"persons of merely aesthetic bias and training, like myself, should be silent in the presence of men of science, who know best about everything"

From "The Cat that Went to Trinity
by Canadian author Robertson Davies from his book "High Spirits" 1983

The Car Was Towed

"I went down to the impound lot

Because my car was towed

I didn’t see the “No Parking Signs”

I guess I shoulda knowed."

by Valerie, when her car was towed.

...and she doesn't even OWN a car :)

Earle Birney comments on Cartagena

In "Cartegena de Indias, 1962," Earle Birney, the Canadian poet, 
(see my blog posts Oct 9 - 12 of 2013) 
walks through a tropical market and sees himself through South American eyes, that is, incredibly rich, a tourist from outer space. Yet the inhabitants of "this rancid disarray" love and honour their local poet Luis Carlos Lopez. The Canadian poet says, "I …am seldom read by my townsmen," envies Luis Carlos Lopez, and loves the people whom he celebrated:

“I love the whole starving,

cheating,

poetry-reading,

lot of you.     

Most of all

for  throwing  me  the  shoes  of  deadman

Luis

to walk me back

into your brotherhood”

"deadman Luis" is Luis Carlos Lopez, and Earle Birney refers to the poem "A mi ciudad nativa" talked about in yesterday's blogpost.

Extract from "A mi ciudad nativa" by Luis Carlos Lopez

Cartagena

A Mi Ciudad Nativa
"Ciudad triste, ayer reina de la mar"  J.M. Heredia
…

Fuiste heroica en los años coloniales,                                                                

cuando tus hijos, águilas caudales,                                                                                       

no eran una caterva de vencejos.          

Mas hoy, plena de rancio desaliño,

bien puedes inspirar ese cariño                                                                               

que uno les tiene a sus zapatos viejos...

To my Native City

"(My) Distressed City, yesterday the Queen of the Sea"  J.M. Heredia

…

You were heroic in the colonial years

When your children, esteemed eagles

Were not so easily vanquished.

But today, full of ancient disorder

You still inspire the love

That one has for (comfortable) old shoes…

By Luis Carlos Lopez, 
A native of Cartagena (Cartagena de Indias), Colombia, the poet says he loves his city as much as he loves his comfortable shoes that take him all over the world.  Lopez is honoured by a monument of old shoes cast in bronze in the old city of Cartagena. 

Cartegena defended itself so often from pirate attacks during the colonial era that Simón Bolívar dubbed it ‘La Heroica’ (the heroic city) upon independence in 1821

(Spanish to English translation is mine)

 I have seen "rancio desaliño" translated as "rancid disarray"
but "ancient disorder" seems to communicate the affection intended.

When You're a Nerd You Can't Turn it Off

"Physicists view math in much the same way that politicians view philosophy.  You use it earnestly when you can, and you twist it to suit your own purposes when you can’t."

In an article (available on arXiv.org)

Brian J. Skinner, PhD Physics, asks when a basketball player should attempt to score early in the possession of the ball, and when the team is better off waiting for another chance.

In his own pickup basketball games, Skinner says he's always thinking whether the best player is shooting too much or whether the worst player should shoot more. "When you're a nerd, you can't turn it off."   

He also asks: What would happen if my body became 1% charged?
Answer: it would be like the planet earth colliding with the planet Saturn.

Also

"Holy Cow, I picked a bad time to start paying attention to politics again."

inukshuk

"Now the people will know we were here"

Inukshuk are stone monuments built on the tundra (above the arctic circle) by the Inuit from Alaska to Greenland and are thought to have been used as hunting and navigational aids, markers and message centres.  some are single tall rocks, but most are human-like figures.

also spelled inuksuk or inukhuk

We Would Like You to Know

part of Mural from Mexico's National Palace by Diego Rivera

We would like you to know

we are not all
docile
nor revolutionaries
but we are all survivors.
We do not all carry
zip guns, hot pistols,
steal cars.
We do know how
to defend ourselves.

We do not all have
slicked-back hair
distasteful apparel
unpolished shoes
although the economy
doesn't allow everyone
a Macy's chargecard.

We do not all pick
lettuce, run
assembly lines, clean
restaurant tables, even
if someone has to do it.

We do not all sneak
under barbed wire or
wade the Rio Grande.

These are the facts.

We would like you to know
we are not all brown.
Genetic history has made
some of us blue eyed as any
German immigrant
and as black as a descendant
of an African slave.

We never claimed to be
a homogeneous race.
We are not all victims,
all loyal to one cause,
all perfect; it is a
psychological dilemma
no one has resolved.

We would like to give
a thousand excuses
as to why we all find
ourselves in a predicament
residents of a controversial
power
how we were all caught
with our pants down
and how petroleum was going
to change all that but
you've heard it all before and
with a wink and a snicker
left us babbling amongst
ourselves.

We would like you to know
guilt or apologetic gestures
won't revive the dead
redistribute the land
or natural resources.

We are left
with one final resolution
in our own predestined way,
we are going forward.
There is no going back.

 Ana Castillo  from “My Father was a Toltec”  quoted in “Cool Salsa:  Bilingual Poems about Growing up Latino in the US, Lori Carlson, editor