….”these disputes shouldn’t be simply thought of as one political worldview clashing with another political worldview. This is a fight over what is right and proper for the Justice Department to do and what is wrong and improper for the Justice Department to do.” Hear, hear…nytimes.com 9/22/25.

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KEEPIN’ ON

Don’t say why, say how. Why presupposes an unattainable degree of reason, as in truth.

Happiness happened in graduate school, with wonder and growing edges always in process.

Connecting in the same tongue searching for the how, puzzled by all the unsolved mysteries,

All the learning not yet used! The flying bishop, prophetic dreams, who, what when where how,

The tip of the plow still unearthing that which might be now or in the future.

Could quantum mechanics, going with the flow, free us to occupy a niche in our haunted cave?

I’m still curious and not willing to leave my lust for understanding back here with my bones.

Should that occur I shall go out hollering and hope to transition into someone else’s Muse.

[Written in 2022 — sorry if it’s a reprint] :Nan

Strange changes in Word Press functions. If this is the end, it’s been fun and I love you all.

While trying to help deal with boxes and boxes after the second sewer deluge in my basement condo, I flipped through a book I had never really read: Thesaurus of Alternatives to Worn-Out Words and Phrases by Robert Hartwell Fiske, and I almost cried. There, in cold black and white, was a detailed criticism of what appears to be my writing style. I mean, golly ding!

For instance, “mad as a hatter” was labeled “an insipid similie,”; “make a conscious choice” is a “dimwitted redundancy,” and “close encounter” is an “infantile phrase.”

“What’s done is done” is a “quack equation,” and “Quack equations are much favored by montebanks and pretenders, by businesspeople and politicians.” Now that’s going a little far!

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GRASS: A poem

This poem’s supposed to be about grass, alas, and I don’t know what to say, but remember that I tried.

Green grass has earth worms in its hair. Under the sod, I’ve seen them there.

Salt kills grass and so does pee. I eat salt and it doesn’t kill me!

How does grass live after losing its head? If I lost mine wouldn’t I be dead?

Maybe it’s feet that the mower cuts off while the grass lives its life upside down.

Yes! Its hair is under the ground, so it must grow with its feet in the air.

So that’s why the lawn doesn’t move away… They cut off its feet so it has to stay.

But where do I grow, when taller I get? Does my stomach stretch or does my neck?

Dunno that, either.

(I know, I know–I’m not all the way back, either)..

Nan

I didn’t die, if anyone wondered. Don’t worry; My obituary has already been written for when the time comes. My daughter has convinced me to throw a 90th birthday party in mid-September. I do regret the approaching folding of the printed version of the Atlanta Journal Constitution, however (home of my year-long radio column in the Journal).

UNSOLVED MYSTERY

The current mystery remains: Why did I get flushed out of my basement condo by two consecutive sewerage floods? Still living at bay and no restorative work proceeding for the second flooding. Getting to know my community better, however. Will post photo next time my helper appears.

She’s here!

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Trade has been Mr. Trump’s favorite playground for his version of industrial policy, with tariffs being a weapon of choice. He has compared the United States to a “giant department store,” with him as the manager. “I own the store, and I set the prices, and I’ll say, ‘If you want to shop here, this is what you have to pay,’” he told Time magazine in April. (Newsweek)

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CORRECTION: The new black cat color is not blacker, but turns itself whiter by itself. Apologies…

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Happy Birthday to me September the 15th, 90 years….

Thoughts About:

My first poem:

Ireland was once a terrible place;

No happy hearts, no fancy face.

Then the good St. Pat showed them

the cruelty of all of their ways

and in a shamrock’s leafy tree

showed them the holy trinity.

And oft after that people

would say “Ireland, a place

where hearts are gay.”

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My Second Poem several years later:

THREE SOULS

Three souls looked up at the table

an ant, a man and a dog.

The heavens crashed,

lightening flashed and

Fate chuckled with glee;

The ant had bread, the man was dead,

and the dog had changed his master.

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“Intelligent Design” by a 2010 Athens Ohio Library Poetry Group Member and O.U. professor emeritus Milton Ploghoft:

INTELLIGENT DESIGN

The earth designed as a home for man

Missed the mark of a friendly plan.

With deserts barren and burning hot

And frigid mountains productive not.

The weather too is a shaky gift,

With hurricanes and blizzards

Leaving mighty man adrift

To the whimsy of saints or maybe of wizards.

The design of man is iffy as well,

With eating and breathing inside the same face.

When problem occurs at the slightest smell,

While pleasure and plumbing share the same space.

Was man created ready to go

Or left to invent clothing and shack

To keep God’s elements off of his back

While learning to gather and hunt for her tack.

An orderly design from a Creator on high,

Or chaotic God beneath a blue sky?

Were the challenges smaller for lower life forms

Than man given less than bugs birds and sky?

MP 2010

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Photo choice by Nan: