LXXII.

Raymond C. Booth

LXXII.

If all rivers are sweet,

where does the sea get its salt?

How do the seasons know

they must change their shirt?

Why so slowly in winter

and later with such a rapid shudder?

And how do the roots know

they must climb towards the light?

And then greet the air

with so many flowers and colors?

Is it always the same spring

who revives her role?

Pablo Neruda

The best questions are the first questions. Child questions. Wonder questions. “Why is the sky blue?” The remarkable thing about that question is that the child is aware that the sky could have been a colour other than blue. It seems as if we adults lose the ability to think this way.  Like in the fantasy books where children experience magic, but forget it as they get older. That always makes me sad. Why do we forget? Is it possible that this magic can return as we get older/wiser? I remember my university professor saying that the story arc goes from Innocence to Experience to Experience + Innocence, and that the last was best of all because it was Innocence that cannot be taken away. Neruda’s question poems remind me of that. These are Musing and Marvelling Questions rather than Requiring-an-Answer Questions. Child-like without being childish. Here is acknowledgement of mystery, of puzzles, of possibilities; awareness that things could have been another way, and a sense of wonder that they are the way they are. Neruda’s questions give me hope that we jaded, cynical, so-called “realists” simply haven’t reached the age of Wonder Wisdom yet.  So here’s to the return of wonder! And God help us on our way.

Question VII

 

 

 

Albrecht Durer

VII.

 

What is it that upsets the volcanoes

that spit fire, cold and rage?

Why wasn't Christopher Columbus

able to discover Spain?

How many questions does a cat have?

Do tears not yet spilled

wait in small lakes?

Or are they invisible rivers

that run toward sadness?

 

Pablo Neruda

 

 

These questions! - when I first came across these, something broke in my brain. It wasn't until I read these poems that I understood what poetry does, or what the possibilities truly were. In all my years of reading poems, I hadn't seen it. And I don't even know if I can put into words what I am beginning to learn.

At first, the questions seemed child-like and beautiful, but not particularly poetic or deep. Where is the rhythm, the wordplay, for instance? Where is the development of metaphor? But my curiosity was piqued. I read more.

I wrote about this before -( LXXII), and I still hold to those thoughts, but since  then they have grown. Something else is happening in the words - something more than mere childlike wondering. For instance, in that question, "How many questions does a cat have?" 

 
That's not naive wondering, it's questioning whether I have been wrong about the world I live in. We are very "scientific" about the things around us. We have tested things on certain levels, and have come to conclusions. But what if we got it wrong? What if we made a specific answer cover too large an area? Or too small?

What if we have skewed our vision of reality so much that we have lost the path and are now traveling down some self-invented by-way leading only into more distortion?


Neruda's question poems cracked open a treasure box for me. When I look at the cat, I see what I have been told is there, and forget that I have agency in seeing, that I need to take up my eyes and use them in a fresh way. 

 

Science is too small explain a cat.


What I am learning is that poetry is thinking and seeing, or something that is both - seeking? (I just noticed that when I patch those two words together, "seeking" is what get.) Seeking the fuller truth of things. Seeking the possibilities. Cracking out of smallthink.

Does a cat ask questions?
Obviously.

Now what we need is a poet to hear them.