(on a small slip of paper in an old book) All things must pay To each other the penalties And compensation for all the Inequalities wrought by time. -Anaxagoras (tr. Kenneth Rexroth)

‘Poetry has nothing to do with who we are.’ (Iain Crichton Smith)

Yannis Ritsos (tr. Nikos Stangos)

Yannis Ritsos (tr. Nikos Stangos)

Kobayashi Issa (tr. Anthony Opal)

(thanks to Anthony Opal)

7.30 a.m. in a corner of the shed a cow licks her newborn calf

slow rain … the small white flowers

Could be!

🙏It may seem an odd thing to say, but this truly recalls (for me) certain experiences (long ago) while looking in a mirror after taking mescaline &/or psilocybin.

please post some bits 🙏

After Verdi suffered a massive stroke on January 21, 1901, straw was strewn in the street outside his hotel to muffle the noise of wheels and hooves — so that he could rest. ❤️

Well said🙏

5 p.m.

Thanks for this tidbit, John. I remember coming across <The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You> in a used bookshop years ago. It was on the clearance shelf for a couple of dollars. I'd not heard of it (or Stanford) at the time. But I thought a friend might love it, so I sent it to him.

Out of Frank Stanford’s _The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You_ (1977). Summoning up justice, its lack (here, in the lynching of Sylvester the Black Angel: “they called him Mr. Petty Gouger / he said he was a dicty cat from way on back”), and the “nothing one man will not do to another.”