Words That Stand on Their Own

Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand signed the Emancipation Proclamation.

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I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave-owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

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And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado!
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California!
But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!




When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

"Reincarnation" by Wallace McRae…

"What does reincarnation mean?"
A cowpoke ast his friend.
His pal replied, "It happens when
Yer life has reached its end.

They comb yer hair, and warsh yer neck,
And clean yer fingernails,
And lay you in a padded box
Away from life's travails."

"The box and you goes in a hole,
That's been dug in the ground.
Reincarnation starts in when
Yore planted 'neath a mound.
Them clods melt down, just like yer box,
And you who is inside.
And then yore just beginnin' on
Yer transformation ride."

"In a while the grass'll grow
Upon yer rendered mound.
Til some day on yer moldered grave
A lonely flower is found.
And say a hoss should wander by
And graze upon this flower
That once wuz you, but now's become
Yer vegetative bower."

"The posey that the hoss done ate
Up, with his other feed,
Makes bone, and fat, and muscle
Essential to the steed.
But some is left that he can't use
And so it passes through.
And finally lays upon the ground.
This thing, that once wuz you"

"Then say, by chance, I wanders by
And sees this on the ground,
And I ponders, and I wonders at,
This object that I found.
I thinks of reincarnation,
Of life, and death, and such,
And come away concludin': Slim
You ain't changed, all that much."

Another Fishing Nut.... :-)

While walking around in the Norristown Farm Park, I came across this memorial stone for Louis T. Damiani, the founder of the Stony Creek Anglers. While I don't know the man, I thought the inscription was memorable :-)

God, grant me that I may live to fish to my dying day
and when it comes to my last task,
I most humbly pray,
that in the Lord's safe handling net
I'm peacefully asleep,
and in his mercy
that I be judged big enough to keep.

The farm park was created from the extensive grounds of the former State of Pennsylvania Mental Health Hospital. It has rolling hills, fields, a creek that babbles through the granite stones, blue birds amongst others, and many old and interesting farm buildings. In all, its a lovely place to walk.

I too will hope I'm "big enough to keep"...