Daily Life 1: Zoe Leonard

March 25th, 2019

This belt is worn out.
Which diner today?
She almost slipped and fell.

The museum doesn’t open for another eighteen minutes.
She almost slipped and fell.
Which diner today?
At this hour the market is not crowded.
My stomach is growling.
They lost power.
I don’t like this wind.

March 10, 2018
By Hazen Piper

David McKay link

February 26th, 2018

http://www.harlemshadows.org/

Link to an electronic open-source edition of David McKay’s Harlem Shadows (1922).

David Walker link

October 8th, 2017

http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/walker/walker.html

Appeal … to the Colored Citizens of the World (Third Edition, 1830)

Helix of the moral universe

March 20th, 2016

Sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn’t.

“We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” – Martin Luther King, Jr., 1968

“I do not pretend to understand the moral universe; the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways; I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. And from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice.” – Theodore Parker, 1853

Perhaps the shape is not an arc but a helix. Theodore Parker said in his sermon, “Of Justice and the Conscience”, that he can divine “the curve and complete the figure” of the moral universe by conscience. The verb to divine means “to discover by intuition or insight”. I do appreciate Theodore Parker’s and Martin Luther King’s intuition and insight but each of us must do our own divining of the moral universe and not simply rely on the divinations of others. My conscience desires justice but does not always intuit the moral universe bending towards it. Perhaps the moral universe bends along the spiraling path of a helix with justice as its axis. Or maybe a double-helix ?

Note: 1853, Ten Sermons of Religion by Theodore Parker, Of Justice and the Conscience, Start Page 66, Quote Page 84-85, Crosby, Nichols and Company, Boston. (Google Books full view) Link

Why poetry?

June 7th, 2015

Why poetry?

time or
breath the same
as time or
life the same
as time and breath
combined

Why life?

poetry or
unity the same
as poetry or
text the same
as poetry and unity
combined

setting of the sun
flowing of the water
reflecting of the light
on the river

architecture of
time remaining
elusive
faintly shimmering
in constantly
varying wavelengths
iridescent riddle

the breath
the passage
of the music
breezes blowing
across my skin
rustling the hairs
on my arms

June 2, 2015

Volunteers of America

May 30th, 2015

counter
factual
volunteers making
out America
one day play
in the gutter
made of concrete running water
it all takes time
divisions sub-divisions rooted in

the sandy soils
the air
support our eyes
so tired so tired

Another Hazen Piper Blog

March 17th, 2013

Hazen Piper Blog

Reservoir

April 18th, 2012
  • To walk along the reservoir surprised me.
  • I don’t recall ever entering Central Park by the Engineer’s Gate on the East Side.
  • Many glances.
  • There is something wrong with my neck.
  • I enjoy being a hermit.
  • Or as much like a hermit as is possible for someone like me.
  • Jack Bulldog is getting old.
  • We talk about him dieing.
  • I took 10,062 steps today.
  • I enjoy playing and studying chess.
  • Also literature.
  • Thinking about Marcel Duchamp.
  • Didn’t he play at the Marshall Chess Club on occasion?
  • I don’t mind hearing the dog who lives upstairs bark and run across the floor.
  • Our daughter has to be at work at 7:00 A.M. tomorrow.
  • Working for a living.
  • Disappearing in the city.
  • (April 15, 2012)

Keener Constants

April 17th, 2011

 

then
single self
beheld inhuman shadows

mimic
maskings at
vanishing poles and

rose
wholly clear
beyond ordering horizons

16 April 2011
Miami Beach

Sunday Afternoon

April 25th, 2010

img00330.jpg

not satisified with response
and call form caught
off guard and evasive
forgetting the sanctuaries
of the reflections in the
puddles left by the day’s
rains the quivering of
the imaginations seemingly
caught on the surfaces all
the people crisscross and
keep coming back and
coming back to forgetfulness

25 April 2010