Wordgrove Post & Review

This issue dedicated to the passing of year 2020, and the people lost to it

Quoted in The Grove:   death

…my friends will lie in their lonely grave, and I alone will remain like a solitary stalk forgotten by the reaper.
~Heinrich Heine

A friend who dies, it’s something of you who dies.
Gustave Flaubert

When some men die it is as if you had lost your pen-knife, and were subject to perpetual inconvenience until you could get another. Other men’s going is like the vanishing of a great mountain from the landscape, and the outlook of life is changed forever.
~Phillips Brooks

EndQuote:
Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.
~Edna St Vincent Millay

~ ~

Exercise Prompt for 01/03:   birth

~ ~

The bitterest tears shed over graves are for words left unsaid and deeds left undone.
~Harriet Beecher Stowe

Death is a challenge. It tells us not to waste time… It tells us to tell each other right now that we love each other.
~Leo Buscaglia

There isn’t much sudden death — there’s usually time to square yourself.
~Martin H Fischer

If you were going to die soon and had only one phone call to make, who would you call and what would you say? And why are you waiting?
~Stephen Levine

Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.
~Og Mandino

~

He first deceas’d;
She for a little tri’d
To live without him:
lik’d it not, and di’d.
~Henry Worton

Life will break you. Nobody can protect you from that, and living alone won’t either, for solitude will also break you with its yearning. You have to love. You have to feel. It is the reason you are here on earth. You are here to risk your heart.
~Louise Erdrich

Mostly it is loss which teaches us about the worth of things.
~Arthur Schopenhauer

~ ~

Posted from the Grove

Honey
Don’t be feared of them pearly gates…
Honey
Go straight on to de Big House,
An’ speak to yo’ God…
~Sterling A Brown

And there came a day, I its reckoning keep,
When mother, worn out, just dropped asleep,—
Her voice melting into an angel’s song:
“I shall wait at the Gate, so don’t stay too long.”
~Adelbert Farrington Caldwell

~

Your white hair
on the thin rack
of your shoulders

it is hard to
look into the eyes
of the dying

who carry away
a part of oneself —
a shared world
~John Montague

We understand death for the first time when he puts his hand upon one whom we love.
~Madame de Stael

I think when loved ones die, we absorb something from them that makes us who we are so we can continue on.
~Reginald VelJohnson

He who has gone, so we but cherish his memory, abides with us, more potent, nay, more present than the living man.
~Antoine de Saint-Exupery

The death of someone we know always reminds us that we are still alive — perhaps for some purpose which we ought to re-examine.
~Mignon McLaughlin

There is no right way to grieve; there is only your way to grieve and that is different for everyone.
~Nathalie Himmelrich

Grief is not a disorder, a disease or sign of weakness. It is an emotional, physical and spiritual necessity, the price you pay for love. The only cure for grief is to grieve.
~Earl A Grollman

We never bury the dead, son. We take them with us. It’s the price of living.
~Mark Goffman/Jose Molina

~~

~Paul Kalanithi:  Before I Go
https://stanmed.stanford.edu/2015spring/before-i-go.html

~

Dylan Thomas:  Do Not Go Gentle   (2:07)   Anthony Hopkins reading
https://vimeo.com/151752108

~

~Rafal Bojar:  Do Not Go Gentle   (2:43)   different, not Dylan Thomas
https://vimeo.com/258059779

~~

Someday I’ll be a weather-beaten skull resting on a grass pillow,
Serenaded by a stray bird or two.
Kings and commoners end up the same,
No more enduring than last night’s dream.
~Ryokan

And they die an equal death — the idler and the man of mighty deeds.
~Homer (Iliad)

You can be a king or a street sweeper,
but everybody dances with the Grim Reaper.
~Robert Alton Harris

Why do you weep? Did you think I was immortal?
~Louis XIV

~

It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
~George S Patton

The highest tribute to the dead is not grief but gratitude.
~Thornton Wilder

The graveyards are full of indispensable men.
~Elbert Hubbard

~~

VIDEO:   tears for catharsis

Death is life’s way of telling you you’re fired.
~Author unknown

Suicide is man’s way of telling God, “You can’t fire me — I quit.”
~Bill Maher

They tell us that suicide is the greatest piece of cowardice… that suicide is wrong; when it is quite obvious that there is nothing in the world to which every man has a more unassailable title than to his own life and person.
~Arthur Schopenhauer

If I cannot give consent to my own death, whose body is this? Who owns my life?
~Sue Rodriguez

Suicide is… the sincerest form of criticism life gets.
~Wilfred Sheed

One should die proudly when it is no longer possible to live proudly.Death of one’s own free choice, death at the proper time, with a clear head and with joyfulness, consummated in the midst of children and witnesses: so that an actual leave-taking is possible while he who is leaving is still there.
~Friedrich Nietzsche

Death is for many of us the gate of hell; but we are inside on the way out, not outside on the way in.
~George Bernard Shaw

Dying ain’t pretty. Death is beautiful.
~Terri Guillemets

Death is a delightful hiding place for weary men.
~Herodotus

Some people say Death’s heart is as dead and black as a piece of coal, but that is not true. Beneath his inky cloak, Death’s heart is as red as the most beautiful sunset and beats with a great love of life.
~Glenn Ringtved

~~

~Marsha Onderstijn:  The Life of Death   (5:00)   animated, loneliness of Death
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofnCdC8P70g

~

~Ammar Sonderberg:  The Call   (3:49)   dad and daughter talk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLbAMN1fc6o

~

~Austin Taylor:  Death and the Robot   (11:30)   animated, Death and spring
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okCIHAbve3k

~

~Yaya:  Keep It Quiet   (14:05)   the decision
https://vimeo.com/channels/staffpicks/490799434

~~

When I die I shall be content to vanish into nothingness…. No show, however good, could conceivably be good forever…. I do not believe in immortality, and have no desire for it.
~H L Mencken

Oh, for the time when I shall sleep
Without identity.
~Emily Bronte

Death will be a great relief. No more interviews.
~Katharine Hepburn

~

Peace, peace! he is not dead, he doth not sleep, —
He hath awaken’d from the dream of life.
~Shelley

We sometimes congratulate ourselves at the moment of waking from a troubled dream; it may be so the moment after death.
~Nathaniel Hawthorne

But what is all this fear of and opposition to Oblivion? What is the matter with the soft Darkness, the Dreamless Sleep?
~James Thurber

There is nothing frightening about an eternal dreamless sleep. Surely it is better than eternal torment in Hell and eternal boredom in Heaven.
~Isaac Asimov

Life is better than death, I believe, if only because it is less boring, and because it has fresh peaches in it.
~Alice Walker

~~

MUSIC:

Life is eternal, and love is immortal, and death is only a horizon; and a horizon is nothing save the limit of our sight.
~Rossiter Worthington Raymond

Emanuel looked down calm as an eternal sun on the autumn of his bodily life; nay, the more the sand fell from his life’s hourglass, so much the more clearly did he look through the empty glass.
~Jean Paul Friedrich Richter

~

When people don’t express themselves, they die one piece at a time.
~Laurie Halse Anderson

You know what the true definition of hell is? It’s when you die, you get to meet the person you could have been.
~Frank Mir

It’s better to burn out, than to fade away.
~Neil Young

~~

~Salut Salon:  Wettstreit zu viert   (3:24)   competitive foursome, fun
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BKezUd_xw20

~

~Farinelli – Ombra fedele anch’io   (Aria – 4:33)   love in the age of castrati
https://youtu.be/y3fzhMnGs5E

~

~Charles Berthoud:  When You Hit A wRonG Note In Classical vs Jazz   (3:33)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1HHKGlBugA

~

~Bob Dylan:  Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door — covered Avril Lavigne   (3:01)   the price
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o_5-Kf2CrLc

~~

Since the day of my birth, my death began its walk. It is walking toward me, without hurrying.
~Jean Cocteau

Our birth is nothing but our death begun.
~Edward Young

Every day in the mirror I watch death at work.
~Jean Cocteau

Somebody should tell us, right at the start of our lives, that we are dying. Then we might live life to the limit, every minute of every day. Do it! I say. Whatever you want to do, do it now! There are only so many tomorrows.
~Pope Paul VI

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.
~Mahatma Gandhi

You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough.
~Mae West

That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet.
~Emily Dickinson

~

Death, in itself, is nothing; but we fear to be we know not what, we know not where.
~John Dryden

After your death you will be what you were before your birth.
~Arthur Schopenhauer

~~

~

~~

I never wanted to see anybody die, but there are a few obituary notices I have read with pleasure.
~Clarence Darrow

I don’t want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve it through not dying.
~Woody Allen

He was a great patriot, a humanitarian, a loyal friend; provided, of course, he really is dead.
~Voltaire

I’m always relieved when someone is delivering a eulogy and I realize I’m listening to it.
~George Carlin

When you’ve told someone that you’ve left them a legacy the only decent thing to do is to die at once.
~Samuel Butler

They say such nice things about people at their funerals that it makes me sad that I’m going to miss mine by just a few days.
~Garrison Keillor

We who think we are about to die will laugh at anything.
~Terry Pratchett

Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh.
~George Bernard Shaw

~

What happens if you get scared half to death twice?
~Steven Wright

What happens after you die? Lot’s of things happen after you die — they just don’t involve you
~Louis C K

I am not afraid of death, I just don’t want to be there when it happens.
~Woody Allen

I want a priest, a rabbi, and a Protestant clergyman. I want to hedge my bets.
~Wilson Mizner

I wouldn’t mind dying — it’s the business of having to stay dead that scares the [$h¡t] out of me.
~R Geis

I want to die in my sleep like my grandfather… Not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his car.
~Will Shriner

You should always go to other people’s funerals, otherwise, they won’t come to yours.
~Yogi Berra

I intend to live forever, or die trying.
~Groucho Marx

I intend to live forever. So far, so good.
~Steven Wright

Hollywood is where they shoot too many pictures and not enough actors.
~Walter Winchell

Some men are alive simply because it is against the law to kill them.
~E W Howe

I didn’t attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I approved of it.
~Mark Twain

~~

© David Lorenz Winston

~~

A single death is a tragedy, a million deaths is a statistic.
~Joseph Stalin

Death is what takes place within us when we look upon others not as gift, blessing, or stimulus but as threat, danger, competition.
~Dorothee Solle

May God have mercy on my soul for the deaths on my name and for the treachery I committed. Betrayal of God and country, what a sad and horrible thing it is.
~E Howard Hunt

Ah, still, at least, whate’er the proud world saith,
Even one debased as I may reach the dignity of death!
I think the meanest life can somehow save
A trace of hidden grandeur for its grave…
I, if I went like that, might thrill to see
Eternity between my shame and me!—
~Edgar Fawcett

If the truth shall kill them, let them die.
~Ayn Rand

~

Death is a law, not a punishment.
~Jean Dubos

To take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, not justice.
~Desmond Tutu

For centuries the death penalty, often accompanied by barbarous refinements, has been trying to hold crime in check; yet crime persists.
~Albert Camus

Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement. For even the very wise cannot see all ends.
~J R R Tolkien

Capital punishment is our society’s recognition of the sanctity of human life.
~Orrin Hatch

Capital punishment is the most premeditated of murders.
~Albert Camus

If we believe that murder is wrong and not admissible in our society, then it has to be wrong for everyone, not just individuals but governments as well.
~Helen Prejean

As if one crime of such nature, done by a single man, acting individually, can be expiated by a similar crime done by all men, acting collectively.
~Lewis Lawes

An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.
~Mohandas Gandhi

The mode of death is sadder than death itself.
~Latin Proverb

Capital punishment would be more effective as a preventive measure if it were administered prior to the crime.
~Woody Allen

~ ~

@Writers Platform

We all die. The goal isn’t to live forever, the goal is to create something that will.
~Chuck Palahniuk

Let no one weep for me, or celebrate my funeral with mourning; for I still live, as I pass to and fro through the mouths of men.
~Quintus Ennius

No one is actually dead until the ripples they cause in the world die away.
~Terry Pratchett

~

Well, right now… I’m not dead. But when I am, it’s like… I don’t know, I guess it’s like being inside a book that nobody’s reading…. An old one. It’s up on a library shelf, so you’re safe and everything, but the book hasn’t been checked out for a long, long time. All you can do is wait. Just hope somebody’ll pick it up and start reading.
~Tim O’Brien

Dying is like coming to the end of a long novel — you only regret it if the ride was enjoyable and left you wanting more.
~Jerome P Crabb

~~

Glass Table:

~GaryBob @NutNut Fountain

Half Moon Bridge

Long ago when the Moon was ever-round, a young man lived on the banks of the White River. Born neither high nor low, he was a man of simple means who lived off the fruit of the Land and the fish of the River. It was common knowledge that the best fish only swam in the silky light of the Moon, so every night he could be found fishing along the riverside. One night, after straying further downriver than he ever had before, the young man spotted something on the other side of the impassable waters.

A large palace was set on the hillside, its many windows alight with glowing candles as the jovial sounds of mirth and merriment drifted out into the winds. Two walls extended forth from the palace to the frothy rapids of the River, enclosing the most beautiful garden he could have imagined. Countless flowers blossomed from carefully sculpted trees, lanterns swung gently in the breeze, and succulent fruits were gathered in bowls at the base of every tree. Enthralled by the sight of such splendor, it was some time later that he noticed her.

She was beautiful and tragic. Her long black hair cascaded as gently as her tears, both mingling with the River while she seemed to ponder her reflection. It felt as if an eternity had passed before she looked up and her eyes locked with his. The Moon was at its zenith, bathing the landscape in subtle grey tones and thus lit their faces. He lost himself in its soft reflection shimmering in her deep amber eyes. They knew it was love in that fleeting instant, but both ran out of fear – she back to the depths of the garden, he into the Woods along his side of the River.

He ran for hours, unsure of what to do as an unbearable mixture of panic and excitement filled his heart. Breathless, he finally collapsed into the tall grass of a large clearing. The Moon was now long gone, with only the starlight filling the void. Catching his breath, he slowly invoked the ancient arts and turned his attention skyward.

“Who was she?” he asked the Stars.

“A princess of the land beyond the White River,” came the reply.

“Why does she weep in such a beautiful garden?”

“It is her prison. In the land beyond the White River, women are forbidden to own their own heart. She stole hers back from the high priest and as punishment she has been forever locked in the walled garden.”

“Oh how I wish to dry those bitter tears, for a single embrace, for one tender kiss… I love her. How do I reach her?” he asked, eagerly sitting up with his eyes still lost amongst the heavens.

“You cannot. The River cannot be crossed, the walls cannot be climbed – she is destined to die alone,” the Stars replied coldly.

At those words the young man snapped from his trance, stunned at the Stars’ lack of compassion. He spent a restless night in the Woods, trying to avoid the ever-watchful Stars, before finding his way home the next morning.

It was three days before he could leave his bed, three nights more before he found himself back across the River from the walled garden. She was nowhere to be seen, so he sat himself by the River and invoked the ancient arts.

“How is the evening?” he asked the River.

“Good,” was the reply, “My waters are running cool and swift, with no sun to light their depths. However, even without the sun I can see the pain in your face, the hunger in your eyes. The best fish are swimming now if you seek food.”

“It is not food I seek, it is the princess in the walled garden. I wish to rescue her from her prison, but I must pass you to do so. Could you slow yourself so I may reach there and back again?”

“No, I cannot,” the River answered with sadness, “I have felt the princess’s pain, her tears falling into me, but I cannot challenge the will of the Stars. They have fated me to run fast and strong, thus taking the life of all who pass my waters. Perhaps you could ask the Woods to bend over me?”

Turning his attention to the Woods behind him, he found they had already been listening. Before he could ask, the Woods spoke of their own accord. “We can protect you from the Stars’ eyes, but we may not challenge their control. We only know two certainties. The first is that if any human tries to cross over, through, or under the River, he will die. The second is that there is only one who can defy the Stars. Find that one and perhaps…”

“Perhaps what?” pressed the young man.

“We know nothing more.”

“Nor do I,” interrupted the River.

And so he rested, pondering the Woods’ riddle. It wasn’t long before he came to an answer.

“The Sun!” he declared triumphantly, “The Sun is the only one who can defy the Stars.”

“The Sun is but another star,” replied the Woods, “A star so bright it outshines the rest, but a star nonetheless.”

“The Moon!” came a voice in the distance. Emerging from the depths of a willow tree on the riverbank appeared the princess, having heard the whole discourse. “Only the Moon outshines the Stars.”

The two then turned their eyes to the Moon as she asked, “Moon, can you please help us cross the River?”

The Moon was silent at first, but finally replied, “Yes, I can outshine them, but even I cannot defy what the Stars have fated without great sacrifice… still, I will help.”

The Moon then began to shine brighter and brighter, more brilliant than even the Sun. The two lovers cast their eyes down, nearly blinded by the glare. When they looked up again the Moon had fallen dark, now only half its former glory.

“What happened?” the Woods asked with caution.

“I am now a servant of the Sun – all my light comes from it now,” replied the Moon, “Half my former power has gone to the Sun, the other half to that…”

Glancing down, the princess and the young man saw a bridge crossing the River. Its high arch made of pure light, a perfect half-circle. It was almost a reflection of the Moon’s new form high above and they approached it tentatively.

Thereafter, the Moon grew and faded as it rose and fell. Though crossing the River still meant death, during a half-moon the bridge of moonlight would appear. Two nights every month, in the twilight of the evanescent Moon, the two lovers could meet at the center of the bridge and together defy the Stars.

~~

If you want to know what love is, have a child. If you want to know what pain is, bury him.
~Giannina Braschi

An angel in the book of life wrote down my baby’s birth. Then whispered as she closed the book ‘too beautiful for earth’.
~unknown

We weep over the graves of infants and the little ones taken from us by death; but an early grave may be the shortest way to heaven.
~Tryon Edwards

Young, loving, and beloved! oh cruel Death!
Couldst thou not spare the treasure for a while?
~Mary Ann H Dodd Shutts

~

Sometimes losing a pet is more painful than losing a human because in the case of the pet, you were not pretending to love it.
~Amy Sedaris

Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.
~Anatole France

Dogs come into our lives to teach us about love, they depart to teach us about loss. A new dog never replaces an old dog, it merely expands the heart. If you have loved many dogs your heart is very big.
~Erica Jong

If there are no dogs in Heaven, then when I die I want to go where they went.
~Will Rogers

If there is a heaven, it’s certain our animals are to be there. Their lives become so interwoven with our own, it would take more than an archangel to detangle them.
~Pam Brown

~~

Exercise Prompt:   death

~~

Some people are so afraid to die that they never begin to live.
~Henry Van Dyke

Death is not the greatest loss in life. The greatest loss is what dies inside us while we live.
~Norman Cousins

The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.
~Author unknown

I don’t believe it’s possible to live the lives we came here to live while being perpetually braced to die.
~Sylvia Browne

~

A man does not die of love or his liver or even of old age; he dies of being a man.
~Percival Arland Ussher

I shall not die of a cold. I shall die of having lived.
~Willa Cather

While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.
~Leonardo Da Vinci

Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.
~Mahatma Gandhi

~~

The Exercise:

~BarTalk:

Goals

Conquering wars
Reshaping borders
Mastering mountains
Romancing the map
Seekers and searchers
ignoring orders
Rogue sages, strayed scientists
ignoring the comfort of laps
Artist renderings
Musicians tendering
Writers reporting
History recording
Rich powers in flower
Champs catching their breath
Advances that are pending
Merely fending off death

~

recycled

sharp memory’s pains
and pangs of life
abrasive strains
corrosive stains of life
mountain top vistas
daily plains of life
cliffs and their precipice
declining steps of life
descending to depths
bringing due end to life
but
the same ascending stairs
climb, rising from death
to life,
again

~

roundabout

birth of competition
dearth of comradery
death of commodities
unearthing excellence
complexities of art

~

say what

lost opportunity
the death of a day
which was the better way
‘you look good in that’
or
‘that looks good on you’
what should I have said
misplayed phrasing
lost opportunity
the waste of a day

~

5-7-5-7-7

there aren’t tears enough
to fill a hollowed out heart
whose love died away
no engraved stone marks the grave
yet slaved for life until death

~

5-7-5 x 2

sacrificing health
frontline wall ‘tween life and death
doctors nursing breath
~
weird, how things have changed
passing strange this passing age
death no longer news

~~

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new.
~Steve Jobs

It is impossible that anything so natural, so necessary, and so universal as death, should ever have been designed by Providence as an evil to mankind.
~Jonathan Swift

If Allah created you for this world, He would have created you without death.
~Habib Umar bin Hafiz

~

This is what I would like. To play in those fields for a little longer. To spend a little more time being me before I become someone else. This is what I would like.
~Garth Stein

Death is the last enemy: once we’ve got past that I think everything will be alright.
~Alice Thomas Ellis

I take a few steps into the field, and it feels so good, so nice to be in the cool air, to smell the smells all around me. To feel the sun on my coat. I feel like I am here… I gather my strength and I start off and it feels good, like I have no age at all, like I am timeless. I pick up speed. I run… Off into the field, into the vastness of the universe ahead, I run.
~Garth Stein

_____________

Expanded page of quotes on Death: https://wordgrove.com/death-quotes.html

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Quotes harvested from:   https://azquotes.com, http://www.quotegarden.com, https://wiseoldsayings.com

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Video Harvest:   https://vimeo.com, https://youtube.com

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Quoted in The Grove:  gift

A candle is a lovely thing;
It makes no noise or stir at all,
But softly gives itself away,
While, quite unselfish, it grows small…
~Anonymous

Love is what’s in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen.
~Anonymous child

I heard the bells on Christmas Day
Their old, familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet
The words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men!
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

EndQuote:
After the children, stuffed and sleepy, finally went to bed, Gertrude and Arnold sat together in the love seat and watched the tree lights blink.
~Ethel Pochocki

~ ~

Exercise Prompt for 12/27:  With a desire to leave this execrable year behind because of it, to tease fate and to ward off its influence by naming it, in remembrance and in honor of those lost to it, the last prompt for 2020 is: death

~ ~

With the gift of listening comes the gift of healing.
~Catherine Doherty

The greatest gift you can give another is the purity of your attention.
~Richard Moss

The greatest gift in life is to be remembered.
~Ken Venturi

~

Before giving, the mind of the giver is happy; while giving, the mind of the giver is made peaceful; and having given, the mind of the giver is uplifted.
~Buddha

To give without any reward, or any notice, has a special quality of its own.
~Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Give what you have. To someone, it may be better than you dare to think.
~Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

~ ~

Posted from the Grove:  looking forward

What is more beautiful than a Christmas reunion at home where the hand of death has been merciful and the little flock, scattered for years, gathers again under the old roof — mother, father and all the children?
~Kin Hubbard

At Christmas, all roads lead home.
~Marjorie Holmes

I wake up to my three dogs and my wife in bed and the kids, and those are the best gifts that I have.
~Mike Ness

A good wife is heaven’s last, best gift to man, his gem of many virtues, his casket of jewels; her voice is sweet music, her smiles his brightest day, her kiss the guardian of his innocence, her arms the pale of his safety.
~Jeremy Taylor

One of the most glorious messes in the world is the mess created in a living room where eight or ten people have just opened their Christmas presents. It should not be cleaned up too quickly.
~Andy Rooney

~

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas,
Just like the ones I used to know,
Where the tree tops glisten
And children listen
To hear sleigh bells in the snow…
~Irving Berlin

The perfect Christmas tree? All Christmas trees are perfect!
~Charles Barnard

Tradition is a good gift intended to guard the best gifts.
~Edith Schaeffer

~~

~Benedict Cumberbatch:  Masterclass — How to React to Bad Xmas Gifts   (6:27)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vp3tDKfu5Q&t=1s

~~

Christmas is a guest that always comes a month before arriving.
~Evan Esar

To perceive Christmas through its wrapping becomes more difficult with every year.
~E B White

I hear that in many places something has happened to Christmas; that it is changing from a time of merriment and carefree gaiety to a holiday which is filled with tedium; that many people dread the day and the obligation to give Christmas presents is a nightmare to weary, bored souls; that the children of enlightened parents no longer believe in Santa Claus; that all in all, the effort to be happy and have pleasure makes many honest hearts grow dark with despair instead of beaming with good will and cheerfulness.
~Julia Mood Peterkin

Isn’t it funny that at Christmas something in you gets so lonely for — for — I don’t know what for, exactly, but it’s something you don’t mind so much not having at other times.
~Kate Langley Bosher

I wish we could preserve and put up this sacred Christmas spirit in one-pound tin boxes, like holiday fruitcake, and open a box of it every profane month all year long.
~Harlan Miller

No, I do like Christmas on the whole… In its clumsy way, it does approach Peace and Goodwill. But oh, it is clumsier every year.
~E M Forster

~~

VIDEO:

Unless you try to do something beyond what you have already mastered, you will never grow.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

The best gift you can ever give your mentor is to grow. They feed off your growth… Raising up others to a higher level is a mentor’s joy and sustenance.
~John C Maxwell

The greatest good you can do for another is not just share your riches, but reveal to them their own.
~Disraeli

~

It is not the answer that enlightens, but the question.
~Eugene Ionesco

A person who is gifted sees the essential point and leaves the rest as surplus.
~Thomas Carlyle

~

Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, but talent instantly recognizes genius.
~Arthur Conan Doyle

I am neither especially clever nor especially gifted. I am only very, very curious.
~Albert Einstein

~~

~Vimeo:  Found Me   (9:00) stumbled on, the gift of self
https://vimeo.com/channels/staffpicks/491339383

~

~BLR_VFX:  The Gift   (4:39)   Russian, forget the politics
https://vimeo.com/33025640

~

~Eaza Shukla:  Regifted   (2:15)   undiscovered gift, orphan object
https://vimeo.com/272008356

~~

The best gifts to give: To your friend, loyalty; To your enemy, forgiveness; To your boss, service; To a child, a good example; To your parents, gratitude and devotion; To your mate, love and faithfulness; To all men and women, charity.
~Oren Arnold

If instead of a gem, or even a flower, we should cast the gift of a loving thought into the heart of a friend, that would be giving as the angels give.
~George MacDonald

Friendship, at least those that I’ve known, is about giving.
~James Frey

The greatest gift of life is friendship, and I have received it.
~Hubert H Humphrey

~

“It came without ribbons! It came without tags!
It came without packages, boxes or bags!”…
Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn’t before!
“Maybe Christmas,” he thought, “doesn’t come from a store.
Maybe Christmas… perhaps… means a little bit more!”
~Dr. Seuss

Remember
This December,
That love weighs more than gold!…
~Josephine Dodge Daskam Bacon

The best gifts come from the heart, not the store.
~Sarah Dessen

~~

MUSIC:

My parents always made education and school the number one priority. They believed that an education is the best gift you can give to your child.
~Debra Messing

For my confirmation, I didn’t get a watch and my first pair of long pants, like most Lutheran boys. I got a telescope. My mother thought it would make the best gift.
~Wernher von Braun

My mother cranes her neck. Her ability to be fascinated by things is her best gift to me.
~Gary Shteyngart

Having the freedom to read and the freedom to choose is one of the best gifts my parents ever gave me.
~Judy Blume

The best gift, and investment, you can give your child is your time
~Kevin Heath

~~

~One Republic:  Let’s Hurt Tonight   (3:28)   olympic love note
https://vimeo.com/248618711

~~

Love is a gift worth giving, sometimes you just give more than you receive.
~Anonymous

Do not impress others at the expense of your progress.
~Gift Gugu Mona

Losing will not always amount to a loss, sometimes you have to lose those toxic relationships and bad habits to create a space for better things.
~Gift Gugu Mona

The giving of love is an education in itself.
~Eleanor Roosevelt

~

No one has ever become poor by giving.
~Anne Frank

If you have much, give of your wealth; if you have little, give of your heart.
~Arabic Proverb

If you can’t feed a hundred people, then feed just one.
~Mother Teresa

~~

~~

I asked mom if I was a gifted child. She said they certainly wouldn’t have paid for me.
~Bill Watterson

When it comes to giving… some people stop at nothing.
~Evan Esar

Lucy: Merry Christmas, Charlie Brown! At this time of year I think we should put aside all our differences, and try to be kind.
Charlie Brown: Why does it have to be for just this time of year? Why can’t it be all year ’round?
Lucy: What are you, some kind of fanatic or something?
~Charles M Schulz

Next to a circus there ain’t nothing that packs up and tears out faster than the Christmas spirit.
~Kin Hubbard

~

Three phrases that best sum up the Christmas season are: Peace on Earth, Goodwill to Men, and Batteries not Included.
~Author unknown

I know some parents who were very smart. They bought their kids some batteries for Christmas and put a sign on them that said: “Toys Not Included.”
~Gene Perret/Terry Perret Martin

Christmas is the season when you buy this year’s gifts with next year’s money.
~Author unknown

Christmas begins about the first of December with an office party and ends when you finally realize what you spent, around April fifteenth of the next year.
~P J O’Rourke

The lord giveth and the lord taketh, so I give it so he won’t have to take it.
~Joseph Julius Bonkowski

The Lord loveth a cheerful giver. He also accepteth from a grouch.
~Catherine Hall

The worst gift is a fruitcake. There is only one fruitcake in the entire world, and people keep sending it to each other.
~Johnny Carson

The first Christmas was a myrrhy Christmas.
~Evan Esar

It is better to give than to receive a Christmas gift because you don’t have the bother of exchanging it.
~Evan Esar

It’s the week between Christmas and New Year’s Day aka “It’s OK to Accomplish Absolutely Nothing” week! Yay!
~Aaron Caycedo-Kimura,

Depending on how good you are at watching and analyzing the weather, taking down the Christmas lights is something that can be postponed until the end of July.
~Robert Kirby

A merry Christmas to all my friends except two.
~W C Fields

~~

Twisted Tree 2020
© David Lorenz Winston

~~

We make a living by what we get, but we make a life by what we give.
~Winston Churchill

The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.
~Pablo Picasso

Your gift is not what you do but what you are.
~Sunday Adelaja

To give anything less than your best, is to sacrifice the gift.
~Steve Prefontaine

Hide not your talents.
They for use were made.
What’s a sundial in the shade?
~Benjamin Franklin

~

If you do not answer the noise and urgency of your gifts, they will turn on you. Or drag you down with their immense sadness at being abandoned.
~Joy Harjo

One of the most wicked destructive forces, psychologically speaking, is unused creative power … If someone has a creative gift and out of laziness, or for some other reason, doesn’t use it, the psychic energy turns to sheer poison. That’s why we often diagnose neuroses and psychotic diseases as not-lived higher possibilities.
~Marie-Louise von Franz

Any gifted child can potentially get in real trouble because of the way they are handled.
~Itzhak Perlman

I also had a brother who was like me a musician and a composer. A man of great talent, far more gifted than I. He died very young… he killed himself in the prime of his life.
~Gustav Mahler

The most gifted natures are perhaps also the most trembling.
~Andre Gide

Amid the sufferings of life on earth, suicide is God’s best gift to man.
~Pliny the Elder

Being gifted needs courage.
~Georg Brandes

~ ~

@Writers Platform

The man who will use his skill and constructive imagination to see how much he can give for a dollar, instead of how little he can give for a dollar is bound to succeed.
~Henry Ford

Give them quality. That’s the best kind of advertising.
~Milton Hershey

A book is a gift you can open again and again.
~Garrison Keillor

~

Give naught, get same. Give much get same.
~Malcolm Forbes

The best investment with the least risk and the greatest dividend is giving.
~Sir John Templeton

We must give more in order to get more, It is the generous giving of ourselves that produce the generous harvest.
~Orison Swett Marden

~

The best gift you can give is a hug: one size fits all and no one ever minds if you return it.
~Marge Piercy

Hugs are great gifts… The only wrapping is arms!
~Bil Keane

~ ~

Glass Table:

God holds the copyright, as the sole author of life.
~Gift Gugu Mona

What we are is God’s gift to us. What we become is our gift to God.
~Eleanor Powell

The gift without the giver is rare.
~James Russell Lowell

When God loves a creature he wants the creature to know the highest happiness and the deepest misery … He wants him to know all that being alive can bring. That is his best gift…. There is no happiness save in understanding the whole.
~Thornton Wilder

~

Never regret a day in your life. Good days give you happiness. Bad days give you experience. Worst days give lessons, and the best days give memories.
~Fernan Vargas

Let my heart be wise. It is the gods’ best gift.
~Euripides

Memories are perhaps the best gifts of all.
~Gloria Gaither

~~

~mademoisellefifi:  Take Him Out

When he heard a loud noise coming from the room next to his, the Godfather rushed in and said…”Hey what you doin?….You make trouble everytime you come here…If you keep that up, i’m gonna send people after you…and you’ll be silenced. You gotta pay your dues and remember: family is always first. You’re not in the streets here, you got to respect this house. The family has worked for years to make this a respectable place, and you think you can change that in a few minutes? Well enough is enough. You gotta be a man and take it like a man. Your time has come. We don’t take too well to “attitude” here, and what we say goes. Luigi…come over here and take him out”.

~~

God holds the copyright, as the sole author of life.
~Gift Gugu Mona

What we are is God’s gift to us. What we become is our gift to God.
~Eleanor Powell

The gift without the giver is rare.
~James Russell Lowell

When God loves a creature he wants the creature to know the highest happiness and the deepest misery … He wants him to know all that being alive can bring. That is his best gift…. There is no happiness save in understanding the whole.
~Thornton Wilder

~

Never regret a day in your life. Good days give you happiness. Bad days give you experience. Worst days give lessons, and the best days give memories.
~Fernan Vargas

Let my heart be wise. It is the gods’ best gift.
~Euripides

My love can’t be purchased. Best gifts have been well-thought-out surprises.
~Nina Dobrev

Memories are perhaps the best gifts of all.
~Gloria Gaither

~~

Exercise Prompt:  gift

~~

The older I get, the better I understand that every day is a gift.
~Joel Osteen

The gift of life is so precious that we should feel an obligation to pay back the universe for the gift of being alive.
~Ray Bradbury

Youth is the gift of nature, but age is a work of art.
~Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

I look upon life as a gift from God. I did nothing to earn it. Now that the time is coming to give it back, I have no right to complain
~Joyce Cary

~~

The Exercise:

~BarTalk:

question #20

which the gift and the wrapping
same question as chicken or egg
was it music or the lyrics
that made magic off the charts

~

Progress

They say love’s the gift, family and more
They say peace and I say it’s war
Ignorance, illness, political difference
Wars it was that fueled our science

~

5-7-5-7-7

presently, a life
unearned, granted gift of breath
heartbeats marking time
celebrate with abandon
yet debt’s unpaid, call it death

~

5-7-5 x 3

bright tinsel trappings
sterling gift, a second chance
golden moment lost
~
puzzle’s myst’ry piece
hist’ry’s missing destined share
the gift of a Child
~
heartbeats marking time
blue unwelcome gifts of breath
unsolicited favors

~ ~

Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.
~William A Ward

The paradox of gifts: I know what I have given you. I do not know what you have received.
~Dr SunWolf

~

Before giving, the mind of the giver is happy; while giving, the mind of the giver is made peaceful; and having given, the mind of the giver is uplifted.
~Buddha

We should give as we would receive, cheerfully, quickly, and without hesitation; for there is no grace in a benefit that sticks to the fingers.
~Seneca

You can give without loving, but you can never love without giving.
~Author Unknown

Love is, above all, the gift of oneself.
~Jean Anouilh

To give without any reward, or any notice, has a special quality of its own.
~Anne Morrow Lindbergh

At its best, giving is an act of worship.
~Cornelius J Dyck

~ ~

Quotes harvested from: https://azquotes.com, http://www.quotegarden.com , https://wiseoldsayings.com

~

Video Harvest: https://vimeo.com , https://youtube.com

~. .~

Read Full Post »

Quoted in The Grove:   machine

If you want a machine to be able to interact with people, it better not do things that are surprising to people.
~Rodney Brooks

It’s hard to guess how smart the machines are, but a good rule of thumb is that they’re always smarter than you think.
~Daniel H Wilson

Machines take me by surprise with great frequency.
~Alan Turing

EndQuote:
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
~Arthur C Clarke

 

~~

Exercise Prompt for 12/20:   gift

~~

 

Technology presumes there’s just one right way to do things and there never is.
~Robert M Pirsig

Normal is nothing more than a cycle on a washing machine.
~Whoopi Goldberg

I watched the piles of feces go up the conveyor belt… They made their way through the machine… A few minutes later I took a long taste of the end result: a glass of delicious drinking water.
~Bill Gates

The chrysanthemums’ astringent fragrance comes
Each year to disguise the clanking mechanism
Of machine within machine within machine.
~Wallace Stevens

Modern technology
Owes ecology
An apology.
~Alan M Eddison

~ ~

 

Posted from the Grove

Remember, machines don’t forgive.
~Joel Salatin

Computers are magnificent tools for the realization of our dreams, but no machine can replace the human spark of spirit, compassion, love, and understanding.
~Lou Gerstner

Compassion–that’s the one thing no machine ever had. Maybe it’s the one thing that keeps man ahead of them.
~D C Fontana

We are all a people in need. We are not perfect. We are not machines. We make mistakes. We need grace. We need compassion. We need help at times. We need other people. And that’s okay.
~Jamie Tworkowski

~

The thing that we possess, that machines don’t, is the ability to exhibit wisdom.
~Herbie Hancock

The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.
~Isaac Asimov

~~

 

~Andrea Dorfman:  Flawed   (12:35)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jc5bSu1QMrE

~

How to Show, Not Tell: The Complete Writing Guide   (27:18)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YAKcbvioxFk

 

~~

Wherever you see a man who gives someone else’s corruption, someone else’s prejudice as a reason for not taking action himself, you see a cog in The Machine that governs us.
~John Jay Chapman

The political machine triumphs because it is a united minority acting against a divided majority.
~Will Durant

I can make them voting machines sing Home Sweet Home.
~Earl Long

The machine conceals the machinations.
~Ursula K Le Guin

Opinions are to the vast apparatus of social existence what oil is to machines: one does not go up to a turbine and pour machine oil over it; one applies a little to hidden spindles and joints that one has to know.
~Walter Benjamin

The single best machine to measure trust is a human being. We haven’t figured out a metric that works better than our own sort of, like, ‘There’s something fishy about you.’
~Simon Sinek

I think politics is like an X-ray machine: Everything is found out eventually.
~Nicolle Wallace

Parties don’t lose overnight, there is a gradual erosion of their base and electoral machine, which leads to sometimes cataclysmic defeat.
~John McDonnell

~

If you knew how much information the campaigns had on you, you’d turn off your machines. And I mean that literally.
~Joe Trippi

I can’t in good conscience allow the U.S. government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they’re secretly building.
~Edward Snowden

If the machine of government is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.
~Henry David Thoreau

I spend all day figuring out how to beat the machine and knock the crap out of the political power structure.
~Bella Abzug

~~

 

VIDEO:

We all use something – you can’t drill holes with your fingers. Whether it’s a knife, a needle, or a machine, we all need the help of a device.
~Jonathan Ive

Machines were devised not to do a man out of a job, but to take the heavy labor from man’s back and place it on the broad back of the machine.
~Henry Ford

Machines are beneficial to the degree that they eliminate the need for labor, harmful to the degree that they eliminate the need for skill.
~W H Auden

~

I see through my eyes; the camera is just a machine to record it for me.
~Juergen Teller

The Balopticon [a machine that projects photos on canvas to trace the lines] is an evil, inartistic, habit-forming, lazy and vicious machine! It also is a useful, time-saving, practical and helpful one. I use one often – and am thoroughly ashamed of it. I hide it whenever I hear people coming.
~Norman Rockwell

If someone is trying to skip the struggle – which is the creative job – our machines today, the technology that we have, can help the person, but it is only momentary. On the other hand, if you are creative, you have the skill, and you are hardworking, technology can only make you superior.
~Arijit Singh

If the machines can take the drudgery out of it and just leave us with the joy of drawing, then that’s the best of both worlds – and I’ll use those computers!
~Don Bluth

To curb the machine and limit art to handicraft is a denial of opportunity.
~Lewis Mumford

The soul paints itself in our machines.
~Joseph Joubert

~~

 

~Dust:  The Stowaway   (12:13)   consequences
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qHp7ngBVnQs

~

~Dust:  Sunshine Room   (11:33)   generations in their time   
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4A9yTBqwgCk

~

~Charlie Chaplin:  The Feeding Machine   (4:10)    classic frenzy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UwahG1s4dqI

 

~~

Technology: “the knack of so arranging the world that we don’t have to experience it.”
~Max Frisch

Suppose you could be hooked up to a hypothetical ‘experience machine’ that, for the rest of your life, would stimulate your brain and give you any positive feelings you desire. Most people to whom I offer this imaginary choice refuse the machine. It is not just positive feelings we want: we want to be entitled to our positive feelings.
~Martin Seligman

Machines deprive us of two things which are certainly important ingredients of human happiness, namely, spontaneity and variety.
~Bertrand Russell

The story is a machine for empathy. In contrast to logic or reason, a story is about emotion that gets staged over a sequence of dramatic moments, so you empathize with the characters without really thinking about it too much. It is a really powerful tool for imagining yourself in other people’s situations.
~Ira Glass

~

Virtual reality is the ‘ultimate empathy machine.’ These experiences are more than documentaries. They’re opportunities to walk a mile in someone else’s shoes.
~Chris Milk

Our machines are disturbingly lively, and we ourselves frighteningly inert.
~Donna J Haraway

The machines men are so intent on making have carried them very far from the old sweet things.
~Sherwood Anderson

Why go to a machine when you could go to a human being?
~Ray Bradbury

Man has made many machines, complex and cunning, but which of them indeed rivals the workings of his heart?
~Pablo Casals

~~

 

MUSIC:

The planet’s spinning a thousand miles an hour around this gigantic nuclear explosion while these people roll these machines with rubber tires over this hard surface that we’ve laid down over the planet so that we can easily move ourselves back and forth.
~Joe Rogan

Listening to music and driving – that’s the best way to listen to music. You just kind of zone out. Driving’s so futuristic – you’re barely putting in any effort, and this huge machine is pummeling down a strip of concrete.
~Galcher Lustwerk

Jazz is the folk music of the machine age.
~Paul Whiteman

Anything can become a musical sound. The wind on telegraph wires is a great sound; get it into your machine and play it and it becomes interesting.
~Hans Zimmer

~~

 

~Michael Peterson:  Wichita Lineman   (3:30)   Glen Campbell tribute
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Z9zziTq3tE&ab_channel

-or-

~Ozark (Netflix):   Wichita Lineman    (4:19)   a mercy
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2M7my1jISxE&ab_channel

~

~Florence + The Machine:  Hunger   (4:31)   something, it’s universal
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5GHXEGz3PJg

~

~Animusic:  Resonant Chamber   (4:27)   pluckin’ good
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=toXNVbvFXyk

~  

~MisterWives:  Machine   (3:57)   shades of mad max
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhC2c6N-cFM

~

~Postmodern Jukebox:  Blue Christmas, feat. Kate Davis   (3:29)   
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F47GKeoRo_s

-or-

PostModern Jukebox (Scott Bradlee/Hannah Gill):  White Christmas   (3:20)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BB2xGzZ81N0

 

~~

The planet’s spinning a thousand miles an hour around this gigantic nuclear explosion while these people roll these machines with rubber tires over this hard surface that we’ve laid down over the planet so that we can easily move ourselves back and forth.
~Joe Rogan

Listening to music and driving – that’s the best way to listen to music. You just kind of zone out. Driving’s so futuristic – you’re barely putting in any effort, and this huge machine is pummeling down a strip of concrete.
~Galcher Lustwerk

Jazz is the folk music of the machine age.
~Paul Whiteman

Anything can become a musical sound. The wind on telegraph wires is a great sound; get it into your machine and play it and it becomes interesting.
~Hans Zimmer

~~

 

 

~~

Do you realize if it weren’t for Edison we’d be watching TV by candlelight?
~Al Boliska

As far as I’m concerned, progress peaked with frozen pizza.
~Steven E. de Souza/Doug Richardson

Several years ago we had an intern who was none too swift. One day he was typing and turned to a secretary and said, “I’m almost out of typing paper. What do I do?” “Just use copier machine paper,” she told him. With that, the intern took his last remaining blank piece of paper, put it on the photocopier and proceeded to make five blank copies.
~Dave Barry

I have the oldest typewriter in the world. It types in pencil.
~Steven Wright

#WhenIWasYourAge: We had to open all doors by ourselves. None of them knew we were coming.
~Neil deGrasse Tyson

I have an answering machine in my car. It says, I’m home now. But leave a message and I’ll call when I’m out.
~Steven Wright

Just done it again. I looked for the time at the top of a magazine page.
~Andy Lee

I’ve got a phone,
answer machine, TV set,
computer, hand grenade
– everything you need
to run a business in
Los Angeles.
~Ice T

I want to get a vending machine, with fun sized candy bars, and the glass in front is a magnifying glass. You’ll be mad, but it will be too late.
~Mitch Hedberg

You can’t expect to hit the jackpot if you don’t put a few nickels in the machine.
~Flip Wilson

Slot machines are like crack for old people.
~Keenen Ivory Wayans

The diet book is one of those fool-and-money separation devices that seems, like roulette or slot machines, never to lose its power.
~Christopher Hitchens

You know how Bed Bath & Beyond sells those white noise machines that help you sleep? And they usually make ocean noises? I want one that’s just David Gergen gently muttering about the economy.
~Jessi Klein

~~

 

© David Lorenz Winston

 

~~

People have long feared that mechanization might cause mass unemployment. This never happened because, as old professions became obsolete, new professions evolved, and there was always something humans could do better than machines. Yet this is not a law of nature, and nothing guarantees it will continue to be like that in the future.
~Yuval Noah Harari

Machines can do things cheaper and better. We’re very used to that in banking, for example. ATM machines are better than tellers if you want a simple transaction. They’re faster, they’re less trouble, they’re more reliable, so they put tellers out of work.
~Geoffrey Hinton

Man seems to be a rickety poor sort of thing, any way you take him; a kind of British Museum of infirmities and inferiorities. He is always undergoing repairs. A machine that was as unreliable as he is would have no market.
~Mark Twain

The machine, yes, the machine, never wastes anybody’s time never watches the foreman, never talks back.
~Carl Sandburg

~

I’m afraid for all those who’ll have the bread snatched from their mouths by these machines. What business has science and capitalism got, bringing all these new inventions into the works, before society has produced a generation educated up to using them!
~Henrik Ibsen

There are the manufacturing multitudes of England; they must have work, and find markets for their work; if machines and the Black Country are ugly, famine would be uglier still.
~Goldwin Smith

Machines were, it may be said, the weapon employed by the capitalists to quell the revolt of specialized labor.
~Karl Marx

The production of too many useful things results in too many useless people.
~Karl Marx

And a revolution of automation finds machines replacing men in the mines and mills of America, without replacing their incomes or their training or their needs to pay the family doctor, grocer and landlord.
~John F Kennedy

We believe that if men have the talent to invent new machines that put men out of work, they have the talent to put those men back to work.
~John F Kennedy

~ ~

 

@Writers Platform

Vigorous writing is concise. A sentence should contain no unnecessary words, a paragraph no unnecessary sentences, for the same reason that a drawing should have no unnecessary lines and a machine no unnecessary parts.
~William Strunk, Jr

I write slowly, and I write many, many drafts. I probably have to work as hard as anyone, and maybe harder, to finish a poem. I often write a poem over years, because it takes me a long time to figure out what to say and how best to say it.
~Philip Schultz

The poem, in a sense, is no more or less than a little machine for remembering itself
~Don Paterson

The word ‘novel’ carries, for me, a weight as ominous, all-consuming and unforgiving as any Job encountered.
~Philip Schultz

When the machine of a human being is turned on, it seems to produce a protagonist, just as a television produces an image.
~Mohsin Hamid

~

Calligraphy, a spiritual art that has been forgotten in favor of an emotionless keyboard.
~Stefan Boldisor

Before the typewriter, this was a booming career path, as nearly every major business needed a competent and proficient penman on hand… during the golden age of penmanship (roughly 1860 to 1930).
~Master Penman Jake Weidmann

I like the process of pencil and paper as opposed to a machine. I think the writing is better when it’s done in handwriting.
~Nelson DeMille

The pen is mightier than the sword, and the typewriter is mightier than both.
~Evan Esar

The most technologically efficient machine that man has ever invented is the book.
~Northrop Frye

~~

 

Glass Table:

~GaryBob @NutNut Fountain in There

Once And Forever

Once upon a hillside, there lived a funny old man in a cottage made of antlers. He wore a tartan tunic and had a beard as long as time. His breakfast was bones and his lunch was flesh. His dinner was life and his supper was fresh. He spoke in funny runes and read in a dreadfully loud shout. He stoked the fire very firmly to keep it from going out. From his cottage he could see through the shadows to the Sea. And at half-past two he drank blueberry tea. And as he sipped the last drops and basked in the bliss, he told funny old stories which began like this…

Once upon a dune, there lived a bizarre young girl in a tent made of silk. She wore a flowing robe and goggles made of frozen tears. Her breakfast was sand and her lunch was dry. Her dinner was bland and her supper was wry. She spoke in bizarre rhymes and read in a frightfully flat monotone. She spent hot afternoons by the gramophone. From her silk tent she could see through the shadows to the Sea. And at the midnight hour, under the blazing moon, she danced in the crystal grove. And as she glowed and basked in the bliss, she told bizarre young stories which began like this…

Once upon a bridge, there lived a strange dark man in a guardhouse made of stone. He wore a seersucker suit and bright straw hat. His breakfast was kippers and his lunch was fine. His dinner was flippers and his supper was wine. He spoke in strange lures and read in a seductively deep tome. Though his eyes often wandered, his heart would rarely roam. From his guardhouse he could see through the shadows to the Sea. On Wednesdays he swam, swiftly from shore to shore. And as he floated and basked in the bliss, he told strange dark stories which began like this…

Once upon a swamp, there lived a quirky bright witch in a hovel made of flowers. She wore a tattered cloak with a dagger at her side. Her breakfast was budding and her lunch was nettles. Her dinner was wilting and her supper was petals. She spoke in bright spells and read in cryptic signs. She brewed nightshade elixirs and herbal brines. From her hovel she could see through the shadows to the Sea. Every noontide she chanted in the clearing by the brook. And as she sang and basked in the bliss, she told quirky bright stories which began like this…

Once upon a thimble, there lived an odd little wisp in a palace made of thread. It held the spark of inspiration in its aurora-eyes. Its breakfast was past and its lunch was ever. Its dinner was last and its supper was never. It spoke in odd lines and read from an infinite loom. In winter it gave the amaranth its effortless bloom. From its palace it could see through the shadows to the Sea. And at every dawn, waiting it shall be. And as the first rays break and it basks in the bliss, it tells odd little stories that begin like this…

Each line a droplet in the vast inventories. Once and forever upon the Sea of Stories.

 

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[Finishing schools] are nicely adapted machines for experimenting on the question, “Into how little space a human being can be crushed?” I have seen some souls so compressed that they would have fitted into a small thimble, and found room to move…
~Olive Schreiner

The common experience is, that the man fits himself as well as he can to the customary details of that work or trade he falls into, and tends it as a dog turns a spit. Then he is part of the machine he moves; the man is lost.
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

People are more difficult to work with than machines. And when you break a person, he can’t be fixed.
~Rick Riordan

Maybe that’s why a broken machine always makes me a little sad, because it isn’t able to do what it was meant to do…Maybe it’s the same with people,” Hugo continued. “If you lose your purpose…it’s like you’re broken.
~Brian Selznick

The mechanic, when a wheel refuses to turn, never thinks of dropping on his knees and asking the assistance of some divine power. He knows there is a reason. He knows that something is too large or too small; that there is something wrong with his machine; and he goes to work and he makes it larger or smaller, here or there, until the wheel will turn.
~Robert Green Ingersoll

There is no term comparable to green thumbs to apply to such a mechanic, but there should be. For there are men who can look, listen, tap, make an adjustment, and a machine works.
~John Steinbeck

 

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Exercise Prompt:  machine

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People are more difficult to work with than machines. And when you break a person, he can’t be fixed.
~Rick Riordan

Maybe that’s why a broken machine always makes me a little sad, because it isn’t able to do what it was meant to do…Maybe it’s the same with people,” Hugo continued. “If you lose your purpose…it’s like you’re broken.
~Brian Selznick

The mechanic, when a wheel refuses to turn, never thinks of dropping on his knees and asking the assistance of some divine power. He knows there is a reason. He knows that something is too large or too small; that there is something wrong with his machine; and he goes to work and he makes it larger or smaller, here or there, until the wheel will turn.
~Robert Green Ingersoll

There is no term comparable to green thumbs to apply to such a mechanic, but there should be. For there are men who can look, listen, tap, make an adjustment, and a machine works.
~John Steinbeck

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The Exercise:

~BarTalk:

process

machine smoke
high mountain air
rain washed
out to dry in the sun
clean again

~

Note on Quotes

Words machined down to their finest tolerance,
Arranged and assembled
Ideas garbed in their sturdiest work clothes
Dreams, hope and visions in their prettiest dresses

~

Today’s Episode

Drama and farce and tragedy
Romance, politics and comedy
Heroes and villains of history
Unvirtuous virtual viewing machine

Epic in scope the sagas of men
Epochs and ages, the series ends
Happy or not, you, they and we
A season’s TV for the galaxy

~

5-7-5-7-7

liberals before
wanted their ballots to count
conservatives now
doubt the machines in their turn
voters die, machines remain

~

5-7-5 x 3

bits of grime and grit
sins of the soul to machines
death, junk pile, the grave
~
manufactured love
designed, machined happiness
pleasure in a pill
~
machined creations
fine tune the scales of measure
for music and law

~~

A determined soul will do more with a rusty monkey wrench than a loafer will accomplish with all the tools in a machine shop.
~Robert Hughes

We all use something – you can’t drill holes with your fingers. Whether it’s a knife, a needle, or a machine, we all need the help of a device.
~Jonathan Ive

When man wanted to make a machine that would walk he created the wheel, which does not resemble a leg.
~Guillaume Apollinaire

I have always hated machinery, and the only machine I ever understood was a wheelbarrow, and that but imperfectly.
~Eric Temple Bell

On two occasions I have been asked, ‘Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?’ I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question.
~Charles Babbage

The tendency of philosophers who know nothing of machinery is to talk of man as a mere mechanism, intending by this to imply that he is without purpose. This shows a lack of understanding of machines as well as of man.
~Arthur Young

~

The big AI dreams of making machines that could someday evolve to do intelligent things like humans could – I was turned off by that. I didn’t really think that was feasible when I first joined Stanford.
~Andrew Ng

Although we will hate and fight the machines, we will be supplanted anyway, and rightly so, for the intelligent machines to which we will give birth may, better than we, carry on the striving toward the goal of understanding and using the Universe, climbing to heights we ourselves could never aspire to.
~Isaac Asimov

I still find it hard to understand that anyone could argue that you can’t have machines that exhibit consciousness.
~Iain Banks

Machines certainly can solve problems, store information, correlate, and play games – but not with pleasure.
~Leo Rosten

~

Artificial intelligence will reach human levels by around 2029. Follow that out further to, say, 2045, we will have multiplied the intelligence, the human biological machine intelligence of our civilization a billion-fold.
~Ray Kurzweil

The real work of us mathematicians, from now until, roughly, fifty years from now, when computers won’t need us anymore, is to make the transition from human-centric math to machine-centric math as smooth and efficient as possible.
~Doron Zeilberger

As machines get to be more and more like men, men will come to be more like machines.
~Joseph Wood Krutch

~

AI does not keep me up at night. Almost no one is working on conscious machines. Deep learning algorithms, or Google search, or Facebook personalization, or Siri or self driving cars or Watson, those have the same relationship to conscious machines as a toaster does to a chess-playing computer.
~Ramez Naam

Man is a slow, sloppy and brilliant thinker; the machine is fast, accurate and stupid.
~William M Kelly

We think of computers as smart and powerful machines. But your goldfish is smarter.
~Jason Fried

~

One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.
~Elbert Hubbard

As machines become more and more efficient and perfect, so it will become clear that imperfection is the greatness of man.
~Ernst Fischer

The universe begins to look more like a great thought than a great machine.
~James Jeans

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Quotes harvested from: https://azquotes.com, https://brainyquotes.com
http://www.quotegarden.com, https://wiseoldsayings.com

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Video Harvest: https://vimeo.com , https://youtube.com

 

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