Don’t mess about. Fullscreen. Speakers up. This is special and marvelous.
Something Wonderful: The Weight (Around the world 50 years after)
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WHEN in the course of human Events, it becomes necessary….
Welcome to the New American Digest: 2003-2020
Home is where one starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
There is a time for the evening under starlight,
A time for the evening under lamplight
(The evening with the photograph album).
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter.
Old men ought to be explorers
Here or there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
Into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion
Through the dark cold and the empty desolation,
The wave cry, the wind cry, the vast waters
Of the petrel and the porpoise. In my end is my beginning.
Gerard Van der Leun
When all Earth’s seas shall Levitate,
Dark shawled within the skies,
Upon our eyes will Starfish dance
Their waltz of Blind surprise.
The sun will Rise within wine Dark
As Argonauts imbibed,
Whose drunken arms embrace that sleep
Where Phaeton’s horses Stride.
Upon all of Earth’s wind-sanded shores,
As dolphins Learn to soar,
All we once were on the land
Shall be sealed behind the door
Of Ivory and Chastened Gold,
That the Mystery solved complete
Shall never til the seas’ Long fall
Wake mariners from their sleep.
— Van der Leun
I CELEBRATE myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.
My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this
air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
— Walt Whitman
Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.
I do not think that they will sing to me.
I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.
We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.
— The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T. S. Eliot
Comments on this entry are closed.
Giddy UP!
I’ve seen this mash-up-musicians across the world, but two things stand out:
It is wonderful by itself
Doubly so because it’s good to be reminded that so much music from here has made its way across the planet, flung out across the airwaves and bootleg tapes, waiting to be caught.
Thanks
Never cared much for this toon but like the way this version was put together.
Okay, I was moved. Almost enough to briefly believe that brotherhood-of-man fable for a few minutes.
Righteous!
I want to believe in this “brotherhood of man” version…but I fear music is not enough.
My favorite Robbie Robertson album is “Storyville”.
RIP Levon Helm, Rick Danko and Richard Manuel
Storyville is a great under appreciated album. I watched waiting for Levon Helm. Is he still with us?
You beat me Trang
I have learned that when you say Something Wonderful, I should pay attention. This is so extraordinary. Best thing that happened to me today. Thanks.
Excellent.
speaking of levon: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOyoWrbdeX0
Oh,Good Lord. You delight us in so many ways.
Like Ghost,never cared for this song overmuch,but this version is listenworthy.
Ringo Starr,rocker par excellence.
As remembered in my forever young portraiture, these and others singing with that innocence and hope that brought us a moment of joy:
Levon Helm
Rick Danko
Richard Manuel
That specific song, maybe more cryptic than intended, was part of a time just out of reach now.
Yes, Gerard, very nice indeed!
And to y’all who mentioned “Storyville”,thanks for letting me know that, at least on that matter, I have not been crazy all those years.
On a more somber note, Robert Hunter is now scribblin’ lyrics for The Choir Immortal. The last coupla years have been tough on Dead alumni.
Cheers to all! I may have to dust off the bottle of Macallan and have a wee snort in remembrance of Rabbie Burns’ aforementioned great great grandson.
Krap Krap Borg .i have nuthin in common with this World music schlock. Get off my lawn….
Gave me chills to watch and listen. I think the watching may have been the greater cause.
Something wonderful indeed.
And to earlier commenters, I say that the brotherhood of man isn’t such a fable- if you pay close attention to your sons or brothers. Sometimes they play well together and sometimes they want to kill each other. We hope it stops short of murder, but it doesn’t always.
It is thrilling to hear your kids playing music together when they don’t know you are listening. I have to think that something is similar is one of the reasons God hasn’t turned the lights out on the whole project yet.