#homily clock

[gtinthepot]

Illusion from the borrowers afield 1952

[mikyapixie]

🎉🎂🥳🎈🎊🎁

🎉🎂🥳🎈🎊🎁

I never knew she voiced Snow White in sherk 2!!!

Or the she helped create Might Bee!!! One of my favorite shows!!!😆😆😆

[flashklik]

My design for Homily Clock

[picturebookshelf]

The Borrowers Afield

Story: Mary Norton -- Art: Beth and Joe Krush

(Original Edition: 1955 -- This Edition: 1990)

[hitchell-mope]

Stranger things borrowers au

Jim. Pod

Joyce. Homily

Jane. Arrietty

Mike. Spiller

[zvaigzdelasas]

What will cause a change in Western policy is Israeli military failure. That is why the Biden administration has devoted more energy to compelling Israel to formulate attainable objectives than it has counseled the restoration of fuel and water to Gaza’s hospitals.

To give a prominent recent example in this regard, in 2006, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ecstatically welcomed Israel’s war against Lebanon as the “birth pangs of a new Middle East.” Confident that Israel was pulverizing Hezbollah, the U.S. imperiously dismissed efforts to achieve a cessation of hostilities. Yet, as soon as Israeli armored columns and ground forces faced slaughter when they attempted to advance into southern Lebanon, the U.S. immediately changed its tune and beseeched the UN Security Council to adopt a ceasefire resolution.

Similarly, in 1982, the U.S. gave Israel a free hand to eradicate the PLO in Lebanon. Once it became clear it lacked the capacity to occupy West Beirut, the Reagan administration sent Philip Habib to negotiate an agreement that preserved the PLO. In other words, so long as the U.S. and other Western governments reject a Gaza truce and focus on meaningless obscenities like “humanitarian pauses,” it means they still believe Israel will or can succeed. If they reverse their position, you can take all the homilies about civilian suffering motivating their new position with a grain of salt. Window dressing. It means they have concluded Israel has failed.

An alternative scenario would be that Western governments have concluded that their and Israel’s conduct is producing a significant threat to their own interests and that it’s time to wind down the clock.

12 Nov 23

[mingisaddctn]

unholy | j.yh

Pairing: preacher's son!yunho x reader Genre:[smut] yunho disguised as the devil brainrot Warnings: religious themes, corruption kink a/n: yea.

(also, sidenote, but it was kinda hard translating some of the christian terms bc i grew up with those but in my native language so bear w me

it always came back to that golden cross.

the token of Christ that he held around his neck, dangling on his chest as if it held the symbolism of carrying the holy figure in his heart.

ha. the irony of that.

you watched intently as the tall boy stood in the background. he didn't blend in, even with the gelled-back hair, white dress shirt and the gentle smile that was plastered all over. they all dressed the same, spoke the same, stood the same, but he somehow, his presence was the only one everyone seemed to focus on.

some could say it was the divine light that chose him, and no one would dare to oppose. how could they? not when the boy did everything to grace his image. an impeccable reputation, something not even the son of Christ himself got before meeting his end, being the towns sole preachers son almost faded in line of all the things jeong yunho was;

hard working student, star athlete, gracious volunteer, cheerful friend, sweet lover and darling son. sinful con-artist.

your father clapped alongside the people, cheering for the homily, he made sure to glance in your direction to ensure his own ego that you were being a good girl and paying attention.

he wanted you to fill those big shoes just as much as he wanted to slap your mother across the face every time she burned the food, leading her to fill another glass of wine and fall asleep alone on the couch, but still waking up earlier than everyone to pretend to be the very good wife that she was graced to be, offered just as young as you were now, by her own father, and the only thing she got in return was a sole golden cross to hang on her neck—a mark, a stamp that stated where and to whom she belonged—not your father, no.

but God.

"make sure to shake the preacher's hand" your father spat, oh-so-loyal to his master, shaking its tail as one of the sheep in the flock.

and you did. the mass had already ended when you approached the altar, under the watchful eye of the big wooden cross as you picked at your cuticles. in line, alongside your mother who held the weight of submission on her back, shrinking almost into a ball, you held your hands together waiting for your turn to thank the old man for doing his job.

"smile" your father told you.

and you did. borrowing one of the various features, doing your best impression of the good daughter, the most innocent sheep.

but the eyes of the predator followed around. to anyone, it would be just a caring gaze, but you knew what came within, the dark pair of eyes making your skin tingle and stomach churn.

you avoided it. you knew the consequences but you did anyway. you knew that later, when the blue darkened into the night and no lights would be seen within a mile radius, he would strip you out of wool, pierce your organs and drink from it as if it were the blood of Christ.

and when the birds went into hiding and dark hues shadowed the figures around, you found yourself shaking your leg frantically, looking between the clock on your nightstand and the closed window with lacy curtains that protected you so foolishly from the outside world.

it was close to time to leave when you heard the wine glass clinking downstairs. you put down the bible, shallow breaths forming inside your chest as you opened the window, jumping onto the dry grass that your father never cared to water. why would he do anything that didn't come with god's name attached to it?

approaching the same chapel you stood in this morning, you saw a faint light of an oil lamp coming from the backside, with it, came the following gaze that haunted you every other day, and you could smell the faint scent of soap in his clothes. not a wrinkle, not a stain, shirt as white as heaven, eyes as dark as sin.

he smiled as you came closer. not his usual one, but the one he reserved for those nightly escapades of yours—and your heart pounded from the knowledge that it was for you. you noticed that he was chomping on an apple, the sweet scent of the fruit adorning your nostrils as you stood idly in front of him. a small light reflected on the small piece of gold that hid on his chest.

with his hand up, he held the viciously red apple in front of your eyes. you didn't eat a lot at dinner because a fight between your parents broke out, and you were already sick from attending mass—ever since you started meeting the boy outside, sundays never felt the same—so the sight of a lustrous, full and juicy fruit did the trick on you.

you reached to grab it, but he retreated his offer.

"nuh-uh" he said. "open up."

and as a good girl, you did, allowing to be fed by the same fingers that found its way into your deepest parts. the same ones that dragged along your skin and touched wherever you claimed to be forbidden by the eyes of the lord. but how could it be so wrong? not when his touch felt that good.

yunho smiled at the sight of you biting into the fruit. you had no idea what he was thinking most of the time, but when he smiled like that, it was real.

"come" he said as he opened the back door, discarding the core on the grass. the evidence of it only being the sweet taste left on your lips, now to linger forevermore.

following him inside, you two reached the same familiar room where you grew up going in and out of. the wooden cabinets surrounding you, full of things that were meaningless without being held at the altar on sunday mornings.

the sacristy was somewhere you spent a lot of time organizing things as a volunteer, helping the altar boys and doing your part as part of the church, being the prideful gem of your community. but would they think so if they knew that your only reason to do it was so you could see more of the golden boy?

you could never lie when someone teased you about being too infatuated with the boy. your cheeks would heat up and heart would pound like crazy, to the point where you always worried if you were on the verge of dying or exploding. you first met him at the church, following him around as if he was your pastor, the one that would lead and save you.

then it was at school, but the meetings would always be brief, since he was always busy with school work or sports. you could never catch him alone, there was always crowds around him wherever he went, and you knew you fell into the category of being another one in his flock, but then he caught you staring that one sunday after mass, while he played the organ and no one was around for once.

"you always stare" he said, his voice velvety and seemingly to be something made by God's hands Himself "but you never say anything. are you scared of me?"

shaking your head, you looked down to your shoes, fingers picking at your cuticles.

you knew he was observant, too. most of the times you stared, he caught you, but he never said anything—that's how thoughtful he was, and that was one of the many things that made your young heart belong to him.

before you could even answer, your father called you from the sacristy, and you left, escaping from those warm, chocolate eyes.

but that was the day when things changed; the day he made you aware that he knew of your hobby of watching, because the next sunday, you caught him sneaking wine from one of those big wooden cabinets.

it was before mass, when you found yourself in the sacristy, opening the door without announcing, not expecting anyone to be there. but then you found the boy leaning by the entrance, drinking from the chalice as he watched you closely, his eyes never leaving you.

it shattered you on the inside. the sharp dress shirt he always wore to mass now held a deep stain by the collar, and everything about him seemed so messy. but what hurt the most was to see his eyes turn dark, something you never expected to see.

and it seemed to exhilarate him, the thought of you being the only one knowing. he knew you watched, and he wanted to give you a show.

on christmas night, when the mass would be held late, you stood behind to help clean up and organize the things from the short play held by the community. it was almost the next day and even the preacher had left, but you were folding the costumes and reassembling the scenery.

it wasn't rare for you to be alone in the church, at some point you even had the keys, but something felt eerie about that night. and then you heard a noise. it was indistinguishable at first, and you thought that someone could have returned and maybe got hurt, so you left the sacristy and went to the main hall.

now the sounds grew louder, and your heart pounded in its cage. it scared you, you thought someone might've gotten hurt, but you kept on going, trying to see where the noises were coming from.

stepping lightly, you heard another moan of what you thought was pain, coming from the confessional, the small door closed, but the sounds coming through.

"h-hello?" you called, no response.

approaching closer, your fingers held the handle and you took a deep breath, opening it slowly.

and you were met with dark eyes, the same ones that corrupted you before, the same ones who disguised themselves all this time, fooling everyone who dared to stare back. the same gaze you longed for, but now dreaded.

yunho leaned against the confessional wall, hair disheveled and the dress shirt half open. he panted, and the air inside felt heavy. moans sung by the heart shaped lips, the same ones you wondered if they were hand painted in heaven, now sounding so shameless, making sounds so sinful as he fisted his cock.

but the way your body reacted, your stomach felt like melting, and your face held too much heat. you didn't know you could sweat from other places, but your undergarments were now drenched. and that's when he grabbed your wrist, leading your hand to fall on top of his, enveloping his warm member into your palms.

you knew you were supposed to feel disgusted. you knew you were supposed to go back to your house, pray and go to sleep, but how could you when your hand was melting into his, and the noises he made when you moved your wrist were so forbidden it tasted good?

his pants became heavier and heavier, and the movements grew faster, then he spurted on your fingers and brought them to his own mouth.

seeing as you didn't move, he pulled your wrist, making your face fall closer to his, and then placed both of your fingers between your mouths, giving them a long lick, tasting his fluids.

"this is because of your staring" he claimed, placing yours and his digits into your mouth, making you jolt in shock. "do you know how hard it is to pretend not to see it?"

you did what you did best; you watched him. both of your fingers now resting on your tongue and the bitterness of his release mixing with your saliva.

"take it. prove it to me" he stared back. "prove that you want me."

it was over for you when you sucked on his skin involuntarily.

after that, he would ravish your body and sing prayers as his tongue tasted the sheen coat of sweat all over you. all week he portrayed the golden boy, the blessed child; but sundays, his mind became possessed by you.

now, back in present, he was holding the same golden chalice, signaling for you to grab the bottle of wine sitting next to you.

"will you open that for me?" he asked, voice coated in velvet that rubbed against your ears.

you took the cork off and he waited for you to serve the chalice, but before you could, he stopped himself, as if he had just gotten a new, better idea. he sat on the cushioned armchair behind the desk, pulling you closer by the hem of your thin camisole, face laying lower than yours, to the point you had to look down.

"pour me a drink, please?" you could've swore you'd seen the small, sheer glimpse of those same warm eyes for a moment. but it had to be just your mind playing tricks on you.

the boy sat under you with his fingertips grazing against your thighs as he opened his mouth, waiting for you to serve him. he knew that no matter what he asked of you, you would do it, no questions asked.

you started pouring the wine into his mouth, watching as the deep, dark liquid pooled onto his tongue as he closed his eyes, his adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed every last drop. mesmerized and lost in his godly features, you tilted the bottle a little more than you should, letting some of the wine drip on his skin, a small, faint line leaving its trace from the corner of his mouth to his neck.

he gave your thigh a small squeeze, and you stopped all motion as his eyes shot open, tongue licking his lower lip to not waste any alcohol.

"c'mon, darling, it's not time to make a mess yet" he laughed, the hearty laugh you grew up replaying inside your mind, giggling with your feet in the air. "clean that up now, will ya?"

you just nodded, turning on your feet to grab a napkin when he stopped you, pulling your legs closer in a quick move, making you fall onto straddling his strong thighs.

"you know what I meant by that" he watched every singular move your irises did closely, keeping track of your thoughts as if he could read them.

biting your lip, you looked at where the wine stained his cheek, and leaning forward, you gave it an experimental small lick. not daring to lean back, knowing that he wouldn't leave you alone with that following eye contact, you went lower, reaching for his neck, the tip of your tongue following the trace of a vein that stood under the fair skin.

the deep rumble of his groan trembled from your tongue to the rest of your body, accommodating itself inside your lower abdomen, a spot of wetness that began to stick to yunho's dress pants.

"I haven't even touched you properly, dear" he whispered into your ear as you kept on licking him clean "and you're already getting wet?"

your breath faltered and, ashamed, you hid your face into the crook of his neck. but he never ran from what he wanted, when he wanted—that's when you felt his long, cold fingers sliding inside your panties, the fingerprints embedded on your folds as he played around with the slick.

"y-yun—" you let out a whimper, your fingernails leaving half-crescent marks onto his shoulder.

"huh, what is it?" he asked, whispers into your ears and engraving his voice into your soul as his fingers pinched your clit, making a squeal leave your lips. "what is it that you want the most?"

you bit into his skin, chills running down your spine and cold sweat forming on your nape, could even be mistaken for a chilly breeze in the middle of that hot summer night.

when he slid a finger inside you, you could swear that your heart almost got stuck into your throat. placing your hand on top of your mouth, you tried to control the noises you were now making in union to the newly-found friction.

you found yourself nipping on your cuticles involuntarily, being too swayed by the waves of pleasure and emotional burst, but he caught it. he always did.

"oh no... you hurt yourself" he grabbed your hand with his free one, scanning it, watching as a small button of blood formed where your teeth bit into, it was a tic, you always picked at your fingers, and making it bleed wasn't news, but he seemed disappointed.

and then he put your fingers into his mouth, and sucked on the blood. eyes not leaving yours as you stared back, brows furrowed, a moan leaving the confines of your lips as you felt the texture of his tongue swirling around your digits.

with his free hand, he kept on moving, fingers in and out, pressing the sweet spot that was reserved for him, and only him. you weren't bounded by marriage, nor you thought you would be too soon, but under the severe gaze of god, you were his and he was yours.

the knot that formed on your stomach grew tighter and tighter while he sucked on your fingers and pressed inside you. the bulge in his pants causing friction when you rolled your hips desperately, using his body for your own selfish needs.

soon, the release came, washing over you as a cozy blanket of pure comfort, and you slumped onto his upper body, being held in arms as a cage, knowing that, even when he was the threat, he was the savior.

"you seem pretty found of this" he noted, and then you came to your senses to see that you were gripping to his golden cross.

leaning back, he unclasped the gold chain, the other hand that was nestled inside you left the warmth, the coldness of the slick on your panties meeting your lower lips and making you shiver slightly.

"I want you to have it" he said, placing the other hand on top of your lips, forcing them open, placing the cross on your tongue, and his wet fingers on top of it, pressing. drool began to form on the corner of your lips as you gazed at him with half lidded eyes. "god... how can you be so beautiful?"

in a quick frenzy, you suddenly found yourself on the top of the altar, legs spread and the weight of the golden cross now falling on your chest. yunho kissed your legs, leaving deep purple marks inside, places where only he could see them. he lost his dress shirt along the way, and his pants were unbuttoned, only a matter of time for him to lower his boxers to reveal the hard cock stuck in its confinements.

from where you laid, you could see the tall boy standing in front of you, and on top of him, as if to peek, was the huge wooden cross. the one last symbol you caught sight of as he entered you, the last view before falling into the depths of insanity.

his big hands sneaked under you, holding your body close to his as he moved in and out, the feeling of his cock rubbing against you making you crazier by the second. the feeling too good to be right, and the small voice inside your head that kept you pure, innocent, now was gone. you had no trace of light anymore, not when you were conjoined; not when your body melted into his.

his groans were prayers and you attended them with moans, the song of angels being made right in that moment, and nothing was holier than the way your heart thumped against his. keeping quiet wasn't an option anymore, and your whimpers soon became screams, the sound of his name echoing over and over between those walls.

you screamed, and drooled, and held onto dear life, his body being the last piece of salvation close to you, and the grasp so desperate you would think your soul was condemned. he kept on thrusting, his member hitting the same spot over and over, and the sound of your hips slapping grew louder.

you weren't you anymore. you never knew what came over your body when he fucked you, but it wasn't something holy. it trembled and shook and moved on its own, every trace of control abandoning your senses, the grasp of reality not being in sight.

"I'll make you mine" he repeated in your ear as a promise, singing it as his own psalm. "you'll be forever bound to me; to my body."

"I am yours" you babbled, not even sure if the words were clear, but he got the message as he kept on thrusting, fingers digging into your skin as his lips sucked on your neck.

and when his dark gaze met yours again, a groan run through his throat, the bundle of pleasure snapping inside you, just as his own did. the seed of his own filled your walls completely, and you smiled satisfied, mind far from your body as you were consumed by the primal urges.

now, with his golden cross wrapped around your neck and his claim slipping between your thighs, he marked you as his.

it was scary, how much you lost yourself when he touched you, scary how good it felt, scary how forbidden it was, scary how he made you feel like never before.

for as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;

and you feared him the most.

[book--brackets]

Summaries under the cut

Tiffany Aching by Terry Pratchett

Armed only with a frying pan and her common sense, Tiffany Aching, a young witch-to-be, is all that stands between the monsters of Fairyland and the warm, green Chalk country that is her home. Forced into Fairyland to seek her kidnapped brother, Tiffany allies herself with the Chalk's local Nac Mac Feegle - aka the Wee Free Men - a clan of sheep-stealing, sword-wielding, six-inch-high blue men who are as fierce as they are funny. Together they battle through an eerie and ever-shifting landscape, fighting brutal flying fairies, dream-spinning dromes, and grimhounds - black dogs with eyes of fire and teeth of razors - before ultimately confronting the Queen of the Elves, absolute ruler of a world in which reality intertwines with nightmare. And in the final showdown, Tiffany must face her cruel power alone...

When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead

Miranda is an ordinary sixth grader, until she starts receiving mysterious messages from somebody who knows all about her, including things that have not even happened yet. Each message brings her closer to believing that only she can prevent a tragic death. Until the final note makes her think she’s too late.

The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss

Swept off course by a raging storm, a Swiss pastor, his wife, and their four young sons are shipwrecked on an uncharted tropical island. Thus begins the classic story of survival and adventure that has fired the imaginations of readers since it first appeared in 1812. With optimism and boundless enthusiasm, the Robinson family undertakes the extraordinary task of constructing a home for themselves and exploring the primitive island filled with strange and beautiful creatures and exotic fruits and plants. Rich in action and suspense, The Swiss Family Robinson  is an exhilarating novel takes us to a faraway place of danger and beauty, where the courageous Robinson family embarks on a thrilling new life of adventure and discovery.

The Indian in the Cupboard by Lynne Reid Banks

At first, Omri is unimpressed with the plastic Indian toy he is given for his birthday. But when he puts it in his old cupboard and turns the key, something extraordinary happens that will change Omri's life for ever.

For Little Bear, the Iroquois Indian brave, comes to life...

The Belgariad by David Eddings

Myths tell of the ancient wars of Gods and men, and a powerful object - the Orb - that ended the bloodshed. As long as it was held by the line of Riva, it would assure the peace.

But a dark force has stolen the Orb, and the prophecies tell of war.

Young farm boy Garion knows nothing of myth or fate. But then the mysterious Old Storyteller visits his aunt, and they embark on a sudden journey. Pursued by evil forces, with only a small band of companions they can trust, Garion begins to doubt all he thought he knew...

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith

Through six turbulent months of 1934, 17-year-old Cassandra Mortmain keeps a journal, filling three notebooks with sharply funny yet poignant entries about her home, a ruined Suffolk castle, and her eccentric and penniless family. By the time the last diary shuts, there have been great changes in the Mortmain household, not the least of which is that Cassandra is deeply, hopelessly, in love.

The Borrowers by Mary Norton

Beneath the kitchen floor is the world of the Borrowers -- Pod and Homily Clock and their daughter, Arrietty. In their tiny home, matchboxes double as roomy dressers and postage stamps hang on the walls like paintings. Whatever the Clocks need they simply "borrow" from the "human beans" who live above them. It's a comfortable life, but boring if you're a kid. Only Pod is allowed to venture into the house above, because the danger of being seen by a human is too great. Borrowers who are seen by humans are never seen again. Yet Arrietty won't listen. There is a human boy up there, and Arrietty is desperate for a friend.

Esperanza Rising by Pam Munoz Ryan

Esperanza thought she'd always live with her family on their ranch in Mexico--she'd always have fancy dresses, a beautiful home, and servants. But a sudden tragedy forces Esperanza and Mama to flee to California during the Great Depression, and to settle in a camp for Mexican farm workers. Esperanza isn't ready for the hard labor, financial struggles, or lack of acceptance she now faces. When their new life is threatened, Esperanza must find a way to rise above her difficult circumstances--Mama's life, and her own, depend on it.

The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke

Two orphaned children are on the run, hiding among the crumbling canals and misty alleyways of the city of Venice.

Befriended by a gang of street children and their mysterious leader, the Thief Lord, they shelter in an old, disused cinema. On their trail is a bungling detective, obsessed with disguises and the health of his pet tortoises. But a greater threat to the boys' new-found freedom is something from a forgotten past – a beautiful magical treasure with the power to spin time itself.

Dork Diaries by Renee Russel

Nikki Maxwell is not popular, in fact Nikki Maxwell is the opposite of popular; she's a total dork! But Nikki's hoping that by moving to a new school she might just stand a chance of making some friends and leaving her old lame-ways in the past. But life is never that simple... Follow Nikki's life through sketches, doodles and diary entries as she starts her new school, battles with her mum for an iPhone and meets her arch-nemisis, the school's queen bee, Mackenzie.

[izvmimi]

cw: catholic christmas and church rituals. reader is at church. yami is not catholic. bad sense of humor. reader is a noble implied to be from a big family.

“Hey so when’s this shit gonna end?” Yami whispers unceremoniously in your direction from the church pew, just three rows from the front of the altar, and you can feel your stomach turn as you look around, trying to gauge whether or not the other attendees to mass heard, or possibly, most terribly, the priest did. However, the priest seems unaffected even if he does hear Yami’s harsh tone of voice and continues his droning homily, and you let your hand rest on Yami’s knee squeezing it tightly.

“Are you insane?” you mouth back to him through the corner of your lips, as though he were no better than one of your many siblings. “Lower your voice.”

Yami breathes out through his nose in a huff and crosses his arms over his chest. A small part of you wonders if him interrupting the mass is really that much of a breach - after all, he’s already wearing a tank top to one of the most important religious holidays of the year, and smells of a recent smoke, even though you are clad in your finest dress of reds and golds to herald the birth of the Christ child, the shimmer in your dangling diamond earrings practically blinding when it catches the light of the many lit candles throughout the church. Despite this, you’re not necessarily the most lavishly dressed, although to Yami clearly you are the most beautiful of the bunch - the royal women in the pews ahead of you are similarly luxurious in their appearance, hands folded in their laps gracefully while their other halves stifle their yawns, stoic faces to suggest piety rather than abject boredom.

Asta, like Yami, is uncouth enough to yawn loud enough that you can hear it, unlike the men of the royal family, and while his partner (and your friend) shoots him a look just short of exasperation, you find yourself stifling a laugh. Yami has the nerve to give Asta a similar look of disrepute and Asta frowns back at him. You see your friend stiffen up, and you can tell she’s considering that she should have left Asta and just sat at the front with the rest of the royal family rather than tolerate her boyfriend’s country behavior. She nudges him quietly with her elbow and Yami lets out a low chuckle, not as easily suppressed as yours.

“I don’t even blame him, there’s no reason this should last this long every single year.”

Yami says this as if he comes often, but this is his very first time ever coming to midnight mass on Christmas in the first place. He’s doing it solely for you, his soon to be wife, and while you appreciate his efforts, the Black Bulls cape doesn’t cover his shoulders enough for him to look at least appropriately dressed.

You don’t answer immediately because the homily ends abruptly, and the priest begins the call and response. Yami doesn’t know the words at all and grumbles something nonsensical, while Asta says the words incorrectly despite having grown up in a church with a fierce crush on a nun, a fact his partner is clearly not above getting riled up about.

The four of you kneel and clasp your hands, and rise, and kneel, with varying synchronization, you always in time with your similarly high class friend, the men you have chosen to love keeping up poorly. You imagine the third of your group, daughter of the noblesse who had the sense to pair up with a man similarly of high status is probably not faring as poorly and shoot her a glance across the church only to see that she and Leopold are clearly fast asleep.

Disastrous.

The clock strikes closer to midnight and you can tell Yami has refused to kneel or stand anymore, and you decide not to look at him lest a foul expression gives him a reason to get up and leave. The Eucharist is passed and Yami raises his hand to refuse the cup from the person before it, as if he were refusing beer, and you quickly cut in to take the goblet from the offerer.

He didn’t refuse the bread.

You turn to your friend who is mortified on the account of just being around to witness Yami’s behavior, and consider hissing that at least he isn’t going to be the potential father of her children.

Midnight strikes and the members of the congregation are called to sing to herald Christmas morning.

Your friend links hands with yours, and your other hand goes to Yami. He’s polite enough to rise this time, and watches you as you sing from the side, and perhaps at that moment he understands what it means to be at peace.

Your voice is lovely, he thinks.

The way you look up into the high ceilings of painted glass, then let your eyes settle on the crucifix; the way your eyes close as your heart lightens.

Yami has always thought of religion as a silly exercise of the bourgeois, a way to differentiate yourselves from the heathen masses with complicated ritual after complicated ritual, the guise of piety to cover your excess and cruelty, and yet…

As he holds your warm hand now, he might understand.

He cannot understand the entirety of your love of religion or your love of the world, but he’ll try to, as those things that move your heart have learned to move him also.

And thus he tries his best to raise his own gruff voice to sing.

And when you turn to him, to smile just at him, it’s all worth it.

—

Your friend whispers something about her repressed fear that Asta would burst into flames the second he crossed the church barrier and you can’t help but double over in laughter as you clear the church. Your other slumbering noble friend finds her way to the two of you and rests on your shoulder.

“Did you have a good nap, princess?” you ask.

She looks sheepish but Leopold is quick to wrap his arm around her shoulders. They match in brilliant hues of yellow, red and gold, and she smiles brightly, warmed by his demeanor and his smile.

“We were simply resting our eyes and feeling the sermon.”

“Of course you were,” your royal friend teases before she blows kisses to you both, then takes Asta’s hand to join the rest of the Silvas, Noelle having beckoned them over to save her from her siblings.

“Merry Christmas!” they wave as they walk off, Asta quick to adjust the hem of his partner’s fur coat as best he can.

“Merry Christmas!”

Many Christmas Eves you’ve spent in the home with your gaggle of siblings, poring over gifts that were meant for them and not you, cookies to set out for Santa of your own solitary labor (you’d often let the help go spend time with their own families) and your father’s many mistresses inspecting every corner of the home to check for dust or something inconsequential for you to be blamed for.

But this Christmas you are surrounded by love, and you are loved.

Yami’s arm wraps around your waist close as you head back to your happy home, and perhaps this Christmas, you’re thankful you decided to give him, of all people, your heart.

[featheredcritter]

Homily Clock from studio ghibli' secret world of arietty would do numbers on tumblr i know it. Most fail milf i've ever seen

[gtinthepot]

Illustration from the borrowers afield 1952

[jostoys]

Meet the Clock family: Pod, Homily and Arrietty, from Mary Norton’s “The Borrowers”. Borrowers are between 4 and 6 inches tall, and “borrow” many small items from “human beans”. The Clocks live beneath a grand home in Georgian England.

Pod is preparing for a borrowing expedition, taking the hat pin he needs for climbing and his borrowing bag.

Homily has requested some sugar for her cake.

Homily and Arrietty prepare dinner while waiting for Pod.

He’s back at last!

[frmartinshomiliesandreflections]

30th March >> Fr. Martin’s Homilies / Reflections on Today’s Mass Readings for the Easter Vigil Mass (Inc. Mark 16:1-8): ‘He has risen; he is not here’.

Easter Vigil

Gospel (Except USA) Mark 16:1-8 Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified, has risen.

When the sabbath was over, Mary of Magdala, Mary the mother of James, and Salome, bought spices with which to go and anoint him. And very early in the morning on the first day of the week they went to the tomb, just as the sun was rising.

They had been saying to one another, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?’ But when they looked they could see that the stone – which was very big – had already been rolled back. On entering the tomb they saw a young man in a white robe seated on the right-hand side, and they were struck with amazement. But he said to them, ‘There is no need for alarm. You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified: he has risen, he is not here. See, here is the place where they laid him. But you must go and tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going before you to Galilee; it is there you will see him, just as he told you.”’

Gospel (USA) Mark 16:1-7 Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified, has been raised.

When the sabbath was over, Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James, and Salome bought spices so that they might go and anoint him. Very early when the sun had risen, on the first day of the week, they came to the tomb. They were saying to one another, “Who will roll back the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?” When they looked up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back; it was very large. On entering the tomb they saw a young man sitting on the right side, clothed in a white robe, and they were utterly amazed. He said to them, “Do not be amazed! You seek Jesus of Nazareth, the crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Behold the place where they laid him. But go and tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him, as he told you.’”

Homilies (5)

(i) Easter Vigil

It has been a long winter, hasn’t it? We have had a good many grey and wet days. Yet, Spring has well and truly sprung. In a few hours time, in the early hours of Easter Sunday, the clocks go forward one hour, giving us an extra hours light in the evening. It is as if nature is in harmony with the feast of Easter. Easter is very much a feast of light. According to tonight’s gospel reading, ‘very early in the morning on the first day of the week the women went to the tomb, just as the sun was rising’. Even though the women went to the tomb in sadness, there is a suggestion that the darkness of Good Friday was already beginning to lift. ‘The sun was rising’. The rising of the sun speaks to us of the rising of God’s Son on that Easter Sunday morning. Every sunrise can speak to us of Easter, the coming of God’s light through the risen Jesus. I have always loved those lines in Saint Patrick’s Confession, ‘This sun, which we see, rises daily at God’s command for our benefit, but will never reign, nor will its brilliance endure…We, on the other hand believe in and worship Christ the true sun who will never perish’. It was ‘the first day of the week’ that the women came to the tomb, which is our Sunday. If every sunrise can speak to us of Easter, even more so does every Sunday speak to us of Easter. On Sunday we celebrate in a special way the good news that Jesus is risen. That is why we come to church on Sunday, to celebrate the presence of the risen Lord among us.

The risen Lord who comes to us as Bread of Life in the Sunday Eucharist comes to us in other ways and in many other places as well. It is said of the women in tonight’s gospel reading that they went to the tomb bringing spices with which to anoint the body of Jesus. These same women, according to Mark’s gospel, stood at a distance watching Jesus being crucified, powerless to help him. Now they wanted to render some service to dignify his body. It was in the exercise of this work of mercy that the women encountered the risen Lord. That is often how we too meet the risen Lord today. Whenever we perform some act of loving kindness for someone, we meet the Lord or, rather, the Lord meets us. The journey of loving service that the women made on that Easter Sunday is being made every day throughout our Greater Finglas Parish. People journey with the equivalent of the women’s spices to anoint someone with their kindness and care. Whenever we travel such a journey, the Lord comes to meet us. We are opening yourself up to the same good news that the women heard on that first Easter Sunday. Whenever we go out of ourselves to treat someone in a dignified way, Easter Sunday happens for us. The risen Lord will surprise us, as he surprised the women on that first Easter morning. The light of the risen Lord will shine upon us.

As the women set about their work of mercy, there was one obstacle in their way that they were concerned about, the large stone that had been rolled against the entrance of Jesus’ tomb. They asked each other anxiously, ‘Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb?’ It was an understandable concern. Yet, what the women worried about on the way was taken care of. When they arrived at the tomb, the stone had been rolled back. As we engage in our own works of mercy, as we try to respond to the risen Lord’s call to love one another as he has loved us, we too may be aware of some obstacle in our lives. We can find ourselves asking a version of the question, ‘Who will roll away the stone for me?’ The stone may not be out there ahead of us as it was for the women but may be somewhere within us. We sense that we are not as free to give ourselves in love to others as we would like. The hurts and disappointments of life may have left their mark on us and hold us back from living in the loving way the Lord wants us live, and deep down we want to live. Yet, as it was for the women, it is often in those moments when we are most aware of the obstacles within us, that the Lord can touch our lives most powerfully. As Saint Paul struggled with what he called a ‘thorn in the flesh’, he heard the risen Lord say to him, ‘My power is made perfect in weakness’. The Lord can and will roll back the stone if we look towards him with hopeful, expectant, faith. We might then find ourselves making that great Easter statement of Saint Paul, ‘I can do all things in him who gives me strength’. When the women got to the tomb the young man in the white robe said to them, ‘He has risen, he is not here… He is going before you to Galilee’. The risen Lord is always going before us, no matter where we find ourselves on our life journey. He stands before us, inviting us to keep.

And/Or

(ii) Easter Sunday Vigil Mass

Most of the time, our lives follow a certain routine. We more or less know what to expect each day. The details may change but the pattern generally remains much the same. Every so often, however, something comes along that is completely unexpected. Our day takes a surprising turn. Sometimes the nature of the surprise can be unpleasant. At other times the surprise can be delightful. In the words of the title of a book written by C.S. Lewis, we can find ourselves ‘surprised by joy’.

The title of that book is a good description of the experience of Jesus’ disciples on the first Easter morning. The gospel narratives suggest that the discovery of Jesus’ empty tomb came as a complete surprise to the women who were the first to the empty tomb. The empty tomb of Jesus just was not part of the expected script. The empty tomb spoke volumes although its full meaning was not immediately understood by the women. The real meaning of the empty tomb was that, in the words of today’s gospel reading, the crucified one ‘has risen, he is not here’. The emptiness of the tomb proclaimed that Jesus had passed over into a fullness of new life. The realm of death had been emptied of its power. The empty tomb announced that love, not hatred and prejudice, had won the day, the love of Jesus for God his Father and for all of us. The women who came to the tomb discovered that Jesus was not dead; he had not left them but was living among them in a way that transcended all their hopes and expectations. Whereas the passion and death of Jesus is very much about the work of men, in the gospel stories of the finding of the empty tomb it is the women who are to the fore. It is the women who are entrusted with the good news that Jesus has risen. As in so many other contexts, it is the women who emerge as the protectors and guardians of unexpected new life.

The resurrection of Jesus defies explanation. It does not lend itself easily to rational analysis. The gospel stories tell us that when the women went to the other disciples to proclaim the good news that the tomb was empty and that Jesus had been raised from the dead, the other disciples did not believe the women’s story. They had to go to the tomb for themselves. They could not bring themselves to believe such staggering news. We often say of something that ‘it is too good to be true’. That seems to have been the view of the disciples on that first Easter morning. Sometimes we can be ready to believe anything but good news. Tonight we are all being asked to renew our faith in the good news that the one who was crucified in weakness has risen in power. His bones are not to be found in any tomb in Jerusalem.

Where then is he to be found? He is to be found among us all; he lives in a special way within the believing community, which is his body. What Paul said to the church in Corinth, he would say to all of us gathered in this church tonight, ‘Now you are the body of Christ, and individually members of it’. Within the believing community, the risen Lord is present to us in a privileged way in and through the Eucharist. In that same first letter to the Corinthians, Paul asks, ‘the cup of blessing that we bless, is it not a communion in the blood of Christ? The bread that we bread, is it not a communion in the body of Christ?’ Like the first disciples in the days after Jesus’ resurrection, we continue to recognize the Lord in the breaking of bread. The forthcoming Eucharistic Congress is a celebration of this special presence of the risen Lord within the church, and through the church to the whole world. Without the resurrection there would have been no church and no Eucharist; there would have been no written gospels. As Paul says in that same first letter to the Corinthians, ‘if Christ has not been raised, then our proclamation has been in vain and your faith has been in faith’.

We don’t just celebrate Easter on Easter Sunday. We celebrate Easter every day, because every day the Lord is risen. Every day the risen Lord works among us and within us, working to raise us up from falsehood to truth, from despondency to hope, from hatred to love, from death to new life. In whatever darkness we may find ourselves, we always dwell in the light of Easter. When the women came to the empty tomb, the message they received was, the risen Lord ‘is going before you to Galilee’. The same risen Lord goes before his disciples in every age, raising us from our own tombs, whether the tombs we have built for ourselves or the tombs others have built for us. Because the risen Lord always goes before us, because, in the language of Saint Patrick’s breastplate, he is with us, within us, behind us, before me, beside us, Easter is an everyday feast and we are always an Easter people. Even as we struggle with our own Good Fridays, the light and power of the risen Lord continues to envelope us, which is why we can all make our own those words of Paul, ‘I can do all things in him who gives me strength’.

And/Or

(iii) Easter Vigil

It is easy to become disheartened when we look around at our world today. We sense that much of the world has become less safe. Those who deal in death can appear to be gaining the upper hand. We can get discouraged by the violence, the hatred, the greed and self-serving that seems all around us. We can easily feel helpless before it all.

Today’s feast speaks a word of hope into that situation. The same forces of evil and death, of which we are so aware today, put Jesus on the cross. In raising his Son from death, God was making a powerful statemen that evil and death need not have the last word. At least on this one occasion the powers of evil and death did not have their way. God’s way prevailed and God had the last word, as he brought his Son through the darkness of death into the light of a new life. God’s last word was a word of love. God’s love for his Son raised him from the dead; God’s love for humanity led God to give his Son back to us, even though he had been crucified by us. In raising his Son from the dead, God sent his Son back into the world that had rejected him. God’s persistent and faithful love ensured that the powers of death and darkness would not prevail.

The persistent and faithful love of God that conquered the dark forces of evil and death on that first Easter morning is as real today as it was then. God continues to face down the forces of death and destruction. Jesus, who was raised from the dead as a sign of the power of God’s love, is as alive today as he was on that first Easter morning. The loving power that brought new life out of death in Jerusalem two thousand years ago remains at work in our world today. When we celebrate Easter, as we do every year, we are not simply remembering a victory that belongs to the past, as some people might remember the victory of King William over King James at the battle of the Boyne. We are celebrating a victory that is ongoing. We are celebrating a king, whose loving and life-giving power at work among us is constantly bringing new life out of death, continually transforming our tombs into places of hope. Tonight’s feast invites us not just to look back to some wonderful victory in the past, but to look all around us for the signs of that victory in our own lives and in our world today. Tonight we announce, not just, ‘Christ has been raised’, but, ‘Christ is risen’.

Because Easter is a present reality and not just a past event, the Lord calls us to become Easter people. Like the women who came to the tomb on that first Easter morning, we are constantly being sent forth as witnesses to the victory of Easter. As Easter people, our whole approach to life should witness to the Easter truth that love is stronger than hatred, and life is stronger than death. As Easter people, we approach every situation, no matter how threatening or painful it might be, with hope in our hearts, because we know in faith that God who worked powerfully in the darkness of Golgotha continues to work in the same life-giving way in all our dark places today. As Easter people we keep on working to ensure that the forces of death and destruction do not have the last word, because we know that this is God’s work today, as much as it was two thousand years ago, and we want to align ourselves with that work. We want to give God the opportunity to do his life-giving work, his Easter work, in and through us. As Easter people, we show the same faithfulness to the broken as God showed to his broken Son. We are alert to the stone rejected by the builders, recognizing that it can become a cornerstone. As Easter people, we try not to allow despondency and negativity to take possession of us. When we sense that happening, we invite the risen Lord to join us on the path of life, as he joined the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and we ask him to pour his Spirit afresh into our hearts and to fan into a living flame once more the gift of Easter hope.

As Easter people we do not get too troubled when our plans fail to work out as we had expected, because we know that God’s plan for our lives is always more wonderful than our own plans. When the women came to the tomb on that first Easter morning they planned to anoint the body of Jesus. They knew how to anoint a dead body; they had probably done it many times before. What they discovered on that Easter morning rendered their spices and their plans redundant. God took them by surprise. They were now into unknown territory. The gospel reading says, ‘they did not know what to think’. The familiar, the expected, was shattered, and this was both disconcerting and exciting. We too can discover that our plans are really too small to contain the work that God is doing in our lives. As Paul says to the Corinthians: ‘no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him’. Easter teaches us to hold our plans lightly, so that we remain open to the surprising new work that the God of life is always doing in our midst.

And/Or

(iv) Easter Vigil

The great spiritual writer C.S. Lewis wrote many wonderful books. One of them is entitled, ‘Surprised by Joy’. The word ‘Joy’ in the title refers to a woman that he met and subsequently married, and whose first name was ‘Joy’. He met her rather late in his life at a time when marriage was not on his horizon. He hadn’t really planned to marry, but, to his great surprise he met ‘Joy’ and married her.

In some ways, the title of Lewis’ book ‘Surprised by Joy’ is a fitting description of what happened on that Sunday morning after Jesus had been crucified. The women went to the tomb bringing spices with which to anoint the body of Jesus. Joseph of Arimathea had buried Jesus hurriedly in his own new tomb. The women wanted to complete Joseph’s hurried burial rite. When they went to the tomb early that Sunday morning, they had death on their mind. They expected to find a corpse. Their only concern was who would roll away the stone from the mouth of the tomb. To their astonishment, when they reached the tomb, the stone had already been rolled back, and, instead of encountering a corpse, they encountered a young man who announced to them that Jesus of Nazareth who had been crucified was risen from the dead. The verse following where tonight’s gospel reading ends states that the women ‘went out and fled from the tomb, for terror and amazement had seized them; and they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid’. The shock of Jesus’ resurrection left the woman completely disorientated. They were rendered speechless. Easter took everybody by surprise. It completely upended the expectations of the disciples, most of whom had already left the Jerusalem area and gone back to what they had been doing before Jesus called them. If Easter was a surprise, it was a joyful surprise. Jesus’ disciples were surprised by joy. Hopefully, that joy of Easter will touch all of our lives this night.

According to all the gospel writers, it is women who are to the fore on that first Easter morning. For the last week or so, we have been reflecting on the story of the passion and death of Jesus in the gospels, where it is mostly men who are to the fore, and the men, with one or two exceptions, don’t come out very well. It is the male Jewish Sanhedrin who hand Jesus over to Pilate who in turn hands Jesus over to his soldiers for crucifixion. According to Mark’s gospel, all of Jesus’ male disciples deserted him at the moment of his arrest, Judas betrayed him and Peter denied him three times. Mark refers to some women looking on from a distance as Jesus hung on the cross; they don’t appear to have fled. Then early on that Sunday morning, after the Jewish Sabbath, three remarkable women come to the fore, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, and Salome. They wanted to honour the body of Jesus. There was a protective quality to their presence on that first Easter Sunday. It is women who, not only give birth to life, but who, so often, are the protectors of life. Their faithful, protective presence on that Easter morning was rewarded. It was these women who were the first to hear the wonderful news that Jesus who had been crucified had been raised to new life by God. It was these women who were the first to be commissioned to proclaim the Easter gospel to the other disciples.

The angel in the tomb said to them, ‘you must go and tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going ahead to you to Galilee; it is there you will see him, just as he told you”’. The women are being called to tell the disciples that they are to to back to where it all began, back to Galilee where Jesus first met them and called them to follow him. Galilee, in a sense, was the springtime of the disciples’ relationship with Jesus. It was where they left everything to follow Jesus. Now they are being called back to Galilee to a second springtime, after the winter of failure, disloyalty and death. There the Lord will renew his call to his disciples and they will renew their response, and this time, in the light of the resurrection, they would remain faithful to the end. Easter was a moment of new beginning, not only for Jesus, but for his followers.

Easter is a moment of new beginning for all of us. The risen Lord keeps calling us back to the beginning of our relationship with him. When was our beginning? It was the moment of our baptism. That is why we renew our baptismal promises at Easter. Baptism was the beginning of our resurrection life. We were baptised into the Lord’s risen life. We don’t always allow the Lord to live out his risen life in and through us, and, so we too need to keep going back to the beginning. Just as the risen Lord went before his disciples to Galilee, so he is always going before us, calling us back to our beginnings. Tonight, we remind ourselves that we are an Easter people, whose song is ‘Alleluia’. As an Easter people, we commit again to following in the footsteps of the risen Lord who is always going ahead of us and calling us in his love.

And/Or

(v) Easter Vigil

There are only two nights in the church’s liturgical year when we gather this late to worship, and they are Christmas Eve night and this night of the Easter Vigil. Of the two, the Easter Vigil is certainly the more important, the more solemn. The lighting of the Easter fire outside the church, the lighting of the Easter candle from the Easter fire, the procession of the Easter candle into the darkened church, the spreading of the flame of the Easter candle to all the other candles that people are holding, the singing of the Easter Exultet – we do all of that because Jesus who was crucified was raised from the dead by God and remains alive among us as the risen Lord. Yesterday, Good Friday, we venerated the wood of the cross, on which hung the Saviour of the world. Tonight, we worship the risen Lord; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord to the glory of God the Father, in the words of Saint Paul’s letter to the Philippians.

The journey from the cross, from Good Friday, to the empty tomb, to Easter Sunday, was chronologically very short; the time interval was less than two full days. Yet, at a deeper level, the journey was immense. In that short interval of time, everything had changed. The political and religious power that put Jesus to death had been overpowered by the power of God who brought Jesus from death to life – and God’s power did not simply restore Jesus to the life he had before he was crucified; it raised him to a new and more wonderful life. Jesus was not resuscitated; he was transformed; he was glorified. Everything changed for Jesus in that short interval of time, and everything changed for us as well. At Easter we do not only celebrate what God has done for Jesus; we celebrate what God has done for all of us, because in raising his Son from the dead to a new and more vibrant life, God has lifted us all, God has raised us all up. If Jesus had not been raised, everything would have ended at Calvary. There would have been no community of believers, no church, no preaching of the gospel, no gospel to preach. In raising his Son from the dead, God authenticated, vindicated, everything Jesus said and did. It is because of Jesus’ resurrection that his life his death have come to mean so much to us.

God was reaching out to us in the life of his Son; God continued to reach out towards us in the death of his Son; God reaches out to us even more powerfully in the resurrection of his Son. God gave us the gift of his Son; when that gift was rejected, when his Son was crucified, God gave us the gift of his Son anew by raising him from the dead. In that sense, the resurrection proclaims God’s faithfulness to all of us. God did not withdraw the gift of his Son when that gift was rejected, but faithfully held out that gift to us all again by raising his Son from the dead. Easter celebrates not only God’s faithfulness to his Son; it celebrates God’s faithfulness to us all. Easter proclaims a divine faithfulness, a faithfulness that is stronger than sin and death. God’s faithfulness revealed in the resurrection of Jesus gives us hope in the face of sin and death; it assures us that sin and death will not have the last word. Easter reveals a God who was able to bring good out of human sin, human failure - the failure of Jesus’ disciples to stand by him, the failure of the religious leaders to respond to God at work in Jesus, the failure of the political authorities to recognize the innocence of Jesus. God’s love is stronger than our sin, our many failures. Easter also reveals a God who can bring new life out of death, whether it is our own personal death or the death of our loved ones, whether it is the various little deaths that we negotiate on our journey through life, the many losses and letting goes that are an inevitable part of our lives. Because of Easter, we can be hopeful in the face of both sin and death. Easter assures us that nothing, not even sin and death, can separate us from the faithful love of God made visible in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We have just read Mark’s account of the finding of the empty tomb. That note of faithfulness sounds very strongly there. Two days earlier, according to Mark, all Jesus’ disciples deserted him, and Peter had denied him three times. Yet, the word of the young man from the empty tomb to the women was, ‘Go and tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going before you to Galilee; it is there you will see him, just as he told you”’. The risen Lord would meet his disciples in the same place where he had first met them and called them, and where they first responded to him. There, he would renew his call and they could renew their response. Easter proclaims a faithful Lord who goes ahead of us, in times of failure and death, and who is constantly offering us opportunities to make a new beginning. Easter was a new beginning for Jesus; it is an invitation to all of us to make a new beginning on our journey of faith.

Fr. Martin Hogan.

[elwenyere]

XVI.

So what shall we do for the dead, to whose conch-bordered tumuli our lifelong attraction is drawn as to a magnetic empire, whose cities lie ordered with streets and rational avenues, exact as the grid of our vibrating metropolis? In our arrogance, we imagine that they, too, share the immense, inaudible pulse of the clock-shaped earth, slower than ours, maybe, but within our dimension, our simple mathematical formulae. Any peace so indifferent, where all our differences fuse, in an insult to imagine: what use is any labor we accept? They must find our prayers so boring, for one prays that they will keep missing us when they have no urge to be ever-remembered, they cannot see what we hoard— photograph, letter, keepsake, muttered or knitted homily— as we change flags and houses. We still wish them to serve us, expecting from death what we expect of our prayers— that their hearts lift like ours with the surge of the surf and the cupolas of the sunset, that the kingfisher startles their darkness sometimes. But each one prefers the silence that was his birthright, and the shore where the others wait neither to end nor begin.

-- Derek Walcott

[plungermusic]

We’re talking ‘bout Quirk, Strangeness & Charm …

OK, it’s not Hawkwind, but when an album is said to have “two recurring themes: the unity of matter and the breaking down of barriers” a quantum physics gag is surely excusable?

Ruth Theodore isn’t shy of crashing through genre boundaries as proved on her last album Cactacus, and her upcoming release I Am I Am is no more hidebound by the restrictions of stylistic pigeonholes.

It’s not a surprise then that on opener Barbed Wire Fence Ruth’s playful quirky vocal (think a Brighton Big Yellow Taxi) rails wryly at boundaries and borders of all kinds, propelled by a loose-limbed acoustic guitar, upright bass and cocktail drum Greenham-campfire-by-way-of-Montego-Bay bounce. Bright and breezy like a day by the river, punctuated by tricksy touches in the timings bringing you up short like the eponymous barrier.

The upbeat mood continues in Full Metal Jacket, a glam-tinged deconstructed piano boogie driven by a striding left hand bassline and witty right hand ornamentation, topped with Andrews Sistersesque tight three-part harmony vocals adding vivacious venom to this relationship revenge tale with a twist; and People People, a stone-cold cert for a crowd pleasing set-closer or a single, with folky strumming, rattling rapid-fire Greenwich Village coffee shop lyrics, swooping vocal acrobatics, and a solidarity-soaked singalong chorus.

There’s more opportunity for crowd participation in Captured, albeit at a more measured pace: a slow tribal drumbeat (as of a ritual procession) is punctuated by heartbeat swells of strings and piano in a homily to the Insta generation on living in the moment and keeping it real, Ruth’s lithe vox descending from falsetto passion to breathy near-spoken and back again, with an airy, easy-going whole-band choir mantra chorus.

Subtler colours come in a trio of more introspective songs: Brighton Stones’ wave SFX, twinkling piano arpeggios, folky acoustic, and ethereal harmony humming make for an ostensibly mellow hypnotic beachside hymn, although the ticking-clock percussion and aching vox hint at a darker theme; opening almost as a chamber piano trio, Watercolour opens out with the aid of minimal drums and rich double bass into a Hammill-meets-Piaf anguished keening soul-baring drama; and the melodrama reaches cinematic peaks in the finale of Here Comes Your Song, an epic sprawling tale of defiant positivity in the face of hardship (and the power of music) that restlessly shifts mood and timings before closing in the aforementioned, almost Springsteen-like, climax.

Ruth waltzes off into the sunset with the closing pair of similarly-timed, if distinctive, tracks:  the deceptively simple off-kilter waltzing Thomson wraps you in snuggly marimba, bass and lyrical cello lines before repeated urgent waves of passion build and release until a belting crescendo, while Hold On Me is an out-and-out, 24-carat, 1970s radio 2 smoochy soul classic, well executed and without a hint of pastiche (but plenty of cracking piano, organ… and trombone!)

Rich production, stylish arrangements and a jeweller’s eye for intricate details (like spangles of Fender Rhodes and dashes of trumpet here, shimmering pedal steel-like strings there, a surprise (and surprisingly effective) underlying combination of synths, modern beats and strings, or washes of wistful village brass band-style horns) add depth, interest and sometimes plain otherness to the songs, making a complete cosmos of each… with Ruth’s mercurial vocal being the fundamental particle binding them all together with quirk, a bit of strangeness and bags of charm.

I Am I Am is released on Righteous Babe Records on May 3rd. Available to pre-order from Ruth's Bandcamp here: https://ruththeodore.bandcamp.com/album/i-am-i-am-4

[epistolizer]

Hit & Run Commentary #144

Washington DC Mayor Muirel Bowser is feigning concern over the violence that could potentially erupt in connection to a rally scheduled to support President Trump while Congress convenes to render a decision regarding the 2020 election. As such, the Mayor is requesting residents stay at home and as a precaution she is calling up the National Guard. If those are her concerns, why didn’t she implement the same decision to protect property against the Antifa and Black Lives Matter upheavals?

Operation Warp Speed, a reference to traveling faster than light from science fiction franchises such as Star Trek, has ground to a screeching halt. At projected rates, it could take until 2031 before the number technocrats deem necessary to achieve herd immunity could be inoculated and thus the human livestock allowed the possibility of once again living free. As a solution, it is being proposed that perhaps subjects could possibly get by with half or even a fourth of a dose. But if that is enough, doesn’t that mean people were being over drugged in the first place?

Juan Williams enunciated criticism of Trump’s tepid response to the shocking occupation of the Capitol building. Perhaps someone should show Williams a tape from 24 hours prior where he hypothesized that the threatening protest outside of a Republican legislator’s home was no big deal.

Interesting Biden had to address the issue of the Capitol being occupied by protesters within hours of the event but said nary a word about Antifa and Black Lives Matter pillaging for months on end.

Biden is concerned about the nation’s children viewing the hooliganism on display at the occupation of the U.S. Capitol. Apparently he had little problem with what the impressionable were soaking in as they watched the non-stop Antifa and Black Lives Matter violence that went on from about May through November and still thereafter with much of it downplayed with next to no condemnation even from many a pulpit claiming to be Evangelical in orientation.

Now was not the time for such vigorous resistance. Should have waited until the establishment of mandatory vaccination centers and proposed Coronavirus death camps.

The occupation of the Capitol was inexcusable. That said, still less property damage than the typical Antifa or Black Lives Matter incursion.

So will numerous pulpits this coming Sunday cry out in unison with homilies counseling how we ought to withhold criticism from the insurgents storming the Capitol and beseeching the Almighty for any slight chance they might have at any time in the past offended a Trump voter?

A number of legislators dropped their objection to the presidential vote in light of the Capitol Hill insurgency. So manipulated terrorism is indeed conductive to achieve political change.

In enacting her curfew edict, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser declared the actions of the insurgents attempting to occupy the Capitol as shameful and unpatriotic. But did she ever as unequivocally condemn the removal of statues an affront to her Afrosupremacist ideology that were no less public property than the Capitol?

Raphael Warnock is from a family of eleven children that grew up in public housing. Apparently most likely as a result of his parents’ lack of self control.

A sign plastered in a number of yards throughout a pervasively leftist suburb reads “Science Is Real”. Yes it is. That is why, just because the clock strikes 10 PM, a pathogen does not become instantaneously more deadly. It is because science is real that a mask with perforations larger than a microbe causing considerable consternation does not really serve as much of a barrier no matter how much citizen snitches and bureaucracies capable of destroying individual lives without flinching might insist otherwise.

Biden insisted that, if Black Lives Matter had been responsible for the Capitol Kerfuffle, the response would have been much more severe. Given that Nancy Pelosi is the Speaker of the House, doesn’t that speak to her own racism and that of the Democrats?

If Trump is morally responsible and should be removed from office over the Capitol Kerfuffle, shouldn’t the likes of Al Sharpton, Don Lemon, and Chris Cuomo be removed from the airwaves for providing ideological comfort to Antifa and Black Lives Matter?

For decades, media elites have admonished that the producers of morally salacious content are not responsible for the reactions these narratives and images evoke in terms of the behavior manifested in the lives of consumers. After all, each person is ultimately responsible for their own decisions. Then why is Trump being blamed for the Capitol Kerfuffle when at no time did he order anyone to destroy public property, physically assault opponents, or crossover into restricted areas?

Biden responded that he was pleased that the outgoing President would not be attending the Inauguration. For that reason alone Trump ought to have changed his mind and shown up anyway.

Arnold Schwarzenegger let it be made known he is aware of Kristallnacht. Too bad he is not as aware apparently of the Reichstag Fire where the rights of an entire nation were eliminated over the action of an alleged single individual.

It has been suggested that roughnecks apprehended in connection to the Capitol Kerfuffle should be sent to Gitmo. Makes you wonder how long until such dissidents are turned into lampshades, bars of soap, and their gold fillings extracted given the fanatic glee in the eye of the aspiring totalitarians.

The mass communication conglomerates feigning shock at the Capitol Kerfuffle are the same ones producing the drama Snowpiercer that glamorizes violent revolutionary resistance.

Powerful media conglomerates are standing by the principle that violence is never a proper response to perceived oppression. As such, does Disney intend to renounce the fortune accumulated as a result of Star Wars and Marvel Cinematic Universe films?

It seems that a galvanizing consensus holds that, while one possesses freedom of speech, one must be held accountable for the repercussions of one’s rhetoric. Apparently that includes responses one did not intend or call for. Applying that sort of logic, a woman that says something and gets slapped by her brute of a husband bears a degree of responsibility for her own abuse.

So instead of Trump simply leaving the White House and passing into history, his enemies have ironically laid the groundwork for him as the central figure of a new religious movement.

In light of the crackdown on controversial expression on social media, those voicing a concern are admonished that they have no right to complain because these services are ultimately private enterprise. Conversely, it can just as legitimately be said that these businesses have no right to cry the blues if they lose a fortune over abandoning these customers.

Scores upon scores of conservatives are outraged over social media’s removal of President Trump along with numerous examples of their ideological kinsmen nowhere as prominent. But how is this selective respecting of speech different than what has taken place on the allegedly conservative news site FreeRepublic for nearly two decades now? At that webpage, you don’t even get the decency of the non-answer of your post violating some undefined “community standard”. On that particular forum, you just find that you are no longer able to post. You are pretty much left to sleuth on your own which of your posts constipated someone with a crossways turd or an associate you also know offsite can attempt to explain what asinine unwritten rule you were never told about beforehand you might have violated.

Interesting. Congressional Democrats applaud the deployment of the National Guard to protect the Capitol but oppose such to protect the border, businesses besieged by looters, or even other federal assets throughout DC.

Biden is demanding that the nation come together in unity. At this point, all that he should expect is for people to mind their own business and keep their hands off of other people’s stuff.

A reporter gushed that Biden is embracing America with his arms. We best watch out. The next step will no doubt be sniffing our hair.

By Frederick Meekins