winter garden

Well a few weeks have lapsed since I last wrote - During that time I've been sick and working and I feel worn out. This post isn't going to be very energized - I'm just going to try to get something down. The purpose of this blog is to help my mind think about things - and to tell you the truth it is hard for me to think about things in a structured way so that I can communicate my thoughts to someone else or even myself. My thoughts are mostly the same - and very old and kind of grumpy and when they bump into each other they don't even bother to say how are you? because they know that nothing is ever new. But occasionally a new thought breezes through and makes some old thoughts laugh - and forget they hurt and they feel like new blades of grass again.

I don't have an example for you - do you have an example?

I did read the words of a man describing a photograph of his dead mother today. He called the photo "The Winter Garden Photograph" and the picture was taken of her when she was five. The photograph is not pictured in the book - but he spends a long time talking about it. I love the words - winter garden - I looked outside my window and there was fog and mud and bare tree branches.

Today I tried to make my main activities sleeping and drinking liquids - I did not go to work.

I had several dreams - each time I woke up I felt like I'd been somewhere - even though I was in bed all day. The dreams are foggy now - I didn't write them down - I thought maybe I'd remember them - I didn't of course.

poetry from the middle

Are you in the middle of your life right now? not like mid-life crisis - I just mean are you in the middle of living? is that what you are doing? how does it feel?
I have been thinking a little about the "middle" and the classic tradition of haiku poetry. Something I admire about haiku is the attention to detail that requires being awake to life and being awake to life often invites gratitude into your heart.

Haiku are the world's shortest poems, however I've heard it said that a very good haiku contains a novel or whole universe inside only 17 syllables. I think I have a lot to learn before I could see all that in a haiku but the more time I take with them the more I see...

Here is an excerpt from the book I've been reading called The Classic Tradition of Haiku an Anthology, edited by Faubion Bowers:
In all their brevity, haiku do tell a story and paint a vivid picture, leaving it up to the reader or listener to draw the meanings out and complete them in the mind's eye. Many poets embellished their writing with shorthand, brush-stroke drawings. Each haiku also contains a hidden dualism: the near and the far, foreground and background, then and now, past and present, high and low, sound and silence, and temporality and eternity.

Iio Sogi who lived from 1421-1502 was a master renga poet (renga means linked verse and is the origin of today's haiku) he wrote some very special poems - apparently he came from a low social background but was given the highest honor a poet could receive in his day by the shogun (or military ruler in japan) Here are some of my favorite poems of his in translation --

Snow yet remaining
the mountain slopes are misty
an evening in spring

However low one may be
it is in holding oneself in sway
that is imperative

everything from my old heart has vanished
leaving not a trace


(the last one is a translation of my own - actually - I just read the translation wrong - but the way I wrote it is the way read it - and I like it)


Here is some meanderings of my own over the last week - with influence from haiku but no haiku yet- I'm still trying to let those sink in


Shogun Song

I am a whale, of all animals, a big whale!
I am a shogun
my heart and stomach are interchangeable
I write poetry from my middle
water, underwater lava,
ridges that are the ocean's back
it stings my heart
it stings my heart
pom pom underwater plants
wave where the clams lay
and the deer swim back
to pine tree island so shining and plain
the mountains move off my shoulders
I am a deer
pines and sage
it's all the same
it stings my heart
it stings my heart
no one can equal the cherry blossom
no one can equal the moon

air carrying scent or sound

I decided to start a blog just a few days ago (I think this will surprise some of you). It happened when my birthday windows were breezy and open, and I was hopin' to get some wind of inspiration.
Do you hope for inspiration? How do you get in touch with what you really need?
I am usually a closed up cupboard, a dusty jar of pale canned pears - where are my feelers? my ears? How do I get in touch with what I really need?
I get nervous about myself and whisper "I don't have a clue."
The truth is I have to do more work than I would like to and I am reluctant to take responsibility for the shape of my own life.
I hope this blog will be one place for me to work - like in a garden - to plant my seeds.
That's the inspiration I got - to plant all my seeds. I need to explore, experiment, and practice. I need to grow and that's more likely to happen if I'm putting seeds in the ground.
My particular interests are in poetry, music, and art. Everyday I'll try to work on things like reading, writing and living. I'll seek things out and try to be open to the moments that surround me and weekly I will post a blog of my findings.
A blog is a strangely intangible place but it seems a fair atmosphere for ideas to blossom - air carrying scent or sound.

Last night I read an interview by a poet named Lance Larsen, I took a creative writing class from him at BYU.
This was an important part of the interview to me:

MERIDIAN: What advice do you have for the aspiring writer?
LARSEN: Four things: become a hungry and discriminating reader, perfect the craft, remain diligent, and learn how to eavesdrop on the cosmos. Not necessarily in that order. Other advice? Turn off the television. Keep a journal. Try to be honest about what you know and don’t know. Listen to Miles Davis. Immerse yourself in good writing. Don’t plan on making a lot of money. Show your work to the best readers you can and listen to what they say.

Try to be honest about what you know and don't know --- that's good advice
Last night I also had dinner with 3 lovely people in Iowa City. After dinner we drank tea, ate dark chocolate and talked about times that we cheated in school.

Here's a poem I wrote before going to bed

I told my friends, "my grandma has horses."
I never rode on horses.
She only had cows.
I threw corn husks to them
over the electric fence.
I got shocked
not on horses
my grandma had cows.
I looked across
at my neighbor's spelling test
to spell the word "king"
and later got a prize
for getting all the words right
I felt a darkness I wanted to spread
over what I did and I wanted
to be proud of myself