Fired Up

chalk art-Columbia Festival of the Arts -
Photo ljoyburke

A week ago, I turned on the fire under my little single egg frying pan to warm it up, and while I was waiting, went back to do something in my office. When I returned to the kitchen a minute later the frying pan was on fire. I was shocked, but calm, because the fire was small enough that I was able to quickly pour baking soda on it to put the fire out. If I had waited say a couple of minutes more, that fire would have turned into something much worse. Needless to say I was filled with gratitude with my knowledge of how to put out a grease fire, and my ability to maintain a calm focus.

Later that evening I read about this fire in Houston Texas, involving a daycare provider, and the death of 4 of the 7 toddlers in her care. When the story broke, we heard that the woman had left something on the stove in the kitchen, while she was in the bathroom, and it caught on fire.
In a follow up story we learn that camera's at a nearby Target store had captured her image while she was shopping, instead of being in the house with the children. She's fled the country, and the legal system is hoping for her extradition.

I decided to read the comments to this particular article because this is such a devastating thing to have happened those who were killed, and to those left behind. I wanted to know how the community was responding and add my prayers and condolences to the voices.

As I read, I was greatful with those who chose to stand against the hateful rants that also accompanied this story. I believe that this woman should absolutely be brought to justice. I agreed also with those who complain that there are a lot of folks who are slackers, just do enough to get by, and don't care. I see it every day, and it frustrates sometimes and angers me at others. I also believe that there is a good deal of negligence that occurs when it comes to children, ask them - they'll tell you for themselves. They'll tell you in no uncertain terms, that they don't believe people have respect for each other. I know because I've asked them and truly that's a sad state of affairs.

These years with our new found freedom of speech through cyber-speak, are showing how profoundly judgmental and at times vile we are. It makes for an insidious level of disconnect in our day to day interactions . This is the world we are creating for our children - the history we are teaching - the model for being in the world. If that is what we perpetuate, we shouldn't be alarmed when those next generations who will be running the world when we are older, aren't doing it like we think they're supposed to.


All rights Reserved by Author - Linda Joy Burke

A Tribute to Lucille Clifton (1936 - 2010)

A Tribute to Lucille Clifton (1936 - 2010)

Poet Lucille Clifton was a mentor, friend, and teacher to scores of writers in Maryland and around the country. Clifton served as Poet Laureate for the State of Maryland and was Distinguished Professor of Humantities at St. Mary's College of Maryland. She received the National Book Award for her poetry collection, Blessing the Boats (2000). Clifton wrote more than 16 books for children. She served as trustee of the Enoch Pratt Free Library from 1975 to 1984.

Join us for this celebration of the life of Lucille Clifton. Poets from Baltimore and around the state will raise their voices to honor the memory of Clifton's life and works. We invite you to bring your favorite Lucille Clifton poem to share.

Enoch Pratt Free Library
Wheeler Auditorium (3rd Floor)
400 Cathedral Street, Baltimore MD

http://www.prattlibrary.org/calendar/atpratt.aspx?id=51090
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Tribeca '10 | Icelandic Directing Duo Explore Falcon's Role in Geopolitics - indieWIRE

Tribeca '10 | Icelandic Directing Duo Explore Falcon's Role in Geopolitics - indieWIRE

Listening to One Black Bird

The landscape is fully laden now with
the open leaves of spring
buds abound - hues shift
into the cacophony of early summer days

high on a leafless branch
far from my reach
sits one black bird singing

listen listen, I silence
the random ringings
listen listen

my love is near-says she
listen listen
her song spills beauty into the air

I shade my eyes, cock my head
search the branches for the
musician I cannot touch

the singer tilts her beak toward
cumulus clouds-
trilling trilling

the park is empty
save for squirrels foraging,
amongst pods floating from trees.

a time of innocence remembered
surfaces - summers long buried
converge with those yet to be.

one black bird sings of longing - longing
harmonic notes rise to envelope
seekers in the wood.

Linda Joy Burke
All Rights Reserved By Author

The Coincidence of Knowing Kilo

Kilo - RIP 1998-2010

 

I met Kilo about 3 years ago, actually I met Kilo's mom before I met Kilo.
I was walking my dog in the neighborhood when this woman came across the street towards me announcing "I have a dog just a like yours Girl or Boy?." We shared dog stories, my current one being that I needed a place that hadn't been sprayed with pesticides so that my dog could go to the bathroom. Every spring some bug-be-gone company comes to the complex and treats the grounds with chemicals that are harmful to pets and children. I point out the yellow Keep Off The Grass signs to M while we walk and talk. Every year the person who does the spraying - puts up fewer and fewer warning signs - you've got to be alert to know where they are.

She tells me my dog is friendlier than hers, I tell her mine used to be hyper, I'm the Bean's second person. She tells me that she's had Kilo since he was 6 months. We part ways at the narrow dirt path that leads to the convenience store, both of us smiling with the delight of having met each other because of our dogs. I cross the street to get to untainted grass.

I met Kilo some weeks later, though I didn't know this was the same dog as he was with an older gentleman. We would pass on our walks - Kilo and his man person, the Bean and me, however our dogs weren't really friendly, so the man and I just said "hi" to each other or nodded and kept on walking. One day I had my little Canon Sure shot with me when I took the picture linked to this piece.I thought his dog was adorable.

The couple and Kilo moved into the building where I live last fall. That's when I put all of the three faces together and realized that I had heard about Kilo before I'd met him.

Kilo passed away on May 29, 2010 6:00 am - the same day as his dad's birthday. His dad works the graveyard shift, get's off at 6:30 a.m. takes the bus home.

It feels sudden to me because just two days earlier I was jogging down the sidewalk when Ki ran after me barking. I paused mid stride and turned to look at him, he stopped, cocked his little head to the side, and stared back at me.

That's my last memory of Ki, his dad picking him up and saying, "he'll run after everything." We laughed, went home.

M. tells me their last memories of K, beyond what I'd already witnessed: T carrying the open box to the car, his companion rigid inside.I listen to her story, and picture the long painful ride to the animal shelter,them paying the bill for the disposition of Ki's remains.That was the day that the construction crew spent the day working on the exterior of the building, replacing on the wood soffits with metal. The sound of sawing and hammering permeated the air until after 7 that evening. This was not a peaceful departure.

M. tells me about how T keeps things inside. I can tell T's a stoic like that, and I know from what I've seen of him and Ki that his memories run deep. Turns out that this photo may be the only one available to them, which I will print out, frame and give them later today.

As I write this I am struck by how a simple conversation about dogs, evolved into my preserving a memory for folks who were strangers-then neighbors and now by this connection friends.

 

Welcome spring.

Flights of Fancy - Butterflies on Display

I went to Brookside gardens in Wheaton Regional Park yesterday afternoon, to see a live Butterfly exhibit. I confess I had mixed feelings about the exhibit. On the one hand the spectacle was beautiful, hundreds of different kinds of butterflies, on flowers, on trees,on fruit, fluttering through the air, and occasionally landing on us. The picture here is from the butterfly on melon collection. On the other hand as I watched the butterflies gathered at the top of the green house, perched on the netting as close as they could be to the sky, I imagined their little butterfly minds screaming we are free beings - not an "exhibit". It was Children's day at Brookside so there was a lot of chatter, squealing, movement, and excitement whenever one landed on someone. One landed on me and stayed with me for a bit of time, and I truly felt blessed. I wondered what it would be like to be there alone with all those fragile creatures fluttering about - would the peaceful energy I felt be amplified without the buffer of so many other bodies.

What I took away from the experience, was many pictures and a little video, and a desire to grow flowers that would entice these magical creatures. This is a task for my garden next year. The Brookside Garden Exhibit ends today.

Sometimes There Be Jerks in These Here Hills

When this grown man decided that it would be funny to come up behind me and try to scare me while I was telling a story during the evening's Ghost Tour, I was not amused. There I am, standing on a stone stair, when all of the sudden I hear what sounds like a firecracker behind me. Interestingly enough I wasn't frightened, felt a little startled which is good. Had I been really frightened I might have fallen off the step.

When I turned around to see what had made the sound, there was the guy who previously had been sitting with his date, high up on the pile of schist (Ellicott city granite.) By the feel of things I don't think the group I was leading was amused either. The prank bombed. I had no indication from their expressions that they saw the guy coming as they were listening closely to me. The guy wound up slinking off throwing apologies over his shoulder. I did not respond - looked at my tour group, inhaled and continued telling the story.

Someone asked me later, "does that happen often?"
Something always happens, usually it's to scare the whole group, which I don't mind, we get a laugh, catch our breath, move on. Every once in a while though folks can be jerks and my mettle is tested. I've got about 40 seconds to prevent an internal melt down. No melt down... Fortunately the stick to the script signals reached my brain in ample time tonight, the show went on, the audience was pleased.

Do We Really Want the World We Live in to be Dominated by Those who Would Wish and Perpetrate the Worst on People they Disagree With?

Clicked on this article this morning, about the Pres. photographed while talking on the phone with his feet up the desk. The soles of his shoes were facing the camera. The lead line in this piece poses the question on whether Pres. Obama is sending a Subliminal Message with the Soles of His Shoe, equating this (from my viewpoint)innocent behavior of talking on the phone with your feet up, to that Shoe Throwing Incident with the past pres.

I'm noticing a pattern in these kinds of articles, with lead phrase set up to skew one's opinion before reading the piece. That's the real subliminal message - not the fact that Pres. had his feet up on a desk. A photographer follows him around all day, takes 1000's of photos.Some days it feels as if our collective inner child has taken over with the way things/people/ways of being are scrutinized. Boundaries are a pass code- Nothing being sacred, or secret the norm rather than the exception.

This nonsense couched as "news" is an insult to progressive, thoughtful people. The poll (there’s always a poll) asks how many are insulted - 26% 100,000 clicks, were and how many weren’t 74%. The comments, unfortunately many from those folks who were insulted were mad and mean. The thing about this new culture of vitriolic, put it on cyber blast criticism, is that it easily infects those folks whose spiritual immune system is so weak that it only takes a photo to validate their feelings of hate.

I am reminded me of another time in American history where organizations like the Sovereinty Commission existed. The commission, an official agency which was based in Mississippi from 1956-1973, and funded by tax dollars, had the sole purpose to repress Black people. The guy who Murdered the guard at the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC this month is of the same ilk as members of this Sovereignty Commission.

There's a new Code Level emerging in this age of fighting terrorism - which seems is being taken directly to the people. Check out this piece in Salon magazine which speaks directly to that notion.

I've been concerned for over ten years now, and believe more than ever, that how we assert our citizenship - our humanity during these times, will directly impact our offspring's future. Boomers the generation that is bound to the tragedies of our separate and unequal histories are far removed from the millennials whose connection to web of the digital world empowers them with the capacity to truly be transformative.

Where one group has possibly had a scarcity of information about people/cultures/ways of being different than themselves, the other knows limitless possibilities in discovery. The tension between the forces of progress and regression call us all to a kind of crucial attention. Here’s my provocative question again, do we really want the world we live in to be dominated by those who would wish and perpetrate the worst on people they disagree with?

A Random Post In The Middle of The Day

I was visiting two retired teachers, Rachel Smith and Singer Songwriter Emmalene Garrett Penn on Friday afternoon. I'd just shot a little video of Penn singing her new single Teachers' Tears, and I wanted to show them how videos can be used in websites.

When I went through the Rolodex of my mind to find something to load onto my site, Stevie Wonder's name immediately appeared. When I was child the first three albums I remember receiving were Sly and the Family Stone, The Jackson Five, and then a little later Stevie's first album. Stevie was a real miracle to me back then, still is, so much creative passion in him. Superstition is an interesting song, considering those years.

Old heads (children of immigrants and the enslaved) had barrels of superstitions which they passed down to their children, while New Age citizens were delving into metaphysics, paranormal psychology, extra terrestrial/walk-ins, and worrying about alien abductions. Those years were such a fun time for self discovery the younger boomers.

Heron at Wilde Lake

ljoyburke

While working on some projects,
I ran across these heron photos from the last season.
My mind is filled with so many distractions
wanting to just spend weeks away from the
heavy handed news, that I decided to stop
working and do a little creating

visioning that I am
wrapped in a verdant batik
listening to so many notes up lifting
smelling fragrant scents drifting
wishing for resurrections redeeming
in this troubled land of the free.

Ending an Era

Obamaphoria - how
the American Dream
evolves

pockets of jubilant
people having placed their bet
on the President Elect
Barack Obama
pack for the inauguration
pilgrimage
millions have cashed in on this
dose of hope, this promise
of change, this lift from
the malaise of war, treachery,
manipulation and greed.

we'd been looking for a hero
some compassion - and a brain bigger
than the last man in charge
a shift in vibration -
away from the self defeating
nature of fear and manipulation
back to progressive
active participation
in the making of a respected
civilization.

All rights reserved by author. Linda Joy Burke

Haunted Ellicott City

Three years ago I added another hobby to my already full life. I've been giving ghost tours in Ellicott City. I started doing this on the suggestion of a close friend who thought I would be a good tour guide. I kept the information on my desk for months, until I decided what the heck why not do something that I really hadn't in my wildest dreams thought I would do।

Here's the thing, I never even knew that there was such a thing as ghost tours, and though I do have some familiarity with the paranormal and have even seen a few orbs, and witnessed a haunting, I never thought that people actually went on "ghost tours." Come to think of it when I imagined who would go on these tours, I saw a Black Sabbath type goth crowd, with a side of Wicca, and a sprinkle of druids.

Well obviously since the Blair Witch project, which really was a dud in my opinion, the interest in the spirit world is a booming business. There are ghost hunters, ghost whisperers, ghost cleansers, certified paranormal investigators, and all manor of folks who follow the wonderful world of the afterlife. Most of the folks who come on these tours are far from what I imagine. They are mom's, dad's, grandparents, friends from out of town, college kids, red hat ladies, girl and boy scouts, birthday parties, and numerous social groups with a sprinkling of druids, pagans, goths, Wiccans and paranormal groupies.

What we do in Ellicott City is a combination of history, and ghost stories, all first hand accounts from residents, business owners, tourists, and people who work in the town. I love history, and have always thought that I was born out of my time but that's another story. There's something telling about walking the streets in this historic town, (founded in 1771 by three Quaker brothers) with a different group of strangers and telling the stories. I get to learn about the nature of this small town the townies who like to try to scare us and the people who are willing to turn off their tv's and cell phones and black berries and all other forms of distraction and listen to our stories.

I say our stories because after a year and a half I had my own experience. I wasn't looking for anything to happen, it just did, and I had a witness, but that's another story. If you want to know more, come on one of my tours to find out. I had the privilege of being able to write Ghost Tour II which I will be giving on October 11th at 8:30pm and on October 31 at 6:30 and 8:30pm. and again in November. The season ends at the end of November right after Thanksgiving. For more information go to www.VisitHowardCounty.com.

It's all downhill from here

thoughts while waiting for the meek to inherit the earth

In the face of the fall out from the mismanagement of the American Dream by the oval office and it’s greedy cronies we are experiencing an elevated threat level. The evil doers have stuck it to the believers, whose destinies were snatched out of their hands. We’re told that we’re not in a “recession” we’re at a slow down, more like a pause. The gross national product isn’t producing, foreclosure is the new household word, and being downsized doesn’t mean going from a twelve to a size four.

I’m confused when they say there’s a credit crunch and the credit card companies, are pumping out these blank checks like water, offering temptation on the end of pen, made especially for those who’ve gotten themselves stretched too thin keeping up with their daily wants and needs.

One would think that credit card companies would want to help out the banks and back off of the ridiculously greedy policies of charging interest rates that would never allow debtors to repay their debt, and finance charges on late fees that further compound the crisis that American families are in. I’ve come to realize that they prefer a passive/aggressive approach.

I saw with the rising of gas prices and the disturbing preponderance of credit card offers, and cash advance checks, that it would only be a matter of time before undisciplined people would be seduced en mass to live way beyond their means. And even those who are doing the right thing, by not wasting resources, and not buying things that they can’t afford are struggling. It is immoral that a select few feel their sole purpose in life is to amass mass fortunes on the backs of the hard working multitudes.

Part of the dream it seems is to acquire. Without acquiring we don’t know who we are, don’t have anything to be compared with, or to compete with. Without acquiring, we don’t know what we look like, sometimes we think we’re in on our own worse dressed list. Without acquiring we haven’t a clue as to what to do with ourselves during a blizzard, or any other natural or unnatural disaster that crosses our paths. Without acquiring we can’t make up braggadocios stories about ourselves, to keep from being ostracized from the crews with the blinged out facades.

There is something to be said for the generations who came before who learned the value of putting away as much cash as they could, and wasting not a bit of anything. If they couldn’t afford something, furniture, Christmas presents, a prom dress, they put the things in lay- away, paid the store bit by bit every week, then when they’d given everything they owed, they got to take the things home. They kept stuff for generations, saw most things could be repaired, until the days of plastics and disposable electronics came to be.

In my part of the world, where the cost of mid level gas is pushing 3.50 a gallon, there are many SUV’s. Property taxes doubled or tripled when property values rose, and those whose incomes don’t meet the needs of the out of control increases of necessary expenses find themselves choosing between food and heat, gas and servicing the car. We’re told we’re not in a recession, more like a pause, while disposable income is evaporating into emissions that are thawing glaciers around the planet and the national debt is a number that burrows into infinity.

Elders who have already lived through one depression, might have the survival skills to weather a “recession”. They’ve got a year’s worth of toilet paper in the basement, bottle water and canned goods for months, powdered milk, and plenty of matches for the emergency lanterns, and batteries for the flashlights.

But these new people, the one’s who believe that the world turns just for them to get what they want, no matter the cost won’t find it so easy. In the scheme of things, those luxuries like, communication devices and 500 channels may fall by the wayside, in preference for real time activities like having conversations, and growing tomatoes, and corn in the neighborhoods where patches of green remain.