During busy times, we may need a few moments of solitary reflection.
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Full moon moonlight
Sony Cyber-shot DSC-V1
10/800s, f 2.8, ISO 100, 7 mm
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flower moon
fireflies enlighten
the pear tree
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I’m currently reading David Bayles’ and Ted Orland’s encouraging little book, Art & Fear. Nice reading to tuck around the edges of a few full weeks.
Nesting. I’ve just finished reading Sarah Robinson’s thoughtful, gentle book by that title, which has offered me interior space at a time I need it. Deborah Barlow does a lovely review here.
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Outside my window every morning…conference of the birds.
The Conference of the Birds (or The Speech of Birds, or The Bird Parliament) is a Persian (Sufi) poem by Attar of Nishapur, an allegory of sorts in which the hoopoe instructs the other birds on how to find their king, which they can do by following the path of the right way to live. Here is an excerpt from the 1888 FitzGerald translation:
Behold the Grace of Allah comes and goes
As to Itself is good: and no one knows
Which way it turns: in that mysterious Court
Not he most finds who furthest travels for’t.
For one may crawl upon his knees Life-long,
And yet may never reach, or all go wrong:
Another just arriving at the Place
He toil’d for, and—the Door shut in his Face:
Whereas Another, scarcely gone a Stride,
And suddenly—Behold he is Inside!—
There are more adept, contemporary translations such as those by Dick Davis, Sholeh Wolpe, or others. This one’s copyright free and thus available here.
The poem inspired the title composition of one of my favorite jazz albums of all time, this one by The Dave Holland Quartet, recorded in 1972. A college friend who loved Anthony Braxton’s music introduced me to this record, and it was one of the things I had in common with my dear David Dunn–early in our friendship, we learned that we loved some of the same poets and some of the same music.
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Nesting season. The earliest fledglings have begun to leave their temporary homes. Some birds seem to return to their house sites–or perhaps their offspring do so. There are ledges here that shelter robins’ nests every year; there are certain trees the orioles seem to favor over and over again.
My children “fledged” some time ago. One’s returning to the house soon, but only for a visit. All homes, no matter how long loved and lived in, are only temporary shelters.
Thanks to a student who pointed out how many of the links to the right (on this blog page) were inoperable, I have finally updated them. Well, most of them; I have limited time for tweaking around on my WordPress settings page.
Links appeal to me because they mean connection. The interconnectedness of the web parallels the many relationships among human beings, societies, and environmental entities from forest to desert, as well as infrastructural connections from town to city and across waters and the physiological connections that make life in a carbon-based embodiment possible. And neuro-connections that maintain our pulses and our consciousness–without such linkages, what would we be?
see link in para. 3
Our genetic linkage influences what we look like, what forms of illness or robustness our bodies possess, and the likelihood of carrying those traits to our offspring.
When we link ideas or concepts or theories, the resulting concatenation can be innovative, revelatory, novel–even if the result is a failure, there’s much to learn from trying to solve the puzzles we encounter when putting together unlike things.
Writing a poem, for example, involves such a combinatory effort. Combinatory logic is a mathematical concept but an intriguing metaphor for what poets do when we mash together observations with ideas and emotions and whatever values each writer operates under.
Linkage permits us to steer things, too, and to integrate systems elegantly:
[thanks to OEM Off-Highway]
So, please check out the links to my work and to the interesting sites on the right of the page on this post. And likewise, links below (yes, I am still taking part in reading blogs on the Blog Tour!)
On capital letters in poems and making craft choices in poetry, an interesting blog post by Marly Youmans.
And Leslie Wheeler on whether a poem can be a monument.
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May you remain always connected, one way or another.
The other day, I mentioned to a friend that I anticipate a busy May, what with sundry beloveds graduating and having birthdays, and visitors from far places, and the end of the academic year at my place of employ, and prime planting-out-the-vegetable-garden season upon me…
She said perhaps I am overwhelmed.
All of the above events are wonderful things. And I have considerable help in accomplishing them, so there are no great burdens on my shoulders. Overwhelmed sounds, well, overstated. That got me thinking about the words overwhelmed and its opposite, underwhelmed–is there a “whelmed,” just on its own?
Turns out there is (archaic, notes Merriam-Webster):
And its source is Middle English (thank you, Online Etymology Dictionary):
early 14c., Middle English whelmen “to turn upside down”… Figurative sense of overwhelm as “to bring to ruin” is attested from 1520s.
Maybe I am whelmed, then, as per definition 2 above; the feeling I have doesn’t jive with the connotation of “to bring ruin.”
At any rate, I herewith offer some diversions by writers of other blogs and sites instead of my own work–with the exception of the first link on “Say It Today.” Read and explore and allow what’s delightful to wash over you without disastrous effect. 🙂
From Haverfordwest Library, accessed through Casgliad y Werin Cymru
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Brothers & Storytellers, a brief essay of gratitude at Say It Today
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Lesley Wheeler’s delightful, on-the-spur-of-the-moment, Day 29 of National Poetry Month poem should amuse those who write poetry and those who meditate and…well, just fun.
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Donna Vorreyer on writing “a whole lotta poems.”
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Kelli Russell Agodon on writing a poem a day (and forgetting about quality).
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Finally, Theodora Goss on love, home, and work–priorities that feel pretty “right” to me.
The landscape’s brought colors and pollinators and all the juiciness of reproduction cycles into the season’s height. Time to take walks and breathe.
And say nothing.
And let the words subside for awhile, and percolate the way the rains percolate through the wet, warm soil and into the waiting earth.
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ann e michael 