“So, friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it. …
Ask the questions that have no answers. …
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.
Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
…Practice resurrection.”
-Wendell Berry
tonight,
wrapped
in the blanket of red
and green
that only sees use on those
rare days when
the temperatures deign to lower
themselves to us,
i sit.
i sit,
wrapped in my thoughts
moreso than anything;
wrapped in the memories
of thanksgivings past
of home and laughter
of tall pines and
rivers
of turkey leftovers
always finding their way
into a tortilla
on a bed of
cilantro.
tonight,
i ate my leftovers with black beans
and kimchi
and laughed.
everythingandnothing
has changed.
i sit,
wrapped
in the glow of tiny lights,
next to a toy elephant and
three dozen crayons
and a hula hoop.
i sit,
wrapped in the sound of endless
automobile engines, humming
outside
through the exit ramp
like messengers
announcing
they will not sleep —
but i will,
wrapped in words
and thoughts
and near-silence,
enveloped in this warmth
and this home
and this hope
and this light,
tonight,
wrapped
in this old blanket of red
and of green.
—
“Sometimes our life reminds me
of a forest in which there is a graceful clearing
and in that opening a house,
an orchard and garden,
comfortable shades, and flowers
red and yellow in the sun, a pattern
made in the light for the light to return to.
The forest is mostly dark, its ways
to be made anew day after day, the dark
richer than the light and more blessed,
provided we stay brave
enough to keep on going in.”
-Wendell Berry
“…You tell me it is too early to be looking back,
but that is because you have forgotten
the perfect simplicity of being one
and the beautiful complexity introduced by two.
But I can lie on my bed and remember every digit.
At four I was an Arabian wizard.
I could make myself invisible
by drinking a glass of milk a certain way.
At seven I was a soldier, at nine a prince.
But now I am mostly at the window
watching the late afternoon light…”
-an excerpt from Billy Collins’ On Turning Ten
Poetry has no rules, it has been said.
I say, rules exist. They lie
in how poetry should be read.
For instance, one cannot
read Octavio Paz
without first pausing
to sink into a faded velvet chair
of some bookstore
now out of mode and forgotten
And when
one reads the words of Billy
Collins it can only be
at a kitchen table
after dark
by the light of a single flame.
Shakespeare’s for the school halls, read
by one who thinks he knows
and Dickinson’s for the garden
with a single yellow rose.
Frenzied prose is for the birds,
scattered in the mist of ancient cobblestone
a panicked pandemonium set off
by the toss of a head
or sleight of hand.
But the poem, in all its outdated ink
remains unruffled
and to think
you nearly passed it by.
The California coast always makes my heart soar.
There’s something so special about
those cliffs and
that icy water and
the way the sky changes color every minute.
Liz, who blogs beautifully at Yellow Finch, was kind enough to post more of my words about the way Bodega Bay makes me feel.
One doesn’t open the windows, often, here, in this place where the air holds a strange combination of constant heat and dampness.
Most times there’s barely a difference in the numbers telling us the temperature and the percentage of water in the air.
Most times the air outside smells thick and old, as if it hasn’t moved in hundreds of years; it’s clinging to the trunks of trees, inching down the crevices in the sidewalk, barely keeping itself afloat, pouring itself into your lungs.
Inside, we empty the dehumidifier, over and over and over again.
But then, sometimes, ever so rarely, there comes a day when the dampness leaves momentarily and the humidity dips down, just a tease, just for a handful of hours. And I run to fling open all the windows, and shake out the blankets and rugs, and turn up the music and laugh and breath it all in and think of Pablo Neruda, who said —
“Walking down a path
I met the air,
saluted it and said
respectfully:
‘It makes me happy
that for once
you left your transparency,
let’s talk.’
He tirelessly
danced, moved leaves,
beat the dust
from my soles
with his laughter…
the day is coming
when we will liberate
the light and the water,
earth and men,
and all will be
for all, as you are.
For this, for now,
be careful!
And come with me,
much remains
that dances and sings,
let’s go
the length of the sea,
to the height of the mountains,
let’s go
where the new spring
is flowering
and in one gust of wind
and song
we’ll share the flowers,
the scent, the fruit,
the air
of tomorrow.”
And I am happy, with this one short gust of fresh wind.
Christmas in the subtropics is different, but it teaches us something about waiting with hope-filled expectancy, not just for Christmas, but for Christ’s return.
Here, in the humid fog
(which, I imagine, might not be much
unlike The Night
in which the angel appeared)
here in the humid fog
the only snow looks like
paper scraps and
shaving cream. Bubbles and
these circles of vinyl we
press to the windowpanes
with hearts of hope
as though we were two again
or five or nine or eighty-four
as though we pressed up our noses
to the glass
waiting for papa to come home
or waiting for Christmas time
or waiting for snow.
But while we are grown
and while we are tall
and while we can reach the upper shelves, now —
we are still children.
We are still waiting for Papa,
every day,
and this window is a glass, dimly, and
we see glimmers of celestial light
inside claypots and
outside trimmed oil lamps, and
in cups of cold water, given.
Christmas day was the first time He came and
so now through the centuries since
we press our noses to the glass
reaching,
waiting,
longing
expecting,
Christmas Day, Round Two
(in which we will all be made wholecompleteperfected
and the sky will light up.)
These are tidings
of the greatest joy.
A bit later, He told us this, so that His
joy might be in us, and
our joy might be full.
So now let’s all press our noses
to the glass
and look heavenward
and reach high
and hope
and rejoice.
“I woke up this morning,
as the blues singers like to boast….
Everything seemed more life-size than usual.
Light in the shape of windows
hung on the walls next to the paintings
of birds and horses, flowers and fish.
…I closed the door to that room
and stood for a moment in the kitchen,
taking in the silvery toaster, the bowl of lemons,
and the white cat, looking as if
he had just finished his autobiography.”
-Billy Collins, from the poem “The Literary Life”
The Oaxacaborn Blog 