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Tag: C***mas

December 11, 2017

merry C***mas

don-quixote-1955.jpg!Large

       “Don Quixote“ (1955) 

             Pablo Picasso

                 _________

last year, my mom and I spent C***mas 
in Munich, attended mass at the
Heiliggeistkirche there, the Church of 
the Holy Spirit, a blessed event, this 
year, we’re spending it here in Vancouver,
she’s just down the street from where I
live, has just come back from three weeks  
in Argentina, with back to back stopovers 
in Montreal to visit the rest of our family 
there, me, I’m happy with my sedentary 
life, in this enchanted place, putzing and
writing poems

but this year, rather than shopping for 
gifts, I’ve determined to look for good
actions, volunteering is out, but little
acts of kindness, everywhere, are in
even big ones

a friend who’d been considering 
coming over for C***mas, from 
Victoria on nearby Vancouver 
Island, alone now after the demise 
of his wife last winter, compounded 
by the death of his only two kids, 
twins, many years ago, is now ill,  
my mom and I ‘ve determined to
visit him there should he not 
make it here

this seems to me to be more 
important, significant, than 
gifts


the moneylenders have now taken 
over the temple, it’s time to take 
back, put the C***mas back into, 
C***mas

find someone to be good to


and all the very, very best

R ! chard

psst: Don Quixote, see above, was 
          perhaps a dreamer, attacking 
          windmills he thought were 
          maleficent, but his vision, his 
          however impossible dream,  
          has lasted as an inspiration  
          for over 500 years  

           it’s never not time to pursue 
           one’s noble ideas

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June 30, 2016

Munich, the application‏

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after a period of some indecision – 
the state of my health, an abysmally
low iron count that left me 
uncharacteristically unsteady, near
fainting, which I’d considered to be 
old age instead of something more
chemical, clinical, the distance to 
where we’d be going, time zones, 
jet lag, the difficulty of finding 
appropriate accommodations for 
the one month we’d be there, and 
at a reasonable price, none of which 
was a problem for my mother, 
incidentally, but which rattled only 
myself – it looks like the holiday 
we’ve envisioned will come to pass, 
my mom and I ‘ll be going to Munich 
for both the C***mas and the New 
Year’s holidays, with at least ten 
days on either end 
 
what clinched it was that not only
had my iron leaped from abysmal
to completely ordinary, though my 
thyroid is now acting up, you plug 
one hole, another one pops up, I 
told my doctor, one day the tide 
will roll in, inexorably, I proclaimed
 
showed up, we got for a song, 
something out of Hansel and Gretel, 
which, with the invaluable help of a 
dear friend in Germany, who was born 
in Munich, apparently we’ve managed
 
I am so happy for you, “Ich freue mich 
ja so sehr auf Euch, dass ich gerne helfe, 
damit der Traum wahr wird“, I’d be
happy to help make your dream come 
true, she said, like a very fairy 
godmother
 
we’re waiting on a response to our 
application
 
 
the house is of stone and wood, 
it has a wooden staircase along 
a wall of the living room going
up to a bedroom there under an 
attic roof, where the whole aerie 
is covered in red carpet, just, it 
would seem, what a poet ‘d be 
looking for, I think, take a look
 
downstairs has all the appliances
we’d want, including a wifi
connection, so I can write my stories 
about the art galleries and churches 
and operas and Bavarian dinners out 
we’ll delight in, the epiphanies we’ll 
cross in all that enchantment
 
a very fairy tale, I project, though for 
me it already is one, with me as 
Prince Charming, why not, and my 
mom as Queen of the Magical Realm,
why neither – your dream is what you 
make it
 
 
Richard
 
 
 

 

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December 13, 2013

my C***mas card‏

          Madonna and Child with Canon Joris van der Paele - Jan van Eyck

           “Madonna and Child with Canon Joris van der Paele” 

                                                (1436)

                                          Jan van Eyck

                                                           _______

 
though I’ve long professed to not being
a Christian, having opted for the more
colourful pageant of Ancient Greece’s
Olympian divinities, and its attendant
metaphysical perspective, wherein
nature is honoured for its bounty
rather than saddled with the guilt of
Original – I ask you – Sin, I nevertheless
revere the spirit that spurred great
painters to such spectacular, even
exalted, heights  
 
in Bruges we saw van Eyck‘s “Madonna
the blue of the prelate’s cape on the left
still reverberates in my subconscious
 
as though I’d discovered a new colour
 
 
the blue on the right on St George, the
patron saint of van der Paele, who
commissioned the painting, rendered
appropriately humble, even kneeling, 
in white, is only slightly less impressive
for being not less pungent but more pale,
noble yet understated, gold armour doing
the definitive rest
 
the ecclesiastic is St Donatian, patron
saint of Bruges, who knew how to
dress, apparently, for so vaunted an 
occasion  
 
 
merry C***mas
 
may your capes ever be as eloquent 
 
may your blues be ever as sublime   
 
 
Richard
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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