10.2.2022 – feed me in sorrow

feed me in sorrow
laugh in all my pain burn freeze
I find no peace yet

I can think of many inventors.

Thomas Edison and the electric light.

Thomas Edison and the phonograph.

Thomas Edison and the cement house.

Ah, well.

Then there is Thomas Wyatt.

Sir Thomas Wyatt.

Sir Thomas lived, worked and wrote during the era of Henry VIII.

He lived to be the ripe old age of 39, which for someone in Henry VIII’s posse, that might be considered to be a old aged.

When Henry wanted to be free of Anne Boleyn, his 2nd wife (I won’t keep you long as Henry was known to tell his wives), Ms. Boleyn was charge with adultery.

Ms. Boleyn was sent to the Tower of London and the Tower Police rounded up the usual suspects which included Sir Thomas.

I think it is almost still common knowledge today that Ms. Boleyn had her head chopped off by orders of the King.

What I didn’t know was the five other men charged the case, George Boleyn, Henry Norris, Sir Francis Weston, William Brereton and Mark Smeaton, were also executed.

Some historians think that Sir Thomas was imprisoned in a cell with a view of the tower green and was able to watch as all five men were beheaded and then, 2 days later, watch the same for Ms. Boleyn.

Things calmed down a bit after that and Sir Thomas was restored to favor with the King.

A glance at his short life his Sir Thomas in and out and in and out of favor with the King on almost a seasonal basis.

Then Sir Thomas dies.

Years after his death, in 1557, a collection of some 97 to 130 or so poems that Sir Thomas wrote in his lifetime was published.

As scholars looked them over, they realized some were pretty good poems and were in face, sonnets.

Then the scholars looked at the dates and realized that they were written some years before Shakespeare.

Thusly, Sir Thomas Wyatt invented the sonnet.

Alas, like some many inventors whose inventions reach acclaim after the inventor has passed on, Sir Thomas never knew it.

I find the sonnet I Find no Peace to be a great source of words for haiku and I have quoted it often.

Having just learned the Anne Boleyn connection I wonder.

I wonder if he watched.

I wonder if he heard.

The sound of the axe.

The roar of the crowd.

Did he listen for the key in the door that day?

Would the knowledge that his poems survived been any comfort?

And yet and yet.

And time and time.

300 years later, Mr. Thoreau would say his famous, The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.

I find no peace, and all my war is done.
I fear and hope. I burn and freeze like ice.

I fly above the wind, yet can I not arise;
And nought I have, and all the world I season.

That loseth nor locketh holdeth me in prison
And holdeth me not — yet can I scape no wise—

Nor letteth me live nor die at my device,
And yet of death it giveth me occasion.

Without eyen I see, and without tongue I plain.
I desire to perish, and yet I ask health.

I love another, and thus I hate myself.
I feed me in sorrow and laugh in all my pain;

Likewise displeaseth me both life and death,
And my delight is causer of this strife.

10.1.2022 – 1st one thousand wins

1st one thousand wins
hail to victors valiant
those stay, champions

I first wrote this haiku in 2019.

Just a few weeks ago I updated this post.

Then Michigan went off and went undefeated and is now 11 wins away!

Back in September, 2020, I wrote:

At that time, Michigan had 953 ALL TIME NCAA College Football Wins

With 47 more wins, barring any sports tragedies (as opposed to those real life tragedies), Michigan will be the first team to record 1,000 college football Wins.

Then COVID hit and backed up things as Michigan had but 2 wins in 2020.

When will this game happen and who will it be against?

Sorry to say that the BIG TEN has messed this all up by expanding and there are only 3 announced games for 2023 and nothing as yet for 2024.

But we can still speculate.

PIE IN THE SKY, Michigan wins their next 19 games, that would mean they win the National Championship this year for a total of 10 wins which means, again this is winning ALL THEIR games, Michigan’s 1000th victory would be in Game 9 of 2023.

I think that maybe 7 more wins this year (Including a BIG TEN Championship and beating Darth Vador Earl Bruce’s team) and another 10 wins next year means that the 1000th win would come early in 2024.

Oddly enough, looking a the math, with 981 wins since 1896, that is an average of only 7 wins a season.

Of course it must be pointed out that for 40 years the norm was a 9 game season.

ANYWAY, hang on to your maize-and-blue fedora’s as this is gonna be interesting …

Back in 2019 I wrote this:

If Michigan went the next 47-0, they would win 3 Big Ten Titles, 6 College Playoff Games and 3 National Championships and on Sept 3, 2022, a victory over UCLA would be win 1,000.

We know that won’t happen.

A possible 47-9 over the next 56 games put Michigan in position to win their 1,000th game on Sept 30, 2023 at home against MSU.

Not only a Michigan Great but our neighbor for years in
Grand Rapids

I went through a 47-9 record and picked the games but its pure speculation.

In compiling this record, over 4 years, I have Michigan going 2-1 in the Big Ten Title Game but 0-2 in the College Playoffs.

All speculation but I predict the 1,000th win will come in the 2023 season.

Should be a big party but planning on this will be like planning on winning the Stanley Cup at home in Game 6 … how do you plan for a win?

I also attached the above info a spread sheet so you can make you own predictions …

michigan-1 Download

9.30.2022 – one certainty

one certainty
when can’t possibly get worse it
absolutely will

What am I writing about?

What AREN’T I writing about?

Actually the words in today’s haiku are in a blurb for the 2019 book, Decline and Fail: Read in Case of Political Apocalypse which is a collection of opinion pieces or ‘political sketches’ by John Crace of the Guardian.

The blurb read: There is now only one certainty in life. When things can’t possibly get any worse, they absolutely will. And so, after three years of Maybot malfunctioning and Brexit bungling, welcome to BoJo the clown’s national circus – where fun for literally none of the family is guaranteed.

Mr. Crace’s columns on the British political scene are a joy to read.

In today’s sketch, Half-witted, reckless Librium Liz may be even worse than May and Johnson, Mr. Crace writes:

But the Tories are just playing with us. It’s as if the members said: “So you think David Cameron is useless? Just wait until we give you Theresa.” And once we’d all had about enough of May, they gave us a narcissistic, sociopathic liar instead.

Now, to top it all – at least we hope so; surely there can’t be another one who is even worse? – we’ve been landed with Liz Truss. Someone who is not just half-witted and robotic, but reckless enough to bankrupt the country. The ideologue with only a tenuous grasp on reality. There’s always a job waiting for Truss in an automated call centre:

A deathless loop that sucks the life out of you.

Further on in the sketch, I was thinking that as I read:

She is the embodiment of the circle of doom on a laptop that’s crashing.

She is not AI.

She is Artificial Stupidity, programmed to carry on repeating more and more errors until she collapses in on herself.

A dead cert to win this year’s Darwin awards for those who have contributed to human evolution by selecting themselves out of the gene pool.

Wire Truss up to an ECG and you’d find no activity. Just a flat line.”

… I wanted to use that old joke and ask, “But what do you really think about Ms. Truss?”

I admit that one of the appeals to me, in reading about the current situation in Britain is that both sides are on the same side that the current leadership is clueless.

This is a myopic view for me to take as I don’t live there or follow much news other than the Guardian and there may be news sources that support Ms. Truss.

From my limited browsing however it does seem that she is being bailed on by her own party.

For me, it is that never never land of a certain political party here in the US admitting that a certain someone indeed does not have any clothes, let alone new clothes, on at all.

I can hope.

BUT I enjoy the writing and the caustic nature and the vocabulary very much.

I think it must have been fun to write.

But I also think there is a down side.

Just like with time, Great Britain is about 5 hours ahead of us.

Stayed tuned for the US version coming soon.

9.29.2022 – mistakes, those crummy

mistakes, those crummy
mistakes are only mistakes
if admitted to

“Generosity, that was my first mistake,” so says bandit leader Calvera in the Magnificent Seven.

And, sorry, you can remake this movie 100 times but Calvera will always, only be Eli Wallach.

Even a bandit leader can admit to a mistake.

Neither here nor, but I was reading today about how the President was making a speech and asked if a certain Congresswoman was in attendance.

The Congresswoman in question was not in attendance as the Congresswoman was dead.

When the Congresswoman was killed in a car accident earlier this year, the White House had issued a statement of remorse and condolence in the name of the President so it was fair to assume the President was aware of her untimely demise.

When the White Press Office was questioned about it, “Did the President mis-speak, make a mistake, was the error in his prepared teleprompter remarks?”

But the Press Office would say neither Yeah no Nay and ended their comments with, “I’ve answered it multiple times already in this room, and my answer is certainly not going to change,” she said. “All of you may have views on how I’m answering it, but I am answering the question to the way that he saw it. And the way that we see it.”

Not looking for a political axe to grind either way but just wondering why it is so difficult for the feller in the White House to say “I made a mistake.”

The previous feller admitted every mistake he ever made.

I mean to say, the previous feller would have admitted any mistake the minute he made that first mistake.

So in 2019, Hurricane Dorian was coming.

The President was told that the east coast would be hit along with Bahama.

The President heard what he wanted to hear and when he tweeted (I don’t miss those days one bit) instead of Bahama, he includes Alabama.

Trump, Donald J (September 1, 2019). “In addition to Florida – South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, will most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated. Looking like one of the largest hurricanes ever. Already category 5. BE CAREFUL! GOD BLESS EVERYONE!”. (Twitter).

Which came as a great surprise to the people in Alabama.

Rather than say oops, the White House went to great lengths to PROVE that Alabama had ALWAYS been in the predicted path was coming.

I am reminded of a bit of dialogue in the book the Caine Mutiny where Captain Queeg is being questioned by a Captain Grace about the tow line cutting incident.

Captain Grace asks Queeg to be honest and admit he made a mistake.

Captain Grace says, “... let’s both put this incident behind us. On that basis I can understand it and forget it. It was a mistake, a mistake due to anxiety and inexperience. But there’s no man in the Navy who’s never made a mistake ”

But Queeg (in the movie played by Humphrey Bogart but it is important to remember that in the book, Queeg is around 28 years old) responds, “No, Captain, I assure you I appreciate what you say, but I am not so stupid as to lie to a superior officer, and I assure you my first version o£ what happened is correct and I do not believe I have made any mistake as yet in commanding the Caine nor do I intend to.“

In a way it was good to hear he did not INTEND to make a mistake, but I digress.

Ho-hummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

In July of 1863, after General Grant took Vicksburg he got this note from the President that said in part, “When you got below, and took Port-Gibson, Grand Gulf, and vicinity, I thought you should go down the river and join Gen. Banks; and when you turned Northward East of the Big Black, I feared it was a mistake. I now wish to make the personal acknowledgment that you were right, and I was wrong.”

It was signed, simply, A. Lincoln.

A later comment on this letter by a friend of Mr. Lincoln’s said, “was not intended for effect as some suppose but was perfectly in character.”

Character.

Good word.

Better character trait.

To have character I mean.

I guess instead of people with character, today the Office of President of the United States only attracts people who are characters.

9.28.2022 – groping as we grope

groping as we grope
if heavens colors were like
music heard afar

As much as I loved the line,

Or wondering, when they learned that leaves were green,
If colours were like music, heard afar?

Seems like the idea of music as colors has turned up before in this blog – and I believe there has been discussion of folks who do SEE color when listening to music.

Then there is the lines:

As though, for them, the Spring held nothing new;
And not one face was turned to look again.

And I think how to have never seen a sunset.

To have never looked back for that one last look.

I am reminded on the painting of the blind soldiers by John Singer Sargent.

Once again the line from The Color Purple comes to mind that “I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.“

Spring , and the Blind Children

They left the primrose glistening in its dew.
With empty hands they drifted down the lane,
As though, for them, the Spring held nothing new;
And not one face was turned to look again.

Like tiny ghosts, along their woodland aisle,
They stole. They did not leap or dance or run.
Only, at times, without a word or smile,
Their small blind faces lifted to the sun;

Innocent faces, desolately bright,
Masks of dark thought that none could ever know;
But O, so small to hide it. In their night
What dreams of our strange world must come and go;

Groping, as we, too, grope for heavens unseen;
Guessing – at what those fabulous visions are;
Or wondering, when they learned that leaves were green,
If colours were like music, heard afar?

Were brooks like bird-song ? Was the setting sun
Like scent of roses, or like evening prayer ?
Were stars like chimes in heaven, when day was done;
Was midnight like their mothers’ warm soft hair?

And dawn? – a pitying face against their own,
A whispered word, an unknown angel’s kiss,
That stoops to each, in its own dark, alone;
But leaves them lonelier for that breath of bliss ?

Was it for earth’s transgressions that they paid –
Lambs of that God whose eyes with love grow dim –
Sharing His load on whom all wrongs are laid ?
But O, so small to bear it, even with Him!

God of blind children, through Thy dreadful light
They pass. We pass. Thy heavens are all so near.
We cannot grasp them in our earth-bound night.
But O, Thy grief! For Thou canst see and hear.