"Vespers" by Louise Glück

In your extended absence, you permit me 
use of earth, anticipating 
some return on investment. I must report 
failure in my assignment, principally 
regarding the tomato plants. 
I think I should not be encouraged to grow 
tomatoes. Or, if I am, you should withhold 
the heavy rains, the cold nights that come 
so often here, while other regions get 
twelve weeks of summer. All this 
belongs to you: on the other hand, 
I planted the seeds, I watched the first shoots 
like wings tearing the soil, and it was my heart 
broken by the blight, the black spot so quickly 
multiplying in the rows. I doubt 
you have a heart, in our understanding of 
that term. You who do not discriminate 
between the dead and the living, who are, in consequence, 
immune to foreshadowing, you may not know 
how much terror we bear, the spotted leaf, 
the red leaves of the maple falling 
even in August, in early darkness: I am responsible 
for these vines.


-- Louise Glück, "Vespers" ["In your extended absence, you permit me"], The Wild Iris, The Ecco Press, 1992.

"Anywhere on this Road" by Lhasa de Sela

-- Lhasa de Sela, "Anywhere on this Road," The Living Road, Audiogram: 2003.

Jeremy Scahill at 2013 Socialism Conference

-- Jeremy Scahill, investigative journalist, author, filmmaker