Song To M

To the tune of Pictures of You, by The Cure

M, you are a name,
You are a quiet invitation,
Briefest braille for the blind
Start of a simple conversation,

Title on the cover page
Without any explanation,
For now, for the moment
You’re the whole presentation.

I want to remember you:
I want to remember you.


From the first frame of the trailer
For unexpected chapters,
Uncharted adventures,
Untold ever afters,

From the first note of the measure
Of music I don’t know
But want to hear more of,
La canto da capo,

You’re a language that’s new to me
From the beginning,
A song to repeat
For its gradual meaning,

And somewhere in the melody
I want to learn you
And find in you more than
A tune that I turn to.

I want to remember you:
I want to remember you


From the first word,
I want to memorize you,
Learn every line of you,
Look into your eyes

And discover you.  M,
You are a name so far,
But I’ve only started
To see who you are,

And I want to see more,
I want to speak you and sing you
And know you by heart,
You and everything in you.

Somewhere in this fantasy
We’ll sing our songs together
And hope that the harmony
Plays on forever,

And if you’ll indulge me
I promise you this,
I’ll keep every secret
And hold every kiss

Between us, and even if
Things never change
And we remain strangers
You’ll always be more than a name

I want to remember you
And know you are more than name.
I want to remember you
And know you, know you are more than a name.

Just say the word, and
I’ll stay here as long
As you keep on singing
And there is a song

Between us, and even if
Things start to change
And we become strangers
I’ll always remember your name.

Co-Opted

...This next piece is inspired by brother Josh’s persistent call for submissions of S2L2A&A: songs to listen to again and again.  Josh would have everyone in the family compile and circulate annual CD-length lists of our favorite songs, and what a beautiful way of showing and sharing a part of what makes us tick, of celebrating our variety and expanding the awareness of our collective souls. Josh also encourages us, by making this an annual project, to keep adding to our life-list of favorite songs and to think year-round of what might go on our next year’s list.  So, one song at a time, I came up with the following twelve...

I am calling this collection “Co-opted,” as it is centered around several of my own poems that I have set to other people’s music.  Consider these co-opted works my P2S2A&A:  poems to sing again and again.

Ellipses

This is my dream, my satisfaction:
the only truth I can control, the only way I can survive the lonely nights, the distant silence:
I dream my song into the darkness: forever listening, waiting, forever calling, wondering; I live by sending and receiving. ....

This is my song, my record keeping: the only way I can hold you. I send my song into the darkness and quietly wait for your reply And in the pause I feel the distance as lonely as the midnight trees But with my song I break the silence and I can feel you close to me.

Week 5: Starry Night Over The Rhone

Starry Night Over The Rhone, a simple prayer poem about a favorite painting, is also from my “co-opted” collection of poems that have found their ways into favorite songs: a convergence of tributaries.

Moleskin 1.4: As I Write This...

As I write this I am sitting on the edge of a river.  I have found myself here many times, perched pretentiously where the Fisher King wept, where Siddhartha attained peace, where many before me have waited and drawn pictures in the sand.  There is a river in every big city, it seems, and streams across every page of history, throughout the world and even into the realms of mythology and legend.  I like a big river, an important river that connects with all others, a river with a famous name and a powerful flow.  Give me Mark Twain's river, but let me find it as Huck did, a few miles out of town; let me sit along its rich banks with nothing but time, away from instructions and factories, unconcerned with obligations and inheritances.  Let this be my Stillwater, full of life and purpose, with destiny beneath its gentle surface, and tomorrow I may weep and seek and wait along these banks, but for today, let me know this river's simple serenity.

Pitch

—I don’t want no characters. I’m not going to have any. 

—What do you mean? You’ve got to have characters. 

—No I don’t. I don’t want any. I want to be alone. 

—What are you going to do then? You can’t just sit there. 

—Yes I can. Why can’t I? 

—You’ve got to have a plot. You need action. 

—No. Who’s writing this thing anyway? 

—What about a title? 

—What about it? 

—Nothing. Forget it. 

—Exactly. I’m not going to have a setting either. And no diction and no conflict and no theme. 

—What about an audience? You’re not going to have an audience either. 

—Yes. Yes I will. 

—No, no you’re not. You know, with no plot you never could call this, this whatever it is, a story. And now if you say there’s no theme, then you can’t really call it anything. 

—I don’t want to call it anything. You’re the one trying to call it something. 

—Okay, never mind. But the point is, who’s going to care? Who’s going to give a shit? If it won’t have any substance why should anyone bother. 

—I don’t want substance. I especially don’t want the shit. 

—Right. But you want an audience. You just said that you even expect one. 

—That’s right. But let me tell you something. Maybe this will make you see. Last Tuesday I was taking a walk through the park. It was noon and I saw this old bum curled up on the edge of the sidewalk, eyes closed, not doing anything. And I stared at him for a little while. He didn’t move. Flies landed on him and he didn’t brush them away. He might have been dead. 

—Maybe he was. 

—I don’t know. But I stood there and stared at him for I don’t know how long and he never did move. He was positioned in such a way that I couldn’t tell whether he was breathing or not. I think he was alive though. I’m pretty sure he had some sort of soul. 

—But what’s the point? 

—Maybe there is none. 

—So what are you trying to say? 

—I’m not trying to say anything. I’m just saying it, there was a bum in the park and I happened to notice him and I think he had a soul. 

—And for that you think you’ll have an audience. 

—Hey look. Someone will notice this some day and maybe even several people will stop and stare and eventually someone will tell somebody else, like I just told you. They’ll even come up with the standard speculations: he looks dead, but I think he’s alive. He’s just a bum, but what was he yesterday and what will he be tomorrow? Who knows? Who cares? Maybe it’s a mental illness, or maybe it’s a statement of choice ...or maybe he really is dead. He’s motionless, but he’s got a soul. People will wonder, I promise. Wait and see. 

—Is that your story? Kind of depressing. And you can’t just end it like that. 

—Settle down. That’s not my ending. It’s not even my story. 

—Whatever. 

—Right. 

—So will you bring your readers to any conclusion? 

—No. No one ever does, really. 

—Now that’s arguable. Platitudinous even. 

—Of course it is. Everything is.

          ...

—So that’s your story. 

—I told you, call it what you will. 

—But it is a story you know. Whether you pretend it’s something else or not. 

—That’s your conclusion. But it sounds like you changed your position. 

—Sure. You’ve got everything in it that you said you wouldn’t have. 

—What are you saying? 

—There’s theme, there’s conflict of characters, style, even a plot of sorts... 

—All incidental, I tell you. 

—...and you’ve got lots of thought. 

—All incidental. 

—What do you mean, incidental? It’s there, isn’t it? And you said it wouldn’t be. 

—But there’s no one here. 

—Sure there is. Me and you. And an audience, maybe. 

—No, there’s no audience. Not now. The audience hasn’t come by yet. They will, later, but not now. 

—And I suppose we’re two bum characters on the edge of the sidewalk. 

—No. There are no characters. 

—What are we? 

—We’re the writer of course. 

—But we’re fighting. There’s conflict, so we must be characters. 

—No, we’re just the writer. We’re just words.

Simorgh

Only after completing the first draft of my first book of poems and giving the book a title did I discover that "Thirty Birds" was a legendary bird-king from 12th century Persia. 

The story was told 800 years ago in a 4500 line poem called Bird Parliament by Farid ud-Din Attar. Briefly, all the birds go on a quest to find their king. The journey is difficult, and only thirty birds make it up the final mountain, where they find their king, Simorgh, or "Thirty Birds," is nothing but a reflection of themselves....

The Source

from Walled Gardens

God takes earth and forms our body,

   takes wind and forms our speech

gives reason to our minds,

inspiration to our hearts,

invitation to our souls,

cause to our creation.

God gives theme to every generation

and truth to every corruption;

God is the source from which everything comes,

the place to which everything returns:

Good proceeds from God and evil departs from God,

as God created the spirit of each,

good and evil in every soul,

as God authors the soul,

originates the mind,

makes each of us something out of nothing

and exalts us, gives us life out of the void.

Melodia

I sing because I'm happy, I sing because I'm free For His eye is on the sparrow and I know He watches me. — Civilla D. Martin

Lowly sparrow, you in your stubble field Are God’s example and encouragement To stand behind a thinly-feathered shield With nothing more as an accouterment Than simple faith in what tomorrow brings: All things are set before you, every seed And sunray comes delivered without strings; God will provide you everything you need But gives you more, the time and voice to sing!
Sing boldly, bird, across the stubble field, Show us your color and your gilded wing, Your air of confidence, that all may yield And pause, to catch the truth within the fable Of fearlessness and food at every table. The sparrow chirps, “But who am I to be The center of attention? I believe Your story: God is good, even to me, And daily God provides, and I receive Abundantly beyond what I deserve, But that’s the point. You call on me to sing For all I’m worth; you’re telling me to serve In song as if my voice made everything Acceptable, but take a look at me: My feathers are the shades of sand and dirt, My wings are short and my ability To fly will never take me far from earth, And now you’re asking me to join the choir Of angels, as if song could take me higher?” Yes, little sparrow, by your very word You are acceptable; indeed, you were before The first note of your song was ever heard, But you will please your maker even more If you will sing. Sing loud for all you’re worth, But louder still for all that you’ve been given: From seed and stubble of your mother earth, To air and sunshine sent to you from heaven, For every camouflage and coloring Designed to keep you safely unrevealed, For all the intricacies of your wing Designed to let you navigate the field. O sparrow, sparrow, know that you are gifted And by your song the whole world is uplifted.

Preaching To The Choir

I have a song to sing.
Actually, it's a poem I wrote.
You probably didn't know I wrote poems,
because I haven't shared this with many people,
but I suppose it's about time.

We all have songs to share.
Some will put music to words,
others stand up and share in different ways;
some sing from the sidelines
as coaches, cheerleaders, teachers.

Some of you sing beautiful songs
with what you do with your hands, 
your thoughtfulness, your time.

It isn't always easy to share our songs,
but it becomes easier when we believe
that God smiles on us when we sing
and when we remember that what we give
is nothing more than what we are given:
the ability, the opportunity, the time.

And best of all, it is nice to hear 
how our songs all come together 
in a beautiful symphony

And God is revealed...

Trailer

—Last Tuesday I was taking a walk through the park. It was noon and I saw this old bum curled up on the edge of the sidewalk, eyes closed, not doing anything. And I stared at him for a little while. He didn’t move. Flies landed on him and he didn’t brush them away. He might have been dead. 

—Maybe he was. 

—I don’t know. But I stood there and stared at him for I don’t know how long and he never did move. He was positioned in such a way that I couldn’t tell whether he was breathing or not. I think he was alive though. I’m pretty sure he had some sort of soul. 

—But what’s the point? 

—Maybe there is none. 

—So what are you trying to say? 

—I’m not trying to say anything. I’m just saying it, there was a bum in the park and I happened to notice him and I think he had a soul. 

—And for that you think you’ll have an audience. 

—Hey look. Someone will notice this some day and maybe even several people will stop and stare and eventually someone will tell somebody else, like I just told you. They’ll even come up with the standard speculations: he looks dead, but I think he’s alive. He’s just a bum, but what was he yesterday and what will he be tomorrow? Who knows? Who cares? Maybe it’s a mental illness, or maybe it’s a statement of choice ...or maybe he really is dead. He’s motionless, but he’s got a soul. People will wonder, I promise. Wait and see. 

Week 4: Melodia

Melodia, from my Thirty Birds collection, is one of eight variously sourced poems that I keep memorized; these are also the bases for the eight simple prayers shared in Week 1.

Moleskin 1.3: Acknowledgements

My story is your story, too: you, to whom I turn, are in these pages, every one of you.  Sister Anne, who prompted me this past summer with a passing what if.  Brother Dan, who has inspired and reinspired the ink to flow.  Brother Josh, who shows beyond scribbling down how good it is to live. Son Andrew and daughter Kirsten, my flesh and blood, my dreams and hopes, wonderfully determined to be more than a reflection.  Mother Marilyn, and father Joe too, whose own faces I sometimes see in the mirror, and there you are in my smile.  And more of you: friends, associates, neighbors, fellow congregants.  Ghosts from the past, strangers I have yet to know, and many more whose names I'll never learn: thank you all the same, for being the faces I see before me and within me, the very mirrors to my soul.

Carrying It Forward

     I

Paine wrote it,
Washington read it,
Obama retold it
in the depth of winter:
“Let it be retold...”
and “Let it be said
by our children’s children...”
...that when we faced
our coldest cold,
our hardest hardship,
when it seemed nothing
but hope and virtue
could survive,
city and country
came forth to meet
their common danger
together, braved
the icy currents
and coming storms
and safely delivered
that great gift
of hope and virtue
to their future
generations.
And now we mark
the day again
and remember when
we carried forth
God’s grace upon us
and wouldn’t let
our journey end.

     II

Seward proposed it,
Lincoln pronounced it,
Obama proclaimed it
with the resonance
of fighting words:
...stretching out
from battlefields
and patriot graves,
the mystic chords
of memory played
from Concord to
Gettysburg
and Normandy
to now: This time,
our time, has come
to choose our
better history,
to summon the
better angels
of our nature,
to remember
who we are, how
far we’ve come.
This is our moment.
This is our time
to be renewed
and reconciled.
This is our
day to take
responsibility
and seize our duties
gladly.

     III

John Locke asserted it,
Jefferson declared it,
Obama offered it
as old and true:
“We hold these truths...:
and carry them forward;
Paul said this too:
we set aside
the things of youth
and see at last
what must abide:
our faith, our hope,
our charity,
and equally,
intrinsically,
our rights to life
and liberty
and free pursuit
of happiness:
These things are old.
These things are true.
And now we return
and rejoice in the truth,
that precious gift,
that noble idea,
the God-given promise
that all are equal
all are free, and
all deserve a
chance to pursue
the fullest measure. 

     IV

Carry it forward,
Thomas, George,
that we may bear
the winter winds
and see the spring.
Carry it forward,
William, Abe,
that we may hear
and learn to sing
the battle hymns
that came before us.
Carry it forward,
Thomas, John,
the glorious burden,
price and promise
of our birthright.
Carry on,
that we may know
the greater purpose
of our present
season. Carry
on, that we
may take
responsibility
with what we’re given,
the old and true,
the truth renewed.
You said it, too,
now carry it
and call on us
to serve with you.

Writing For The Symposia: Part 2

This too I write for the symposia, 
inspired by blue winged teal 
gliding on a river surface 
and becoming one with the water. 

I do give credit to those a' ya 
who do not show their busy feet 
or the power of the carrying current, 
who offer poems without words 
like faith without argument. 

We would be symposians, 
but you are the better Siddhartas 
showing us the river for what it is.

Reflective Study Of Howard Nemerov's Blue Swallows

Across the millstream below the bridge
     from where I work and where we cross
Seven blue swallows divide the air
     into big patterns all their own
In shapes invisible and evanescent,
     as if to thwart the witnessing:
Kaleidoscopic beyond the mind’s
     imaginative stagnancies
Or memory’s power to keep them there
     but there they are.

“History is where tensions were,”
     giving stages to society, and
“Form is the diagram of forces,”
     seeing patterns in biology:
Thus, helplessly, there on the bridge,
     between birth and forgetfulness
While gazing down upon those birds—
     having the time and taking it
How strange, to be above the birds!—
     to end up here, so out of place!
Thus helplessly the mind in its brain
     wanting to make some sense of it
Weaves up relation’s spindrift web
     trying to trace the winds of waves
Seeing the swallows’ tails as nibs
     in nature, begging imitation,
Dipped in invisible ink, writing . . .
     an ever-changing rhyme.

Poor mind, what would you have them write?
     Poor poet, sticking out your chest,
Some cabalistic history
     of old traditions being reclaimed
Whose authorship you might ascribe
     to fit your backward preference
To God? to Nature? Ah, poor ghost,
     leading the living to their unrest,
You’ve capitalized your Self enough
     and overscored the trinity.
That villainous William of Occam
     trimming off inelegance
Cut out the feet from under that dream
     in search of more simplicity
Some seven centuries ago
     out of the dust of time.

It’s taken that long for the mind
     collectively, immortally
To waken, yawn and stretch, to see
     beyond its unreality
With opened eyes emptied of speech
     and turned to continuity,
The real world where the spelling mind
     in a state of higher consciousness
Imposes with its grammar book

     of meaning being read into
Unreal relations on the blue
     brushstrokes over stream and sky,

Swallows. Perhaps when you will have 

     time to gaze awhile,

Fully awakened, I shall show you
     what you have not seen before,

A new thing: even the water

     sharing colors with the sky
Flowing away beneath those birds

     dancing above the moving stream
Will fail to reflect their flying forms,

     can't capture what they seem to be
And the eyes that see become as stones

     bewildered in the river bed
Whence never tears shall fall gain
     nor add life to the stream.

O swallows, swallows, poems are not

     O sister, brothers, water is not
The point. Finding again the world,

     the point.  Watching it flow, that
That is the point, where loveliness

     is the point, and celebrating
Adorns intelligible things
     truth at every shore...
Because the mind’s eye lit the sun.

     to become the fire.

Dear Symposians

I have another poem to share, and this time with some spindrift analysis.  The poem is another one by someone else: The Blue Swallows, by Howard Nemerov. The analysis is a parsing of the poem’s abundant allegories.

I first planned on sending this just to Dan, as I thought he might be more in to my urge to deconstruct, but then I remembered that I had once shared a few lines of this with you, Anne, and then I discovered some Stillwater symbolism in the poem, and then I realized how much this poem reminds me of the birds of Windmill Creaks (the swallows at the millstream, and a midstream tie to of one of my most Windmill Creakish poems (“What would you write, Ruben...”).   With all of that, I knew I had to post this on the Water-blog. 

For those interested in the allegories, my first fascination was how this poem brought together so many subjects of which I know next to nothing (D’Arcy Thompson’s force diagrams, Jung’s archetypal Self, Occam’s Razor, the Kaballah, the Vedas, Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, Plotinus’s Enneads, even a Hamlet allegory).  How ironic it was that the poem would pique my interests in these subjects before ultimately directing me to find the world again and see things without the “spelling mind”!

I purposefully found the allegories on my own efforts, with the help of Google and Wikipedia but without reading anyone else’s analysis of the poem.  Occam’s razor was easy enough, because I had actually heard of that before, and the author of the second quoted passage was quickly revealed (Thompson), but it took me a while to learn that the first quote is a less common translation from Marx’s manifesto.  I wasn’t keen on embarking further into communism, let alone delving into an introduction to cabalistic history or Jung’s capitalized Self. But the kaleidoscope of allegories kept appearing.  From Hamlet, “ Alas, poor ghost.” From the Vedas, Brhadaranyaka Upanishad (I.3.28): “From the unreal lead me to the Real.”  From Plotinus: “Never did eye see the sun unless it had first become sun-like.”  Or more expositively, from Plato’s Republic: “Any one who has common sense will remember that the bewilderments of the eyes are of two kinds, and arise from two causes, either from coming out of the light or from going into the light, which is true of the mind's eye, quite as much as of the bodily eye.” 

What led to all of this?  Wanting to pick a poem, other than one of my own, to memorize. I’ve always liked this poem but never fully understood it, and I thought a quick study would help me commit it to mindfulness.  And it has.  I’ve done it! Memorized it, I mean; I think I’m only about halfway to understanding it.

And why, again, this interest in memory work?  In getting back to those walking hours in the mornings and afternoons (birding interests having been set aside by full time parenting duties, then being more directly replaced by having a dog to pull me along), I have found it invigorating to exercise more than the legs.

But why do I bring this to the Stillwater Symposia?  I suppose Nemerov would say that I am missing the point with this poem, and yet in our own way, with this blogsite, we, brothers and sister, are finding the world again.   But there’s more.  I’ve got a paraphrase, just for you symposians.  And in my efforts to understand this poem, I don’t think the poet would mind if I brought God back into it (as long as he was not too Selfish, or political, or scientific, or cabalistic, or presupposed)....

What Would You Write?

O sister, brothers, water is not

The point.  Watching it flow, that

Is the point, and celebrating
Truth at every shore...

Writing For The Symposia: Part 1

This I write for the symposia
inspired by stillwater dreams
and turtle songs and prayer requests
and trappist breweries. 

I raise my glass to those a’ ya
who have known the wilder seas
but are still led to restfulness
along God’s peaceful streams, 

and as the quiet river flows
with more movement than the 
     surface shows,
let these odd words be for those a’ ya
who celebrate such things
but would convive to bring to life
your erstwhile hidden dreams.

Week 3: Stillwater Symposia

Stillwater Symposia is our family blog of random poems, stories, photographs and ideas. The blog is there for all to see but it remains our intimate gathering of riverside contributors.

Moleskin 1.2: A Proper Introduction

The big chapters are daunting: love, faith, health, pride, humility, so let me start with tamer subjects: diversions, distractions, digressions.  You can skip this section if you want, but this is what defines me: old fashioned poetry, watching birds in their natural state, listening to human music; joys of discovery, paddling down a slow river, taking time for an arthouse movie; aerobic meditation, finding rhythm in routine, sometimes changing the pace. Noticing the rule of threes. The big chapters, love and God and healing, the ups and the downs, will be more important I suppose, or as important as a story for posterity should be.  But this is me, and this is my proper introduction.  Chapter Two, then: I am alive.  Maybe, whimsically, this will be the whole story.

Thirty Birds : A Foreword

I do not know which to prefer, the birds of photography or the birds of poetry, flight in a frame or songs on a page. 

Of course, I would really prefer a walk in the woods, across the prairie or along the shore to see the herons, thrushes, sparrows and gulls in their proper places. I would give you the birds themselves if I could, and if I could be sure they wouldn't fly away.

But I will give you what I can: my own thumbnail pictures and sets of sonnets, mixed in with fair use snippets of classic poetry by Yeats, Neruda, Oliver, Baudelaire and more than thirty other familiar poets. Like the birds, I would give you the whole of these other poets if I could, that you might walk into their woods and along their shores. 

It will be enough, though, if I can inspire you to see and listen for yourselves.

Ben, By The Way (A Guest Poem For The Menagerie)

To Dan, on his birthday


Ben, by the way, when
  one of our parakeets
died last week, was the first to say

when freer days were
  over, and the summer,
alas, had ended coolly,

when I didn’t have
  time for such a poem
as this on the Lost Menagerie,

as we lowered
  the birdcage from our Russian
rafters, Ben was the one to pray.

He prayed, especially
  when I dug the lifeless
bird into the autumn earth,

not quite a
  see-you-later prayer, more
than an hasta-manana blessing,

days before the
  pet store’s replica would
join its brothers in the chapel cage

Ben prayed with
  a grateful appreciation,
saying “thank you for your worth.”


And now the other
  parakeet, placed beside
those who would live another day

and lifted with them
  to hang from the rafters rising
over one who had died

is placid, quiet
  as a gravedigger, or
confused, with no words to offer,

and it was for this
  parakeet, too, by the way,
that Ben was the first to pray.

Rubin's Robin

What would you write, Rubin, of this odd bird
That sticks out its fat chest and bounces through grass
Dancing with butterflies, pulling at worms,
Covering ground with a chirp and a hop?

What gives you pause, Rubin, and what have you heard
That we didn’t notice and started to pass,
Ever commuting through everyday terms,
Running through seasons with no time to stop?

What did you see, Rubin, that we didn’t see
Or set to the side long ago and moved on
To whatever matters have caused us to be
Blind to the beauty of birds on the lawn?

How does it feel, Rubin, discovering spring
in the middle of August and finding a song
in your own back yard and suddenly starting
to look at those things that were there all along?

How sad,  to think  we laughed,
To think  we laughed  and thought,
We laughed,  thought  you absurd
To stand and cheer an ordinary bird.

What Rubin Saw

In an older generation
of still life souls, one
paused mid-conversation
on a summertime patio
and saw (or almost didn’t,
if not for the breeze
and an offhand chance
for the mind to wander)
more than ever before,
more than anyone else
took time to consider
the peripheral scene,
a remarkable moment
of cause to give notice
to that which in the
greencut grass was
never even there as far as
conversations go (so
far as he had ever known),
and in that pause,
for all that it was,
found poetry, perhaps,
or a minute, at least,
of something more
than prose...