pickin time

 

in the garden and the wilderness

undulating rows of sea island or maybe pima

rising and falling in tides of dowdy white

they wait…

 

squinting , I wade inside embarrassed,

like an awkward traveler to an exotic shore

seeking to trade nothing for something

I snake…

 

between the stalks that seek to swallow my

trespasses…My breath--held in expectation of

sights and sounds and smells feeling so new to me

yet so familiar…

 

I am aching in my need to know them for who they are:

not who they pretend to be with upturned white faces

occasionally nodding in approval but more often just staring

at me like the foreigner I am…

 

they cut me?

bleeding into their dead sea souls

leaving small dropped traces of myself: unrecognizable

in mirrored silence…until the crows caw me back...

 

slave to my words

to my work

to my thoughts

to my hands

I promclaim myself…

 

A writer.

God, Pet Semetary, Tolstoy and Ravi ~ Improvising truth.

In the olden days, I believe Mozart also improvised on piano, but somehow in the last 200 years, the whole training of Western classical music - they don't read between the lines, they just read the lines.

Ravi Shankar

 

 

 

This has been a very weird, Jungian, connect the dots, kind of week.  First I had a quote from (of all things) Pet Semetary rattling around in my head.  It was the scene where Jud was discussing Missy’s suicide with the main character, the doctor, Louis.  Jud says, “God sees the truth, but waits.”

Hmmmm…

I googled that phrase because it seemed just a little too good to be something uttered by a supporting character in a movie.  Sure enough, I’m correct. Turns out, that’s the title of the short story by Leo Tolstoy.  So now I’m wikipedia’ing the plot of the story:

"God Sees the Truth, But Waits"(Russian: "Бог правду видит, да не скоро скажет", "Bog pravdu vidit da ne skoro skazhet") is a short story by Russian author Leo Tolstoy first published in 1872. The story, about a man sent to prison for a murder he didn't commit, takes the form of a parable of forgiveness. English translations were also published under titles "The Confessed Crime" and "Exiled to Siberia". The concept of the story of a man wrongfully accused of murder and banished to Siberia also appears in one of Tolstoy's previous works, "War and Peace", during a philosophical discussion among two characters who relate the story and argue how the protagonist of their story deals with injustice and fate.

 

Reading that paragraph was no less than an epiphany to me. “Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption” anyone? A tunnel even plays into the story….I can’t make this kind of stuff up! I mean, King totally ripped off that plot right?  No offense Mr. King if you happen to be reading this (my attempt at sarcasm.) I mean they say there are only 5 basic plots ever written and we all re-form those plots to our liking but recently tunnels and domes have been showing up as little breadcrumbs probably telling me as a writer that “It’s okay to NOT reinvent the wheel here. After all one of your favorite authors didn’t!”

This simmers in my head.

So finally another favorite of mine shows up just in time to tie this week neatly together:  Mr. Ravi Shankar. I love improvisational baroque kinds of music, especially meditative ones and find his Ragu Piloo on “West meets East” exquisite.  I spin it often in my cd player, but this week I pulled it out and more than once made myself late to listen to the whole Raga.  I also happen to stumble on his daughter’s homage to him recently and one of the quotes was what I’ve placed at the top of the page. ^^

I laughed.

I’m all **about** reading between the lines. It’s what I do because no matter how rational and pleasing I try to be, I can’t help but do it because life is more fun this way---and makes more sense.  See, to me we are all God’s truth? We all have a divine purpose here on this earth, and that purpose is glaringly apparent in our youth as we find our talents.  But in our efforts to “be successful” and be pleasing in other’s eyes, we tend to just read the lines because we’re programmed that is what we’re supposed to doing. We create a cycle also because that is what we teach our children to do as well, to trust our “knowledge” instead of their intuition.

I don’t think it is what we’re supposed to be doing at all?

I think we’re supposed to be improvising.

And that is our truth.

Ocean’s breath for Stephen and Lorca

green how I love you green:
the tint of my faerie wings in
gossamer’d foamy ocean love
whispering to the gypsy moon above:

I hear him calling me from that foamy wide?
familiarly around my waist his laced fingers slide
so perfectly willing and thrilling my soul
green goddess beauty in love made wholly

free in silver flight, misfit hazy skimming
across that ocean’s breath this starry night ~

green how I love you green,
the silver blue green mingling of the sea,
phosphorus currents mixing magically
igniting imagination’s fire, your eyes shining

free in desire, poet’s hazy dreaming
upon that ocean’s breath this starry poem is agreeing~

with that green fading into blue, silver laced melancholy
falling ~ I hear your ocean’d breathy voice calling

and we’re closer…

closer to that green.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federico_Garc%C3%ADa_Lorca

Why do we do this?

why do we do this?

we do it because we love it.



this dance of words...

courage hurled upon a page,

persuading ourselves

despite our constant parade of humanity

that calamity of life is wonderful

amid those fragile shells



we tiptoe around ~

the silent sounding thoughts;

the echoes in our collective head…

that secretly dread the day when east meets west

without apology and we are facing

that omniscient horizon.



what will we find then?



when time no longer matters and the

days are scattered out before us

without that thin line that grounded us along?

how will our rhymes sound then

amid the babbling den of everything?



or nothing?



I’m wondering? will the temptation arise

to double back within the loop of space

erasing all the waiting from before and

seize the day’s open door of opportunity

in that stunning gift of frail human possibility

once we finally grow and know….



why we do this?

why we do this...revisited

why do we do this?

we do it because we love it.

this dance of words...
courage hurled upon a page,
persuading ourselves
despite our constant parade of humanity
that calamity of life is wonderful
amid those fragile shells

we tiptoe around ~
the silent sounding thoughts;
the echoes in our collective head…
that secretly dread the day when east meets west
without apology and we are facing
that omniscient horizon.

what will we find then?

when time no longer matters and the
days are scattered out before us
without that thin line that grounded us along?
how will our rhymes sound then
amid the babbling den of everything?

or nothing?

I’m wondering? will the temptation arise
to double back within the loop of space
erasing all the waiting from before and
seize the day’s open door of opportunity
in that stunning gift of frail human possibility
once we finally grow and know….

why we do this?


I wrote this of course about writing, and the collected words I feel compelled to arrange and rearrange all the time. But the image that always comes to mind when I read this poem is vintage typewriters. I have one vintage typewriter, but would love to have another--especially a color.

Grace Light's lovely name reflects her really interesting blog called Poetic Home that combines the idea of living with poetry nicely. She describes her blog as dedicated to poetic interior design, and that's certainly the kind of space I crave. I also love she has a whole category devoted to "typewriter love."

If any of you love and live with vintage typewriters, show me the way.