#92 - a glimmer of hope
Art by Raphael Perez
Modern Love by Douglas Dunn
It is summer, and we are in a house
That is not ours, sitting at a table
Enjoying minutes of a rented silence,
The upstairs people gone. The pigeons lull
To sleep the under-tens and invalids,
The tree shakes out its shadows to the grass,
The roses rove through the wilds of my neglect.
Our lives flap, and we have no hope of better
Happiness than this, not much to show for love
But how we are, and how this evening is,
Unpeopled, silent, and where we are alive
In a domestic love, seemingly alone,
All other lives worn down to trees and sunlight,
Looking forward to a visit from the cat.
Other poems I enjoyed reading this week:
"Darling,
Je fais ce que je peux.
Which is to say, midwinter
and poems are as difficult as flowers.
Roots are secrets, my heart
mulch-heavy—a flowering shrub
under leaves and leaves,
rotting beech and oak.
I do what I can, which is to say,
there is little going on aboveground."
-poem by Sylvie Legris
"You think you know them,
these creatures robed
in your parents’ skins. Well,
you don’t. Any more than you know
what the pines want from the wind,
if the lake’s content with this pale
smear of sunset, if the loon calls
for its mate, or for another." -from At the Lake House by Jon Loomis Wind
"Harm will come. It’s the kind of knowledge
that ruptures and won’t
repair—an ocean that keeps
on breaking.
The day moves with the gradual logic
of drowning. Evening fills the house.
Oh, where are you? Where are you going?
The mother folds up the ocean
and shuts it in a cupboard." -from Everything Is Restored by Jenny George
"Whatever happens. Whatever
what is is is what
I want. Only that. But that."
-Prayer by Galway Kinnell
Recommended Listening:
My Other Side - Taba Chake The Photographer’s Playlist Drinking Song - Haley Heynderickx That Sound - Sam Fender Creative Boom's podcast Reorientation - Neel Murgai
Links of the Week: Japanese Garden Walk: Cherry blossoms in bloom Send a message of support to a loved one during COVID-19 Michael Moore Presents: Planet of the Humans Colour-in Wes Anderson posters 22 Photo Projects You Can Do Inside Your Home The Strange Things I’ve Found inside Books
The Fake Book Paintings of Anna Hoyle (although Michael Dumontier and Neil Farber will always be my first love when it comes to fake book paintings)
Instagram accounts I like:
Interview: Reena Makwana
UK-based artist Reena Makwana's work is a fascinating documentation of London, people, plants and everything she sees around her. Primarily working with embroidery and illustration and occasionally ceramics, she's carved her own niche in the art world. I interviewed Reena about inspiration, London and the changing world she's trying to capture in her gorgeous work.
Read the full interview here.
Harper Collins India x The Alipore Post: Arundhathi Subramaniam
I'm thrilled to announce an ongoing collaboration with Harper Collins India, aimed to get people to read more poetry. Their editors believe that poetry is medicine, magic and much more. I share this sentiment. As part of this, I’ve picked five poets from their new special edition #Harper10 series, which highlights the best contemporary poetry from India and the subcontinent. Every Sunday of May, 2020, I’ll be sharing three poems from a poet I love.
The first set of poems are selected from When God Is A Traveller by Arundhathi Subramaniam. These are poems of wonder and precarious elation, and all the roadblocks and rewards on the long dangerous route to recovering what it is to be alive and human.
Read more poems by Arundhathi here.
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