TRANSPARENCY II

A letter to R.

 

Saturday Sermon

"Transparency.  To let the light not on but in or through.  To look not at the text, but through it; to see between the lines; to see language as lace, black on white; or white and black, as in the sky at night, or in the space on which our dreams are traced."  Norman Brown, Love's Body. 259.

The man is a poet!  And questions questions questions remain. 

 

The moment underground when we can no longer imagine the compost,

when process ceases,
is that death?

Or is compost the soul? 

It is when and why we cannot, we are unable to integrate the teachings of the underground on to our school curriculum. 

Hibernation, burrowing, quiet, multiple deaths of some species and on and on.  Like monarch butterflies that migrate to Mexico in one season, in two or three, or a hundred generations.

I do not think butterflies have been tagged by scientists to count their multiple generational deaths. Kind of hard to do.

 

Simply because we do not wish to go there. To the place of soul.

Silly of us because we are surrounded by this fluid death.

"When I was born, a death wish so strong the certainty then I was already dead."

Or can we imagine this intriguing in-between,

the between the lines as something other than - a possibility?
The blank page? Amniotic fluid as death and life in one.

I have been writing about this place in dream, this City of Lights and it is a haunting task - the entire comes from dream state and it comes in pieces, ready made.  An amazing process of translation on to word that which does not wish to be translated on to word.

It is like a "real" dream I had once about a theatre play that had no words - the entire play was made out of movement without a sound or a word. A mimic, a mime.

 

 

I have started training a new bunch of interpreters at the arboretum and once again, it is time for the wonderful talk about the "ecology of the watershed". 

When this old biologist, a "deep ecologist" reminds us of the closed nature of the cycle of life - from water to water. 

He looks at all facets of science and ties it all together –

the flow of the creek downriver, the resistance to the flow downriver. To the large body of water in the bay, to the eggs of fish spawning upstream, to the calcium in the teeth of human and the egg shell of bird, to the methodical transformation of nail and tooth to dots in the wings of a butterfly, seen under the lens and back to full color, when seen by naked eye. 

 

 

George, our resident neighbor peacock showed up today, after a long absence.

In the end, they all willingly or not, come up with the moralizing tale that we (humans) are more predatorial than,

And I think - why?  This anthropomorphic view does not yield great insights! Anymore, anyway.  We have written the classics already.  It is time for new thought!

Well, it is Saturday and a day to write and to ponder.  Another literary magazine in New England picked up one of my poems - to appear in January.  I am done taping a CD, The case of dreams.  Will read some on Friday, October 8, at Ed Kling's gig with the open mike thing at the St. Michaels Community Center at 8 pm.  At least, I think I will, if the spirit of the soul moves me.

Next week it is Saint Michael’s 200th anniversary celebration.  Gordon will dress up as a true "colonial" baker at the Saturday farmers market.  I will come as his "poor relation".  I thought perhaps to dress up as a South American rarity of an Indian old woman, complete with a bone on my nose - brought to the northern territories as a circus act, way back when, and now working for the "boss man" as a baker's assistant in exchange for room and board and a little sex.  We are trying to get a true black man to come in dressed as a slave - so what else is new? in shackles and chains.  Do you think Mark Woodie might go for it?  We shall be arrested for sure.

Of course, Gordon is working on a boat that shall land at Muskrat Park precisely at 10 am, when the bells ring for market start.

 "Oh how pretty!" will exclaim the ladies!  And out of the boat all the slaves will disembark, fresh from Sa Leone, covered in slime and in shit!  And the good ladies of the market shall hand them lemons as a good remedy to combat their scurvy!!

Cheers!  This is my sermon for the week.

 

 

 

 

 

CRYSTAL AND FLAME

Musings on transparency, crystal, flame and harmony with the material...

Transparency as lightness - same as in flame same as in crystal. Ever noticed the light out of those is not dissimilar?  I tend to lean toward one or the other, all the time. 

 

And in both, we have period of non-light.
Less gliss in crystal, defects, intrusions from other stones, lack of outside mirror images of light to reflect the clear of crystal? 

And for the flame, the common talk  - the fire is out, no more passion, no more firewood, depleted forests, and by lazy extension, no more electricity, no more no more, no more of more.

Ah, but wait --

Once we couple crystal and flame, we may hopefully see that this is not about either/or.

Rather

to stare at clear water, yes, we learn to say these are clear sailings!

 

to stare at muddy waters, no, we learn to say, stay clear. 

- I propose then to stare long enough until the particles of sand loam and clay separate, and a space appears in between - that is one of the meanings of transparencies - you do not change the waters - you see into them.

thus knowing thy topic as mirror image to what you may see. 
And here enters the topic of time, while you wait and gather up the necessary patience and knowledge to wait. Here is the exercise to be practiced.

It occurs to me that confrontation is, in a way, the mode of staring into the "muddy" waters - into that we do not know, into the possibility of change.

Society and physical reality are separate entities.

The anthropomorphic view eventually always gives way to a more earthy reality, or, if you wish, to a cosmic reality - a slightly larger scale. or a smaller scale ( the bug, the virus, the tiny) 

What you touch - gets touched AND moves on with your touch.  No way for us to deny that simple reality.

Sympathy with your materials

as harmony.

Interesting that in architecture the "people" who make up a structure are called materials, as opposed to the architect, who calls himself a man.

The notion of leavers and takers, a book called Ishmael

the notion of leavers and takers still places man at the center, does it not?

And the issue of control comes to mind -  No. No, it will not change – I am in control, here!  “ Ah, but to control is to take. “

 

and, at the end of this particular time

it is not about moving or change

 - that is a given. -

it is more about moving and change in a particular manner

every single paratactic moment, in grace

 

it is about a take in cinema, flash, point, swish

and hwishh of eternal oceans

 

as long as we stop

when the endings are there

we leave

 

hwishh and swish of oceans

 

GENETIC MATERIAL

Genetic Material


Before he died
my Father told me
Cousin Alice was carried around in a wheelbarrow
she was so big, when she was old

He told me Aunties had lumps in their upper backs,
German/Polish/Jewish/Hungarian noses with knobs protruding,  
warts with hairs in their faces
when they were old

My dead Father, Cousin Alice and the Aunties
had a way with me this way
in holding me inside
when all is revealed

when I seek still
the hairy woman underneath the waters
when I see signs on foreheads
in new babies born

In the mold of elders
I am the proud descendant of fat humpbacks
big noses, warts

in song

Material genético

Antes de morrer
meu Pai me contou
que êle levava a Prima Alice num carrinho de mão
de velha,
de tão gorda que ela era



Me disse que as Tias tinham calombos na nuca
alemãs, polacas, judias, húngaras
de narizes avunculares
verrugas cabeludas ancilares
na cara delas

Meu Pai morto,
Prima Alice e as Tias
tinham um jeito comigo
de me aquietar por dentro
quando tudo então se revelava

Quando ainda busco a mulher barbada
debaixo das águas dos rios
quando enxergo símbolos
na testa dos bebês recem nascidos

Sou,
na moldura anciã
descendente orgulhosa das baleias
nariguda, verrugosa

em canção.





Erica Weick
June 2, 2007, revisited 2013, 2014 and 2017

HIGH MAINTENANCE

 

 

  

 

High Maintenance for the New Year

Ah, but all is not well with me.  The tall corn is now fallen and yellow. The grasses have lost their copper sheen.

In spite of my desire to ignore the brisk unforgiving coolness of the breezes, hibiscus have gone dormant.  Shameless pitiful sticks, my eyes retain mere glimpses of their former daily glory.  Showy flowers that bloom and fade so soon, not at all suited for lasting arrangements, and so, perfect reminders of something ephemeral,

something I seek.

Still around the marigolds.  From the distance they splash low sunlight on to the light greens of winter lettuce, the darker shades of perpetual spinaches. Tall sunlight still filters through the yellow blooms, the artichokes from Jerusalem. This year for sure, I will eat them. When all else is dead outside, when the compost piles no longer smoke,

when all is quiet and snowy and gray,

I will dig those long brown gnarly roots. I will cook them with garlic and onions. I will eat them, the artichokes, this year.

But all is not well.

As I wonder if the mulch cover will protect the hopes for the perennials in the garden.  The strawberries, did I choke them on purpose?

Did I do enough for them, did I weed enough, did I nurture them enough? 
The pear trees, did the deer kill them?
The green caterpillars, will I kill them?

No, not all is that well. 

As winter, one more time, takes away my light, my lifeline and I must understand the stillness of the underground.

A memory stretches and sends probing tendrils to find a resonance in the cold, the dark.

Finds nothing.
There is no lesson there, not yet.
My trade is still with the business of life.
I have not learned of death.

A partial vision of a revelation bounces against the walls inside my heart.  Ripples under my skin, where rivers flow in vein currents and countercurrents. A possible meaning forms:

"Maintenance!"

If only I could give up maintenance. If only I could adopt the most precious tenet of mainstream culture.

"Abandon maintenance and embrace obsolescence."

Maybe then, I can understand and integrate my descent into the depths of monochromatic coldness. 

Maybe then I can envision a garden of deserted cars,

yellow stained broken sinks, glass less windows, boats,
refrigerators with no doors,
old fashioned brass hospital beds, green with moss,
rusted iron, stoves abandoned, smothered by weeds,
exposed to the wind and the furies.

Fallen oaks, empty bottles, tin cans. 

Dead carcasses of birds, putrefied, their feathers flown,
eyes sunken inward for lack of juice.
Pokeweed structures, fractal and dangerous in their winter decay.
Enzymatic buried seeds.

Abandon maintenance.

Give up perpetuity in her entirety, the cultivation of plants, attempts to prolong, to protect and to nurture.  

Allow weeds to invade and choose their place. 
Allow lettuces, tomatoes, poison ivy to invade and choose their place. 
Allow all seeds to germinate or not to germinate.

Give up matter, and all the implications of matter,

material, motherly. 

Give up the control that stems from Matter. 

Embrace rust, rot and decay. 

Go down inside the tunnels.

Give a thought to the underground, to the underworld.
Not a kind nurturing thought.
Just a clear, precise, cold, crisp as winter thought
to the circular porosity of volcanic rock,
the diamond cubic density of sand,
steady decay of seed,
deep reddish brown powder of rust and of rot

of all materials.

Celebrate then, in quiet ritual, this inferno.

 

Erica Marianna Weick

October 14, 2000/December 31, 2013