Although there remain many Twitter accounts which I enjoy following, Twitter has become an unreliable place, after Elon Musk bought it.

His changes have ended Twitter as an epoch in popular online (“social”) media. The machines may have constituted a “platform,” but—as something in which a great many people participated—Twitter was an epoch; a moment; a murmuration among humans. Whatever it had been—now it is over.

In reaction, I have opened an account on Mastodon: @burbridge@mastodon.social. A “fresh start,” I guess!

Mastodon won’t be a resumption of what was happening on Twitter. Mastodon may not get to be a “moment” at all. We’ll see.

I haven’t yet posted anything to the account. Still thinking about it: To whom will the posts be addressed? Who is this other community? Is that what it is—a “community”? Or more like a town square—an agora; or a marketplace? A commons—yes, that’s more like it.

An arresting image, one of several packed into six, simple, declarative sentences. What singular, poetic imagination devised this! A perfect description of sang froid.

“The psalms of David,” in the King James 1611 translation of the Bible are as remarkable—and splendid—a cycle of poems as the Sonnets of Shakespeare.

Although similar to lyric poetry, they more than that, and different from it, because addressed to a god; and because they are prayers.

The King James translation into English remains unequaled for simplicity and directness of expression—no other translation comes close. That’s my opinion, speaking of its literary value—not of its fidelity to the original text (about which I know nothing), nor of its service as a devotional text. Those constitute other subjects: The politics of Bible translations.

Psalm 23

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: He leadeth me beside the still waters.

He restoreth my soul: He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name’s sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: For Thou art with me; Thy rod, and Thy staff, they comfort me.

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: Thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: And I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

Having a two-year old is like living with a little gnome from a folk tale that you have to trick into doing things because if you ask it directly it will curse you.—@buttpraxis

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