Reflecting On The Meaning Of A New Year!

Happy New Year Everyone, In case I don't get to the computer before tommorrow. This past Autumn, I was thinking back to all the people I've met in my travels. Here is a haiku



I am alone now.
So many I knew are gone,
To make their own way.


Copyright 2007

Thinking A Head To New Years.

Sometimes to plan forward, we need to look back.

I can see the pain
My words caused you that night
All these years later.

Copyright 2007

Still In The Cafe

In addition to sneaking off for a forbidden read, I also enjoy writing forbidden things as well,
it's only fun though as long as someone disapproves. And of course, that certain someone helps.


At corner cafe
Looking out for you in crowd,
Writing out haiku.

Copyright 2007

Vacation's Past Time

One of the things that I've always enjoyed doing with vacation time is to read. This scares the living bejabbers out of some people, I guess because reading is the mark of an independent mind. Independent minds make people nervous. So when more conservative relatives come to visit I sneak out when I can to get just a few more pages of delicious thoughtcrime read. Here is a haiku for all you independent minds out there.

Man reads in cafe
Evening light takes its flight
A moonlit walk home

Copyright 2007

Remembering Times Past!

When we think of this Season, we generally picture the Victorian period with its Brownstone townhouses all frosted with snow.

A horse drawn carriage
Parked near an island of trees
In Pemberton Square.

Copyright 2007

Back To The Grind!

For many of us, it's back to the grind. For others, like myself, we have vacation left because we were misers with vacation time during the rest of the year. I have to go back to working on my craft, this can be work and play at the same time.

An artist studies
His completed oil landscape
-for final touches.

Copyright 2007

Merry Christmas!

I would like to Like to wish you the very best on this Special Day!
A special Christmas haiku-

Sun struggled through clouds
Broke spell of an overcast sky
-hazy light beckons

Copyright 2007

In The Pursuit Of Happiness, Let's Not Forget...

This Christmas, just a thought,
For those folks who sought,
But never quite got,
The bounties of those of us who have a lot-
A haiku:

The man you now see
Laying in the street was once
A boy with Santa.

Copyright 2007

Tis' The Season To Be Scrooged

If you work in retail as I once did (in "the real world"), then you know just how surreal it can be this time of year, especially if you have a brutal boss. Here's something for all you folks taking flack this holiday season.You are not alone.



The Season to be Jolly
by Edward S. Gault

I knew Mr. Heimer was going to snap
My head off
If I didn’t get
Those invoices down
To him immediately.
But I was
Held up by angry
Customers who were
Complaining about products
being sold out
So close to Christmas.
They said they had been running
All over the place-kicking,
Shoving, biting, punching-
And all out maiming other people
Just to grab
The last Cabbage Patch doll in stock.
This chronicle would go on
For half an hour.
All the while these kids came in
And were tearing our place apart.
When I got down to Heimer's office,
He went into his own tirade.
Outside on the street
Were children singing
Tis’ the season to be Jolly.

Copyright 2007

The Post Storm Blues

Sometimes the aftermath of a snowstorm can be even more of a pain in the neck than the actual storm.

After the snowstorm,
warm sun comes and melts mountains
-then there are puddles.

Copyright 2007

Seeing Strange Things In The Winter

Ever wonder if some people just can't give up summer?

Air conditioner
In window during snow storm
-In case of heat wave?

Copyright 2007

Bundle Up!

More snow tomorrow?

Walking streets in snow.
Huddled in coats, scarves, and hats
-warmth in movement.

Copyright 2007

Keeping Warm Everyone?

Bundle up folks, and move around.

Man jumps up and down
As snow continues falling,
-Perhaps a snow dance?

Copyright 2007

Snow Scenes #2

When I was five, one of the things that I asked my parents for as a Christmas present was a toy Humpty Dumpty that would fall off the wall and break just like the one in the story did. Of course, I didn't get it, there are some toys that are too cool to actually exist! Like the the toy in this haiku:

Truck with flashing light
Is never seen in snowglobes
Sold in small toy shops.

Copyright 2007

Snow Scenes #1

There are some things that just don't belong in a nice snow scene!

Outside my window
It is snowing, but one thing-
Truck with flashing light.

Copyright 2007

Weathering Those Snowstorm Blues

Here in Boston , we're down one snowstorm this last Thursday, and we have another one coming up tomorrow. I got a lot of good material out of this storm though, The best way to "weather" a storm is to write:

Snowstorm in courtyard
People shovel paths to door-
Then, even more snow.

Copyright 2007

Coffee Bean #5

"Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind."

Albert Einstein, 1921

Currently the leadership of the U.S. needs to grow up and get over their need to spread "freedom" around the world. It is not for freedom that we are in this war with Iraq, but our own nationalism. Our form of freedom may not fit the Iraqi people, they need to find a form that fits their history and culture-to industrialize, modernize, and develop democracy without westernization in their own way, over time...their time. If it is something they create, it will be stronger when it does take hold.

Here's One For The Misanthropes! #2

O.k., O.k., here's something a little more constructive (but less fun).
Look at it this way:

So they despise you,
Where though does that put the ball-
In your court, or theirs?

Copyright 2007

One For The Misanthropes!

The one thing that we all need the least of in our lives is jerks. If you live long enough, you collect more than enough. One classic jerk for this season is Scrooge. When you're out holiday shopping, your bound to run into many more. Here is a Haiku for the MEAN people who enter our lives, and unfortunately (many times) stay!

You glower at me,
like something pickled in a jar.
-Just try some Maalox!

Copyright 2007

Caught!

Here's a haiku for the folks like me who get caught by the supervisor taking that well deserved Coffee break.

One moment in time
Does not truly represent
Other ninety nine.

Copyright 2007

Lets Go For The White Christmas!

Polar Desert
by Edward S. Gault

White roofs.
The trees,
Their limbs burdened with snow,
Sag to the ground.
The train tracks
Stretch across the frozen
ground
Toward the horizon,
Then vanish-
Snow gusts.
The pond
Covered with a thick sheet of ice,
Is like a sanctuary
For all life beneath
- quiet reigns.
Like arrows, icicles
hanging from the wires
point the way.
The sun triumphs,
Snow glistens.

Copyright 2007

Got The Boston Blues?

Haymarket Dream
by Edward S. Gault

Old derelicts
Lay sleeping to the sounds
Of clarinet music
Under the Fitzgerald Expressway.
Vendors pitch chick peas,
Squash, and drupes;
Others haggle
With old vietnamese women
Over the price of celery.
Nearby a child sells
Conch shells
For a nickle
At her table.

Copyright 2007

Old Friends, Good Times

We ate Chinese Food
I can't recall what was said
Only that we talked

Ever Have One Of Those Nights?

Tirades
by Edward S. Gault

Every night was a trial
When the people upstairs got
Ticked off at each other-
Or their in-laws
Or their exes'
Or their exes' lawyers
Or the landlord
(I was actually tempted to go up
And join in on that one).
It scarcely mattered what the issue was-
The who or the what.
When they went into one of their tirades
Their hollering alone shook the foundations of the building-
Loosening the bricks
(even the ones just recently put in
with fresh cement),
Peeling the wallpaper,
And shattering the windows.
Then there were the things they threw-
I don't believe it was limited
To just the dishes.
There were thuds on the floor
That I was sure were going to bring down the ceiling.
Oh, and on those hot Summer nights (I mean really hot, wicked humid).......
I always thought
They might consider
recording these sessions
In a studio
On a C.D.
That way they wouldn't need to
Have the actual fight
Just enjoy it on C.D.
(With head phones).

Copyright 2007

Ah, To Be Young Again At This Time Of Year

Here's a haiku in memory of what it was like.

Children play in snow
Running around the playground
In Geometry

Copyright 2007

Time To Start Thinking About Snow.

Song Of Snow
by Edward S. Gault

It had rained for days
That May of '06
A blanket of fog
Descended down upon the city
So at times
You could not see the Customs Tower.
A bridge in one town collapsed.
Many businesses and residences were flooded.
People were evacuated.
A woman, her head covered by a hood,
- being carried out of a nursing home,
Was asked if she had any words-
So she sang
The song of snow

Copyright 2007

Ever Think You're Just Not Getting Through?

Technically, this may not be a haiku, just call it a 16 syllable short poem.

I spoke of fir trees
You spoke of big cities-
Disjointed connections

Copyright 2007

Just When You Thought You Could Relax!

The Hair Losing Its Cat
by Edward S. Gault

As I was laying
On the couch,
Reading the Boston Sunday Globe,
My wife asked me-
(And it's really not until
You've reached the zenith
In personal comfort
That you get asked to do something)
To vacuum the cat hair
From her chair.
So I asked her
'If it was really
So much a question
Of the cat losing its hair OR
The hair losing its cat
Of course she wasn't amused
(I was in stitches!).
Not only did I have to
Vacuum the chair and the couch-
But the soup that night
Was cold.

Copyright 2007

Seeing Unusual Things In Nature?

Again, Sometimes you have to look Really hard!

Fly on lily pad
sees a frog flying around-
tongue out, insert frog

Copyright 2007

Seen anything unusual lately? Look!

Or justry to look at something in a new way.

Bike walking the man-
People too busy to see
what is around them.

Copyright 2007

Glory of the Season

Here something that celebrates the complexity of (and glory) of our our late Autum season.

Tomorrow, my gloves
My camera as well, Fall
Bicycle path blooms

Copyright 2007

It's Haymarket Day!

Dead Avocadoes
By Edward S. Gault

It didn’t feel like May
It was more like March or April
With the rain and the chill.
The vendor, bundled
In his wool jacket
Made it clear to anyone
Who could hear him
(for several blocks around)
That they could get
A carton of strawberries
For a dollar, fresh kiwi,
For a dollar fifty.
The bananas were guarding the pears and apples
As in a traditional still life.
The avocadoes though,
Were dead.

Copyright 2007

While You're On the Roads This Winter...a thought.

Close Call
by Edward S. Gault

He had to have been listening to the radio
Or he may have been nuts
But he certainly didn’t see me
Crossing the street.
I only just made it-
Even feeling the breeze from his van
At my back as he sped away
Not giving me any thought at all.
Every muscle stiff, I stood there,
Like a wooden statue.

Copyright 2007

Coffee Bean #4

" Where books are burned, human beings will be burned too."

-Heinrich Heine

There is currently a movement afoot to boycott The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman led by The Catholic League and other Rightwing religious groups. Forest River Journal stands opposed to any act of censorship, and recommends reading any book that is banned for general principles.

-E.S.G.

Christnmas Blitz

I'm back folks! I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. Here is a "Haiku" for the Christmas Shopping Blitz-it's my own corallary to Percy Shelly's Ozymandias:


In a vast desert
was a stone slab that read thus:
Me, Me, Me, Gimme!

Copyright 2007

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

I am going to be out of town all this week, Nov. 20-26. In the meantime, here is something for you and your family this holiday season.

Father, We Thank Thee

by Ralph Waldo Emerson

For flowers that bloom about our feet

Father, we thank Thee,

For tender grass so fresh and sweet,

Father, we thank Thee,

For the song of bird and hum of bee,

For all things fair we hear or see,

Father in heaven, we thank Thee.

For blue of stream and blue of sky,

Father, we thank Thee,

For pleasant shade and branches high,

Father, we thank Thee,

For fragrant air and cooling breeze,

For beauty of the the blooming trees,

Father, in heaven we thank Thee.

For this new morning with its light,

Father, we thank thee,

For rest and shelter of the night

Father, we thank thee,

For health and food, for love and friends,

For everything Thy goodness sends

Father in heaven, we thank thee.

A Haiku To End The The War In Iraq #2

Fools talk
Of spreading freedom around the world
But understand little

Copyright 2007

A Haiku To End The The War In Iraq

Tyrants talk
As troops march across a border
Children cry many tears


Copyright 2007

Gallows Humor

Funeral
By Edward S. Gault

I sometimes imagine
What my funeral
Will be like.
People will stand
Around my coffin.
Of course it will be raining.
It always is
In these scenes.
O dreary day!
People will be standing
Around drinking Scotch
And reaching for potato salad.
They will be talking about
What a spectacular career
I could have had,
If only I had
Not been a poet.
And the corpse
Looks terribly old.
Even so –
I know it’s me-
There’s a huge coffee stain
On my shirt.

Copyright 2007

Rain, Rain, Go Away, Come Again Another Day!

Burnt Toast
By Edward S. Gault

It would be the first time in a decade
Boston City officials said
That the Charles River flooded.
As rain first came down softly,
And then came down in massive torrents,
A bridge in one town collapsed.
People were evacuated
From their homes,
The man on the radio said.
And that morning
I burnt the toast.

Copyright 2007

Coffee Bean #3

"Materialists and madmen never have doubts"
-G.K. Chesterton

We had no doubts about going to Iraq then,
And we seem to have no doubts about going to war with Iran now.


Copyright 2007

Buyer Beware!

Brown Bananas
By Edward S. Gault

There are some things
Everybody knows but me-
One of those things
Is that you don’t put bananas
In the refrigerator!
This I had to learn the hard way.
Last Saturday, for once
I was able to get
To get to the haymarket extra early.
My wife wanted:
Bananas,
Peaches
Grapes
black and blueberries
and strawberries
(And thousands of other things).
Of course when I got to work
I put them in the staff fridge
(Not the thousand other things, just the fruit).
There they stayed
Throughout the the day.
When I got home I found,
The bananas had turned brown.

Copyright 2007By Edward S. Gault

THANK YOU VETERANS!

For all the service that you have given to our country


To those of you in Iraq now, Our Prayers are with you,
For a safe return home.

10 Great Things About America

10) The Boston Red Sox
9) The Rockies
8) Our National Parks
7) The Immigrants
6) The Native Americans
5) Labor Day
4) Martin Luther King Day
3) The Statue Of Liberty
2) The Flag
1) The American State Papers
a- Declaration of Independence
b- the Constitution
c- The Bill Of Rights


Copyright 2007

Why Couldn't School Be This Much Fun More Often?

This really happenned. You simply can't make stuff like this up!

Drafting Theology
by Edward S. Gault

Mr. Horowitz, my drafting teacher
Would actually talk about drafting
From time to time.
But he had found Jesus one day,
Or as he liked to say,
Jesus found him.
So our classes were like
A theological seminary where we would,
From time to time,
Draw maybe a thing or two.
So Horowitz was talking one day
About how Jesus would come into our hearts
And change us from the inside out
if we would simply ask him to.
At this point Tim,
(who had just seen the movie Alien)
Asked Horowitz if it were similar
To the way in which the creature's egg
Grew inside this guy
Then hatched itself
By eating its' way out
Through his chest.
Tim went on and on,
Describing it all in micro detail.

Copyright 2007

Coffee Bean #2

"Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty"
-Ronald Reagan

Yes, true. Multi-national corporations, televangelical organisations,
the military-industrial complex, all have concentrated power.


Copyright 2007

In Re Tobacco #1: Teen Smoking

Recently Massachusetts police have been having a hard time controlling
the sale of tobacco to minors over the counter. According to statistics our
state has the worst problem with this than any other state in the union. So naturally anti-smoking activists want to throw more money at new legislation to toughen up laws and really "get serious" about teen smoking.
That's fine.
But nobody wants to see youngsters smoke, and we already have laws to prevent retailers from selling to them. We simply need to enforce the laws we already have on the books instead of throwing more money at new legislation. Any available money should be put toward health education, public service ads, and commercials. About the scariest of these was one in which a woman discusses how she started smoking at age 13, got addicted, and years later developed cancer. The final scene shows her putting a cigarette up to a hole in her throat.
Weird.
Our focus should be to get kids to give up on smoking on their own or not start in the first place. There is an old saying that you can't legislate morality. You can however inform the public morality of young people by giving them the facts about smoking and letting them decide for themselves what to do. This what the anti-smoking activists do best, and it works better than indoctrination and bans in bars and taverns which can only serve to make the habit more attractive to young people by creating a sort of outlaw mystique around it. The message instead should be "This isn't cool, it is harmful to you, here are the facts." If the facts don't work, then we've got a bigger problem than just a law enforcement problem where retailers are concerned. No Smoking bans won't be the solution either, just look at how ineffective, and even counter productive Prohibition was. Attitudes have to change first, it will take time.

This essay was published in BostonNow October 18, 2007
Copyright 2007

Coffee Bean #1

In a letter to William James, Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote "The great act of faith is when a man decides that he is not God."

Wouldn't it be great if Pat Robertson et al took the act of faith and made that decision?

Copyright 2007

Here's Monday's poem belated

Since we had to deal with a serious subject yesterday, here is Monday's poem today.



Carpe Diem
by Edward S. Gault

On the day of my graduation
I wanted to go out
And transfigure the world,
Even if I hadn’t considered
How this would be done
Or what foundations
Would be needed to do it.
And I still consider it,
Even as I am now
A ghostly figure
Riding the daily transit
To work.

Copyright 2007

Remembering Pope's Day

Today is the day that colonial Bostonians celebrated as Pope's day. A lot of People don't remember what Pope's Day was, partially because it is not the sort of history that is generally taught in high school, it is a mere footnote in the story of our republic. It was "celebrated" every November 5 to commemorate the arrest of Guy Fawkes in the act of blowing up the British Parliament in 1605. Eventually Fawkes and the conspirators were convicted and hanged for treason. For Protestant England November 5 became a day of Thanksgiving for being saved from Catholic Rule. Ironically the Puritans who did not ordinarily celebrate anniversaries or holidays like Christmas( no evidence that Jesus was born on the 25th of December) unless they were biblical, made an exception for Nov.5th, or what they called Guy Fawkes Day. At first the day was celebrated by huge bonfires-I have a tendency to picture these being in the town square, but more realistically the authorities probably would have insisted instead that the event take place just outside the town. Eventually the celebrations grew more elaborate.
By the 1760's Bostonians were constructing "Popes Day Carts". These looked a bit like our parade floats today.Each cart had the figure of the pope, and beside him the devil, and trailing behind them on a donkey was Joyce Jr (Fawke's executioner was George Joyce). Boston had two factions, the north end and south end gangs, that would each construct their own Cart. They would parade them toward the center of town, then try to capture the other side's Pope's Day cart. This involved fist fighting, supplemented with cudgels, knives, and broken bottles. In the 1950's
they called these kinds of fights "Rumbles", today we would call it gang warfare. When one side had finally won by capturing the other side's
cart, both sides would bring the carts down to the neck of Boston and have the traditional bonfire.
When I first read of this ghastly holiday in Hiller B. Zobel's The Boston Massacre, I was reminded of the Two Minute's Hate depicted in George Orwell's 1984.When the image of Immannuel Goldstein, the official state enemy, came on the telescreen, people would scream over his voice and even throw chairs and other nearby items about until the reassuring figure of Big Brother came on. As "far out" as this scene is, it did happen,
not only in Nazi Germany, Communist bloc countries, fascist Italy and Spain, but also much earlier in 18th Century Boston with Guy Fawkes/The Pope as the Immanuel Goldstein figure (Pope's Day was also called Guy Fawkes Day).
In 2003 when the Bush Administration was trying to get support for the present Iraq, France refused to send troops there, and encouraged us to solve the problem another way, through diplomacy. Of course the French could have been of great help to us in this capacity as they had more influence with Baghdad than we did, and could have maybe got Saddam to cooperate with U.N. inspection teams. But no, as usual, we didn't listen to the French-we didn't heed their advice about Indochina (Vietnam) either and consequently became "embedded" there for quite a long time.
Never mind that other countries also refused to send their troops to Iraq,
France for some reason was singled out for venom that went beyond just
criticism from Washington, boycotts were called for of everything French from wine to cheese-even going so far as to pour the wine into the streets.
Absurdly enough we had to go changing the names of things like french fries to "Freedom Fries." Then of course came the real hate, a shirt which read France Sucks and to top it off, there is a little beret
draped over the F. This shirt seems to have become enormously popular.
In 2005 I photographed a local store window which had not only the french shirt but others which vilified the New York Yankees. I guess when the bigots figure that they're no longer allowed to hate the Jews ,Blacks, Hispanics, and Catholics, there is always the French and the Yankees.

The above Photograph entitled Shirts in a Window is currently displayed at the J.P. Licks Coffee shop in Brigham Circle in Boston.

Copyright 2007

A Little Something Non-Political

Gazebo
By Edward S. Gault

On the Muddy River
A stone gazebo sits
Guarded by trees
The Moon is seen
Through the branches.
And in the water ,
Through the ripples,
A reflection of the moon
Through the branches

Copyright 2007

And Here's One for Pat Robertson!

Embarrassed by Jesus
by Edward S. Gault

The People in the Church
Told me that if I were embarrassed by Jesus,
Then Jesus would be embarrassed by me
On the final Day of Judgement;
And send me to the eternal Lake of Fire,
Where I would burn forever.
But While they pretended
(even to themselves)
To have great knowledge,
I didn’t give to them the power
Over my mind
That so many others had.
And I wasn’t embarrassed by Jesus,
I was embarrassed by them.

Copyright 2007

Here's One for the Republicans!

MGT Philosophy
By Edward S. Gault

As we drove down I-93
To Boston from Salem
My friend’s father told me
About how he retired
For a year
And just played golf.
About halfway through the year,
It was routine.
When he woke up, he thought
“gee now I have to go play golf”
So he went back to work.
He said he was the manager
of a chain of stores.
When he hired a new manager
He would delegate to them
Responsibility for the whole department
-Let them handle it their own way.
He even gave them a few days off
Before they started
So they would be refreshed
And invigorated
To get to work
And to do the numbers.
Then he said that in the 60’s
He went to this place called The Shark’s Cage
Where people threw beer bottles
At this guy singing in a chicken wire cage.
I wondered if the guy
Ever got a couple of days off,
So he could come back
Refreshed and invigorated
To throw bottles back at the audience.

Copyright 2007

In Re: Useless Sanctions

According to the Boston Globe, the Bush Administration is pushing for unilateral sanctions against Iran for attempting to start a nuclear Program. The Russian foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov who met with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has stated that he has doubts that such sanctions will be effective . While I'm glad that the administration is looking at non-military options, I believe we should heed Lavrov's advice and not pursue sanctions. They never affect the people we are aiming to influence anyway, they only hurt the average person who is struggling to make ends meet just as we are. The elite can always obtain what they want from some "friendly" country abroad. The sanctions in fact strengthen the resolve of people like Ahmadinejad. I wonder if we couldn't loosen his grip on power a little by trading more with Iran.The people themselves like us and our products (and don't want world War III any more than we do), and we might have an opportunity here to influence their culture through trade.We as citizens
should be trying to learn more about the Islamic Culture anyway. We could then bring back the citizen diplomacy that we practiced with the Russians during the Cold War.
Eventually that worked.

Happy Halloween!

Grandma's Pie
by Edward S. Gault

I remember
really looking forward
to those Autumn weekends
that we would spend
at grandma's house.
It seemed to take forever to get there-
but grandma would be waiting
there by the door
welcoming us with her smile.
Then she gave us each our shovels,
and we would go to the cemetery
to dig up some of the things
that grandma would need to
bake her Thanksgiving Pie.

Copyright 2007

The Reasons Why Most American Art Galleries Wouldn't Allow A Starving Dog Exhibit

It would never get this far because:

1) Most reputable galleries are concerned for the the kind of P.R. they might get.

2) Aside from criminal prosecution, there is the very probable load of lawsuits that would be filed even if the animal didn't get loose and hurt someone, (let alone if somebody did get injured). We're as litigous as hell in this country.

3) One of those lawsuits would be filed by P.E.T.A.

4) Institutions have lost their accreditation for less.The New England Acquarium had a close call with accreditation over mainitinance issues, we havn't gotten to starving the fish yet

Bill Murray's Philosophy on Fame

Some have suggested to me , and I agree, that publicity had alot to do with Guillermo Vargas's dog starving stunt. I think our media culture drives people nuts. Our plethora of "reality" shows demonstrates this, but it has been true for a very long time. Just one of many reasons (#3,749 on a list of 9,865) why I don't watch t.v.
Mr. Vargas is about to learn the hard way the difference between fame and infamy .
Actor Bill Murray once said that when people seek to be rich and famous, they don't know what they asking for in fame."Simply get rich," he said "and see if that doesn't cover it."

In re:The Starving Dog Exhibit- A Big Round of Boos

Generally you can't get three people to agree on lunch, but in my travels around Bloggistan, I have found that most of the commentary is negative Actually, the vast majority of it is. At the blog of the Centro Nacional de la Cultura the criticism of the...uh..."artist" was intense. Now my Spanish is rusty, but I was able to pick out the following in quite a number of the comments:
"le falta un poco de imaginacion"
"el arte de la basura"
"Imbecil"
"estupido"
"la torutura no es arte ni cultura"
One guy called Vargas a "puta"- that word might not be in your English-Spanish dictionary . I don't think their P.R. is going well folks. And rightly so.One disturbing thing about this to me is that people weren't allowed to feed the dog obviously, but who was enforcing that?! Museum authorities-and who would they have been, a private security company? Where were the police? Or were they the ones asked to enforce this? If you were the prosecutor, who else would you hold responsible? In my opinion, those in the Gallery administration should be made to resign (and would do voluntarily, if they had any honor and integrity).If you happen to be a Spanish pro (or speak it as a first language), you might find the commentary interesting, just scroll down past the pictures (yes do-I wished I had!), and you will come to the commentary (See previous post for link).

Cruelty in the Name of Art?

A couple of days ago, a friend of ours sent us this letter that she wanted us to see about a Costa Rican "artist" named Guillermo Vargas, who starved a dog as part of an art exhibit at a major art gallery in his country . The letter is below and I have provided a link to the gallery that hosted the exhibit (It is in Spanish though, but there are pictures, you will more than get the idea). If you wish, you can sign it yourselves and e-mail it to them. The show was in August, and unfortunately this letter is only just making the rounds. It's too late for the dog, it died. But it might not be too late to give the gallery grief, and maybe bring the pretending "artist" to justice. If the gallery directors had any decency or honor they would resign.

To http://us.f841.mail.yahoo.com/ym/Compose?To=info%40madc.ac.crI am writing regarding the horrifying actions of Guillermo Habacuc Vargas, who paid local children to catch a dog on the street and then confined, starved and publicly displayed the dog as an "art" exhibit until the innocent animal died of starvation.I, along with many people world wide, am outraged that Guillermo habacuc Vargas has been selected to represent Costa Rica in "Bienal Centroamericana Honduras 2008", This man is by no definition of the word an artist he is a criminally insane sadist and enjoys inflicting prolonged suffering upon his innocent victims. He is a danger to all of society as it is well documented that those with the capacity to intentionally cause harm to an animal have the same capacity to harm humans.To state that this animal would have died eventually of natural causes is unjustifiable and beyond logical, rational thinking.To allow Guillermo habacuc Vargas to represent Costa Rica in Bienal Centroamericana Honduras 2008 will in no way benefit Costa Rica, the world is watching and the actions of this so called artist has brought much negative assumptions as to the humanity of the people of Costa Rica and the fact that the many witnesses of this animal's suffering did nothing and that the organizers of this event allowed this rather than taking action to see that Guillermo Vargas be criminally charged with animal abuse is sending the world a message that Costa Rica consists of a cruel, uncivilized society that has no regard for life but enjoys viewing and contributing to the loss of life.Each and every person who knew of and witnessed the suffering of this innocent dog is equally as guilty of causing it's uncalled for death.And to let this crime go unpunished and instead be awarded by Guillermo Vargas representing Costa Rica in Bienal Centroamericana Honduras 2008 is unacceptable and shameful not only to Costa Rica but to all participants of this event.I urge you, do not condone the heinous actions of Guillermo Vargas by allowing him to participation in Bienal Centroamericana Honduras 2008. He should be jailed and prosecuted to the fullest extent of law for this animal's death, not representing Costa Rica as an artist for he is not an artist and to refer to him as such is an insult to all true artists.Sincerely,Your Name


In Spanish:
http://www.marcaame.com/blogs/analog/index.php2007/08/22/5%20_piezas_de_habacuc

San Diego, you are in our thoughts!

I just want to offer my sympathy to anyone who lost their home to that fire in San Diego.No time is easy, but this has got to be the most difficult time of year, with the Holidays just around the corner, to undergo a tragedy of this magnitude. God be with you.

Getting ready for Halloween

Little Hobo
by Edward S. Gault

My mother pointed out to me
As she helped me put on
The various parts of my hobo costume,
That winning contests was not easy.
Other kids may have worked harder,
I should not get my hopes up or
My expectations too high.
She did not want me to
To suffer the blow when I didn’t win.
Still, I carried home a blue ribbon that day

Copyright 2007

Don't you hate it when this happens?

A Golden Oldie This Week
For One Single Impression: Never Ending 10/19/08

Carol and the Baby
By Edward S. Gault

The clerk was having this
Wonderful chat with the woman
Directly in front of me
With the frock coat.
They must have been good friends
For they talked on and on
About Carol and the baby.
And the manager
Was in the doorway
Of his office
With his back
To the front of the store
Talking about the setbacks
(the many setbacks)
He had in sales.
I went down the street
To the other store
And as I walked in
The clerk’s phone rang-
And they talked and talked,
About Carol and the baby.

Copyright 2007

The Blogger Curse

"Even a man who is pure of heart,
and says his prayers at night,
can turn into a blogger
when the moon is full
and the Bloggervane grows"

Apologies to Lon Chaney, Jr.

Copyright 2007

For the Monday Morning Commuter

Mornings
By Edward S. Gault

The Alarm rings
At the stroke of 7
Every morning
And I arise
From a deep sea of dreams
Pale and with little appetite
I lumber out of bed
To make the coffee-
All in all
One of my better mornings

Copyright 2007

New Reflection
by Edward S. Gault

Dismal Skies.
Torrential rains came down.
I looked into a puddle in the street.
The sun shone in
-a new reflection of myself.

Copyright 1982

A Kick-Off Poem

Spoonbill
by Edward S. Gault

The Senator was a learned man.
All the books he read
were about to topple over,
and over the floor all spread
"I can't support your bill,"
he said
"because the spoonbill
is not my constituent,
and like most birds, is nomadic,
its' seasonal abode most sporadic."
And he spoke on and on,
-most erratic.


Copyright 2007