Double Trouble

I've been teaching doppelgangers in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, so why not one of my own?
Matt and Mateo.

You know, my mother once told me she had seen my double earlier in the day.
I was rather affronted.
I mean, my mother, me, a double?
She should have known better, don't you think?

Duncan's Falcon-Thoughts

MY MOTHER WOULD BE A FALCONRESS
    --by Robert Duncan, 1919 - 1988

 My mother would be a falconress,
And I, her gay falcon treading her wrist,
would fly to bring back
from the blue of the sky to her, bleeding, a prize,
where I dream in my little hood with many bells
jangling when I’d turn my head.

My mother would be a falconress,
and she sends me as far as her will goes.
She lets me ride to the end of her curb
where I fall back in anguish.
I dread that she will cast me away,
for I fall, I mis-take, I fail in her mission.

She would bring down the little birds.
And I would bring down the little birds.
When will she let me bring down the little birds,
pierced from their flight with their necks broken,
their heads like flowers limp from the stem?

I tread my mother’s wrist and would draw blood.
Behind the little hood my eyes are hooded.
I have gone back into my hooded silence,
talking to myself and dropping off to sleep.

For she has muffled my dreams in the hood she has made me,
sewn round with bells, jangling when I move.
She rides with her little falcon upon her wrist.
She uses a barb that brings me to cower.
She sends me abroad to try my wings
and I come back to her. I would bring down
the little birds to her
I may not tear into, I must bring back perfectly.

I tear at her wrist with my beak to draw blood,
and her eye holds me, anguisht, terrifying.
She draws a limit to my flight.
Never beyond my sight, she says.
She trains me to fetch and to limit myself in fetching.
She rewards me with meat for my dinner.
But I must never eat what she sends me to bring her.

Yet it would have been beautiful, if she would have carried me,
always, in a little hood with the bells ringing,
at her wrist, and her riding
to the great falcon hunt, and me
flying up to the curb of my heart from her heart
to bring down the skylark from the blue to her feet,
straining, and then released for the flight.

My mother would be a falconress,
and I her gerfalcon raised at her will,
from her wrist sent flying, as if I were her own
pride, as if her pride
knew no limits, as if her mind
sought in me flight beyond the horizon.

Ah, but high, high in the air I flew.
And far, far beyond the curb of her will,
were the blue hills where the falcons nest.
And then I saw west to the dying sun--
it seemd my human soul went down in flames.

I tore at her wrist, at the hold she had for me,
until the blood ran hot and I heard her cry out,
far, far beyond the curb of her will

to horizons of stars beyond the ringing hills of the world where the falcons nest
I saw, and I tore at her wrist with my savage beak.
I flew, as if sight flew from the anguish in her eye beyond her sight,
sent from my striking loose, from the cruel strike at her wrist,
striking out from the blood to be free of her.

My mother would be a falconress,
and even now, years after this,
when the wounds I left her had surely healed,
and the woman is dead,
her fierce eyes closed, and if her heart
were broken, it is stilled

I would be a falcon and go free.
I tread her wrist and wear the hood,
talking to myself, and would draw blood.

------------------------------------
Thanks to JP for sharing the poem with me.

A Family Outing

Stripes, Stripes, Stripes

"Tied-Up House": Lyrics By Jackie Leven

TIED-UP HOUSE

found a little stone on a harbour wall
sea-spray-soaked and very small
big bay rough and turning brown
little shrimp boat on a dangerous sound

i can't go back to the tied-up house
tied so tight people can't get out
you can hear them wail, you can hear them shout
or they sit in chairs till the silence hurts

the ocean roars from room to room
leaving tide marks in the shallow gloom
i got cuts on my hand from i don't know where
and a sobbing hall that i just can't bear

--Jackie Leven,
from his CD Shining Brother Shining Sister

Park-Time

Friends at play.

Sweet dog.

Time-Travel: Take Four

Photo of a photo.  1965 vintage, perhaps.
Between more formal posturings, wouldn't you say?
Or after.  Mostly candid capture here, though one fellow is tracking the camera still.

(Me? The small fry in front.)

Happy July 4th, 1966?

Here's an old family photo. On the back, you can read "July 4th, The Ducks."

I'm thinking this would be 1966, 1967, or possibly 1965. I'm that buzzhead boy in the front in the Buster Brown shirt (loved that shirt), and I look like a first grader, maybe. I'm standing all goofy. I'm thinking that I'm doing that thing with my feet because of the way I'm having to hold my arms behind my back and pose. (The energy comes out somewhere, somehow; nothing much has changed, though I look a lot older.)

We were patriotic children, so posing with the flag would have made perfect sense. It's funny to see the slice of porch and the street; I lived there for almost 20 years or so and still dream about that house every once in a while.

And, while the sun is (as usual for a family photo) in our faces, we look pretty happy here. That's worth appreciating.

Happy 4th to you too.

(When I consider that caption, I wonder if Uncle Bob took the shot.)

Morning with Kelp: Monterey Bay

Tuesday, June 14: Cool, overcast morning with light winds from the west. Few marine mammals; lots of pelicans and gulls. Light swell, but fun, especially just west of the Aquarium as we watched the surf hit the point. The kelp beds provided classic illustration of how they mellow out wind chop, and the water had a thick texture as we paddled.

My favorite photos below catch the rolling swell, lifting and dropping, as you can see by looking at my brother in the red kayak. He's no further away, really, in the seventh photo below, but he seems to have dropped into a hole. I couldn't find the best way to catch the swell action with the camera, so after a bit I put the camera down and concentrated on holding the feelings and the look in my body and mind. The mild conditions meant we paddled further and faster without quite noticing, which led to appropriately sore muscles later.

I need to get back into paddling shape, and this day was a fine effort.

Good day.

Rock-and-Roll 1967

The three Duckworth boys: Xmas 1967.

I was six, George nine, and Hugh twelve.

"Long May You Run" is playing in the cafe right now.

I think we were channeling the Beatles or Beach Boys back then, though.

Postcard: Time-Travel

The Goof Squad, sun-struck, 1968.

Tomorrow, I am going to get the same haircut I'm sporting in the picture. Of course, what was blond then is brown and gray and white now. I still have the same smile though, at least when the sun is in my face.