#257: In search of fleeting delight
"I'm chasing myself (I have been for years).” -Susan Sontag
Dear reader,
November be done (almost), and this year is slowly coming to an end. It’s been one hell of a tumultuous year for me and the world at large. No regrets, but I cannot wait to move on. To write 01 / 01 / 24 in the pages of my journal.
I’ve been in a somewhat inspired state, working on daily drawings and sporadic collages. The act of making something, anything, is the one guaranteed source of delight in life, apart from my cat Haiku. From the nearly-perfect pasta after years of experimenting to a poem with words and phrases cut up from forgotten magazines from decades ago, there is a sense of joy and restfulness that creativity opens up in me.
In other news, don’t forget to look at the gorgeous full moon tonight.
Staying with Mary Lou Cook’s words tonight:
“Creativity is inventing, experimenting, growing, taking risks, breaking rules, making mistakes, and having fun.”
Poetry Corner
Five poems that filled me with fleeting delight:
1. Chocolate Chip Pancakes by Caitlyn Siehl
You are making breakfast
in every dream that I have
of you.
You are in the kitchen, your
soft middle pressed up against
the cold marble countertops
like a vision too beautiful for
the magazines, sprinkling
dark chocolate chips over
pancakes.
I think for a brief second that
I am dreaming inside of my dream,
that I had to make you up twice,
just to get it right.
You, brushing your dark hair out
of your face, smearing batter
across your cheeks.
You have come and made
my dreams smaller, narrower.
Filled them with sugar and
your body humming in the
same room as mine.
I dream, now, of a normal life
with you.
A life where breakfast lasts until
the sun goes down,
until I have finished gazing at
you from across
the table,
flour dried to your forehead
like a kiss.
It is a dark fall day.
The earth is slightly damp with rain.
I hear a jay.
The cry is blue.
I have found you in the story again.
Is there another word for ‘‘divine’’?
I need a song that will keep sky open in my mind.
If I think behind me, I might break.
If I think forward, I lose now.
Forever will be a day like this
Strung perfectly on the necklace of days.
Slightly overcast
Yellow leaves
Your jacket hanging in the hallway
Next to mine.
3. A Portable Paradise by Roger Robinson
And if I speak of Paradise,
then I’m speaking of my grandmother
who told me to carry it always
on my person, concealed, so
no one else would know but me.
That way they can’t steal it, she’d say.
And if life puts you under pressure,
trace its ridges in your pocket,
smell its piney scent on your handkerchief,
turn its anthem under your breath.
And if your stresses are sustained and daily,
get yourself to an empty room – be it hotel,
hostel or hovel – find a lamp
and empty your paradise onto a desk:
your white sands, green hills and fresh fish.
Shine the lamp on it like the fresh hope
of morning, and keep staring at it till you sleep.
We need to separate to see
the life we've made.
We need to leave our house
where someone waits for us, patiently,
warm beneath the sheets.
We need to don a sweater, a coat, mittens,
wrap a scarf around our neck,
stride down the road,
a cold winter morning,
and turn our head back,
to see it—perched
on the top of the hill, our life
lit from inside.
5. The cat’s song by Marge Piercy (Excerpt)
Come I will teach you to dance as naturally
as falling asleep and waking and stretching long, long.
I speak greed with my paws and fear with my whiskers.
Envy lashes my tail. Love speaks me entire, a word
of fur. I will teach you to be still as an egg
and to slip like the ghost of wind through the grass.
Read the full poem here.
Recommended Listening
Links of the Month
I like the Swiss cheese model of Self-Care
A Catalogue of Simple Pleasures by Alex Singh on Are.na + this interview about the card deck version
Prose Play (A tool for exploring alternate wor(l)d choices and possibilities.)
Can’t wait for All Living Things Environmental Film Festival (ALT EFF), a film festival for climate awareness (December 1-10)
Wishing you unexpected delight on sunny days ahead. 🙋🏻♀️
Love,
Rohini
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