Larger than our bodies

Language exerts hidden power, like the moon on the tides.
~Rita Mae Brown

Metropolitan Opera by Genista

Happy Poetry Friday! I hope December has had some high points for you. I really enjoy my family's tradition of giving homemade gifts. My daughter Elena painted the snake I'm going to use for Jone's New Year postcard. (If you aren't participating in Jone's postcard exchange but you would like one of mine, let me know.)

A reassuring excerpt from "Our Revision" by Kelly Cass Falzone:

...Science tells us we are mostly space, mostly not matter.
Maybe then, we’ll someday be more of what we once were.
If most of what is me is what cannot be seen, then my
unsomethingness will still be here for my son; yes?

Some say they can still smell their lost beloveds. I say:
Yes, of course. That which you cannot see is right beside
you. The sea can be heard in a shell or a soup can. It is
not a trick; it’s there to be heard. And we are— like the sea,

and the seeing— we are larger than our bodies; consider
the expansive contraction of the tides, the way light travels
from every star. It keeps going. And your breath, when it
leaves you, is still your breath. Still yours, and mine, too.

************

Want to share a brave poem? Info here.

More Art 4 All has the Poetry Friday round-up. Thanks, Michelle!

Filling the air

Since 2018 the chief conductor has been Luigi Gaggero. He came to Ukraine as a performing percussionist around 2012, and was impressed by the quiet attention of the audience, listening like to a spiritual message ("geistige Botschaft").
~Wikipedia

For Music Monday, the Kyiv Symphony Orchestra with Carol of the Bells and Prayer for Ukraine:

The Conductor

With an orchestra you are building citizens, better citizens for the community.
~Gustavo Dudamel

Cellist by Róbert Berény

Happy Poetry Friday! I am "away from my desk" but I'm scheduling a poem that my daughter Ariana wrote for her future mother-in-law's retirement. As a music professor, Sara created a thriving orchestra program after having started with only five students.

The Conductor
by Ariana Yeatts-Lonske
For Sara Edgerton

Sometimes she beckons a great sea swell.

Sometimes she places a pebble on top of a wall.

Sometimes she slices through slabs of marble.

Sometimes she captains a ship through choppy waters.

Sometimes she offers a single peony.

Sometimes she flicks red drops of paint.

Sometimes she closes a chest of gold.

Sometimes she opens a door to the light.

*

33 years ago, Sara walked across a field
and found five panes of glass.

She picked one up and held it to the sun,
saw a cathedral.

Only she could see it.

Last night we stood inside it.
Who says the world has lost all its beauty?

No one who has been here.
No one who has heard this.

******************

Jone Rush MacCulloch has the Poetry Friday round-up. Thanks, Jone!

Swan Knight

A knight is sworn to valor...His blade defends the helpless...His wrath undoes the wicked.
– George R.R. Martin

For Art Thursday, a terracotta sculpture of a knight with a swan helmet by my daughter Elena. The "copper" on top is where the knight's beloved has rubbed it:

Sweet babies

Compassion is a piece of vocabulary that could change us if we truly let it sink into the standards to which we hold ourselves and others.
~Krista Tippett

First Steps by Jean-François Millet

For Wellness Wednesday, a minute of sweetness:



More Krista Tippett quotes:
* Kindness is an everyday byproduct of all the great virtues.
* The things that go wrong for you have a lot of potential to become part of your gift to the world.

Celebrating the aged queen

On the face of this aged queen of our cathedrals, by the side of a wrinkle, one always finds a scar.
~Victor Hugo

Notre-Dame's largest and oldest bell, cast in 1686

For Music Monday, a bit of the Notre-Dame Cathedral reopening celebration. Daniel Lozakovich sur "Aria de la 3ème Suite" de Bach and Pretty Yende with Amazing Grace (Dudamel conducting):

Say no to mask bans

Hagstone Art

Excerpts from a Substack piece by The Disabled Ginger re: "how the shooting death of Brian Thompson is being used to re-ignite interest in banning masks in New York City - a move which would be a devastating blow to the disabled community."

This idea that masks are driving criminal activity is incredibly harmful to disabled and high risk individuals who NEED to mask for their health. It promotes the spread of disease - and discourages people who are still Covid cautious from masking.

There’s also no evidence to suggest it stops crime - and studies have shown that sunglasses obscure identity more effectively, yet no one is trying to ban them...

How far we’ve fallen that people are more concerned with banning masks than guns.

Masks bans won’t stop crimes. All they will do is fuel hateful anti-mask rhetoric and make public spaces even less safe for disabled and high risk individuals...

I naively assumed that the same people who screamed about personal freedom and bodily autonomy would oppose these bans. After all - telling someone they’re not allowed to use a medical device is a clear violation of autonomy and freedom...Of course I was wrong. They celebrated these bans.

People were cheering for them and saying they can’t wait to “rip the masks off our faces”.

In June the North Carolina ban passed - albeit with a very narrow and problematic medical exemption added back in. The ‘exemption’ allows medical masks for the purpose of “avoiding spreading a communicable disease”. Whether you can mask to avoid catching a disease - or to protect yourself from pollen or wildfire smoke - remains a legal grey area.

Who makes the determination with respect to whether YOU are masking for legal reasons? The police. As you can imagine, this is incredibly scary for people - especially those who are marginalized. These bans give police an excuse to stop, search and potentially arrest someone who’s doing nothing more than trying to safeguard their health.

Soon after the North Carolina ban passed - we heard of a woman with stage four cancer who was harassed in a store because she wouldn’t remove her mask. Another patron yelled at her that she was a “liberal” and demanded she take it off. When she explained she had cancer - he coughed on her.

This is where mask bans lead.

Read the whole piece here.

Disability-related stickers:
Fight for Disability Justice
Disability Rights are Human Rights
Make the World More Accessible
Cure Ableism
Not All Disabilities Are Visible
Certified Member Invisible Illness Club
It's Not A Miracle, I'm an Ambulatory Wheelchair User!
All of Us Are Different, None of Us Are Less