I Stood on a Tower

Edmund Dulac

I Stood on a Tower

I stood on a tower in the wet,

And New Year and Old Year met,

And winds were roaring and blowing;

And I said, ‘O years, that meet in tears,

Have you all that is worth the knowing?

Science enough and exploring,

Wanderers coming and going,

Matter enough for deploring,

But aught that is worth the knowing?

Seas at my feet were flowing,

Waves on the shingle pouring,

Old year roaring and blowing,

And New Year blowing and roaring.

Alfred Lord Tennyson

"Years that meet in tears"... That's not the case for me at the moment, I'm glad to say, but for many, it's exactly the situation. Wherever you stand on that account, it's an interesting question - what will we experience, what will we learn in 2018 that will be "worth the knowing"? And how does one position oneself to learn worthwhile things? I have to think about that. Is the poem asking - in all this noise and commotion, all this action and busyness - or "roaring and blowing", what is meaningful? It's a very good question.

Burning the Old Year

Brent Cotton

Burning the Old Year

Letters swallow themselves in seconds.   

Notes friends tied to the doorknob,   

transparent scarlet paper,

sizzle like moth wings,

marry the air.

So much of any year is flammable,   

lists of vegetables, partial poems.   

Orange swirling flame of days,   

so little is a stone.

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,   

an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.   

I begin again with the smallest numbers.

Quick dance, shuffle of losses and leaves,   

only the things I didn’t do   

crackle after the blazing dies.

Naomi Shihab Nye

"So much of any year is flammable". I appreciate the idea of burning all the things that are unneccessary. Purging the past, cleansing all the partials, the half-ways, the debris and rubble - getting completely clear of it so there's space -"absence" as Nye calls it - room to move forward, to dance, to look off into the distance and make new plans and goals. It seems like the perfect way to end the year.

 

Painting a Wave

Lia Melia , "Songs of Melusina"

Painting a Wave

"Painting a wave requires no system,"
The painter said, painting a wave.
"Systems may get you flotsam and jetsam,
Seaweed and so forth. But never a wave."

There was a scroll or fine-lined curve
On the canvas first, and then what looked
Like hair flying or grayish nerves,
Which began to move as the painter worked.

"Painting the sea is a lot of trouble;
It never stops still for a moment, so
I try to make it internal, mental,
As though I stopped it, then let it go."

Something began to pulse and tumble
Out of the brushes, the ink, the chalk;
A long black line commenced to tremble,
Then, like a fishline, started to jerk...

With what at the end? "I think I've caught it,"
A drop of water hung by a hair,
"If I could only stop it a minute!"
The drop began to race somewhere.

Spreading out in every direction,
A bird of thread, caught in a storm,
Trying to say "Connection! Action!"
But in the end it was very calm.

Soon there was water under water,
And over the sand a sun...a moon?
Who could have seen that wave of water
One night ago? Or a thousand and one?

Who could have seen the lid of water
With its thin mascara of buoys and corks,
With its lined horizon's distant glimmer
Of maybe a skyline like New York's?

Now there will be that morning evening
Tide dyeing the water's pulse,
The wave drying in ink. The Wave.
Moving, momentous, motionless.

Howard Moss

Here is the question - how do you capture motion in art? Imagine the days before photography, before slow motion, the days when people didn't know if all four hoofs of a running horse left the ground midstride, or if one was always touching the ground. The things we have seen since! I've spent my share of time watching extreme slow motion videos of bursting water balloons and watermelons on Youtube, and it's utterly fascinating. But how does an artist approach the task of portraying motion - in a still, unmoving medium? I love how this poem looks at that question. 



  

From March 1979

Unknown

From March 1979

Weary of all who come with words, words but no language
I make my way to the snow-covered island.
The untamed has no words.
The unwritten pages spread out on every side!
I come upon the tracks of deer in the snow.
Language but no words.

Thomas Transtromer

It's something to think about. How much of our talk really says anything? How many of our conversations, writings, books - poetry even, is meaningful? Is it only when we're stripped down to life and death essentials that we actually speak?

 

A Christmas Hymn

Arcabus

 "And some of the Pharisees from among the multitude said unto him, Master, rebuke thy disciples. And he answered and said unto them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out." 
 Luke 19, 39-40

A Christmas Hymn

A stable-lamp is lighted

Whose glow shall wake the sky;

The stars shall bend their voices,

And every stone shall cry.

And every stone shall cry,

And straw like gold shall shine;

A barn shall harbor heaven,

A stall become a shrine.

This child through David's city

Shall ride in triumph by;

The palm shall strew its branches,

And every stone shall cry.

And every stone shall cry,

Though heavy, dull, and dumb,

And lie within the roadway

To pave his kingdom come.

Yet he shall be forsaken,

And yielded up to die;

The sky shall groan and darken,

And every stone shall cry.

And every stone shall cry

For stony hearts of men:

God's blood upon the spearhead,

God's love refused again.

But now, as at the ending,

The low is lifted high;

The stars shall bend their voices,

And every stone shall cry.

And every stone shall cry

In praises of the child

By whose descent among us

The worlds are reconciled.

Richard Wilbur

That verse where Jesus says "If no one speaks about me, the stones themselves will cry out." has always got to me. Can you imagine? I mean, this is the Son of God, Creator of the Universe, and humanity does not recognize him, but all the rest of creation does. They know his voice, his step, his touch. The winds and waves obeyed him, illness and disease shrank away. And I have to say,  nature has been crying his name from the beginning - anything I look at, a leaf, a feather, and yes,  even a rock, when I look closely enough, when I see the beauty and complexity, the wonder in the smallest details - I hear his name over and over again.

Nest

Bruno Liljefors, "Song Thrush at Nest"

Nest

It wasn’t until we got the Christmas tree 

into the house and up on the stand 

that our daughter discovered a small bird’s nest 

tucked among its needled branches.

Amazing, that the nest had made it 

all the way from Nova Scotia on a truck

mashed together with hundreds of other trees 

without being dislodged or crushed.

And now it made the tree feel wilder, 

a balsam fir growing in our living room, 

as though at any moment a bird might flutter 

through the house and return to the nest.

And yet, because we’d brought the tree indoors, 

we’d turned the nest into the first ornament. 

So we wound the tree with strings of lights, 

draped it with strands of red beads,

and added the other ornaments, then dropped 

two small brass bells into the nest, like eggs 

containing music, and hung a painted goldfinch 

from the branch above, as if to keep them warm.

Jefferey Harrison

This story is a perfect reminder - underneath all our ways of dressing things up, repeating habits and traditions, carefully presenting ourselves, inventing plans for dealing with any situation we might face - life is wild. Sometimes beautifully so, and sometimes otherwise. 

Christmas Ornaments

Kim Smith

Christmas Ornaments

The boxes break,

At the corners,

Their sides

Sink weak;

They are tied up

Every year

With the same

Gray string;

But under the split

Lids, a fortune

Shines: Globes

Of gold and sapphire,

Silver spires and

Bells,  jeweled

Nightingales with

Pearly tails.

Valerie Worth

This is exactly how unpacking the Christmas tree ornaments was when I was a kid. I even remember the slightly musty smell of the boxes. There is something remarkable about those drab brown cardboard boxes holding such sumptuousness  Even now, getting out the decorations has it's magic.How often in our lives do we uncover treasures like we do when preparing for Christmas?