I put my wishes in a box of sparkling air
send them off so you can share–
send them—there!–
to fly through star-filled skies,
scatter, fall, like meteor showers
land, bloom as luminescent flowers
of hope and joy,
on worlds restored, not destroyed.
I just put up a post about my new books, so now for something completely different–a quadrille for dVerse. De Jackson, aka Whimsy Gizmo, has asked us to use the word “box.” This is my anti-darkness quadrille. 🙂
I’ve had two books on rape/rape culture published recently–because for some reason, I thought working on two books at the same time would not be a problem. I could not have done it though if my co-editor on the Rape Cultures book, Tuba Inal, had not done so much of the work. I forgot to announce this second one on my blog, so here are both of them. They are both two-volume reference books, and in addition to editing them, I also wrote chapters in each one.
This one just came out. Amazon says August 31.
Rape Cultures and Survivors, edited by
Tuba Inal and Merril D. Smith
Encyclopedia of Rape and Sexual Violence,
edited by Merril D. Smith
“Poetry isn’t a profession, it’s a way of life. It’s an empty basket; you put your life into it and make something out of that.”
–Mary Oliver, Georgia Review (Winter 1981), 733.“There is nothing stronger than a broken woman who has rebuilt herself.”
“I have a right to be angry, but not to spread it.”
–Hannah Gadsby’s, “Nanette”
Ask why an ancient wind
rose beneath a hot sun–
they never will
see souls rustle in soft shade.
So,
murmur harmony
to nature’s song
and feel life bloom
***
We listen to the woman, a masterful storyteller,
skilled at creating tension—and
relieving it with a punchline,
but in this set,
she lets the tension linger–
at least for a while
noting both her anger
and its reasons—
reasons that should anger us all.
I think of that,
as neo-Nazis gather in our nation’s capital.
Neo-Nazi? Why should there be new ones
after the defeat of the old ones?
I ponder the other labels–
shouldn’t we all be anti-fascist
and united against hate?
It should be the default mode, shouldn’t it?
The novel I’m reading is set in
the early 1930s in Berlin,
the female protagonist had a gay brother
who was murdered.
While they were growing up, she tried
to teach him what she called
“A Code of Masculinity,”
so, he could pass,
but he didn’t.
Hannah Gadsby
in the 1990s in Australia
was assaulted for not being
feminine enough,
she couldn’t pass either. But growing up,
in a culture where she was reviled, left its
legacy on her. She talks about the shame
she felt for being a lesbian, for being different.
I think about trying to explain
these weird and artificial binaries
to a visitor from another world,
But how could I,
when they make no sense to me?
You must be this color,
you must love this person,
you must be this religion. Why?
And where do I go with this? I seem to have
gone off on a tangent–because
I wanted to tell you about baskets.
Picture the basket itself,
woven together from strands of straw, reeds, or
even wire,
each one different.
And my life, also woven of many different strands.
I weave my basket, and sometimes I take it apart
and start over.
So, let me tell you how
we celebrated the anniversary of my father’s birth—
He would have been ninety-nine. He’s been dead for twenty years,
and I still miss him.
We toasted him with wine–
and ate ice cream afterward,
because he loved ice cream.
We eat Pakistani food with our younger daughter and her husband,
enjoying samosas and other delights
as their dog and cat circle the table,
where there were no scraps tossed,
but love drips,
like melting ice cream,
because it can be messy,
but there is plenty to go around.
I could tell you about being with
dear friends over the weekend,
how we eat pizza,
and discuss that new normal, how
it is difficult not to discuss politics
but at the same time,
conversations are fraught
with hesitation—or anger.
How can one be friends with someone
who supports a racist?
The saying goes, “Don’t put all your eggs
in one basket.”
We should welcome those who think
differently or look different.
And isn’t part of the joy of having
a full basket
come in examining its contents?
There is so much we do not see.
We toss everything
in the basket of life, and pull out what we need
or what we want. But maybe sometimes
we need to look at the basket itself.
There is no punchline here.
We watched “Nanette” on Netflix. Trailer here.
I’m reading the novel A Trace of Smoke by Rebecca Cantrell.
Reminder that Vita Brevis is having a haiku competition. We’re having fun. All of the haiku are in the comments.
Here’s mine:
mockingbird’s wings flash–
night songs drift from silvered branch,
bright dreams fly starward
Charcoal clouds gather
together they roil, blow
with stormy fervor
the winds of change, so ruthless
I fear, yet watch for rainbows
A tanka for Colleen’s Tanka Tuesday, using synonyms for passion and congregate.
This seems appropriate for today. It’s the one-year anniversary of the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, and we are expecting thunderstorms here in New Jersey.
Poetry joy is open—
come dance!
Voices color a universe
with words breathing perfume
and bleeding.
Celebrate and linger–
remembering when, yet, and
always after. . .
in blue clouds of time
The Oracle gave me this bit of joy today. I think it means I should write poetry today and not bother with anything else. 🙂
This looks fun! I know some of my blogger friends will want to do this. I will, too. 🙂
Vita Brevis is hosting a four-day haiku competition–taking place entirely in the comment section of this post!
Here’s What You Need to Know:
How to Submit:
1. Submit one nature-themed haiku as a comment on this post
2. Reblog this post on your blog or write a post announcing that you’ve entered it
3. (Optional) Give good feedback on other commenters’ work!
Theme: Nature
Reward: We’ll publish the winning poet, featuring their haiku on the front page of our online magazine with a link to their blog.
When: Starting right now (08/10), ending Monday night (08/13)
Questions: Use our Contact Us page–I’ll get back to you soon!
I’ll try to respond to as many of you as I can–get writing and have fun!
I think of my dad today and how he admired Tony Hillerman’s novels, mysteries involving the Navajo Tribal Police. Once he wrote Mr. Hillerman a letter and received a gracious reply. It’s been twenty years now since my father died. He’d be ninety-nine today—perhaps he’d have new favorite books and authors. He was a man filled with passion—for food, women, art, history–and for his children and grandchildren. He thought we were the best and brightest, no question. Though he expected all to wait upon him–courtiers of the court of Lee–yet—he was generous with love, presents, and hundreds of restaurant meals. He was always proud of me and assigned my first book to his history classes. (Sorry). I wish my dad was still here to read my words. I love you, Dad. I miss you.
yellow-green stems grow
vivid blooms in summer’s heat—
then red-gold leaves fall
This is for open link night at dVerse, where Lillian is hosting. I’ve given a nod to National Book Lovers Day in my Haibun.
Enchanting dawn slips
silently past the night,
and with her rosy lips
scatters her light
as she kisses the world awake.
Then—I ache
remembering my dreams
of blue ponies by incandescent streams.
I’ve seen them as I danced among the stars,
but in the light of day,
their world seems much too far away–
and yet–
I know, if never truly seen, still the ponies are there. . .
prancing, shining with blueish sheen, somewhere.
Franz Marc, “Blue Horses,”(Public Domain) Wikipedia Commons
This is for dVerse, where Jilly asked us to write about “unseen.” Last week, Jane Dougherty reminded me about the blue horses. She knows they’re real, too.
“We have grown to trust blindly in our senses of balance and reason, and I can see where the mind might fight wildly to preserve its own familiar stable patterns against all evidence that it was leaning sideways.”
–Shirley Jackson, The Haunting of Hill House
The weather has been erratic. Storms followed by sunshine, but always hot, only the level of humidity changes. The volatile, vacillating moods are echoed in the movie we see about a woman with an abusive husband and their custody battle. Neither child wants to see the father, but the daughter, who is almost eighteen, doesn’t have to. It’s the ten-year-old son, Julian, who must submit to visiting his father in this movie that becomes an intense thriller, rather than a legal drama. After the movie, we walk through Old City, where ghosts still walk, flitting through gates to hover over flowers, and drift over the cobblestone streets.
Sun-chased charcoal clouds
tumble through the evening sky
bright blooms smile hello
Summer in Old City, Philadelphia
We sip wine another night as the sky changes once again—blue turning grey. But we stay.
Wine glasses turn red,
echoes of the summer blooms
coloring the gloom
William Heritage Winery, NJ
We travel to the New Jersey Fringe Festival in Hammonton, NJ—“Blueberry Capital of the World.” We see three short plays, funny, touching, strange. (It is fringe after all.)
Summer festivals
walk through human emotion,
taste laughter and tears
We see a play about two fantasy worlds colliding,
sliding together
the man who lives in a porno world
meets a woman
then hurled
into her action hero world.
We thought the script could be tightened,
some excised, some enlightened,
but it was silly fun—and we’d only just begun
when off to the next one
about a man with two cartoon character names
and a most awkward life,
not so much filled with strife,
rather loneliness and seeking to connect
(even when his house is wrecked)
it’s whimsical, with ukulele and narration
and women who give him quite an education
in their multiple roles in his life, unlucky as it is
somehow, we see some hope at the end in his.
We pause to shop and eat gelato
NJ Fringe Festival,
Hammonton, NJ
walk through the flow, and then go
onto the next play
stay there in the small, hot basement room
listen to the man, the actor, speak,
we jump at every creak
we’ve seen him before
(someone opens the door
to cool the room a bit,
and still we sit).
Last year he performed here
serial murderer Jeffery Dahmer,
he is compelling, in this telling
of the ghosts and demons he has seen.
All the evidence leaning sideways,
We always
Try to make sense of what we see and fear
And here
With theater we sway a bit—wonder what is real
What did he see? What did he feel?
Is it all a metaphor for inner trauma,
Packaged as paranormal drama?
And does it matter if it is?
We take what he gives
entertainment and thoughtful reflection
we walk and talk in the direction
of our car. Then off to dinner, a day well spent
in this summer event.
The clouds fly by—
perhaps it’s my fantasy
to see ghosts and shadow figures in the sky.
I decided to play with form a bit today–Haibun and rhyme.
We saw the French movie, Custody. Trailer here. We went to the NJ Fringe Festival and saw, Wildest Fantasy, The Most Awkward Love Life of Peabody Magoo, and Ghost Stories.
We ate dinner at Mera Khana in Berlin, NJ, where I finally got my vegetable samosas. (Everything they make is delicious.)
