ON READING FALKOWSKI

Published April 22, 2024 by Nan Mykel

The first science best seller was in 1665, and kept Samuel Pepys up until 2 a.m. reading “the most ingenius book that I have ever read in my life”. (Falkowski 2015, 27). Falkowski describes the author of the book Micrographia (still in print) as “Roert Hooke, then a 30-year old hunchbacked, contankerous, neurotic hypochondriac who was also a brilliant natural scientist, polymath, and an original Fellow of the society.”

Falkowski’s research is impeccable. “Darwin indeed took a microscope with him on the Beagle. Along with his Bible and natural history books, he took two pistols, 12 shirts and two books to help him learn Spanish and a coin purse.” [And pants?]

He quotes Carl Woese and George Fox who state that all extant life on Earth is derived from a single, extinct microbial organism. “There could have been only one common ancestor from bacteria to us…a microbe.”

“Indeed, microbes are not mentioned in the Bible….They certainly weren’t taken deliberately by Noah on the ark, nor are they woven into the Turkish tapestries depicting the Great Flood.”

__________________________

BOOKS WITH HUMAN SKIN COVERS?

No thank you. I won’t bother you with that one today…

____________

OUCH

Environmental Group Asks RFK Jr to End Presidential Bid

I’m glad, but that must hurt!

____________

HOME SWEET HOME

The median home-sale price as of February 2024 was $384,500, up 5.7 percent from one year ago, according to NAR data. The nation had a 2.9-month supply of housing inventory as of February, which is low enough to be considered a seller’s market.

Mom, you would not

recognize your boy today.

Without a home or job

he is lost to the world.

____________

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY:

The Freedom Caucus, where many of these extreme conservatives call home, has long cared more about upsetting apple carts than using them to deliver apples. …Keith Wilson

____________

THE END?

We came, we tried, we fought

and ate each other up.

We lived and died by our own hands.

If two survived and met on a plain,

would we hug one another

or kill again? Nan 4-24

I USED TO CARE guest poem

Published August 15, 2022 by Nan Mykel

I used to care
When I was young
Innocent, perhaps naïve.
There was a future
To be secured and enriched
For my family
For the world.
I voted, confident it counted,
Marched, protested, and was seen,
Wrote letters, and believed they were read,
Debated, and was heard.
I witnessed change
With civil rights
Clean water and air
The end of an ugly war
Even a ban on assault rifles.

Now?
More extinctions
Extensive clearing of rainforests

More guns
More fossil fuels being burned
More voter suppression
Government dysfunction
Expansive partisan division and violence
More corporate greed
Widening gap between rich and poor
More rights stripped away.
I used to care
When I was young,
Innocent, perhaps naïve.
Now…only tears.

Thank you Thomas Shostak for permossion to share this poem

YOU SEE, I CAN NO LONGER KEEP UP…

Published July 25, 2022 by Nan Mykel

…with the young’un bloggers. I can’t even keep up with mature Diane Ravitch, who’s only a tad younger, it seems.

I’ve stumbled recently on an exchange of ideas when viewing Diane and Jill Dennison and Keith Wilson that really gets to the nuts and bolts of things, and from many bloggers on the subject. Maybe Ned Hanson offers such an offering, too. Or maybe Word Press thought I just needed a change? Whatever, I’m convinced that all I can offer at this point is an emotional touchstone. Feelings I have, although rushed by a November election and the question of my own longevity (smile). (I smile when I know I’m being a little grimmer than called for).

Maybe over a year ago I asked readers to think of jingles–maybe to old tunes–portraying issues of the political heart (though I was less flowery). Today, after reading again The Moral Ground by Elie Mystal in The Nation, I put a couple of things together: I would try, myself, to do it tho it receive rejection and avoidance, even ridicule. Here I go willingly into that space, having already failed at an I Am a Woman attempt, which you will never see.:

HOW DARE YOU…

….Tell me what to do.

I wear masks for others.

Do you?

I don’t invade your heart of hearts

nor presume to know your pain.

Look into my eyes and see

another human same as thee.

Those who swallow others’ lies

and betray the Golden Rule

do not attend to their still voice

when push comes around to shove.

Painful decisions require clear-eyed guts

not your state’s grotesque intrusions.

Does your God favor laws that plot

to make me suffer their invasion?

Out out, damned spot I say–

Let the freedom of our people

rule the day.

Friend Felix Speaks Again

Published July 19, 2022 by Nan Mykel

4th of JULY: GOOD GRIEF!

If you like pretty poems, please look away,

for here I lament decay, dying and death.

I’m not bemoaning my dying contemporaries,

who lately fall like old-growth trees in a forest.

Nor do I pre-grieve my own impending death.

My concern is for the fate of our democracy,

as it is doing a dangerous dance with doom.

Our precious political freedoms are eroding.

Our fractured center seems not to be holding.

Our democracy could be in its death throes.

Female bodily autonomy has been outlawed,

voting rights have been wantonly suppressed,

there is massive support for Trump’s Big Lie.

The Supreme Court defies the majority’s will.

Throughout our land gun fetishism flourishes.

Louder liars shout down the voices of veracity.

Violence grows, the environment degrades.

This Independence Day is a day of gloom.

Sadly I fly our tattered flag upside down.

Today I can’t sing Happy Birthday America!

In these dark days, I weep as I sing of thee.

Felix Gagliano, July 2022

I WON’T REPEAT THE NEWS OF THE DAY, BUT…

Published June 24, 2022 by Nan Mykel

Heaven forbid, what threat is being held over our Attorney

General’s head? Whether you believe or not, pray.

Love, Nan

REMIND ME…

Published December 26, 2019 by Nan Mykel

…how this makes America great again…

Newsweek.com Thanks, Skip Shirey, for finding this

I KNOW BIG RED RIDER DOESN’T RHYME

Published April 13, 2018 by Nan Mykel

BIG RED RIDER

Not so long ago, in the normal

world of things, a little woman

on her way to visit grandma met

a big red wolf in sheep’s clothing.

“You can trust me,” he said with

a grin, “She’s my grandma too and

I want to see who she voted for.”

The little woman became scared when

the wolf’s teeth began to show from

under the sheep’s pearly white skin,

and she feared for grandma’s health.

“I’m going on a picnic” she protested,

“on a restful picnic.” “Well who did you

vote for, my pretty?”

“I cannot tell a lie: Bernie.”

Big Red huffed and he puffed and he

grew red in the face too. “Can you prove

you’re a citizen and not a wetback?

Your hair is black, unlike mine, so

the ICE team may grab you and grandma

too. If you’re not for me you’re ag’in me.”

Oh where was the brave hunter who

would step out and save her? Was he

already fired for being too sharp?

“Fie fie, sir” she cried out hotly—

“How many of the 10 Commandments

have you broken in office? Mueller,

my brave hunter will arrive at last.”

So perhaps the normal world of things

will return without whimper and

the denizens of Make Believe Land

will shine with the child’s regained hope

that love can be gentle, respectful and

honest, and that truth is no longer a

carelessly tossed flapjack.

End of the Dream for d’Verse

Published April 7, 2018 by Nan Mykel

Can’t pick up rocks no more

’cause something’s under there

just a-waiting to suck your blood

and pull out all your hair.

Can’t trust nuttin’ any more

It’s all rotted through

The young’uns won’t never know

how wishes might come true.

Do You Remember This?

Published February 4, 2018 by Nan Mykel

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

	Nan Mykel on Neutering
	Nan Mykel on Neutering
	Dr. John Persico Jr. on Neutering
	nedhamson on Neutering
	jilldennison on BUBBLE TO BURST?

NANMYKEL.COM

American Dream

All posts in the American Dream category

ON READING FALKOWSKI

I USED TO CARE guest poem

YOU SEE, I CAN NO LONGER KEEP UP…

Friend Felix Speaks Again

I WON’T REPEAT THE NEWS OF THE DAY, BUT…

Heaven forbid, what threat is being held over our Attorney

General’s head? Whether you believe or not, pray.

Love, Nan

REMIND ME…

…how this makes America great again…

Newsweek.com Thanks, Skip Shirey, for finding this

I KNOW BIG RED RIDER DOESN’T RHYME

End of the Dream for d’Verse

Do You Remember This?

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

Share this: Reblog, Like

Share this: Reblog, Like

Share this: Reblog, Like

Share this: Reblog, Like

Heaven forbid, what threat is being held over our Attorney

General’s head? Whether you believe or not, pray.

Love, Nan

Share this: Reblog, Like

…how this makes America great again…

Newsweek.com Thanks, Skip Shirey, for finding this

Share this: Reblog, Like

Share this: Reblog, Like

Share this: Reblog, Like

O beautiful for spacious skies, For amber waves of grain, For purple mountain majesties Above the fruited plain! America! America! God shed His grace on thee, And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea!

Share this: Reblog, Like

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!