Conch shell on a beach...
CONCH
By Olav H. Hauge, translated by Robert Bly
You build a house for your soul,
and wander proudly
in starlight
with the house on your back,
like a snail.
When danger is near,
you crawl inside
and are safe
behind your hard
shell.
And when you are no more,
the house will
live on,
a testament
to your soul's beauty.
And the sea of your loneliness
will sing deep
inside.
From: "The Dream We Carry" by Olav H. Hauge
I'm growing my wings, slowly.
I found this poem just in time. It gave me what I needed to stay alive today. And that's enough...
xo,
Marion
7 comments:
I reckon that the Conch shell should be used in the UK Parliament in the way that a native tribe used it. Their rule was that in a debate or suchlike, only the person holding the Conch shell could speak. It is a marvelous idea: no shouting down by those who want to argue until the shell is handed to them.
So sorry to read of how you have been ignored by those who ought to be close by and supportive. You are suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune - as told by Hamlet. I wish you well, and that you have a much happier 2018.
Thanks, Philip. You are a true gentleman...and I'm going to dust off my "Complete Works of Shakespeare" and re-read Hamlet. I enjoyed the Conch shell trivia. xo
One of my happiest memories is of seeing the ocean at Galveston (the Gulf of Mexico, actually, but what did I know) when I was seven or eight. I loved the smell of the salt water and I treasured the seashells that I bought, but most of all I treasured the little shriveled seahorse. Now, I would be horrified by the thought of buying a creature that was killed for the tourist trade, but I could enjoy a great many such things then that I will never be able to enjoy again, and, sad though it is, I think it better to know what price we made others pay for our enjoyment.
I hope you're well. I'm happy we're visiting again. Paths converge, diverge, and sometimes converge again, and what fun it is when a re-convergence occurs.
I just read the words beneath "Leave your comment." Van Gogh said that!? What a treat. He would have known, of course, that in his case, most people not only didn't know what he was inside, they thought he was crazy inside.
Snow, I saw the Gulf, too, as a kid in Biloxi, MS. I also thought it was the ocean. I was 21 before I saw the Atlantic Ocean in Jacksonville Beach, Florida. It was breathtakingly magical. I've yet to see the Pacific. I still love the Gulf, though. Yes, that's a Van Gogh quote. I'm glad you like it. If your sweet Peggy kicks the bucket before you, I'm moving to Oregon! Ha! ;-) xo
In most places that I've seen it, the Pacific is cold and violent. Here in Oregon, beach strollers are sometimes swept out to sea by sneaker waves or killed by drift logs that were thrown at them by sneaker waves (signs warn people to never turn their back on the ocean). I've rarely seen a swimmer here, and what few surfers there are wear wetsuits. In many--maybe most--places, there is no sandy beach but rather jagged volcano rocks to walk up. There are also tidal pools, sea stacks, and mountains that overlook the ocean. It's all very beautiful but also scary. It's still a bit hard for me to understand why the Gulf isn't simply the ocean, it being so big and poorly defined. I didn't see the Mississippi Coast until I was eighteen, and I was not impressed by the man-made beach (have they replaced it?). Several years later, I went out to Ship Island and was blown away by how pretty the Gulf side (as opposed to the channel side) of the island looked. Here, we live sixty miles from the ocean, but don't go there much. Mostly, we go the High Cascades or (more often) the Old Cascades. Sadly, we've gotten to where we hardly leave home due to my pain issues and sleep problems.
olav hauge is special. i go to the shelf just to see what i might have marked in my copy. it is this, which i still dream,
This is the Dream
This is the dream we carry through the world
that something fantastic will happen
that it has to happen
that time will open by itself
that doors shall open by themselves
that the heart will find itself open
that mountain springs will jump up
that the dream will open by itself
that we one early morning
will slip into a harbor
that we have never known.
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