Discontinued due to AI

Hi there, 

Almost all  my posts are now unpublished. Having a blog since 2012 to have it scraped and fed to AI is not something I will ever agree to. If something changes, I will act accordingly, but for now, it is not up for discussion. Thank you for your time and support over the years. :) I appreciate you. 
 

If anyone wishes to contact me, please email me: elswaps (at) gmail dot com. Thank you. 

 

Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/CONo9aHpj_1/

 You are not the others

The writings left behind by those whom
Your fears implore won’t have to save you;
You are not the others and you see yourself
Now at the center of the labyrinth woven
By your own steps. The agonies of Jesus or
Socrates will not save you, nor will the
Strength of Golden Siddhartha who,
At the end of the day, accepted death
In the garden. The word written
By your hand or the verb spoken
By your lips, these too are dust. Fate has no pity,
And God’s night is infinite.
Your matter is time, ceaseless
Time. You are each solitary moment.

Jorge Luis Borges

 Poem in Spanish

Rainer Maria Rilke

Poetry speaks to the soul, and this man speaks with the voice of my soul. Gone for 90 years now, and yet, his voice still echoes through space and time, the message resonating like the haunting song of a bird in the twilight.

You Who Never Arrived

You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start,
I don't even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of
the next moment. All the immense
images in me -- the far-off, deeply-felt
landscape, cities, towers, and bridges, and
unsuspected turns in the path,
and those powerful lands that were once
pulsing with the life of the gods--
all rise within me to mean
you, who forever elude me.

You, Beloved, who are all
the gardens I have ever gazed at,
longing. An open window
in a country house-- , and you almost
stepped out, pensive, to meet me.
Streets that I chanced upon,--
you had just walked down them and vanished.
And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors
were still dizzy with your presence and,
startled, gave back my too-sudden image.
Who knows? Perhaps the same
bird echoed through both of us
yesterday, separate, in the evening...

How to make an emergency baby bottle for a kitten

This is not about making an fb, but someone I know needs a little help with feeding a kitten. Usually pet shops have special baby bottles for kittens, but if you can't find one in your local pet shop (or perhaps it is an unholy hour in the night) here is how you can make one. You will need a latex glove like the one you use to wash the dishes, but not dirty, a pair of scissors, a rubber band and a small plastic bottle. From my experience, it works much better than using a syringe. The syringe is hard plastic and can also wound their mouths or make the milk go into their lungs.

First, cut a rectangular strip from the base of the glove. In my example I am using a piece of paper, but you can see what I mean.

Take the strip and shape it into a cone:

Make sure the tip of the cone is as small as possible, because otherwise a lot of milk will spill out and the kitten will have trouble swallowing. Then take the plastic bottle. In my example picture the bottle has the cap on. (My mom has some alcohol in this bottle, and she will not be happy if I spill it everywhere, so I kept the cap on.) In your case, the bottle will have milk in, and it will be uncapped.

Place the cone on the neck of the bottle. Now, take the rubber band and wrap it tightly around the neck, so that it stays in place. It is ready!

 A few more pieces of advice to help you:

• Always (ALWAYS!) check the milk temperature on your wrist before feeding the kitten.
• Cow milk causes severe diarrhea and kills kittens; if you can't go to the pet shop to buy special kitten formula and the baby is too hungry and dehydrated, you can give it canned milk, but only as an emergency measure. If you really want your kitten to live, you need to buy special formula as soon as possible. Ideally, look for a local place that takes kittens in or a nursing cat.
• If the kitten struggles too much while you try to feed it, I suggest wrapping it in a towel and leaving only its head out. It will keep it still and reduce the mess, too.
• Before feeding it, take a bit of soft cotton and gently rub its tummy from the middle toward the anus. Repeat a few times, always from the middle towards the back. This stimulates their intestines and helps really small kittens to urinate and defecate; it is what their mother does with her tongue. If their intestines are empty, they will eat with a greater appetite. Do that after the meal, too. 
• Very small kittens can't maintain body temperature. If you have a hot bottle or a small heating pad you can use, please do. Make sure it is not in direct touch with the kitten's skin. Wrap the pad or bottle in a towel or a cloth before placing it in the box.
• If the kitten is really small and it has not drunk any of its mom's milk, chances are it won't make it. Their mother's milk contains antibodies than kitten formula cannot provide them with. Don't feel bad if that happens; it really isn't your fault. There is a  possibility it will pull through. It's worth fighting for. 

Good luck!

 

 

T.S. Eliot: Circe's Palace

Around her fountain which flows
With the voice of men in pain,
Are flowers that no man knows.
Their petals are fanged and red
With hideous streak and stain.
They sprang from the limbs of the dead.--
We shall not come here again.

Panthers rise from their lairs

In the forest which thickens below,

Along the garden stairs

The sluggish python lies;

The peacock's walk, stately and slow

And they look at us with the eyes

Of men whom we knew long ago.

Taken from http://world.std.com/~raparker/exploring/tseliot/works/poems/eliot-harvard-poems.html

Poetry

The fire is out, and spent the warmth thereof,

(This is the end of every song man sings!)

The golden wine is drunk, the dregs remain,

Bitter as wormwood and as salt as pain;

And health and hope have gone the way of love

Into the drear oblivion of lost things,

Ghosts go along with us until the end;

This was a mistress, this, perhaps, a friend.

With pale, indifferent eyes, we sit and wait

For the dropt curtain and the closing gate:

This is the end of all the songs man sings.

Ernest Dowson

Dregs

1899

Picture taken from here: http://adalheit.deviantart.com/art/Face-au-vent-255445053