While They're Away

26 December 2007, 5:17
Upon reading Wendell Berry’s The Clearing.

Mr. Berry,

You have a way of taking the most noble
and daily responsibilities of a lover of the earth;
casting them in a light of profundity
which makes me wish I also walked The Farm
with you and pondered such meaning-filled subjects
as politics, religion, and care of the earth.

I forget our craft can be bent upon
the commonest of life’s comings and goings-
those tasks which you and I must do,
regardless of our level of environmental sophistication
and our preference for or against politics-
that there is laundry to be folded
which does not fold itself, and dishes
in the kitchen which require my attention.

The world will turn, but this home will not live
of its own accord. I must help it breathe
and pulse and love. The children
who live within my care will not thrive
without a deliberate sort of care-
a tilling, a sowing, a watering of sorts,
a nurturing of their loves, their wants
and their needs which only I can tend to,
assuming they are with me on any given day.

Even when they’re not, it is my willful
diligence which sets their feet on solid ground
when they return. I will be waiting- this house
will still be home to them because I make it so;
because I am faithful to the fields
while they’re away.

Cerulean

18 December 2006, 8:20 PM
SRB

There's something about
the color I can't quite put my finger on,
except I found it in a box of crayons,
the tone that only brightens,
deepens, beautifies when pressed
to its limit. They named it
long before I had any inkling
of Crayola, though I might have chosen
the hue before their nomenclature
found its way into my world.

Cerulean-

a shade-my-own of not-quite-blue,
for its hue entails a hint of jade-
the color of my eyes- making the heavens
a little more complex than they were before:
The color of wide, West Texas skies on days
when horizons are the only limits.

Snowballs with Baba

17 December 2007, 11:26 AM

I watched my African put on
his warm against the bitterness
of a belated Kentucky cold snap. There are
few things he hates more than winter,
and there’s not enough snow on the porch
to justify the donning of his gloves,
his scarf, his hat, his lined winter coat,

yet he dons, and I smile,

because I know why he goes
to the purported tundra. For my little boy
is out there in his too-big snow gloves,
clumsily shoveling the paltry powder
into a plastic bag. He wants to be
the only kid with a snowball next summer,
and this man-not-his-father
won’t let our precious boy
gather his dreams alone.

My husband and I are both coming down with what I think is a mild, but uncomfortable, case of flu. But down time can be creative time, so here's my latest creative endeavor. It's only Sculpey clay, but I have to say, having tried it, I'm very interested in giving real clay a try. This was SO much fun.

Handwriting meme

I didn't get tagged, but I'm participating anyway. ;-) I love to write- really WRITE- with a good pen. I used a Lamy 1.1 caligraphy fountain pen for this one, a gift from my Beloved. The ink is my favorite color. They call it "Sonic Blue", but I think of it as slate blue.

Studebaker II

RESTORING A CLASSIC
10 December 2007, 9:02 AM

Restoring a Studebaker
has to do a number on the mind:
blasting the paint from rusted
panels, carefully tapping away
dents and dremeling the rough spots,
restoring what’s been lost- bumpers
and bearings and broken fenders.

The man as old and oxidized
as the lost-cause car works his fingers
to the bone to prove the object of his
labor is not beyond redemption.

And after the primer, after the paint,
after the newly upholstered
seats and dashboard, oiled to a luster,

he finds the old leather bomber jacket,
dry and cracked and fading,
turns the key, throws the transmission;
time in reverse, showered and clean shaven,

almost new again, for just a moment, brief,

the wind in what little hair is left, peaking out
from under the suede cabbie,
a gentleman and his classic once again.

Vanity, vanity, all is vanity...

When my son (and now my daughter) complains about going to Liturgy or Great Vespers or Wednesday night prayers, most often my answer to him runs thus: "You don't have to want to go. But we're going, because it's part of who we are, and it's what we do." I have said this so many times over the years that I almost consider it a mantra.

So when I see phrases like this on fast food containers, it completely upheaves my brain and makes me shudder. WHAT DOES IT MEAN, PRECIOUS???

Studebaker

STUDEBAKER
7 December 2007, 2:24 PM

He had passed us on the right and we were
obliged to speed up in order to catch a clearer
glimpse of rusted panels; flattened tires;
more dents than dash, more rust than rev
pulled along behind the unimpressive truck
of a non-descript, working-class gentleman,
as outlived and disenchanted as his lading.
But enough Studebaker (and gentleman) survived
to stir a presentiment of unlived story, still salvageable
from the ruins of Once Upon a Time.


Inspired by The Weekend Wordsmith.

Another Glimpse

7 December 2007, 2 PM

I slept beside sharper skies
than ever I imagined on my own;
his dreams bled into mine, revealed
sunset skies I’d never known,
fading into diamond-scattered midnight
cerulean, so deep and dark and bright.

I couldn’t catch my breath amidst
the beauty of a thing so brutally
gentle; in the wake of brushing up
against a sea of so much tenderness,
all within me bruised and raw-
aching for another glimpse of Paradise.

Skimbleshanks the Railway Cat

The newest addition to the clan- Skimbleshanks Shroedinger Five the Runcible LFC- Skimble for short. Don't laugh- it's an extremely literary, and therefore dignified and respectable, name. She's so stinking cute. She didn't come home today, as they will spay her first thing next week. We'll pick her up on Monday at 5 PM.