PLEASE. Stop me from turning into an absolute mother hen to EVERYONE in every conversation.
Pal of mine sent me vid of her dog in her yard … I just advised herself to check herself for ticks, in the same manner my mother used to say to me.
Poster for “Band of Brothers” (2001)
HBO.
“At the Coffee Shop,” by Eric Robert Nolan
Draw your
slim white finger to your lips in your thoughtful
pause at the coffee shop.
Glide it unknowingly down
the slender pink bank of your lower lip
beneath the easy stream of your speech,
your lithe tongue a siren there,
pressing gently along your syllables,
and your enlivened words
her serene refrain.
Draw your
eyes to the bright light at the great window —
the iridescent blue of the sky you led me to,
Your irises reflecting
the heaven that is yet less than you.
Draw your
warm opal palm over the pages of your book, to show me,
though its words are only hieroglyphs —
illegible in my ardor,
Iberian beside you,
arcane runes under your perfume.
Draw your
fingertips to touch my knee
in gentle reassurance,
sensing my avidity.
These — all of these —
Song and lesser heavens, hieroglyphs and touch of knee,
draw me
to you, now and ever, whether
present or in memory.
(c) Eric Robert Nolan 2023
Photo credit: By Takeaway – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=26758175
Throwback Thursday: U2’s “Tryin’ To Throw Your Arms Around The World” (1991)
I love this song. This was the ninth track from U2’s landmark 1991 album, “Achtung Baby.” I remember listening to this song while munching on Butterfingers candy bars, cramming nervously for psych exams in my dorm room during the 1993/94 school year at Mary Washington College.
By psych exams, I mean tests in my psychology classes — not tests administered to me by a psychiatric professional. But, hey, maybe they should have given me the latter. It might have saved everyone a lot of time.
“Morning,” Maxfield Parrish, 1922
“Pretty friendship ’tis to rhyme/ Your friends to death before their time.”
‘Terence, this is stupid stuff:
You eat your victuals fast enough;
There can’t be much amiss, ’tis clear,
To see the rate you drink your beer.
But oh, good Lord, the verse you make,
It gives a chap the belly-ache.
The cow, the old cow, she is dead;
It sleeps well, the horned head:
We poor lads, ’tis our turn now
To hear such tunes as killed the cow.
Pretty friendship ’tis to rhyme
Your friends to death before their time
Moping melancholy mad:
Come, pipe a tune to dance to, lad.
— excerpt from A. E. Houseman’s “Terence, This is Stupid Stuff,” 1896
Oh no!
We’re gonna ROCK DOWN TO Eclectic Avenue
— and then select our method.
Cover to Stuart Friedman’s “Nikki,” art by Robert Maguire, 1959
Monarch Books.
Eric Robert Nolan, Author 