Well... this will be a first...:)

Meletaó, No. 1

No wonder

we dream of flying

when hearts float incessant

on rise... fall...

But leave your head 

awhile;

allow yourself the present

weight of dust. 

We possess these

root-like

lungs

commanding bones

move and

muscles work 

incessant. 

Use them. 

Love them.

Haikus: Epiphany

I know this summer I haven't posted as much as usual.  Due to my job and thesis research, I didn't have as much time for personal writing as I wanted to.  I did find myself jotting down phrases on the go and eventually got the idea to work on a collection of haikus.  I had a lot of fun with this project and it was really fascinating how once I embraced the form, it seems like I started thinking 5-7-5.  I'm not sure if this project is over, but it's time I share these snippets from the past few months.

So, without further adieu, summer 2015 according to Haikus: Epiphany.

* * * * *

Cascadia:

Disillusioned ones

walk on. But the face of God

is a mountainside. 

Staying up the hours the carpool lane is open:

Embrace the night owl 

living within yourself and 

stop harboring guilt.

Post Alley:

I don't remember

the song playing, but I now 

have my alibi 

Flat Rate Boxes:

Can't account for the 

words, tears, everything, but...

"You want your stuff back?" 

Park West:

See the pale half-moon, 

fire-red sun share the sky

and feel my pulse calm. 

Breakfast conversations:

"Girls go to work, too?"

As mothers and execs, but

yes, darling girl, yes.

12805:
Strangers footprints mark
once most-familiar floors,
when home is not home.

Soho, 1.30am:

"What the hell is that?"

Your wedding ring... Brokenness 

I can't help you bear. 

Anticipation:

Oxford isn't a place, 

but an ancient creature made

of heart-beating stones. 

Original Starbucks:

Spain. England. Belgium. 

"No, that wasn't the last one." 

Stroking away fears...

Welcome:

Fresh-faced pixies, once

I was like you, before I 

felt always behind. 

Cœur de la vallée:

Wood smoke.  Unbroke.  Our

star-gazing conversations

ease anxiety. 

Highway 101:

Ever think about

Seattle and recall that

corridor we shared? 

An Erasure from Compline, Book of Common Prayer:

Glory to Father, Son 

Holy Spirit, as it was, 

is, will be. Amen.

Westview:

That moment when they

cry, "I can't believe..." and it's

like vindication. 

Excerpts from TS Eliot's "Four Quartets" [Part III]

"Little Gidding"

 

Midwinter spring is its own season
Sempiternal though sodden towards sundown,
Suspended in time, between pole and tropic…

In the dark time of the year. Between melting and freezing
The soul's sap quivers. There is no earth smell
Or smell of living thing. This is the spring time
But not in time's covenant.

You are not here to verify,
Instruct yourself, or inform curiosity
Or carry report. You are here to kneel
Where prayer has been valid. And prayer is more
Than an order of words, the conscious occupation
Of the praying mind, or the sound of the voice praying.

Who then devised the torment? Love.
Love is the unfamiliar Name
Behind the hands that wove
The intolerable shirt of flame
Which human power cannot remove.
     We only live, only suspire
     Consumed by either fire or fire.

For last year's words belong to last year's language 
And next year's words await another voice.

[via]

 

What we call the beginning is often the end
And to make an end is to make a beginning.
The end is where we start from. And every phrase
And sentence that is right (where every word is at home,
Taking its place to support the others,
The word neither diffident nor ostentatious,
An easy commerce of the old and the new,
The common word exact without vulgarity,
The formal word precise but not pedantic,
The complete consort dancing together)
Every phrase and every sentence is an end and a beginning,
Every poem an epitaph.

Quick now, here, now, always—
A condition of complete simplicity
(Costing not less than everything)
And all shall be well and
All manner of thing shall be well
When the tongues of flame are in-folded
Into the crowned knot of fire
And the fire and the rose are one.

[via]

Excerpts from TS Eliot's "Four Quartets" [Part II]

"The Dry Salvages"

The point of intersection of the timeless
With time, is an occupation for the saint--
No occupation either, but something given
And taken, in a lifetime's death in love,
Ardour and selflessness and self-surrender.
For most of us, there is only the unattended
Moment, the moment in and out of time,
The distraction fit, lost in a shaft of sunlight,
The wild thyme unseen, or the winter lightning
Or the waterfall, or music heard so deeply
That it is not heard at all, but you are the music
While the music lasts. These are only hints and guesses,
Hints followed by guesses; and the rest
Is prayer, observance, discipline, thought and action.
The hint half guessed, the gift half understood is Incarnation.
Here the impossible union
Of spheres of existence is actual,
Here the past and future
Are conquered, and reconciled...

Excerpts from TS Eliot's "Four Quartets" [Part I]

"Burnt Norton"

Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind 
Cannot bear very much reality.
Time past and time future
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.

Time past and time future
Allow but a little consciousness.
To be conscious in not to be in time
But only in time can the moment in the rose-garden...
Be remembered; involved with past and future.
Only through time time is conquered.

Words move, music moves
Only in time; but that which is only living
Can only die. Words, after speech, reach
Into the silence. Only by the form, the pattern,
Can words or music reach
The stillness...

"East Coker"

...Do not let me hear
Of the wisdom of old men, but rather of their folly,
Their fear of fear and frenzy, their fear of possession,
Of belonging to another, or to others, or to God.
The only wisdom we can hope to acquire
Is the wisdom of humility: humility is endless.

I said to my soul, be still, and wait without hope
For hope would be hope for the wrong thing; wait without love
For love would be love of the wrong thing; there is yet faith
But the faith and the love and the hope are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for you are not ready for thought:
So the darkness shall be the light, and the stillness the dancing.

Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter...
Here and there does not matter
We must be still and still moving
into another intensity
For a further union, a deeper communion...

31 Days of Books: The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock

Today's was a last minute change.  Most of the others were planned in advance, but I thought, "this deserves a day."  And as I thought more, I realized, yes, I said "books," but we need a poem in this little anthology.  So, today's 31 post...

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

Title:  The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

Author:  TS Eliot

Published:  1917

Year I read it:  2012

One sentence summary:  In this profound, Modernist poem, the young Eliot personifies the aging & intensely indecisive Prufrock musing on his life and on an "overwhelming question."

Interesting fact(s):  It's not a love song.  CS Lewis hated the intro.  It's one of Eliot's few rhyming poems.  

Three reasons to read it:

• It's much shorter, more accessible, and more delightful than The Wasteland.  I found that it was a good intro into Eliot's perspective before tackling The Wasteland.  Also, I'm not a huge poetry buff, but this one has fascinated me since the day I read it.
• This poem was written and published during the Great War, just before Modernism exploded onto the scene.  It's very insightful into some of the frustrations and questions plaguing artists at the time.
• You will find references.  You will want to reference it.  This is a very quotable poem.  It's like an erudite version of Dr. Seuss.  

One reason you maybe shouldn't:

• It's far, far easier than the Wasteland, but still one of the most intertextual poems ever - so find a version with lots of explanatory notes.

Great quotes:

Let us go then, you and I, When the evening is spread out against the skyLike a patient etherised upon a table;Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,The muttering retreatsOf restless nights in one-night cheap hotelsAnd sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:Streets that follow like a tedious argumentOf insidious intentTo lead you to an overwhelming question...Oh, do not ask "What is it?"Let us go and make our visit.[Opening lines]

There will be time, there will be timeTo prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet...Time for you and time for me,And time yet for a hundred indecisions,And for a hundred visions and revisions,Before the taking of a toast and tea.

Do I dareDisturb the universe?

For I have known them all already, known them all:--Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.

I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,And in short, I was afraid.