See sun's change

The pointillist leaf color changer is painting our North Woods. A few leaves here, a splotch there, first sumac, now maples, against back drop fields of goldenrod, ripening field corn, and soy beans. Tomorrow is the first day of meteorological Autumn. Even the weather is showing tinges of the changing season so today I finally did what should have been a Spring chore of washing the outside of some windows. Return of lower angle, late afternoon sun made the need obvious.

maple leaves trading chlorophyl for gold

Photo by J. Harrington

Hummingbirds are still coming to the sugar water feeders. I expect those birds to head south before autumn equinox (Alban Elfed to the Druids among us). Meanwhile, Minnesota's early season for teal and geese opens next Saturday, September 6th. I'm still contemplating whether to participate. It's been a few years since I've hunted waterfowl and I miss it but I'm also far out of practice. We'll see what the weather is looking like and how the chores are going.

Recently I stumbled onto a resource that looks like it may be increasingly helpful, the way things are going with the regime in Washington, D.C. In case you've been looking for something like The Anti-Autocracy Handbook: A Scholars’ Guide to Navigating Democratic Backsliding, click the link. A quick skim suggests it can be useful even to those who aren't scholars. If you scroll and click around a bit, you may well find some other helpful resources at the site. I'm getting more and more frustrated by the lack of really effective pushback at authoritarian Executive Orders combined with incompetence and malfeasance. American Democracy, even with all its flaws, deserves better protection and restoration than we're providing.

[Update, just discovered despite its 1993 publication: 

From Dictatorship to Democracy: A Conceptual Framework for Liberation]

Perhaps the World Ends Here

by Joy Harjo

The world begins at a kitchen table. No Matter what, we must eat to live.

The gifts of earth are brought and prepared, set on the table. So it has been since creation, and it will go on.

…It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh with us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.

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Abundance and Reciprocity

Summer's midpoint is about a month away, on August 7, unless, like many of the Celts, we recognize only two seasons, in which case Summer solstice was also midsummer, half way between the two equinoxes. Since Minnesota is (in)famous for its two seasons of either winter or road work, I'm not sure where that leaves us. Each, in its own way, is exceptionally irritating and this road work season's trials and tribulations are compounded by roads being buckled by well above (historic) normal temperatures. At least we've not (yet) reached the level of flash flooding Texas is experiencing these days.

butterfly weed in bloom

Photo by J. Harrington

Locally, butterfly weed has started to bloom. Roadsides are also brightened by black-eyed Susans and what I think is bird's-foot trefoil. Many Eastern-tailed blue butterflies have been flitting around the driveway. Yard work is getting done in bits and pieces and short bursts in between downpours and unworkable levels of heat and humidity. Storms keep bringing down more branches, and an occasional tree, which have to get cleaned up before the mowing can occur. 

I suspect lots of folks in Gaza and Ukraine would be only too happy to trade problems with me, even if I add in a raccoon that twice yesterday tried to feed from the bird feeder and mention that it looks like deer, rabbits, or somethings, have managed to do in the serviceberry bushes I planted a couple of weeks ago. Maybe they'll recover. We'll wait and see (with extremely lowered expectations).

One of the bigger concerns I have these days is that we're living in a time of sliding baselines in environmental, societal and political sectors. I'm too often hearing in my head the line from Me and Bobby McGee "freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose." Is a freedom with nothing left to lose what we really want as a country? Or, do we need to include responsibility to balance our freedom? Have you read Robin Wall Kimmerer's The Serviceberry? It offers a helpful and healthy alternative to our current situation.

Solstice

by Jane Hirshfield

The Earth today tilts one way, then another.

And yes, though all things change,
this night again will watch its fireflies,
then go in to a bed with sheets,
to lights, a beloved.

To running water cold and hot.

Take nothing for granted,
you who were also opulent, a stung cosmos.

Birds sang, frogs sang, their sufficient unto.
The late-night rain-bringing thunder.

And if days grew ordinarily shorter,
the dark’s mirror lengthened,

and one’s gain was not the other lessened.

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We're all in/on this together

The world is full of good, or at least better, news, but we won't find it in main stream media's "if it bleeds, it leads" coverage. Try looking in books. I'm just finishing What If We Get It Right, Visions of Climate Futures. It's leaving me feeling encouraged despite yesterday's political assassination and shootings, allegedly by a christian nationalist right-wing police imitator.

For a recent birthday, I received a copy of Robert Macfarlane's Is a River Alive? Reading is underway and, so far, it's as good as I hoped it could be. If Ecuador can incorporate the rights of nature in its constitution, why not US?

Blue Marble
Image Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring

There's a couple or three old sayings you should be aware of: as a recovering planner, I learned quite well that "more of the same never solved a problem." That fits rather well, I think, with “Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” And let's not forget, now that we find ourselves at the bottom of a deep hole, to stop digging.

When I was growing up, the future was presented as something objective out there that, over time, we entered. During the past few years I've learned that the future is actually like a garden. It's something we ourselves grow. If we do a good job and work together, we'll have stores to get US through the winter and early spring. If not, we're in serious, perhaps deadly, trouble. Too many of US seem too think going it alone is the solution. Survival and thriving are shared results unless you're the Donner party.

We have become hyper-individualistic to the point of selfdestruction. Let me share an example from the past week or so that, I think, helps make my case. My email inbox has been repeatedly filled by conservation organizations asking me to "Take Action" to change or eliminate one provision or another off the Reconciliation bill in the Senate. None of the requests suggested killing the whole damn POS. I responded that I would ask the members of Congress representing me to Kill the Bill, but not individual provisions. I remain deeply disappointed that there isn't a coalition of conservation interests working to totally defeat the House's crappy work.

Without

Joy Harjo    1951 –

 

The world will keep trudging through time without us

When we lift from the story contest to fly home

We will be as falling stars to those watching from the edge

Of grief and heartbreak

Maybe then we will see the design of the two-minded creature 

And know why half the world fights righteously for greedy masters 

And the other half is nailing it all back together

Through the smoke of cooking fires, lovers’ trysts, and endless 

Human industry—

Maybe then, beloved rascal

We will find each other again in the timeless weave of breathing

We will sit under the trees in the shadow of earth sorrows 

Watch hyenas drink rain, and laugh.

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United we stand ...

Today I’m (re)posting the story below because, as much  as I dislike MAGAts, I keep wondering who is benefitting from our being at each others' throats and in each others' faces. I really hate being played for a sucker.

Using Art to Bridge the Rural-Urban Divide

by Anya Petrone Slepyan, The Daily Yonder
March 21, 2025

As the 2024 election approached, news channels and commentators once again revived a familiar narrative: the urban-rural divide. 

But Laura Zabel, executive director of Minnesota-based arts non-profit Springboard for the Arts, was more interested in urban-rural solidarity. 

“Going into an election year, we knew that there was going to be a lot of narrative that focused on ways we might be different, or ways that people assume we’re different,” Zabel said. “And we wanted to do something to not only counter that narrative, but to help people build real relationships and real solidarity across urban and rural places.” 

Stoking resentment between urban and rural communities serves to divide largely working-class constituencies that could gain more political power if they work together, Zabel said. Emphasizing what these communities have in common, across different geographies and demographics, can help counter that divide. But it’s not easy to overcome a narrative that is so deeply ingrained that many Americans take it for granted.

So Springboard for the Arts launched a new initiative, consisting of over 35 artists working on projects across Minnesota, Michigan, Kentucky, and Colorado that connect urban and rural communities. The installations include phone booths that connect communities in rural Northfield, Minnesota and Minneapolis, a culinary project that celebrates the fusion of a chef’s Southeast Asian roots and rural midwestern upbringing, and a Kentucky poetry slam honoring the renowned theorist and professor bell hooks.

Artists Drew Arrieta and Maddy Barsch created cozy phone booths that connected the communities of Minneapolis and Northfield, Minnesota. (Photo by Drew Arrieta)

The results, Zabel said, demonstrate “all of the different ways that we’re connected, and all of the different creative ways that we might reach out to one another and build that kind of understanding.” 

Using art projects to foster connection and understanding is effective, according to Zabel, because they leave room for nuance and complexity that is often flattened by media narratives.  Creative projects can also help people approach new ideas with a more open mind, she said. 

“Art has a tremendous ability to build shared experience in ways that takes people outside of their comfort zone, or makes people more open to thinking of things in a different way,” Zabel said.

A project installed in two Minnesota elementary schools demonstrates the principles behind the projects. Artist David Hamlow worked with 2nd and 3rd graders in rural St. James and urban Minneapolis to design wall sculptures made of recycled materials. Each student was also given a yearbook photo of a participating student from the other school, and asked to incorporate that picture into the sculpture. The resulting walls of faces serve a purpose similar to pen pals, according to Zabel.

Each student was given a class portrait of their counterpart at a different school, and asked to decorate the picture with recycled materials. (Photo by David Hamlow)

“The goal of this whole project in a nutshell is to just get people thinking about one another as individuals and as people who are living full lives and having similar experiences and to help people be more curious about what those lives might be like,” Zabel said.

The youth-focused project also hopes to reach urban and rural children before they’ve internalized the harmful stereotypes these communities can apply to one another. 

Project installations by the initial class of 35 artists are ongoing, but Zabel hopes to expand the initiative further in coming years.

“I think that if we are able to build greater understanding and connection, and help people see a more complete picture of what it looks like to live in different contexts, we end up finding out that there is a lot of shared interest and shared hope for our future and our children,” Zabel said.

This article first appeared on The Daily Yonder and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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Values for the seventh generation

It’s the time of year when fawns and goslings and cygnets and sandhill crane colts are adulting, i.e., growing into their adulthood. It’s never been very clear to me how much of animal behavior is genetic and instinctive versus learned from adults of the species. If anyone has a recommended source on this topic, please leave a comment.

almost grown Canada geese goslings and adults

Photo by J. Harrington

I recently watched a video of our almost four year old (more than 3 1/2) granddaughter learning to lead and ride a pony that’s several orders of magnitude larger than she is. She looks comfortable and unfazed both in front of and on top of the pony. I think I was in my late teens or early twenties before I took riding lessons. I never did get really comfortable on a horse.

Part of today’s theme is prompted by an article I recently read on Slashdot: Should Kids Still Learn to Code in the Age of AI? The phrase that caught my attention is “... the idea that learning to program is the cornerstone of computational thinking and an important gateway to the problem-solving, critical thinking, and creative thinking skills necessary to thrive in today's digitally driven world.” It left me wondering what other gateways are there in today’s curricula to problem solving, critical thinking and creative thinking and where does humanism and characteristics that define humanity fit in?

Before I cane across the Slashdot trigger, I was considering getting my hands on a copy of The Blind Spot: Why Science Cannot Ignore Human Experience, although first I need to finish reading The Systems View of Life. I’m about 2/3rds of the way through at the moment. Recent events, compounded by a pandemic and four years under the rule of a wanna-be dictator, have made me concerned about the kind of future our Granddaughter and her cohorts will grow up in and if anyone can anticipate the kind of country she’ll have to live in when she is grown up. It seems to me that the seventh generation principle becomes more challenging to apply the greater the rate of change triggered by (mostly) human factors.

All of the preceding is a convoluted and long-winded way of expressing my view that we have become too short-sighted and focused on the cost of things rather than their value. For some years now I’ve tried to be guided by a speech of a former presidential candidate, Bobby Kennedy. Here’s an essential excerpt:

Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages, the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage, neither our wisdom nor our learning, neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country, it measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.

These are the values I want to see expressed by any presidential candidate that wants my vote. These values are timeless.

For the Children

The rising hills, the slopes,
of statistics
lie before us.
the steep climb
of everything, going up,
up, as we all
go down.

In the next century
or the one beyond that,
they say,
are valleys, pastures,
we can meet there in peace
if we make it.

To climb these coming crests
one word to you, to
you and your children:

stay together
learn the flowers
go light

Gary Snyder
From: Turtle Island

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Some ways to wisdom

The Better Half and I spent much of the afternoon listening to a wise and interesting white man, Kent Nerburn, talk about the wisdom of Native Americans. Nerburn has written a number of books on the theme of his talk and he read excerpts from several, plus answered questions and spoke a bit from his own notes. The presentation took place in an art gallery in Sandstone, about an hour’s drive north of our place. The trip home was disrupted by a several mile long traffic backup north of Hinckley and another one near the Pine / Chisago county boundary on I-35. If it’s not winter blizzards messing up Minnesota’s roads, it’s summer road work making drivers harried.

Thinking about Nerburn’s comments while sitting in the southbound backup pretty much convinced me, not that I needed much, that Native Americans have more sustainable and resilient cultures than ours. Plus, ours is headed in the wrong direction. We have much too much emphasis on individuals and not enough on community; we place waayyy too much value on money and not enough on intangible values like friendship and kindness; we confuse religion with spiritual. Over the past several decades, I’ve noticed increasing awareness of, and acceptance of, Native American culture. More is needed. I hope we become wise enough to include many indigenous teachings in our children’s education. Whether he intended to or not, I believe President Biden reflected honor on the role of elders in a healthy culture when he decided to not campaign for the nomination and became a potential elder advisor to the next president. We need more of that kind of thinking and doing.

sometimes an owl symbolizes wisdom

Photo by J. Harrington

If you’re interested in learning more about how Native American and Western Judeo-Christian perspectives can complement each other, try reading any of these:

• Gathering Moss, Robin Wall Kimmerer
• Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer
• Medicine Wheel for the Planet, Dr. Jennifer Grenz
• The Seven Generations and The Seven Grandfather Teachings, James Vukelich Kaagegaabaw
• The above linked list of books by Kent Nerburn
• Almost any Joy Harjo poem such as this

For Calling the Spirit Back from Wandering the Earth in Its Human Feet 

Joy Harjo
1951 – 

Put down that bag of potato chips, that white bread, that bottle of pop.

Turn off that cellphone, computer, and remote control.

Open the door, then close it behind you.

Take a breath offered by friendly winds. They travel the earth gathering essences of plants to clean.

Give it back with gratitude.

If you sing it will give your spirit lift to fly to the stars’ ears and back.

Acknowledge this earth who has cared for you since you were a dream planting itself precisely within your parents’ desire.

Let your moccasin feet take you to the encampment of the guardians who have known you before time, who will be there after time. They sit before the fire that has been there without time.

Let the earth stabilize your postcolonial insecure jitters.

Be respectful of the small insects, birds and animal people who accompany you.
Ask their forgiveness for the harm we humans have brought down upon them.

Don’t worry.
The heart knows the way though there may be high-rises, interstates, checkpoints, armed soldiers, massacres, wars, and those who will despise you because they despise themselves.

The journey might take you a few hours, a day, a year, a few years, a hundred, a thousand or even more.

Watch your mind. Without training it might run away and leave your heart for the immense human feast set by the thieves of time.

Do not hold regrets.

When you find your way to the circle, to the fire kept burning by the keepers of your soul, you will be welcomed.

You must clean yourself with cedar, sage, or other healing plant.

Cut the ties you have to failure and shame.

Let go the pain you are holding in your mind, your shoulders, your heart, all the way to your feet. Let go the pain of your ancestors to make way for those who are heading in our direction.

Ask for forgiveness.

Call upon the help of those who love you. These helpers take many forms: animal, element, bird, angel, saint, stone, or ancestor.

Call your spirit back. It may be caught in corners and creases of shame, judgment, and human abuse.

You must call in a way that your spirit will want to return.

Speak to it as you would to a beloved child.

Welcome your spirit back from its wandering. It may return in pieces, in tatters. Gather them together. They will be happy to be found after being lost for so long.

Your spirit will need to sleep awhile after it is bathed and given clean clothes.

Now you can have a party. Invite everyone you know who loves and supports you. Keep room for those who have no place else to go.

Make a giveaway, and remember, keep the speeches short.

Then, you must do this: help the next person find their way through the dark. 

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Make America Great Again, Vote, but NOT for Felons!

I may have known, but forgot, or maybe I missed the announcement when it was made, but today I (re?)learned that there’s no incumbent in our Legislative District in this year’s election. I’m doubtful that will lead to being represented by a Democrat in our area, although that was the case when we first moved in. According to Ballotpedia, our district has leaned more and more Republican for the past decade or so. Since I have neither aspirations to nor any probability of becoming a billionaire, I lean heavily toward the left and find few, if any, uses for Republicans and even fewer for MAGAts. I truly never thought I’d live to see the day when a major political party would nominated a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist as its presidential candidate. So much for American exceptionalism. How about Make America Great Again, Don’t Vote for Felons!

Then again, the contrarian in me (yes, me) raises the question: If Joe Biden were more like Mitch McConnell, would we have Clarence Thomas, aided and abetted by Gini, on the SCOTUS? And why, when they had their trifecta, didn’t the Democrats incorporate Roe V. Wade in legislation? As long as I’m at it, the country would be better served, in my opinion, if we had a mandatory retirement age of 70 or so for all those elected or appointed folx who are on the federal payroll.

If you’d like to gain some insight into why I’m negative on both major parties and both elected and appointed officials, pick up a copy of Andrea Wulf's The Founding Gardners and read it. Those who first served as POTUS seemed to have a preference for the real life of the plantation and/or garden more so than a life of politics. We should be wise enough these days to realize that anyone’s strong aspiration to be elected nationally should disqualify them from office. If major sports leagues can have a draft, why not politics? As a former Speaker of the House from Massachusetts, Tip O’Neill, noted “All politics is local.” If you haven’t played on farm teams, you shouldn’t be allowed to buy your way into the big leagues. That would also help the bench strength of booth parties, but we shouldn’t be limited to two. Can you imagine if there were only two banks, two sports leagues, two tv networks, two internet providers? Why are there only two major political parties who are more indebted to a few corporations than to millions of taxpayers?

Why I Voted the Socialist Ticket

By Vachel Lindsay

I am unjust, but I can strive for justice.

My life’s unkind, but I can vote for kindness.

I, the unloving, say life should be lovely.

I, that am blind, cry out against my blindness.

Man is a curious brute—he pets his fancies—

Fighting mankind, to win sweet luxury.

So he will be, though law be clear as crystal,

Tho’ all men plan to live in harmony.

Come, let us vote against our human nature,

Crying to God in all the polling places

To heal our everlasting sinfulness

And make us sages with transfigured faces.

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does GOP = BORG?

I grew up with a story of America as a “melting pot,” which I incorrectly pictured as a stew pot in which the carrots and corn kernels and pieces of potato all retained their individual identities as they contributed to a wholesome and filling meal. Later, as a fan of the Star Trek tv series. I learned of the Borg and assimilation and the phrase “Resistance is futile.” As I read about and see stories of the Republican National Convention and their nominees for president and vice-president, and Project 2025, I wonder when and how the Borg landed and assimilated MAGAts using nanoprobes and what that means for our future if they are not promptly and resoundly driven back to wherever they came from. If you wonder what life as an assimilee might be like, check news stories about life in Russia, China, Hungary or Gaza.

Another part of the story I grew up with in Massachusetts is that Colonial America was largely founded by religious emigrants (who didn’t invade and usurp the territories of indigenous peoples). For those emigrants, the separation of church and state was endemic to the creation of a country from separate colonies. To become a christian nationalist country in November would, in my opinion, put US in BORGian territory and I want no part of it or those who would assimilate US that way. 

If you believe I’m overreacting to the deconstruction of a political party in the creation of an alien Borganization, let me leave you with these thoughts:

• "I’m from Appalachia. JD Vance doesn’t represent us – he only represents himself"
• "Hillbillies Need No Elegy"
• “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose,” and, it could be this:

Freedom

By Jill McDonough

I talk to the students in jail about freedom, how in America

we obsess over it, write it over flags on T-shirts, spread

it around under eagles. It has something to do with guns

and fireworks, Harley-Davidsons, New Hampshire, living free

until you’re dead. I tell the students I think the people

fetishizing freedom don’t mean it. That they really mean

look over here, away from all the slavery

we did, away from all the jail! I tell them they

are the experts, ask them to write what freedom means:

privacy is freedom and if  you feel held back, afraid

to do something, you’re not completely free.   No fear

of  loss. No fear of  hunger, no fear of  pain.   A body

to call my own, a voice driven by my own mind.

The security of a dry, warm place to sleep.   To own

my own time left here.   Being able to hold my son

at night.   Showering in private.   Freedom to me

is having the choice to walk away from a fight. Freedom

a work in progress. Everyday freedom, the real work for us all.

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It’s about de clutter

I’m not happy with the presumed choices in presidential candidates this election, but the odds are strongly against my vote going anywhere except the Blue column. Do I care enough to vote in the local (state) primary? We’ll see. At the moment I’m not aware of any contests that affect my legislative, congressional, or statewide races. My thinking is that the Democrats have made such a mess of things that I’ll give them a vote but no more dollars. In fact, I’m contemplating going beyond that reduction.

Some years ago, a writer named Seth Godin claimed we now live in an “attention economy.” Several out-of-state Democrats have been spamming my email box with requests for donations. I keep reporting them as spam but the messages continue to arrive, doing no more than pi** me off at the sender candidate, the Democratic Party, and all politicians in general. I am officially, as of today, withdrawing my attention from the political economy until about November 5th or whenever I get around to early voting.

picture me wading here

Photo by J. Harrington

No matter what I do, the political system is unlikely to reform itself. It is, therefore, my responsibility to prevent it from doing unnecessary damage to my mental, emotional, and physical well-being. I intend to take the time I’ve been spending looking at news and doom-scrolling social media doing things that are of more immediate relevance to my life and much more capable of bringing joy into my existence. Mostly, that’s going to involve participating in, reading about, and enjoying fly-fishing, environmental healing, and similar themes.

A former Speaker of the House, from my home state of Massachusetts, Tip O’Neil once noted that “All politics is local.” I’ve been active in local issues and opportunities, it’s time to become more so. My life needs decluttering and this feels like the best time and theme on which to start. The political world, especially, is full of more bitching and moaning than I can (under)stand.

The Stolen Child

W. B. Yeats
1865 – 1939

Where dips the rocky highland
Of Sleuth Wood in the lake,
There lies a leafy island
Where flapping herons wake
The drowsy water rats;
There we've hid our faery vats,
Full of berrys
And of reddest stolen cherries.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wave of moonlight glosses
The dim gray sands with light,
Far off by furthest Rosses
We foot it all the night,
Weaving olden dances
Mingling hands and mingling glances
Till the moon has taken flight;
To and fro we leap
And chase the frothy bubbles,
While the world is full of troubles
And anxious in its sleep.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Where the wandering water gushes
From the hills above Glen-Car,
In pools among the rushes
That scarce could bathe a star,
We seek for slumbering trout
And whispering in their ears
Give them unquiet dreams;
Leaning softly out
From ferns that drop their tears
Over the young streams.
Come away, O human child!
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than you can understand.

Away with us he's going,
The solemn-eyed:
He'll hear no more the lowing
Of the calves on the warm hillside
Or the kettle on the hob
Sing peace into his breast,
Or see the brown mice bob
Round and round the oatmeal chest.
For he comes, the human child,
To the waters and the wild
With a faery, hand in hand,
For the world's more full of weeping than he can understand.

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Return to first principles

Today is one of those days when I get especially homesick for my home state of Massachusetts and my home town of Boston, site of the Cradle of Liberty. Boston is also the location of the Old North Church, from which colonists were warned by lantern, and Paul Revere’s ride, that the British army was on its way to confiscate arms and supplies.

Boston Common and Statehouse

Photo by J. Harrington

We have fallen quite a distance from the time and values of the original Declaration of Independence. The depths to which we continue to fall are revealed in the declaration of servitude offered by one of the presumed candidates for POTUS this year, someone already a convicted felon and adjudicated rapist. Compare the character of this year's presumed Republican candidate with those of any of our founding fathers to further understand the crassness of our times. Then read the Project 2025 playbook and compare those ideas with the original Declaration of Independence. And remember, without the Declaration, there would have been no Constitution and where would that leave US today, recovering from Brexit?

The Landlord's Tale. Paul Revere's Ride

By Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Listen, my children, and you shall hear 

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, 

On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five; 

Hardly a man is now alive 

Who remembers that famous day and year. 

He said to his friend, "If the British march 

By land or sea from the town to-night, 

Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch 

Of the North Church tower as a signal light,— 

One, if by land, and two, if by sea; 

And I on the opposite shore will be, 

Ready to ride and spread the alarm 

Through every Middlesex village and farm, 

For the country folk to be up and to arm." 

Then he said, "Good night!" and with muffled oar 

Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, 

Just as the moon rose over the bay, 

Where swinging wide at her moorings lay 

The Somerset, British man-of-war; 

A phantom ship, with each mast and spar 

Across the moon like a prison bar, 

And a huge black hulk, that was magnified 

By its own reflection in the tide. 

Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, 

Wanders and watches with eager ears, 

Till in the silence around him he hears 

The muster of men at the barrack door, 

The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet, 

And the measured tread of the grenadiers, 

Marching down to their boats on the shore. 

Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church, 

By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread, 

To the belfry-chamber overhead, 

And startled the pigeons from their perch 

On the sombre rafters, that round him made 

Masses and moving shapes of shade, — 

By the trembling ladder, steep and tall, 

To the highest window in the wall, 

Where he paused to listen and look down 

A moment on the roofs of the town, 

And the moonlight flowing over all. 

Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead, 

In their night-encampment on the hill, 

Wrapped in silence so deep and still 

That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread, 

The watchful night-wind, as it went 

Creeping along from tent to tent, 

And seeming to whisper, "All is well!" 

A moment only he feels the spell 

Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread 

Of the lonely belfry and the dead; 

For suddenly all his thoughts are bent 

On a shadowy something far away, 

Where the river widens to meet the bay, — 

A line of black that bends and floats 

On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats. 

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride, 

Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride 

On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere. 

Now he patted his horse's side, 

Now gazed at the landscape far and near, 

Then, impetuous, stamped the earth, 

And turned and tightened his saddle girth; 

But mostly he watched with eager search 

The belfry-tower of the Old North Church, 

As it rose above the graves on the hill, 

Lonely and spectral and sombre and still. 

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height 

A glimmer, and then a gleam of light! 

He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns, 

But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight 

A second lamp in the belfry burns! 

A hurry of hoofs in a village street, 

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark, 

And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark 

Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet: 

That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light, 

The fate of a nation was riding that night; 

And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight, 

Kindled the land into flame with its heat. 

He has left the village and mounted the steep, 

And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep, 

Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides; 

And under the alders, that skirt its edge, 

Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge, 

Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides. 

It was twelve by the village clock, 

When he crossed the bridge into Medford town. 

He heard the crowing of the cock, 

And the barking of the farmer's dog, 

And felt the damp of the river fog, 

That rises after the sun goes down. 

It was one by the village clock, 

When he galloped into Lexington. 

He saw the gilded weathercock 

Swim in the moonlight as he passed, 

And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare, 

Gaze at him with a spectral glare, 

As if they already stood aghast 

At the bloody work they would look upon. 

It was two by the village clock, 

When he came to the bridge in Concord town. 

He heard the bleating of the flock, 

And the twitter of birds among the trees, 

And felt the breath of the morning breeze 

Blowing over the meadows brown. 

And one was safe and asleep in his bed 

Who at the bridge would be first to fall, 

Who that day would be lying dead, 

Pierced by a British musket-ball. 

You know the rest. In the books you have read, 

How the British Regulars fired and fled, — 

How the farmers gave them ball for ball, 

From behind each fence and farm-yard wall, 

Chasing the red-coats down the lane, 

Then crossing the fields to emerge again 

Under the trees at the turn of the road, 

And only pausing to fire and load. 

So through the night rode Paul Revere; 

And so through the night went his cry of alarm 

To every Middlesex village and farm, — 

A cry of defiance and not of fear, 

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door, 

And a word that shall echo forevermore! 

For, borne on the night-wind of the Past, 

Through all our history, to the last, 

In the hour of darkness and peril and need, 

The people will waken and listen to hear 

The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed, 

And the midnight message of Paul Revere. 

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Happy Interdependence Day

As we approach yet another Independence Day, it may be wise to recall a wonderful quotation that Bill McKibben offered about 25 years ago:

The laws of Congress and the laws of physics have grown increasingly divergent, and the laws of physics are not likely to yield.

Bill McKibben

I offer his quotation because this morning I read an assessment that purports to explain why so much of the world is turning toward the right. A link is offered below in hopes you’ll consider following it and reading the article, not because I believe it’s entirely explanatory, but because so far it’s the only attempt I’ve seen that even tries to provide an explanation of what’s going on in our world. (I’m not including my theory of Martians hiding behind the moon with a ray that makes people even more stupid.) Here’s the link, courtesy of the good folks at Centre for the Advancement of a Steady State Economy: Democracy Trumped at the Limits to Growth. Our society is, and has been for a long time, based on the premise of perpetual growth to make things better. That’s inconsistent with living on a finite planet, as we’ve been experiencing the past few decades. Not only is there No Planet B, there is no “away” to which we can throw things. Perhaps it’s time for independence to be realized as interdependence day?

I am the People, the Mob

Carl Sandburg
1878 – 1967

I am the people—the mob—the crowd—the mass.
Do you know that all the great work of the world is done through me?
I am the workingman, the inventor, the maker of the world's food and clothes.
I am the audience that witnesses history. The Napoleons come from me and the Lincolns. They die. And then I send forth more Napoleons and Lincolns.
I am the seed ground. I am a prairie that will stand for much plowing. Terrible storms pass over me. I forget. The best of me is sucked out and wasted. I forget. Everything but Death comes to me and makes me work and give up what I have. And I forget.
Sometimes I growl, shake myself and spatter a few red drops for history to remember. Then—I forget.
When I, the People, learn to remember, when I, the People, use the lessons of yesterday and no longer forget who robbed me last year, who played me for a fool—then there will be no speaker in all the world say the name: "The People," with any fleck of a sneer in his voice or any far-off smile of derision.
The mob—the crowd—the mass—will arrive then.

If at first, ....

I remember reading, some years ago, about an old lady who claimed "I don't vote. It just encourages them.” While her attitude is certainly understandable, it isn’t productive. There are beneficial responses to the current conditions we face. Some of them can be found here:

• Institute for Local Self-Reliance [ILSR]


• The Bioneers


• Institute for Humane Education


• Indigenous Ecology Lab


• Citizen Connect

There are other organizations also focused on healing rather than hatred; collaboration instead of division; and creation rather than destruction. Follow one or all of the above links as you keep in mind that “more of the same never solved a problem” and that “insanity is doing the same thing and expecting a different result.” Also, from my Boston boyhood: “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me."

what may emerge from behind our clouds?

Photo by J. Harrington

Just as nature abhors a monoculture, we have brought to a logical extreme two party democracy, oligarchical capitalistic monopoly and neoliberalism. I’m not sure whether to be encouraged that we are not alone in suffering outrageous stupidity and shortsightedness from our institutions and those who would lead US. Britain has gone through Brexit. France and others are seeing the rising of the Right. Contentiousness is growing. All that’s missing so far is the spaceship full of aliens, scheduled to arrive this Thursday.

There are no kings in America 

Aileen Cassinetto

we are not that kind of country.

We are sanctuary for the hungry,

the homeless, the huddled,

held together by an idea

our immigrant fathers believed in.

Rendered, it meant independence.

Pursued, it kindled war, ordinance,

a fighting chance. Forty thousand

musket balls, by themselves, did not

shape the boundaries on which we

map our days. To draw our borders,

we needed more than firecakes.

More than a pound of meat

with bone and gristle,

or salt fish and a gill of peas.

We needed the faith and grit of people

who were not yet Americans.

To be an American is to

recognize the sacrifice

of the widow and the orphan;

it is to understand the weft of tent

cities expecting caravans,

and the heft of a child in a camp

not meant for children, or sitting

before a judge awaiting judgement.

What do we say to the native

whose lands we now inhabit?

What do we say to our immigrant

fathers who held certain truths

to be self-evident?

Do we now still pledge to each

other our lives, our fortunes,

our sacred honor.

There are no kings in America.

Only gilded men we can topple

again and again.

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All Hands: On Deck or Be Decked

1. Please find me in contempt of the Roberts’ SCOTUS.
2. Also, dismayed by POTUS performance at the recent “debate.”
3. Disgusted that our political parties have put our democracy in this position and condition.
4. Frustrated by the lack of a clear course of action to make things better.
5. Absolutely refusing to throw up (my hands) in despair.

Where does that leave US?

1. Make sure you’re registered to vote and mark November 5 on your calendar.
2. If you haven’t yet, please read Sarah Kendzior’s Hiding in Plain Sight and The View from Flyover Country.
3. Also read Heather Cox Richardson’s Democracy Awakening: Notes on the State of America and subscribe (free or paid) to her Letters from an American.
4. Remember that it won’t be enough for Democrats to have a trifecta if they don’t make necessary systemic changes to our systems of governance. The operative phrase is “No more Mr./Ms./Whatever Nice Guy/Gal/Other"
5. If you’re not worn out by the preceding, take a look at the idea of being a Solutionary and see if you can get your local school and government to include it.
6. Remember Kris Kristofferson’s great lyrics:

“Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose
 Nothin' ain't worth nothin' but it's free"

If you have additional suggestions on how we can and should fix our longstanding governance problems, please feel free to leave a message.

Freedom

By Jill McDonough

I talk to the students in jail about freedom, how in America

we obsess over it, write it over flags on T-shirts, spread

it around under eagles. It has something to do with guns

and fireworks, Harley-Davidsons, New Hampshire, living free

until you’re dead. I tell the students I think the people

fetishizing freedom don’t mean it. That they really mean

look over here, away from all the slavery

we did, away from all the jail! I tell them they

are the experts, ask them to write what freedom means:

privacy is freedom and if  you feel held back, afraid

to do something, you’re not completely free.   No fear

of  loss. No fear of  hunger, no fear of  pain.   A body

to call my own, a voice driven by my own mind.

The security of a dry, warm place to sleep.   To own

my own time left here.   Being able to hold my son

at night.   Showering in private.   Freedom to me

is having the choice to walk away from a fight. Freedom

a work in progress. Everyday freedom, the real work for us all.

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All the Me, Me, Me! is killing US!!!

SCOTUS recently announced that it’s legitimate for cities to fine and incarcerate homeless people who have nowhere to sleep. It appears the GOP is hell-bent to nominate an adjudicated rapist and convicted felon as their presidential candidate. Several members of SCOTUS were, at best, misleading in their testimony to US Senators. We now appear to be living in a combination patriarchy, oligarchy, corporatocracy, inside a sham democracy. And the colonists just had to focus on King George III ! We have to deal with a free press that puts clicks and ads ahead of emphasizing the truth, even during a “presidential debate.” The America I grew up in would not knowingly elect a sociopathetic prevaricating misogynist as its leader. What happened to US?

In the last Civil War, geographically the conflict broke down to the North against the South. This time it’s likely to be a lot more messy with quite a bit of neighbor against neighbor. Is this really the best we can do after some 250 years of trying? Somewhere in my college sociology courses I seem to remember that a group lacking external enemies often turns on itself. That seems to fit US only too well these days.

I find comparable fault with both major political parties, focused more on winning than governing. Corporations who act as though profits and dividends are the cause of success rather than the result of successfully producing items of value. Anyone looking forward to flying in a Boeing product these days? Has Microsoft become an enemy of the state by failing to provide secure software to the government? Have ordinary folks like you and I decided we can “go it alone” better than we can live responsibly and cooperatively in a community? (Home owners associations don’t count.)

When was the last time any of US or our current or potential leaders looked at a book such as Anna Bernasek’s The Economics of Integrity? As I find more and more these days, a Native American has some worthwhile guidance to offer.

Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings

By Joy Harjo

I am the holy being of my mother's prayer and my father's song

                                              —Norman Patrick Brown, Dineh Poet and Speaker

1. SET CONFLICT RESOLUTION GROUND RULES:

Recognize whose lands these are on which we stand.
Ask the deer, turtle, and the crane.
Make sure the spirits of these lands are respected and treated with goodwill.
The land is a being who remembers everything.
You will have to answer to your children, and their children, and theirs—
The red shimmer of remembering will compel you up the night to walk the perimeter of truth for understanding.
As I brushed my hair over the hotel sink to get ready I heard:
By listening we will understand who we are in this holy realm of words.
Do not parade, pleased with yourself.
You must speak in the language of justice.


2. USE EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION SKILLS THAT DISPLAY AND ENHANCE MUTUAL TRUST AND RESPECT:

If you sign this paper we will become brothers. We will no longer fight. We will give you this land and these waters "as long as the grass shall grow and the rivers run."

The lands and waters they gave us did not belong to them to give. Under false pretenses we signed. After drugging by drink, we signed. With a mass of gunpower pointed at us, we signed. With a flotilla of war ships at our shores, we signed. We are still signing. We have found no peace in this act of signing.

A casino was raised up over the gravesite of our ancestors. Our own distant cousins pulled up the bones of grandparents, parents, and grandchildren from their last sleeping place. They had forgotten how to be human beings. Restless winds emerged from the earth when the graves were open and the winds went looking for justice.

If you raise this white flag of peace, we will honor it.

At Sand Creek several hundred women, children, and men were slaughtered in an unspeakable massacre, after a white flag was raised. The American soldiers trampled the white flag in the blood of the peacemakers.

There is a suicide epidemic among native children. It is triple the rate of the rest of America. "It feels like wartime," said a child welfare worker in South Dakota.

If you send your children to our schools we will train them to get along in this changing world. We will educate them.

We had no choice. They took our children. Some ran away and froze to death. If they were found they were dragged back to the school and punished. They cut their hair, took away their language, until they became as strangers to themselves even as they became strangers to us.

If you sign this paper we will become brothers. We will no longer fight. We will give you this land and these waters in exchange "as long as the grass shall grow and the rivers run."

Put your hand on this bible, this blade, this pen, this oil derrick, this gun and you will gain trust and respect with us. Now we can speak together as one.

We say, put down your papers, your tools of coercion, your false promises, your posture of superiority and sit with us before the fire. We will share food, songs, and stories. We will gather beneath starlight and dance, and rise together at sunrise.

The sun rose over the Potomac this morning, over the city surrounding the white house.
It blazed scarlet, a fire opening truth.
White House, or Chogo Hvtke, means the house of the peacekeeper, the keepers of justice.
We have crossed this river to speak to the white leader for peace many times
Since these settlers first arrived in our territory and made this their place of governance.
These streets are our old trails, curved to fit around trees.
 

3. GIVE CONSTRUCTIVE FEEDBACK:

We speak together with this trade language of English. This trade language enables us to speak across many language boundaries. These languages have given us the poets:

Ortiz, Silko, Momaday, Alexie, Diaz, Bird, Woody, Kane, Bitsui, Long Soldier, White, Erdrich, Tapahonso, Howe, Louis, Brings Plenty, okpik, Hill, Wood, Maracle, Cisneros, Trask, Hogan, Dunn, Welch, Gould...

The 1957 Chevy is unbeatable in style. My broken-down one-eyed Ford will have to do. It holds everyone: Grandma and grandpa, aunties and uncles, the children and the babies, and all my boyfriends. That's what she said, anyway, as she drove off for the Forty-Nine with all of us in that shimmying wreck.

This would be no place to be without blues, jazz—Thank you/mvto to the Africans, the Europeans sitting in, especially Adolphe Sax with his saxophones... Don't forget that at the center is the Mvskoke ceremonial circles. We know how to swing. We keep the heartbeat of the earth in our stomp dance feet.

You might try dancing theory with a bustle, or a jingle dress, or with turtles strapped around your legs. You might try wearing colonization like a heavy gold chain around a pimp's neck.


4. REDUCE DEFENSIVENESS AND BREAK THE DEFENSIVENESS CHAIN:

I could hear the light beings as they entered every cell. Every cell is a house of the god of light, they said. I could hear the spirits who love us stomp dancing. They were dancing as if they were here, and then another level of here, and then another, until the whole earth and sky was dancing.

We are here dancing, they said. There was no there.

There was no  "I"  or "you."

There was us; there was "we."

There we were as if we were the music.

You cannot legislate music to lockstep nor can you legislate the spirit of the music to stop at political boundaries—

—Or poetry, or art, or anything that is of value or matters in this world, and the next worlds.

This is about getting to know each other.

We will wind up back at the blues standing on the edge of the flatted fifth about to jump into a fierce understanding together.


5. ELIMINATE NEGATIVE ATTITUDES DURING CONFLICT:

A panther poised in the cypress tree about to jump is a panther poised in a cypress tree about to jump.

The panther is a poem of fire green eyes and a heart charged by four winds of four directions.

The panther hears everything in the dark: the unspoken tears of a few hundred human years, storms that will break what has broken his world, a bluebird swaying on a branch a few miles away.

He hears the death song of his approaching prey:

I will always love you, sunrise.
I belong to the black cat with fire green eyes.
There, in the cypress tree near the morning star.


6. AND, USE WHAT YOU LEARN TO RESOLVE YOUR OWN CONFLICTS AND TO MEDIATE OTHERS' CONFLICTS:

When we made it back home, back over those curved roads
that wind through the city of peace, we stopped at the
doorway of dusk as it opened to our homelands.
We gave thanks for the story, for all parts of the story
because it was by the light of those challenges we knew
ourselves—
We asked for forgiveness.
We laid down our burdens next to each other.

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We’re now the National Lampoon of politics

It was many years ago (1973) that the National Lampoon used the famous demand on the cover. These days, it seems to me that both political parties are using a similar demand to get support from their base (how appropriate a term) and to use it as a fundraising tool, through fear of the opposition’s accession to power. Is it time to call these bluffs? Why don’t we, the voters and taxpayers, demand that political campaigns be publicly funded with spending caps for each type of position? We end up paying for it one way or another so let’s demand more and better transparency and accountability. Maybe in the process we can also kill Citizens’ United. That’s all for today. I’m still fed up from last night’s “debate.”

Politics

By William Meredith

Tonight Hazard’s father and stepmother are having

jazz for McGovern. In the old game-room

the old liberals listen as the quintet builds

crazy houses out of skin and brass, crumbling

the house of decorum, everybody likes that.

For decades they have paid for the refurbishing

of America and they have not got their money’s worth.

Now they listen, hopeful,

to the hard rock for McGovern.

The ceiling in this palace needs fixing,

the chalky blue paint is like an old heaven

but there are holes and flaking.

They had movies here when grandpa was solvent.

Hazard desires his wife, the way people

on the trains to the death camps were seized

by irrational lust. She is the youngest woman

in the room, he would like to be in bed

with her now, he would like to be president.

He has not been to his studio

in four days, he asks the bartender,

a college boy with a ponytail, for more gin.

He stands in the doorway. Forsythia and lilac

have overgrown the porch, there is the rich

smell of wood-rot. What twenty years will do

to untended shrubbery and America and Hazard.

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