#249: Poetry on a Monday afternoon
Hello!
It’s been so hard to get any work done with this lulling Bangalore weather. But here I am nonetheless, promptly visiting your inbox on a Monday afternoon.
A few life updates:
One of my photographs will be a part of a group show, Anarchyº1 next month in Tokyo, curated by Anne Murayama, Founder/Curator, ephemere. If there’s anyone in Tokyo around here, please do go!
I went on a Tumblr deep binge last weekend and came out fresh and in love with the weird corners of the Internet. Here’s my Tumblr page. What’s yours?
Haiku is now a full-time co-editor and has been “assisting” me with the final proofreading for Memories on a Plate. Proof:
If you haven’t pre-ordered your copy, do it! Pre-orders close on the 30th.
Poetry Corner
A Note (Notatka) by Wislawa Szymborska
Translated from the Polish by Stanislaw Baranczak and Clare Cavanagh
Life is the only way
to get covered in leaves,
catch your breath on the sand,
rise on wings;
to be a dog,
or stroke its warm fur;
to tell pain
from everything it’s not;
to squeeze inside events,
dawdle in views,
to seek the least of all possible mistakes.
An extraordinary chance
to remember for a moment
a conversation held
with the lamp switched off;
and if only once
to stumble upon a stone,
end up soaked in one downpour or another,
mislay your keys in the grass;
and to follow a spark on the wind with your eyes;
and to keep on not knowing
something important.Excerpt: Leaves and Blossoms Along the Way by Mary Oliver
(Read the full poem here)
All important ideas must include the trees,
the mountains, and the rivers.To understand many things you must reach out
of your own condition.For how many years did I wander slowly
through the forest. What wonder and
glory I would have missed had I ever been
in a hurry!Beauty can both shout and whisper, and still
it explains nothing.The point is, you’re you, and that’s for keeps.
Poem (The day gets slowly started) by James Schuyler
The day gets slowly started.
A rap at the bedroom door,
bitter coffee, hot cereal, juice
the color of sun which
isn’t out this morning. A
cool shower, a shave, soothing
Noxzema for razor burn. A bed
is made. The paper doesn’t come
until twelve or one. A gray shine
out the windows. “No one
leaves the building until
those scissors are returned.”
It’s that kind of a place.
Nonetheless, I’ve seen worse.
The worried gray is melting
into sunlight. I wish I’d
brought my book of enlightening
literary essays. I wish it
were lunch time. I wish I had
an appetite. The day agrees
with me better than it did, or,
better, I agree with it. I’ll
slide down a sunslip yet, this
crass September morning.Poem by Patrizia Cavalli (via Transactions with Beauty)
Translated from the Italian by Gini Alhadeff
“We’re all going to hell in a while.
But meanwhile
summer’s over.
So come on now, to the couch!
The couch! The couch!”
Links of the Week
Lunar Codex is an archive of art, writing, music, film destined for the moon.
I’m in love with this page on Tumblr.
Also this: OfHouses is a collection of Old Forgotten Houses.
“Scratch your chin and read it once again
Recall the poem once again”
-Three ways of translating a poem by K Satchidanandan“My choice was to be gentle with this poem and let it spill out line by line, one at a time, as if each line were the only answer to the question of what the rain could do.”
-Making of a Poem: D. A. Powell on “As for What the Rain Can Do”Watch: Georgia O'Keeffe | By Myself
Still no new/old music in my life, so no recommended listening. But I will leave you with this poetic wish for the week ahead:
“I wish you a great big garden and blue skies.”
-Franz Kafka
Also, please watch Limbo. One of the best films I’ve seen in a while.
Sending love,
Rohini