#158: The Longing Edition
Dear reader,
I have been feeling perplexed by the intensity and nature of longing these days. This is, of course, not a new feeling. I learnt what homesickness is at boarding school. I have longed for the people and places. I have longed for the person I used to be.
In order to make sense of the overwhelm of this emotion, I have been reading about longing versus desire. One of the things that stood out is that longing is a now feeling, while desire is for the future. Another line that spoke to me is Jim Elliot’s “Let not our longing slay the appetite of our living.”
When it came to poetry, I came across some ridiculously beautiful poems.
Here are a few poems I chanced upon that moved me tremendously:
This Longing by Martin Steingesser
... awoke to rain
around 2:30 this morning
thinking of you, because I'd said
only a few days before, this
is what I wanted, to lie with you in the dark
listening how rain sounds
in the tree beside my window,
on the sill, against the glass, damp
cool air on my face. I am loving
fresh smells, light flashes in the
black window, love how you are here
when you're not, knowing we will
lie close, nothing between us; and maybe
it will be still, as now, the longing
that carries us
into each other's arms
asleep, neither speaking
least it all too soon turn to morning, which
it does. Rain softens, low thunder, a car
sloshes past.Poem by Izumi Shikibu
Even if I now saw you
only once,
I would long for you
through worlds,
worlds.Untitled by Clementine von Radics
I thought leaving you would be easy,
just walking out the door
but I keep getting pinned against it
with my legs around your waist and it’s like
my lips want you like my lungs want air,
it’s just what they where born to do so
I am sitting at work thinking of you
cutting vegetables in my kitchen
your hair in my shower drain
your fingers on my spine in the morning
while we listen to Muddy Waters, I know
you will never be the one I call home
but the way you talk about poems
like marxists talk of revolution
it makes me want to keep trying.
I’m still looking for reasons to love you.
I’m still looking for proof you love me.Interstate by Anne-Marie Fyfe
Half-eaten fries, the remains of hash browns,
fill the table’s distance between them.
She scoops the car-keys, says she’ll not be long.
In the washroom mirror she checks her face
close up; sees years of wearied waiting.
She steps into a sticky afternoon.
How long before he’ll notice, before he’ll ask –
the forecourt is nauseous with diesel and ocean –
ask if anyone’s seen a woman in middle years.
She’s onto the freeway, jittering across lanes.
And why, he’ll wonder, now that the kids are gone,
now that they’re free to hit the road each spring.
She overtakes on automatic, clearing Carolina –
recalls the one dream he has left, of building a boat;
upriver in summer; dry dock in winter. The two of them.
An unforeseen calm settles with sundown: she longs
for nightfall on unbroken stretches of highway.
It’s clear ahead as far as her eyes can see.We Inherited Trees by Iman Alzaghari
We inherited trees
with roots uprooted,
trees planted
far from their original orchards
in dirt damp with blood and tears.
We inherited trees
with twisted branches
trees flourishing,
bent towards the warmth of the scorching sun.
We inherited trees
with blossoms fragrant
with the scent of love and longing,
when they bear fruit,
we are reminded of the taste of their original homeland.Adrienne Rich: Twenty-One Love Poems [Poem II]
I wake up in your bed. I know I have been dreaming.
Much earlier, the alarm broke us from each other,
you’ve been at your desk for hours. I know what I dreamed:
our friend the poet comes into my room
where I’ve been writing for days,
drafts, carbons, poems are scattered everywhere,
and I want to show her one poem
which is the poem of my life. But I hesitate,
and wake. You’ve kissed my hair
to wake me. I dreamed you were a poem,
I say, a poem I wanted to show someone …
and I laugh and fall dreaming again
of the desire to show you to everyone I love,
to move openly together
in the pull of gravity, which is not simple,
which carries the feathered grass a long way down the upbreathing air.
Recommended Listening (A playlist for JD)
Links of the Week
-Finding a Face for My Invisible Illness
-Adventures in Nature’s Nonbinary Botany, with a Side of Emily Dickinson
-Safe space: the cosmic importance of planetary quarantine + The First Mars Rover
-Pop-Up Newsletters are the Greatest Newsletters (I'm ending my year-long experimental newsletter This is my newsletter after the final takeover by a special friend this Sunday. Felt good to read this piece when I was making the decision.)
-Turning coronavirus masks into Olympic events!
This is my newsletter: Nishant Jain aka The Sneaky Artist
Nishant Jain @thesneakyartist took over the second last edition of This is my newsletter this Sunday. He spoke about his latest drawings and projects, and shared ideas from his journey of self-education to be an artist.
“SneakyArt is secretly-drawn art of my world. I draw it with a fountain pen in my sketchbook. It features ordinary people in ordinary places, doing ordinary things on ordinary days. SneakyArt is based upon the idea that moments of art occur all the time in the flux of everyday life. They are sparked by the collision of different worlds - as we walk past one another, as we sit beside other people in cafes, as we travel together on a bus or plane, or even as we relax in the same park to enjoy the sun on a beautiful day.”
- Nishant Jain
Read the full newsletter here.
Parting Tweets
I spent some time going through old tweets I’ve liked over time. Felt like sharing some favorites:
I hope you found something to take away from today’s newsletter. Before I end it, I’d just like to remind you to tell the people in your life who matter that you care. Life can be uncertain and unforgiving.
Be brave, ok?
Rohini