Looking Forward to Being Swept Up in Joy

The Great Sea Moves Me by Uvavnuk trans. by Jane Hirshfield

The great sea

frees me, moves me,

as a strong river carries a weed.

Earth and her strong winds

move me, take me away,

and my soul is swept up in joy.

 

    I hadn't heard of Uvavnuk until I stumbled upon this poem.  An early 20th century Inuit, legend has it after she witnessed a meteor in the sky she was gained the gift of healing and became a poet and a shaman.  I'm heading to the great sea on Sunday for a few days.  It's the landscape in which I feel most at home, most alive, most swept up in joy.  What is the landscape that most speaks to your soul?

 

 

The Spaces of Hope by Ivan V. Lalic from The Passionate Measure (Anvil Press Poetry)
I have experienced the spaces of hope,
The spaces of a moderate mercy. Experienced
The places which suddenly set
Into a random form: a lilac garden,
A street in Florence, a morning room,
A sea smeared with silver before the storm,
Or a starless night lit only
By a book on the table. The spaces of hope
Are in time, not linked into
A system of miracles, nor into a unity;
They merely exist. As in Kanfanar,
At the station; wind in a wild vine
A quarter-century ago: one space of hope.
Another, set somewhere in the future,
Is already destroying the void around it,
Unclear but real. Probable.

In the spaces of hope light grows,
Free of charge, and voices are clearer,
Death has a beautiful shadow, the lilac blooms later,
But for that it looks like its first-ever flower.


Today's poem has me thinking about how lightly and carelessly I use the word hope.  I hope it doesn't rain today.  I hope I can find a parking space near the coffee shop.  I hope Netflix gets new seasons of Lewis or Vera soon.  Those types of hopes would be better expressed as "It would be nice if"s. 

A space of hope is more like a moment of grace, a breaking through of light, wholly unexpected, a gift for our soul which we've done nothing to earn other than simply being aware enough to notice it.

Better late than never

Excerpt from Spring Giddiness by Rumi (trans. by Coleman Barks)

Today, like every other day, we wake up empty
and frightened. Don't open the door to the study
and begin reading. Take down the dulcimer.

Let the beauty we love be what we do.
There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.

I'm getting this poem in just under the wire.  Today I was so busy letting the beauty I love be what I was doing that I didn't get a chance to post until now.  This evening, about fifty or so people braved the sideways rain and umbrella stripping wind to read and write poetry  at Washington National Cathedral.  As always, I was amazed and humbled by the poems people wrote in the brief ten minute period I allowed for writing. 

I also always come home from program's like tonight amazed and humbled that I get to do what I love, what I'm passionate about, what energizes me and gives me joy.  Reading and writing are the ways I kneel and kiss the ground.  How about you?    What is the beauty you love and how will you let that be what you do when you awake tomorrow?

 

 

Some Questions You Might Ask on a Mary Oliver Monday

Some Questions You Might Ask by Mary Oliver from House of Light (Beacon Press)
Is the soul solid, like iron?
Or is it tender and breakable, like
the wings of a moth in the beak of an owl?
Who has it, and who doesn't?
I keep looking around me.
The face of the moose is as sad
as the face of Jesus.
The swan opens her white wings slowly.
In the fall, the black bear carries leaves into the darkness.
One question leads to another.
Does it have a shape? Like an iceberg?
Like the eye of a hummingbird?
Does it have one lung, like the snake and the scallop?
Why should I have it, and not the anteater
who loves her children?
Why should I have it, and not the camel?
Come to think of it, what about maple trees?
What about the blue iris?
What about all the little stones, sitting alone in the moonlight?
What about roses, and lemons, and their shining leaves?
What about the grass?
In between loads of laundry I've been reading a lot today, looking for poems to use in tomorrow's program on The Spirituality of Poetry that I'll be leading at Cathedral Crossroads.  This is one I had bookmarked and as I haven't celebrated Mary Oliver Monday in several weeks, I decided to post it as today's offering.

Lately I've been skirting around the edges of articles and books that deal with the science of consciousness.  Some of these talk about the idea of the soul and look to answer questions like the one Mary Oliver raises.  Who has one?  Can it be measured?  What's it made of?  Where does it reside?   All that theorizing fascinates me but the question that I am most often ask in relation to the subject is the one I pose today:  How goes it with your soul?

How to cope with PTSDAD

Violet Words of Wisdom
(Words by The Dowager Countess Grantham, arrangement by Terri Lynn Simpson)

Vulgarity is no substitute for wit.

Life is a game in which the player must appear ridiculous.
You see, sometimes we must let the blow fall by degrees.
War makes early risers of us all.

Life is a game in which the player must appear ridiculous.

Have we all stepped through the looking glass?
War makes early risers of us all.
A change is as good as a rest.

Have we all stepped through the looking glass?

The truth is neither here nor there, it’s the look of the thing that matters.
A change is as good as a rest.
One way or another, everyone goes down the aisle with half the story hidden.

The truth is neither here nor there, it’s the look of the thing that matters.

I hope we’re in control of something, if only ourselves.
One way or another, everyone goes down the aisle with half the story hidden.
There’s nothing more to be said.


PTSDAD-- Post third season Downton Abbey depression

I'm sure it will hit many of us tonight as we sit down at 9 pm and tune our televisions to our local PBS stations and we aren't greeted by the rear view of a yellow lab.

Granted, some will take solace in the glitz and glamour of the Oscars but for those of us who don't watch award shows, I offer today's poem, violet words of wisdom to fight the PTSDAD blues.  And some suggestions to help you cut back on the period dramas without having to go cold turkey.  (All of these are available on Netflix on Demand.)

Upstairs Downstairs - The original introduction of the US audience to the complex relationships in English aristocratic households.  It's the Bellamys rather than the Crawleys and a townhouse in London rather than an enormous manor house but making sure the ladies get their tea on time is still a challenge at times.








Brideshead Revisited - Set a bit later than Downton, Brideshead offers another perspective on what happens when a middle class lad gets drawn into the world of the aristocracy.

My Life So Far - Colin Firth, a Scottish manor house, an eccentric family, a post WWI setting, and a precocious ten year old who spends his time reading an elicit copy of the racy "Dictionary of Morals" in an attic.  It's worth is just to watch the scene at the dinner party where he comes up with a way for his mother and future aunt to make money to help save the estate. 







Also from the pen of Julian Fellowes . . .

Gosford Park - Downton with deception and murder.  Maggie Smith is joined by other luminaries of British drama-- Alan Bates, Derek Jacobi, Helen Mirren, Stephen Fry, Richard E. Grant . . . basically it might be easier to say who isn't in Gosford Park.  Colin Firth.

From Time to Time - Another Fellowes film featuring Maggie Smith.  Also in a grand house that needs to be saved.  Another war era setting, this time WWII.  Maggie's grandson comes to stay with his estranged grandmother while his mother tries to find out the fate of his father who has been declared missing in action.  Meanwhile, Tolly becomes reacquainted with his grandmother and the house and discovers the house has more inhabitants than he remembers.  A movie more for kids it's reminiscent of the Disney's 70's classic Candleshoe.


Monarch of the Glen - Not really a period piece but another story of a family's attempt to save their destitute estate.  And there is a Julian Fellowes connection as he appears as an actor in the series, portraying Lord Killwillie, frenemy and partner-in-crime of the patriarch of the MacDonald clan.

The two faced god of Not-Yet

Not-Yet by Jane Hirshfield from Lives of the Heart (Harper Collins)
Morning of buttered toast;
of coffee, sweetened, with milk.

Out of the window,
snow-spruces step from their cobwebs.
Flurry of chickadees, feeding then gone.
A single cardinal stipples an empty branch –
one maple leaf lifted back.

I turn my blessings like photographs into the light;
over my shoulder the god of Not-Yet looks on:

Not-yet-dead, not-yet-lost, not-yet-taken.
Not-yet-shattered, not-yet-sectioned,
not-yet-strewn.

Ample litany, sparing nothing I hate or love,
not-yet-silenced, not-yet-fractured, not-yet-

Not-yet-not.
I move my ear a little closer to that humming figure,
I ask him only to stay.

Janus, the Roman god of beginnings and endings
One face looks into the past, one into the future

I imagine the god of Not-Yet is a cousin of the Roman god Janus.  The two-faced family resemblance is certainly there, but instead of looking into opposite directions, both of Not-Yet's faces look into the future.

One is as Hirshfield describes-- the Not-Yet face that sees our future and in reminding us that we are not-yet-lost, not-yet-fractured, not-yet-dead, and reminds us that we should embrace our lives while we still can.

The other face, though, looks at the things we haven't accomplished yet, the not-yets that we use as excuses, that keep us from embracing the present-- not yet rich, not yet successful, not yet thin, not yet partnered, not yet patient, not yet forgiving, not yet healthy, not yet whole, not yet holy. 

That's the god of Not-Yet who has overstayed his welcome.  The one I won't be inviting to stay. 

What to do, what to do . . .

The washing never gets done . . .  by Jaan Kaplinski from Selected Poems (Bloodaxe Books)
The washing never gets done.
The furnace never gets heated.
Books never get read.
Life is never completed.
Life is like a ball which one must continually
Catch and hit so that it won't fall.
When the fence is repaired at one end,
It collapses at the other. The roof leaks,
The kitchen door won't close, there are cracks in the foundation,
The torn knees of children's pants...
One can't keep everything in mind. The wonder is
That beside all this one can notice
The spring which is so full of everything
Continuing in all directions--into evening clouds,
Into the redwing's song and into every
Drop of dew on every blade of grass in the meadow,
As far as the eye can see, into the dusk.


I sat down at my desk this morning with the intention of writing this blog post then updating my "To Do" list.  Normally, the first two items I'd include on my litany of tasks would read
                                                
                                                  1.  Update to do list
                                                  2.  Write blog post for today

I always put "update to do list" as the first thing on my to do list.  That way, when the list is complete I can take a bright fuchsia Sharpie and draw a deliberate line through it.  It makes me feel that I've accomplished at least a little something that day.

Now, after reading the Kaplinski poem, I'm re-thinking my list. 

What if, instead of just including the work that takes place primarily in lap top windows, I consider including the things from the world outside my window-- stepping outside to throw out a handful of birdseed before the weather turns,  noticing how the tinny aroma of impending snow has driven away last week's loamy scent of spring, smiling as I catch a glimpse a neighbor with a perpetual spring in his step bop to the bus stop. 

At the end of the day, how many more things could I write down and cross off as being accomplished if I simply expand my vision of  "To Do?"

Making space

One Art by Elizabeth Bishop from The Complete Poems:  1927-1979 (Farrar, Straus & Giroux)
The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day.
Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

Lent, to me, is a time to make space, space in which I can be more keenly aware of the presence of the holy.  I can create it by letting go of stuff that's taking up space-- extraneous possessions, emotional baggage, not helpful habits.  Or, I can create space by adding to my life-- more silence, more reflection, more poetry.  Either way, it's my intention that makes the space.

Elizabeth Bishop's poem got me thinking about space that is created through no action of my own.  What have I lost?  What do I fear I will lose?  And how can space created through loss be transformed from absence to presence? 

An honest love poem

Welsh Love Letter by Michael Burn from Open Day and Night (Chatto)
Were all the peaks of Gwynedd
In one huge mountain piled,
Cnicht on Moelwyn,
Moel-y-gest, Moel Hebog,
And Eryri on top,
And all between us,
I'd climb them climb them
All!
To reach you.
Oh, how I love you!

Were all the streams of Gwynedd
In one great river joined,
Dwyfor, Dwyryd,
Glaslyn, Ogwen,
And Mawddach in flood,
And all between us,
I'd swim them swim them
All!
To reach you.
O, how I love you!

Were all the fortress of Gwynedd
In one great fortress linked,
Caer and castle,
Criccieth, Harlech,
Conwy, Caernarfon,
And all in flames,
I'd jump them jump them
All!
To reach you.
O, how I love you!

See you Saturday.
If it's not raining.


I find a lot of glorious love poems when I'm looking for material for this blog.  Some I file away, hopefully, for future personal use.  Most I read and let go.  This one, however, I just had to share.  Not because it made me laugh.  And not because I've eaten far-too-many half price gummy hearts this afternoon and have had slightly nauseating thoughts of love and romance as a result (actually I'm just slightly nauseated in general).  The more I read this poem, the more I realized that it speaks to our nature as human beings in a way that goes beyond romantic love.  It's the time worn adage, "Actions speak louder than words."  We all know better, but sometimes it's easy to get swept up in words, the words we hear from others as well as the words we say to others . . . and to ourselves.

There have been times when I've proclaimed such platitudes, expressed grand intentions.  Great passion is betrothed to the promise of dramatic action until it actually comes time to do something. Then the ifs and but' object and the wedding is off.  Sometimes it's sheer laziness, at other times self-centeredness that's at the root of my inaction.  On rare occasions I get caught up in emotion and make promises before I've really thought things through and in hindsight, realize that what I've said isn't for the higher good.

Conwy Castle, Gwynedd - Hard to set alfame, even harder to jump

Often though, it's fear that stops the action.  Placing conditions on the situation let's me off the hook emotionally.  Staying in my cozy dream world climbing imaginary Welsh mountains seems a heck of a lot safer than actually venturing out into the real world where I might get rained upon, even if I'm just stepping outside on the porch to get the mail.  

William James said, "Action may not bring happiness but there is no happiness without action."  So this evening I'm pondering the "if's" I'm using as an excuse not to act on something that will bring happiness.  I think the first step is to plan on always carrying an umbrella.

A touch of Frost for a frosty morning

DUST OF SNOW by Robert Frost from New Hampshire (Henry Holt)

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree

Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued

A dust of snow is about all we've had this winter in the DC area, a baker's dozen of days with enough snow to make it look like the grass has been covered with powdered sugar.  This morning's snow/sleet mix has left the landscape glazed like a pound cake.  But even that drizzle of snow was enough to lift my spirits.

I'm in the minority that loves snow.  I strain to catch a glimpse of the first flakes of the winter once the autumn wind turns cold and damp.   That first discernible snow always seems to me like the universe is throwing a party, tossing about handfuls of white confetti and inviting me to join in the celebration. 

Last week in the Celtic spirituality class at the Cathedral that I was co-teaching with the wise and wonderful Sue Mosher, we wrapped the series with a session on celebrating the seasons.  During the group discussion time, the idea of harbingers came up-- those signs that let us know that the season is about to turn.   

I'm good at noticing the harbingers.  I keep an eye out for the crocuses and daffodils stretching their stalks up through the earth after their winter slumber.  I scan the summer twilight for the first flash of lightning bugs and gaze at the October trees waiting for them to spark and catch fire.  And of course, there's the snow.

What I'm not so good at, is appreciating a season when I'm in the thick of it.  And that's when I need reminders of what is rather than harbingers of what's to come.  I need a dusting of snow to help me recapture those feelings of delight, joy, gratitude that I feel when I spy the first snowflakes.  I need to be reminded that today and every day there's something to celebrate.








 

Doors and Perception

The Door by Miroslav Holub (trans. by Ian Milner) from Poems Before & After: Collected English Translations, second edition (Bloodaxe Books)

Go and open the door.
     Maybe outside there's
     a tree, or a wood,
     a garden,
     or a magic city.

Go and open the door.
     Maybe a dog's rummaging.
     Maybe you'll see a face,
or an eye,
or the picture
                      of a picture.

Go and open the door.
     If there's a fog
     it will clear.

Go and open the door.
     Even if there's only
     the darkness ticking,
     even if there's only
     the hollow wind,
     even if
                 nothing
                             is there,
go and open the door.

At least
there'll be
a draught.


This poem is one I can read over and over again and continue to find something new to ponder. Perhaps it's because doors are such powerful images for reflection.  I always seem to find myself taking photographs of doorways and thresholds when I travel. 

There are the inviting doorways . . .





Winchester Cathedral Close

and the ones that deny access.

Mosque, Old Damascus

 



 There are doorways that are forever closed . . .

Another from Winchester Cathedral

 

and places where walls are knocked down to create a way in.

 

Berlin Wall





 

Sometimes it seems like there are a lot of doors from which to choose . . .

 

Beittedine Palace, Lebanon

 

 

and at other times just one path.

Beaumaris Castle, Wales

Doors invite us to go beyond what the eye can see, to consider what is revealed and what is hidden, what is expected and what is unexpected, where there is light and dark, invitation and obstacles.  So what kind of door are you facing today?  And what do you expect to find when you open it?
 

Doorway and Lantern, Damascus

 




 

Neruda Double Stuff

Oh Earth, Wait for Me by Pablo Neruda
Turn me oh sun
towards my native destiny,
rain from the ancient forest,
return to me the fragrance and the swords
that fall from the sky,
the solitary peace of field and rock,
the moisture at the margins of the river,
the scent of the larch,
the wind, alive like a heart
beating among the remote flock
of the great araucaria.

Earth, return to me your pure gifts
the towers of silence that rose
from the solemnity of their roots:
I want to return to being what I have not been,
learn to return from such depths
that amongst all the things of nature
I could live or not live: no matter
to be one more stone, the dark stone,
the pure stone that is carried by the river.

O Tierra, Espérame
Vuélmeme oh sol
a mi destino agreste,
lluvia del viejo bosque,
devuélveme el aroma y las espadas
que caían del cielo,
la solitaria paz de pasto y piedra,
la humedad de las márgenes del río,
el olor del alerce,
el viento vivo como un corazón
latiendo entre la huraña muchedumbre
de la gran araucaria.

Tierra, devuélveme tus dones puros,
las torres del silencio que subieron
de la solemnidad de sus raíces:
quiero volver a ser lo que no he sido,
aprender a volver desde tan hondo
que entre todas las cosas naturales
pueda vivir o no vivir: no importa
ser una piedra más, la piedra oscura,
la piedra pura que se lleva el río.

 

Not growing up in a tradition that made a big deal about Lent, I didn't learn about the "Sundays off" rule until I was an adult and one of my Catholic friends tore open a package of Oreos one Sunday afternoon.  Ah the blessings of Sabbath.  Rest, recreation, and Oreos. 

 

I decided to "take Sundays off" from this blog.  I'll still post a poem on Sundays, one to be read  and enjoyed rather than written aboout and reflected upon. 

 

So here's a little yummy Neruda for your Sunday afternoon.  And since I'm a fan of the Double Stuff Oreos, I offer it in English and its original Spanish.  Enjoy it with a glass of ice cold milk or simply savour it on its own. 

A Poem for the End of the Day

The Inner History of a Day by John O'Donohue

No one knew the name of this day;
Born quietly from deepest night,
It hid its face in light,
Demanded nothing for itself,
Opened out to offer each of us
A field of brightness that traveled ahead,
Providing in time, ground to hold our footsteps
And the light of thought to show the way.

The mind of the day draws no attention;
It dwells within the silence with elegance
To create a space for all our words,
Drawing us to listen inward and outward.

We seldom notice how each day is a holy place
Where the eucharist of the ordinary happens,
Transforming our broken fragments
Into an eternal continuity that keeps us.

Somewhere in us a dignity presides
That is more gracious than the smallness
That fuels us with fear and force,
A dignity that trusts the form a day takes.

So at the end of this day, we give thanks
For being betrothed to the unknown
And for the secret work
Through which the mind of the day
And wisdom of the soul become one.

 

Since I'm posting today's poem just under the wire, I decided to offer a poem for the end of the day.  I love the phrase "the eucharist of the ordinary," those everyday moments brimming with presence that we may overlook when they occur but notice later.  Something to ponder before falling asleep . . .

Breadmaking

Breadmaking by Hilary Llewellyn-Williams from Hummadrumz (Seren)
Forgive the flour under my fingernails
the dabs of dough clinging to my skin:
I have been busy, breadmaking.
So easy, the flakes falling feathery
into the warm bowl, as I dip and measure
and pour the foaming treasured brown
yeast down to the ground grain.
O as the barm breaks and scatters
under my working fingers like a scrum
of tides on shifting sands, the secret cells
swell, you can smell their life
feeding and beating like blood
in my bunched palms
while I lift the lump and slap it back again.

It moves, like a morning mushroom,
a breathing side, stirring, uncurling
animal nudged from sleep; so I pummel
and thump and knuckle it into shape
to see it unwind like a spring
soft as a boneless baby on the table.
I have covered it now:  let it grow
quietly, save for the least rustle
of multiplication in the damp bundle
telling of motion in the fattening seeds.
It's body's an uproar as I open the burning door --
it gives one final heave, and it blossoms out
to the brown loaf I have spread for you.
Taste the butter touching its heart like snow.

Once upon a time I spent my Saturday mornings making bread.  It was when I was living in an apartment in Glover Park.  My roommate worked an odd schedule, afternoons and evenings during the week, bright and early on weekends, so I often had the place to myself.  I'd get up, make a cup of tea, clear the clutter off the table in our tiny dining room, then start measuring and kneading. 

When I first started baking bread I used Nick Maglieri's How to Bake as my bible.  I chose recipes at random and tried out several before I found one that regularly worked well for me.  Eventually I got to the point where I didn't need the book.  I knew the recipe by heart and could adapt the ingredients depending upon my mood or what I had at hand-- tossing in a handful of chopped kalamata olives, some fresh rosemary from the pot of herbs I planted outside, dusting the crust with parmesan and cracked black pepper or sesame seeds and sea salt.  Since our oven was in keeping with our diminutive dining room, one loaf was the most I could bake at a time but it was usually enough for the week.

It struck me as I read today's poem how much meditation is like breadmaking.  You find a method you want to try, assemble the ingredients-- perhaps a special location or posture, maybe a mantra or image on which to focus-- and then you begin to put it all together.  It can be exhilirting at first as your soul feeds on the silence.  Sometimes what bubbles up feels like agitation, at other times, fermentation.  But if you've found your perfect recipe, you sense something is happening.

So you start adding more ingredients, more time, more silence.  There comes a point, however, when you may start to feel stiff and unyielding.  And then it happens:  your soul starts to feel like it's being pummeled.  Of course, there are those lovely times when meditation leaves you feeling as soft as a boneless baby but those moments are fleeting.  Just as dough needs to be worked in order to form the gluten that gives the bread strength so it doesn't fall apart when baked, so does your soul need to be kneaded sometimes in order to give you the strength you need to face the heat of daily life . . . and to nourish others. 

The question to consider today is where are you in the process?  Are you fermenting?  Baking? Being kneaded or needed?  Or maybe just resting?

A little Sweetness, Always for Valentine's Day

Sweetness, Always by Pablo Neruda trans. by Alastair Reid from Extravagaria
(Farrar, Straus & Giroux)

Why such harsh machinery?
Why, to write down the stuff
and people of every day,
must poems be dressed up in gold,
or in old and fearful stone?

I want verses of felt or feather
which scarcely weigh, mild verses
with the intimacy of beds
where people have loved and dreamed.
I want poems stained
by hands and everydayness.

Verses of pastry which melt
into milk and sugar in the mouth,
air and water to drink,
the bites and kisses of love.
I long for eatable sonnets,
poems of honey and flour.

Vanity keeps prodding us
to lift ourselves skyward
or to make deep and useless
tunnels underground.
So we forget the joyous
love-needs of our bodies.
We forget about pastries.
We are not feeding the world.

In Madras a long time since,
I saw a sugary pyramid,
a tower of confectionery -
one level after another,
and in the construction, rubies,
and other blushing delights,
medieval and yellow.

Someone dirtied his hands
to cook up so much sweetness.

Brother poets from here
and there, from earth and sky,
from Medellin, from Veracruz,
Abyssinia, Antofagasta,
do you know the recipe for honeycombs?

Let’s forget about all that stone.

Let your poetry fill up
the equinoctial pastry shop
our mouths long to devour -
all the children’s mouths
and the poor adults’ also.
Don’t go on without seeing,
relishing, understanding
all these hearts of sugar.

Don’t be afraid of sweetness.

With or without us,
sweetness will go on living
and is infinitely alive,
forever being revived,
for it’s in a man’s mouth,
whether he’s eating or singing,
that sweetness has its place.


When I sat down to post this morning I imagined it would be an impossible task to find a poem that would suit for Valentine's Day and Lent.  And then I came across this poem by Pablo Neruda. 

It may seem like an indulgent poem for Lent with all this luscious imagery. . . melt-in-your-mouth verses and honeyed poems, the desire for sweetness always.  But Neruda reminds us that we are all fragile, mortal.  Hearts of sugar may break and inevitably will melt away but the sweetness, "with or without us/sweetness will go on living/and is infinitely alive/forever being revived." 


So the questions I'm thinking about today is where am I finding this sweetness in my life right now?  And how can I give some sweetness back in return?

The Journey Begins Again . . .

A Northern Morning by Alistair Elliot from My Country:  Collected Poems (Carcanet Press)
It rained from dawn. The fire died in the night.
I poured hot water on some foreign leaves;
I brought the fire to life. Comfort
spread from the kitchen like a taste of chocolate
through the head-waters of a body,
accompanied by that little-water-music.
The knotted veins of the old house tremble and carry
a louder burden: the audience joining in.

People are peaceful in a world so lavish
with the ingredients of life:
the world of breakfast easy as Tahiti.
But we must leave. Head down in my new coat
I dodge to the High Street conscious of my fellows
damp and sad in their vegetable fibres.
But by the bus-stop I look up: the spring trees
exult in the downpour, radiant, clean for hours:
This is the life! This is the only life!

For those who mark the dates on the western church calendar, today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of the Lenten journey.  Last year I posted a poem a day for Lent on this blog and offered a brief reflection and/or question.  This year I hope to continue that practice.   

Although Ash Wednesday is my favorite day on the Christian calendar, I chose not to attend a service or get ashes this year.  That doesn't mean that I didn't reflect on my mortality and brokenness.  Quite the opposite.  I discovered having a massage on Ash Wednesday is a great opportunity to be made aware of the fragility of this life and this body.  Every kink my massage therapist attempted to knead into some semblance of order served as a reminder.  I became keenly aware that one day the hamstrings that propel me on my walks through the park and the gluts that cushion me as I sit at my desk writing will one day return to dust. 

One of my friends said last night that the liturgy should be changed to remind us
that, according to recent scientific findings, we are stardust and to stardust we shall return.

 

Returning to stardust is a lovely thought.  Returning to Ziggy Stardust, not so much.
 (With apologies to David Bowie.)

Some people understand Lent to be a time when we are to adopt strict disciplines, deny our bodies.  The message coming to me this Ash Wednesday is to be more aware of and care more for my body.  For as Elliot writes, "This the life!  This is the only life!"  And this is the only body.

So how about you? What messages were you getting as you start your Lenten journey?

Damn the Electric Fence

Well that was painful. 

I was trying to find a poem I wrote in college so I pulled down the faded blue spiral notebook in which I used to carefully transcribe "finished" poems that I'd written.  So I'd know it was my poetry notebook, I cut out and pasted this Far Side cartoon on the front:

The first page contained a poem that was written when I was in high school as an assignment for a Spanish class.  It was written in Spanish, and in Spanish it sounded pretty good.

I should have stopped reading at that point. 

These poems are bad.  Painfully bad.  Painfully, shoulder raising, teeth grimacing, ever-so-slightly nauseatingly bad. 

It's not the teenage angst, trite subject matter,  slavishness to rhyme and meter without any real ear for rhythm or sound, or any of the other hurdles that burgeoning writers must get past that pained me so much. It was that, at the time, I thought they were good.  I thought they were good and showed them to people.  I thought they were good and showed them to people who were boys.  I thought they were good and showed them to the boys for whom they were written. 

To all the previous objects of my youthful affections for whom I wrote and read poetry, I humbly apologize. 

In hindsight, my main problem was that I tried to write poetry without actually reading poetry. Unfortunately, I was NOT familiar with the works of Pablo Neruda . . . or any other modern or contemporary poet.  After my initial revulsion, I re-read some of my early attempts with a kinder eye, thinking about what advice I'd offer the budding writer I was . . . and still am. 

First and foremost, I would have encouraged my young self to read. To learn how to write a love poem I would have pointed her towards Cien Sonetos de Amor (one way to get her to study her Spanish).  I would have given her books by Billy Collins to see how to walk the fine line between humor and profundity, and introduced her to Mary Oliver to learn how to read the world around her with a poet's eye.  I would have told her that you can't write good poetry without reading good poetry.  And to find good poetry, I would have introduced her to Bloodaxe Books. 

In fact, it was a volume by Bloodaxe, Poetry with an Edge, that ended up being my primer in contemporary poetry even without the guidance of my future self.  I can't remember how I stumbled upon it in the first place as even now it's difficult to find the works of this Northumbrian publisher on bookstore shelves in the DMV.  Maybe my future self did give it to me and had to erase the memory of the encounter.  However it happened, I'm glad it did.  From Fleur Adcock to Benjamin Zephaniah, Bloodaxe has published many of the brightest and best poets of the 20th and 21st centuries. In particular, their anthologies are like the crown jewels of contemporary poetry.  Each collection contains individual gems that dazzle when taken as a whole. 

So I would have told my young self, like I'm telling you, check out Bloodaxe books.  In addition to buying their books, it's also worth spending some time playing around on their website.  You can hear poets reading their work in the video section and get recommendations for possible new-to-you poets on their "new to poetry?" page.  If you are an American poet I'd recommend steering clear of the "Want to be published by Bloodaxe?" page (abandon hope all ye who enter here) but the the little photo of a fox vaulting a sheep on their home page is alone worth the click

Carpe Libris, The February Edition

Look into my eyes . . . you are getting the urge to curl up with a good book . . . and maybe a cup of tea.

Since Punxsutawney Phil predicted an early spring four days ago, I've been busy trying to race through my winter reading list. Like this summer, I've stumbled upon other books that have begged to curl up in bed with me these dark and dreary winter afternoons. And since I'm not one to turn down the offer of a good cuddle, here's what I've been snuggling up with in recent weeks. . .

 

 

The Snowman by Jo Nesbø
Lately I've been reading a lot of books by Nordic authors.  Perhaps it's the Stieg Larsson phenomenon that's making these writers more available in translation now.  Or maybe they've been out there all along and I've just overlooked them as I usually read books set in the UK.  Whatever the reason, I'm coming to enjoy tales set in the cold climes of northern Europe almost as much as those that take place in the British Isles.  

Almost.  

The mysteries, in particular, have been a pleasant surprise, barring the aforementioned Stieg Larsson.  I made it through The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo but stopped reading the second book in the trilogy when he started inventorying the contents of the desks in the Millennium offices.  I can't handle that much irrelevant detail.  But that's okay because I found Jo Nesbø who is a master of plot and offers the tight, sparse, sharp writing I want in a Nordic writer.    

Although The Snowman isn't the first in his Harry Hole series, it was the first book I read.  Combine a detective with the requisite brilliant mind and screwed up personal life, a creepy serial killer who builds snowmen in the yards of his victims (note to readers:  if a snowman suddenly appears in your yard and he's looking towards your house rather than the street, it's probably a good time to move), and some plot twists and turns and you get a compelling, well written story.  Part of Jo Nesbø's skill as a writer comes in creating tension in plot as well as characters. I finished the book wanting to get my hands on the earlier books to find out what made Harry Hole the flawed man he is, and then read the later ones to see if he finds redemption somewhere along the line. Unfortunately the first couple books aren't out in English translation yet so I'll have to wait for now.  And while I'm waiting I can always turn to Nesbø's Doctor Proctor series which includes the sure to be classic Doctor Proctor's Fart Powder.

Eowyn Ivey's The Snow Child is another story where a person made of snow is the harbinger of an unexpected guest.  Fortunately for Jack and Mabel, the central characters in this tale set in turn-of-the-century rural Alaska, the visitor isn't a sociopath, rather a young girl who appears with the first snow fall of each year and vanishes when spring appears.  As the childless Mabel struggles to figure out whether or not the snow child is real or a creature conjured from the sorrow and pain she has tried to deny, her heart begins to thaw and she comes to accept the girl's presence as a mysterious gift.  If the story sounds familiar, it's because it is based on the Russian fairy tale of the same name.  I won't give away the ending but will say that it's a charming tale that upholds the idea that no matter how difficult it is, the best way to love someone is to let them be who they are meant to be.

I don't read on Sunday evenings between 9 - 10 pm.  Like many I am camped in front of the TV, tuned to my local PBS station, having severe wardrobe envy while watching Downton Abbey.  est assured, there will come a time in my life when I will live in a place where I will dress for dinner.  Granted, it may be when I'm 85, living in a an old age home and show up to the communal dining room decked out in taffeta and a tiara. But I hope I'm with it enough to know what I'm doing because it will be grand.  Until then, I am fortifying myself with the witty words of the Dowager Countess of Gratham and books such as The Uninvited Guests and The St. Zita Society.  

Ruth Rendell's mystery focuses more on the realm of downstairs than up, following a group of servants in contemporary Sloan Square who meet regularly in their local and dub themselves The St. Zita Society after the patron saint of domestic servants. As with all the Ruth Rendell books I've read, and I've read quite a few, this story drew me into the lives of the characters almost immediately.  I was so wrapped up in their ordinary lives that I almost forgot that in order for it to be a mystery, a crime would have to occur.  And when it did, it didn't disappoint. 

The Uninvited Guests could also be described as a mystery although it's more about secrets and deception rather than criminal offenses.  Sadie Jones's story is set a generation after Downton Abbey in a slightly less grand estate with a slightly more middle class family.  Like Downton, the Torrington's home is in peril but the family put on a brave face for their guests as they celebrate eldest daughter Emerald's 21st birthday.  The uninvited guests indicated in the title then arrive, acting as a hammer that chips away at the fragile veneer of civility and good manners the family tries to hide behind.  The characters soon show their true colors, although without the dignity and wit of Lady Violet.  Fortunately there's the delightful character, Smudge, oft-overlooked little sister in the Torrington clan, who not only adds charm to the story but who gets herself into a predicament that redeems the family and guests -- invited and uninvited alike.  Jones's writing is also top notch and I found myself pausing to revel in some of her gorgeous images. 

Finally, I've been slowly working my way through this delicious book.  I admit I've got a major writer's crush on Owen Sheers but that doesn't color this review in any way.  True, he's an adorable Welshman, but more importantly he's a brilliant young poet and an extraordinary collector of poetry.  In this anthology, Sheers has pulled together poems corresponding to six categories of British landscape-- cities, villages & towns, mountains & moorland, islands, woods & forests, and finally, coasts & sea.  Reading the poems in order, you get a sense being taken on a journey. It's like a poetic Britrail pass, although without the crying babies and tepid tea.  I have tried to assemble collections of poems (on a much much smaller scale) that have the same sense of conversation and connection.  It is a tremendous time and labor intensive venture that Sheers makes look effortless.  You can hear him talk more about his intention and process in this video.

 

 

So how about you?  What books are keeping you warm these winter evenings?  Or offering you a bit of refreshment if you're in the sunny southern hemisphere?

Listening to the tongues of trees . . .

As You Like It, Act 2, Scene I by William Shakespeare
     Are not these woods
more free from peril than the envious court?
How we feel but the penalty of Adam,
the seasons' difference; as, the icy fang
and churlish chiding of the winter's wind,
which, when it bites and blows upon my body,
even till I shrink with cold, I smile and say
'This is no flattery:  these are counsellors
that feelingly persuade me what I am.'
Sweet are the uses of adversity,
which like the toad, ugly and venomous,
wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
and this our life exempt from public haunt,
finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
sermons in stones, and good in every thing.
I would not change it.


I was going to entitle this post "Confessions of a Tree Hugger" yet as I thought about it, it's more a proclamation than a confession.  I hug trees.  I also touch, pat, caress and otherwise fondle trees.  I hesitated writing that because fondle is a word that's so often associated with things sordid and creepy these days.   The original definition, however,  means, "to stroke, handle, or touch something or somebody gently, in a loving or affectionate way."  So in addition to proclaiming I'm a tree hugger in this post, I'm rehabilitating the word fondle. 

I fondle trees.  And how can I not, when I walk in the woods and see their stories written on their bark . . . hardship and disease, uprootedness and brokenness, growth and fecundity . . . the frailty and strength heard in the tongues of trees, as Shakespeare says.   And when I do actually look up or look around long enough to notice this, I am moved to compassion, gratitude,  awe.  So I stop to fondle a tree or two along the path.

I was walking through the park a couple weeks ago and came across this tree. There was something about the way it had split at the base, partially uprooted and toppled, a beauty in its brokenness that made me pause and ponder the story it was telling me.

I daresay many human beings, myself included, tend to keep our stories inside us, the signs of our fragility are buried deep within until something breaks us open and the circles of our lives are made visible, not only to others but also to ourselves. 

This tree spoke to me about perceptions and vulnerability. It reminded me that no matter how strong and deeply rooted I think I may be, the possibility of being toppled is a reality of life that is always there.

"Sweet are the uses of adversity . . . I would not change it."
      

 



Whistling in the dark . . .

The Blessing of Brigit

I am under the shielding of good Brigit each day;
I am under the shielding of good Brigit each night.
I am under the keeping of the Nurse of Mary,
Each early and late, each dark, every light.
Brigit is my comrade-woman,
Brigit is my maker of song,
Brigit is my helping-woman,
My choicest of women, my guide.

The veneration of Bride is one of those interesting conflagrations in Celtic spirituality, the coming together of a pre-Christian goddess and fifth century saint whose stories have been woven together to create a tapestry of legends that continues to intrigue and inspire. Brighid the goddess invented keening after the death of her son and, according to the story, was the first one to whistle in the dark to let others know of her presence.   Brigid the saint traveled through time, had a magic cloak, and always seemed to find a miraculous way to provide for the sick and needy who crossed her path.  They were wise women, known for their powers of healing and both goddess and saint are credited with being keepers of the flame and patrons of poetry. 

Known by many names in the Celtic world-- Brigit, Brigid, Brighid, Bride, Ffraid, Mary of the Gael-- whatever you want to call her, today is her feast day, and the first day of Imbolc, the start of spring in the Celtic calendar. 

A great resource for learning more about
the history and rituals of Imbolc.
 

Part of following the path of Celtic spirituality in the 21st century is reimagining the rituals of the past to fit the world of today. Many of the ancient rituals of Imbolc focus on hearth and home, a realm watched over by Brigit. Cleaning out clutter, kindling the hearth, lighting fires, and inviting the holy to cross the threshold are all activities for the beginning of spring.  Earlier this week I did some decluttering as I sensed a whiff of spring in the air when I spied way-too-early blossoms on a cherry tree near the cathedral and noticed the maple tree in my backyard is kindling little red buds on the tips of its branches. 

But now Imbolc has officially arrived and I'm wondering how to best mark the day.  (Cleaning is NOT an option.)  What keeps coming to me is the idea of tending the flame.  How can I kindle my creative energy, fill that well of writing that I feel is running dry? 

As I was journaling this morning I wrote that I feel like my writing is out there somewhere shrouded in a dense fog and every time I try to reach for it, I end up bumping up against something I didn't expect that knocks me off kilter.  Instead of trying to move forward in the dark, as was my plan for the day when I woke up this morning, maybe for the rest of the afternoon I just need to sit still, be quiet, and wait for Brighid to whistle. . .      

You gotta love a goddess who can conjure up her own light to read in the dark!