Blessings

Carved in Stone 37

Carved in Stone
37

A great blue heron,
half-buried in the sand,
lies, covered in flies.

What words could I carve
in sand beside his grave?

What words would I carve
on mine?
What could anyone say?

I guess I could say
that I was happy,
in spite of the pain,
but would I do it
all again?

Commentary:

I guess I could say that I was happy, in spite of the pain, but would I do it all again? – Good question, and I have no answer to that question. Is life circular? Do we pass on from existence to existence, learning as we go? Some religions think so. Do the participants and believers have a choice? That I do not know.

Would we, like the English cricket team currently in Australia, make the same mistakes again and again, never learning from each dismissal, never learning from the blows given to another’s body or head? All good questions. Or would we learn from each life, each circumstance, slowly ascending a sort of Platonic Ladder until we climbed to the highest level of perfection? Who knows? I most certainly don’t. Nor do I know where the light and the flame go when I blow out the candle.

So many mysteries, as the fate of my little bird was a mystery, as the fate of the fish in the first photo was also a mystery. Albert Camus – meurtriers ou victimes? Are these the only choices that we have, to be the predator or the prey? I most certainly hope not. Libre albedrío – free will in the Calderonian world of the seventeenth century in Spain. But how free are we? What cultural and developmental chains bind us, pull us down, and are we surrounded by our childhood and our culture, and our education, in such a way that we have little or no choice in how we think and what we do?

Answers by air mail, please, and tied to the back of a great blue heron, preferably the one in the upper photo, not in the lower one!

Carved in Stone 36

Carved in Stone
36

Words, cast stones,
ripples spreading out
across water, reaching out
and beyond this shore,
traveling, how long,
in time and space?

Will they last longer,
than the sanderling’s prints,
their silent words upon dry sand,
wet, when waves come in
to wipe them all away.

Gone forever,
until next day,
when the outgoing tide
permits new birds
to create fresh messages.

Commentary:
La poesía se explica sola, si no, no se explica. Pedro Salinas (Spanish Poet, Generation of ’27). Poetry explains itself, if it doesn’t, it’s inexplicable.

The quote certainly works well for this poem! Not much else we can say about it. The phot (taken by Clare at Pointe Wolfe Beach, Fundy National Park) shows sandpipers, sheltering from the wind, not sanderlings. They are both beautiful shorebirds and can often be seen together.

Sign Language

Sign Language

A skater leaving marks on fresh ice
or a stone cast into a pond,
with multiple meanings, multiple ripples
moving slowly outwards,
to end up where?

Who knows? Not me.
I only know that the thrown stone,
like the spoken word,
can never be recalled.

Each word a stone,
and each stone leaving its mark
on many people of many cultures
and multiple languages,
though English is the language
in which I now write.

Frost and snow here this morning.
Not much, just a dusting.
I look out of the window
at the crows’ claw prints
on my yard’s white surface.

My eyes draw silence
out of the white space
with its runic language
written by the crows.

The meaning of meaning –
tell me, if you can,
what do they say?
What do they mean?
What do they want from me?

Commentary:

Intertextuality – this poem came directly from this morning’s commentary, with some minor alterations. The commentary itself, emerged from Carved in Stone, 35. Three separate steps in the great chain of intertextuality, where text speaks to text and the crows cock their heads, turn them to one side, listen, and write their answers in the snow.

Sometimes words just flow. Sometimes, I force them to flow. However, I have learned over the years that the secret is to relax and to allow the words to come to you of their own free will. Sometimes they whisper, occasionally they shout. But if you are willing to listen, you will hear them everywhere. And they have so much to say, if you will only learn to listen carefully and try to understand their language.

Carved in Stone 35

Carved in Stone

35

My eyes draw sound
out of the white space
of silence.

Silent the pen,
gliding smooth,
over unlined paper,
a skater leaving marks
on fresh ice.

Each mark is a signifier,
or a series of signifiers
constituting a signified,
a message engraved
in the reader’s mind.

Commentary:

Each mark is a signifier, part of a series of signifiers constituting a signified, a message written on paper, then engraved in the reader’s mind. But, of course, the message has to be read, and the reader has to be diligent enough to burrow into the meaning of the message. And what is the meaning of meaning? Ah, we have been down that rabbit hole before and Alice has been through the looking glass, and we have seen ourselves in our daily mirrors, slowly fading as the years go by.

A skater leaving marks on fresh ice or a stone cast into a pond, with multiple meanings, multiple ripples moving slowly outwards, to end up where? Who knows? Not me. I only know that the thrown stone, like the spoken word, can never be recalled. And there’s a 2,000 year history behind those words. Each word a stone, and each stone leaving its mark on many people of many cultures and multiple languages, though English is the language in which I now write.

Frost and snow here this morning. Not much, just a dusting. I looked out of the window at the crows’ prints on the white surface of the garden. My eyes drew silence out of the white space with its runic language written by the crows.

The meaning of meaning – tell me, if you can, what did they say? What did they want from me? What did they mean?

Carved in Stone 32

Carved in Stone
32

I dream of winter snow
snaking its whispering way
down the highway.

Waves draw lacy curtains
across the beach.

Sandpipers wade, pecking,
probing at tide’s foaming edge,
strange writings their footprints,
punctuation,
the holes they leave
drilled in the sand.

Evening now, and a low light
casts its magic on the forest,
gilding the trees.
Dry leaves rustle.

A shadow flickers
at the edge of my eye,
my childhood –
a sea bird soaring.

Commentary:

So inadequate, the word world I create. Sound – winter snow snaking its whispering way down the highway / dry eaves rustling. Absence of sound – waves draw lacy curtains across the beach / sandpipers, with their shrill voices and constant whistling’ / the gentle hiss and buddle where the sandpipers sew their holes.

What about the other senses? I miss the sense of smell, the odors borne on the wind, the different aromas that arises from dry and wet sand, the pong that wet sea weed exudes, the perfumes of sea side grass and wild flowers … And what about touch – the sandpaper scraper of dry sand between the toes, the feel of those lacy curtains as, jeans rolled up, you paddle along the shoreline, the feel of the wind on your face when sea birds soar … and who can ever forget the salt taste of the sea upon their lips?

The Catch 22 of all writers – how much can we include? How much can we suggest? How much must we let slip by? Culture – how can we describe the sea to someone who has never seen the sea? I can ask the questions – but I must leave you to work out the answers for yourself. So inadequate, the word world I create.

Two New Poems

Two New Poems

1

My Words

My words are black print
on white paper.
My memories flare
 – an aurora borealis of senses
sent crackling down the spine,
in and out of the mind,
tumbling the brain into a world
 … what sort of world?

An unimaginable world.
One never forgotten.
One never re-recreated.
One that never existed.
One that never could exist.
One for which the young child,
six or seven years old,
yearns for the rest of his life.
His unsatisfied life.
His unsatisfying life.
His meaningless life.
His absurd life.

2

Puppy

Oh, pity the poor puppy,
not knowing
 what he has done wrong,
not knowing
how to put things right,
always inadequate,
always in fear
of the angry word,
the quick, sly kick,
the vicious blow,
whining and cringing
at his master’s feet.

“Into your box!”

And always,
that cold puppy bed,
often soiled,
 where the long, chill snakes
of frail, wriggling dreams,
remind him of
the next day’s
punishment.

Commentary:

Both these poems evolved from the comments I made yesterday to my blog post. I have started noticing that those words, beneath the poems, sometimes have a rhythm and a magic all to themselves. I guess it is a little bit of the unconscious slipping upwards and spilling out.

Discovered poems – I never set out to write these two poems. When I re-read my commentary, I thought ‘wow, there’s a poem in there”, and I found not one, but two new poems. Interesting. As I age, I discover something new every day. What a wonderful world it is, unless, like earlier this week, I discover my tap leaking and am forced to call my friend, the plumber, into my water world. Alas, if only that tap were tapped into a maple tree and it weas spring once more. Ah well, I am a dreamer, I can always dream.

A Touch of Frost

A Touch of Frost

Cooler nights have brought
a touch of frost to higher ground.

At night, temperatures fall.
By day, they build.

I watch as Autumn, finger on lips,
tiptoes through the garden.

With a wave of its wand,
winter threatens.

A gust of wind swirls the leaves,
sends snow flaking round the tree.

My love has a gentle touch of frost,
a blanched fringe at her curl tips.

When I look in the mirror,
I see the full effects, snow drifts
gathered on my own head.

I look at my beloved.
Her hair –
a crab apple tree
in full spring bloom.

Commentary:

Moo to the rescue with a little touch of frost and snow in his painting. So many images here. So many pictures floating through my mind. Still Autumn, and we had some snow. Not much, but enough to remind us that winter lies just around the corner. Enough for today. More tomorrow. And snowflakes and blessings to all.

Carved in Stone

Carved in Stone

28

The man who cannot cry
is dry indeed,
his inner space
a wasteland without rain.

Who can now walk forty days
in a desert wilderness,
without water?

Where is that crystal fountain,
with its healing streams
flowing from the rock,
its waters flowing through us,
bringing us tears of sorrow
and tears of joy.

Water and words –
they drift through me
and shadowed waves move,
shifting shape in the changing light.

29

A rising moon,
shimmers over the bay.
It reveals the path
that leads me back
to my primal waters.

Oh, salt flow of tears,
salty the waters
of the baptismal font
washing away all stain of sin.

Immersion in water,
a new start, a new life,
and all the soul-sweet eternities
of water and the word.

Commentary:

Water – such an important commodity, and filled with so much symbolism, religious and otherwise. And our bodies, on average, are composed of 60% water. We can survive for three days without water, if we are lucky. How precious it is. How much we depend on it.

The Bay of Santander, so beautiful beneath the moon. And I remember the full moon’s circle touching a rocky triangle as it rose above Peña Cabarga. Oh, the night life of the fish as they rose in the bay and basked in the moonlight. How often was I tempted to walk out along that moon path and walk the waves to Somo and Pedreña on the far side of the bay.

Immersion in water, a new start, a new life, and all the soul-sweet eternities of water and the word. Total immersion, then, not just in languages, but also in water. Where would we be without those life-long commitments, not to mention the crystal fountain whence the healing streams do flow?

Carved in Stone 25 & 26

Carved in Stone

25

I speak to a generation I will never see,
as others, in the past, have spoken to me.

They spoke through their prison bars
in manuscripts and books,
or told me, in hieroglyphics,
of ages disappeared,
their secrets lost, and gone.

Who now will listen, with their eyes,
as I listened with mine, for my world
is not their world,
nor can their world be mine.

And yet the same moon,
finger-nail thin, or gibbous,
waxes to full, then wanes,
in search of its rebirth.

26

What are words?
Is it the language that speaks,
not the author, as Barthes tells us?

Or do I write these words,
and who am I,
who sits mouse in hand,
fingers on keyboard,
tapping these words?

Do I not speak to the readers?
Yet how could I speak to them,
for the printed word
cannot ring out from the page.

And what are my words,
but soap bubbles,
blown by an old man
in his second childhood,
through an iron ring?

Or are they soft letters
of snaking snow,
lisping their whispered words
along the inner highways
of the listening mind?

Meaning – the readers
must recreate it,
illusions, delusions, and all,
in their own creative minds.

Commentary:

Meaning – each reader must recreate it. We come from so many cultures, so many languages, so many backgrounds. And yet I write in one language, one of the several I speak. I know only too well how words shift, shuffle, change their meanings. I know how innuendo, culture, religion even, changes the meaning of words. So who am I to say – this, and this only, is the correct meaning of the words carved in stone. Even the words and the symbols carved in stone are open to interpretation.

“Patience,” said Miguel de Cervantes, “and shuffle the cards.” Of course, wrth gwrs, he wrote those words in Spanish, and he placed them in the mouth of one of his characters. And now I am repeating them and placing them in your minds. For you, each one of you, must shuffle the words, shuffle their meanings, adapt them to your own minds and cultures, and come up with the meanings, the multiple meanings, that you can attach to my words.

“And what are my words, but soap bubbles, blown by an old man in his second childhood,
through an iron ring?” Answer that question and perhaps you can solve the riddle of the universe. But to whose satisfaction? Words carved in stone – but what is the stone, who quarries the stone, who carves the words in the stone, and who descends from the mountain with what words carved in stone?

Meaning – each reader must recreate it, illusions, delusions, and all, in his or her creative minds.

Carved in Stone 23 & 24

Carved in Stone

23

It isn’t true that art
lives longer than life,
for all too often art and artist
are destroyed together.

Words, all words,
and words emerge
from the silence of blood,
bone, and stone, breaking
that silence the day they are born,
and the word once spoken
cannot be recalled.

24

Here, among the ruins of my life,
I have learned how to be alone,
how to sink into silence,
how to smother at birth
that world of words,
and that world, still-born,
becomes a lost world
whirled on the silent wind that fans
the unborn fires within.

I sit here
brushed by a tadpole’s solitude
as it swims through the sultry silence
of blood, bone, and stone,
into its own metamorphosis.

The wind that blows unspoken words
tugs at the spider web of my mind
twisting and untwisting
its frayed, fragmented ends.

Commentary:

The fragility of life. The single puff that turns the dandelion into a dandelion clock. The multiple puffs that dowse the candles on the birthday cake. And then, one day, there are no more candles, no more cakes, just the heart ache of multiple absences, family and friends all gone and each of us alone with our individual loneliness.

That’s when we finally turn in and seek the inner roads that lead us to ourselves. The selves that were, the selves that are, the selves that always will be. Crack the walnut – inside is the map of a brain – your brain? If it is you will have found yourself in this labyrinth. But if it is the brain of another, you must not give up, you must seek yourself, walnut after walnut.

And when you go to the library, you must check book after book, because one day, if you are lucky, you will find the book of your life and it will tell you who you were, what you are, and what you will always be.