Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light:
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.
Ring out the grief that saps the mind
For those that here we see no more;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying …
On Sunday, the wood-paneled concert hall at Pomona College will be filled with people from Los Angeles, Orange, San Bernardino, and Riverside counties singing George Frideric Handel’s “Messiah.” I’ve taken …
Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.
“Now they are all on their knees,”
An elder said as we sat in a flock
By the embers in hearthside ease.
We pictured …
In Nancy Dale’s 1986 epic tome of Southern California native plants, Flowering Plants, she has this to say about toyon—aka California holly, Christmas berry, or, if you’re a botanist, Heteromeles …
The air’s turned chilly, Hollywood awards season has begun, retailers are knee-deep in their quest to get in the black, and so everyone—and their mother—has a best of the year …
As our family ate tacos and cupcakes on the occasion of my grandmother’s 65th birthday last week, my 4-year-old brother Bryce—the youngest of the seven of us, four of whom …
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I do not remember how old I was when my grandmother showed me Phillis Wheatley’s poetry. Ten, maybe 11? Young enough that my hands were open to everything she put …
The work of California’s new poet laureate, Juan Felipe Herrera, powerfully evokes the landscape and language of places he’s known well: the San Joaquin Valley, San Diego, San Francisco’s Mission …
A Ballad of the Republic, Sung in the Year 1888
The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the Mudville nine that day;
The score stood four to two with but one inning more …
In between gift-giving and watching Oscar contenders,
Listening to Beyoncé and holiday party benders,
Zócalo took a break to take a look back in time,
To bid a fond farewell …
