Ithuriel's spear

Some years after I planted the corms, the flowers finally appeared under my black oak this spring. Abundant this time of year in our Bay Area hills, it is one of my favorite flowers. Ithuriel is an angel in Paradise Lost, and Milton may have invented the name. Gabriel instructs Ithuriel and Zephon to find the devil in the Garden of Eden, and they do...

Ithuriel and Zephon, with winged speed

Search through this garden, leave unsearched no nook;

But chiefly where those two fair creatures lodge,

Now laid perhaps asleep, secure of harm.

This evening from the sun's decline arrived,

Who tells of some infernal Spirit seen

Hitherward bent (who could have thought?) escaped

The bars of Hell, on errand bad no doubt:

Such, where ye find, seise fast, and hither bring.

So saying, on he led his radiant files,

Dazzling the moon; these to the bower direct

In search of whom they sought: Him there they found

Squat like a toad, close at the ear of Eve,

Assaying by his devilish art to reach

The organs of her fancy, and with them forge

Illusions, as he list, phantasms and dreams;

Or if, inspiring venom, he might taint

The animal spirits, that from pure blood arise

Like gentle breaths from rivers pure, thence raise

At least distempered, discontented thoughts,

Vain hopes, vain aims, inordinate desires,

Blown up with high conceits ingendering pride.

Him thus intent Ithuriel with his spear

Touched lightly; for no falshood can endure

Touch of celestial temper, but returns

Of force to its own likeness: Up he starts

Discovered and surprised. As when a spark

Lights on a heap of nitrous powder, laid

Fit for the tun some magazine to store

Against a rumoured war, the smutty grain,

With sudden blaze diffused, inflames the air;

So started up in his own shape the Fiend.

Back stept those two fair Angels, half amazed

So sudden to behold the grisly king;

Yet thus, unmoved with fear, accost him soon.

Paradise Lost, Book IV

Rose galls

Diplolepis is a genus of cynipid wasp that induces galls on our native wild roses. I'd never noticed them before this spring. Recently I stumbled across two different species that produce similar spiny galls. The first, D. bicolor, occurs along the stem; I saw it in Armstrong Redwoods State Park. The second, D. polita, grows on the leaf (photo below); these were at Hidden Villa. D. bicolor has the honor of being the cover photo of Ronald Russo's wonderful guide, Plant Galls of the Western United States. Lucky gall!

Chris Strachwitz, RIP

I didn't realize he had died, and heard this profile on KQED today. An underappreciated hero of American cultural preservation, and of great American music.

Congrats Terence Blanchard

SFJAZZ has appointed Terence Blanchard its new Executive Artistic Director, filling the shoes of SFJAZZ founder Randall Kline, who is stepping down after 40 years at the helm. It's hard to imagine another choice who would bring Blanchard's creativity, reputation, and influence across jazz and American music. Check out his soundtrack for the new Perry Mason series on HBO. The show is OK, the music is killer.

A few flowers

On the trails above Hidden Villa. Elegant clarkia, wind poppies and blue dicks, false babystars, and yellow Mariposa lily, respectively. So nice.

Reading roundup

The Eye in the Door
Pat Barker

This was the sequel to Regeneration, Barker's excellent anti-war novel of WWI. A psychological thriller of a sort, The Eye in the Door keeps a lot of balls in the air in its tightly written 277 pages, with its portrayal of the oppression and repression of homosexuality, pacifism, and leftism in wartime Britain, the psychological trauma associated with trench warfare as well as subterfuge, and the inner turmoil of characters navigating complex moral dilemmas. A justly celebrated book. I'll eagerly move on to the third in the trilogy.

The Feral Detective
Jonathan Lethem

A dystopian novel of post-Trump America, it takes place in the desert hinterland east of Los Angeles, and features competing tribes of off-the-gridders: the (male) Bears and the (female) Rabbits. Pitched as an edgy detective novel, it is also a fairly ham-handed allegory of Trumpian America and our gendered political and cultural divide. Lethem still seems to be phoning it in, compared to the brilliant promise of some of his earlier work, and only five years after its publication, The Feral Detective's message seems more stale than insightful. Still, Lethem phoning it in is a better writer than many: If you're in the market for a detective story as well as a quirky love story, you could do worse. 

The City Inside
Samit Basu

William Gibson goes to Delhi in this high-energy, near-future romp. I liked the characters, and I liked the buzzy language and plausibly bleak but somehow still hopeful vision of authoritarian India after post-Modi fundamentalist turmoil. 

Infinity Gate
M.R. Carey

It's the multiverse. Travel between dimensions is a bit like travel between planets or galaxies, but all you have to do is step on a platform and shazam! you appear in the same place and time, but in an alternative history. Alternative evolutionary paths across these histories have made some people look more like cats or bunnies than humans. Huh. Apparently a lot of people liked this book. Maybe it improves after the point where I turned off my kindle and re-joined the here and now... 

The Mercy
Philip Levine

Levine's poetic voice was disarmingly plain. One page of Levine is a good antidote to 150 pages of M.R. Carey. It will restore your faith in the beauty and power of the written word.

Amanita velosa

Quite a perfect late-season specimen... eminently edible... but be sure of your ID. I let it be.

Joe Biden Has Given Us the Greatest Economy Ever

Dean Baker says so. He's probably correct. Maybe this helps explain why the Republican Party is hellbent on tanking the global economy by refusing to raise the debt limit. 

Starting with unemployment, the current unemployment rate of 3.4 percent is the lowest in more than half a century. More than any time in this period, people who want a job are able to get one. The unemployment rate for Blacks is at 4.7 percent, the lowest number on record.