27th
& 28th December, 2007
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Rod at
Dos Vidas. Photo by Thomas Kist from the 2006 Arjan Vlakveld film “Rod
McKuen: A Man Alone” for Netherlands Public Television. Photo ©2006,
2007 by Stanyan Audio Video Archives. All Rights Reserved.
A Thought for Today
Don’t be too quick to question everything. There are wild roses that have bloomed far into December seemingly without reason.
FROM the¨BOOKS
BETHLEHEM BC
You could hear
the flapping of their wings
for some distance –
not a sudden rush
or panic made by masses
but a slow coming together
quietly in the air.
Then, following that yellow highway
that the star provided
into Bethlehem they came.
Slow. Slow. Quietly.
Like snowfall making up it’s mind
before a winter downpour
And winter it was.
On the ground
we huddled – first in awe,
then in fright
thinking it miracle enough
that our important lives
should be interrupted
by creatures on a winter’s eve
who flew above us and beyond us,
to settle in the barnyard
at the other end of town.
(We make up miracles to suit ourselves
and so we knew these winged persons
had been sent for our amazement,
and not to please the cattle
in an unremembered farmer’s barn.)
Were you there?
But file into the barn they did
while some kept vanguard in the air
as though imagining they guarded
some important person
living there.
Some of us went home,
having seen them with no ill effect.
In the morning there’d be stores to open,
pigs to feed
and stories to enlarge upon
concerning what had happened
on the night before.
Were you there?
-from “The Carols of
Christmas,” 1967, 1971
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Thursday 27 December
John Amos o
Gerard Depardieu o
Marlene Dietrich o
'Howdy Doody' o
Tovah Feldshuh o
Sydney Greenstreet o
Rich Jones o
Michael Joseph o
David Knopfler o
Eva LaRue o
Oscar Levant o
Dr. William Masters o
Heather O'Rourke o
Louis Pasteur o
Cokie Roberts o
Roy White
Friday
28 December
Cliff Arquette o
Steve Austin o
Lew Ayres o
Dorsey Burnette o
Kelly Fitzpatrick o
Malcolm Gets o
Joyce Haber o
Earl 'Fatha' Hines o
Hildegard Knef o
Stan Lee o
Sam Levenson o
Martin Milner o
Johnny Otis o
Otar Roszinski o
Roger Sessions o
Maggie Smith o
Denzel Washington o
Woodrow Wilson o
Edgar Winter |
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Love is an act of giving. Giving is an act of love.
There are no wise men. Only men and women who go on gaining wisdom.
Most of our needs should far exceed our grasp. Or what are needs for?
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FOR A SON AT CHRISTMAS |
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When Christmas comes around this
year, I’d like to give you something that you least expect: your father’s
wisdom. If, indeed, he’s yet acquired enough to share. Your father’s charity, if
he can truly say he has done nothing all these years to harm his fellow man. Your
father’s understanding, if he understands your needs well enough to listen to whole
paragraphs of your young troubles without judging you mid-sentence. Your father’s
absolution, though he has yet to be absolved for the recklessness he’s passed down to
you both knowingly and unknowingly. Your father’s future, if he can see untroubled
days ahead. Your father’s needs, that you might meet the ones he never filled
himself.
I hope, though, that your father, your old man, is not so selfish as to burden you with
his unanswered prayers. You will need all the God that you can get to answer some of those
requests you are making now and many you have not thought up yet, but will.
-
adapted from "An Outstretched Hand," 1980 |
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