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The Times Square Prophet; one of the poems in Rain Witness

The Times Square Prophet                          

Yo, you got a problem, me talking to you?

You too good to listen, mister suit?

I heard you moan buzz off.

You could learn a thing or two

Even from us street folk.

We don’t just mumble to ourselves.

I got a cell phone too.

It called me, told me

I should share this secret 

If you could spare a New York minute.         

Listen, yeah to me.

I can give you something precious

The secret to a better life.

I could pass it on to you

If you would take a New York minute. 

What I want? No money. Really.

I tell you what the secret is.

If you think I’m right

You nod to me, a little bow, then you say

You may be poor and smell like shit but you have got a point.

You game for just a minute?

Ok, here it is.

Be nice, real nice.

There really is a God.

She’s watching you and keeping score.

You know when you are losing?

If you don’t know that God’s a lady

She says Count your friends

Them people ask for nothing

Just your company.

So, what about it?

Be a mensch and I’ll be on my way.

I’m waiting. Over here. Look at me.

A little bow and then you say

You may be poor and smell like shit...

Beach

Rain Witness is out!!!

The new book Rain Witness is out. You can purchase it using this link on my website www.edryterband.com; Click "Books". The reviews have been great, “…your best ever…”.

The proceeds, all of them, will still go to ACLU, Planned Parenthood or Doctors Without Borders; you choose. When I receive your orders (you could buy more than one copy and gift it to your friends :) I’ll be happy to personally sign your copy (copies) and mail them to you. It’s listed at Amazon, but my personal response to you leaves us more to donate.

PS If you haven’t already, you can purchase the other two collections Life on Cloud Eight and Beyond Cloud Eight.

My best wishes,

Ed

Brief Poetry

I'm heading toward the publishing of Rain Witness, the third collection of poems. In the process of getting there, i'm learning brevity, how to message a poem with fewer words and lines. Here's an example of what i'm calling Brief Poetry

the lobster’s brown-black water home

cold as an ex-lover’s goodbye

he doesn’t know he tastes as good as a first kiss.

A new President, a getting-old pandemic

How Else To Keep Me Going          

Beyond vaccination, masks and social distance

Watch hawks float around the tops of trees 

Drink coffee without sugar

Savor M’s painting of a red dahlia

Watch a movie we both agree on

Rub her feet on our sofa

Spend time with Steven Colbert, Lady Gaga 

Curate my Spotify music library; include standup comics 

Pamper my curiosity on Wikipedia about Glaciers, Vermeer 

Let questions pop up others might think are silly

What would life be like if I do live until I’m 120?

How would my sons look when they were 77 and 71?

Will there still be the filibuster?

Play solitaire on my phone while I head toward sleep 

Don’t count wake up calls to the bathroom, until they are 3 or more

Sleep 8+ hours and look out the window every morning  

Re-read James Baldwin and Ram Dass

Highlight points I should memorize

Take another class on equanimity and the fear of dying

Remember, at least once a day, I am safe in this moment

Love people who I believe see the real me 

Say thank you when people let me talk, not just wait for me to finish

Repeat to myself, it’s okay to need optimism

Keep knowing I’ll live through being disappointed.

Be willing to cry when I’m happy, even if others see it.

A last minute plan for democracy

I’ve submitted this elsewhere, but for those of you who happen upon this website, a plan (plea?) for some thinking about the upcoming election. It’s a bit wordy, but, what else do you have to do? It’s a quiet Sunday before election day.

My advice to all who may still vote: remember the basics:

Theme 1. This is Trump's pandemic:

China is where the virus started but Trump turned it into a pandemic in the U.S. On his watch we have actually, factually become a world leader in cases (closing in on 6 million) and deaths (over 230,000) and all he says: "It is what it is”, or “were turning the corner”.

Theme 2: This is Trump's economy:

He inherited a winning economy and has squandered it, like all his businesses. On his watch jobs and businesses have been lost in record numbers. New jobs before the pandemic were not growing as fast as the last two years of Obama’s presidency. Unemployment is still above 8%, more than double what it was last year. And the biggest deficit in history, because his tax break for the rich DID NOT create more jobs and tax revenue as he said it would. PS Job LOSSES have occurred in the manufacturing sector. PS over 850,000 women have left the workforce to take care of at-home children. Trump: “We’re gonna get your husbands back to work…” Welcome to the 1950’s.

Theme 3: This is Trump's social unrest:

Record growth in gun sales and increasing protests on his watch. Yes, some violence in the protests, much of it created by hopped up militia as in Kenosha or Lansing Michigan, and hoped for by Trump to scare white suburbanites. As one famous black man said... white people "say they're scared, but we're the ones getting killed"

Theme 4: This is Trump's incompetent government

Record turnover in his cabinet; sycophant's like Mike Pence, Bill Barr, Mike Pompeo in key roles; the firing of Rex Tillerson; leaving under protest of James Mattis; gagging and firing of Inspectors General who could tell the truth about what's happening in the DOJ, the State Department. The criminals indicted in his organization: Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort; Michael Flynn; Roger Stone, Steve Bannon, Rick Gates, George Nader (look up this beauty; a child pornographer)

Theme 5: This is Trump's endless stream of shameless lies

"I've done more for black people..." "I created the greatest economy ever..." "I'd be happy to turn over my tax returns, but they're being audited..." "I believe Putin..." "Joe Biden is in the pocket of radical socialists who will destroy the suburbs and take away your guns…"

Theme 6: We can do better after Trump because we can have the competence, the compassion and real plans to deliver

1. We will put science first in order to really break the back of the pandemic. 2. We will push back on climate change - get back into the Paris Accords; 3. We will reform, NOT defund the police. The violence in the protests will decrease, because the protesters will feel they’ve been heard once Trump is gone. 4. We will safeguard and improve the ACA and our healthcare, including Medicaid. 5. We will bring back jobs, e.g. by really funding infrastructure projects. 6. We will restore the Voting Rights Act which will counter voter suppression.

The new foundation for government: Bring back honesty (e.g. you can see our tax returns), competence and checks and balance to the White House and Congress.

The Pushcart Prize

In the middle of a pandemic, writing and reading poetry has become a healing. If you have recommendations or you want some of mine, let me know. Also, there’s been a bit of good news. Just got nominated for The Pushcart Prize for poetry. It’s a prize offered annually for writing that's published in small press journals. Lots of other nominees but still, it’s nice to have the recognition, this one for the poem “Rain Witness”, which is also included in the book “Beyond Cloud 8” 🙂

Forecasts for the summer of 2020 from the spring

We should have seen this coming

Date: April 13, 2020 at 7:24:17 PM EDT

Subject: The presidents briefing

I just finished watching the today’s presidents daily briefing. I couldn’t make it until the end. Simply put, the daily briefing is a horrible, embarrassing self defense and completely lacks two critical qualities 

1. Clear guidance to the people about what to expect and how we can best take care of ourselves and loved ones. Instead, he rattles off accomplishments, even phoney ones.

2. When concerns or criticisms arise, he attacks those who bring them forth. He calls them fake or disgraceful. 

He is the most self possessed, defensive public figure I have ever known in this country. He sets the tone of a junior high school bully. He does not tell the truth or care about us when we most need it. 

The briefings have become a horror show. It is worse than watching a traffic accident. In a traffic accident there are innocent victims and we engage in a dark curiosity about what may have happened. Now we are the victims in the accident and we watch the most insensitive person drive by us. He drives by and doesn’t slow down, care about us at all. Instead, he drives on, slavishly devoted to his own journey to re-election. 

He has been a principal contributor to the dilemma in which we find ourselves. He has blood on his hands; more people have died and live in fear because of him. Period. There is no possibility ever of him admitting it in the slightest degree. Instead he blames the fake news and the radical Democrats. He is the opposite of what we should be having in our leader. He knows how to exercise power only to get what he wants. He knows nothing about what real people need and how to govern to give those people what they need.

I could go on. Suffice to say I am very sad and angry that our country ever gave him the opportunity to be our president, that we have a system that enabled him to be elected. I am somewhere beyond furious at his hideous disregard for honesty and the utter lack of compassion and insight that he should be showing us. 

But there is only one way out of this morass. Everybody votes. Make it easy to vote and punish those who make it hard. No more third-party candidates. Vote as if your life depended on it, because it does.

NEW FLASH #2

BEYOND CLOUD EIGHT HAS BEEN OUT FOR A MONTH!!!

The book has been available for the past few weeks and has been very well received. I’m grateful for the interest. One person said, who had read Life on Cloud Eight, “I enjoyed this even more than the first book; there is a more mature voice here.”

I don’t know if the review is correct, but I’m glad to have the input. I hope more of you will give it a try.

News Flash!!! The Next Book

Looks more and more like a new book will be published in the coming months. We'll need a new title. The current one "Son of Life on Cloud Eight" is a draft idea and not necessarily the best one. Stay tuned.

In the meanwhile, if you haven't read "Life on Cloud Eight", you can order one now. Just go to www.edryterband.com and click on the link "Books". If you do order, get as many copies as you like and ALL the proceeds will go to Doctors Without borders or Planned Parenthood. You get to choose.

July Update - Some New Reflections on Our Politics

Below is a quote from Hannah Arendt. She was a keen observer of the tyrants of the 20th century. Their rise to power was fueled by the lies they told and the anger and hatred those lies gave birth to. They told lies about Jews and non aryans in Germany, supposed communists in Italy and Spain, non communists in Russia, all of whom were enemies who they declared threatened their dreams for their countries. Their lies led to epic disasters for the world, but especially for Germany, Italy, Spain, Russia, the countries the tyrant felt they owned. They did have accomplices, like Goebbles. But most of all they had their lies and they spread those lies relentlessly. We may not be headed for such epic disasters now, but the diet of lies we are being fed and the current accomplices of the liar in chief, is the seed bed for nothing good. Hannah Arendt captures the grave risks of such lying:

 “If everybody lies to you, the consequence is not that you believe the lies, but rather that nobody believes anything any longer...And a people that no longer can believe anything cannot make up its mind. It is deprived not only of its capacity to act but also of its capacity to think and to judge. And with such a people you can do what you please.”

What Donald Trump is up to, is not just to forward a racist, xenophobic, angry agenda, but to use the lies that underly that agenda to erase the value of the truth. And then, …”with such a people you can do what you please.”

February 2019 Update about our politics

(Just posted on Facebook): There are glimmers of light in our political scene. 

 Paul Manafort is going to jail.  Michael Cohen is going to jail.  Roger Stone is indicted, and will be tried for lying to Congress. The Senate has, in a bipartisan way, rebuked the President on his foreign policy initiatives, e.g. removing troops from Syria. You can argue with their position, but at least they had one of their own. The intelligence community has testified before Congress that the President’s foreign policy perspectives, his view of climate science are all very much at odds with the facts. The House has produced its first major legislation, announcing its top priority, and it is a good choice, no matter what your politics are. It’s called HR1. Look it up.  Its about assuring voting rights to more people, making voting more easy, undoing gerrymandering, requiring full financial disclosures of anybody running for President or Vice President. 

 Yes, there’s still too much that’s troubling going on.  There is still Narcissus, the finger puppet for Vladimir Putin, in the White House, who wants a wall when a better choice for a top priority would be better roads and schools; more vigilance against Russia, more respect for climate science.  And there are still the weasels in Congress, who wont stand up to him, because they fear for their jobs more than they care about their country.  

My wishes for the future? Weasels learn, narcissists do not. The weasels can see their own future imperiled if they continue to follow the President in his chaotic, self serving agenda. A start at least would be:

·      They should pass all or parts of HR1

·      The Senate should create a veto-proof majority to 

deny the President his wall 

increase sanctions on Russia

Notice I haven’t said anything yet about impeachment. I’m for it, but don’t think the Senate is ready to try and convict him. And then, what would we have, Mike Pence?

 What are your thoughts on a starter set of ideas for a hopefully invigorated Congress?  

The Looks of Love A Poem that was just accepted for publication

The Looks of Love                            

In the beginning was our fresh erotic clamor.  Phosphoric flashes exploded through our doubts                                                                                                  blinded and consumed us.                                                                                                                        In the mornings we awoke longing once again, hungry                                                                            for the danger and the wonder in each other’s flesh.                                                                                        

Then we turned to fateful choices  giving up our blood and juices into babies aliens who conquered spaces we once called our own. We reveled in their laughter and their triumphs. The years have helped us blur the endless tending   to their cries and smells and disappointments.

Now our evening mirror shows this older couple         who have kept on all these years worn smooth like stones in flowing rivers  rounded from the flow of countless days. We touch each other still  although less frequent, more distracted.

We’ve traveled all these places fitfully and sometimes self immersed  but kept on showing up because we said we would. We plan, we laugh, we fight and then repair  worry to each other, to ourselves choose to still believe there will be ways to love ahead.

Ideas that Matter: #2 Being Afraid (of the right things)

The President has said that IF there is a blue wave in November, we should be afraid of the violence it will unleash.  He's also said that we should be afraid of immigrants poring over the border who will murder and rape and steal and take advantage of our laws to vote illegally and drive illegally and take jobs that belong to real Americans. Look at the picture of the woman who was killed by an illegal. What does that tell you? That we should be afraid of illegals. 

But look at the whole picture, the picture from across the whole country, not just one incident. That picture tells you where the real dangers are. Illegals break laws LESS then others;  Illegals are less dangerous than real Americans.   Real Americans; people who look like you and I; they are far more likely to be violent, have more guns they use in fits of rage or fearful impulse.

It is a scarier world out there, and fear can be a useful guide to make ourselves safer in that world, if it is aimed in the right directions. We should be afraid of losing social security and our health care insurance or paying even more for them; be afraid of our wages continuing to stagnate; be afraid of rotting roads, trains and airports, underfunded schools; be afraid of unchecked climate change and the heat, and storms, floods, dirty air and water it can lead to.  

Most of all, we need to be afraid of people who don't tell the truth about themselves or the way things are; who know better and deny these dangers.  They try to point us toward scapegoats and away from solutions that would hurt their selfish interests. Yes, it will cost more money to do something useful with the real fears we should be having; to get good things done.  

Some of it will need to come from rich people who don't pay as much as they should in taxes. Some of it will need to come from spending less on foolish things like Space Forces. Some of it will need to come from the rest of us giving more in taxes. That is not socialism, another fear mongering, baseless scream.  That is how we actually will pay for the things we really want.

Being afraid of the right things and doing something constructive about them is enlightened self interest.  We should think more and learn more about where the real dangers lie and be moved by a desire for a better future based on a willingness to contribute to it.

The book is doing well; time for the next phase. Any ideas?

Feedback from readers has been very encouraging. Although, I'd guess that people who don't like it are reluctant to say so. In any case, over $3000 has been raised so far from book sales that people have chosen to donate to Doctors without Borders and to Planned Parenthood.  

And now that I'm retired from RHR International (a truly outstanding place to work), I'll have more time to figure out how to further share the current book and write the next one.  Life on Cloud 8 2.0?  If you have ideas about how this book might be more widely shared, let me know.

Happy end of summer.

Ed

The Book will be here very soon

Hi to everyone on this Memorial Day,

I've posted this message also on my Facebook page, but want to reach as many people as possible.

My book, Life on Cloud 8, is coming out in the next few weeks.  I'm really pleased, of course, but will be even more so if lots of people let me know they want to give it a try and buy a copy.  I'll sign and send it to you personally, all for only $15.00 (+$2.00 for postage). I know that sounds brash of me, but i’m arranging it so that proceeds will go to Doctors Without Borders and/or Planned Parenthood. You choose. 

Of course you can buy it from Amazon, where it will be listed, but that will leave far less for me to donate.  

I’m working on a way to process orders and payments so I can quickly mail copies of the book to you. Stay tuned, and I'll let you know when it's available. Of course, advance orders are welcome (you can even order for your friends).

Ed

Ideas That Matter: Idea #1 Voting Matters More Than Protests and Especially More Than Party

There are ideas that matter and others that matter way less. Yesterday's protests, even the ones that say they are defending the second amendment are statements coming from all of us. They will matter more when they turn into votes. Those votes will say who we really want to represent us. And that will maybe change things, even at the federal level. 

My side of the debate? I was struck by how right the kids were, how articulate they were and how media savvy they are. That last feature, i hope will give them influence that other protests have not mustered. That influence will be important in hopefully mobilizing current voters to vote and these new ones to vote in record numbers.

My view of the path ahead? It's really not about defending the second amendment. That amendment, like it or not, guarantees people the right to bear arms. It does NOT say that right is unlimited, just as the first amendment does NOT guarantee unlimited speech. When speech incites violence, it is not protected. When guns make deadly violence against other people, the second amendment gun ownership should not be protected. 

So, no bump stocks, no assault weapons, more background checks, higher age limits and longer waiting periods are simply to protect us against unrestricted gun ownership. Many people agree; these thoughts are coherent, defensible and will matter more when they reach others and then we turn them into votes.

Catching up

Its been quite a while since the last post.  Lots has happened, mostly good for me and my folks, not so good for the world.

The world:

Earthquakes in Mexico, ethnic cleansing in Myanmar; three awful hurricanes; slaughter in Las Vegas. The earthquakes and hurricanes couldn't be prevented but so much more could be done, to help the survivors and manage the future with climate science not a debatable issue. The ethnic cleansing and slaughter in Las Vegas can be prevented but politics keeps winning over people. 

Personally:

• Submitted a manuscript for a book of poems entitled "Life on Cloud 8".  Catchy title, no? Hopefully it will be published.  Planning on sharing all proceeds with a worthy charity, like the Red Cross, Planned Parenthood.  Other ideas welcome.
• Two lovely vacations; the first to Alaska which is in the process of melting, but there's still a lot left to see and wonder at.  The second to Barcelona and the Catalonia region of Spain, which is in the process of exploding over section issues.  A pic from each below

La Sagrada Familia Barcelona

The Hubbard Glacier

Three Illuminated Manuscripts

       For those Who Believe in Mindfulness

 

  For those Who Believe in a Higher Power

   

For Those Who Believe Only In Themselves

Focus on the media and congress Part 2

There's enough evidence that the new president is doing things that should cause concern. My own concern is deepened as he continues to lie, brag and attack those who disagree. However much we are worried and for whatever reasons, ringing our hands is not enough.

Call people in congress, they own the purse strings; they can insist on the maturity the President should show and limit him if he doesn't show it. When you call, have a list (preferably short) of the things you want them to pay attention to.  And tell them you'll be watching.

My own list:

Be a saner voice about immigration, from Mexico and elsewhere. Don't fund the building of a wall. It sends a terrible message to Mexico and beyond. 

Do fund an infrastructure bill, but not one that enables crony contractors. It will create jobs and the roads, bridges, etc. that we need

Stay in the Paris Climate Agreement.  We cant afford to back away from the gathering perils of climate change. If you don't agree with that, you're pandering to fools who endanger us all.

Do fund Planned Parenthood and lift the gag order abroad. The best abortion prevention has been provided by Planned Parenthood and there is no viable option for underserved women here or abroad re. cancer screenings, and a host of other health matters.