Monday Morning Musings:
Magic is always pushing and drawing and making things out of nothing. Everything is made out of magic, leaves and trees, flowers and birds, badgers and foxes and squirrels and people. So it must be all around us. In this garden – in all the places.”
–Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Secret Garden
“When you look at a piece of delicately spun glass you think of two things: how beautiful it is and how easily it can be broken.”
–Tennessee Williams, The Glass Menagerie
I dream about time
and death
and mothers mad with a thousand aches
whose cries shatter the skies
like glass
yet never disturb the shadow figures
or the thunder clouds of war and destruction.
The manufacturers of death never go out of business
and the rain only washes the surface blood away
We go searching for magic
in the break between storms
when the sky is blue
and the world around us is green
on what were abandoned lots
filled with trash,
we find magic, human made
from glass and stone,
sparkling, glittering, honed
with skill, passion, artistic vision–
whimsy combined with social justice
and a creative spirit
We walk down South Street
(“Where do all the hippies meet?”)
“You must know where all the bodies are buried,”
says one man to another at a café table.
He agrees he does,
and while I want to know more,
we keep walking, till
a police officer stops us,
on the sidewalk,
not to ask us about bodies,
but instead, to talk up a restaurant,
“They make the best gyros, full of meat.
I eat there all the time.”
Do we look hungry, I wonder?
We thank him,
keep walking,
observing magic all around,
sometimes you just have to look up.
We wander through shady green–
Hoping these souls are at rest—
and seeing magic all around us,
in the sparrows flitting and chirping in the bushes
and in the flowers glowing in the sunlight.
In between storms,
when lightning flashes
and rain, first pounds
then tinkles delicately—
like glass chimes–
we look for Earth’s magic
reborn
in plants and vegetables,
strawberries,
tasting of sunlight and summer heat
And so, we recall,
that life is luscious still
look through glass darkly
see what is half empty,
half full,
mend the broken shatters
into a thing of beauty.
And on this cloudy day
while people mourn and celebrate
the fragility of life
I will think of magic,
baking a pie that tastes
of sunlight and summer heat
and life, tart and sweet.
Today is Memorial Day in the U.S.
We visited Philadelphia Magic Gardens a few days ago and then walked around Old City.
We went to Joan’s Farm Stand, in Mickleton, NJ.
I feel the magic all around. I’m glad you were able to celebrate this day with the walk-about. Lovely pictures, too!
Thank you very much, Vivian! 🙂
What magical art around you! And the magic of your excursions. I love the policeman bit hah!
Thanks, Luanne.
The policeman was really funny. We were just walking, and he came up to us and asked if we had ever eaten at that restaurant and then went on and on about how wonderful it is. 🙂
It’s a pretty funny story. It would be a good scene in a comedic movie!
He had a sort of Don knotts look. 😉
Oh, Don could have played that role to perfection!
🙂
You are lucky to have to much man-made magic around you, and to be able to turn it into poetry magic 🙂
Awww–thank you, Jane!
Last night we were at younger daughter’s house. As she was dealing with crazy pets, I told her about yours. 🙂
We were all out in the storm last night with flashlights looking for Trixie, for an HOUR. If the kids hadn’t been here, I’d probably not have panicked but they get worked up about foxes and the things that creep around the house at night. She eventually appeared at 11.30pm out of a box of clothes in the attic…
I’d be crazed right along with your kids!
I’m glad she was OK. She probably was snoozing up there the whole time. 🙂
She doesn’t like storms. The daft little cat is completely oblivious but Trixie hides during storms.
Mickey, our big white cat, used to hide before we even heard the thunder, but now he’s brave, and he only runs if there are loud thunder claps. They also both run from the vacuum cleaner, and Mickey has peed on it, too. 😉
Ha ha! I love that. Cats have such an unsubtle way of taking revenge. Poor Finbar finds someone has peed in his bed rather too often 🙂
🙂
Poignant poem, Merril. Made me cry a bit. Then I came to South Street. I remember walking it once (when I was a teenager) looking for all the hippies. All I found were boarded up windows. :-0
Magic in glass – fragile, delicate, breakable. Just like us.
Thank you, Pam.
South Street varies from block to block–there are boarded windows, urban messiness, and kitsch–and magic gardens. And yes, about glass, just like us. Sometimes sharp and pointed and beautiful, too.
X O
Your opening metaphor is fantastic, Merril. Tragic, but fantastic.
I had to laugh at the cop story. I pictured him wearing a sandwich sign as he patrolled the street.
Thanks so much, Ken. The Oracle helped me with that first part. 🙂
The cop was so funny–not that he meant to be–but it was just so random. Like something that would happen on Seinfeld. 🙂
Whoa, Merril! Your husband and you look really good in this picture! The setting suited both of you.
You could do portrait photography. . . The woman who may be Joan (?) at the farm stand is radiant! It is magical, the glowing face and posters. . .
Did you offer to send it to her email or phone?
The strawberries looks so ripe and juicy.
The brightness in skies, storms passing and beautiful artworks are well described!
Thank you, Robin. Some stranger took the photo of us at Philadelphia Magic Gardens after they asked me to take one of them. I was pleased with it, too.
Joan at the farm stand is the mother of one of the instructors at the gym I go to. I asked her if it was OK to post it–they’re both on Facebook, and I tagged her daughter, so I think she saw the photo. The strawberries were delicious–plain and in the pie I baked.