Buying Votes for Wayside Waifs

Before the county election season starts up, with all its excitement and intrigue, Wayside Waifs offers you an opportunity to vote for your favorite pet. The leader of the contest right now features a video that I fear will be stuck in my head long after the contest is over.

Sunday Poetry: The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock, by T.S. Eliot

The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.


Let us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherized upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question ...
Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"

Let us go and make our visit.
In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes,
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?"
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair--
(They will say: 'How his hair is growing thin!")
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin--
(They will say: "But how his arms and legs are thin!")
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all--
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all--
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
(But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!)
Is it perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows? ...

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

* * *

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep ... tired ... or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head (grown slightly bald) brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet--and here's no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it towards some overwhelming question,
To say: "I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all"--
If one, settling a pillow by her head
Should say: "That is not what I meant at all;
That is not it, at all."

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor--
And this, and so much more?--
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
"That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all."

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous--
Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old ... I grow old ...
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

- by T.S. Eliot
__________________________________________________

This is my favorite poem in the world. There is so much in it that is humorous, serious, tragic, pathetic, challenging, mysterious and simply lovely that every time I read it, I read it differently. I first read this poem over 30 years ago, and it has always remained fresh and relevant.

So what is going on in this poem? Narratively, the speaker of the poem is struggling with his inability to grab hold of life and love. He wants to declare his love to a woman, but cannot "force the moment to its crisis." That's all.

Stylistically, this poem is structure set to perfect purpose. Rhyme and rhythm are central to the poem, but it does not settle into any single form. The first few lines introduce a strong iambic, rhyming couplet, only to be dashed by the morbid image and non-rhyming "patient etherized upon a table". In those first three lines, we get notice that we are in the hands of a competent master of verse, with a radical's willingness to knock hard against tradition's boundaries.

Prufrock is an English major's playground, chock full of allusions to other works of literature. A quick Google search can put you onto pages of annotations, though I have yet to see one achieve a complete compilation of all that is contained within the poem. T.S. Eliot was a well-read, literate scholar, and his poetry is enriched by a thorough knowledge of other works.

Allusion is a tricky tool, and Eliot is a master for his ability to use it to enrich without obscuring. In lesser hands, allusions to other works can be frustrating and fussy - a crossword puzzle that is meaningless unless you know exactly who "Duke Orsino" is and how he figures into the plot of "Twelfth Night". In Prufrock, though, the allusions deepen and embellish the meaning, but they are not necessary to a thorough enjoyment and understanding of the work.

Take, for instance, "And indeed there will be time". That is a reference to the opening lines of Andrew Marvell's "To His Coy Mistress":

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime

If you've never read "To His Coy Mistress", the line still makes sense, and stands on its own. If you have read it, though, and you happen to catch the allusion, it brings a contrast to mind. Marvell's protagonist is not bound by self-doubt in the slightest - he practically begs for some action:

Let us roll all our strength, and all
Our sweetness, up into one ball;
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Thorough the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

Nothing could be further from Prufrock, who frets about whether he should "presume", and

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it towards some overwhelming question

Prufrock is a character who has been with me for 3 decades. It shocked me to learn that Eliot produced this masterpiece when he was 22 years old. He was born over a hundred years ago, into a society that is worlds apart from my own. Yet I still can't eat a peach without thinking of Prufrock.

Pasta with Chicken and Olives - Simple Sophistication, Quick and Easy

Elaborate recipes are great fun, but some days I just want something quick and easy. Those are the days for Pasta with Chicken and Olives. Thanks to the development of olive bars and rotisserie chicken in grocery stores, I can have this on the table in thirty minutes or less.

The olive cart at my local grocer is small but wonderful. For this recipe, I have a bias toward green olives - they tend to be a bit firmer, and their flavor goes well with chicken. But the key is to pick out a blend. I pick out a mix of 2 cups or so of olives, black and green, mostly pitted, along with a few bright red Peppadew peppers (read their odd story here)
and some caper berries. (If you've never used caper berries, just cut off their stem and prepare yourself for a briny, grainy treat.)

Don't use the slotted spoons when scooping out your olives. That juice is key to infusing the dish with flavor. I usually wind up with juice covering about half the olives.

When you get home, start a pot of water boiling for the pasta (use your favorite variety, though I prefer good old fettucini). Take about half of the meat off the chicken, in bite-sized chunks. Set it aside, and chop the olives, peppers and capers into smaller pieces. No mincing, just breaking them up a little. Dump them with the juice into a pan big enough to hold the pasta when it's ready, and heat them up.

Then go to your refrigerator and see what enhancements you want to toss in. A little Siracha sauce is great. Pepperoncini add a spicy bite. A little garlic flavor from a splash of bottled Garozzo's Amogio sauce is great. A squeeze of lemon or a little white wine works, too.

Once the pasta is cooked just a bit shy of al dente, drain it and toss it in with the olives. Add the chicken meat and cook it for 5 or so minutes so that some of the juice flavor gets into the pasta, and the dish is heated through. Mix it all up and serve it.

If you have a loaf or crusty bread or a salad, all the better, but the meal is satisfying as is. It's a lot cheaper than getting a pizza delivered, and it's even better for lunch the following day.

Corn and Spit, and Memories

Via KC Hophead, I learned that Dogfish Head Brewery is producing Chicha.

Chicha is a corn-based beer created when people chew corn, spit it out, let it dry, then mix it with water, boil it, let it ferment, and then drink it. I know, I know, it sounds more like a fraternity hazing ritual than a real beverage, but it's popular in the Andes.

A few years ago, I was in Bolivia on a service trip, and I really wanted to taste chicha. It seemed wrong to visit a country and not partake of one of the core experiences. Leonardo, our guide, was having nothing of it, though, because he told us the chicha parlors were dangerous, disorderly places where drunk Bolivians might want to take on a conspicuous, non-Spanish-speaking, non-Quechuan-speaking American. Given the near-incident that involved brandy, a drunken man, the "Girls of the Mountain" and Abba, I can't claim that he was being completely unreasonable.

Chicha was served in little huts and shacks on the side of the roads, and advertised by small white flags on long poles to announce that fresh chicha was available. When I saw a flag flying near the place we were staying, I told the guide that I was going to pay a visit, with or without him. I reasoned that for almost 2 weeks, I had been the largest person within eyesight; even if some chicha-soaked rowdy wanted a piece of me, I felt confident I could extricate myself and anyone who wanted to be in my posse.

Leonardo and Robin accompanied me to the local chicha shack at around 4 in the afternoon.

I don't know how rowdy the places get at night, but we were the only customers there. The proprietess was a tiny - I mean maybe 4 or 4 and a half feet tall - wrinkled old woman who looked like she would be whipped in a cage-match with Mother Theresa. There was also a chicken running around the place, scratching around on the dirt floor. There seemed to be no electricity, and the woman dipped a pitcher of chicha out of a repurposed industrial barrel, and brought it to us with a drinking gourd. It cost 12 cents for a pitcher, and, apparently, you could negotiate discounts if you were drinking multiple pitchers.

You don't just drink chicha. Before partaking, you pour a little from the gourd onto the dirt floor, as a respectful offering to Pachamama, the goddess of the good earth. I forgot to spill once, and earned a scowl from the old woman.

As for taste, to be honest, taste was such a tiny part of the entire experience that I neglected to taste with my entire attention. I was surprised how much it tasted like one of the wild-yeast-fermented non-fruited lambics of Belgium, thought it was a bit sweeter. It was only mildly carbonated, and the gourd was not an ideal vessel for careful observation of color, but I would say it was light-colored, kind of like a yeasty Belgian Wit. I don't think it was highly alcoholic, though it certainly was not a weak beverage; it seemed to be at about the same strength as a typical beer, or perhaps slightly weaker.

It is a strange experience to taste something without knowledge of what it is "supposed" to taste like. Given my knowledge of how the brew was traditionally produced, the scant rafts of foam floating on top were a bit of a hurdle to enjoyment, though my intellect knew they were carbonation and not remnants from the little old lady's brewing process.

On the day we departed Bolivia, Leonardo presented me with two of the only bottled examples of chicha that I saw. They were in brown plastic liter bottles, and labeled "Chernobyl Chicha". I stuffed them into my luggage and got them back to the States without having to explain them to anyone, for which I was grateful. By the time I drank them, they were more cidery and lacked the liveliness of the chicha I drank with a chicken at my feet.

Our best food and drink experiences have more to do with experience than taste.

Free Yeast for Baking

Few things on earth are as satisfying as a loaf of home-made bread of sourdough. First, the aroma spreads through the house, and then you get to saw through a rich dark crust and taste that still-warm bread. It has a tang that elevates it over blander loaves, and it's all yours for a bit of patience and less money than the cheapest supermarket fluff.

Sourdough yeast is wild yeast - not from a packet or a jar, but from the air and surfaces surrounding us. Yeast is everywhere, hoping to find the right opportunity to start converting sugars and starches into carbon dioxide and alcohol. If you give yeast that opportunity and capture its carbon dioxide in a glue of flour and fluid, you have bread dough.

Thousands of varieties of yeast exist around us. Over time, civilization has cultured the "best" varieties, and these are the ones you find in foil packets in the grocery store. They are wonderful at what they do - produce consistent loaves with dependable rise and a neutral flavor. Now, they even have rapid-rise versions that do all those things in about half the time the prior generations had to invest in their bread.

Sourdough yeast is different. It has a tangy, distinctive, sour taste. It rises on a slower schedule, and can be finicky about whether it will rise at all. Sourdough yeast is typically kept in starters, some of which have been passed down for generations and originally gained fame when gold prospectors left their civilized yeast behind and started fresh cultures of wild yeast in the Wild West (you can get a free starter of a Carl Griffin's Oregon Trail strain from 1847 here, for the cost of a self-addressed stamped envelope).

It's easy to make your own starter, though. Saturday morning, I mixed a cup of flour and a cup of water, and put it in a loosely covered jar and let it sit. By Saturday evening, a layer of yellow-brownish fluid had formed on the surface, and I mixed it back in. Sunday morning, it looked kind of foamy. This morning, it had risen up the jar and fallen back down, and is ready to be "fed" with more water and flour.

The yellowish stripe in the second picture is "hooch" - a layer of fluid with alcohol in it, but nothing you would want to drink. You can either mix it back in or wait for it to rise to the surface and pour it off.

I have captured the wild yeast, and, as baking season returns, I'll be able to create my own unique versions of sourdough loaves, biscuits and even waffles.

Sunday Poetry: Musee des Beaux Arts, by W. H. Auden

Musee des Beaux Arts

About suffering they were never wrong,
The Old Masters; how well, they understood
Its human position; how it takes place
While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;
How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting
For the miraculous birth, there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:
They never forgot
That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course
Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot
Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse
Scratches its innocent behind on a tree.
In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away
Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may
Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry,
But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone
As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green
Water; and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen
Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky,
had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.

- by W. H. Auden
_________________________________________________

Ordinary life versus the extraordinary. Most people read this poem as a statement of how life continues on, and how ordinary life diminishes the astonishing. Even the spectacular fall of Icarus from the sky (when he ventured too close to the sun and the heat melted the wax of the wings his father had crafted to help him escape the Minotaur's maze) does not draw the attention of the common folk in Breughel's painting of the scene.

It is, of course, a completely accurate reading of the poem. We are like that expensive delicate ship, in that we are vaguely aware of the amazing tragedies and joys that surround us. A friend had a son this past week; another friend was diagnosed with a horrid and terminal disease. I went to the Chiefs game today and I'll go to work tomorrow. As Auden wrote about the day that his friend William Butler Yeats died:

But in the importance and noise of to-morrow
When the brokers are roaring like beasts on the floor of the Bourse,
And the poor have the sufferings to which they are fairly accustomed,
And each in the cell of himself is almost convinced of his freedom,
A few thousand will think of this day
As one thinks of a day when one did something slightly unusual.

Life does go on.

There is another reading, though. The world is an incredibly rich place, filled with exquisite pain and beauty that can stop you at full sail. The old masters saw that - that we cannot always be fully aware of the beauty of each birth, or the tragic failure of those who strive greatly. But it's there, if we look, and if we dare to see and feel it.

Mix Tapes/CDs

For our Book Club meeting this week, we read "Love is a Mix Tape", and a bunch of us created mix CDs to share. It occurred to me that it had been years since I had created my own mix, though the technology for sharing music has improved vastly from the days of putting an album on the turntable and snapping the cassette recorder on and off as the desired songs played. Back in cassette days, a mix tape was a real time investment, but now it's a matter of dragging and dropping.

It was a fun project. The challenge is to come up with something that the recipient might not have heard, which forced me to break out of my "same old" mold. My natural inclination was to pull out a few of my favorite songs by favorite artists, but what's the point of sharing Springsteen, Petty, Dylan, and Prince when the people I know are mostly well-versed in their music already? A mix tape should introduce your friends to the gems you've found that might not have shown up on their radar.

I would up going with a mostly alt.country mix, with a few other gems. Alt.country is a sound I've been enjoying a lot over the past several years, and it's under-appreciated by most people who think of rock as Springsteen and country as Toby Keith.

Anyhow, here's what I came up with.

1. Let's Take Some Drugs And Drive Around… 5:12
2. I Will Survive / Cake 5:11
3. Shrapnel / American Steel 4:28
4. Permanent Scar / O+S 3:34
5. Hurting Each Other / Johnette Napolitano… 4:12
6. Skinny Love / Bon Iver 3:59
7. Some Are Lakes / Land Of Talk 3:41
8. Flowered Dresses / Slaid Cleaves 3:49
9. Another Kind Of Blue / Slaid Cleaves 2:28
10. Hallelujah / Jeff Buckley 6:53
11. Oh My Sweet Carolina / Ryan Adams 4:57
12. Girl From Maryville / Thad Cockrell 4:29
13. I and Love and You / The Avett Brothers 5:01
14. Drown / Son Volt 3:22
15. A Better Place / The Setters 3:59
16. Euro-Trash Girl / Cracker 8:04

There was also a bonus track in there, which shall remain nameless.

Since I've reintroduced myself to the ease of sharing music with friends, I think I'll try to do a better job of evangelizing music I like.

A Hoppy Shade of Pale

I've been neglecting the blog writing this week - it's tough to get caught up after a week away.

For a better-spent week, Gary Street at the under-appreciated Muddy Mo provides a report on his week tasting 7 pale ales and looking forward to his next homebrew project.

"Pale ale" is a term that applies to a broad swath of beers, and Gary's sequential approach is a great way to learn about different beers and your own tastes. You can get a lot more nuance out of a beer if you taste it in comparison with another of the same or similar style, and that helps you decide what to be looking for in your brewing and buying.

Springfield Cashew Chicken

Batter-dipped, deep-fried chunks of chicken, topped with a sauce based on oyster sauce, served over rice with a sprinkling of crisp cashews and a garnish of green onions - that's what I'm talking about. One of Missouri's great contributions to the culinary world, Cashew Chicken is a soul-satisfying melding of Chinese tradition with the Midwestern insistence that everything is better when it's battered and fried.

Springfield residents are justifiably proud of the dish, which must be ordered as "Springfield Cashew Chicken" outside of the area, lest one be served a batter-deprived stir-fried version with vegetables serving as a major component, rather than a garnish. Some residents of the city will claim that Springfield has the most Chinese restaurants per capita of any city in the United States - an unverified, unsourced and unlikely assertion if ever there was one, but it's nice to see Southern Missourians taking pride in something that doesn't involve large tires, guns, or strange interpretations of the Bible, so let's let that one slide, okay?

The important thing is that the dish is really good. Well-prepared, the sauce is a tiny bit sweet and a little more salty, the chicken pieces are crisp and light, the green onions add just enough bite, and the cashews add elements of crispness and richness. It's not pretentious in the slightest - this is food aimed to please, not impress.

According to most histories, the dish was invented by a man named David Leong, whose first restaurant was welcomed to the neighborhood with ten sticks of dynamite. (Asian-Americans weren't appreciated in southern Missouri in 1963, even if they had stormed the beach at Omaha.) No wonder he chose to please the local palate rather than challenge it.

On my recent vacation in Colorado, Ancillary Adams and his wonderful "lady friend" prepared a home-made version of the dish, and it may have been the best meal served in Breckenridge that evening.

Are there any good versions of this regional treat served at restaurants here in Kansas City?

Back from Colorado

It's mind-boggling that a half-day's drive away from Kansas City, you can see mountains soar above 14,000 feet, you can wade knee-deep in beautiful trout streams, and you can feel the relaxed funky vibe of a low-oxygen Colorado mountain town.

Now it's back to the real world.

Michael Tosatto on Kids in Restaurants

Michael Tosatto, over at the usually even-tempered Cooking in Kansas City (worth adding to your list of regular reads because of such gems as Olive Oil Cake) unleashed his fury on families who behave like savages in restaurants.

I've been on all sides of this one. Before I had children, I had zero tolerance for screaming babies, and I had militaristic expectations of behavior from everyone else. Families like the von Trapps were okay, but the Brady Bunch would have been too rambunctious for my patience.

After I had children, my standards slipped, but just a little. A few cries from a baby are tolerable, but just a few. Whereas I formerly believed that parents should be dashing to the parking lot with the crying kid like a running back as soon as the crying started, I came to see that most crying babies can be calmed within a minute, with a properly applied pacifier or a few bounces on a parental shoulder. So, that became my Plan A, but Plan B (removing the child from earshot of the other patrons) would be implemented within a minute, if Plan A didn't deliver immediate results.

My expectations for non-infant children remained the same - volume should remain at respectable levels, and no clowning around that can disturb other patrons. And I got more strict in my attitude toward parents. This is not the time to threaten pain and dismemberment on your child. That time is in the home, so that when you give them that raised eyebrow or use a certain phrase to them, they know you mean business and will submit to human behavior with a minimum of fuss. Parents who create a bigger disturbance than their obnoxious children should eat in the car, or at home.

Now, all this judgmental opinion doesn't mean that you cannot take a rambunctious child anywhere. Chucky Cheese is designed with the expectation that kids will behave like unschooled savages, so all bets are off. (As a side note, I caution parents with well-behaved children to carefully consider whether they should expose their angels to the demons of Chucky Cheese. Perhaps your little angel simply hasn't realized that it is even possible to run around a restaurant with half-eaten pizza spilling from your screaming mouth.)

Similarly, some bars with pin-ball machines are well-suited to a late afternoon or early evening visit with an energetic child. Ms. Pacman served as our family babysitter on more than one trip to Hooper's, and the children are now model adults. But get them out of there before people get drunk enough to dance on tables, okay?

Sunday Poetry: The Death of the Hired Man, by Robert Frost

The Death of the Hired Man

Mary sat musing on the lamp-flame at the table
Waiting for Warren. When she heard his step,
She ran on tip-toe down the darkened passage
To meet him in the doorway with the news
And put him on his guard. 'Silas is back.'
She pushed him outward with her through the door
And shut it after her. "Be kind,' she said.
She took the market things from Warren's arms
And set them on the porch, then drew him down
To sit beside her on the wooden steps.
'When was I ever anything but kind to him?
But I'll not have the fellow back,' he said.
'I told him so last haying, didn't I?
"If he left then," I said, "that ended it."
What good is he? Who else will harbour him
At his age for the little he can do?
What help he is there's no depending on.
Off he goes always when I need him most.
'He thinks he ought to earn a little pay,
Enough at least to buy tobacco with,
won't have to beg and be beholden."
"All right," I say "I can't afford to pay
Any fixed wages, though I wish I could."
"Someone else can."
"Then someone else will have to.
I shouldn't mind his bettering himself
If that was what it was. You can be certain,
When he begins like that, there's someone at him
Trying to coax him off with pocket-money, --
In haying time, when any help is scarce.
In winter he comes back to us. I'm done.'
'Shh I not so loud: he'll hear you,' Mary said.
'I want him to: he'll have to soon or late.'
'He's worn out. He's asleep beside the stove.
When I came up from Rowe's I found him here,
Huddled against the barn-door fast asleep,
A miserable sight, and frightening, too-
You needn't smile -- I didn't recognize him-
I wasn't looking for him- and he's changed.
Wait till you see.'
'Where did you say he'd been?
'He didn't say. I dragged him to the house,
And gave him tea and tried to make him smoke.
I tried to make him talk about his travels.
Nothing would do: he just kept nodding off.'
'What did he say? Did he say anything?'
'But little.'
'Anything? Mary, confess
He said he'd come to ditch the meadow for me.'
'Warren!'
'But did he? I just want to know.'
'Of course he did. What would you have him say?
Surely you wouldn't grudge the poor old man
Some humble way to save his self-respect.
He added, if you really care to know,
He meant to dear the upper pasture, too.
That sounds like something you have heard before?
Warren, I wish you could have heard the way
He jumbled everything. I stopped to look
Two or three times -- he made me feel so queer--
To see if he was talking in his sleep.
He ran on Harold Wilson -- you remember -
The boy you had in haying four years since.
He's finished school, and teaching in his college.
Silas declares you'll have to get him back.
He says they two will make a team for work:
Between them they will lay this farm as smooth!
The way he mixed that in with other things.
He thinks young Wilson a likely lad, though daft
On education -- you know how they fought

All through July under the blazing sun,
Silas up on the cart to build the load,
Harold along beside to pitch it on.'
'Yes, I took care to keep well out of earshot.'
'Well, those days trouble Silas like a dream.
You wouldn't think they would. How some things linger!
Harold's young college boy's assurance piqued him.
After so many years he still keeps finding
Good arguments he sees he might have used.
I sympathize. I know just how it feels
To think of the right thing to say too late.
Harold's associated in his mind with Latin.
He asked me what I thought of Harold's saying
He studied Latin like the violin
Because he liked it -- that an argument!
He said he couldn't make the boy believe
He could find water with a hazel prong--
Which showed how much good school had ever done
him. He wanted to go over that. 'But most of all
He thinks if he could have another chance
To teach him how to build a load of hay --'
'I know, that's Silas' one accomplishment.
He bundles every forkful in its place,
And tags and numbers it for future reference,
So he can find and easily dislodge it
In the unloading. Silas does that well.
He takes it out in bunches like big birds' nests.
You never see him standing on the hay
He's trying to lift, straining to lift himself.'
'He thinks if he could teach him that, he'd be

Some good perhaps to someone in the world.
He hates to see a boy the fool of books.
Poor Silas, so concerned for other folk,
And nothing to look backward to with pride,
And nothing to look forward to with hope,
So now and never any different.'
Part of a moon was filling down the west,
Dragging the whole sky with it to the hills.
Its light poured softly in her lap. She saw
And spread her apron to it. She put out her hand
Among the harp-like morning-glory strings,
Taut with the dew from garden bed to eaves,
As if she played unheard the tenderness
That wrought on him beside her in the night.
'Warren,' she said, 'he has come home to die:
You needn't be afraid he'll leave you this time.'
'Home,' he mocked gently.
'Yes, what else but home?
It all depends on what you mean by home.
Of course he's nothing to us, any more
then was the hound that came a stranger to us
Out of the woods, worn out upon the trail.'
'Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
They have to take you in.'
'I should have called it
Something you somehow haven't to deserve.'
Warren leaned out and took a step or two,
Picked up a little stick, and brought it back
And broke it in his hand and tossed it by.
'Silas has better claim on' us, you think,
Than on his brother? Thirteen little miles
As the road winds would bring him to his door.
Silas has walked that far no doubt to-day.
Why didn't he go there? His brother's rich,
A somebody- director in the bank.'
'He never told us that.'
'We know it though.'
'I think his brother ought to help, of course.
I'll see to that if there is need. He ought of right
To take him in, and might be willing to-
He may be better than appearances.
But have some pity on Silas. Do you think
If he'd had any pride in claiming kin
Or anything he looked for from his brother,
He'd keep so still about him all this time?'
'I wonder what's between them.'
'I can tell you.
Silas is what he is -- we wouldn't mind him--
But just the kind that kinsfolk can't abide.
He never did a thing so very bad.
He don't know why he isn't quite as good
As anyone. He won't be made ashamed
To please his brother, worthless though he is.'
'I can't think Si ever hurt anyone.'
'No, but he hurt my heart the way he lay
And rolled his old head on that sharp-edged chair-back.
He wouldn't let me put him on the lounge.
You must go in and see what you can do.
I made the bed up for him there to-night.
You'll be surprised at him -- how much he's broken.
His working days are done; I'm sure of it.'
'I'd not be in a hurry to say that.'
'I haven't been. Go, look, see for yourself.
But, Warren, please remember how it is:
He' come to help you ditch the meadow.
He has a plan, You mustn't laugh at him.
He may not speak of it, and then he may.
I'll sit and see if that small sailing cloud
Will hit or miss the moon.'
It hit the moon. Then there were three there, making a dim row,
The moon, the little silver cloud, and she.
Warren returned-- too soon, it seemed to her,
Slipped to her side, caught up her hand and waited.
'Warren?' she questioned.
'Dead,' was all he answered

- by Robert Frost
_____________________________________________

I know I've already gone to the well of Robert Frost twice in this series. But he's one of my favorite American poets, and it's been months since I've written about him, and this is probably one that most people have not read, unless they are Frost fanatics or English majors.

This poem is an example of blank verse, by which I mean that the meter is well-established, but Frost does not employ rhyme. Blank verse has a long tradition - and that's a little word play, since it is favored in lengthy poems. "Paradise Lost", Milton's masterpiece, is an example, and the contrast of blank verse's dignity in the hands of Milton compared to the sing-songy annoyance of Alexander Pope's long rhymes shows the advantage of blank verse for sustained reading.

I also admire Frost's restrained use of iambic pentameter. He uses enough variation to prevent the "iambic bongos" effect. The poem offers enough structure to make it hold together, but not so much that the structure dominates the poem.

This poem shows Frost's mastery of dialogue. Notice that you learn enough about Silas to understand the poignancy of his visit without having either of the speakers launch into an improbable biographical narrative. The husband and wife speak naturally to each other about their visitor, and the husband sets the scene by explaining the source of his disapproval before the wife explains that .

For me, the section that stands out is:

'Home is the place where, when you have to go there,
They have to take you in.'
'I should have called it
Something you somehow haven't to deserve.'

Perhaps Frost was speaking of his own careful use of words and their placement when he wrote:

He thinks if he could have another chance
To teach him how to build a load of hay --'
'I know, that's Silas' one accomplishment.
He bundles every forkful in its place,
And tags and numbers it for future reference,
So he can find and easily dislodge it
In the unloading. Silas does that well.
He takes it out in bunches like big birds' nests.

There are learned analyses of this poem - probably even a few University theses. But, for me, the length and conversational tone relax me far too much to engage in such a dissection. I particularly enjoy listening to Robert Frost himself read this poem - you can find an audio file of him doing so at this wonderful archive.

Missouri Bar Keeps its Money in Missouri

For years, the Missouri Bar Board of Governors has treated itself to a lavish trip to some exotic locale, underwritten by the bar dues of less-exalted attorneys. In January, while the rest of the state was struggling with sleet and freezing rain, the Missouri Bar Board of Governors would jet off to the Bahamas or the Florida Keys or the people-watching paradise of South Beach. While there, they would hold a sinfully brief meeting to "justify the expense". Incredibly, they would even use that meeting to plan raising the bar dues or to convince legislators to pass judicial pay raises.

Irony sunbathed on those trips.

Finally, the Bar has listened to the complaints and decided to scale back the meeting, bringing it back to Missouri. Not surprisingly, this dose of common sense comes from Skip Walther, the President-elect of the Bar. Skip is a great guy with excellent judgment. Under his leadership, the Missouri Bar will increase in its credibility as a voice for justice.

Remembering Brookside Soccer

On the way home the other day, I saw a group of tiny soccer players swarming around a field, hip-high to a guy trying to restrict the motion to a space defined by plastic orange cones. It brought a surge of nostalgia - for years, I was a coach of kids in Brookside soccer.

The team played together for 4 or 5 years, and I had a tremendous amount of fun in my role as coach. Part of the reason for the pleasant experience was the attitude of my group of parents. The only time a parent questioned my substitutions was once when one asked whether her son had spent his fair share of time on the bench; I wasn't subjected to the hyper-competitive parents who advocate for their child's maximum time at preferred positions.

But the greatest part was the kids. They were a motley crowd of widely varying abilities. A few of them belonged on premier teams, a few of them showed no evidence of athletic ability whatsoever, but most of them were average kids, full of energy, short of attention, and always excitable. I shouted through the games, but only advice and positive comments. As a result, the less talented players always felt welcome on our recreational team, and everyone got equal playing time, so, as the years in the league progressed, our team slipped further and further from a winning record, as other teams winnowed their ranks of weaker players by making them feel less welcome.

By the end of our time together, wins came rarely, but the team always had fun, and we had our sparks of talent. Justin had a booming foot and a great, can-do attitude. Steven was hilarious, a smart-mouthed kid who kept me in stitches. Arnaud was a great kid, with all-star talent. Lee, Bobby, Paul, Andrew, Ben, and dozens of others cycled through the team, and all brought enthusiasm and developing skills.

They are now in their early twenties. I've lost touch with most of them, though I see a few of their parents around once in a while, and ask how they're doing.

Seeing the coach out in the field with the group of little, shin-guarded tykes, it crossed my mind to volunteer again, and take on a new group of kids. But then I remembered that I'm not as quick on my feet anymore, and my schedule would make practice time hard to calendar. I also reminded myself of those cold, not-quite-rainy-enough Saturday mornings when I wished I could just sleep in.

If you're of an age and station where you have the time and ability to coach a group of little ones, I recommend the experience with sincere warmth. Go here to get involved.

My team never won a bunch of games, but we had a lot of fun, learned a few skills, and outclassed everyone we played with our sportsmanship. Except for that time that Steven spit in his hand before the traditional post-game hand-slaps with the opposing team . . .

Affirmative Action for Rich People

Somehow, the horrible injustice of "affirmative action" seems downright natural when it works in favor of the privileged. When top schools give admissions preference to children of segregation-era alums, few question the practice. When children are groomed for management of the family business, that is called succession planning, not an offense to meritocracy.

And when a teacher is given a regular slot on the "Today Show", it's because she's the best possible choice for the position.