Without Lifting A Finger

His mother wrote to try to dissuade him from this decisive step, but he replied that he felt God's call which transcended all other considerations. Only his sister, who was as proud and ambitious as he, understood him. She understood that he had become a monk in order to be above those who considered themselves his superiors. And she understood him correctly. By becoming a monk he showed contempt for all that seemed most important to others and had seemed so to him while he was in the service, and he now ascended a height from which he could look down on those he had formerly envied. . . . But it was not this alone, as his sister Varvara supposed, that influenced him. There was also in him something else--a sincere religious feeling which Varvara did not know, which intertwined itself with the feeling of pride and the desire for pre-eminence, and guided him. His disillusionment with Mary, whom he had thought of angelic purity, and his sense of injury, were so strong that they broug...

Hard to feed a Family of Four these Days. Spent the morning with four Peregrine Chicks @ Pointe Vicente (Palos Verdes CA) -- hungry as wolves with wings.💗 #rlswihart13  #palosverdescalifornia  #peregrinechicks  #purepoetry  #readmorepoetry2026💕

It is idiotic to write out in one's own hand (in the evenings by candlelight) things already in print. Why not use scissors to cut out items that are worth remembering and deserve a place on the wall? Geiser is surprised that he did not think of this before. There are scissors in the house; all he has to do is find them. Quite apart from the fact that print is easier to read than an old man's handwriting—though he has taken the trouble to use block letters—no one has that much time.  Geological formations, layers that are clearly distinguished from the stratifications beneath and above them by the petrified animals and plants (see Characteristic Fossils) within them and that represent a (stratigraphic) unit. Among these belong the igneous rocks, which evolved at the same time. Related G. F. evolving successively are bracketed together in formation groups. Formations and formation groups reflect periods of the earth's history and are in consequence used as descriptions of ti...

I think he himself said something like his poetry doesn't rise to level of his prose, but this poem is somewhat interesting, especially because it's a companion piece to the story he tells in The Emigrants. * New Jersey Journey  Spent two hours at the end of December on the Garden State Highway In the ancient Ford’s trunk nothing but my heart grown heavier year by year  A protracted catastrophe: the constant river of traffic the endless business of overtaking vicious eye-contact with total strangers in the adjacent lane  Driven by yearning for its prehistoric brothers a Jumbo climbs out of Newark airport over marshes and lagoons a giant smoking mountain of rubbish and the countless lights of the refineries  Mile after mile of stunted trees telegraph poles fields of blueberries a Siberian countryside colonized then run to seed with moribund supermarkets abandoned poultry farms haunted by millions and millions of breakfast eggs harboring the undeciphered sighs of an en...

Still, it is the capital, where until now I’ve failed in all my errands: the Japanese Embassy is closed for a ‘Festival of Flowers’, the freight company hasn’t anything going east before the autumn, and the journalists I hoped to see haven’t kept our appointment. Our new consul — fresh from Hong Kong — on whom I was rather relying, had been knocked down by a taxi the day he took up his post. I visited him in hospital. Multiple fractures. He was swathed in bandages like a mummy, adrift in morphine, dreaming of his longed-for retirement; he could offer only incoherent remarks apropos of Berne’s ingratitude and the mushrooms of the northern Vaud. My seedy hotel is much too dear for what it offers. From my attic I survey varnished tile roofs and a sea of saturated foliage foaming against the low clouds. Silly crows play in nooks and crannies, croaking all the time. Languid, arrogant boys. Long corridors gleaming with polish. Dark figures loafing about or motionless in front of their cups o...

  My "Dipper Day" (all about the bird and more) is in the current Meniscus 14.1 (2026), pp. 141 - 142. See what you think (see "tease" above)! Thanks to Jen Webb and all the Meniscus staff. https://www.meniscus.org.au/_files/ugd/7c40c1_9e1f0dd429934dc88f099994dda0d83a.pdf #rlswihart13 #meniscusliteraryjournal  #dipperday #poetry #readmorepoetry2026💕