Seeds

By Sherwood Anderson

The Triumph of the Egg

There is a note that comes into the human voice by which you may know real weariness. It comes when one has been trying with all his heart and soul to think his way along some difficult road of thought. Of a sudden he finds himself unable to go on. Something within him stops. A tiny explosion takes place. He bursts into words and talks, perhaps foolishly. Little side currents of his nature he didn't know were there run out and get themselves expressed. It is at such times that a man boasts, uses big words, makes a fool of himself in general.

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The lives of people are like young trees in a forest. They are being choked by climbing vines. The vines are old thoughts and beliefs planted by dead men. I am myself covered by crawling creeping vines that choke me.

Excerpts from:  Seeds - The Triumph of the Egg and Other Stories

The Watchers

An excellent new book by journalist Shane Harris explores the revelation that the American government has been spying on not just Foreign players intent on harming the U.S. and its interests, but on it own citizens as well. The book mainly covers the post digital revolution and offers a fair amount of information on past, as well as present intelligence gathering programs utilized by the NSA.

I learned about this book from an interview of Harris conducted by Terry Gross on NPR/Fresh Air. Listen Here

The Watchers: The Rise of America's Surveillance State

Shane Harris Blog

Dublin

 By 17yr. old Eoin Moore

The thick clouds cover up the moonlight, but the city’s lights provide worthwhile illumination – above them all, the beacon burns bright atop the monolithic podium, signaling to wayfaring voyages the ancient Viking settlement.  Now, where Norsemen once stood, I look back, along the quays, streets and alleys, to where the inhabitants live their lives: eating, speaking, and breathing their city into existence.  It gives me cause to wonder, as I stroll aimlessly along the cobbled paths, about those who have traversed them before me, by carriage or before there were even cobbles to walk upon.  I feel their lives and mine are somehow connected, that we all were at one point a part of this city, living pieces of its grand, striking framework.   Every High King and scholar, every playwright and poet, every politician and every rebel, every merchant, student, and busker who ever set foot in the city holds or held onto a chunk of this city’s soul; every one of them stepped to the city’s heartbeat.  I listen to the streets at night and I can feel the city’s lifeblood pumping through me; I can feel myself flowing through it.  All of us who travel those arteries step on the words, actions, and lives of those who traveled them before us. The city embodies the people, and the people embody the city.

Ireland’s newest stampfeatures an entire short story  

Ireland’s New Stamp Features a 224 Word Short Story

The Triumph Of The Egg

By Sherwood Anderson

                         In the fields

                         Seeds on the air floating.

                         In the towns

                         Black smoke for a shroud.

                         In my breast

                         Understanding awake.

                               -Mid American Chants

Tales are people who sit on the doorstep of the house of my mind.

It is cold outside and they sit waiting.

I look out at a window.

The tales have cold hands,

Their hands are freezing.

A short thickly-built tale arises and threshes his arms about.

His nose is red and he has two gold teeth.

There is an old female tale sitting hunched up in a cloak.

Many tales come to sit for a few moments on the doorstep

     and then go away.

It is too cold for them outside.

The street before the door of the house of my mind is

     filled with tales.

They murmur and cry out, they are dying of cold and hunger.

I am a helpless man--my hands tremble.

I should be sitting on a bench like a tailor.

I should be weaving warm cloth out of the threads of thought.

The tales should be clothed.

They are freezing on the doorstep of the house of my mind.

I am a helpless man--my hands tremble.

I feel in the darkness but cannot find the doorknob.

I look out at a window.

Many tales are dying in the street before the house of my mind.

The Triumph of the Egg Complete iBook

Red Meat

When I came home from work today, I checked the mailbox on my way to the front door. Hidden away amongst the mess of carpet cleaning fliers, coupons, a Vons ad, the Penny Saver, and various other dross by post, was a newsletter from the Poway Memorial Society. The cover featured a Grim Reaper standing in front of a cash register asking the question, ‘Do Funeral Prices Scare You To Death?’ Being that it was two days after my 49th birthday, I asked rhetorically, “Is this some kind of sick joke?” Or was it some kind of dire portent; a harbinger of my imminent demise? Did they know something? 

We sat down for dinner a while later. Steak and salad. I took my steak extra rare.

I ate the steak first… just in case.