In Blackwater Woods...More Mary Oliver

Yellow godlight from a neighborhood tree... This is for you... ;-)

In Blackwater Woods By Mary Oliver, from "American Primitive" Look, the trees

are turning

their own bodies

into pillars

of light,

are giving off the rich

fragrance of cinnamon

and fulfillment,

the long tapers

of cattails

are bursting and floating away over

the blue shoulders

of the ponds,

and every pond,

no matter what its

name is, is

nameless now.

Every year

everything

I have ever learned

in my lifetime

leads back to this: the fires

and the black river of loss

whose other side

is salvation,

whose meaning

none of us will ever know.

To live in this world

you must be able

to do three things:

to love what is mortal;

to hold it

against your bones knowing

your own life depends on it;

and, when the time comes to let it

go,

to let it go. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

RIP, Sweet Mary Oliver

Mary Oliver died January 17, 2019.  Rest In Peace, beautiful poet.

Where Does the Temple Begin, Where Does It End? 
By Mary Oliver

There are things you can’t reach. But
you can reach out to them, and all day long.

The wind, the bird flying away. The idea of God.

And it can keep you as busy as anything else, and happier.

The snake slides away; the fish jumps, like a little lily,
out of the water and back in; the goldfinches sing
from the unreachable top of the tree.

I look; morning to night I am never done with looking.

Looking I mean not just standing around, but standing around
as though with your arms open.

And thinking: maybe something will come, some
shining coil of wind,
or a few leaves from any old tree–
they are all in this too.

And now I will tell you the truth.
Everything in the world
comes.

At least, closer.

And, cordially.

Like the nibbling, tinsel-eyed fish; the unlooping snake.
Like goldfinches, little dolls of goldfluttering around the corner of the sky

of God, the blue air.

 

Southern Winter by Marion

My Louisiana Pines & Moon

Southern Winter

Rain, rain, rain.

Humidity & teasingly

warm Southern air.

Ah, zone 9 winters,

so like life:  unpredictable.

Cold.

Sadness sandwiched between

the rain-plastered leaves on

the Goji Berry bush.

Low, dark, menacing (tornado?)

clouds:

The not-knowing,

the storm-fear---

season of death teasing life...

an annual event...

keeps you on your toes:

WAKE UP!

Winter:

always pregnant with Spring

here in the South---

bulbs push skyward

before Christmas.

Tiny new leaves

sprouting at the

base of the Goji bush---

roots exposed from

brutal rains...

Note to self:  add soil,

and mulch...again.

LifeDeathLifeDeath,

tied eternally together

from the moment

of conception.

Ouroboros alchemy,

cycles of samsara.

Born to die or

born to live?

Your choice.

Namaste.

1/25/17

Poetry...Because...

Let us remember . . . that in the end we go to poetry for one reason, so that we might more fully inhabit our lives and the world in which we live them, and that if we more fully inhabit these things, we might be less apt to destroy both.  ~Christian Wiman

**********

I didn't trust it for a moment
but I drank it anyway,
the wine of my own poetry.

It gave me the daring to take hold
of the darkness and tear it down
and cut it into little pieces.
-- Lala, 14th century Persian poet

************

If you know what you are going to write when you're writing a poem, it's going to be average. ~Derek Walcott


************

Mr Witwould: "Pray, madam, do you pin up your hair with all your letters? I find I must keep copies."

Mrs Millamant: "Only with those in verse.... I never pin up my hair with prose."

~William Congreve, The Way of the World

********

In The Bleak Midwinter by Christina Rossetti

In the bleak midwinter

BY CHRISTINA ROSSETTI

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,

Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;

Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,

In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him, nor earth sustain;

Heaven and earth shall flee away when He comes to reign.

In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed

The Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

Enough for Him, whom cherubim, worship night and day,

Breastful of milk, and a mangerful of hay;

Enough for Him, whom angels fall before,

The ox and ass and camel which adore.

Angels and archangels may have gathered there,

Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;

But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,

Worshipped the beloved with a kiss.

What can I give Him, poor as I am?

If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;

If I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;

Yet what I can I give Him: give my heart.

As Our Bodies Rise, Our Names Turn Into Light by Charles Wright

Sunny & Susie, custom Blythe dolls

As Our Bodies Rise, Our Names Turn Into Light

By Charles Wright

 

The sky unrolls like a rug,

                                                unwelcoming, gun-grey,

Over the Blue Ridge.
Mothers are calling their children in,

                                                mellifluous syllables, floating sounds.

The traffic shimmies and settles back.

The doctor has filled his truck with leaves

Next door, and a pair of logs.

                                                Salt stones litter the street.

The snow falls and the wind drops.
How strange to have a name, any name, on this poor earth.

January hunkers down,

                                                the icicle deep in her throat---

The days become longer, the nights ground bitter and cold,
Single grain by single grain
Everything flows toward the structure,

                                                last ache in the ache for God.

1995

 

---------------------------------------------

I last posted this excellent poem in 2012.  I opened my "Norton Anthology of Poetry" to this poem this morning, just as I did that day six years ago.  It's quite worthy of a repeat.  

Please pray for my Mama or send good thoughts to her (Snow :-).  Her name is Juanita.  She's not doing well.  Thank you, my faithful readers & fellow poetry lovers.  I appreciate you all so much. 

xo,

Marion

“Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: ‘What! You too? I thought I was the only one.”-C.S. Lewis

Phoenix by Ijeoma Umebinyuo

Green!  Sunlight through my Fiddle Leaf Figs & pals...

Phoenix by Ijeoma Umebinyuo

From:  "Questions For Ada"

One day,
your bones will get weary
of men
who refuse to worship the God in you.

On that day,
you will either slit your soul
or gather your spirit
leaving any man
who has never called you
Holy.

Remember
how your mother kept her bones warm
on nights your father was far away.

So,
do not love a man who keeps you clinging
to the pillow for too many nights.

Stay away
from men who peel the skin
of other women, forcing you to wear them.

Remember how your mother struggled
to find her skin in the pile.

Do not
scratch your words,
soften your pain or scrub yourself in shame.

Do not
drown yourself in a man.

He will leave you struggling to breathe.

וווו×

All Things Pass...

(Moh-noh-noh-ah-wah-ray)

Buddha & my singing bowls...

Klimt

All Things Pass
By Timothy Leary, homage to Lao Tzu

All things pass
A sunrise does not last all morning
All things pass

 A cloudburst does not last all day 
All things pass 
Nor a sunset all night 

But Earth... sky... thunder... 
wind... fire... lake... 
mountain... water... 
These always change

And if these do not last 
Do man’s visions last? 
Do man’s illusions ? 

Take things as they come 
All things pass the

וווו×

RIP President George H. W. Bush

Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd

My favorite Pink Floyd song of all time sung by the amazing David Bowie & Eddie Vedder...great memories...

David Bowie

Eddie Vedder

Comfortably Numb by Pink Floyd

Hello,
Is there anybody in there?
Just nod if you can hear me.
Is there anyone at home?

Come on now
I hear you're feeling down
Well, I can ease your pain
And get you on your feet again

Relax
I'll need some information first
Just the basic facts
Can you show me where it hurts?

There is no pain, you are receding
A distant ship smoke on the horizon
You are only coming through in waves
Your lips move but I can't hear what you're saying
When I was a child I had a fever
My hands felt just like two balloons
Now I've got that feeling once again
I can't explain, you would not understand
This is not how I am
I have become comfortably numb

I have become comfortably numb

O.K.
Just a little pin prick
There'll be no more aaaaaaaah!
But you may feel a little sick

Can you stand up?
I do believe it's working, good
That'll keep you going through the show
Come on, it's time to go.

There is no pain you are receding
A distant ship smoke on the horizon
You are only coming through in waves
Your lips move but I can't hear what you're saying
When I was a child
I caught a fleeting glimpse
Out of the corner of my eye
I turned to look but it was gone
I cannot put my finger on it now
The child is grown
The dream is gone
I have become comfortably numb.

Thanksgiving by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Pain doodles...

I wish you all a blessed Thanksgiving filled with love & laughter!

Thanksgiving

Ella Wheeler Wilcox, 1850 - 1919

We walk on starry fields of white
   And do not see the daisies;
For blessings common in our sight
   We rarely offer praises.
We sigh for some supreme delight
   To crown our lives with splendor,
And quite ignore our daily store
   Of pleasures sweet and tender.

Our cares are bold and push their way
   Upon our thought and feeling.
They hand about us all the day,
   Our time from pleasure stealing.
So unobtrusive many a joy
   We pass by and forget it,
But worry strives to own our lives,
   And conquers if we let it.

There’s not a day in all the year
   But holds some hidden pleasure,
And looking back, joys oft appear
   To brim the past’s wide measure.
But blessings are like friends, I hold,
   Who love and labor near us.
We ought to raise our notes of praise
   While living hearts can hear us.

Full many a blessing wears the guise
   Of worry or of trouble;
Far-seeing is the soul, and wise,
   Who knows the mask is double.
But he who has the faith and strength
   To thank his God for sorrow
Has found a joy without alloy
   To gladden every morrow.

We ought to make the moments notes
   Of happy, glad Thanksgiving;
The hours and days a silent phrase
   Of music we are living.
And so the theme should swell and grow
   As weeks and months pass o’er us,
And rise sublime at this good time,
   A grand Thanksgiving chorus.