Bloom

(An impromptu poem by Dangerboy:)

It's spring. The flowers are growing in our backyard.

See? They are so beautiful!

There are no bees in this story.

The sign says you can pick the flowers.

(There are butterflies in this garden.)

And when you pick them, they don't die.

(These were the rules set out by Dangerboy as we were playing together in the hall. It's his fantasy garden--first of all, that it exists; it's pain- and fear-free; and it's immortal. Just like heaven...)

By Emily Dickinson...

Nature, the gentlest mother,
Impatient of no child,
The feeblest or the waywardest,
Her admonition mild

In forest and the hill
By traveller is heard,
Restraining rampant squirrel,
Or too impetuous bird.

How fair her conversation,
A summer afternoon,--
Her household, her assembly;
And when the sun goes down,

Her voice among the aisles
Incites the timid prayer
Of the minutest cricket,
The most unworthy flower.

When all her children sleep
She turns as long away
As will suffice to light her lamps;
Then, bending from the sky,

With infinite affection,
And infiniter care,
Her golden finger on her lip,
Wills silence everywhere.

(Isn't that lovely? Aaron Copland set it to music too. Also lovely. Sorry, no picture. Can't get it to work today. Now I'm just going to take a nap. Ahhh.)

Poem

Harbor Hills Ward: Newport Beach

You emerge from your car, laughing.

“I forgot to tie my dress,” you say,

turning your back to me, and I do it for you.

And I think I understand how Cinderella felt

once, that early afternoon,

when the ball was still imaginary:

Standing there,

in her wrinkled black polyester,

grasping Drusilla’s sash,

her callused fingertips

not fathoming the silk,

it’s that fine, bluer than

Gatsby’s shirts, softer,

wealth slipping through her fingers,

fluttering, catching on a hangnail--

Cinderella hopes she doesn’t smell of onions

as she ties a lopsided bow

on her sister.

I write poems for fun sometimes, and it's fun to have a place to share them. But I'm going to start writing what I'm trying to convey too, just in case anyone feels like they want to give some feedback, which I always appreciate.

I live in a ward in which the economical variance among members is huge. Generally it doesn't bother me, but one morning I felt the difference a little stronger than usual. I was on my way in to church and a beautiful, youthful-looking, skinny, perfectly-coiffed, perfumed sister stopped me in front of the church doors and asked me to tie the back of her dress. The touch of the material was a shock--my hands hadn't felt anything so soft and obviously expensive in a looong time. So this poem is trying to convey that shock, as well as a bit of wonder that two "sisters" could come from such unequal walks of life.

(art by Roger d'Erlander from here)

This is just to say...

How many poets does it take to change a light bulb?

Two: One to look at the light bulb and think about his mother, and the other to stare out the window, watching the rain.

(Art: Carl Spitzweg, 1835, "The Poor Poet." Joke: I think I heard it on Prairie Home Companion.)

Poem (not mine)

I love this poem--the last three lines have really helped me keep going on those days when it's hard to get out of bed and get going.

On Angels (by Czeslaw Milosz)

All was taken away from you: white dresses,
wings, even existence.
Yet I believe you,
messengers.

There, where the world is turned inside out,
a heavy fabric embroidered with stars and beasts,
you stroll, inspecting the trustworthy seams.

Short is your stay here:
now and then at a matinal hour, if the sky is clear,
in a melody repeated by a bird,
or in the smell of apples at close of day
when the light makes the orchards magic.

They say somebody has invented you
but to me this does not sound convincing
for the humans invented themselves as well.

The voice -- no doubt it is a valid proof,
as it can belong only to radiant creatures,
weightless and winged (after all, why not?),
girdled with the lightening.

I have heard that voice many a time when asleep
and, what is strange, I understood more or less
an order or an appeal in an unearthly tongue:

day draws near
another one
do what you can.

Poem

The Life Before

It is Saturday. I am cleaning the back porch, rag in hand,
dusting down an old rocking chair, a table, easel. I turn over
a folding cot, springs rusting, frame bent; creak it open
and start wiping the grit from the inside. Then,

a cluster of spiders. I’ve caught them mid-sentence.
They don’t run for cover, just watch me sideways.
The mother is the stillest. Her brown legs spread three inches across.
She was born here, in the half-light, the warm decay.
Now her young are piled around her, white, each large as a thistle head,
but fragile—I’ve already crushed some—legs as fine as the hairs on my arm.
I could easily wipe them all away, wash my rag afterward, still—

“Come see,” I call to my son.
He doesn’t hear me. He’s watching cartoons,
getting over a fever. His cheeks are pink
and his damp hair curls at his temples.
My husband is next to him, dozing,
his feet up on the coffee table. One hand
rests on the book turned over on his chest.
His other arm holds my daughter,
her small fingers opening and closing
on his skin. Her lips open as she sleeps.

So I lift the cot over the side of the deck, lean over and blow.
The mother catches the wind first and wafts down into the grass.
Two more breaths and her children follow in clumps, like dandelion seeds.
I brush the cot down after them.

Inside, my family rests together.
It is not an unusual Saturday.
I shake out my cloth.

A riddle....

Peter composed this little poem on the spot as I was dropping him off for work one day long ago. It applies to me now in altogether interesting ways...anyone want to hazard a guess?

I am the pod,
You are the pea;
I'm empty without you,
And you're naked without me.

How Can I Keep from Singing?

One to add to the list of things on NPR that made me cry in the car this week as I listened: Martin Sheen singing.

Actually, they were mostly happy tears. Mr. Sheen, I learned, has been passionate about human rights causes since using the services of a soup kitchen as a young actor. He mentioned the marches in Myanmar before performing this hymn on Prairie Home Companion last weekend. The song is one of my favorites, and though he is not a singer by trade, it was obvious that he believed what he was singing. Below are the words, and here is the link (it's in the third segment). BYU Singers and, I'm told, Enya also do lovely arrangements. (Dangerboy fans, I'll write more soon!!)

My life goes on in endless song
Above earth's lamentations;
I hear the real, though far-off hymn
That hails a new creation.
Through all the tumult and the strife
I hear its music ringing:
It sounds an echo in my soul.
How can I keep from singing?

While though the tempest loudly roars,
I hear the truth, it liveth.
And though the darkness round me close,
Songs in the night it giveth.
No storm can shake my inmost calm,
While to that rock I'm clinging.
Since love is lord of heaven and earth
How can I keep from singing?

When tyrants tremble in their fear
And hear their death knell ringing,
When friends rejoice both far and near
How can I keep from singing?
In prison cell and dungeon vile
Our thoughts to them are winging,
When friends by shame are undefiled
How can I keep from singing?

i like kittens...and jackknives...and pennies...and rosebugs

Yesterday I played for a funeral at church. The woman who passed away was named Kim; she'd been a member of the church for less than a year. I didn't know her, but I'd seen her around, and once she made a kind comment about Dangerboy, but I don't remember what she said. She was in her thirties--had been ill for about four years. I came away wishing I'd known her. She and her husband had been together since junior high (she was a straight-A student); she worked with autistic children and was passionate about helping them; she donated a kidney to her father and help him live ten years longer than he might have; she was very committed to her new church membership, e-mailing the bishop often. Her family (in speeches) said she had a plan for everything--the bishop said that in one of her last e-mails, she wrote up her plan for a system of increasing sisterhood in the Relief Society. What a lady. Wish I'd have been able to know her better 'round here.

The service was uplifting; despite the heartbreak the family must have felt, there were many touching, funny moments. And while I know that funerals are for the living, whenever I attend one it's impossible for me not to think of what my own funeral might be like--or what I'd like to see, were I able to attend it. I'm actually somewhat serious but, don't worry, not planning on leaving anytime soon. Hope this isn't offensive to anyone:

--In the place of honor, my senior picture should be used (the photographer's blowup) as a monument to my vanity, even if I live until the age of 101 or more

--Music and poetry should be chosen meticulously; John Cage's 4:33 might allow for contemplation and get a few laughs (it's a completely silent piece); old folk hymns are good too. And I like Louise Gluck's "The White Lilies" for poetry, though there are probably others.

--After a glowing eulogy, allow for some open-mike time (not more than, say, 45 minutes)--if nobody can think of any fond memories, not-so-fond ones will do, or better yet, outrageous lies (think "she spent every spare moment making sweaters for oil-spill-damaged penguins" or something).

--Although a New Orleans jazz funeral would be ideal, it's probably unrealistic; so how about recordings to play to and from the cemetery--a jazz dirge on the way there, something upbeat on the way back to get everyone in the mood for a good Mormon funeral buffet. (See this Langston Hughes poem--another favorite--scroll down on the page to see it in English)

--No viewing. (I don't think Kim had one either, actually.)

--"In lieu of flowers" donations should be sent to children's charities, if anyone feels the desire.

I think that's it--if I think of anything else...I'll change it!

The painting is Funeral Procession by Ellis Wilson

Water and Sleep

At ol' Ricks College, in the Collegiate Singers, we once performed an arrangement of Hark I Hear the Harps Eternal, a 19th-century Southern song with a good tempo for rocking a chair, or maybe rowing a boat:

Hark, I hear the harps eternal

Ringing on the farther shore,

As I near those swollen waters

With their deep and solemn roar.

And my soul, though stained with sorrow,

Fading as the light of day,

Passes swiftly o’er those waters,

To the city far away.

Souls have crossed before me, saintly,

To that land of perfect rest;

And I hear them singing faintly

In the mansions of the blest.

Hallelujah, hallelujah,
Hallelujah, praise the lamb!
Hallelujah, hallelujah,
Glory to the great I AM!

The song is about, on one level, crossing over; as in crossing over to the afterlife. I can't relate to that meaning yet, on a personal level, though I suppose I will someday. But I used to hum this tune as I did baptisms for the dead--I like the baptismal image of water, like to think that this song might be sung from the point of view of one waiting for on the other side for the ordinance to be performed for them. More recently, I've come to think of these crossing the waters in the song as crossing over into sleep, and I sing this to DB quite often. Some of these old hymns are so rich--this one touches me on rather a mystical level.

Other waters: my parents came to visit this week, and we went to Laguna Beach on Thursday, to one of our favorite places for tidepools. It was so windy and cold--high wave advisories and all--we didn't think we'd have any fun. But the huge waves had brought in all sorts of beautiful shells and creatures--live clams and barnacles and brittle stars, sea urchins and spiny hermit crabs that played peek-a-boo with Dangerboy, made him belly laugh. I took this tidepool picture of a tiny shell like a cornucopia filled with pieces of tinier shells and sea dust. It was like a tidepool within a tidepool--makes you wonder how far down it goes? (Is it turtles all the way?) (Does anyone know that joke?)

The top picture is The Tetons: Snake River by Ansel Adams. Love the photograph--love the place.

Poem and Purple

Today I was walking with Dangerboy when he exclaimed, "Flowers. Purple." Sure enough, there they were. He saw more, pointing at each stalk, saying "Purple, purple." His first color.

And when I bumped my head this morning, he reached his arms toward me until I picked him up, and then he rubbed my head for me, and kissed it better. And it worked!

Here is a poem I like.

Lying In A Hammock At William Duffy's Farm In Pine Island, Minnesota
by James Wright
Over my head, I see the bronze butterfly,
Asleep on the black trunk,
blowing like a leaf in green shadow.
Down the ravine behind the empty house,
The cowbells follow one another
Into the distances of the afternoon.
To my right,
In a field of sunlight between two pines,
The droppings of last year's horses
Blaze up into golden stones.
I lean back, as the evening darkens and comes on.
A chicken hawk floats over, looking for home.
I have wasted my life.

Poems and cuteness

Here are a couple of recent poems. The first is about a snail (as a metaphor for finding our the world you've created may not hold after all) and the second is P.'s Valentine's day present--about making strawberry shortcake together in his parents' kitchen before we were married (as a metaphor for the beginnings of a family, and by extension, "worlds without number").

Dangerboy cuteness of the day: pointing at things with his index finger held next to (and extending outward from)his nose. Try it--it can't help but look cute, if I explained it right.

Rainy morning

In that instant of outrageous pressure before you crack,
you consider the wedges like bricks
each larger than the last,
placed firmly in a spiral around your body,
packed with memories like concrete.

And you realize your fortress will not hold;
that each tiny compartment contains
only warm air and filtered sunlight,
and that each wall is not of stone, but of bone;
not even of wood, but of dry leaves. (12/12/06)



Shortcake Genesis

sunlight through the kitchen window, white on the cupboards and scratched linoleum,
I having come to you under a cool late-summer sky
on a day tied up with blue and yellow flowers growing around your parents house,
gathered in a bunch and preserved in the heat of Grandpa’s ’78 pickup

and after the grit of flour on our hands, the spent strength of sticky eggshells, the
creamy white sweetness and red juice of blossoms come to fruit (your eyes like Caleb’s) we blessed our creation of strawberries, cream, and cake (2/13/07)