I WAS OF (THREE) MIND(S)

 42 of #100daychallenge

Strange dreams last night. In one, I was cozying up to Wallace Stevens. I can't think of a single Stevens poems I can even reference. I would probably get him confused with, at least momentarily, William Carlos Williams. What does it all mean? I don't even have a volume of Stevens work in my A-list poetry collection next to me here.

I also had a dream about a friend I recently fired, or put on sabbatical. In the dream I was surprised to be having a normal conversation with her, given our current estrangement. Maybe she isn't allowed to appear in dreams, either, although the dreaming mind has a mind of its own.

As I am post behind, I though to get writing early. I have much housework to do, given that I did nothing at all on that front. You know you need to snap to when you see seldom used coffee cups appearing on the sink. 

Later.

I have done some research on Wallace Stevens. My conclusion is that we would not be attracted to one another, so no cozying of any kind. And what is his gig barging in to my dream space? Cursory research and the reading of some of his poems do not support a fella that believes in equality among the genders. At least at the early part of his life, he had some Romantic notions about being the noble "male poet." Here's his wiki if you find yourself further interested.

Several of the poems I looked at did not cut the mustard of this my poetic standards ... and those are loose like others of my standards. The poems I perused leaned far too heavily on not-even-tired-but-broken-down tropes about females. I can take a bit of era proscribed sexism and fantasy, but no John Donne he.

Here is one of his more famous poems.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

I

Among twenty snowy mountains,   

The only moving thing   

Was the eye of the blackbird.   

II

I was of three minds,   

Like a tree   

In which there are three blackbirds.   

III

The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.   

It was a small part of the pantomime.   

IV

A man and a woman   

Are one.   

A man and a woman and a blackbird   

Are one.   

V

I do not know which to prefer,   

The beauty of inflections   

Or the beauty of innuendoes,   

The blackbird whistling   

Or just after.   

VI

Icicles filled the long window   

With barbaric glass.   

The shadow of the blackbird   

Crossed it, to and fro.   

The mood   

Traced in the shadow   

An indecipherable cause.   

VII

O thin men of Haddam,   

Why do you imagine golden birds?   

Do you not see how the blackbird   

Walks around the feet   

Of the women about you?   

VIII

I know noble accents   

And lucid, inescapable rhythms;   

But I know, too,   

That the blackbird is involved   

In what I know.   

IX

When the blackbird flew out of sight,   

It marked the edge   

Of one of many circles.   

X

At the sight of blackbirds   

Flying in a green light,   

Even the bawds of euphony   

Would cry out sharply.   

XI

He rode over Connecticut   

In a glass coach.   

Once, a fear pierced him,   

In that he mistook   

The shadow of his equipage   

For blackbirds.   

XII

The river is moving.   

The blackbird must be flying.   

XIII

It was evening all afternoon.   

It was snowing   

And it was going to snow.   

The blackbird sat   

In the cedar-limbs.

Wallace Stevens, “Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird” from The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens. Copyright 1954 by Wallace Stevens. 

I want to go watch the American Experience Episode about The Tulsa Massacre so this will be short.

I had Sebastian, the yardman, dig a new garden bed for me. More photos as it develops.

WAITING TO BE

 41 of #100daychallenge

Music shapes and fundamentally changes us. Once we have listened we do not stop. We do not ever recover from music. We will return again and again to the radio, the record store, the bedroom where girls listen to music all day.

— Rickie Lee Jones, Last Chance Texaco

I had a quiet day today, with naps, some reading, some ironing, some laundry, a little bit of gardening, and substantially more television than I have viewed in weeks. Part of me is frustrated with the lack of forward motion where it is really needed, but perhaps I need a bit of break.

On Saturday night, I went to have dinner with Rand and Lydia. That was the usual pleasant and loving evening. I never really know what we talk about besides politics and aging mothers, but the time flies by. We were playing rummy and Rand was kicking our asses as usual. We don't always pay a lot of attention to the background music, but for some reason, it was more part of the mix last night. Then their best friends came to pick up their dogs who R&L had been dogsitting. 

Without much ado and with some armangac, we were suddenly dancing to the Buena Vista Social Club. Roy and Rand provided some additional percussion. It was really fun. Old people can have fun, too.

Rickie Lee's quote at the beginning here resonated with me very much. Listening to and sharing music with people is fairly rare for me these days, but it is an activity I never tire of. And I very much recall hanging out in the bedroom Kim shared with her sister Pam, for hours at a time. Joni Mitchell's Ladies of the Canyon and Blue and Laura Nyro's Christmas and the Beads of Sweat are the ones I remember the clearest. I would bet that Crosby, Stills, and Nash and Deja Vu were in high rotation as well. We would listen to the radio hoping that Fleetwood Mac's Oh Well would magically appear. I did my listening to the Dead at home.

HIDE AND SEEK

It’s hard not

to jump out

instead of

waiting to be

found. It’s 

hard to be

alone so long

and then hear

someone come

around. It’s

like some form

of skin’s developed

in the air

that, rather

than have torn,

you tear.

— Kay Ryan, The Best of It: New and Selected Poems, Grove Press, New York, 2010

THE PASSAGE OF A LIFE SHOULD SHOW

 40 of #100daychallenge

Vera is a much better desk sleeper than Fox. Vera Paris is probably the most focussed and organized being in this household, which may not be THAT much of an achievement. Still, it is good to have an exemplary figure around the house. 

I am borderline verklempt tonight. I will own being tired. I ran into my neighbor, Sally this morning and we quickly moved to our favorite mutual subject, gardening. I had to show her a couple of cool things like the dinnerplate dahlias, and this "automatic bouquet" rose ... I have no idea where or when I purchased it or what it might be. Turns out my nextdoor Sally ALSO has a baby tooth that never descended. Now, this might not be a big deal to you, but I have never met another person who has a baby tooth. AND we share a name! We giggled about that.

 I drove my mom across town to her eye appointment, picked up Ulysses, hit Savers, and then picked up mom. We then stopped for doughnuts and food and went to KH who was nearish by working on her mother's effects with her brother, M. We hung out with them for awhile, trying to ... not cheer them as much as comfort them. Janet was a gem, giving off some loving mom vibes and being a trouper although she had had an injection for her macular degeneration that morning.

I am thinking a bit about what is "owed" and what "needs be paid." I think my domineers yogis and yoginis are "aware" that I am teaching them gratis. One of them mentioned it to me this afternoon when he came over to share his County Food Bank largesse which I mostly share with a person who comes by on Tuesday to pick up bottles. As in NYC, I leave my monetarily valuable recyclables out and now I leave leftover largesses from Jimmy. But the idea that I want or need to be paid for helping them/teaching them is absurd. The exchange is equal in what I get in learning from them and the sweet sweet gratification of doing a necessary and good thing. I am the one that is grateful here.

It has been a bit of an emotional week what with one dear friend experiencing some unprecedented breakthroughs in his self understanding, while another lost her mother. Meanwhile, I am frustrated that my home is getting to a pre-Shelly state full of un-put-away things and boxes that need to be dealt with. Perhaps I am being hard on myself as I did do the necessaries to get to teach Chair Yoga this summer and kept up with some reasonable level of writing, reading, and gardening.

To that end, Janet is shuffling down the hall to brush her teeth. I needs get up early for yoga, followed by a reunion breakfast of two yoginis from our Saturday wall class that I liked very much. Then dinner with my extended family, Lydia, Rand, and likely their son, Jules, so it will be a long day.

THINGS SHOULDN’T BE SO HARD

A life should leave

deep tracks:

ruts where she

went out and back

to get the mail

or move the hose

around the yard;

stand before the sink,

a worn-out place;

beneath her hand

the china knobs

rubbed down to

white pastilles;

the switch she

used to feel for

in the dark

almost erased.

Her things should

keep her marks.

The passage 

of a life should show;

it should abrade.

And when life stops,

a certains space—

however small—

should be left scarred

by the grand and

damaging parade.

Things shouldn’t

be so hard.

— Kay Ryan, The Best of It: New and Selected Poems, Grove Press, New York, 2010

for Bernice M, mother of a dear friend, June, 5, 1928 to May 27, 2021.

THE WINKING SIGNAL

 39 of #100daychallenge

Memorial. Day. Weekend. It's already here. For reals and truly. I see this with incredulity. Time does seem to go more quickly as you age. 

Speaking of aging, I had a day or two of no knee pain and thus had high hopes that the cortisone injection helped. Today, it is back to the land of pain. Certainly it is not as acute as it was, but the pain is not insubstantial. 

After a bit of rushing around to actually hand in my application to teach, I made it over to instruct the Domineers. This morning found me a bit upended and unfocussed as early on I received the very sad new that KH's mother had passed. KH's mother had had a bad fall on Sunday, enough to break her hip and bruise her face. She had surgery on Tuesday and then had some kind of heart attack. The diagnosis/prognosis was that she would be fine, her arteries looked good and she was headed to rehab/PT, had eaten breakfast when she just died. KH was on her way out the door to see her.

KH's mom and Janet are only a year apart in age, so we have kind of bonded over the aging mother issues. KH's mother's passing really made me feel vulnerable about Janet, not to mention other friends, SC, BB among them have recently lost their female parent. 

Janet feels so invincible. She is doing great in my yoga class. I can see the improvement in her shoulder mobility and she is having somewhat less pain for having done some of the exercises. Other things, she does better than I do. But she is 94. Not just for her, but we have been working on issues of leg strength and balance and boy do they feel it. We have been practicing getting up from the folding chair with a block between the knees without holding on to anything. Very challenging. But gosh, I almost cry when I see how very focussed and earnest they are. I can see the improvement in the diabetic feet from the massage they get with the tennis balls. The swelling and the redness has gone down. And they all oooh and aaah as they enjoy it so much.

Getting any actual yoga/asana training takes more imagination on my part, but I do want them to get used to the concepts, at the very least. Today they started working on forward fold and the rudiments of downward dog. I would like to have them doing push-up at the wall, but there really isn't any adequate wall. I suppose more research on line and in my big ol' yoga book library will help, but, as I said, I didn't have any plan today at all. 

I just leave feeling that there is so much more I have to do and moved that they are trying so very hard. Mixed with some gratitude that I can be of service. 

The Kermit Place Readers met this evening, In Brooklyn there were several who were in person for the first time in months. The general consensus was that we should start on Ulysses. I went to find my copy, only to find that it had disappeared with who knows what else. As we have only two weeks to read the first hundred pages so that we can meet on Bloomsday, I had to track down a local copy. There happened to be one at the Barnes and Noble in Torrance and I happen to be going there tomorrow to take my mom for her eye injection. So that is some kind of serendipity (do). Here are two of the Irish poems I read (not very well).

HOUSE ON A CLIFF

Indoors the tang of a tiny oil lamp. Outdoors

The winking signal on the waste of sea.

Indoors the sound of the wind. Outdoors the wind.

Indoors the locked heart and the lost key.

Outdoors the chill, the void, the siren. Indoors

The strong man pained to find his red blood cools,

While the blind clock grows louder, faster. Outdoors

The silent moon, the garrulous tides she rules.

Indoors ancestral curse-cum-blessing. Outdoors

The empty bowl of heaven, the empty deep.

Indoors a purposeful man who talks at cross

Purposes, to himself, in a broken sleep.

— Louise Macneice, A Hand of Snapshots, Farber and Farber, London

THE BLACK LACE FAN MY MOTHER GAVE ME

It was the first gift he ever gave her,

buying it for five francs in the Galeries

in pre-war Paris. It was stifling.

A starless drought made the nights stormy.

They stayed in the city for the summer.

They met in cafés. She was always early.1`2qasz He was late. That evening he was later.

They wrapped the fan. He looked at his watch.

She looked down the Boulevard des Capucines.

She ordered more coffee. She stood up.

The streets were emptying. The heat was killing.

She thought the distance smelled of rain and lightning.

These are wild roses, appliquéd on silk by hand,

darkly pricked, stitched boldly, quickly.

The rest is tortoiseshell and has the reticent,

clear patience of its element. It is

a worn-out, underwater bullion and it keeps,

even now, an inference of its violation.

The lace is overcast as if the weather

it opened for and offset had entered it.

The past is an empty café terrace.

An airless dusk before thunder. A man running

And no way to know what happened then -

none at all - unless you improvise:

The blackbird on this first sultry morning,

in summer, finding buds, worms, fruit,

feels the heat. Suddenly she puts out her wing -

the whole, full, flirtatious span of it.

— Eavan Boland, Outside History: Selected Poems 1980-1990, Norton, New York, 1990

S'CUSE ME

 38 of #100daychallenge

I would have sworn that I started this post this morning. Then again, I might have just projected that I was going to. 

I remain in a state of semi-shock or something. I managed to get it together to sign up to teach chair yoga in my town beginning June 15th. I bought liability insurance and everything. Although you may not see it this way, it's kind of a minor miracle for me. I have been thinking about doing this for maybe two decades. That I threw up so few obstacles is what amazes me the most. My fees will be ridiculously low, but I was never interested in this for the money, really. I have always been focussed on giving back, adding perspective, and giving some comfort and a way forward. 

S'cuse me while I kiss the sky.

UNACCOUNTABLE THINGS WE BETRAY

 37 of #100daychallenge.

First year this rose has blossomed. Fantastic scent, too.

The electricity is out this morning. That’s when it is nice to have a fully charged laptop battery and Bluetooth speakers. We are a little at loose ends, not being able to watch tv or surf the internet. Vera is crammed in the window, Idrisse is outside on the potting table. Vera thinks she needs to go kill Idrisse. I will never understand that, I just know that I had better go outside and move those vintage planters from the top of the potting bench or there will be casualties.

It’s hot already. I am suited up for yoga which I will teach in half an hour. I’ve no idea what I am going to do besides the usual. I am rather creaky myself. I cranked my neck on the side where I have the degenerating vertebrae and have bit of a headache as well.

Later

Four out of five cats are trying to find space to be near me on this small and messy desk. Vera is back in the window, which is the coolest spot by far.

This way is more convenient for head scratches and biting. This one makes it hard to concentrate, what with him flinging his tail around and so forth.

Teaching yoga was, again, fascinating and eye-opening. I try to introduce a new concept each week and this week we did a seated twisted. There is so much to review from even the three weeks I have already taught, and there is so much remedial work, it is pretty simple to fill up the hour or so. They always want to do more, but they can get overly tired just from a short walk. I have incorporated drinking lots of water during the session so that they get more accustomed to hydrating (not bad for me either). We work on things as basic as standing up and sitting down, although I add in trying to stay in proper alignment. All the yoga blocks I can find are at Joe's house now. I can see the tennis ball/feet exercises are helping Joe and Jimmy. 

I leave there feeling humbled and emotional. And fired up to teach more.

The rest of the day went by in shopping and errands. The closer it gets to the weekend, I imagine, the crazier it will get. I have seen other people on the neighborhood site complaining about the fireworks and what that does to the poor animals. I wish they could be contained to certain areas. Actually, they are contained to certain areas and I live in one of them.

I like the bee getting busy in there

BLUE CHINA DOORKNOB

I was haunted by the image of a blue china doorknob,

I never used the doorknob, or knew what it meant,

yet somehow it started the current of images.

— Robert Lowell

Rooms may be

using us. We

may be the agents

of doorknobs’

purposes, obeying

imperatives china

dreams up or 

pacing dimensions

determined by

cabinets. And if

we’re their instruments—

the valves of their

furious trumpets,

conscripted but

ignorant of it—

the strange, unaccountable

things we betray

were never our secrets

anyway.

— Kay Ryan, The Best of it: New and Selected Poems, Grove Press, New York, 2010