7th & 8th October, 2006
Details of Rod at The
Luckman in November - click here
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Photo by
Edward Habib McKuen. ©2006 by Stanyan Audio Video Archives
A Thought for Today
The sun is a moveable target. Aim for something in life a little more steady and less all consuming.
FROM the¨BOOKS
OURSELVES TO KNOW
Our losses are the sores
we box and bottle up
far back, ladder down
amid the unlit chambers
of our cluttered minds,
hoping they'll stay lost
or unrecovered
like the mother lode
of some as yet uncovered mine.
Those things first dear to us
then lost or yet undone,
no matter what the reason
go unlisted in our wills
and codicils.
No pirates bearing half a map
find the other half marked x.
the interview is over
when the questions
come too close.
Grudges come
and settle in with ease
when losses are the subject.
We wear our gains
like barfly gear
or rows of medals
on an unpatched shirt.
Hurt, like loss,
is no brother
to ill attention,
the more we leave it
unrepaired and unattended
the quicker it will go.
It leaves behind
at most a residue
like sediment
that bubbles
at the bottom of the wine.
Why is it then
that simple sorrows
seem to thrive
as though the weekend gardener
was charged
with keeping them alive.
One snub
and every act of joy
once raised in toast
and sweetly celebrated
is crushed into the never was.
Friends are not immune
to this ill treatment
and lovers bear the brunt.
Acquaintances
remain immune to arson
even as the ashes smolder.
Not yet close enough
for love or final friendship,
they remain unblemished
and unblamed.
Why make tedium
safer than it should be,
constant, crossfiled,
calibrated
dried and dreary
hauled out in a hurry
dusted off and fluffed
like paper flowers
that go unnoticed
as counterfeit and crude
until the posy paper
tears
or the paint upon the plastic
wears thin and peels
enough to warrant touching up.
Reality is square
and easy to make out.
Its shadings are
the works of men
imbibed with building
barricades and battlements.
The more we hide
our summits or our sorrows
the less of what we are
or can be
is reflected or looks back at us
from mirrors.
Pause
before you give up seeking
the exit to the maze
send the guard or guide dog
off to chase a bone.
Be unafraid to leave
some portions of your life
to fate, to change, to God.
Should a friend's behavior
worry you
you may at last be given
the chance to give
some friendship back.
Some unexpected love
arriving right on time
is more welcome to the ill
than penicillin.
We know ourselves
but we'd know our worth
and, yes, our worthlessness
better if we paused
with more regularity
to take the boards off
the shuttered windows
and let some sunlight in.
The worth of man
is not in how he treats himself
or his dearest dozen friends
but how, when it is offered him,
he treats the treat of giving.
- from "Looking For A Friend", 1980
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ROD McKUEN
CONCERTS
ROD
McKUEN APPEARANCES
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Saturday 7 October
Sukkot
June Allyson o
Shawn Ashmore o
Niels Bohr o
Toni Braxton o
Bobbie Brown o
Shura Cherkassky o
Sarah Churchill o
Andy Devine o
Alfred Drake o
Robert Drivas o
Charles Duitoit o Le
Roi Jones o
R.D. Laing o
Diana Lynn o Yo
Yo Ma o
Helen MacInnes o Al
Martino o
John Cougar Mellencamp o
Vaughn Monroe o
Elijah Muhammad o
Oliver North o
Vladimir Putin o
James Whitcomb Riley o
Bishop Desmond Tutu o
Henry Wallace o
Thom Yorke
Sunday
8 October
Rona Barrett o
Robert "Kool" Bell o
Christian Bernard o
Jill Bonney o
David Carradine o
Chevy Chase o
Matt Damon o
Temple Fielding o
Frank Herbert o
Paul Hogan o
Jesse Jackson o
Rouben Mamoulian o
James Olsen o
Juan Peron o
Chad Petree o
Sarah Purcell o
Eddie Rickenbacker o
Pepper Rodgers o
Walter Schumann o
R.L. Stine o
Sigourney Weaver o
Stephanie Zimbalist |
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All of us love and hate but few of us understand.
In love, as in anything, better to underestimate than over
estimate.
Averse is easy and a bad habit. Be a benefactor and watch your fortunes grow.
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THINGS DO NOT CHANGE |
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Things do not change
because of accident or war.
Man is not altered,
at least not rearranged by man himself.
Man changes and is changed
by something else.
He evolves like the dinosaur, but slower.
Evolution is usually preoccupied
and pays no attention to proceedings
when it comes to man.
And so the wind of change
is not always accompanied by
the sands of time.
More often they are left behind
not even relegated to the history book.
Whatever you believe or see,
whatever horoscope you read or bible you consult-
God's own ancient diary or the one
you've written for yourself -
no stars, no sages, and no sayings change us.
We are altered by the alternates we stumble on.
These certain accidents
planned, unplanned, or perpetrated
that come upon us like an early fog
do make a difference.
If that fog would last or was predictable
then any change could last or be controlled.
But men have brains too small
to chronicle or keep a change
from falling backward into all the rubbish
that a brain contains.
Knowledge is akin to loving the closer
to reality you come the deeper the mystery.
He who loves his country first has time
for children and for walking, talking in his sleep,
rolling down a hill, and finding one
who supersedes all other loves.
Time will take the patriot on an endless journey
and it will seem like overnight.
His list of pursuits can challenge an abacus
and still his mind will stay uncluttered.
If you would put yourself,
your house in order
try thinking of your country first,
and you will learn that order
is the secret of selectivity.
Believe it. Try it, anyway.
- from
"The Power Bright & Shining", 1980 |
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