[MD] The Fool on the Hill - repainted

[MarshaV]

John,

Cherubic cheeks indeed!   

You are very sweet for sharing, the fool does sometimes wonder. 

What does the witch know?  She knows that when you send something out into
the world, it will return three-fold. Thank you.    
 
 
Marsha    



-----Original Message-----
From: moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org
[mailto:moq_discuss-bounces at lists.moqtalk.org] On Behalf Of John Carl
Sent: Tuesday, September 01, 2009 12:24 PM
To: moq_discuss at moqtalk.org
Subject: [MD] The Fool on the Hill - repainted

Yes, there are stingy people,
but I'm not one of the stingy kind.
The robe I wear is flimsy? The better to dance in.
Wine gone? It went with a toast and a song.
Just so you keep your belly full--
never let those two legs go weary.
When the seeds are poking through your skull,
that's the day you'll have regrets!

So Marsha, I really, liked the posting of young paul spinning on the
hilltop.  I enjoyed it on my laptop and the morning after when Lu was up and
at her computer, it played again for me yawning  and coffee in hand in the
quiet morning home.  Only this time on the big screen with the big speakers
and even more evocative sharing it with my wife.

An old song applied in a new way.  Something about those cherubic cheeks.
In Demon Box, Ken Kesey talks about the high powered lens of fame, how it
scours the soul and turns humans into something twisted usually ...  With
John it seemed to carve him out hollow, but Paul just let that beam of
attention go 'round  and 'round and 'round- spinning and polishing those
cherubic cheeks into buddha bellies of joy.

 a dynamic interaction with an old song

Then, last night, I sat down with something a bit different I got from the
library and I found a poem I'm sure you've read but for me was brand new.

a dynamic interaction with a new song.

And they blended so well, I wanted to offer you a taste

As for me, I delight n the everyday Way
among mist-wrapped vines and rocky caves.
Here in the wilderness I'm completely free,
with my friends, the white clouds, idling forever.
There are roads but they do not reach the world.
Since I'm mindless, who can rouse my thoughts?
On a bed of stone I sit, alone in the night,
while the round moon climbs up Cold Mountain.


It goes along with the Long and Winding Road too!

But the most evocative image I got from your posting, Marsha, and that
resonated for me the same evening, happening upon HanShan's poem, wasn't a
new picture of Paul, or myself, or Platt or anyone on this forum but the old
fool on the hill himself.

Wise men, you have cast me aside.
Fools, I do the same to you.
I would be neither wise man nor fool;
from now on let's hear no more from each other.
When night comes I sing to the bright moon;
at dawn I dance with white clouds.
How could I still my voice and my hands
and sit stiff as a stick with my gray hair rumpled?

A man sitting in a mountain pass--
robed in clouds, tricked out in sunset's rose.
In his fingers a fragrant flower, to pass along,
but the road's so long and hard to climb!
In his mind: disappointment and doubt;
old as he is, he's accomplished nothing.
People laugh at him, call him a cripple,
yet he stands alone-- constant, untouched.

Poems of five-character lines, five hundred,
of seven-character lines, seventy nine,
of three-character lines, twenty-one--
six hundred poems in all.
Usually I write them up on a rock face
and praise myself:  "Very good calligraphy!"
Anyone who can understand my poems--
you must be the true mother of all things!