Clifton Quotes

You might as well answer the door, my child, the truth is furiously knocking.

may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back

Some people standby you in your darkest hour while others walk away; only a select few march towards you and become even closer friends.

When you re-read a classic you do not see in the book more than you did before. You see more in you than there was before.

the lesson of the falling leaves the leaves believe such letting go is love such love is faith such faith is grace such grace is god i agree with the leaves

When you travel, remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable. It is designed to make its own people comfortable.

If you make a deal with a fool, don't be surprised when they act foolishly.

What they call you is one thing. What you answer to is something else.

they ask me to remember but they want me to remember their memories and I keep on remembering mine

I find I don't learn a lot while I'm talking

don’t write out of what I know; I write out of what I wonder. I think most artists create art in order to explore, not to give the answers. Poetry and art are not about answers to me; they are about questions.

Every pair of eyes facing you has probably experienced something you could not endure.

I am running into a new year and the old years blow back like a wind that I catch in my hair like strong fingers like all my old promises and it will be hard to let go of what I said to myself about myself when I was sixteen and twenty-six and thirty-six but I am running into a new year and I beg what i love and I leave to forgive me.

We cannot create what we can't imagine.

listen, you a wonder. you a city of a woman. you got a geography of your own. listen, somebody need a map to understand you. somebody need directions to move around you. listen, woman, you not a noplace anonymous girl; mister with his hands on you he got his hands on some damn body!

But really, aren't there bits of magic everywhere we look?' Dr. Clifton continues. 'We've just stopped seeing it that way.

won't you celebrate with me what i have shaped into a kind of life? i had no model. born in babylon both nonwhite and woman what did i see to be except myself? i made it up here on this bridge between starshine and clay, my one hand holding tight my other hand; come celebrate with me that everyday something has tried to kill me and has failed.

Come celebrate with me that every day something has tried to kill me and has failed.

A bottle of wine begs to be shared; I have never met a miserly wine lover

I come to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable.

You can often judge the character of a person by the way he treats his fellow men.

There are defining moments in one's life when you learn about yourself, and you deposit that knowledge in the experience account, so you can draw on it at some later date.

People wish to be poets more than they wish to write poetry, and that's a mistake. One should wish to celebrate more than one wishes to be celebrated.

I do not feel inhibited or bound by what I am. That does not mean that I have never had bad scenes relating to being Black and/or a woman, it means that other people’s craziness has not managed to make me crazy.

The sign of a great man is how you handle defeat. - Old Jack

I knew what she was, and it made no difference at all. She was hard, as ruthless as she was beautiful, as brittle as bone china.

The worst moment of any campaign is waiting for the sun to rise on the morning of the battle

You are the one I am lit for. Come with your rod that twists and is a serpent. I am the bush. I am burning I am not consumed.

A work of art is worth what someone will pay for it.

they will empty your eyes of everything you love

Sometimes an abundance of sympathy can be more overwhelming than solitude

Time spent on preparation is seldom wasted.

You see, the problem with being a bully is that on the flipside of that particular coin, you’ll find the imprint of a coward.

Dr. Seuss provided "ingenious and uniquely witty solutions to the standing problem of the juvenile fantasy writer: how to find, not another Alice, but another rabbit hole.

No time like the present

the lost women I need to know their names those women I would have walked with, jauntily the way men go in groups swinging their arms, and the ones those sweating women whom I would have joined After a hard game to chew the fat what would we have called each other laughing joking into our beer? where are my gangs, my teams, my mislaid sisters? all the women who could have known me, where in the world are their names?

Good night, good night, parting is such sweet sorrow,' she whispered 'That I shall say good night till it be morrow,' Harry replied.

Reading to small children is a specialty.

only a fool blames the messenger.

so many languages have fallen off the edge of the world

If someone gives you permission, they can take it away. I give myself permission.

I am a black woman poet and I sound like one.

To take wine into our mouths is to savor a droplet of the river of human history

Cheese - milk's leap toward immortality.

His name was Clifton and he was black and they shot him. Isn’t that enough to tell? Isn’t it all you need to know?

blessing the boats (at saint mary’s) may the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back may you open your eyes to water water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that

Books act like a developing fluid on film. That is, they bring into consciousness what you didn’t know you knew.

Wishes For Sons i wish them cramps. i wish them a strange town and the last tampon. I wish them no 7-11. i wish them one week early and wearing a white skirt. i wish them one week late. later i wish them hot flashes and clots like you wouldn't believe. let the flashes come when they meet someone special. let the clots come when they want to. let them think they have accepted arrogance in the universe, then bring them to gynecologists not unlike themselves.

After that month in Cairo she was muted, read constantly, kept more to herself, as if something had occurred or she realized suddenly that wondrous thing about the human being, it can change. She did not have to remain a socialite who had married an adventurer. She was discovering herself. It was painful to watch, because Clifton could not see it, her self-education.

The literature of America should reflect the children of America.

Dream and imagine what you want and you will bring it into reality.

You’re so bossy.” “Why is a woman always described as bossy, when if a man did the same thing he’d be thought of as decisive, commanding and displaying qualities of leadership?

who among us can imagine ourselves unimagined? who among us can speak with so fragile tongue and remain proud?

Sometimes it’s an advantage to be disadvantaged,

An unguarded comment often proves every bit as valuable as a response to a direct question.

Back in the 1930s, Carl Jung, the eminent thinker and psychologist, put it this way: Criticism has 'the power to do good when there is something that must be destroyed, dissolved or reduced, but [it is] capable only of harm when there is something to be built.

dreaming your x-ray vision could see the beauty in me.

At an early age, you started hearing it: It's a virtue to be "well-rounded."... They might as well have said : Become as dull as you possibly can be.

Clifton, in life you get what you deserve, no more and certainly no less.

Poems come out of wonder, not out of knowing. Lucille Clifton

The director mentions the whispers about Clifton's sexual orientation, a supposed gig on a porn site years ago, a rumor about a very famous actor and a tryst in Santa Barbara and Clifton's denial in a Rolling Stone cover story about the very famous actor's new movie which Clifton had a small part in: 'We're so into girls it's ridiculous.

To read in bed is to draw around us invisible, noiseless curtains. Then at last we are in a room of our own and are ready to burrow back, back to that private life of the imagination we all led as a child and to whose secret satisfactions so many of us have mislaid the key.

her dangling braids the color of rain.

a tongue blistered with smiling

The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward in the night.

Poetry is a matter of life, not just a matter of language.

If you've struck gold, why go in search of brass?

If your senses are numbed with delusion and denial, you will stop looking for these true strengths and wind up living a second-rate version of someone's life rather than a worldclass version of your own

oh antic God return to me my mother in her thirties leaned across the front porch the huge pillow of her breasts pressing against the rail summoning me in for bed. I am almost the dead woman’s age times two. I can barely recall her song the scent of her hands though her wild hair scratches my dreams at night. return to me, oh Lord of then and now, my mother’s calling, her young voice humming my name.

Rosalind exploded with a shriek worthy of a tea-kettle.

i am rejuvenated bones rising from the dear floor where they found you

When we studied them, excellent performers were rarely well rounded. On the contrary, they were sharp.

[Wine is] poetry in a bottle.

In the end, it all comes down to how you cope with the unforeseen.

A cheese may disappoint. It may be dull, it may be naive, it may be oversophisticated. Yet it remains cheese, milk's leap toward immortality.

For the Indians, cricket is not a game, it’s a religion.

Socrates called himself a midwife of ideas. A great book is often such a midwife, delivering to full existence what has been coiled like an embryo in the dark, silent depths of the brain.

In any conversation, it's often something that seems quite insignificant at the time that gives you the piece of information you're looking for.

they are shrouding words so that families cannot find them.

The English are the biggest snobs on earth Harry.

if you’ve got a problem, sleep on it before you make a decision you might later regret. Things always look rosier in the morning.

The moon is queen of everything. She rules the oceans, rivers, rain. When I am asked whose tears these are; I always blame the moon.

Some clever children don’t discover how bright they are until after they’ve left school,’ continued Mr Holcombe, ‘and then spend the rest of their lives regretting the wasted years.

She just stood there and looked at the empty highway, and you could almost tell how bored she was by the way she stood.

was my first landscape, red brown as the clay of her georgia.

Carmen Bristoliense.

birth is life’s first lottery ticket.

You will see by this that no man should be judged by another here in this life, for the good or evil he has done. Deeds may be properly judged, whether they are good or bad, but not men.

But if you find yourself thinking in the future, if you find yourself actually anticipating the activity-'When can I do this again?'-it is a pretty good sign that you are enjoying it and that one of your talents is in play.

Self-confidence seemed to me more mimicry than anything else and I suggested visiting Clifton Zoo to watch the leaders in a group of baboons, and learn from them: make your gestures slow and deliberate; cultivate a deeper voice; appear casual at all times; eschew all rapid movements. That was all you had to do to look confident.

Seven pounds, nine shillings and sixpence turned out to be the value they’d put on Arthur’s life. I sat alone at the kitchen table, and I think that was the moment I knew I’d never see my husband again.

The 'big five' factors of personality are neuroticism (which reflects emotional stability), extroversion (seeking the company of others), openness (interest in new experiences, ideas, and so forth), agreeableness (likability, harmoniousness), and conscientiousness (rule abidance, discipline, integrity).

King Cygnus dozed in his chair, and a dark shadow curled up in the window seat. That dark shadow happened to have a name, which happened to be Darcy; but nobody really notices dark shadows, even named ones. They have a habit of lurking about. People learn to ignore them after a while.

stop for a drink, which made him feel

walked erect out of my sleep

and at night my dreams are full of the cursing of me fucking god fucking me.

One measure of friendship consists not in the number of things friends can discuss, but in the number of things they need no longer mention.

I find I don’t learn a lot while I’m talking,

Eton has been known to bend the rules when it comes to members of the aristocracy

The only possible failure would be never managing to find the right role or the right partners to help you realize that strength.

if you make a deal with a fool, don’t be surprised when they act foolishly.

Don't be afraid of poetry.

Isaiah looked in the mirror and saw everlasting broken pieces, but maybe my broken pieces would fit with his. Together, maybe we’d make a whole.

Day by day, I was falling in love with the lie.

come celebrate with me that everyday something has tried to kill me and has failed.

Maybe I should have wanted less. Maybe I should have ignored the bowl in me burning to be filled. Maybe I should have wanted less.

In normal circumstances, being presented with a tied vote, I would not hesitate to support the Law Lords in their earlier judgment,

when there was a third rap.

sending

these hips are big hips. they need space to move around in. they don't fit into little petty places.

you should take your consciences with you, and leave your politics in the chamber.’ Lord

Sometimes it’s an advantage to be disadvantaged,’ said Harry.

America made us heroines not wives. We hid our ladyness to save our lives

The best part of having your dreams come true is you get to make new ones!

said without looking up. ‘That’s no reason not to say goodbye

Believe in your characters with all your heart, & they will believe in you. Only then will they trust you enough to reveal themselves. -RCSJR

Experience teaches you that the man who looks you straight in the eye, particularly if he adds a firm handshake, is hiding something.

Some people stand by you in your darkest hour, while others walk away; only a select few march toward you and become even closer friends.

coffin nails. Once Stan had left for

sometimes an abundance of sympathy can be more overwhelming than solitude. Giles

1. Each person's talents are enduring and unique. 2. Each person's greatest room for growth is in the areas of his or her greatest strength.

Knowledge consists of the facts and lessons learned. Skills are the steps of an activity. These three-talents, knowledge, and skills-combine to create your strengths.

Ideas smack of rebellion and rebellions must be put

the English and the Americans were divided by a common language.

Like a blind man, unaware of race or religion, he quickly discovered that prejudice was often taught at the breakfast table.

Last night, he’d let down his guard. Last night, I’d fallen asleep in his arms. And last night, I’d stopped pretending I wasn’t in love with my husband.

If my heart left her breathless, then hers gave me a reason to breathe.

It was unbearable to be around her, knowing she’d eventually leave. It was exhausting to keep her at arm’s length when all I wanted to do was hold her close.

Haven’t seen him since he clocked off last

Knowles,” said Emma,

there are defining moments in one’s life when you learn a lot about yourself, and you deposit that knowledge in the experience account, so you can draw on it at some later date.

I rise up above myself / like a fish flying...

Wellington wrote in his memoirs,’ said Old Jack, ‘that the worst moment of any campaign is waiting for the sun to rise on the morning of battle.

hockey field at Red Maids’ School. By the time Emma had explained why she crossed the Atlantic despite the risks involved, they were both staring at her as if she’d just landed from

bad, or you might prefer a whisky.’ ‘A half of bitter will be just fine,’ said Giles, taking a seat at the small, beer-stained table. While Karin’s father was ordering the drinks, Giles

From this point of view, to avoid your strengths and to focus on your weaknesses isn't a sign of diligent humility. It is almost irresponsible. By contrast the most responsible, the most challenging, and, in the sense of being true to yourself, the most honorable thing to do is face up to the strength potential inherent in your talents and then find ways to realize it.

He was a cop. A good citizen. But this cop had an itching finger and an eager ear for a word that rhymed with ‘trigger,’ and when Clifton fell he had found it. The Police Special spoke its lines and the rhyme was completed. Just look around you. Look at what he made, look inside you and feel his awful power. It was perfectly natural. The blood ran like blood in a comic-book killing, on a comic-book street in a comic-book town on a comic-book day in a comic-book world.

In Martin Seligman's words, 'Psychology is half-baked, literally half-baked. We have baked the part about mental illness. We have baked the part about repair and damage. But the other side is unbaked. The side of strengths, the side of what we are good at, the side…of what makes life worth living.

shapeshifter poems by Lucille Clifton 1 the legend is whispered in the women's tent how the moon when she rises full follows some men into themselves and changes them there the season is short but dreadful shapeshifters they wear strange hands they walk through the houses at night their daughters do not know them 2 who is there to protect her from the hands of the father not the windows which see and say nothing not the moon that awful eye not the woman she will become with her scarred tongue who who who the owl laments into the evening who will protect her this prettylittlegirl 3 if the little girl lies still enough shut enough hard enough shapeshifter may not walk tonight the full moon may not find him here the hair on him bristling rising up 4 the poem at the end of the world is the poem the little girl breathes into her pillow the one she cannot tell the one there is no one to hear this poem is a political poem is a war poem is a universal poem but is not about these things this poem is about one human heart this poem is the poem at the end of the world Credit: Copyright © 1987 by Lucille Clifton.

may the tide that is entering even now the lip of our understanding carry you out beyond the face of fear may you kiss the wind then turn from it certain that it will love your back may you open your eyes to water water waving forever and may you in your innocence sail through this to that — Lucille Clifton, “blessing the boats,” Blessing the Boats: New and Selected Poems, 1988-2000. (BOA Editions Ltd. April 1, 2000)

The boundaries of human experience are finite (if you haven't experienced emotions such as pain or fear or shame, you are either a sociopath or an alien), but within these boundaries there is significant range and diversity.

BREAKLIGHT Light keeps on breaking. i keep knowing the language of other nations. i keep hearing tree talk water words and i keep knowing what they mean. and light just keeps on breaking… Collected in: Sisters of the Earth: Women's Prose and Poetry About Nature by Lorraine Anderson

and we hang onto our no place happy to be alive and in the inner city or like we call it home

thunder and lightning and our world is another place no day will ever be the same no blood untouched

is it treason to remember what we have done to deserve such villainy nothing we reassure ourselves nothing

When everyone thinks something is true, it does not make it anything more than effective marketing.

company. She

I should have prepared you for a brand of snobbery that no other nation on earth can emulate.

but he still wasn’t sure how to respond to the English obsession with the weather.

of

not a single woman

Our definition of a weakness is anything that gets in the way of excellent performance.

If there is any difference between you and me, it may simply be that I get up every day and have a chance to do what I love to do, every day.

The acid test of a strength? The ability is a strength only if you can fathom yourself doing it repeatedly, happily, and successfully.

Talent is any recurring pattern of thought, feeling, or behavior that can be productively applied.

I see life as a challenge but success is what you make of it.

Some people stand by you in your darkest hour, while others walk away; only a select few march towards you and become even closer friends.

Barrington?

have

The scientist who would rather refute than comprehend demonstrates he has chosen the wrong calling.

disappeared

Deakins is in my class but, frankly, he’s in a different class.

together

The kind of poetry to avoid in the pretty-pretty kind that pleased our grandmothers, the kind that Longfellow and Tennyson, good poets at their best, wrote at their worst.

mama mama if we are nothing why should we spare the neighborhood mama mama who will be next and why should we save the pictures

Simply giving money to charity is the easy way out. Giving time is much more precious. So make it your aim that,

Fathers don’t ask their children’s permission to marry. In any case, I’m sure they’ll be delighted.

longer looking at the

when you lie awake in the evenings counting your birthdays turn the blood that clots on your tongue into poems. poems. from “The Message of Thelma Sayles

It’s just that I was released from prison today.

you have your own story you know about the fears the tears the scar of disbelief you know that the saddest lies are the ones we tell ourselves you know how dangerous it is to be born with breasts you know how dangerous it is to wear dark skin

While your spontaneous reactions provide the clearest trace of your talents, here are three more clues to keep in mind: yearnings, rapid learning, and satisfactions. Yearnings reveal the presence of a talent, particularly when they are felt early in life.

and this is not the time I think to ask who is allowed to be american america all of us gathered under one flag praying together safely warmed by the single love of the many tongued God

The Empire was a haven that saved the mediocre from obscurity. Lionel Clifton-Meek was a prime example of the shoe clerk, the railroad ticket seller, the humbled assistant tailor who had wiggled his way into a niche in His Majesty’s far-flung interests. It was a small hole to crawl into indeed, but once staked out it was his and his alone. Clifton-Meek carefully guarded against either taking on responsibility, or making decisions, or outside intrusions. He clothed himself in a blanket of paper work to expand a belief in his own importance. In this safe place he could wait it out and end up with a nice pension for loyal service to the crown.

The point here is not that you should always forgo this kind of weakness fixing. The point is that you should see it for what it is: damage control, not development. And as we mentioned earlier, damage control can prevent failure, but it will never elevate you to excellence.

Criminy! Do you mean to tell me that the top man in the Empire would fold up and quit, just like that? Because somebody behind the scenes ordered him to?” “I’m afraid that is just what I do think.”  I shook my head. “Politics is a dirty game!”  “No,” Clifton answered insistently. “There is no such thing as a dirty game. But you sometimes run into dirty players.”  “I don’t see the difference.”  “There is a world of difference.

Such was the short bitter life of Brother Tod Clifton. Now he’s in this box with the bolts tightened down. He’s in the box and we’re in there with him, and when I’ve told you this you can go. It’s dark in this box and it’s crowded. It has a cracked ceiling and a clogged-up toilet in the hall. It has rats and roaches, and it’s far, far too expensive a dwelling. The air is bad and it’ll be cold this winter. Tod Clifton is crowded and he needs the room. Tell them to get out of the box,’ that’s what he would say if you could hear him. Tell them to get out of the box and go teach the cops to forget that rhyme. Tell them to teach them that when they call you nigger to make a rhyme with trigger it makes the gun backfire.

I watched Hugo Barrington when he gave his evidence. The same self-confidence, the same arrogance, the same half-truths spouted convincingly to the jury, just as he’d whispered them to me in the privacy of the bedroom.

But not unlike the gremlins in the film of the same name who were transformed into nasty little critters if they were splashed or if they were fed after midnight, irrelevant nontalents can mutate into real weaknesses under one condition: As soon as you find yourself in a role that requires you to play to one of your nontalents-or area of low skills or knowledge-a weakness is born.

own moral standards. It was just a pity that Major Fisher had no standards, and Don Pedro Martinez no morals.

Such was the short bitter life of Brother Tod Clifton. Now he's in this box with the bolts tightened down. He's in the box and we're in there with him, and when I've told you this you can go. It's dark in this box and it's crowded. It has a cracked ceiling and a clogged-up toilet in the hall. It has rats and roaches, and it's far, far too expensive a dwelling. The air is bad and it'll be cold this winter. Tod Clifton is crowded and he needs the room. 'Tell them to get out of the box', that's what he would say if you could hear him. 'Tell them to get out of the box and go teach the cops to forget that rhyme. Tell them to teach them that when they call you nigger to make a rhyme with trigger it makes the gun backfire.

Satisfactions provide the last clue to talent. As we described in the previous chapter, your strongest synaptic connections are designed so that when you use them, it feels good. Thus, obviously, if it feels good when you perform an activity, chances are that you are using a talent.

We're the grand design, and I think Stepehn Hawkings was right when he mentioned the Greek Ionian influence spreading throughout the world, talking about the universe and how it possesses an internal order. The Atlantians knew this and we'll be the sheriffs of that order fighting to keep gargoyles from arriving here and warming up our planet earth more than it is at this moment.

and adam rose fearful in the garden without words for the grass his fingers plucked without a tongue to name the taste shimmering in his mouth did they draw blood the blades did it become his early lunge toward language did his astonishment surround him did he shudder did he whisper eve

only thing you need to worry about is which block they put you on. As you’re a first-timer you’ll probably end up on A block, where life is a lot easier. The old-timers, like me, are usually sent to D block, where there’s no one under thirty and no one with a record for violence, so it’s the ideal set-up

Tod Clifton's one with the ages. But what's that to do with you in this heat under this veiled sun? Now he's part of history, and he has received his true freedom. Didn't they scribble his name on a standardized pad? His Race: colored! Religion: unknown, probably born Baptist. Place of birth: U.S. Some southern town. Next of kin: unknown. Address: unknown. Occupation: unemployed. Cause of death (be specific): resisting reality in the form of a .38 caliber revolver in the hands of the arresting officer, on Forty-second between the library and the subway in the heat of the afternoon, of gunshot wounds received from three bullets, fired at three paces, one bullet entering the right ventricle of the heart, and lodging there, the other severing the spinal ganglia traveling downward to lodge in the pelvis, the other breaking through the back and traveling God knows where.

Sir Alan Redmayne believed in the rule of law. It was, after all, the basis of any democracy. Whenever asked, Sir Alan agreed with Churchill that, as a form of government, democracy had its disadvantages, but, on balance, it remained the best on offer. But given a free hand, he would have opted for a benevolent dictatorship. The problem was that dictators, by their very nature, were not benevolent. It simply didn’t fit their job description.

The bottom line on skills is this: A skill is designed to make the secrets of the best easily transferable. If you learn a skill, it will help you get a little better, but it will not cover for a lack of talent. Instead, as you build your strengths, skills will actually prove most valuable when they are combined with genuine talent.

As the wit W. C. Fields advised: 'If at first you don't succeed, try again. Then quit. There is no point making a fool of yourself.' This advice is easy to give and difficult to put into practice, but as you build your strengths, sometimes making great progress, sometimes slipping back, take comfort from the fact that this is how a strong life is supposed to be lived.

For history records the patterns of men's lives, they say: Who slept with whom and with what results; who fought and who won and who lived to lie about it afterwards. All things, it is said, are duly recorded--all things of importance, that is. But not quite, for actually it is only the known, the seen, the heard and only those events that the recorder regards as important that are put down, those lies his keepers keep their power by. But the cop would be Clifton's historian, his judge, his witness, and his executioner, and I was the only brother in the watching crowd. And I, the only witness for the defense, knew neither the extent of his guilt nor the nature of his crime. Where were the historians today? And how would they put it down?

Rapid learning offers another trace of talent. Sometimes a talent doesn't signal itself through yearning. For a myriad of reasons, although the talent exists within you, you don't hear its call. Instead, comparatively late in life, something sparks the talent, and it is the speed at which you learn a new skill that provides the telltale clue to the talent's presence and power.

We're the grand design, and I think Stephen Hawking was right when he mentioned the Greek Ionian influence spreading throughout the world, talking about the universe and how it possesses an internal order. The Atlantians knew this and we'll be the sheriffs of that order fighting to keep gargoyles from arriving here and warming up our planet earth more than it is at this moment.

This is the BBC in London. You will now hear a statement from the Prime Minister.” “I am speaking to you from the Cabinet room, Ten Downing Street. This morning the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German government a final note, stating that unless we heard from them by eleven o’clock, that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us. I have to tell you now, that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently, this country is at war with Germany.

Thus, the lesson we should draw from these people is not that each person's talents are infinitely malleable or that they can be anything they want to be if they just apply themselves. Rather, the lesson is that talents, like intelligence, are value neutral. If you want to change your life so that others may benefit from your strengths, then change your values. Don't waste time trying to change your talents.

There is one sure way to identify your greatest potential for strength: Step back and watch yourself for a while. Try an activity and see how quickly you pick it up, how quickly you skip steps in the learning and add twists and kinks you haven't been taught yet. See whether you become absorbed in the activity to such an extent that you lose track of time. If none of these has happened after a couple of months, try another activity and watch-and another. Over time your dominant talents will reveal themselves, and you can start to refine them into a powerful strength.

As John Bruer describes in The Myth of the First Three Years, nature has developed three ways for you to learn as an adult: Continue to strengthen your existing synaptic connections (as happens when you perfect a talent with relevant skills and knowledge), keep losing more of your extraneous connections (as also happens when you focus on your talents and allow other connections to deteriorate), or develop a few more synaptic connections.

The Internal Revenue Service which collects taxation in America is also a private company, though the public believe it is part of their government. In 1863 the Bureau of Internal Revenue was formed to collect taxation, but in 1933, that year again, came the start of another coup on the American people. Three members of the Prescott Bush circle, Helen and Clifton Barton and Hector Echeverria, formed the Internal Revenue Tax and Audit Service, registered in Delaware, America’s flag of convenience state, where few questions are asked. Prescott Bush was the father of George Bush. In 1936, this organisation changed its name to the Internal Revenue Service and ran as a private company. In 1953, the original Bureau of Internal Revenue was disbanded, leaving the private Internal Revenue Service to collect all the taxes, illegal taxes most of them, too. This is controlled by the same people who own the Federal Reserve and the Virginia Company and it is bleeding America dry. The Internal Revenue Service was, appropriately, created by American Nazis who were funding Adolf Hitler under the coordination of Prescott Bush, George’s father.

The child cannot too early learn to be a good citizen? I think this is questionable: citizenship is an adult affair. Let school and home teach the child to respect the laws and institutions of his country. For the time being that should suffice. To use the juvenile novel or biography to turn the child into an internationalist or an advocate of racial tolerance may be high-minded, but I would suggest that the child first be allowed to turn into a boy or girl. Pious Little Rollo is dead; the Good Little Citizen is replacing him. The moralistic literature of the last century tried to produce small paragons of virtue. How about our urge to manufacture small paragons of social consciousness?

The remainder of my estate, including twenty-two percent of Barrington Shipping, as well as the Manor House—” Mr. Siddons couldn’t resist a glance in the direction of Lady Virginia Fenwick, who was sitting on the edge of her seat—“is to be left to my beloved … daughters Emma and Grace, to dispose of as they see fit, with the exception of my Siamese cat, Cleopatra, who I leave to Lady Virginia Fenwick, because they have so much in common. They are both beautiful, well-groomed, vain, cunning, manipulative predators, who assume that everyone else was put on earth to serve them, including my besotted son, who I can only pray will break from the spell she has cast on him before it is too late.

Poetry is not an esoteric art cultivated by dreamy young men in open collars and with wispy beards. Its finest masters have always been men and women of outstanding energy and great, though by no means common, sense. Poetry is the most economical way of saying certain things that cannot be said in any other way. At its most intense it expresses better than other forms of literature whatever is left of us when we are not involved in instinct-following, surviving, competing, or problem-solving. Its major property is not, as some suppose, beauty. It is power. It is the most powerful form of communication. It does the most work per syllable, operating on a vast field—that of our emotions. It gains its efficiency from the use of certain levers—rhythm, music, rhyme, metaphor, and many more—for which other forms of communication are less well adapted. Some poetry, especially modern poetry, is difficult. But just as our ears have accustomed themselves to difficult music, so our understanding, if we are willing to make an effort, can accustom itself to the most condensed and superficially strange verse. At one time poetry was as democratic an art as the novel is nowadays. It can be so again, if we are willing to make it so.