Kampai - 2015

 

Never having pre-loaded toasts ready to go except for, "Here's to swimmin' with bow-legged wimmen,"  I made a few of my own. Enjoy.

 

Raise your glass for this kampai

The bottle empties until it's dry

A grape or grain, barley or rye;

A taste of time as life goes by.

A kampai to outkampai all the rest 

The trace of sweetness in your breath;

Close your eyes and wonder when

And the best kampai will begin and end.

 

- by Cagey

Poem: "The Picket Guard"

by Ethyl Lynn Beers

``ALL quiet along the Potomac to-night!"
Except here and there a stray picket
Is shot, as he walks on his beat, to and fro,
By a rifleman hid in the thicket.
'Tis nothing! a private or two now and then
Will not count in the news of a battle;
Not an officer lost, only one of the men
Moaning out, all alone, the death rattle.


All quiet along the Potomac to-night!
Where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming;
And their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon,
And the light of their camp-fires are gleaming.
A tremulous sigh, as a gentle night-wind
Through the forest leaves slowly is creeping;
While the stars up above, with their glittering eyes,
Keep guard o'er the army sleeping.
There's only the sound of the lone sentry's tread
As he tramps from the rock to the fountain,
And thinks of the two on the low trundel bed,
Far away, in the cot on the mountain.


His musket falls slack, his face, dark and grim,
Grows gentle with memories tender,
As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep,
And their mother--"may heaven defend her!"
The moon seems to shine forth as brightly as then--
That night, when the love, yet unspoken,
Leaped up to his lips, and when low-murmured vows
Were pledged to be ever unbroken.


Then drawing his sleeve roughly over his eyes,
He dashes off tears that are welling;
And gathers the gun closer up to his breast
As if to keep down his heart's swelling.
He passes the fountain, the blasted pine-tree,
And his footstep is lagging and weary;
Yet onward he goes, through the broad belt of light,
Towards the shades of the forest so dreary.


Hark! was it the night-wind that rustled the leaves?
Was it the moonlight so wondrously flashing?
It looked like a rifle: "Ha! Mary, good-by!"
And his life-blood is ebbing and plashing.
"All quiet along the Potomac to-night!"
No sound save the rush of the river;
While soft falls the dew on the face of the dead,
And the picket's off duty forever!

Interpreted as song: (LINK)

Cagey's listening to

'Sleep', Cause and Effect, Artificial Construct Part One, 2010
http://www.causeandeffect.com/

Cause and Effect on the album's iconography:
Cause and Effect ‎"@David - The squares represent the elements of a song with the red one being voice and the others being instruments. The four lines represent the 4 songs on the EP and their different lengths."

A song by King Missile, modified by the power of Fark

I thought this lyrical poem was just terrific!  Kind of evokes Shel Silverstein, no?

So then I got this idea
about driving a little debbie truck,
'Cause I figured at the end of the day,
I could take some of
the leftover snackcakes home
And I love snackcake.
So I went to the little debbie company
And they asked me
if I could drive a truck
And I said "yes"
And they said "You're hired!"

So the next day
I got in the truck with all
the snackcakes
And I drove about a block
and I just had to have a snackcake
So I pulled over and opened the truck
And I got a snackcake
And I also took another one for later
And I took one to bring home
And I took one for my friend Farm boy,
And by that time I had
Eaten one of the snackcakes
so I took another one.

Then I figured I might as well
stop at my house
To drop off all the snackcakes
So I take five cakes
to eat on the way
And i drive another block
and a half to my house.
Now it's lunchtime
so I eat ten snackcakes
And a snackcake for dessert.
I should point out by the way
That all of these snackcakes were very delicious.
Anyway I decided
that the only thing to do
Would be to eat all the rest
of the snackcakes
And hide the truck somewhere
And leave town.
And I miss everybody a lot
But I'm not really sorry,
'Cause they were
very delicious snackcakes.

GCAS goes multilingual

Welcome, international readers!

Je veux brancher avec blogs en francais.  Nous parlons francais. Bienvenue.
Tenemos ganas de relacionar con blogs en español.  Se habla español. Bienvenidos.

我々は少しの日本語を話します。 英語のブログの学生たちを歓迎してください！

"Taking the Long Way Home" by The Fixx

Played abroad many nights on my ship, after stumbling back from tucked away haunts.

http://www.sightnsound.org/sounds/Fixx/The%20Fixx%20-%20Long%20Way%20Home%20(Live).mp3

It's not where you are
It's what you think
Satellite beams
Trusting your instincts

Miles down the road
Trees grow in place
Our rooms now down know
Not face to face
Not face to face

A prison of Rhodes
They mess with your head
Enjoy your time
Look for the magic instead
The books in your life
Have now run their course
Find that the peace comes without force
Without force

I feel like taking the long way home tonight
Maybe I'll turn left - I better get right
Keeping my eyes on that distant harbor light
The seas may be wrong
But the stars shine bright

Are you dead as you live?
Please come alive
Show me the pearl buried deep inside

Step off the cart
Come for the ride
It's more fun to seek than it is to hide
...Than it is to hide

I feel like taking the long way home tonight
Maybe I'll turn left
We better get right
Keeping my eyes on that distant harbor light

Ohhhh
The seas may be wrong
But the stars shine bright

There's the warming sight of the harbor lights
Straight through the hard door wrong or right
There're be no more doubt
There'll be no more lies
Keeping my eye
On the harbor lights
Taking the long way

Home
I feel like taking
The long way home tonight

There'll be no more doubt
There'll be no more lies - tonight

Stop where you are
It's what you think
Satellite beams
Trusting your instincts
I feel like taking the long way home - tonight

Taking the long
Taking the long way home...

Transcribed by Cagey

Depeche Mode/Construction Time Again/...and Then

All that we need at the start's
Universal revolution (that's all)
And if we trust in our hearts
We'll find the solutions

To put it all down and start again
From the top to the bottom and then
I'll have faith, or I prefer
To think that things couldn't turn out worse

Took a plane across the world
Got in a car
And when I reached my destination
I hadn't gone far

Let's take the whole of the world
The mountains and the sand
Let all the boys and the girls
Shape it in their hands

To put it all down and start again
From the top to the bottom and then
I'll have faith, or I prefer
To think that things couldn't turn out worse

Link to cover: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGWX-IKAHBQ&feature=related

Article: "At 29, Depeche Mode is now post-post-punk"

Love the catchy headline: "...post-post punk".  Our efforts to lay latticework upon latticework in order to categorize and taxonomize is grand.  Depeche Mode what - is post-punk, so that would make them New Romantic...?  Synth...?   Click HERE to read the article.

Heh.

"She's So Gone" by Cause and Effect

With a bottle of wine
and two friends of mine

We could head to the hills

There's no need for those pills

Under fractal trees and a fractal sky

we are everything

All she needed was,

was a push from us

Now she's learning to fly

She's so gone

but so am I

Both of us been learning to fly

She's so gone

she'll touch the sky

And now I don't know what I'm feeling

Can't remember feeling this high

-

C&E interview here:

http://www.westnet.com/consumable/1997/12.16/intcande.html

Facing the Wind

Facing the Wind, by The Fixx

Just give me something to hold on
A piece of the world
That won't go wrong
Is there somebody there
I can talk to
Somebody sharing the same view

Facing the wind

One avenue that would lead to
A place on this earth
Where we all grew
Longing for travel we stood still
Watching a sky that was once blue

Facing the wind

Each line we throw
Gives us false hope
One ray of light, God I can't cope
Thinking about what we all are
One human race that's gone too far

Facing the wind...

"North South East West" by The Church

(It's neither here nor there) It's neither here nor there
North and south and east and west
(It has to be somewhere) It oughta be somewhere
North and south and east and west
I take my payment, I catch my flight,
And don't wait up for me tonight
(And you might find me there) and you might find me there
North and south and east and west

Original poetry

Untitled


It is but the steadfast man
On boundless feet
Whose assurances I - would like to meet


- by Cagey