"The World Is Too Much With Us..." Happy 251st Birthday to William Wordsworth

 The World Is Too Much With Us

William Wordsworth

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

The winds that will be howling at all hours,

And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

For this, for everything, we are out of tune;

It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be

A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;

Or hear old Triton blow his wreathèd horn.

And if you're looking for books to read (and who isn't), I'd wholeheartedly recommend a book from Jonathan Bate that published in time for Wordsworth's 250th birthday last year, Radical Wordsworth: The Poet Who Changed the World. Or, even better, the beautiful illustrated and annotated edition of Wordsworth's masterpiece, The Prelude, published by David R. Godine in 2016.

Obama & Hamilton

First of all, Happy 59th Birthday to President Barack Obama.

What better way to celebrate than with one of the greatest cultural events in White House history from the first spring of the Obama presidency. On May 12, 2009, 'An Evening of Poetry, Music, and the Spoken Word' gave us a sneak peak at a song from a proposed hip-hop album that would become the Broadway classic 'Hamilton' six years later.

Will we ever have a White House that has such cultural highlights again?

Who, for example, visited the current president for a photo op (there are no musical or poetry performances there since 2017) during his first spring in the office?

Happy Birthday to James Baldwin

This photo was taken by me at the Women's March in D.C. on January 21, 2017.

"Ignorance Allied with Power Is the Most Ferocious Enemy Justice Can Have."

Joni Mitchell is 75 today.

Who is the greatest English-language songwriter of the 20th century?
Discuss among yourselves.



"Sitting in a park in Paris, France 
Reading the news and it sure looks bad 
They won't give peace a chance 
That was just a dream some of us had"


I can't express how much I love Joni's words and music and voice.
I hope she's having the happiest of birthdays today.

Happy 75th to Mick Jagger

Happy Birthday to Amelia Earhart...

...born on this date in 1897 (disappeared in July 1937).




A ghost of aviation
She was swallowed by the sky
Or by the sea like me she had a dream to fly
Like Icarus ascending
On beautiful foolish arms
Amelia it was just a false alarm
--Joni Mitchell, 1976

Happy Birthday to Philip Seymour Hoffman

Brandt left us much too soon.

70 Years Ago Today, UK citizens got something that US citizens are told is impossible, a National Health Service

How is it possible that a modern National Health Service was achievable 70 years ago in a Great Britain still clearing rubble from World War II and still experiencing food rationing, but is considered impossibly expensive in the world's wealthiest economy, one that hasn't experienced war on its soil since 1865?

The National Health Service began on July 5, 1948.

I'm simply retyping the historic text of the page above in order to make it searchable and readable on all devices:

THE NEW

NATIONAL

HEALTH 

SERVICE

*

Your new National Health Service begins on 5th July. What is it? How do you get it?

    It will provide you with all medical, dental, and nursing care. Everyone--rich or poor, man, woman or child--can use it or any part of it. There are no charges, except for a few special items. There are no insurance qualifications. But it is not a " charity ". You are all paying for it, mainly as taxpayers, and it will relieve your money worries in time of illness.

Happy 70th Birthday to Bob Weir.

Here he is with the band on August 27, 1972 in Veneta, Oregon.

Happy 100th to Thelonious Monk!

Although we're the ones who get the gifts...



One of the (many) crimes of the Trump era is that the steady stream of idiocies coming through the media from the media manipulator in D.C. today almost made me miss the fact that Thelonious Monk was born on October 10, 1917. There's more of what Makes America Great in any single note from Monk's fingers than in all the words ever tweeted by you know who.


Happy Birthday Mr. Monk.

Intentional and Unintentional Humor in the White House

Happy Birthday to 1968's joke presidential candidate, Pat Paulsen (7/6/1927).


And to 2000's joke president, George W. Bush (7/6/1946).

Happy Birthday to Cleavon Little (1939-1992)

Happy Birthday Bob!

Bob Dylan turns 76 today.



And you still don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.

Happy 73rd Birthday to Jack Cassady

"...Early morning, April four / Shot rings out in the Memphis sky..."

Happy 164th to Vincent van Gogh

On its website, the Van Gogh Museum describes Vincent's 'Head of a Skeleton with a Burning Cigarette' from 1886 as 'a juvenile joke.' Maybe it's because I was a juvenile 19-year-old visiting Amsterdam when I was first exposed to (and surprised by) the original painting by an artist I knew for sunflowers, starry nights, and self portraits, but it's always been one of my favorites ever since. Revisiting it today on the virtual walls of the internet after many years, it struck me that it could be yet another in Van Gogh's long series of self portraits.

Happy Birthday. Smoke 'em if you've got 'em.

Head of a Skeleton with a Burning Cigarette (1886)
in the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam

Happy 74th Birthday to Janis Joplin.

Here's Janis with Big Brother and the Holding Company at the Monterey Pop Festival on June 18, 1967.




She was 24 at this performance right before her big breakthrough.

She'll never be older than 27.

Happy Birthday Patti Smith!

Happy 70th!

The Tweet of the Day for Sunday, December 18

The TrueBlueLiberal.org tweet of the day for Keith Richards' birthday came from @HeadsNews:

A rolling, stony 73rd to Keith Richards, born today in 1943. Tripping at Stonehenge, 1967. https://t.co/W2BWcZb8Fy pic.twitter.com/m2VT3YbBBL

— Heads News (@HeadsNews) December 18, 2016

Happy 73rd Birthday to Keith Richards.

In a year during which we lost a lot of great musicians, at least we know that Keith Richards, thanks to the long-term preservative effects of tobacco and heroin, will be with us until well past his hundredth birthday.

You got my heart you got my soul
You got the silver you got the gold
You got the diamonds from the mine
Well that's all right, it'll buy some time

Happy Birthday Keef.