DAILY BLOG
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A few years ago I picked up a copy of Personae by Ezra Pound at ABE books. When I opened it up to start reading, I came across this note in pink on the inside cover. September 15, 1969 Jay, Happy Birthday Enjoy! Love, Sara Books are living things, with histories, lives of their own… Read more
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Osip Mandelstam is an artistic martyr, a saint of the imagination. No poet sacrificed as much for his art. No poet paid more dearly for believing in the power of language and beauty and the freedom of imagination. Exiled and incarcerated often in Soviet Russia for what he wrote, Mandelstam reminds us that words do matter. That one of… Read more
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To be able to post something everyday here at ClimbingSky, I need to always have postings scheduled a couple of weeks ahead of time. And have a basic plan for 30 days ahead of time. My personal habit of writing daily helps. As well as sticking to things I have a lot of opinions about… Read more
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Today Americans go to the polls and again Democracy faces Lincoln’s famous question. Can our democracy or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, long endure. The choice we face today is clear. Please join with me in praying that a majority of our neighbors take up Lincoln’s spirit today. Hate, injustice, and untruth cannot… Read more
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William Butler Yeats as a poet is unique. He grew greater as he aged. He was world famous as a poet in his early 20s, but wrote many of his best poems when he was in his 70s. For this reason, he has more great poems about middle age and old age than any other… Read more
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There are books you read because of their plot and there are others you read for their tone and style. Far Bright Star by Robert Olmsted is the latter. Like All the Pretty Horses, by Cormac McCarthy, it is a story of beauty and violence and horses and Mexico. And like All the Pretty Horses (and Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry),… Read more
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As book collectors know all too well, we only regret our economies, never our extravagances. ~ Michael Dirda In 1986, I had just moved to St. Paul, was sleeping on a friend’s floor, and looking for work. One day after a job interview in downtown Minneapolis, I wandered into a used bookstore that has been… Read more
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Late fall has arrived in the North Country. Experience tells us the first true snowstorm of year is not far off. Frost and cold temperatures have already arrived. In matters of metaphor, Art turns toward Nature for illumination. The laws and rhythms of creation are a teacher worth paying attention to – growth toward death,… Read more
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“A thousand years makes economics silly and a work of art endures for ever, but it is very difficult to do and now it is not fashionable.”― Ernest Hemingway, Green Hills of Africa There remain hundreds of books on my reading “to do” list, yet sometimes I find myself re-reading an old favorite. With poetry this is… Read more
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“A wild and crazy weekend involves sitting on the front porch, smoking a cigar, reading a book.” —Robert M. Gates Here’s to wild weekends! Read more
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