lastly, an oddball little article about subway graffiti and schizophrenia with a tart moral at the finish. Particularly when read in tandem with Eberstadt's essay, Dalrymple's thoughts jab the prioritized order of individual and social ethics. What problems can _I_ change, what can _we_ change? Does the problem most personal, the problem closest to us with a human face, take automatic priority?

Second Presidential Debate

Visually, the candidates presented an interesting scenario. Obama, his lanky limbs casually and confidently splayed out from his tall debatin' chair, head cocked and ready to blare a pair of big, vigilant eyes or an assured smirk, looked the part of a watchful, sarcastic eagle.
McCain, on the other hand, had the stiffly eager movements of a friendly penguin using every waddle and woefully limited flipper movement possible to try, with the utmost sincerity, and sell you something.

Eagle vs. Penguin: who wins? The Eagle possesses obvious advantages of strength, speed, and savvy: his screeching triumph is all but assured when the penguin has no hope but to burrow underwater or hide amongst hundreds of his indistinguishable fellows.
But unfortunately for the Eagle, it's not the Law of the Arctic which decides this battle, but the viewing public, whose sympathies will rarely lie with the bird of prey prepared to rip apart the penguin's lovable tuxedo tufts like so many cheap Christmas presents.

As for the town-hall forum or "debate" itself (and please, let's not abuse our words - it has been, and will be, a long time before any pair of presidential candidates actually engage one another in a true debate), a few clear differences emerged from the malaise of side-stepped questions and litanously repeated talking points: Obama favors undefined market regulation, McCain favors undefined market de-regulation. McCain favors government buy-ups of bad mortages to immediately get at the current economic crisis (I'll see your federal deficit, Mr. Bush, and raise you...); Obama favors tax cuts (dipping further into the dictionary, "tax cuts" never mean actual reductions, but merely a restraint in levying newer taxes) for the middle class (although wealth, as he says, does not "trickle downwards", it apparently oozes from the middle?). Absorbing "sissy diplomacy" blasts from McCain, Obama maintained a dedication towards a foreign policy built on open negotiations and discussions with America's antagonists; McCain resolutely stuck to a mantra of God-Military-Intervention-and-David-Petraeus that left no room for an admission of any errors or standing problems in the prosecution of the War on Terror.

Consistent from past debates and stretching back to the Saddleback discussion, both candidates steadfastly refused to state a doctrine for America's forceful involvement in international crises (say, genocides) which don't pose immediate threats to national security. And the day when a major candidate actually criticizes the ubiquitous "average American"...well, to quote Buddy Holly, "that'll be the day."

Obama's Belle of the Ball moment:
Declaring, with clarity and intensity, "We will kill Bin Laden and crush al-Qaeda" - unexpectedly confident and winning words for a candidate whose party is used to ceding patriotism and national security across the aisle.

Lowlights: After forcefully declaring America's moral interests for intervening in cases of genocide, "If we were able to respond to a Rwanda again...we would...have to strongly consider our involvement." (to his credit, he added the feeble coda of "...and then act!"); after acknowledging the economic toll of the War in Iraq and the constraints the economic crisis would impose on America's global presence, proceeding to chide McCain for offering Ukraine and Georgia only "moral support," and insist that America offer "financial and material support" to these struggling nations.

McCain's Belle of the Ball Moment:
His forceful final words, offering up himself as a man who "knows dark times" and burns with a desire to serve America, did far more than the previous hour's trumpeting of "experience" and "records" to evince a capacity for wisdom and leadership.

Lowlights: Repetitive self-identifications as a maverick bi-partisan reformer; blind assurances in, and dubious similes illustrating, America's infinite power and capacity ("We're not a rifle shot! We're Americans!")

Discuss: Both candidates agree, "America has been the greatest force for good in the history of the world." ?

From the New Yorker online:

Spring Haiku for Late Summer

Nightfall –
I light one candle, then two,
when you come.

The cat slinks
From milk
To making love.

The meadow-larks build
Their nests, and girls
Buy their bikinis.

Spring-noon:
Even mosquitos and your mother
Are beautiful today.

Grass blooms,
And your eyes brighten
Beneath a kiss.

http://www.runofplay.com/2008/06/17/the-tuesday-portrait-michael-ballack/

Fine commentary on Michael Ballack's bone structure and the Deep Magic of life.

This Is Just to Say

This Is Just to Say (after WCW)

It was I who sent a spent cigarette
into the wind along that stretch of the
Indian Territories where you,
Lone Tear Trickling Down Cheeks,
earned your name.

Perhaps it skittered
and flamed out
at that same spot where
your ancestors,
marching west,
lost a beaver pelt,
a moccasin,
or a smallpoxed child.

Forgive me,
but the Marlboro's smoldering heart,
like your cracked face,
was red, red, red.

Some Bests

A pair of Bests I've been thinking of recently:

Contenders for Best Book Title:
"Let Us Now Praise Famous Men", by James Agee and that photographer
"Ladies Whose Bright Eyes", by Ford Maddox Ford

Contender for Best Two Lines to Open a Song:
"In the summer of my wedding / As the corn burned in the field..." from Hem's song, "Strays"

An occasional poem, written in farewell to The Ranch:

In farms and ranches
men have labored,
long hands passing through grimy sun
and breeze-brushed twilight.
Day or night
does not matter,
only the labor
of strip-mined
hearts
and cracked
hands
and exhausted,
un-rotated minds.
Some mornings:
oranges
straining to burst
against damming
peels.
Some mornings:
tanned
and tender
from moon
and her shine.
Each morning:
horseshit
and daybreak prayers.
In farms and ranches
men have dreamed
of vineyards in
cities and deep glassy
seas. But today
the almond tree
blossoms and the grasshopper
drag himself along,
so for uncertain wages,
today we will labor.

Revelation

Revelation 2:17
"He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, with a new name written on the stone that no one knows except the one who receives it."
Revelation 3:5
"The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels."

All Saints' Day

At the All Saints’ Day Parade,
A host of the blessed
March down the boulevard, a creek
Of meek, forthright faces
And simple tunics. Here
And there, the brown-gray array
Is augmented by a buckler, a milk-pail,
A purple robe.
Fishermen, bishops, and midwives
All pass, pleasantly enough,
Until the crush of martyrs
Comes crowding the procession’s end.
There is hollow-cheeked
Stephen, hauling
A quarry-full of stones. Clement is dragging
His anchor, and Vitus is wheeled
In a cauldron. Agatha steps gingerly,
Balancing her sliced breasts like dinner rolls
On a platter. Saint Lucy is fishing
Eyeballs out of her pocket, and I
Too find my hands digging into my slacks,
Feeling sheepishly a pen, wallet, lip balm.

"Old West Outlaws"

Old West Outlaws

Though wasteful with the buffalo, the Old Westerners
Knew to use every last part of a good outlaw, every inch
Of their spangled names and bullet-burnished skin. Two-
Bit boys from Independence vaunted over the callow hands
Which, they said, blazed down this devil from Cochise or that snake,
from Durango, their stampede of competing claims
Bleeding each fearful syllable dry from names like “Black Jack Ketchum.”

Nor, once dead, were those bodies inviolate. A Philadelphia banker
Might slip from his pocket a wallet tanned from William
H. Bonney’s stomach, oblivious to George Washington’s green,
papery face caressing that spot once marked by the lay of
a lover’s fingers, or the slice of a hot knife in El Paso.
Supply and demand, of course, meant that there are
Only so many wallets to go around, but those names
Take a long time to dry out. They slipped off wagon-wheels
Into the plains, slipped from mumbling mouths into cracked alley-ways,
Bleaching slowly in the broad Western sun.

A birthday poem, in honor of my birthday.

What are days for?
Days are where we live.
They come, they wake us
Time and time over.
They are to be happy in:
Where can we live but days?

Ah, solving that question
Brings the priest and the doctor
In their long coats
Running over the fields.

"Days", Philip Larkin

All-World Starting XI

My personal best of the World Cup (in the 4-5-1 that seemingly every football-civilized country played)

Goalkeeper: Andreas Issakson (Sweden)
Although Italy's Buffon kept nearly a clean sheet throughout the entire World Cup, he also had the universe's best defense in front of him, wore a faux-camisole underneath his keeper's jersey throughout the entire World Cup, and bears the nickname "Gigi". Though Issakson more goals through, he's also responsible for some of the Cup's most spectacular saves.
[also considered: Italy's Buffon, Portugal's Ricardo, Mexico's Oswaldo Sanchez]

Central Defender: Fabio Cannavaro (Italy)
By all rights, the unquestioned MVP of the World Cup. Cannavaro is a ninja-assassin demigod who simply dominated every attacking player he encountered. Also, no one seems to have noticed that he has single-handedly rescued the name "Fabio".

Central Defender: Ricardo Carvalho (Portugal)
If the fact that he put the entire Portuguese defense and defensive midfield on his back during the Holland game doesn't do it for you, consider his new entry in the sporting dictionary's "Taking One For the Team" (courtesy of Wayne Rooney) as justification enough.

Left Defender: Gianluca Zambrotta (Italy)
Blazing speed up and down the field, combined with steely tackles and the most perfect trashy-hipster image of any footballer playing? Zambi's got my vote. Naturally a left-sided player, Zambi played on the right during the World Cup, but we shifted him over to include...

Right Defender: Phillip Degen (Switzerland)
Switzerland became the first team in World Cup history to be eliminated without allowing a single goal. Degen used his incredible pace to provide almost all of Switzerland's admittedly pathetic attack (but, when your best attacker is your right defender, you've got problems anyhow) , then sprint back to cut off opposing forays. If Zambrotta is the top trashy-hipster, Degen is the quintessential preppy Eurotrash.
[also considered: William Gallas and Lillian Thuram (France), Roberto Ayala (Argentina)]

Central Midfielder: Gennaro Gattuso (Italy)
Simply destroyed every attacking midfielder Italy faced. When marking Zidane, rendered him nearly a non-factor in the Final. I also like to think we share a resemblance, right down to his now-infamous pantsless (or, more appropriately, sans culotte) victory celebration.

Central Midfielder: Maniche (Portugal)
The best two-way midfielder in the entire tournament, Maniche patrolled both halves relentlessly, helping Carvalho bolster the defense, and then orchestrating Portugal's forward movement. Also seemed to be the only Portuguese player who preferred taking an actual shot on goal to passing it, crossing it, dicking around with the ball in the box, or forgetting about the ball entirely to gaze upon Cristiano Ronaldo's elegant neck.

Central Midfielder: Juan Roman Riquelme (Argentina)
Though most critics implicitly condemn Riquelme by blaming deference to his style as the root cause for Argentina's demise, he also, seemingly unnoticed, led the tournament in assists (4) despite playing in only five matches.

Winger: Franck Ribery (France)
Ridiculously fast, tricky on the ball, coolest permanent scar, and most unlikely convert to Islam: things that all describe Franck Ribery.

Winger: Arjen Robben (Holland)
Like all Dutch players, looks kinda goofy, but plays aggressive, lightning-quick football up and down the touchlines.

[also considered: Stephen Appiah (Ghana — who, being known as the Black Stars, simultaneously win the Best Nickname of the Tournament, and Best Nickname of the Tournament That Could Be Easily Appropriated by a Racial Power Movement), Cristiano Ronaldo (Portugal), Anatoliy Tymoschuk (Ukraine), Pavel Nedved (Czech Republic)]

Striker: Miroslav Klose (Germany)
Simply, the only striker who was able to consistently finish in the entire World Cup. Dangerous with both head and foot, Klose also created chances for his strike partner, Lukas Podolski, with some nifty passes and inventive movement. If he weren't so tall, would also win the Most Likely To Star in a Formulaic Family Sitcom as the Bland, Harried Father After Retirement award.

[also considered: a sixth midfielder. Strikers universally sucked this year.]

Coach: Ricardo La Volpe (Mexico)
Was asked to quit smoking on the sidelines by FIFA officials, a request he grudgingly acquiesced to. Looks like Satan, but wears ties adorned with suspiciously Tweety Bird-esque figures. Quit as national team coach no less than three times during the actual tournament in front of the media, and immediately denied resigning the morning after, claiming the press were "mental". Without question, the Coach of the Tournament.