PAINTED HAWK

  

From blank white silk arise wind and frost– 

a blue hawk, painted in fine detail. 

Its body tenses, spotting a wily hare. 

Its eyes glare like an angry barbarian. 

The bright tether ring tempts your grasp. 

The high perch solicits your call. 

Would the great hawk then attack lesser birds, 

marring the green plain with blood and feathers? 

      –Du Fu

Not yet mown, the lawn 

full now of dandelions 

and grape hyacinth.

When the vet killed him, ending him and his misery, they rolled him away on a rough floor, ears twitching. Good Boy asleep and dreaming. When the vet killed him, ending him and his misery, they rolled him away on a rough floor, ears twitching, as if asleep and dreaming.

 

Marie Tuohy, 95, died of Covid pneumonia on January 24, 2021 at The Maplewood extended care facility in Webster, New York.  

Marie was born on March 5, 1925 to Charles Holmes and Elizabeth Krieger Holmes in Toledo, Ohio.  The family, including her younger brother, Charles H. Holmes, lived for many years in the Lagrange and Bancroft area of Toledo near the Krieger family home as did several of the families of her mother’s siblings.  Charles and Elizabeth moved the family to the Homeville development in the West End as Marie was attending Woodward High School.  Although she was then out of the district, she was able to continue at Woodward until her graduation in 1943.

After graduation, Marie went to work as a clerk on the dock at the Autolite plant in North Toledo.

Marie always loved music and often went out dancing at the Trianon Ballroom and other venues around town, frequently accompanied by one or more of her several cousins.

Marie met Paul Tuohy shortly before he enlisted in the Army Air Corps and they corresponded all through his deployment in the South Pacific.  When he returned from the war, they became a couple and were married in 1947. 

For several years, Marie stayed home with their children, Ronald, born in 1948, and Janet, born in 1952.  After taking some business classes, Marie got a job as a clerk in the local office of the Paul Revere Insurance Company.  Marie eventually rose to the position of office manager. She was very proud  of the multiple commendations received for the efficiency of her office and for new procedures that were implemented company wide.  She was also recognized for exposing the financial malfeasance of two local general managers.  When the Toledo office closed, Marie transferred to the Cincinnati office.   

Along with her formal employment, Marie also did bookkeeping for Paul’s auction business and often clerked for sales.  When Paul became involved with agencies serving disabled people, Marie often accompanied him to various functions and acquired many friends in this community.

She had the gift of a beautiful, and very powerful, soprano voice, which she further developed through some years of training. Wherever she lived, she sang in church choirs and community choruses, often as a soloist. 

In retirement Marie and Paul enjoyed theater and traveling. In 2005, when Marie could no longer care for Paul on her own, they moved to Rochester, New York near their daughter. After Paul’s death, Marie continued to enjoy singing and was active in her senior living community for many years.

Marie was preceded in death by her husband, Paul, and survived by son, Ronald (Beth) Tuohy, daughter, Janet (Mike Ball) Tuohy, grandchildren Jared Higgins, Jamie Higgins, Nathaniel (En-Chieh Chao) Tuohy, and Conor (Alexis) Tuohy, and by four great grandchildren.  

New Translations

HOUSE AT SOUTH HILL


In middle age, I found the Buddha Way.
In old age, I've settled here at South Hill.
Often on a whim I go walking alone:
small portions of nature known just to me.
I can trek up to the source of a stream
and sit down to see when the clouds will rise.
Sometimes I meet this old man in the woods
and we talk and laugh and forget to leave.
    --Wang Wei




WEI CITY SONG


A morning rain settles the light dust.
Willows by the inn green up again.
Have one more cup of wine here with me.
No old friends will be west of Yang Pass.
     --Wang Wei




FARM HOUSES BY WEI RIVER


Setting sun--slanting rays bright on the hills.
Sheep and cattle return to scruffy lanes.
In the field, old folks, leaning on their staffs,
watch for the herdboys by the fruitwood gate.
Pheasants call in rows of ripening wheat.
Silkworms sleep as mulberry leaves grow sparse.
Returning workers, still bearing their hoes,
stream together and linger long to chat.
Beginning to envy their end-of-day ease,
hopelessly then, I hum a song from the Odes.
     --Wang Wei

What is helpful to know here is that Wang Wei was a wealthy, highly educated  man, a painter and government official, as well as a poet.  He would have been steeped in the ancient classics, which included the Book of Odes.  And here he is observing the life of peasants, who presumably would not have been able to read that book.

The Last Stanza of My Every Poem

Such are the thoughts
to which have led
polymath heart
and punkin head.

Always Choose Less Evil

My friends, as the Democratic field narrows down, many of us have been disappointed to see our favorites drop out.  And whoever is the eventual nominee, more of us will be disappointed.  Some will think that the nominee has a repugnant political philosophy and will make a genuinely bad president. A choice between a good candidate and a bad candidate is easy. A choice between two good candidates in a general election may be difficult, but it is a rare and happy luxury.  A choice between two bad candidates is also very difficult, but paralyzingly distasteful. To cast a positive vote for a bad candidate offends moral sensibility. But it does not offend rational morality.  The lesser of two evils is--less evil. To discern which is the lesser evil, and then to choose it, may be the most consequential vote you have ever cast.