Still looking for the right words

A high school classmate sent me copies of two little poems I wrote for a school magazine in 1940. They survived the mice for almost three-quarters of a century, and the ink has not peeled off.

 

What we kids liked most about poems was the sound of them.

 

            “Shoot if you must this old gray head,

            but spare your country’s flag,” she said.

            John Greenleaf Whittier kept his quill in tune.

 

            Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered,

            weak and weary…

            While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came

            a tapping,

            As to some one gently rapping…

            Edgar Allen Poe knew tintinnabulation, and how to use it.

 

The rockets and dive bombers of World War II were thundering across Europe, and the war was spilling over into Africa. The U.S. was legally at peace, but the vibes of blitzkreig were felt everywhere. Pearl Harbor was not far ahead.

 

That’s why there was a commotion in the press when members of the Jehovah’s Witness denomination, who were conscientious objectors, refused to salute the flag.

 

While this was happening, the tensions in English class were about infinitives, to split or not to split. And the teacher wanted her kids to write modern verse that did not rhyme, to write in the free and slightly spooky spirit of Orson Wells’ “War of the Worlds” and Thornton Wilder’s “Our Town,” stark and shadowy.

 

Hence, this verse from a 15-year-old who didn’t know he was just two years short of boot camp.

 

            Why do we salute that piece of cloth waving in the wind?

            We do not salute a cloth. That is the flag.

            Why do we pledge allegiance to a brightly colored rag?

            We do not pledge allegiance to a brightly colored rag.

            We salute the pioneers, the explorers, the soldiers.

 

            But they are all dead.

            They are not. They live today:

            The pioneers in aviation.

            The explorers in medicine.

            The soldiers in science—and war.

            We salute them in respect—not worship.

 

And this to accompany another student’s article about telephones, which had already been discovered by teenagers in 1940.

 

            Poles. Tall, silent telephone poles.

            But how loudly they speak—

            What a message they carry.

            Poles. Wires.

            Strong, taut wires,

            Poking into stock markets

            In New York. Into the mellowing buildings

            Of San Francisco’s China Town.

            Into the suburban bungalow,

            Tight, slick wires,

            Glistening in the moonlight.

            Death. Fire. Birth. Money. Tragedy.

            This is the story of telephone wires.

 

And so, after nearly 75 years, we still have wars and we still have telephones. We still have verse-writers, too. Dorothy Parker’s now in e-books that were no more than science fiction when she wrote that men seldom make passes/ at girls who wear glasses. Another quarter century, almost, would pass before Betty Frieden explained in a famous book that feminine vision had nothing to do with spectacles.

 

They still write verses in high school English classes. Chances are there’s more teen poetry for peace than there was in 1940, and that more verses are written to be sung than recited. Chances are the crafting runs deeper. Teens of the first fully computerized generation have a knowledge breadth unimagined when their grandparents were memorizing dates in schools where the cops were never seen, unless maybe for a safe driving lecture. With that breadth of knowledge comes a reach for depth, and words do the digging.

 

It only hurts when I list

Why not? I’ve been asked to do goofier things than list some of the little things a person with multiple system atrophy (MSA) may deal with during a day. These are not the spectacular things, such as falling over in the kitchen and leaving the eggs to keep frying solo.

 
These are little things that people seldom talk about outside their support groups.

 

There’s the pain in the back of the neck that pops up when you turn your head, or lift something, or for no apparent reason.

 

Then there is the frustration trimming fingernails when the thumb’s too weak to click the nail trimmer.

 

Or dropping a glass of iced tea you thought you were holding securely.

 

How about the vocal cords acting up during a conversation, like a violin squeaking?

 

Or choking and gagging that feels a lot like waterboarding, triggered by a drop of moisture or a breath of fresh air.

 

Maybe speaking to the person whose shadow just moved up beside you and getting no answer because you’re all alone.

 

Starting to gasp like an old steam locomotive spinning its wheels, then stopping whoever’s starting to call 911.

 

Walking off the edge of the sidewalk because straight lines are tricky.

 

Squinting at the TV screen because your headache du jour is distracting, like a wriggle of electric current across your eyebrows.

 

Little things can annoy, especially if they are mosquitoes or gnats, but they are less annoying than big things, like angry elephants or rolling out of bed and breaking the other hip.

 

The best thing I can say about this is that nobody actually likes MSA and its incurable misdemeanors, but among the scores of victims I’ve known via the Internet, there are doers, planners and givers, but no whiners. The confidence that medical science will find a cure for this and other diseases is virtually unanimous. Maybe it will be soon, maybe not. Meanwhile, some support research, some pray, some write lists.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Split personality? What about split persons?

Texted prayer
 

God, whose presence in my heart

   clears my path before I start;

God, whose love within my eye

   keeps my vision leveled high;

God, whose purpose in my feet

   makes my journey straight and fleet;

God, whose life within my blood

   gives me power of tropic flood;

God, whose breath enlivens me

   opens windows, shares the key;

God whose spirit’s everywhere

   reads all thoughts as texted prayer.

A. E. P. (ED) WALL

 Split personality?
What about split persons?
 

Split personalities are just what the doctor ordered if you are writing a movie script or hosting a televised talk show. But Americans especially, and many other folks, are born into a formally declared belief that all persons are created equal.

          That was understood, in the 18th century, to mean that social classes are artificial, that candlemakers and cooks have just as much dignity, and are just as entitled to justice, as any lord, count, bishop, baron or princess.

         The absence of equality in personal wealth, health, housing, employment and personality was known to all.

          Voters, workers, capitalists and citizens of all races include the bright, the beautiful and the ugly. Nations and neighborhoods are populated by the gifted, along with sociopaths, psychopaths, thieves, killers and rapists who have jobs, shop in the supermarket, patronize the movie theater, date daughters and raise their hands when volunteers are called for.

         Some are Christians, some are not, some are Republicans, some are not. Do angry sociopaths interpret Bible verses the same way smiling optimists do?

          Do they hear the promises of political candidates the same way?

          Everybody is created equal. The presidents of the United States and Iran, the creators of Windows and the Edsel, Italian Catholic bishops Chinese Methodists, children going to school in Japan and in Afghanistan, all find that equality is subject to definition.

          Some equality is handed out, like the number of toes ordinarily provided at birth. Some has to be reached for, like the rights due to women. An equality obscured by prejudice, power and politics is everyone’s equal access beyond the sublime to the divine. Just as some believe in no religion, some believe in all religions.

 

 

What about Tom?

Thomas Henry James rolled over for the last time while I was too young to remember him. My grandma’s cat was in her kitchen every morning while she flipped the breakfast pancakes. He knew she would make one small but tasty pancake for him. All he had to do was listen for her to say, “Thomas Henry James, roll over.” Then he rolled over, and Grandma flipped his pancake into his bowl.

            The first cat I remember was with us in Jamestown, NY, when we moved 104 miles away to Coudersport, PA. At age 4 I was younger than the cat. My mom had arranged his adoption by friends in Jamestown, but about a month later he appeared at our door in Coudersport. The saturation love of cats for humans, and vice versa, is a happy mystery, like the Trinity.

            Some may think it is a confirmation of my brain disease that I keep a polished wooden box of ashes in the room that’s stuffed with my computers and books, printers, pictures of upbeat memories, things like that. The ashes recall Abraham, my Titusville/Orlando cat for 16 years.

            Abe was succeeded in Orland Park, IL, by Thomas Henry James II, known to his friends as Tom. He arrived at my condo as a young adult cat and has stayed for more than 12 years. He’s never been outdoors and lives like a cheerful puppycat, although in cat years he may be close to my age, a few weeks short of 89.

            A couple of weeks ago he started acting the way Abe did in his last days, sneaking off to quiet corners, ignoring tuna treats, crying out in loud meows every now and then. After a lifetime of living with cats I chose not to expose my elderly housemate to treatment by well-meaning veterinarians. I thought he was dying.

            This coincided with a loving invitation from my daughter and son-in-law to leave the isolation of my condo and move into their large home one mile away. My five grandchildren who grew up there are sometimes home, but more often away at college or enterprises. The household includes one with a severe allergy to cats, and so any cat is, for good reason, felina non grata.

             My driving is limited to my power wheelchair and my four-wheel electric scooter. Standing up is an adventure. Winter weather keeps me from crossing the street to the mailbox. I wear a Rescue Alert button, but punching a number into a telephone or into a garage door opener can be a challenge.

            Marie and Mark are looking into the installation of a stair lift, because a head packed with dizziness and feet that dance jigs to their own tunes rule out the ordinary use of stairs. The reason for all this is called olivopontocerebellar atrophy/multiple system atrophy, a form of parkinsonism.

            While we’re getting organized for my move into the household of a grandpa’s dreams, I’m formidably anxious about Thomas Henry James II. What to do?

 

 

 

President Kennedy wasn't finished

Fifty years ago today the tolling of a bell momentarily paralyzed the news room. It was the bell on the wire service machine. It signaled a rare “Flash,” a designation reserved for the most urgent stories.

            The staff of The Honolulu Advertiser didn’t want to believe the report on the wire, that President John F. Kennedy had been fatally shot in Texas.

            Three years earlier both Kennedy and his Republican opponent, Richard Nixon, had campaigned in the 50th state of Hawaii. The population was small, but statehood was new, and journalists from all over were happy to dateline their work from Waikiki or Kona. When the votes were counted, 50.03% went to Kennedy and 49.97% to Nixon.

During the campaign I interviewed both candidates when they visited the Big Island, where I was editor of the local daily newspaper. When that heartbreaking flash came on November 22, 1963 I was Sunday editor of the morning paper in Honolulu.

            Almost everybody took the assassination personally. Kennedy was a personal president, in the minds of countless Americans.

            President Kennedy was scheduled to move on from Dallas to Austin to address the Texas Democratic State Committee. I received the text of that address from the White House, framed it as a minor memento of that terrible time.

            The President was not finished. He had planned to speak that night about the linkage of Texas and the Democratic Party in “an indestructible alliance.”

            Alas, alliances come and go. Religions come and go, and so governments. But the mystery of human behavior hangs on.

Does God have pets?

 

           God as Father is at the center of worship for countless believers, even as fatherhood takes a few hits from sitcom laugh tracks, feminist affirmations and happy challenges to notions of centuries past that men held exclusive rights to vote, judge, own property, preach and preside.

            God is Father, fathers are male, it is said, and therefore God must be male.

            One drawback is that some of us picture Father according to the Gospel of Disney, the giver of things we ask for. We don’t usually ask for discipline, training, correction.

            Dads and moms try to steer their offspring from one learning experience to another, first encouraging them to crawl and then to stand up and walk. Along the way dads and moms press their kids to brush their teeth, pass the algebra exam, tell the truth, prepare to earn a living and to pass it on. Fathers and mothers are there when sickness strikes, jobs vanish and games are lost.

            Some fathers indulge aimless whims of their children, and that’s how candles get lit at both ends and children fill playrooms and garages with toys while their minds are on vacation.

            That’s the sort of Father who is expected to hear prayers for a lucky lottery ticket, passing an exam without studying for it, winning a race without training for it.

            But the Father sees each child, like the planet itself, evolve in understanding and competence. The Father’s love is not to affirm a child’s frailty and insecurity, but to provide the steps on a ladder to strength and confidence.

            The Bible, a book of conflicts, tragedy and hope, stirs emotions as no other. Hundreds of churches and denominations claim its authority. This book of the ages identifies God as Father. It is not asleep in the distant past it describes. Scripture, an inspiration for the American Constitution, is awake. Scripture is written in the present tense. It declares the Now. Its Father is always Love.

 

 

            After 88 years on the roller coaster, this I know:

I believe in God,

dweller in mystery,

provider of all that is known

and unknown,

timeless teacher

of uncounted Teacher’s pets.

The unforgettable Trayvon Martin

 

 

         Six citizens drafted into Florida jury duty have underscored the quirkiness of a justice system that counts among its resources executions at San Quentin and forced feeding at Guantanamo. As of 2011 there were more than 2.6 million adults incarcerated in this country, and another 4.8 million on probation or parole. The Florida jury has excused George Zimmerman from being one of them.

         It was right and proper, according to the jury, for Zimmerman to stalk and then kill a 17-year-old African-American boy on his way to the nearby home of his dad.

           The jury heard all of the testimony and reviewed all of the evidence in Zimmerman’s Sanford, Florida, trial. The jury’s good faith and hard work are taken for granted. That doesn’t mean the verdict is happily accepted by everyone.

           There will be some exploitation of it by anti-white individuals, some of whom are white, all pursuing a creeping fashion of social robotics. Others will recognize that Zimmerman was prosecuted by white attorneys, working within the system of government that enabled white soldiers to fight for emancipation, white presidents to broaden and enforce civil equality laws, white judges and legislators to support—if too slowly—the ongoing extermination of official racism.

         In a world populated by humans there will still be prejudice, bigotry, favoritism and political nuttiness. But every slip backward is accompanied by two or three steps forward.

          Much of the world will see the Zimmerman verdict as one of those slips backward.

         Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

         We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.

          Know who spoke those two sentences? Martin Luther King. Everyone remembers him. Now, few will forget Trayvon Martin, who like those anonymous jurors has been drafted into history.