A really neat vid from National Geographic online

If you hit 'more videos' in the upper righthand corner of the video you'll find an amazing selection opens in a new window.

Still Got The Blues Gary Moore

Thanks, James Shepard, for turning me onto this great musician and performance. Wow!

Overdosing on Poetry

Growing up, we had a couple of poetry anthologies in our home and one other poetry book. The town library was a room about the size of our den and had a scant selection of books, none of them poetry. My parents enjoyed poetry, so I became a fan, too, returning to the anthologies to read and reread my favorites. I memorized The Highwayman so I could recite it to myself when I was away from the book. I was 14. Poems were rare and became jewels to be cherished. More and more I've realized that as the internet brings me poem after poem on a daily basis I don't cherish them as much. To be honest, I prefer going to youtube right now and finding a good piece of music. Yes, I do stumble across poems and poets I love and yes, I still do read some poetry every day. I admit I've lost the thrill of it, though (except when a winner of a poem comes down the pike). I no longer fondle the pages of a poem, sigh, come back to read and reread...there's no time. It's on to the next. I still love writing poetry, but I suspect my own poetry gets a cursory glance from the reader as a mound of poetry links to move on to after mine.

With a novel, we stick with a story until the book is finished. We immerse ourselves in it, become part of the characters and settings. We're not trying to read part of ten books at the same time so the author can have feedback..instantly.

Well, that's my confession. I want poems to be diamonds again. I want space and time to enjoy when I'm ready.

nodding off
another poem slides
through my hands

You've got to love Eric Clapton playing a reggae version of You Look Wonderful Tonight!

I've always loved his straight version of this song, yet can't get this version out of my mind.

Pris

Dr Robert Keller, R.I.P.

I received an email yesterday that Dr Robert Keller, the first doctor to finally help me with CFIDS and my doctor for 8 years before he first dropped Medicare, then closed his practice, died on Friday of a long illness. I knew that he left for health reasons but privacy is a huge thing so I didn't know it was terminal. This has been a huge shock. He was a brilliant doctor, knowledgeable, and very good with his patients.

A small part of an online resume for Dr Keller includes:

* a triple board certified physician

* Named as one of the 2000 Outstanding Scientists of the Century

* Elected to the Board of Governors of the American Academy of HIV Medicine of the State of Florida

* Serves on the National Practice Committee

* The Consumer's Research Council of America has named him as one of the Top Physicians in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007 in the fields of Internal Medicine, Immunology and Hematology; he is featured in the: “Guide to America’s Top Physicians”

* In 1995 he founded Immune Balance Technologies. IBT develops technologies to modulate the human immune system, to treat disease, preserve wellness & reverse the aging process

* Over the last twenty years Dr. Keller has been involved in scientific research in both Immunology and Hematology

* Dr. Keller also treats patients with immune dysfunction through his medical practice The KBK Institute, a state of the art medical clinic for the cutting edge treatment of patients afflicted with chronic illnesses including: HIV, Hemophilia, Hepatitis, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, Autoimmune diseases, pre and post Cancer care, chronic neurogenerative diseases and aging – which we view as a disease.


God speed, Dr Keller. Know that you made a difference!


NOTE ADDED JUNE 10: I would appreciate it if no more product comments are made to this post. Anyone interested in Dr Keller's research or products can find those by googling his name. This blog was posted in his memory. Personal comments are not only welcomed, but encouraged. Thanks.

Sprained ankle

I jammed my ankle between two hard things on Wed. Can't walk on it and need to keep in elevated until the orange on one side goes down. No way to elevate at this computer, so I'm again slow to respond and brief. I went to doc, but since I could still walk on it at that point...it had just happened, they didn't x-ray it, but that may yet need to be done since they said it should be 'deflated' in 2-3 days. Not happening. I won't be reading blogs until I can stay on longer but thank all of you who visit in the meantime.

Pris

Blue Fifth Collaborative Issue is out!!

It's a wonderful issue, thanks to editor, Sam Rasnake. You can see it HERE.

Scott Owens and I have collaborations in the journal along with other poets I really enjoy.

Pris

More about our Origins from National Geographic

I've always been fascinated by National Geographic articles, especially the ones about anthropological findings that shed light on what the world might have been like eons ago...our ancestors and the face of the planet, itself. I'm enclosing a photo from this article as well as a few teasers. It's worth the time to take a peek. Just click HERE.




In March of 1994 some spelunkers exploring an extensive cave system in northern Spain poked their lights into a small side gallery and noticed two human mandibles jutting out of the sandy soil. The cave, called El Sidrón, lay in the midst of a remote upland forest of chestnut and oak trees in the province of Asturias, just south of the Bay of Biscay.In addition to the fractures, cut marks left on the bones by stone tools clearly indicate that the individuals were cannibalized. Whoever ate their flesh, and for whatever reason—starvation? ritual?—the subsequent fate of their remains bestowed upon them a distinct and marvelous kind of immortality. Shortly after the nine individuals died—possibly within days—the ground below them suddenly collapsed, leaving little time for hyenas and other scavengers to scatter the remains.


The bones from El Sidrón were not Republican soldiers, but the fossilized remains of a group of Neanderthals who lived, and perhaps died violently, approximately 43,000 years ago. The locale places them at one of the most important geographical intersections of prehistory, and the date puts them squarely at the center of one of the most enduring mysteries in all of human evolution.



So, while the new genetic evidence appears to confirm that Neanderthals were a separate species from us, it also suggests that they may have possessed human language and were successful over a far larger sweep of Eurasia than previously thought. Which brings us back to the same hauntingly persistent question that has shadowed them from the beginning: Why did they disappear?




When teeth are imaged at high resolution, they reveal a complex, three-dimensional hatch of daily and longer periodic growth lines, like tree rings, along with stress lines that encode key moments in an individual's life history. The trauma of birth etches a sharp neonatal stress line on the enamel; the time of weaning and episodes of nutritional deprivation or other environmental stresses similarly leave distinct marks on developing teeth. "Teeth preserve a continuous, permanent record of growth, from before birth until they finish growing at the end of adolescence," Smith explained

A good post by Marcus Slease

A friend sent me the link to this post today. It's good reading...Is Poetry Special?? See what he says HERE Hit the back arrow or click on the upper tab in your browser to return.

Pris

Big Mama Thornton 1971

It was in about 1972 that I saw her perform in a small nightclub called Lennys on the Turnpike, north of Boston. What a night! Elvis took his hound dog from her original cut of it.

Billy Elliot on broadway with Elton John

I saw the movie. I would give anything to see it on stage. This video is exquisite!

Pete Seeger turned 90 on May 3 (Thanks Barbara Moore for posting about this on Facebook)

In my opinion, Peter Paul and Mary sang If I Had A Hammer better than any group of that time. This video comes with a short intro by Pete Seeger. I saw PP & M perform this in the sixties and they were dyanamite!

Go to Sam Rasnake's blog for this post

Sam's Blog...Only Chains We Can Stand

Thanks for posting these two videos, Sam.

Torn Shirt (from the Poem A Day challenges)

Sara glides onto the stage,
flower tucked behind her right ear.
You'd never guess she was forty
but her birthday was yesterday.
Her run in the play has ended.
She'd like to go back
to the beginning and start over but
the audiences want brighter eyes for the role.

The male lead still makes her shiver;
his hands turned the sky purple.
Her replacement has already
caught his eye, though,
and Sara's blank dance card sighs
from its drawer.

She bows, blows kisses into the darkness,
calls last farewell to the crowd.
She'll go out like Garbo
or Hepburn. Not like Blanche,
crying over some man's torn shirt.





(this is a slight revision of a couple of lines)

'Poetry month' has officially ended. While I didn't write a poem a day, I did write quite a few and some might make it into my queue for submission later. I used the prompts posted on Poetic Asides, a site run by Robert Brewer.Thanks, Robert, for your dedication in doing this.The prompt for the last day was Farewell, so the above poem comes from it.