Echoes on the Ipswich and Essex Road (poem)

Echoes on the Ipswich and Essex Road

This poem was read 

at the Parson Barnard House

300th birthday celebration

September 2, 2015

Standing here,

under the sun of an early day,

warm clapboard siding

runs under my hand.

Standing here,

along the front of the old colonial,

square cut nail heads

hidden in the wood

press against my fingertips.
The strike on nail by hand-forged hammer
still echoes to my touch.

Careful joins of the old growth cedar

trace invisibly on my skin.

These old growth trees still stand,

though turned sideways on this house front,

now three hundred years.

A surprising fate, yet they remain.

Careful joins of odd length clapboard –

why these runs of five, five, four, two, four?

Careful hands chose the best lengths,

set them right

on that early day,

now three hundred years.

Half hidden behind the house, a barn stands

unmoved on its foundation of glacial stones,

stones cleared by horse and hand from this field.

A narrow diamond window stares me in the eye,

looks back into darkness.

A round-columned side porch, open like a greeting,

steps to a kitchen garden. There the mistress

once walked to raised beds,

her thyme and sage to gather.

A triangle topped pediment, half columned,

their homage to the spirit

of another past and place,

ordains the entry door. Above, bullet pane glass

paints sunlight on the stair and empty parlor floor.

Standing echoes

of first and second period men and women

are in these frames and walls.

Here, one second before,

their children, sturdy and quiet,

stood and watched from this same sunlit door.

Standing echoes of the past,

standing echoes of their minds and hands

press on me, push into my mind,

speak to me with wordless voice.
How can wood and glass and stone

ache to tell me who was here

on that early day,

now three hundred years?

They started here with rough unpainted frame

when life was rocky and hard,

and madness against neighbor

was one time too near.

A diamond window’s dark light

revealed flinty souls.

On to painted saltbox, add a columned federal porch,

the frame remade 

by these men and women of rising freedom,

and a rare matching rise of grace.

The men who built these walls - 

The women who set these frames - 
I can feel their hands

in what they made and left.

I love their shape,

I love their rough grace
and high simplicity.

These wooden frames remain,

like markers on the shore
of an inland New England harbor,

unsurprised when seas retreated,

unmoved by passing tides.

Standing on the Ipswich and Essex road,

against my fingertips

press board and nail and hidden joins.

How can I hope to know

the minds and hands of those who crafted

these simple protections from the wind and rain?

Yet I feel

the minds of men and women

who made these simple frames.

Yet they remain,

these places to stand and sit,

to dine and play,

to divine and pray.

Echoes of men and women

are standing here,

under the sun of an early day,

now three hundred years.

Mark Bohrer

May 2015 North Andover, Mass.

My poem is published in the North Andover Citizen!

Here's the link to the online version:  North Andover Citizen - on wickedlocal.com

Here is the front page:

Here are pages 4 and 5:

Article and poem opposite the "Your News" page

And here it is, zoomed in to the poem:

Bradstreet School Still Stands

Bradstreet School Still Stands                       

The old brick façade gazes silently down,

watching the quiet yard of school days past.

Empty halls echo, life and lessons are done.

Windows stand dark, the welcome door is held fast.

For these brick walls, the bell has rung.

Here lively feet and playful voices once gathered.

Days began with a class on the swings and bars.

So keen to learn – a jest – not all so eager

for the school mistress bell to sound the start.

Take your seat, hands folded, sit straight for teacher.

Pens out, books open, the lesson’s begun.

Perhaps the hand of an earlier mistress

guided their pens, though her hand held a quill.

She walked the same land, a poet’s page was her canvas.

She reared her own, with goodly words instill’d.

In the verse that she wrote – to her child not yet born –

was it meant for those who gathered here each morn?

Perhaps you saw far to your red brick namesake.

Would you nod your assent, to what your words began,

to lessons learned under your good gentle name?

Surely taught – as by your own careful hand –

the pupils and teachers you trained,

your descendants became.

The purpose that guided the build of this frame

has carried on to other rooms, other doors.

This mistress is left, behind her fence, her gate.

Decision made, by town citizens okayed,

this red brick lady will stand no more.

Only some stores, in-town homes, and a plaque –

Leaving the mind’s eye, and a gift, in the heart

of those with town colors of scarlet and black,

of those in her care who studied and taught,

of those with the spirit of sturdy red brick.

The good gentle spirit of our mistress poet,

with her own at her knee as she taught and pen’d,

has carried on to those who were not yet born,

has carried on to those who guide with sure hand,

has carried on to those who teach all as their own.

When this brick lady is gone,

some will yet understand –

Bradstreet school is still here.

Bradstreet school still stands.

Mark Bohrer

December 2014  North Andover, Mass.

"Bradstreet School Still Stands" posted on the fence when the school was being torn down (background).

The poem had its start this past December when I drove past the then shuttered Bradstreet School. Somehow that day, the sight of the old school building sitting by itself behind the closed gate, surrounded by the snowy schoolyard, gave me an idea for a poem. My daughter had gone to kindergarten at Bradstreet when it was last in use as an Early Childhood Education Center. I felt sad to see it sit there empty and unused for so long, and I felt this even more keenly when the town decided that it should be torn down. 

 

For a few weeks I mulled over these thoughts. Then I parked there one Saturday afternoon in December and put the thoughts on paper. The poem is what resulted. 

                

I’ve enjoyed reading poetry all my life, but only recently read Anne Bradstreet’s poems.  I was really amazed at how good and accessible they are, even after these centuries. She was a really remarkable woman. And this town was her home. I tried to capture something of the spirit she conveyed, and my feelings about Bradstreet School.

I've since heard that Bradstreet School was actually named after Anne's husband, Simon Bradstreet, who was governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. But where Simon spent much of his life away in Boston in service to the colony, Anne lived and wrote here in this town, and I feel that the name of Bradstreet School is hers as much as Simon's.

 

I’ve written poetry before, but was especially happy to write a poem about and for North Andover. I hope people enjoy it, and think about all of those who dedicated their lives to teaching the children of our town over the years - and centuries.

If you'd like to read some of you Anne Bradstreet's poems, you can find them here: http://annebradstreet.org/annes-poems/  
The site is the work of  "The Friends of Anne Bradstreet", chaired by Karen M. Kline, Poet Laureate of North Andover.

The Good Pilot (poem)

The Good Pilot

The good pilot knows his plane

What it can do, what it can’t

Others might know takeoff power, rate of climb, service ceiling

He knows how to restart an engine that’s freezing

He knows how to crab in a cross wind

Knows how to land it dead stick

The good pilot knows his way 'round the sky

When to fly under clouds, when to turn back

Others might know albedo, isotherm or wind shear

The clouds he can read, he knows weather by feel

He knows how to navigate storms when they darken

Knows how to fly those dark valleys of heaven

The good pilot knows his route

To the home field today

No need for a chart, no flight plan is filed

He vectors on final, he pilots by heart

The instruction is done, no more touch and go’s

All his flight hours logged, at last returns to his love

At the home field she waits, sees the wheels kiss the ground

Takes in his last taxi and turn, her vigil ends at the gate

Patient during the post flight, magnetos check, engine off

She knows her man, was willing to wait

She opens the door as he flies through

Again they are one, no longer two

The good pilot is home

July 2014 Written in the air, somewhere over America

In memory of my dad, Joe Bohrer, Jr., the good pilot, and my mom, Ann, his love.

My mom passed away on July 23, 2006, and my dad on July 2, 2014. On the flight returning from my dad's funeral, with my son Nick sitting next to me on the plane, I sat there wanting to write a poem for my Dad. 

I was on the flight leg from Detroit to Seattle, I sat on the plane and knew I had to write a poem for my Dad. I just started putting words down on paper. That’s what they say – if you want to write something, start writing.  The first two tries didn't go anywhere, but then the third try brought me the phrase “The Good Pilot”, and the main idea and structure came with it whole, just like that. I never know how this happens, but somehow it does. 

As I wrote it, it turned into something more – a love note to both my dad and my mom. I didn’t know it would take that turn, but poems have a mind of their own.

While I was growing up, Dad took us kids flying all the time. Thinking back to those flights, I can still visualize what Erie PA and the area around it looked like from the air. We heard about flying so much from him – it wasn’t possible to have a conversation with him about any topic that didn’t end up being redirected to be about flying! I was able to use some of the flying terms I heard all the time, and work them into the poem. For anyone who never met my dad, "Good Pilot" has a dual meaning – "good" applies to both pilot and man. 

 

I wanted to read a poem at my father's funeral. I didn’t have the right words that day. But that's what motivated me to write "The Good Pilot". Peace.

poem copyright 2014

elyptical

elyptical - MORE SONGS OF CHEERFUL MENACE

after an amazing career that saw them known as one of the greatest unknown bands of recent times, some additional songs were found in the elyptical vaults

here are MORE SONGS OF CHEERFUL MENACE

BLACK VELCRO DRESS

IN YOUR HEAD

WEEP FOR THE CRYING

FLOWER GUY

HERE'S SOME SOUND

AN EVIL NUN

THAT CREEPY SONG ABOUT MY FRIEND

SO EXACTLY HOW DID PEOPLE GET SO STUPID

WHEN THE LATE EVENING CALLS IT QUITS

ROT

(YOU'RE SO) BLONDE

LONG SONG WITH THAT HIDDEN SONG ABOUT A CRAZY ASIAN LADY INSIDE IT FOR SOME REASON

"All their fans know the sound - yes, that was definitely an elyptical song!"
 
CD Songlist:
1) Intro - George Harrison
2) LS Bumblebee - Peter Cook and Dudley Moore
3) Rocket Man - William Shatner
4) Ballad of Bilbo Baggins - Leonard Nimoy
5) Ouch! - The Rutles
6) Stairway to Gilligan's Island - Dr. Demento
7) What's The New Mary Jane - The Beatles
"There is no higher praise than a loving parody." 

 Amazon Review

When The Night Calls It Quits By  Mark J. Bohrer "Beatles Fan" (New England, USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME) When we look back, this will be seen as a milestone album. I don't say this lightly. June 22, 2011 Top of Form Bottom of Form Top of Form Bottom of Form This review is from: When The Night Calls It Quits (MP3 Music) This is one of those rare albums where every song is different and interesting. Almost every song has an original lyrical, musical or sonic idea. Best of all, the songs all sound "organic". By organic, I mean that the music and lyric are one piece, where the music and the words effortlessly make a greater whole. There aren't too many bands that can do this. Start by listening to any of these: Blind, Deeply Sympathize, Meet My Friend, Cheers to the Sound, New Morning (a long one that has a gem of a song hidden in the 2nd half). Well worth getting, and gets better with each listen. These guys are great songwriters and instrumentalists. All around, kudos to Eclyptic! These guys should be famous!

Dr Who: Day of the Doctor

We saw this last night - Jill, Nick, Debbie and myself - at Loews in Methuen. Even for those who you haven't seen much of the Who story (as I'm guessing applies to many parents), this movie is entertaining and very enjoyable, and is well worth going to.

The story, acting, special effects (including 3D) and the Who-vian humor (as always) were just great.

Cheers to the Dr Who writers and producers! Well done!

Germany sets new solar power record

Germany sets new solar power record

By Erik Kirschbaum

BERLIN | Sat May 26, 2012 2:02pm EDT
(Reuters) - German solar power plants produced a world record 22 gigawatts of electricity per hour - equal to 20 nuclear power stations at full capacity - through the midday hours on Friday and Saturday, the head of a renewable energy think tank said.
The German government decided to abandon nuclear power after the Fukushima nuclear disaster last year, closing eight plants immediately and shutting down the remaining nine by 2022.
They will be replaced by renewable energy sources such as wind, solar and bio-mass.
Norbert Allnoch, director of the Institute of the Renewable Energy Industry (IWR) in Muenster, said the 22 gigawatts of solar power per hour fed into the national grid on Saturday met nearly 50 percent of the nation's midday electricity needs.
Solar panels line Germany’s residential rooftops and top its low-slung barns. They sprout in orderly rows along train tracks and cover hills of coal mine tailings in what used to be East Germany. Old Soviet military bases, too polluted to use for anything else, have been turned into solar installations.
Twenty-two percent of Germany’s power is generated with renewables. Solar provides close to a quarter of that. The southern German state of Bavaria, population 12.5 million, has three photovoltaic panels per resident, which adds up to more installed solar capacity than in the entire United States.
With a long history of coal mining and heavy industry and the aforementioned winter gloom, Germany is not the country you’d naturally think of as a solar power. And yet a combination of canny regulation and widespread public support for renewables have made Germany an unlikely leader in the global green-power movement—and created a groundswell of small-scale power generation that could upend the dominance of traditional power companies.
Some critics say renewable energy is not reliable enough nor is there enough capacity to power major industrial nations. But Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Germany is eager to demonstrate that is indeed possible.

SC Green Team Climate Reader

South Church Green Team

Climate Reader

Here is a collection of articles that serve as a starting point on what you need to know on the scientific, political and moral aspects of the climate change crisis, the crisis of our age.

These articles are a way to help you get started to understand:

1)   The situation we face (Yes, it’s serious)

2)   Why the scientific debate is over (Yes, the evidence is unequivocal)

3)   Why we need to act now (We have only a few decades to make significant cuts in emissions)

4)   How it can be solved with today’s technology (We don’t need to give up everything to solve it)

5)   How people and countries around the world are already succeeding in the transition to a low emission economy (How the changes are also making life in their countries better and healthier)

6)   The few simple big things that will get us there (Starting first with a fee on carbon emissions. This uses the free market to find solutions, and taps into the incredible inventiveness and creativity that we have, and that we’ll need to solve this)

The climate change problem is different and more challenging than anything the human race has faced before. It can and must be solved if we want to have a stable, habitable planet for ourselves and our children to live on.  If we don’t get on a path to solve this, and act soon, climate change will soon dwarf any other problem we face. 
      
Now is the time to act.

SC Green Team Climate Reader

Table of Contents
(Note: Not all content has been uploaded yet, so some presentations and links are not yet live. But feel free to start reading what's here!)

1.    What You Need to Know about Climate Change

·         SC Green Team Climate Presentation

Bill Schroeder and the SC Green Team

·         The Big Picture 
                and 
·         The Scientific Guide To Global Warming Skepticism

John Cook, et. al., www.skepticalscience.com

·         Why the Global Warming Skeptics Are Wrong

William D. Nordhaus

·         Skeptics Arguments and What The Science Says

www.skepticalscience.com

·         Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math

Bill McKibben

·         Climate Change Is Simple

David Roberts, Grist.org, TEDx talk

2.    What We Need To Do

-         A Climate Fix That Conservatives Can Love
                                                            Elliot Spitzer, Grist.org
-       Why Conservatives Should Support a Carbon Tax

Byron Smith

-         A Carbon Tax: Carbon Fee and Dividend FAQ

Citizens Climate Lobby

3.    What Can I Do to Make a Difference for Myself and My Family, Right Now?

·         Go Green: Improve the Energy Efficiency of Your Home

·         Go Solar: Install Solar Photovoltaics on your home

·         Go Renewable: Choose the renewable energy option from your electricity provider

·         Go Offset: Reduce your impact by purchasing “carbon offsets”

4.    Success Stories

·         Germany sets new solar power record, May 12, 2012, Reuters
 

·          South Church Green Team
               Scroll down to the link to the church solar panel output 

 

Where Can I Find Out More?

Web Sites

www.skepticalscience.com	Best source for the latest science. A scientific site with references to the latest papers and findings. It’s also a compendium of latest climate news. Also the best up-to-date responses to the misinformation by climate deniers.
www.350.org	From the 350.org mission statement: “350.org is building a global grassroots movement to solve the climate crisis. Our online campaigns, grassroots organizing, and mass public actions are led from the bottom up by thousands of volunteer organizers in over 188 countries. “350 means climate safety. To preserve our planet, scientists tell us we must reduce the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere from its current level of 400 parts per million to below 350 ppm. But 350 is more than a number—it's a symbol of where we need to head as a planet.”
www.climate.gov	NOAA’s site for climate information
www.citizensclimatelobby.org	Political group advocating for climate policy

Books

Storms of My Grandchildren by James Hansen, former head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies

This book was written by the man who is perhaps the world’s leading climate scientist. It’s the best book I’ve read so far because he covers the whole scientific picture of climate change from millions of years ago through the changes we’re introducing today in clear and understandable way. Secondly, and just as importantly, he also tells the story of how the Bush administration played games with science by attempting to manipulate or block the research that he was trying to report.
 

Field Notes from a Catastrophe by Elizabeth Kolbert

Online review comment: “Earlier this year I read The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery. It was an excellent book full of scientific explanations to nearly all the questions I had about the issue of climate change. Now I have just finished Field Notes From a Catastrophe by Elizabeth Kolbert. It also is an excellent book. In fact, I wish I had read it first - not because it is the better of the two books, but because it is a better introduction to the subject.”
 

The Weather Makers (2005) by Tim Flannery"

“The author, Tim Flannery, has succeeded in writing one of the most comprehensive and easy to understand books on climate change and the effects fossil fuel consumption has on our planet. He lays out the science, the politics and economics behind the effects greenhouse gases have on our planet. These effects include mass species extinction, rise in temperature of the Earth's atmosphere, as well as its oceans, and sea level rise just to name a few. Flannery also does a wonderful job of laying out some of the practical steps we need to be taking in order to avoid catastrophe for future generations and possibly even our own. Highly recommended.
 

Now or Never: Why We Must Act Now to End Climate Change and Create a Sustainable Future (2009) by Tim Flannery 

He has some significant ways (that were mostly new to me) that we can make changes to how we live as a species on this planet and how we can take steps to limit or reverse our impact.
 

The Long Thaw: How Humans Are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth's Climate by David Archer (2010)
 

The Climate War by Eric Pooley

Eric Pooley has served as managing editor of Fortune and national editor, chief political correspondent and White House correspondent for Time.  He is now deputy editor of Bloomberg Business Week. No Rolling Stone there. A lot of behind-the-scenes reporting on both sides of the climate change argument. Here you see why the deniers case is not defensible.
 

Climate Wars by Gwynne Dyer

Gwynne Dyer is military analyst, and he runs through some of the likely/possible scenarios over the next 50 years, and how countries are likely to react to loss of water, droughts, constant storms, refugees streaming across their borders. Not pretty.  Think about what WW I was fought over. In that case, millions died over treaty obligations, colonial rights in Africa and bad feelings?  What happens when countries are in real stress and their neighbor countries have food and water?
 

Books for kids

The kids books are actually good for adults looking for a fast way to come up to speed on the topic, and make for a quick read!
 

Our Choice (Young Reader's Edition) by Al Gore - aimed at the 6th-8th grade audience.
 

How We  Know What We Know About Our Changing Climate; Scientists and Kids Explore Global Warming Cherry, Lynne and Gary Braasch. (Grades 4-8)

An introduction to scientists around the world and their research into global warming. Also work of citizen scientists, including children. Covers where clues are found about climate change, combining clues to  get the big picture and how the resulting information is used, and what we all can do. List of all scientists introduced and their locales at the back of the book. 

 

"What’s it going to be like when the number of wildland fires doubles or triples over the next half century? What’s it going to be like when we have these droughts? What’s it going to be like when the 100-year event becomes the every-year event, which is what we’re right on track for.

"The scientists have been consistently wrong about climate change in the following way: They’ve always been too conservative. The things that are really happening are happening faster than the predictions, than even some of the most pessimistic predictions. Scientists are human. They’re going to have a denial mechanism. They’re, in a way, almost hesitant to say how bad it could be because they don’t want to be considered alarmists. But it’s consistently coming out worse than even their dire case predictions. So when you’ve got the rightwing demagogues saying that the scientists are wrong? Yeah, they’re wrong. They’re wrong the other way. It’s much worse than they’re saying."

Director James Cameron, speaking at the 2012 American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco

Why Conservatives Should Support a Carbon Tax by Byron Smith

      Conservativism, as defined by Edmund Bourke, the father of conservatism, is based on the desire to hand on to our children a world that resembles the one we received from our parents, on the assumption that human knowledge and wisdom is incapable of handling too much change all at once.

      On that criteria, today's "conservatives" espouse the most radical position possible: that we should continue to alter radically the chemical composition of the oceans and atmosphere.
       I am a conservative. I wish to pass to my children a world that is still somewhat recognizable. This is not possible with continued use of fossil fuels.

      The idea of a fee and dividend is not slapping a price on a product I don't like. It is simply reflecting the true cost of emitting carbon to ensure that the polluters don't get to dump their waste into the atmosphere causing everyone to suffer as a result. In no other industry are waste products able to be dumped without charge. Charging polluters for their waste is an idea thoroughly compatible with conservative economic assumptions.    

Saw this quote from Rachel Carson's "Silent Spring":

We stand now where two roads diverge. But unlike the roads in Robert Frost's familiar poem, they are not equally fair. The road we have long been traveling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster. The other fork of the road — the one less traveled by — offers our last, our only chance to reach a destination that assures the preservation of the Earth. - Rachel Carson

Hard to believe she wrote this in 1962, and wasn't even thinking about climate change.