The Lighthouse
Portsmouth Harbor Lighthouse on a light, lovely November 30, delightfully sans tourists |
And on its outer point, some miles away,
The Lighthouse lifts its massive masonry,
A pillar of fire by night, of cloud by day.
Even at this distance I can see the tides,
Upheaving, break unheard along its base,
A speechless wrath, that rises and subsides
In the white lip and tremor of the face.
And as the evening darkens, lo! how bright,
Through the deep purple of the twilight air,
Beams forth the sudden radiance of its light
With strange, unearthly splendor in the glare!
Not one alone; from each projecting cape
And perilous reef along the ocean’s verge,
Starts into life a dim, gigantic shape,
Holding its lantern o’er the restless surge.
Like the great giant Christopher it stands
Upon the brink of the tempestuous wave,
Wading far out among the rocks and sands,
The night-o’ertaken mariner to save.
And the great ships sail outward and return,
Bending and bowing o’er the billowy swells,
And ever joyful, as they see it burn,
They wave their silent welcomes and farewells.
They come forth from the darkness, and their sails
Gleam for a moment only in the blaze,
And eager faces, as the light unveils,
Gaze at the tower, and vanish while they gaze.
The mariner remembers when a child,
On his first voyage, he saw it fade and sink;
And when, returning from adventures wild,
He saw it rise again o’er ocean’s brink.
Steadfast, serene, immovable, the same
Year after year, through all the silent night
Burns on forevermore that quenchless flame,
Shines on that inextinguishable light!
It sees the ocean to its bosom clasp
The rocks and sea-sand with the kiss of peace;
It sees the wild winds lift it in their grasp,
And hold it up, and shake it like a fleece.
The startled waves leap over it; the storm
Smites it with all the scourges of the rain,
And steadily against its solid form
Press the great shoulders of the hurricane.
The sea-bird wheeling round it, with the din
Of wings and winds and solitary cries,
Blinded and maddened by the light within,
Dashes himself against the glare, and dies.
A new Prometheus, chained upon the rock,
Still grasping in his hand the fire of Jove,
It does not hear the cry, nor heed the shock,
But hails the mariner with words of love.
“Sail on!” it says, ”sail on, ye stately ships!
And with your floating bridge the ocean span;
Be mine to guard this light from all eclipse,
Be yours to bring man nearer unto man!”
Asian slaw at BaoBao – delicious!! |
Rabbit Rillettes – apple curried mustard seed, apple butter & rye crisps |
MuMu N Nogu |
Albert Bierstadt United States, 1830-1902 Autumn Birches (Approaching Storm), 1860 Oil on board |
With all the concern about the 6th mass extinction, scientists would like to but don’t understand why the end-Permian was so much worse than any other. That’s because they don’t account for the death of trees and other vegetation, unique to the “Great Dying”. They realize there must have been acid rain from the volcanic activity, but ignore toxic ozone in the air – just as they do now. With plants dying, CO2 is no longer absorbed. Seems kind of obvious that climate change would rapidly accelerate as a result, destroying the delicate web of life in bottom up trophic cascades.
One of many Wyeths in the collection depicts a thriving tree of the sort that can no longer be found.
N.C. Wyeth United States, 1882 – 1945 Georges Islands, Penobscot Bay, Maine 1928-29 Oil on Canvas |
Frederick Childe Hassam United States, 1859-1935 Isles of Shoals, 1915 oil on canvas |
A recent examination of the extinction of Steller’s Sea Cow, which occurred in a matter of decades during the fur trade, ignores the evidence that the species was endangered from indigenous hunting before the trade began, in a pattern that reflects evolved tendencies stretching back through prehistory.
N.C. Wyeth United States, 1882-1945 Dark Harbor Fishermen, 1943 Tempera on panel |
Leopard, antique European porcelain |
Henri Manguin France, 1874-1949 Decorative Fruit, 1919 Oil on canvas |
Why write, or blog, or paint? How to take joy in being a grandmother?
Edward Henry Potthast United States, 1857-1927 Children Wading, 1920 Oil on canvas |
Children are adorable but also demanding and purely selfish, and motherhood is fraught with pangs of separation.
Mary Cassatt United States, 1844-1926 Hélène is Restless, 1890 Oil on canvas |
What is Picasso saying with this decapitated rooster and bloody knife, just after WWII?
Pablo Picasso Spain, 1881-1973 Cock and Knife, 1947 Oil on canvas [sold by the artist to a NY gallery in exchange for a 1948 Oldsmobile convertible] |
This Maine “vacation” could be shorthand of my entire life.
Matt Blackwell United States, born 1954 Vacation, 2002 Oil on canvas |
In a very large work, the same artist places a bewildered moose in the center.
Matt Blackwell United States, born 1954 Moose, 2015 |
The human pandemonium rages beneath him.
t looks like a modern Pieter Bruegel to me.
Moose, detail |
I suppose it might be much nicer to go through life believing in human progress, and innate goodness, and a future. But either I prefer the truth, or I just tell myself that to feel better.
Frederic Edwin Church United States, 1826-1900 Mount Katahdin from Millinocket Camp, 1895 Oil on canvas |
Negroni Bianco at Fore |
Bottoms up!
Source: http://witsendnj.blogspot.com/2018/12/the-lighthouse.html
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