http://lgbt.wikia.com/wiki/File:ELI_Silhouetted_back_cover.jpg

     The silhouetted picture on the back cover of the vinyl record album, Eli and the Thirteenth Confession became  Laura Nyro’s memento mori of  her eventual life partner, Maria Desiderio . 

N.B. The above image is available on GOOGLE in all but the strict mode.

_______________________________________________

     “Timer” is actually Laura Nyro’s thirteenth confession from the album Eli and the Thirteenth Confession. It has been alleged that “Timer” is about a cat and/or the passage of time. There is even an erronious  claim that Laura, at her live concert Season of Lights, alluded to “Timer as being about a cat.”  After she performed “The cat-song,”  Laura did say while introducing  the song “When I was a freeport (& you were the main drag)” “here’s a song about another cat.” ¹

     What the lyrics of “Timer” do reveal is Laura musing about love, e.g.  “and now my hand is ready for my heart… Timer knows the lady’s gonna love again – if you don’t love me - The lady rambles never more – if you love me true…And if you love me true, I’ll spend my life with you…”  Supporting the notion about the passage of time is the ascending lyrical array climaxing as shown above. The array covers the beginning of  life ”holding to my cradle at the start” and ends ”I’ll spend my life.” But even these references, arguably about the passage of time, are wrapped in allusions to love .   (see the youtube links to “Timer” below)   

   Charlie Callelo, the arranger & Laura’s co-producer, claimed that every song of ELI “had some underlying meaning about her own life…Eli was one of her boyfriends…” Michele Kort,  Soul Picnic, p. 62. 

    The newspaper ads for the album Eli and the Thirteenth Confession stated  “She doesn’t explain anything – She fills you with experience.” ibid p. 62.

    The  lyrics  of  “The Confession” e.g. “love my lovething, super ride inside my lovething,” were described by Kort as “a postcoital exuberance.” ibid p.61. The lyrics “oo who stole Mama’s heart and cuddled in her garden? darlin Emmie, oo la la la, oo la la la …” were part of “ Emmie,’ Pop’s first lesbian love song.” (Alanna Nash – EW.com -April 25, 1997 – Passion Player)  As early as June 1968, Pete Johnson in his review of  “Emmie” in Coast FM & Fine Arts (p.50) commented “There is a momentary shock at hearing a woman romancing another woman.” *

    With the album released on March 3, 1968, it’s easy to see why CBS would have been loathe to “explain anything.”  

      As with “Emmie,” the muse for “Timer” was Maria Desiderio. She was thirteen and Laura was nineteen. “So let the wind blow Timer …I like her song and if the song goes minor - I won’t mind.” Haunting and prescient are the lines “And if you love me true, I’ll spend my life with you, you and Timer.”

      Laura’s songs: “Emmie” ‘68, “Timer” ‘68, “Désiree,” (“Gonna Take a Miracle” 1971), “Roadnotes” (“Mother’s Spiritual” 1984),  “Walk the Dog & Light the Light” ‘93, “Angel in the Dark” and “Sweet Dream Fade” both ‘94 (“Angel In The Dark” 2001)  reveal an “on and off” relationship of thirty years, from 1967 to 1997, Laura’s death.

     Laura and Maria shared an undisputed 15 year, eventual, life partnership.  Laura, Maria, and their dog Ember were buried (ashes interred) under the Japanese Maple at their estate in Danbury CT.

      Laura left us her keepsake, of Maria, on the back cover of the vinyl dust jacket of Eli. In March 1968, Columbia released the thirteen-track vinyl record. Creativity wise, her recently negotiated four album contract with CBS gave her carte blanche. It was not an exaggeration that Laura listed herself on Eli’s back cover as “the writer, composer, voices, piano and witness to the confession.” As such, she would have been free of any inhibition in witnessing the confession in a graphic way. On May 22, 2007, Gregor von Kallahann, in his review of Soul Picnic for Amazon.com reported, “Even as a teenager growing up in a small town in Maine, some of my friends said knowingly… that Laura was ‘gay’ or ‘bisexual’ …How else could you explain that back cover on ELI…?” On August 12, 2007, Michele Kort posted a rave comment on the von Kallahann review. ^

      There are the other explanations of the silhouetted picture being a double exposure and/or a three-quarter angle of a young Laura. Brian Van der Horst, in his April 1968 review of Eli in the New York Free Press, Critique – 4, p.8, ingeniously, described it as “representing the parting chrysalis of her old life.” Assuming it true, notwithstanding, the back cover is a memento of her then “flame” and eventual life partner, Maria Desiderio.

    The ditty on the vinyl record, Part 2, 13. The Confession is very likely a deliberate diversion, a subterfuge common to a “flame” (an intimate friendship between an older woman and a younger woman).  But,  reminiscent of the flame, that Laura kept for Maria, is the token of the inside lyric flap. The outer flap, appearing as part of the cover, contains the title in script viz “Laura Nyro   Eli and the Thirteenth Confession.” Just below that is the printed menu of the thirteen songs and a last line “Lyrics Within.” As you open the flap, revealed  on the other side, are the lyrics of “Eli’s Comin’” & “Timer,” hence, Eli and the Thirteenth confession (Timer). 

       Argue all you want, you can’t get around “Désiree.”  In 1971, she records  “Désiree,” a song that can only be described as a Sapphic reverie. Laura, uniquely, titles her cover “Désiree.”   She refrains her beloved’s name 14 times in 1:48 min/sec. More than a remarkable coincidence are the facts that “Désiree” means desire and  Maria’s last name, Desiderio, also means desire. Laura’s treatment of  this ditty was her personal attribution. Kort mentions in Soul Picnic, that  ”Désiree” was stripped down to voice, piano, and vibes with “Nyro smoothly harmonizing with herself.” ibid p.133. Laura insured that this song would be just so.#

      The past analysis of the song “Timer” has dwelled on cats and time. No one tackled the climactic lyrics, i.e. “And if you love me true, I’ll spend my life with you, you and Timer.” These lyrics are an obvious and ultimate expression of love! Who might “you” be, if not Maria? It is a remarkable coincidence that Maria Desiderio was the you that Laura did eventually spend her life with. As remarkable as the coincidence that the beloved’s name in the song “Désiree”and Maria’s last name Desiderio both meant desire.

     Supporting the notion that “Timer” was a love song to a woman is the redacted version of “Timer” from Laura’s live concert on May 30, 1971. This concert occurred while she was deep in love’s thrall  with her fiancé,  her future husband, a Vietnam War Veteran.  (see link  for the redacted “Timer” at  ”Spread Your Wings and Fly)

http://rabdrake.wordpress.com/category/spread-your-wings-and-fly-laura-nyro/

    If Maria was the inspiration for “Désiree,” is it such a stretch to trace the origin of the flame back to 1967, especially, as Laura marked the event with “Timer” & “Emmie” and the Back Cover of Eli?

Listen to the song, then tell me I am wrong!  (Désiree  #3. on the g2g love song list)#

__________________________________________________

¹  http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=13742640 

# http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8098867

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 Two great links to “Timer.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYIKBH9z7SU -graziemillione

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4cX7ahizSh8 -Kurt11110

P.S. don’t let Kurt11110 seduce you with his cats. lol

 Emmie, Pop’s first lesbian love song.  

*  http://lgbt.wikia.com/wiki/Emmie_%28Laura_Nyro_song%29

Youtube link to “Emmie”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lqSYUBY-dc

^ Amazon Review of Soul Picnic & Comments 

  http://www.amazon.com/review/R287457JTV66ZB/ref=cm_cr_pr_cmt?ie=UTF8&ASIN=0312303181&nodeID=#wasThisHelpful

To The Editor

letters@out.com

Please, click for an expanded view & comments

     Eli and the Thirteenth Confession, released March 3, 1968, is an example of the superb talent Laura Nyro possessed for blending Tin Pan Alley and the Brill Building. Laura listed herself on the vinyl back cover of Eli as the “writer, composer, voices, piano and witness to the confession.”

     It is widely accepted that her earthy musical style and candid sexual imagery are about her men, i.e. “Eli’s Comin,” “December’s Boudoir,” and “The Confession,” e.g. “love my lovething – super ride inside my lovething.”
     “Emmie” was “pop’s first lesbian love song.”¹ Laura sang of her beloved in a frank and exalted style, e.g.  “you ornament the earth for me,” “the natural snow,” “the unstudied sea,” “you’re a cameo.”  Laura was a weaver of song, and Laura’s beloved “ you were born a weaver’s lover. Born for the loom’s desire.” (Laura’s piano)

     The inspiration for “Emmie” was Maria Desiderio, aged 13. While respecting by her discretion, Maria’s tender age, Laura could not resist her own love’s vanity. Laura sang in her flame to Maria, “oo who stole Mama’s heart and cuddled in her garden? darling Emmie, oo la la la, oo la la la…” For the past two years, I have interviewed scores of gay, bi, and straight women about the import of these lyrics. Every woman has considered “cuddling  in a woman’s garden” to be a description of an  intimate embrace of the female genitalia. 

        ____________________________________________          

     Laura was  widely reported to have said at concerts that the song “Timer” was about a cat. This was incorrect. The vinyl recording of the live concert  of Seasons of Lights makes it clear that the comment  ”here’s a song about another cat” was in reference to “When I was a freeport (& you were the main drag)” and not about “Timer.”#

     The opening musical phrasing of “Timer” conjures a pace and the lyrics evoke the imagery of a dog walk. The song is her musings about love, e.g. “and now my hand is ready for my heart.”
     But, who was “My lady woke up - and she broke down - she got up - she let go…”?
     Who was the muse for “I like her song and if the song goes minor – I won’t mind”?
     Who is being put on notice in “And Timer knows the lady’s gonna love again – If you don’t love me – The lady rambles – never more – if you love me true – And if you love me true – I’ll spend my life with you – you and Timer”?

     It was also reported that “Timer” was about the passage of time. But lyrically, the song was mostly Laura’s feelings about love and not the passage of time, e.g. “But now my hand is open and now my hand is ready for my heart.”  The song repeatedly identified or was spoken to a lover.

     By juxtaposing the lines “My lady woke up - and she broke down – she got up – she let go”  with the lyrics “Baby I’m not trying to talk you down,” is there  the suggestion of a lovers’ falling out? And is the lyrical ultimatum “the lady rambles never more- if you love me true,” an allusion to the reason for the tiff?

     “So…let the wind blow Timer / I like her song – and if the song goes minor – I won’t mind.” Is the repeated use of the idiom “let the wind blow” for emphasis and to suggest a willingness to brave what may be  adverse consequences? Is the use of the phrase “…if the song goes minor”  to suggest the possibility of a lost or unrequited love?  Is it also, a subterfuge common to a flame, i.e. a  cryptic reference to  Maria’s age? 

     Are the lyrics “but I could walk thru them doors onto a pleasure ground. It was sweet and funny a pleasure ground” the same as cuddling in Mama’s garden?

     Any doubt as to the lover being a woman was dispelled by Laura’s redacted version of “Timer” performed on May 30, 1971, in live concert at the Fillmore East. It becomes apparent when viewed in the context of the song “American Dove” which was Laura’s love song to her fiancé, a decorated Vietnam War veteran. Both songs were released on the 2004 CD Spread Your Wings And Fly.²

     Maria was also the inspiration for “Désiree” on the album Gonna take a miracle? ³^

     The young woman silhouetted with Laura on the back cover of the vinyl album jacket of Eli and the Thirteenth Confession became Laura’s memento  mori to her then flame and eventual life partner, Maria Desiderio.

     The picture is worth 1,000 confessions and renderings of the image are an easy find on-line.*

http://lgbt.wikia.com/wiki/Image:ELI_Silhouetted_back_cover.jpg

 
     The songs of ELI are a treat, a treasure trove of her musical precocity and lyrical poetry. Even though the silhouetted picture is not on the back of the CD, the re-mastered songs beat the dust off the vinyl.

————————————————————————– 

    #  http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=13742640

    ¹  http://lgbt.wikia.com/wiki/Emmie_%28Laura_Nyro_song%29

   ²  http://rabdrake.wordpress.com/category/its-been-a-long-time-coming/

   ³  http://rabdrake.wordpress.com/category/desiree-sapphic-reverie-to-maria-desiderio/

   ^ Link below to “Désiree”

http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8098867

   * N.B.  be sure to avoid the strict search mode on Google. 

Hi Debra/Virgil – Debra J. Wolstein

Thank you so much for the feedback.
I would love to acquire the 1973 version of your treatment of Désiree.
You are the first person who had personal knowledge of Lauria
to admit to a belief of their intimate connection pre-1977.
“Laura & Maria had to have at least tested the waters in the early 70’s
for that song to have manifested in ‘71 as such a personal tribute of love and desire.”
Your agreement and support comes at a critical time for me.
June 10, 2009 is Maria’s 55th birthday.
I was despairing of ever finding an appropriate birthday present.

Edgar Allan Poe married his first cousin, Virginia Clemm, when she was thirteen.
Jerry Lee Lewis married his first cousin, Myra Gale Brown, when she was thirteen.
Perhaps, as Laura sang in “Emmie’…time to design a woman”?
While respecting by her discretion, Maria’s tender age,
Laura could not resist her own love’s vanity.
In her flame, “Emmie” Laura sang (bragged)
“oo who stole Mama’s heart and cuddled in her garden? darlin’ Emmie, la la la, oo la la la…”

Eli was an album of confessions.
According to Charlie Callelo, every song “had some underlying meaning about her own life.”
Michele Kort, Soul Picnic, p. 62.

Now, it is not so grand a leap, i.e. Emily – Emmie – M – Maria.

Thank You for your gift and Happy Birthday Maria.

P.S. How preciousness must be your time in rehearsing “Songs for a New World;”
this comes as such a boon.

http://www.facebook.com/inbox/readmessage.php?t=1121733134580

–mk:

     On June 5, 2009, I posted a birthday card to Maria Desiderio on Laura Nyro myspace.com.¹

     I happened upon the fact that circa 1967, Laura Nyro and Maria Desiderio began a “flame” (an intimate relationship between an older woman & a younger woman).  Laura was 19 and Maria was 13.   “So let the wind blow…Timer, I like her song.”

     My discovery is supported by: hard facts, historical data, Laura’s songs, the undisputed fact that she regularly used her songs as confessions, and Laura’s custom to write about Maria in her songs.

     According to Zoe Nicholson, Maria’s ex, the following is true.  Maria and Zoe first met in 1970. Zoe claimed that even back then, Maria was already obsessed with Laura Nyro. Zoe and Maria became lovers in 1976.  Sometime in 1978, Laura met Zoe and Maria on a fan line at the Roxy in Los Angeles.  Much to Zoe’s astonishment, sometime in 1980, Laura showed up in the “Gypsy with dog and child” at Zoe/Maria’s Magic Speller bookstore.  Zoe threw Maria out on Labor Day Weekend 1982. Around 1984, Zoe, Laura and Maria reformed a deep friendship until Laura’s death.  Zoe is emphatic that all three: Zoe, Laura and Maria were bisexual, but living in and embracing the radical, feminist, lesbian subculture.#  Zoe insists Laura told her, expressly, that “Walk the Dog and Light the Light” was about Maria. Zoe confirmed that Maria liked older women both Laura and Zoe were six to seven years older than Maria. 

     Brian Van der Horst confided that at Laura’s 20^th birthday party in the Bronx, he and David L. Geffen concocted to do an advance review of Eli and the Thirteenth Confession. According to Brian, “…I asked him (David) to send me a ‘test-pressing’ which he did.” This was months prior to the release of Eli. The review was a rave in the New York Free Press.  The same review in which, Brian ingeniously described the back cover of Eli as “representing the parting chrysalis of her old life.” “David gave Columbia the advance copy of my article….” CBS liked the story so much that they had thousands of copies of the review printed and distributed with the album as part of the press kit.  

FYI Here’s that pesky back cover! 

http://lgbt.wikia.com/wiki/File:ELI_Silhouetted_back_cover.jpg

Tuna Music company, founded by David and Laura, granted use in 1967 of Eli’s lyrics to Brian for his article in the New York Free Press. The review date of Brian’s rave was April 1968, but CBS was putting the review out in advance and as early as possible. As you know Eli’s release date was March 3, 1968. Pete Johnson didn’t publish his comment re: “Emily – There is a momentary shock at hearing a woman romancing another woman” until June 1968. 

     There exists an understandable, but mistaken, belief that Laura at her live concert Season of Lights alluded to “Timer as being about a cat.” The exact comment implied that after Laura performed “The cat-song” she introduced “Timer” as “another song about a cat.” I dusted off the vinyl. Indeed, Laura did introduce a song as “here’s a song about another cat,” but the song was “When I was a freeport, (& you were the main drag)” and not “Timer.”² 

     In “Timer,” there are at least a dozen express references to love, a lover, a third party. Who is “I like her song and if the song goes minor I won’t mind”?

     I’m bemused by the prior analysis of this song. Everyone dwells on cats and time. No one has tackled the climactic lyrics of  “Timer,” i.e. “And if you love me true, I’ll spend my life with you, you and Timer.” These lyrics are an obvious and ultimate expression of love. WHOSE YOU? A remarkable fact is that the actual you turned out to be Maria Desiderio.  (see link to “Timer” below)

      “Emmie” was Pop’s first lesbian love song and you dismissed it? You insisted that the song could not be a lesbian love song!  You wrote “Emmie” “was a favorite of her mother – hardly the endorsement one would expect for her daughter’s paean to her female lover.” Both Maria’s mom, Irene, and Zoe’s mom were enthusiastic about their daughters’ relationship. They were as “out & proud” as their daughters. They fully supported the creation of the “Magic Speller,” a lesbian owned/ lesbian friendly bookstore.³ Laura’s dad said of Maria “She was like another daughter, a lovely woman.”  Why wouldn’t Laura’s mom have been proud of her daughter’s creation “Emmie,” even as a Sapphic paean? 

     You never mentioned the Pete Johnson quote above. On April 25, 1997, seventeen days after Laura’s death,  Alanna Nash posted the music comment Passion Player on EW.com touting “Emmie” as “pop’s first lesbian love song.” With ample authority to analyze “Emmie” as an open expression of same-sex attraction, why did you downplay and resist the implications of “her female lover”?  Having earned your chops writing for the Advocate, your analysis of “Emmie” was skewed and incomprehensible! (see link to “Emmie” below)

     I do not persist in positing something that never happened.  I found a witness. Her name is Laura Nyro. She confessed her ultimate love of Maria Desiderio in her personal attribution of “Désiree.” * 

     I recently published a rave review of the 2004 CD Spread Your Wings and Fly with e-pinions.com.  A sample of e-pinions’ commenters found, along with my other assertions, that the observations re: Lauria, were “very helpful.”

     It is you, who persists in your denial of the comment posted by Debra J. Wolstein, on June 4, 2009, on facebook.com, concerning Lauria. “Laura & Maria had to have at least tested the waters in the early 70’s for that song to have manifested in ‘71 as such a personal tribute of love and desire…because of the unmistakably erotic/romantic quality of that song (again, I agree that she re-wrote it as a subtle reference to Maria “Desiderio”) and other songs to follow…” 

     I have urged you repeatedly to listen to the song, and then tell me I’m wrong.* You resist because you know that I am right.

Rabdrake

¹ http://rabdrake.wordpress.com/category/happy-birthday-maria-desiderio/

² When I was a freeport and you were the main drag

  http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=13742640

³ “…Maria…and Zoe…consider themselves the ‘luckiest lesbians alive’ because they have experienced little discrimination regarding their lifestyle…”

http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/lgbt/images/5/54/Maria_D_Lesbian_Tide-1

* Désiree

 http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8098867

link to Timer

http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8098787

link to Emmie

http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8098787

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# youtube links by VJ denknee of Laura Nyro, bisexual, but living in and embracing the radical, feminist , lesbian subculture.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNWF2AxThy0 - N.B. 0:14 to 0:20

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVtd91jhRcw&feature=related  – Sappho was a poet, Bille was a real musician.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XoCdBWLv4s&feature=channel - The Wind - N. B. 1:24-25

It’s Been A Long Time Coming, I mean Love.

The audience in the background is a thrill!
Laura chose “American Dove” to open the program before 2,500 avid fans. “American Dove” and the closing song “Mother Earth” were original works.  Both were introduced at this live concert at the Fillmore East on May 30, 1971.
“American Dove” fulfilled the elusive quest for love that she had longed for, years earlier, in “Wedding Bell Blues.” When I first listened to the CD, I was deeply moved hearing her sing “it’s been a long time comin’ I mean love.” “American Dove” was a love song to honor her fiancé, a decorated Vietnam War Veteran, e.g. “But Johnny he come home from war…Tell them the young lord’s come to bring liberty to everyone.” They were married in the October of that year.

Underscoring the depth of her limerence was the follow-up medley of “Ain’t nothing like the real thing/ You make me feel like a natural woman.” Laura closed the opening set with her gender-shifting version of “Spanish Harlem.” She and Aretha Franklin in 1971, recorded their own personalized covers. (both links below) In this version, Laura gender shifts twice “I’m goin’ to pick that rose and watch him as he grows in my garden.” (originally, “watch her as she grows”) Laura added an original gender reference, i.e. “With eyes as black as coal he looks down in my soul.” (originally, “with eyes as black as coal that look down in my soul”) It is noteworthy that in her second refrain, she substituted “rare rose up” for “red rose up.”

A beautiful and thoughtful rendition of “I Am The Blues” was followed by “Walk On By” which too soon transposed into “Dancing In The Street.” Next is “Emmie” her standard. Listen carefully and you will hear her voice crack with emotion. (see link below) Virtually, sub rosa in 1968, “Emmie” was Pop’s first lesbian love song. Even in 1971, it was a love song to a woman, extolling a “love that dare not speak its name.”

Supporting the premise that this concert was dedicated to her fiancé are her redactions in her treatment of “Timer.” She deleted all reference to “My Lady woke up and she broke down – she got up – she let go.” Laura left out, from the song’s denouement “I like her song.” The original version of “Timer” was released on March 3, 1968 on Eli and the Thirteenth Confession. “Timer” is the thirteenth confession of ELI! These redacted lyrics were a reference to Maria Desiderio, the third party so frequently alluded to in the song. Maria was 13 and Laura was 19. “So let the wind blow Timer…I like her song and if the song goes minor I won’t mind.” That lyrical omission would have been consistent with the emotional thrall that she was held in that evening. (see link below)

By the concert close the audience was “over the top” avidly enraptured. She had to depart from the performance to remonstrate with them.

At the concert close, Laura reprised the love that she was feeling that night for her fiancé.  In the other original song that she premiered “Mother Earth,” appearing almost as a non sequitur, she sang “I love him body and soul.”

“American Dove” is one of my favorite songs and one of her best live performances of a song.

The 2004 CD Spread Your Wings And Fly is one of her best live concerts. It is a tour de force of voice and piano. The audience’s avid support throughout is an irresistible treat.

Less than two months after the debut of “American Dove” in July of 1971, Laura records her Sapphic reverie, “Désiree.” (link below)
 
Her singing with such an intensity of passion to both a man and a woman is a testament to her bisexuality.

Laura superbly balanced her standards, fan favorites, covers & medleys, while bookending the program with her two original pieces. My only reservation, the concert was too short. I echo the sentiment of the fan who shouted ”sing everything.”  This CD is a must have.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ND84MmUU-I  – American

Dove – kofn1

http://www.imeem.com/countrymusic2/music/OyB4_ALE/laura-nyro-spanish-harlem/  – Laura Nyro – Spanish Harlem

Spanish http://www.tu.tv/videos/aretha-franklin-spanish-harlem  -Aretha  Franklin – Spanish Harlem

http://www.imeem.com/countrymusic2/music/x9230u-c/laura-nyro-emmie/ - Emmie

http://www.imeem.com/people/TMEiO0a/music/hbTnINT2/laura-nyro-medley-timer-o-o-h-child-up-on-the-roof/http://www.youtube.com/watch  - redacted Timer/Medley

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UKcwd1BBgNo&feature=related - Mother Earth – kofn1

Désiree 

 http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8098867

Entire live concert

http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1951040&albumid=8106532

An Open Letter to Mary Ann Glendon

You once wrote “… privacy …gives women the freedom of choice concerning abortion.” If you really believe this, then why can you not grant the same respect and presumption of good faith to our president and Notre Dame? You claimed that a primary reason for demurring was your inablity to frame your speech.  I wish you would change your mind.  May I suggest that  you speak on this theme? “The need to end the Absoluteness of Male  power in the Roman Catholic Church”  

You know that if women had a modicum of real power  in the Roman Catholic Church, the bishops “common practice” of transferring predatory, pedophile clergy would never have occurred . You, yourself are an adviser to the Council of Bishops. Would you have silently sat by while these abominable practices flourished among the bishops? BTW those same prelates, using the faux controversy of Pro Choice/Pro Life, now seek to cast the stones of intolerance at others. Just like the hypocrites that they are.

You sound as a person trying to convince yourself of an argument you don’t really believe. Lord Acton, a catholic, re: the obnoxious principle of papal infallibility coined the phrase “power tends to corrupt, absolute power corrupts absolutely.”

Mary Ann Glendon, I read your book, loved page 52! Abortion and Divorce in Western Law.