Carpe Diem

The End of Time

The End of Time

A thin violin crying
its cat-gut heart out
in tears of sound, falling,
rhythmic raindrops,
down a grey-streaked face
tight with stress and taut with pain.

Such concentration,
such soulfulness packed
into each mindful note.

An audience of one,
I sit, head bowed, meditating
on the meaning of meaning
and the nothingness
of a being condemned
to oblivion, yet oblivious
of the how and when.

Each note a hammer-blow,
then, the piano pounding nail
after nail into this living coffin,
this body I drag through the motions
of extracting meaning
from this meaningless life.

Comment:

The End of Time is the second poem in the first sequence (Crystal Liturgy) of Septets for the End of Time. The painting, by my friend Moo, expresses his impressions of the nature of the end – but he doesn’t tell me the end of what. Certainly not of our friendship, I hope.

I am always worried by those last two lines: extracting meaning from this meaningless life as I don’t think that life is meaningless. However, there are times when it certainly feels that way. Those are the times when we need our beliefs in truth and the purity of art to survive. But how do you define them, you ask me. In all honesty, I don’t. I can’t. Art changes. What we consider to be true changes. Relativism? Yes, to a certain extent. I know what I believe. I don’t know what you believe. But I would never try to inflict or enforce my beliefs on to you. That is not how I work.

As for Moo, I don’t know how his mind works. I think he just sees things in color and shape and in the creation of movement within the stillness of a two dimensional illusion. I also think he thinks like a child. Maybe, like me, he has entered his second childhood, though I don’t really remember ever having had a first one. Oh dear – the meaning of meaning – one of the great enigmas of this wonderful world in which we live.

Do you play in your daily life? What does ‘playtime say to you?

Daily writing prompt
Do you play in your daily life? What says “playtime” to you?
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Do you play in your daily life? What does ‘playtime say to you?

Poesía de juego y poesía que expresa la autenticidad del ser / poetry as play and poetry that expresses the authenticity of being. For me, poetry is play. However, it is far more than just ‘play‘ – because it is a play that expresses the authenticity of my being.

I write in my journal on a daily basis. As I write, I sometimes spot little gems, thoughts or word clusters that can be turned into poems. For me, playtime is when I start to elaborate the words (signifiers) and turn them into thoughts (signified). The meaning may be the message, but the words that carry the message are the building bricks of the poetry of play which sometimes, with a happy Midas touch, turns into the poetry of gold that expresses the authenticity of who and what I am.

But play is also what I do when I paint. And sometimes I sit beside my mirror image friend, Moo, and paint with him. While Moo is great with colours, he is sometimes at a loss for words. Then I help him by playing with words, shuffling them around, until he finds the title that he wishes for his poems. Sometimes I consult, on Moo’s behalf, with other friends, and they are the ones who join in the game, and settle the dispute by agreeing upon the name that Moo will finally choose for his painting.

But, speaking of painting, there is no play better than the game of making meaning out of color [does it really matter how you spell it? ] and shape while taking a line for a walk and turning it into something playful yet meaningful. Mix and match, and stitch and patch, and then add the lines and title that ease the metamorphosis of color into shape and meaning.

There are other games I play to help fill in the daily gaps that have entered my post-retirement life. Online games of patience, crosswords, chess games with their intricate patterns of red and white or light and dark. Then their [now it does matter how you spell there!!!] are mining games when I dig deep into other people’s poetry and search among the gems of Octavio Paz, Antonio Machado, Dylan Thomas, John O’Donohue, Milton Acorn, Valverde, Quevedo, St. Teresa of Avila, Gongora, Sor Juana, Cervantes, or many other friends, their voices now silences, with whom I speak with my eyes, in order to find something that inspires me to play yet another game – hunt the symbol.

Re-reading Rudyard Kipling is a game too. “Do you like Kipling?” “No, I never Kipple.”And in books like Kim, the great game of life goes on and on, and Kipling’s signifiers (words) turn into a signified (meaning) that is warped by my creative mind and changed into my ideas of a new game in which hunt the symbol turns into the game of Brillig where the slithey troves of new words, fresh words, are reborn into my game-world and emerge from their game-whirled into my own word-play conversation with my own thyme and plaice [or should that be time and place?] And long may Moo and I play that game!

When are you most happy?

Daily writing prompt
When are you most happy?
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When are you most happy?

What on earth does that mean? When? Are we talking time of day, or time of night? Are we talking a season of the year? Are we talking mood swings – happy now, oh dear, mood swing, not happy now? Are we talking Hen Wen, the magic white pig at the feeding trough? “I am at my happiest, oink-oink, when I am eating a big burger from …” – and here you name your favorite burger outlet. None of that Hen Wen nonsense applies, of course, if you are vegetarian, vegan, or have an allergy to burgers or buns!

I can tell you when I am least happy – 7:30 am, on a wet, damp, cold, icy, snowy winter morning, when I have to get up, get dressed, and go out in the mush and the slush to have an early morning blood test – no food or drink for 12 hours – at the local hospital. Last time I did that, I couldn’t find a parking spot, and drove round and around until eventually one opened up, as far away as possible from the hospital of course. No, I was not a happy camper on that occasion. Especially when I slipped on the ice, returning to my car, and then found someone had driven into my side while I was parked there. Oh, that made me so happy and so jolly, I laughed until I cried. [I do hope you can recognize sarcasm when you see it.]

So, let us reverse the question and reframe it by saying that I am perfectly happy when the things that make me miserable do not happen. No fender-bender in the ice and snow – I am a happy man. Caught speeding or jumping a red light – totally by accident, of course, – and the man in blue asks me for my license, sees that it’s my birthday, and lets me drive away with a verbal warning and a jovial ‘happy birthday”! Ah yes, reverse psychology, that sort of thing does make me happy.

So, above all, it’s the little things in life that go right, and not wrong, that make me happy. This morning’s boiled egg, boiled to perfection – not too hard, not too soft. My coffee a perfect blend designed to bring joy and happiness. Marmalade on blue cheese, the Welsh equivalent of Chinese sweet and sour – oh yes, and actually making someone laugh or smile when they read this nonsense I write. Even Hen Wen grunts with joy – oink! oink! – at that one. So if you have enjoyed this post, please take the time to send me an oink or two, and I will be happy. Thanking you in advance is, yours sincerely, Hen ‘oink!’ Wen ‘oink!’ Wink, ‘oink!’

What was the last thing you did for play or fun?

Daily writing prompt
What was the last thing you did for play or fun?
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What was the last thing you did for play or fun?

I guess it depends on how you define ‘play’ and ‘fun’. The first snow storm of the winter left us without power for 39.5 hours. That should have been horrible – the temperature outside dropped to -7C overnight, and the temperature inside fell to 58F. Rather than sit and suffer, we turned it into a fun time. A candlelight supper, a bright log fire burning in the grate, reading by torchlight and candlelight. The flames flickering across my beloved’s face and making her countenance softer and more beautiful than ever.

When we lose power, we lose everything, except our fireplace and our cell phones. Recharging them was fun. We have a portable charger, and we also recharged them in the car while driving around. The roads were good – and driving was warm – so that was fun as well.

When the power came back, we called the local tree company (Treecological) and they took down the trees, young, bendy birches, that had bent onto our power lines. When we lost power, a second time, exactly a week later, it was a much shorter power loss. While the first was a power out[r]age, the second was a power outage. Both times, when the power came back on, that first buzz of energy renewed really made us happy.

In between the two storms, we had some warmer, sunnier weather and cleaning the snow with our trusty snowblower was much easier than we expected. Mind you, it is always difficult the first time, when the body is unaccustomed to the machine and all the old tricks must be learned once more. Luckily, you can teach new tricks to an old dog, well, to this one anyway, and I managed to cut a few corners and had fun doing so.

After four consecutive days of snow blowing – one does it bit by bit when one is eighty years old – otherwise no, it isn’t much fun. But bit by bit, step by step, and the job gets done. So there we were, playing in the snow and having fun. Mind you – once in a while isn’t too bad. But for this to happen every day, over a series of years, that would not be fun. And doubly not in winter, with the cold outside and supplies inside running out or down.

Poppy Day

Poppy Day

Remembrance Day
11 November 2024

I wasn’t there
I never saw the gas clouds
            rolling over our positions
            never felt the barbed wire’s bite
            nor the bayonet’s jab

I never hung out my washing
            on the Siegfreid Line
            (“Have you any dirty washing, mother dear?”)
            never broke out of barracks
            never did spud bashing
            nor feasted on bread and water
            nor heard the rifle’s rapid rattle

I wasn’t there
            to see them carried away in carts
            coughing spluttering vomiting
            or bandages over their eyes
            walking slowly to triage a hand on
            the shoulder of the man ahead
            the sighted leading the blind

I wasn’t there
            but both my grandfathers were
            both decorated
            one mentioned in dispatches
            signed by Winston Churchill
            that one uninjured
            the other one gassed
            coughing up his lungs
            bit by bit for forty years

I am here now
    to remember
    and to honor them
           though so much
    has been lost

Comment:
My friend, the painter known as Moo, painted this poppy today. My generation, unless they served voluntarily, as many have done, was never conscripted. As a result, the horrors and tragedies of combat were never known to us, except as seen through they eyes of other people. I think of Wilfred Owen and his magnificent, heart-rending poems from WWI.
Today, I pay tribute to those members of my family who served in the armed forces by land, sea, and air. I also pay tribute to the veterans who survived, and to those who gave their lives in the defense of our country.

Exploring the Divine in Nature

Divinity

outside us or in us
the divine is always with us

green god
of the mountain ash
garlanded now
with autumn berries

lady hollyhock
and her flock
of butterflies and bees

colibri
martyred soul
reborn
as a hummingbird

our garden
a paradise
where the creator
still strolls

some of her
many faces
glimpsed
among the leaves

in this half-light
as the sun
goes down

In Laud of Light

In Laud of Light

Sun, moon, and stars
wait, day and night,
outside my window.

I sometimes glimpse
the crackling shimmer
of Northern Lights.

They crown me
with joy and pleasure,
treasures I will treasure
until the natural end
when stars, sun, and crown
come tumbling down.

I will be left alone,
seemingly naked,
yet clothed in
an eternity of light.

Comment:

Hunter Moon in Island View, NB.
Pure chance – I looked up, and there it was.
Oh to be clothed in such a glorious light!

What is your favorite form of physical exercise?

Daily writing prompt
What is your favorite form of physical exercise?
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What is your favorite form of physical exercise?

As the arthritis gets worse and the pain grips more and more, I am not sure that I have any favorite form of physical exercise. Perhaps getting in and out of the whirlpool bath? Getting out after a half hour or so soaking, is easy enough. But getting in, after a couple of days without one – well, that can be a bit of a pain.

Then there’s getting up in the morning. That is exercise in itself. Hauling myself out of bed. Limping to the bathroom. Doing some s-t-r-e-t-c-h-i-n-g when I remember too. Painful to do, but I usually feel usually a bit better afterwards. Don’t forget the obstacle race of making it, half-asleep, to the bathroom during the night. Then there’s getting dressed in the morning and that’s always an interesting exercise. Sometimes I need help with socks, or shirt, especially after a bath. Shoes are always a wrestling match, as are shorts and jeans. What used to take me about 90 seconds, now takes closer to ten or fifteen minutes. Hardly aerobic!

And speaking of aerobics, physical exercise can also refer to anaerobic and an / aerobic with lactic acid build up. Lactic acid and the ensuing cramps have never been anyone’s favorite form of physical exercise, unless they are masochists instructed by a sadistic coach, as sometimes happens.

The stairs are always a great physical exercise. Easiest is walking safely downstairs in the morning. But there is always the fear of a fall, especially with the turn round the Newell post at the bottom. And then there’s climbing up again safely at night. That takes longer and longer, one painful foot lift at a time.

Cooking has become a physical exercise too. Peeling the vegetables and cutting them up can be quite vigorous. Standing at the stove cooking, gently stirring the food, that is good exercise, as is setting the table and serving the food.

But perhaps my favorite exercise is what the Abulenses call El paseo de la nevera. This is to get up, to walk to the fridge, and to grab another can of beer or open a new bottle of wine. Maybe that is my favorite form of physical exercise, that and the repeated elbow lift and flex that is necessary to drain the can or the bottle or the glass. And don’t forget, there’s always the pinch of salt and the over-the-shoulder salt throw, always necessary with this style of blogging, where everything you read should be taken with a large pinch of salt.