Rock, Poem, Photo II

Transition 2

Today feels like September, even here: hot and Indian-summery, the lowering bright crisp light, the faintly dusty smell that comes with falling leaves. From the three or four trees here that molt their leaves.

I managed a Rabbit Rabbit this morning; hopefully it will bring luck for the rest of the month, even the season. And change; somehow this feels like the right time for change. So off to the third installment of the blog: Rock, Poem, Photo III.

After/Going

Back. Achy, tired, cut, bruised, and inspired. Dozens of little stories and photos and videos that don't quite tell the full story. Arriving, immersing in desert camping culture with a dozen strangers. Watching night fall and hearing the rise of heavy music beats. Venturing out into the esplanade in the lit dark, into the stream of people and bicycles and invention and experiment. Eventually, dancing until nearly dawn.

After a day's awkwardness, I remembered how comfortable it felt to wander around in this place, where the odd is ordinary. How much I love the unusual and unexpected. How good it is to get away and brave a little discomfort in exchange for feeling refreshed.

The Ungraceful Reminders Our Bodies Insist On

Reunion with Jake at Still Pond Creek

We are becoming martyrs to our spirits,
you and I. Every time I see you,
you are thinner, listless, eating less.
You have given up breakfast and dinner,
sometimes indulging in a lettuce leaf
at noon. I know you aim to disappear.
What we both want is sensation without
shame or fear. And now I am bored
by sex, washing my hair, my clothes,
the bathroom scarred with drying underwear.
The time a body takes. The waste. Forests
of Kleenex. Six ibis for an acre of grain.
The pull of gravity shrinking us, drying
out the tissues of the brain. Bodiless
we could go anywhere. For how could we
transgress? To fly with no fear of falling,
no planes, schedules; no one inspecting our
baggage, dirty socks spilling from plastic
sacks, condoms, Tampax, the ungraceful
reminders our bodies insist on. I'm afraid
this flesh will always be too solid for us,
Jake. Your cigarettes reveal that. I take
up smoking when we are together. We eye
each other through the clouds we make.

—from Rites of Strangers, by Phyllis Janowitz

Location

Letter

I had wanted to begin
by telling you I saw another
tanager below the pond
where I had sat for half an hour
feeding on wild berries
in the little clearing near the pines
that hide the lower field
and then looked up from red berries
to the quick red bird brilliant
in the light. I have seen
more yarrow and swaying
Queen Anne's lace around the woods
as hawkweed and nightshade
wither and drop seed. A new blue flower,
sweet, yellow-stamened, ovary inferior,
has recently sprung up.
                                           But I had the odd
feeling, walking to the house
to write this down, that I had left
the birds and the flower in the field,
rooted or feeding. They are not in my
head, are not now on this page.
It was very strange to me, but I think
their loss was your absence. I wanted
to be walking up with Leif, the sun
behind us skipping off the pond,
the windy maple sheltering the house,
and find you there and say
here! a new blue flower (ovary inferior)
and busy Leif and Kris with naming
in a world I love. You even have
my field guide. It's you I love.
I have believed so long
in the magic of names and poems.
I hadn't thought them bodiless
at all. Tall Buttercups. Wild Vetch.
"Often I am permitted to return
to a meadow." It all seemed real to me
last week. Words. You are the body
of my world, root and flower, the
brightness and surprise of birds.
I miss you, love. Tell Leif
you're the names of things.

—from Field Guide, by Robert Hass

Shh.

A Palpable Silence

What is as delightful
as a palable silence
a creamy latex of a
silence, stirrable
with a long stick. Such
a silence is particularly
thick at the bottom, a
very smooth lotion, like
good paint by the gallon.
This is a base silence,
colored only by addition,
say a small squeeze of
green when the bird sings
idly of trees he has
seen. It is a clean
silence, the kind that
does not divide us,
like dreams it is
viscous but like good dreams
where sweet things last and
last past credibility.
Even in dreams we know
it is a luxury.

—from Strangely Marked Metal, by Kay Ryan