Why Don't YOU Do Right????

Where Reagan->Bush->McCain Will Take Us


Why Don't You Do Right?

You had plenty money, 1922
You let other women make a fool of you
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too

You're sittin' down and wonderin' what it's all about
You ain't got no money, they will put you out
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too

If you had prepared twenty years ago
You wouldn't be a-wanderin' from door to door
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too

I fell for your jivin' and I took you in
Now all you got to offer me's a drink of gin
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Get out of here and get me some money too
Why don't you do right, like some other men do?
Like some other men do

Abou ben Adam

Abou ben Adam (may his tribe increase!)

awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,

And saw, within the moonlight of his room,

Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,

an angel, writing in a book of gold.

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adam bold,

And to the Prescence in the room he said:

"What writest thou?" The vision raised its head,

And, with a look made of all sweet accord,

Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord."

"And is mine one?"said Abou, "Nay, not so,"

Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,

But cheerily still, and said, "I pray thee, then,

Write me as one who loves his fellow men."

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night

It came again, with a great awakening light,

And showed the names whom love of God had blest,

And lo! Ben adam's name led all the rest.

- Leigh Hunt

The Stone

"AND will you cut a stone for him,

To set above his head?

And will you cut a stone for him--

A stone for him?" she said.

Three days before, a splintered rock

Had struck her lover dead--

Had struck him in the quarry dead,

Where, careless of a warning call,

He loitered, while the shot was fired--

A lively stripling, brave and tall,

And sure of all his heart desired . . .

A flash, a shock,

A rumbling fall . . .

And, broken 'neath the broken rock,

A lifeless heap, with face of clay,

And still as any stone he lay,

With eyes that saw the end of all.

I went to break the news to her:

And I could hear my own heart beat

With dread of what my lips might say;

But some poor fool had sped before;

And, flinging wide her father's door,

Had blurted out the news to her,

Had struck her lover dead for her,

Had struck the girl's heart dead in her,

Had struck life, lifeless, at a word,

And dropped it at her feet:

Then hurried on his witless way,

Scarce knowing she had heard.

And when I came, she stood alone--

A woman, turned to stone:

And, though no word at all she said,

I knew that all was known.

Because her heart was dead,

She did not sigh nor moan.

His mother wept:

She could not weep.

Her lover slept:

She could not sleep.

Three days, three nights,

She did not stir:

Three days, three nights,

Were one to her,

Who never closed her eyes

From sunset to sunrise,

From dawn to evenfall--

Her tearless, staring eyes,

That, seeing naught, saw all.

The fourth night when I came from work,

I found her at my door.

"And will you cut a stone for him?"

She said: and spoke no more:

But followed me, as I went in,

And sank upon a chair;

And fixed her grey eyes on my face,

With still, unseeing stare.

And, as she waited patiently,

I could not bear to feel

Those still, grey eyes that followed me,

Those eyes that plucked the heart from me,

Those eyes that sucked the breath from me

And curdled the warm blood in me,

Those eyes that cut me to the bone,

And cut my marrow like cold steel.

And so I rose and sought a stone;

And cut it smooth and square:

And, as I worked, she sat and watched,

Beside me, in her chair.

Night after night, by candlelight,

I cut her lover's name:

Night after night, so still and white,

And like a ghost she came;

And sat beside me, in her chair,

And watched with eyes aflame.

She eyed each stroke,

And hardly stirred:

she never spoke

A single word:

And not a sound or murmur broke

The quiet, save the mallet stroke.

With still eyes ever on my hands,

With eyes that seemed to burn my hands,

My wincing, overwearied hands,

She watched, with bloodless lips apart,

And silent, indrawn breath:

And every stroke my chisel cut,

Death cut still deeper in her heart:

The two of us were chiselling,

Together, I and Death.

And when at length my job was done,

And I had laid the mallet by,

As if, at last, her peace were won,

She breathed his name, and, with a sigh,

Passed slowly through the open door:

And never crossed my threshold more.

Next night I laboured late, alone,

To cut her name upon the stone.

Wilfrid Wilson Gibson

Punishment Central--the US of A

Adult, American, poor--book 'em, Dan-o!

According to Adam Liptak writing in the NY Times:

One out of every 100 adults in the United States is behind bars!

One out of every 36 Hispanic adults in the United States is behind bars!

One out of every 15 African American adults in the United States is behind bars!

While one of every 335 white women in the US is behind bars, one out of every 100 black women is incarcerated!


Today the NY Times tells us the US is planning a big new prison in Afghanistan!

What the hell kind of animals have we turned into? In a recent interview on NPR Adam Liptak reported that in the 19th century the US prison system was a model for the world, people came from all over to see how rehabiltative incarceration could be made to work. Nowadays no one comes, we have become the poster child for a different sort of prison system--one which punishes and gives no thought to rehabilitation.

We have become a nation that kidnaps, carries out renditions, tortures, warehouses, ignores due process, runs kangaroo courts, military tribunals (with mulligans), and warehouses millions for their addictions.

We have become addicted to vengeance, inured to cruelty. When will we try to be better?

The Starved Beast

How ironic! Bush whines that there are no easy fixes to the nation's economic woes that his profligate leadership has been responsible for.

How ironic that the Conservative philosophy of "starve the beast" that he has implemented to kill social programs and leave Medicare's and Social Security's long term prospects in jeopardy should have taken away most of the levers of power that might be quickly applied to alleviate the misery that his tax breaks for the wealthy and insane war against Iraq have engendered.

Huoguo Shacha 火锅沙茶 Chinese Hotpot

People enjoying Chinese firepot 火锅 at a large restaurant.

For hotpot, broth is kept simmering in a hot pot in the center of the table into which thin strips of meat and pieces of vegetables are dipped to cook and then dipped in sauces. My favorite was always sha cha sauce 沙茶酱--a dark brown, pungent, thickish dip that has a somewhat gritty mouth feel. The Chinese characters of the name mean "sand" "tea" "sauce". The sauce is made from flatfish, shrimp, soybean oil, chilis, garlic, and shallots. It is also known in southeastern China in the Min dialect as "satay." The food, after being cooked quickly in the hot broth, is whisked out on one's chopsticks and dipped in the sauce which often has had a raw egg stirred into it and then popped into the mouth and eaten.



Canned shacha sauce -->




A fancy hotpot & Shacha sauce with raw egg--below.

Pineapple shaved ice 鳳梨刨冰

Pineapple shaved ice 鳳梨冰
Originally uploaded by fuyanyu.

When I was studying Mandarin language and T'ang poetry in Taiwan in the summer of 1968, one of my favorite treats at the market place was fengli baobing 鳳梨刨冰. Baobing 刨冰 means shaved ice and fengli 鳳梨 is pineapple.

In those days baobing was generally served in a bowl with sweetened condensed milk over it and for an additional few cents with fresh fruits. My favorite was the pineapple! Pineapples in the market were always at their peak of juicy deliciousness on the day they were being sold. This was a truly refreshing and wonderfully delicious summer time treat that I still think of on hot days all these years later.

Ralph Nader at his Nadir

The great ego has lifted Nader's head for another plunge but I view Nader at his nadir like the protagonist of Oscar Wilde's prose poem "The Master":

THE MASTER

Now when the darkness came over the earth Joseph of Arimathea, having lighted a torch of pinewood, passed down from the hill into the valley. For he had business in his own home.

And kneeling on the flint stones of the Valley of Desolation he saw a young man who was naked and weeping. His hair was the colour of honey, and his body was as a white flower, but he had wounded his body with thorns and on his hair had he set ashes as a crown.

And he who had great possessions said to the young man who was naked and weeping, 'I do not wonder that your sorrow is so great, for surely He was a just man.'

And the young man answered, 'It is not for Him that I am weeping, but for myself. I too have changed water into wine, and I have healed the leper and given sight to the blind. I have walked upon the waters, and from the dwellers in the tombs I have cast out devils. I have fed the hungry in the desert where there was no food, and I have raised the dead from their narrow houses, and at my bidding, and before a great multitude, of people, a barren fig- tree withered away. All things that this man has done I have done also. And yet they have not crucified me.'

The Doctor is "In"

Let's face it, some astrologers are doing a better job than ARG and Zogby. If you believe in polls, then the electorate is one huge flock of sheep being constantly led hither and then yon by a bunch of spin-merchant border collies! The polls are being given too much credit by the media which needs horse races to supply talking-head fodder.

If you believe in polls, clap your hands. If you believe in polls, clap your hands! Oh, yeaa! Arg and Zogby are coming back to life, quick give them money!

The only polls that count are those on election day!

The doctor is in, please be seated.

Twa Corbies

Photo by Doc Rock

AS I was walking all alane
I heard twa corbies making a mane:
The tane unto the tither did say,
'Whar sall we gang and dine the day?'
'—In behint yon auld fail dyke
I wot there lies a new-slain knight;
And naebody kens that he lies there
But his hawk, his hound, and his lady fair.
'His hound is to the hunting gane,
His hawk to fetch the wild-fowl hame,
His lady 's ta'en anither mate,
So we may mak our dinner sweet.
'Ye'll sit on his white hause-bane,
And I'll pike out his bonny blue e'en:
Wi' ae lock o' his gowden hair
We'll theek our nest when it grows bare.
'Mony a one for him maks mane,
But nane sall ken whar he is gane:
O'er his white banes, when they are bare,
The wind sall blaw for evermair.' anonymous