Frants Diderik Bøe, “Birds in the Midnight Sun,” [Public domain]
When you soar—
up through purple mist
is there beauty there?
Blue shadows lick
the red rocks
a lazy sky-spray sings,
but rain recalls dreams–
the sweet smell of peaches–
and yet the wind cries why
as a symphony, a moan
an ache in me sleeps
The Oracle sends me lyrical questions. I hit “Publish” too quickly! Re-publishing this with my screen shot.
So, first I published my musings without a title
then I forgot to erase my random thoughts–
the scribbles on the metaphorical napkin–
the unpremeditated words,
that come flying from my mind,
aimless, falling like autumn leaves. . .
and now you see that first process
before other ideas came to me—
while I brushed first my teeth
and then my cat’s
(because good dental hygiene is important
but doesn’t require much brain power).
So, I’ll just leave that post up as a monument
to first and second thoughts,
and perhaps a third,
even as I took a breath,
I somehow forgot to breathe.
In today’s Monday Morning Musings there is a gap between “the real post” and the first scribbled thoughts that I forgot to delete. Now you see how I work. 🙂 I did correct the title, but I didn’t scroll down far enough to notice that gibberish. And I also misspelled “breathe.” Also, the WP Gremlins seem to be active today, so who knows what may happen to this post. BEWARE! NOW, I’m getting back to work. Really. In just a few minutes. . .
Most of Rina Bannerjee’s artwork has very long titles.
“Poverty made a sound like a wet cough in the shadows of the room.”
–Ray Bradbury (Referenced here.)
There’s ice on the river,
but it will melt,
not so some hearts
that stay ever frozen,
no warm current flows
there to thaw,
the cold. No way
to resuscitate the lifeless
zombies
feeding on the living.
Yet they proclaim
their love of life
when it’s cells
they pretend to care about–
but not the ones
into which people are thrown
not the children taken
and lost
and not their parents–
only the cells that might be,
not the violence
that affects them,
not the guns or poverty.
Power and money
their gods
though they pay lip-service
to a deity
twisted to defend
their beliefs.
It’s an age-old tale,
a universal truth that
the mighty can tumble,
but those just getting by
fall over the edge
and into a ravine
often unseen,
there to remain,
but it can happen
to almost anyone
without influence
or connections.
Perhaps—
connection
is the key,
if only to one
lock
of the many–
the librarian
who makes the homeless child
feel special,
the immigration officer,
who learns that
that law and morality
and not always the same thing.
We walk through city streets
where murals bring beauty–
and truth,
and a museum opens its doors
and galleries
to new works among the old–
social and economic inequality
consumption of people and goods
the movement of people and goods
across the globe–
a complex interaction
of thought, art, and words.
I amuse myself in imagining
my father and older daughter
walking though these rooms–
he, who wrote a dissertation
on Charles Willson Peale,
and she, an artist with a passion
for justice. What fun they would
have had here.What a discussion
they might have had—
perhaps in some alternative world,
but here, we are
and we go to a movie
immersed in a world that does exist–
It is fiction, but tells a truth
of poverty, chaos
that most of us cannot imagine.
Through it a young boy navigates
with defiance, bravery, spirit—and kindness
rising above it all
despite the example
of his parents, and many
around him blind to what is before them.
A story again of immigrants, too,
because this another universal truth
that people move and come legally and illegally
to Ethiopia, Lebanon, Iceland, the U.S.
to which my grandparents came.
And your ancestors were immigrants too
if you look back far enough.
And were they helped by someone?
Most likely.
We each walk our own paths
with tenuous connections
that sometimes mesh
or interact.
The meteorologist says
there’s freezing fog today
but the temperatures will rise,
and the ice will melt
But some hearts will stay cold
and some minds will remain frozen
screens where the cursor never moves
to write new thoughts.
We saw And Breath Normally. It’s on Netflix, trailer here. It’s a quiet movie (no music, Dale!), but well done, about a immigration officer in Iceland and the African refugee who helps her. Though it’s set in Iceland, it could have taken place in many different nations. And we saw Capernaum (trailer here), which will just rip your insides outs. That little boy AND that toddler, and the horrible parents, and the surroundings. . .yeah, just see it.
We went to the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts where Rina Bannerjee’s work is on display until March 31. (Free on Sundays during the exhibition). You can see and read more about her work here.
My grandmothers, both immigrants
I amuse myself by imagining my father and my older daughter walking through the gallery discussing his view of the Peales and her views on art and feminism. They would have had so much fun.
Art
Resistence spices peel never imagine without inheritance I see revealed
Sun disguises well the feather we see while home
Stop these storms
She sings of summer
While the wind urges elaborate dreams
Heaving enormous fluff
When
Her heart healed
He looked long
Letting it be less
Herself
Him
The perfume of need and want
Melting
In embrace
Timeless as the ocean
Exploring the night
Robert Vonnoh, “Lingering Rain” Public Domain, Wikipedia Commons
Recall, she says,
we watched the moon
and time stopped
as shadow mist played
above the blue forest.
What was it you wanted?
Us?
The sea?
A dream of if—
lives on for us, my love,
like the smell of spring rain
as sun shines through it.
From today’s visit to the Oracle.
Caspar David Friedrich
A ghost from eternity
haunted me
like a laugh
in rhythm with time.
And it dazzled,
embraced the night in perfume
and celebrated caramel-colored days in dance–
almost always–
we could
and did
more or less like need,
to heal.
Then it said go,
the window is open—
but listen for poetry,
it surrounds you.
My weekly message from the Magnetic Poetry Oracle.
“Luis Fernández García, “Susanna and the Elders,” [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)%5D, from Wikimedia Commons
She shed her old life the day the soldiers came,
sloughed like a snakeskin. Perhaps
traces remain to be found someday
in a dusty archive, a notation in a book,
but she has grown, now
metamorphosed,
each day she wears a new persona—
school girl, maid, shy lover—
they think she’s eager to accept
their upright soldiers, ramparts breached
they thrust to claim her,
but she’s eager only for information–
spilled words that she can pass along, not their seeds
she does not want planted.
So, she listens, and they disregard her—
seeing only body, not mind.
She shed her old life when the soldiers came—
she lives in shadows,
hoping for a new life, a new skin
that need not be shredded and shed.
This is for Lillian’s “shed” prompt on dVerse,
Peder Severin Krøyer [Public domain] “Summer Evening at Skagen beach, the artist and his wife”
there with us,
purple shadows—
and above,
the moon,
diamond cool,
urging, what?
We want beauty and music
(so, we say)
Summer sea-sprayed lives
and the smell of storms
that blow away—
as life must—
but still—
you ask why?
I haven’t had much time to read or write poetry this week, but I didn’t want to miss my weekly consult with the Oracle. Her message seems appropriate for MLK weekend and the Women’s Marches today–and the Super Blood Moon lunar eclipse.
Whispered chants, when
must it all go?
So, with a moan,
she soars through shadows
as the moon sings of time
in blooded beats
and
if
she asks—aching—
is it never yet?
A thousand whys—
but still she dreams
of wind-sprayed skin
and purple seas
This is for Open Link Night at dVerse, where Grace is hosting. I don’t usually consult The Magnetic Poetry Oracle until Saturday, but it’s been a strange week anyway, and then I saw the report about the oceans are warming up faster than has been anticipated. Well, the Oracle knows everything. A bit of surrealism here perhaps—it seems fitting.
Vincent van Gogh, “Wheat field in Rain” [Public Domain]via Wikipedia Commons
licks pink from the sky
and shadowed mist
cries a raw symphony of aching sighs,
you trudge to–
or from—
wanting. . .
whispering. . .
“There the sun rose in honeyed music,
sang of life when”
So our dreams together
recall time
My message from the Magnetic Poetry Oracle. She’s knows it’s raining here—again.
Soaring through dream-time. . .
we watch the sea pounding
gorgeous fluff licking
sun shadows–
beauty at play.
Summer storms whisper,
a symphony
the wind urges
in language of will—not when—
and there is life,
sad, bitter, delirious, and luscious—
all that—and love.
I consulted the Oracle earlier this morning, but I’m just getting a chance to post it now. It seems a like a good message, especially this time of year.
