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Tuesday, June 30, 2015

"Red Dirt Girl"

Me and my best Friend, Lillian
And her Blue Tick Hound dog, Gideon
Sittin' on the front porch, coolin' in the shade
Singin' every Song the radio played
Waitin' for the Alabama Sun to go down
Two Red Dirt Girls, in a Red Dirt Town
Me and Lillian
Just across the Line, and a little Southeast, of Meridian.

She Loved her brother,  I remember back when
He was fixin' up a 49' Indian
He told her, little Sister, gonna ride the Wind
Up around the Moon and back, again
He never got farther than Vietnam
I was standin' there with her, when the telegram come
For Lillian
Now, he's lyin' somewhere, about a Million miles, from Meridian.

She said, there's not much here, for a Red Dirt Girl  
Somewhere out there is a great Big World
That's where I'm Bound
 And the Stars might Fall in Alabama
But one of these Days, I'm gonna Swing
My Hammer Down
Away from this Red Dirt Town
I'm gonna make a Joyful Sound.

She grew up Tall, and she grew up Thin
Buried that olde Dog, Gideon
By a Crepe Myrtle Bush, at the back of the Yard
Her Daddy turned mean, and her Mama Leaned hard
Got in trouble, with a boy in Town
Figured that she might as well, settle down
So, she dug right in
Across a Red Dirt Line, just a little Southeast, from Meridian.

She tried hard to Love him, but it never did take
It was just another Way for her Heart to Break
So she Learned  to Bend
But one Thing they don't tell you, about the Blues
When you got em
You keep on Fallin', cause there ain't no Bottom
There ain't no End
Least not, for Lillian. 

Nobody Knows when she started her Skid
She was only 27, and she had five Kids
Could'a been the whiskey
Could'a been the pills
Could'a been the Dreams, she was tryin' to kill
But there won't be a mention in the News, of the World
About the Life and Death, of a Red Dirt Girl
Named, Lillian
Who never got any further, across the Line, than Meridian.

Now, the Stars still Fall on Alabama
Tonight, she finally Laid
That Hammer Down
Without a Sound
In the Red Dirt Ground.

Emmylou Harris
U.S.A.


~Beannaichte'
30 June,2015

beannaichte@twitter.com     
  
   


   

Saturday, June 20, 2015

"The Everyday Miracle"


~ When people truly open their minds,
and contemplate the way
in which the Universe 
is ordered and governed, they are amazed ~
overwhelmed by a sense of the miraculous.

~ When people contemplate 
with open minds the
germination of a single seed,
they are equally overwhelmed~
yet numerous babies are born 
every day, and no one marvels.

~ If only people opened their minds,
they would see that the birth of a baby,
in which a new life is created,
is a 
greater Miracle
than restoring life. 
 
~ St. Augustine of Hippa
 (354-430)
North Africa 


                                        ~ Beannaichte'                                          
20 June, 2015

~ For Lily.

@beannaichte.twitter.com

Wednesday, June 17, 2015

"Plainswoman"


             Tough and independent, she lives comfortably with contradiction.  Plainswomen are realistic and romantic, tender and strong.  They are quietly proud of their accomplishments and well-informed about a world that is largely ignorant of them.
              Sweat-stained, these women wear plain's mud on their boots and under their fingernails.  They have Scars to prove they belong- they've dug beneath the topsoil.  Staying  makes them part of a unique history and validates their writing.  They possess the Power and the Dignity that comes from strife and experience and teeth-grinding Faith.  In fact, the writing by these women clearly demonstrates the contradictions inherent in Western life and people.  Her "Home on the Range" may make her cower in dreadful doubt and pain, and just as surely be valiant; unafraid of dragons, demons, and a stack of overdue bills.  A Western woman understands the life-cycles of cattle, sheep, and horses, and believes in the sheer ecstasy of that moment of a colt's birth.  She may become "death's handmaiden", as well as a lifesaver. She may spend her honeymoon cleaning the barn, or shoveling snow in a blizzard, and be proud and happy to work the land with her husband.
              A woman who thrives here must be able to endure hardship, to bear the long gray winters of isolation.  But-and this may be even more important-she must embrace the Beauty that may bloom and fade in a hour.
              Tough times have, as they have always been, part of the Western woman's experience, and her writings prove it.  But observing only the hardships would leave the panorama incomplete.  Hearing the carol of a meadowlark helps a woman bear the disappointment of the barren years.  Reflecting that perseverance is part of the genetic code.  Many of the women learned to delight in the mud of March, because it means a hay crop is on the way.
              What other qualities define an authentic Plainswomen?  Some castrate lambs with their teeth or saddle their own horses.  Many speak of their fathers who believed his girls could do anything a boy could do.  Still, if a man orders a woman to jump in front of five 16,00-pound bulls, armed only with a sunflower stalk, she may write about it rather than commit murder.  Or not.   
              Mourning her losses, a Western woman may reflect on the link between Birth and Death.  Women here still dig in their toes and hang on, and sing when they feel like sobbing.
              Knowledge of Freedom lies bone-deep in these women, whether in means loping over the countryside on horseback or climbing onto a Quonset roof.  But a stern land teaches lessons ruthlessly, and a woman here, as anywhere, may lose much of what she loves.
              She may use Anger sparked by Injustice to Forge a New Life.  Still, Plainswomen go on, becoming a part of history.
               She becomes one of the gullies carrying the stories down to the children.  Each woman, each story, is a Rivulet,  part of the Stream,  the River, the Plains.  This is the Plainswoman- a part of the Circle. 

~Unknown
~Beannaichte'
17 June, 2015

@beannaichte.twitter.com

Thursday, June 11, 2015

"Love Minus Zero"


My Love she speaks like Silence
Without Ideals or violence
She doesn't have to say she's Faithful
Yet she's True, like Ice, like Fire
People carry Roses 
And  make Promises by the Hour
My Love she Laughs like the Flowers
Valentines can't buy her.

In the dime-stores and bus stations
People talk of Situations 
Read books, repeat quotations
Draw Conclusions on the wall
Some Speak of the Future
My Love she speaks Softly
She  Knows there's no Success like Failure
And that Failure's no Success at all. 

The Cloak  and dagger dangle
Madams Light the Candles
In Ceremonies of the Horsemen
Even the Pawn must hold a grudge
Statues made of match-sticks
Crumble into one another
My Love winks, she does not bother
She Knows too much to argue or to Judge.

The Bridge at Midnight Trembles
The country doctor rambles
Banker's nieces seek Perfection
Expecting  all  the Gifts that Wise men bring
The Wind howls like a Hammer
The Night blows Rainy
MLove she's like a Raven
At my Window with a Broken Wing.

~Bob Dylan
U.S.A.


~Beannaichte'
11 June, 2015

@beannaichte.twitter.com 

Monday, June 1, 2015

"Listen"

~To Reveal Myself  Openly and Honestly
Takes the Rawest Kind
 of Courage...


              "How beautiful, how grand and liberating this experience is, when people learn to help each other.  It is impossible to overemphasize the immense need humans have to be really listened to, to be taken seriously, to be understood.
              "Modern psychology has brought it very much to our attention.  At the very heart of psychotherapy
is this type of relationship in which one can tell everything,  just as a little child will tell all to his mother.
              "No one can develop freely in this world and find a full life without feeling understood by at least one person...
              "If I am to see myself clearly, I must open up to a confidant  freely chosen and worthy of such trust.
              "Listen to all the conversations of our world, between nations as well as those between couples.
They are for the most part-dialogues of the deaf."


~Dr. Paul Tournier, M.D.
(1898-1986)
Swiss Psychiatrist  and Author

~Beannaichte'
1 June, 2015


@beannaichte.twitter.com