Wanderling❁

this week's words

 

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Every time I attempt a feminist critique of prose, I unconsciously end up associating "woman" with "earth", and my argument is always the same: the hurt felt by the earth is echoed in the female condition, and vice versa.

Discovered this week, this poem by Patti Smith first appeared years ago in The New Yorker, after the tragic shooting at Virginia Tech. Her sister, Tara, was watching the snow fall when she received a call from her daughter, who attended Virginia Tech. She was safe, somehow, and her mother hung up the phone and continued to watch the snow and a family of deer. I treasure how Smith captures her sister, the solemn & silent beauty of feminine strength, embodied in the roles of mother, creator, provider, and reservoir of hurt.

 

"She stood by the door

of her Virginia farm

pulling a sweater on

the branches

of the dogwood

were bowed

loosened

in sudden snow

the deer stood

in mute wonder

at the garden's edge

she slipped the phone

in her pocket

her daughter

unharmed

among

the petals gone

she snapped

a branch

the tempest stalled

she felt the boy

she felt the dead

she felt the families

she felt the wind

the deer don't do that

she said

the deer don't do that"

 

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- Patti Smith, "Tara", (2007)

This Week's Words

 

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I've laughed, wept, shouted, danced, & fallen asleep to the words of this song recorded by Kaleo - at least once every day. Something about the quiet, underlying agony and the resigned acceptance of one's ordinary life is so apparent in these lyrics, I can't help but think of what unknown things we all wait for, and what unknown disappointments we'll have to learn to smile at one day.

 

"All the pretty girls like Samuel
Oh, he really doesn't share
Although it's more than he can handle
Life is anything but fair, life is anything but fair...

 

Just as soon as they turn older
He'll come and sweep them off their feet
It's only making me feel smaller
All the hidden love beneath

 

So won't you lay me, won't you lay me down...

 

All alone, alone again
No one lends a helping hand
I have waited, I have waited
Takes its toll, my foolish pride
How long before I see the light

 

I have waited, I have waited
For you to lay me down

 

Sail on by, sail on by for now
They play naked in the water
You know it's hard, heaven knows I've tried
But it just keeps getting harder

 

So won't you lay me, won't you lay me down..."

 

 

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- music and lyrics by JJ Julius Son, All The Pretty Girls, Way Down We Go (2014)

This Week's Words

 

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I love when writers quote other writers. It delights me and somehow makes me feel a little more at home among humans.

I recently read this poetic quote in "Ideas of Heaven", a collection of comforting short stories by Joan Silber. Silber's narrator, in the story "Ashes of Love", finds himself enchanted by the words of Rainer Maria Rilke (the Austrian poet) while traveling through the greener & wilder parts of Thailand with his lover:

 

"... if only we too could discover a pure, contained

human place, our own strip of fruit-bearing soil

between river and rock. For our own heart always exceeds us..."

 

I keep repeating this phrase to myself as I go about my daily routine, searching for beauty in the ordinary. I know why we quote others. Sometimes our tongues fail, just as our hearts exceed us. Sometimes we need to hear our own thoughts strangely coming from another trembling artistic mind. Doesn't the universe work in strange, marvelous ways?

 

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- Joan Silber, "Ideas of Heaven: A Ring of Stories", (2005)

this week's words

 

 

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Selena Quintanilla made me a lover of Spanish music at a early age - a love I forgot until mid-college, when I formally studied the language to remove the barrier that prevented a real, true, full understanding of poets like Neruda, Martí, de Vega, and Hernandez. The first day I read my most treasured Neruda sonnet in its original Spanish, oh... I wept like a child. Such literal, tangible beauty no longer clouded.

Even at six years old, far from fluent in Spanish, my heart would  ache at my favorite Selena lyrics. In a pair of my mom's high heels with a cherry red hibiscus flower in my hair, I would twirl around the house singing her music loudly. 22 years later, Selena is missed by all, and rightfully so. Una flor que florecío, y nunca se marchitó.

 

"Como la flor

Con tanto amor

Me diste tú

Se marchitó

Me marcho hoy

Yo sé perder

Pero, ay, cómo me duele

Ay, cómo me duele"

 

"Like the flower 

With so much love

You gave to me

It wilted

I'm leaving now

I know how to lose

But, oh, how I hurt

Oh, how I hurt"

 

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- Selena, "Como la Flor", Entre a Mi Mundo (1992)

This Week's Words

 

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It's been a while since I dove deep into a creative pool. But starting my official, formal education in poetry has awakened me again. As I compiled a list of literary magazines and publications that I'd like to see my name in before the next summer, I stumbled across this brilliant poem in The Sun. It's strange and wonderful how a few simple words arranged in just the right way can be more pleasing than sunshine after rain.

 

The Soul in a Body

"is like an old Russian immigrant

looking out his apartment’s only window.

Yes, yes, he says.

The landlord printed my name in block letters

on the lobby directory

decades ago.

All correspondence 

has been forwarded to this address.

But I am not from here. I am not

from here at all."

 

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- Yehoshua November, "The Soul in a Body", (2016)

This Week's Words

 

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La Marseillaise. The French National Anthem.

No other words are needed to bring tears to the eyes this week.

 

 

Peace for Paris, by artist Jean Julien.

 

"Ye sons of France, awake to glory,

Hark, hark! what myriads bid you rise!

Your children, wives and white-haired grandsires.

Behold their tears and hear their cries! (repeat)

Shall hateful tyrants, mischiefs breeding,

With hireling hosts, a ruffian band,

Affright and desolate the land,

While peace and liberty lie bleeding?

To arms, to arms, ye brave!

The avenging sword unsheath,

March on, march on!

All hearts resolv'd

On victory or death!

Now, now, the dangerous storm is rolling

Which treacherous kings confederate raise!

The dogs of war, let loose, are howling,

And lo! our fields and cities blaze! (repeat)

And shall we basely view the ruin

While lawless force with guilty stride

Spreads desolation far and wide

With crimes and blood his hands embruing?

To arms, to arms, ye brave!...

With luxury and pride surrounded

The vile insatiate despots dare,

Their thirst of power and gold unbounded,

To mete and vend the light and air! (repeat)

Like beasts of burden would they load us,

Like gods would bid their slaves adore,

But man is man, and who is more?

Then shall they longer lash and goad us?

To arms, to arms, ye brave!...

O Liberty, can man resign thee

Once having felt thy generous flame?

Can dungeons, bolts or bars confine thee

Or whips thy noble spirit tame? (repeat)

Too long the world has wept, bewailing

That falsehood's dagger tyrants wield,

But freedom is our sword and shield,

And all their arts are unavailing.

To arms, to arms, ye brave!..."

 

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La Marseillaise, English versification

Original 1792 by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle, after declaration of war by France against Austria

This Week's Words

 

 

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My favorite words this week reminded me that sometimes the only way to cope with an impasse is to turn numb, cold, and quiet, until it passes. This old song by The Cranberries is a good anthem for the dawn of October. The winds are changing, something's coming, can you feel it? It's like the end of the world, an apathetic apocalypse, but better.

 

 

 

 

"... Another head hangs lowly

Child is slowly taken

And if violence causes the silence

Who are we mistaking

But you see it's not me

It's not my family

In your head in your head

They are fighting

With their tanks and their bombs
And their bombs and their guns
In your head in your head they are crying

In your head
In your head
Zombie zombie zombie ei ei
What's in your head
In your head.
Zombie, zombie, zombie..."

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- The Cranberries, "Zombie", No Need To Argue

This Week's Words

I re-wrote the words of this 1977 Bukowski poem about ten times tonight, over and over until they were drumming an unconscious beat in my head. "Do it, do it, do it, all the way, all the way"... Lonely and in the quiet, alone with the gods and my night is flaming with fire. 

 

 

 

 

if you’re going to try, go all the
way.
otherwise, don’t even start.

if you’re going to try, go all the
way. this could mean losing girlfriends,
wives, relatives, jobs and
maybe your mind.

go all the way.
it could mean not eating for 3 or
4 days.
it could mean freezing on a
park bench.
it could mean jail,
it could mean derision,
mockery,
isolation.
isolation is the gift,
all the others are a test of your
endurance, of
how much you really want to
do it.
and you’ll do it
despite rejection and the
worst odds
and it will be better than
anything else
you can imagine.

if you’re going to try,
go all the way.
there is no other feeling like
that.
you will be alone with the
gods
and the nights will flame with
fire.

do it, do it, do it.
do it.

all the way
all the way.
you will ride life straight to
perfect laughter,
it’s the only good fight
there is.

 

- Charles Bukowski, "Roll the Dice", Love is a Dog from Hell

This week's words

 

 

"My heart and soul were never mine to own, what you care to die for?

(What you care to die for?)

We die alone, we'll all die young, what you care to die for?

(What you care to die from?)

Snow glistens on the ledge, whiskey on the bed, shake it out and light a cigarette 

Miss me when you, you wish you weren't right. 

Shake me all out if I'm wrong, for you, for you. 

Shake it all out when I'm gone, I, for you. 

Is the Devil so bad if he cries in his sleep, while the earth turns,

and his kids learned to say, fuck you they don't, love you.

Does the Devil get scared if she dies in her dreams, where the earth burns,

she cries 'cause she's nothing like, is she like you?"

 

- Rainbow Kitten Surprise. "Devil Like Me", Seven + Mary