Books, as Pocket Gardens

A true paucity on the Internet these days--a really good essay, one in which you find yourself nodding in agreement, resonating to its rhythm, where you want to pass it on to others. And so I am.

Check out Seattle writer and poet John Olson's essay entitled "A Garden in the Pocket" posted on March 4th, 2010 over on Steven Fama's blog, "The Glade of Theoric Ornithic Hermetica."

It opens with a Chinese proverb: "A book is like a garden carried in the pocket."

Books, writes Olson, have "a feel and a smell that you cannot find in anything electronic ... the end result of a great deal of effort. So that whatever making goes into the making of the book will make you wonder at what a wonderful thing a book is..."

Look down. Down at the ground. There is consolation in seeds. They become trees. Leaves. Pages in a book. The book opens, and a skeleton of sound dances from page to page in an astronomy of ink...

One day I pulled a meaning out of a word I did not expect and it grew into an orchard of fruit, peaches and plums swollen with light, a larynx extending the granite of a wooded solitude...

Yes.

"Books may disappear but their essence will not," he says.

And yes again.

Worth a Look

Cerise Press's Spring 2010 issue is out!

If you have never visited this online international journal of poetry, translations, essays, fiction, photography, art, interviews and reviews, you are in for a treat.  This is a publication well worth reading and subscribing to.  It is by far, the most beautifully produced, easiest to navigate, and most interesting selection of writings, art and photography of any online journal I've ever seen.

In this issue:

-- Poetry translated from Albanian, Japanese, Bosnian, Chinese, French and Russian
-- (Six Poems by Osip Mandelshtam!)
-- Naomi Shibab Nye on the political voice of poetry in America

to name but a very few.

Check it out!  You will not be disappointed.  And it's free to subscribe.

"Let's Go for a Walk", she said.

 

Arm in arm in the bone-chilling cold

two old friends walk the icy paths,

watch the sun retreating,

nod hi to a man and his son gliding by with the wind.

Then we sat on a bench

and talked about our summer

gardens-to-be.

 

_____________________________________

*Photos by awyn, two and a half weeks ago with JB on the grounds of the Montréal Botanical Garden. 

Poems are like batteries...

Thanks to Joe Hutchison over at The Perpetual Bird for his excellent posting at Suite 101 on the writing of metaphors.

How many poets do you know who would use the lines of one of their own, unpublished poems to give an example of a tortured metaphor, much less deem it "bizarre" and possibly even "grotesque"? (Yes, we all do that, I suppose, or at least some of us do, in re-reading something we've written years ago that in the light of now seems hopelessly naive, embarrassingly trite, or pompously pedantic (referring to fiction here) or just blatantly bad (referring to poetry) and the last thing one wants to do is showcase those words--except perhaps among trusted friends in moments of mutual hilarity, as in a  "You think YOUR early stuff is awful--bet you can't top THIS one!" kind of way.)

But Joseph Hutchison is a fine poet and I wish I had had someone like him as a mentor when I was first being introduced to poetry. I think I've learned more from his insightful explanations (in this type essay) and discussions about poetry (on his regular blog) than I ever did in academia.

"Poems are like batteries," he says, "they store imaginative energy and release it in moments of illumination." A poem's force is felt in its metaphors. And not just any old metaphor will reach the reader in a way that "shines a light into the dark that surrounds us".

Poems as batteries ... this metaphor itself illuminated another realization--that batteries don't work forever, they have to be frequently recharged, that imaginative energy can be in short supply, and that poems, like their authors, come and go. But the creative force behind the delicate job of the finding of words to construct a meaningful poem somehow remains. That it comes easily to some and is enormously difficult for others is not the point.  I guess I'm interested more in the fact that poems continue to be created at all, that countless individuals are still compelled, century after century,  to sit down, put pen to paper and attempt to express things that cannot be expressed in quite the same way in any other way except in a poem.

Poems need to be re-read [recharged]to release their illumination to new generations of readers. Poets want readers to see what they see: Stop a minute. Look. Can you see where these words are taking you? Can you feel their effect?

The poet Edna St. Vincent Millay talked of her candle burning "at both ends"[1], not lasting the night, and she invited friends and foes alike to just look and see its "lovely light".  That little poem, for me, expresses the sheer strength of this force, the power of mere words on a page to enable the reader to see and understand what a poet sees and strives to describe without actually describing it.  This just to say that for some of us, poetry is indeed sometimes a connection ... to that light in the dark "that surrounds us."


"Metaphors Gone Amuck"

Words are like threads           [cliché in need of a fresh likeness]
that we weave to connect
the fibres of being,
the eyes of our seeing,
that others unravel, restitch
or preserve
but preserved, are forgotten;
destroyed, are remembered.
a tapestry forever
in progress.

Poetry:  an unfinished portrait of words
seeking other words
that bring the light
to light.

Or something like that....

Thanks to Joe Hutchison for a fine article on metaphors.   [I actually cringed when I saw his reference to writers who have this inexplicable "urge to be ostantatiously inventive".  Dang.  There goes my bloggy wordplay plans for the week.  I never met a 4 I didn't like.  On the other hand, meta 4s are so uppity, so beyond the beyond, so to speak.   That kind of thing.  OID:  Ostantatious Inventive Disorder.  (Or is it Overly Idiotic Digressionamblia?   Obviously Intentionally Delusional?) ("Can I ask a rhetorical question? Well, can I?" -- Ambrose Bierce)

Missing You

To Alamor

First mate
there for me, even when I'm not
all

"There".

I don't dance,
you said.
But oh, you
do
in your eyes and gentle
touch
in the warmth of your smile
in the music of your laughter,
in that soft, familiar
voice that joins
my own heartbeat.

Missin' ya, Love.

Who was it, really?

Am in Boston again, a different journey, a different year. But this morning, while everyone else in the house is still asleep, I'm up early, having a cup of green tea, watching the sun rise and remembering another trip from some years ago when I was returning to my then home in Vermont back from a trip to Boston, where I had left far later than I'd intended. It was close to midnight and I still had an hour's more driving left to go. It was a cold winter night and there were no other cars on the highway; it was pitch black outside, the only lights being the headlights of my car. In front of me, sheer darkness; behind me, sheer darkness; to the right of me, the dark stone walls of a craggy mountainside caked in ice.

I was really tired and trying to stay awake. The darkness, the silence, the monotony of the ribbon of highway, my fatigue, all contributed to my beginning to fall asleep at the wheel. My eyelids closed, I began nodding off and the car careened rightward, heading off the road directly into the wall of rock to the right.

All of a sudden I heard someone loudly shout my name--twice. I jerked awake, just in time to see what was happening, quickly grabbed the wheel and steered it away seconds from impact. I pulled to a stop, shocked and horrified at what had just happened, or was about to happen. After a few moments I pulled myself together, turned the radio on, to some loud, lively music. I popped a stick of gum into my mouth, as if the chewing action would help me concentrate. The rest of the way home I sang along with the radio, forcing myself to focus and be alert, and above all, stay awake. It was only the next day, after arriving safely home and having had a good night's sleep, that I remembered that loud voice in the car that woke me up.

It had come from my own throat.

Talk about uncanny. The person who shouted my name so loudly that it woke me up--was me. Think about it. You're in a car, alone on a highway, not another human being around for miles and miles, and you're falling asleep at the wheel, driving headlong into a rocky mountainside. If you're going to be saved at all, someone, or something, has to get your attention. Someone has to warn you but the only person there is you. If you could somehow alert yourself sufficiently forcefully enough to wake yourself up, you might stand a chance. And that's exactly what happened. Except it wasn't one of those mysterious "little voices" in one's head which are really more like nagging little suggestive thoughts--this was actually vocal, and LOUD, and it called me by name, and it came from my own throat.

I puzzled about this for a long time afterward. It was God, some might say. God saved you. Or, "It was your guardian angel." Or was it maybe some part of myself observing what was happening and making the decision to alert the part of me that was slowly becoming unconscious? How to reach 'me', though? By using the only thing available--my very own vocal chords.

Whoever, or whatever it was, I thank them. Or if it was truly just me, this tells me there is more to life and consciousness and being than I have ever imagined or may ever understand. I suspect this happens often, these odd experiences, however we choose to explain them, label them.

I'm re-reading Kurt Vonnegut slouching through the slaughterhouse with Billy Pilgrim, "Earthlings are the great explainers," he writes, "explaining why this event is structured as it is ... All time is all time. It does not change. It does not lend itself to warnings or explanations. It simply is. Take it moment by moment, and you will find that we are all, as I've said before, bugs in amber."

When I consider certain world events--or even certain inexplicably heart-rending personal events (something happens and you can see the direction it's going and you can't do a thing about it, you can't "save" a loved one, for example, or keep them from suffering, etc.)--you're tempted to think, with 'ol Kurt here, that we're truly only, in the end, just a bunch of bugs in amber. Like a ladybug stuck in tar, wings flapping and flapping, to no avail. Yes, we have that. Some manage to get "out". Many don't. Who or what decides which ones get more time? And why?

It doesn't do one good to dwell too long on such questions. Because we'll likely come to the end of life without having ever found an answer. And yet ...

What a journey life is. The good, the bad, the ugly, the exquisite, the unbearable ... and the absurdly mystifying. (Not to mention the weirdly ironic or downright comical)

I kind of don't care if I ever know. I wouldn't have said that years earlier, when "knowing" was a kind of obsession. It no longer seems important. I'm just glad I got another chance.

Rideshare People

I have become a rideshare addict. I am not talking about local commutes to and from work but long-distance rideshare, through the border and across the states. It is how I arrived in Massachusetts this week from la belle province, Quebec.

Why would anyone make arrangements to travel with a complete stranger in an unknown vehicle for hours at a time, to a faraway destination with no guarantees of safe arrival? And yet it happens, all the time and everywhere, in the world of rideshare.  And if you do it often enough, you get to know the best and most trustworthy drivers, saving yourself time and money and needless inconvenience.   The particular rideshare driver I normally go with has become so popular he now has a waiting list.  He offers a comfortable ride in a large, roomy car with heated seats, plenty of room for luggage, choice of music, and captivating conversation. One meets the most interesting people on these rideshares and we exchange books and emails and food.   Plus you only pay a third of what it would cost by bus, and even with three rest stops we still get there in record time.

Ridesharers also often tend to be WWOOFers and Couch Surfers as well.  A WOOFer is a person who signs up to voluntarily work on an organic farm anywhere in the world to gain experience in farming and experience working and living in another culture.  Couch surfers exchange free housing accommodations among members traveling in 230 countries. 

How does one find a rideshare and how safe is it really?  One popular source is  Craig's List, a site for classified ads worldwide.  If you want to sell a refrigerator, rent an apartment, find a job, etc., you can look here first.  There are, of course, the usual risks re: scammers and one should definitely be cautious.  I found my regular rideshare driver on this list and have used several others as well and have never had a problem. 

An unusual thing did happen, however, when we crossed from Quebec into the U.S. at the Vermont border.  I presented my new Canadian passport and the border guard asked me how long I planned to stay in the U.S. and how I planned to return to Canada.  I said "one week or so" and that I didn't yet know exactly how I was going to return--by rideshare if I could get a ride, and if not, by bus.  This answer, however, was not acceptable.  I was informed that I could not enter the U.S. without proof that I wasn't going to stay there forever.  In other words, I'd have had to have had a return bus ticket back to Canada or a definite, verifiable plan of exit from the U.S. before I was allowed to proceed.  All foreign nationals have to be able to prove they're not coming to stay permanently.  But I'm an American citizen, I said.  "Prove it!" the guard glared at me.  I had presented a Canadian passport and so I fell under the "foreign national" category.  Luckily I had also brought along my American passport.  I was almost tempted to remark to him that there may actually be more people trying to leave the U.S. these days than those wanting to get in, but the border is no place to express one's personal viewpoint.  Trust me on this.

I was given a lecture by the border guard on making sure I had that American passport with me on any future trips because only Americans with "red, white and blue blood" (he actually said this) could be allowed in to stay indefinitely.   A student rider in the seat behind me, who was from Alberta, who also did not have a return ticket by bus, was told to come inside for further questioning.  She was finally allowed to proceed into the U.S., with a warning that next time, please be able to show proof of your intent to return back to Canada. As many times as I've crossed this particular border, this is the first time I've ever experienced such an intimidating encounter.  There are two ways to ask for documentation at a border: one in which you ask politely, and another in which your tone screams "PROVE to me you're not a terrorist". The latter tone insures that persons might think twice about visiting the U.S. to go shopping or to see the sights. So much for winning the hearts and minds of future tourists.

Some officials seem puzzled by the concept of rideshare, finding it bizarre that a group of people who don't really know one another, are all traveling together--A Swiss, an American, an African, a Chinese, all in the car together, complete strangers.  It's downright--subversive.  Or that is the impression one gets from the expressions on their face when they ask: "How are you people related to one another?" and you say "We're ridesharers."

So I don't know, at this point, how or when I'm getting back to Canada next week and it may end up being by bus, which is a minor hassle as they make everyone get off the bus at the border and go in, one by one, to be identified and the luggage searched.  I find it amazing that there is no one who speaks French at this particular Vermont border, which sits right next door to a French-speaking province.  Everybody on the French side is bilingual.  One would think they could hire at least one person who speaks French on the American side but I guess that's just too difficult to find and employ such a person.  I'm just saying. 

We had a mini snow storm yesterday.  Everything outside is all white and beautiful.  Only about a half foot of snow but the trees are thick with it.  Back home we have four times as much and it is permanent, till April.  This will all turn to mush and slush probably in a few days, then disappear.  Today we are taking the bubs to the Science Museum to look at dinosaur bones and tomorrow we will go see Alvin and the Chipmunks. 

Oh to be a kid again, ha ha.

Write Like It's Your Last One

What do you do when you want to interview a poet who is dying, unavailable and/or unable to respond to your questions?   Iranian poet Farideh Hassanzadeh-Mostafavi faced such a dilemna.  She wanted to interview her favorite poet, Bloga Dimitrova, a Bulgarian poet whose poems she had translated into Farsi, but Dimitrova, who was "in her last days", sent along her books instead, letting her published words speak for her.

Farideh decided to structure the interview around those printed words, found in four of Dimitrova's books of poetry.  Farideh asked the questions, then looked to Dimitrova's poetry for the answers.

"What is your interpretation of the word 'poet'"?

Prometheus who dared to steal
from the Gods,
not fire
but the word.

"What would you ever do, if there was no poetry?"

Without words, I am without hands –
touch nothing, I reach no one else.
and if I am also forbidden words
how shall I slake my thirst?

"What is your message for today's poet?"

Write each of your poems
as if it were your last.
In this century, saturated with strontium,
charged with terrorism,
flying with supersonic speed,
death comes with terrifying suddenness.
send each of your words
like a last letter before execution,
a call carved on a prison wall.
You have no right to lie,
no right to play pretty little games.
You simply won’t have time
to correct your mistakes.

Write each of your poems,
tersely, mercilessly,
with blood — as if it were your last.

__________

You can read the interview in its entirety here.

Parlez-vous Kerouac?

Soundjots:

Beat, crushed
béatifique parasitic bohemians
in beards and sandals ...
dégrinateurs

and devils
turned hermit

weird that we don't
say "Verses"

I'm sick of myself
But I'm a good
writer

You tell 'em,
Jack

Boggles the Mind

Having my morning coffee, reading the news and up comes an item that just, well, kind of boggles the mind.

Two, actually, and they both fall under the category of, "Say WHAT??!!!"

Item No. 1:
Meetings were held in a school district in Riverside County, California recently to consider banning the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary because it contains a number of referenced words that were thought to be "age-inappropriate" and which some parents found highly offensive.[1]   After due deliberation, it was finally decided that said dictionary could remain on the shelves and those parents who objected, could  "opt to have their kids use an alternative dictionary...."[2]

Perhaps they should have slapped a warning sticker on that dictionary, saying "For college-age students only" (like the title says, it's a "collegiate" dictionary), alerting users under the age of 18 that:  "This book contains certain words that may be offensive and parental permission is required to consult it."  (I notice it didn't mention any of the offended parties offering to substitute an "alternative" dictionary that did not contain any offending words.)

If they want to ban a dictionary in a school library because it contains the words "oral sex", because those are not  "age-appropriate"  words for an elementary school child, why stop there?  Why not also ban the Bible, which contains words such as "sodomy", "lust" "naked", "whoremongers" "adulterer" and  "harlot", which terms are also not "age-appropriate" for a child? I'm just saying ...

And maybe, by extension, children should not be allowed to attend religious services in which the word "hell" and "damn" (as in, you will be damned to hell if you don't stop sinning) are shouted out from the pulpit.  But that was in context.  You must always take things in context.  A minister can say hell or damn in a sermon but if you're a kid and you try it, chances are you'll get your mouth washed out with soap.  (If you accidently hit your thumb with a hammer, for example, you still can't say hell or damn.  Only adults are allowed to do that.  You have to say heck or dang or gosh.) 

Today dictionaries, tomorrow school textbooks.  Wait, that's already happening ...  Don't like school textbooks teaching your kids about evolution?  Some parents have succeeded in getting those books replaced with 'alternative' ones, more in line with the creationist point of view.   There are alternative views on every subject.  Even documented history is revisable. You can sometimes influence which 'truth' gets promulgated; and you can control how a person--child or adult--perceives a thing, to a certain extent, by limiting access to information that supports or contradicts a particular point of view.  With young children, it's a pre-emptive thing:  in the good sense--you don't want to deliberately expose them to things that will frighten, upset or radically confuse them.  But there's a negative side:  too restrictive a control can also serve to squelch curiosity (or, conversely, fuel it, setting the stage for future rebellion).

Organizations sometimes attempt to control a member's reading choices so as not to lose their membership.  Several decades ago Roman Catholics were forbidden to read certain books appearing on an Index of banned books. Only those officially sanctioned with the nihil obstat (i.e., containing nothing damaging to their faith or morals) were safe to read. Voltaire, Descartes, Galileo, Rousseau, Gide, Pascal--were all on the Church's list of forbidden books. What the Church feared, of course, happened.  Scores of members eventually abandoned their unquestioning adherence to certain previously accepted dogmas and went swimming instead with the dreaded secular fishes. Censorship sometimes backfires.

Item No. 2:
South Carolina now requires 'subversives' to register (and pay a $5 fine) if they intend to overthrow the government.[3]   Failure to comply will result in a fine of up to $25,000 and up to ten years in prison.   (Say what?!!)  I kid you not.  The state's "Subversive Activities Registration Act," passed last year and now officially on the books, states that "every member of a subversive organization, or an organization subject to foreign control, every foreign agent and every person who advocates, teaches, advises or practices the duty, necessity or propriety of controlling, conducting, seizing or overthrowing the government of the United States ... shall register with the Secretary of State." Good luck with that, guys. 

Take out the "or's" in the above quotation, condense it, and it now reads:   Every person who advocates the necessity of conducting the U.S. government has to register with the Secretary of State. 

Who do they consider subversives? Because they include persons who "reside" or "transact business"  in South Carolina who might, among other unspeakable deeds, "attempt to influence political action by unlawful means".   Somebody better tell the lobbyists and certain corporations and certain politicians used to taking bribes.

 The law here says this doesn't apply to free speech, by the way.   "The terms of this chapter do not apply to any labor union or religious, fraternal or patriotic organization, society or association, or their members, whose objectives and aims do not contemplate the overthrow of the government of the United States, of this State or of any political subdivision thereof by force or violence or other unlawful means" says section 23-29-40.   You're apparently okay if you "do NOT contemplate" overthrowing a political subdivision by unlawful means.   Wait, but are they saying that if you merely "contemplate" (i.e., ponder, think about, etc.) a regime change in the U.S. or South Carolina by "unlawful means" (like manipulation of electronic voting machines), that according to them you are a 'subversive' and must notify the Secretary of State of your contemplations? I mean, that's what the wording says.  (Diebold, are you listening?)

This is hilarious.  No terrorist planning a violent act is going to trot down to City Hall, fork over $5.00 and inform the Secretary of State of South Carolina of their intent.   And no lobbyist or corporation or politican bent on "influencing politics" is going to, either.  Get real.   How, one might ask, would such a law be even enforceable?  It would be interesting to know, since the law's been enacted, just how many subversive entities have actually registered.  Where would one find out that information--or is that, too, a "matter of national security"?

SUBVERSIVES, REGISTER HERE PLEASE $5.00 fee required

Not to harp on this, but one should really pay attention to how a thing is worded, especially new laws that are enacted.  Lawyers do.  Just look at the number of criminals who never get prosecuted because of mere "technicalities." 

Now if you check that South Carolina state website you will find right away a disclaimer stating that the "Subversive Activities Registration Act", a copy of which they have provided there on the web page, is the "unannotated" version.  To read the "official", annotated version you have to go find and read the published volumes.  You probably have to make an appointment to do so.  What's the difference between the unannotated and the annotated version?  Well, just that the annotated version includes a brief summary of the law and demonstrates how it is interpreted and applied. The unannotated version on their web page, does not.  The legislative staff says it won't respond to any questions as to the application of this law to any facts, by the way.  They suggest you retain a lawyer for help with that.

Words are so important and people find them so boring sometimes, they barely notice them. Others obsess over them to the point of unbalanace.  And if there are too many of them--as in this absurdly long posting today on my blog--some readers will have left long before the article is concluded.

Words contained in dictionaries, words embedded in legalese, words that incite, titillate, confuse, threaten, or deceive. Words in tiny print and unfamiliar jargon are particularly uninviting--one barely manages a perfunctory skimming.  People routinely sign contracts without understanding the terms, the interpretation of which is assumed but not ever verified.

If one wants to include something in a contract that if spelled out and thoroughly described would invite further scrutiny and possibly result in cancellation, one might include the words "and for other purposes".  This particular phrase is especially useful if one is later required to justify certain expenses incurred when the contract doesn't specifically mention such items, such as millions of dollars earmarked for one program that finds its way instead into a senator's local pork project, the "other purpose" alluded to but not defined.  Despite attention continually being called to this deceptive practice, it remains alive and popular and well-exercised.

The inclusion--or absence--of a single word or phrase in an official document,  poem, or personal correspondence, can make all the difference in the world.

So these two news items above are making the rounds of the Internet this week, eliciting whoops of incredulity or howls of laughter.  People wanting to ban a dictionary because it contains a few words felt to be morally repugnant; a state enacting a bizarre, ambiguous law that appears ludicrous and unenforceable. I saw these stories in a slightly different light, more akin to the image of an old, familiar tapestry, slowly becoming unravelled, thread by tiny thread. Yeats came to mind:

    Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold ...
    Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
    The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
    The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
    The best lack all conviction, while the worst
    Are full of passionate intensity.

Words bandied about, daily, that mean absolutely nothing to the hearers.  Legal loopholes met with a yawn and "business as usual."  "Falcons that cannot hear the falconer".  Maybe this blog posting was, in the end, less about two random news items that initially evoked a chuckle and more about the state of the times in which we live.  I don't know, sometimes it feels like a soap opera:  The Beastly, the Beautiful and the Bizarre.  Poets in chains, babies starving, billionnaire bankers, $700 designer shoes, War is Peace, silence about "the other purposes."

I'll take some peace and beautifuls, you can keep the beasties.  :)

Words! Gotta love 'em!

Orange Sisyphus

Carrying what's inside
on your back

separation inevitable
but only if
you
let
go

Oarless in the Plaza

Mankind owns four things
That are no good at sea:
Rudder, anchor, oars
And the fear of going down

–Antonio Machado (trans. Robert Bly)

Promise was that if you ask

delivery from that yoke you'd find
the answer, just keep going
they say.

Got the vessel, not enough, fear I''ll

end up, stylus lost, sans the will, 

a voiceless bard put out to see,

I-less.

_______________________
*Artwork with the kind permission of  Kinnon Elliott of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.  

Whistles from the Elsewhere

returning there it
takes you

in.

I should have been
writing

and yet ...

______________________________

Photo of train coming out of the fog in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia, with the kind permission of D. L. Ennis over at  Visual Thoughts Photography, 2007, all rights reserved. 

Trains coming, loves leaving

I love trains.   I grew up in a railroad town.  My father and grandfather worked on the railroad.  I went to sleep each night, for 18 years, to the sound of trains passing through the mountains, train whistles calling in the night,  train wheels clack-clack-clacking along the tracks across the river heading to or coming from the yards. Whenever I hear one today, it's like a song from the past taking root again ... and I get very ... nostalgic.

American songwriter Steve Goodman wrote a song later made famous by Arlo Guthrie, about a train called the "City of New Orleans."  Yeah, you know the one I mean.  :)  They say imitation is the greatest form of flattery.  Singer/songwriter Joe Dassin (son of Jules Dassin the film director), in 1972 took the melody from this song about a train and with the words (in French) of  Richelle Dassin and Claude Lemesle and a new arrangement, turned it into a meloncholic song, in French, about the end of a love affair.  (The couple in the song still love one another, they just weren't meant to live together, and they have things to talk about, say the lyrics.)

I was sitting outside on the patio at a family gathering one evening last summer when--as often happens when all the family gets together--everyone started singing.  One of the songs was "Salut les amoureux".  I didn't know the words but I sure recognized that melody!  This song is enormously popular here in Québec, even after more than 30 years. I say this because anytime it's played, I notice everyone up and starts singing along, and they all know ALL the words. 

Here's Arlo Guthrie, in 1978, in Atlanta, Georgia, performing with Shenandoah (my favorite version):

And now, its French adaptation, as "Salut les amoureux" ("Hello, Lovers", referring to a line in the song where neighbors pass by and call out to the couple, unaware that they are splitting up.)

There are lots of other versions out there, take your pick:  In English, by Steve Goodman, Willie Nelson,  John Denver,  Johnny Cash, Judy Collins, and Jerry Reed ; in German (by Rudi Carrell: "Wann wird's mal wieder richtig"); in Finnish (by Karma: "Huomenta Suomi"), and finally, by a bunch of people at some gathering, singing their hearts out, in French. 

Music transcends borders, it brings people together. We may not always understand the words, but the melodies can be, and frequently are, enjoyed and shared and played, again and again.

For any sing-along buffs out there, here are the respective lyrics: first in English,  then French. Hop the train, pull out your guitar and join in!

THE CITY OF NEW ORLEANS

Ridin’ on the City of New Orleans
Illinois Central, Monday morning rail
Fifteen cars and fifteen restless riders
Three conductors, and twenty-five sacks of mail.
All along the southbound odyssey
The train pulls out of Kankakee
and rolls along past houses, farms and fields.
Passing trains that have no name
Freight yards full of old black men
And the graveyards of the rusted automobiles

CHORUS:
Good morning, America, how are ya?
Say, don’t ya know me? I’m your native son!
I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done.

Dealin’ cards with the old men in the club car,
Penny a point, ain’t no one keepin’ score.
Pass the paper bag that holds the bottle,
Feel the wheels rumblin’ ‘neath the floor.
And the sons of pullman porters
And the sons of engineers
Ride their fathers’ magic carpet made of steel.
Mothers with their babes asleep
Are rockin’ to the gentle beat
And the rhythm of the rails is all they feel.

CHORUS:
Good morning, America, how are ya?
Say, don’t ya know me? I’m your native son!
I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done.

Night time on the City of New Orleans,
Changin’ cars in Memphis, Tennessee.
Halfway home and we’ll be there by morning,
To the Mississippi darkness rolling down to the sea.
But all the towns and people seem
To fade into a bad dream
And the steel rails still ain’t heard the news.
The conductor sings his songs again,
The passangers will please refrain,
This train’s got the disappearing railroad blues.

CHORUS:
Good night, America, how are ya?
I say, don’t ya know me, I’m your native son.
I’m the train they call the City of New Orleans,
I’ll be gone 500 miles when the day is done. [1]

And now in French:

SALUT LES AMOUREUX

Les matins se suivent et se ressemblent
Quand l'amour fait place au quotidien
On était pas fait pour vivre ensemble
Ça n'suffit pas toujours de s'aimer bien
C'est drôle hier on s'ennuyait
Et c'est à peine si l'on trouvait
Les mots pour se parler du mauvais temps
Et maintenant qu'il faut partir
On a cent milles choses à dire
Qui tiennent trop à coeur pour si peu de temps

CHORUS:
On s'est aimé comme on se quitte
Tout simplement sans penser à demain
A demain qui vient toujours un peu trop vite
Aux adieux qui quelques fois se passent un peu trop bien

On fait c'qu'il faut on tien nos rôles
On se regarde on rit on craint un peu
On a toujours oublié quelques choses
C'est pas facile de se dire adieu
Et l'on sait trop bien que tôt ou tard
Demain peut-être ou même ce soir
On va se dire que tout n'est pas perdu
De ce roman inachevé
On va se faire un conte de fée
Mais on a passé l'âge on n'y croirait plus

CHORUS:
On s'est aimé comme on se quitte
Tout simplement sans penser à demain
A demain qui vient toujours un peu trop vite
Aux adieux qui quelques fois se passent un peu trop bien

Roméo Juliette et tous les autres
Au fond de vos bouquins dormer en paix
Une simple histoire comme la nôtre
Est le seul qu'on écrira jamais
Allons petite il faut partir
Laisser ici nos souvenirs
On va descendre ensemble si tu veux
Et quand elle va nous voir passer
La patronne du café
Elle va encore nous dire salut les amoureux

CHORUS:
On s'est aimé comme on se quitte
Tout simplement sans penser à demain
A demain qui vient toujours un peu trop vite
Aux adieux qui quelques fois se passent un peu trop bien. [2]

For Now, They Stay

Those prayers that should be drifting
up and out
now choked and held by nature's hand.
Once bright and firm, cloth soaked by rain,
the colors fade, in sifting seasons
like the songs from their once land
now choked and held, not lifting up
the heaviness of now.

Every spring they are replaced,
and brighter still until the sky rains down,
again, as if by plan
yet twisted hope
still sends out words that catch the wind,
are carried far and reach beyond
the shadow blocking sun's remembered light.

~ ~ Annie Wyndham

[first publication]

[This one was for you, Tibet.]

_______________________
*Photo by awyn, Jan. 28, 2010, outside my kitchen window.

The Air Around the Butterfly

The Air Around the Butterfly
Въздухът около пеперудата

by Katerina Stoykova

Sofia, Bulgaria: Fakel Express; First edition (August, 2009)

SBN: 978-954-9772-64-7
Size: 6.5" x 8.5", 147 pages
Price: $10.00

Bilingual poetry books are relatively rare today, particularly those where the English text is paired with one in a non-Latin alphabet.  The interesting thing about the above book--the author's first--is that she wrote the poems in English--her second language--and then translated them back into her native Bulgarian.

The 59 poems presented in this book are grouped into three sections, each representing a different period in the poet’s life.  The first section, “My Mother Was Going to War”, is a collection of poetic vignettes: of a mother who was dying; of a grandfather as a young guerrilla; of the first time she tried to leave home while yet a child; of a colonel's heart not yet thawed from the Cold War.  The second section,  “E.T. and I Phone Home” covers the poet's departure from her native Bulgaria to her arrival and settling in America, unsure of what that would entail, but "diving in" nonetheless.  The third section, titled “The Apple Who Wanted to Become a Pinecone”, is a collection of memories, observations and self-reflections where she acknowledges that "Here I've Already Been Lost”, yet she emerges finally, fully at home, as a writer and poet.

What particularly interested me about this book was first, its bilingualality--it introduces me to a language with which I am totally unfamiliar; and second, it offers an intriguing glimpse of the emotional seesaw that results from leaving one's home in one country to spend the rest of your life in another; of the nostalgic reluctance in letting go, coupled with the magnetic pull toward the unknown--and of the need, above all, to be one's Self.

This is reflected quite clearly in the poem  “Sus-toss”, which in the Hopi culture is a word that describes the disease that people suffer when they move to live on new lands.  Here are some excerpts:

Sus-toss is a disease that makes you not want the things you want . . .

It is the disease of living in a walnut shell
and spending all your strength to keep it closed. . .

Sus-toss . . . causes different parts of you to live in different places. . .

It makes you eat cheesecake when all you want is bread. . .

When you have sus-toss you are afraid to be happy.

Sus-toss makes you feel as though you are living somebody else's life.
Somebody ordinary.
Somebody terrified by the thought of not being successful.
Somebody who does not want to care about anything
and is bothered by that.

Sus-toss makes you want proof that it was all worth it.
You can see the rest of your life and predict every day
until the very end.
You feel as though you are sleep-living.

When I first sounded out the word "sus-toss", I had a mental image of people being thrown into the air, landing all twisted and confused, scrambling to unwobble themselves.  "It's us, tossed" was the word equivalent that came to mind, which implies a kind of forced ejection, like mandatory exile.  But deliberately choosing to take oneself out of one land, self-launching permanently toward another also, apparently, subjects a person to "sus-toss."

Katerina Stoykova plunges into her new life in America, still  “Slow Dancing with My Demons", asking the mirror to forget everything it's seen so far and to wipe the slate clean, as she leaps ahead with manifest

Optimism

The space in my heart

intentionally left blank

Some of the poems in the book are three pages long; others, but a single word:

Impatience Kills

quickly

The poems are a mixture of pathos and humor, expectation and disappointment, of having to eat “bitter cookies” and being lost, hanging on to  “The Rope to Nowhere”--yet finding a way to soar,  “still intact, flying elsewhere”.

This poet definitely has a sense of humor. The poem “Reluctance” is about a spare tire who “is constantly afraid/ that one day/ it will be his turn/ to start carrying the weight/ of the car/ in which/ he has been riding.”  He whispers his fears to the windshield wipers but "they just shake their heads."  He longs to be like the wheels, "so confident and groovy."   "Crossing" is a witty poem about an alphabet marching to the border, intent on taking over, to "help people".

In sum, this book is a delightful find. And I've learned a few Bulgarian words as well.

How To Write a Poem

Catch the air
 Around the butterfly

I admit I was a bit puzzled as to the meaning of the above poem, whose phrase "the air around the butterfly" was also chosen as the title for this book.  What does it mean to "catch the air" around a butterfly?  And assuming one can catch it, what then?  How does a poem arise from capturing butterfly air?

When a butterfly is at rest, the air around it is calm.  But when it flies and flaps its wings, it creates a small disturbance in the air. Miniscule, probably.  Chaos theory posits that even the smallest event can have large, widespread consequences, for example, meterologically.  Culturally speaking, its metaphorical equivalent, "the bufferfly effect,"  suggests that seemingly insignificant moments in our lives can alter our history and shape our destinies, depending, of course, on which path we ultimately choose to take (the operative words here being "can" (not "will"), and "choose".  Nothing is set in stone, or 100% predictable, when it comes to an individual life.   Possiblity, and creativity, I think, may trump "fate" in this regard.

An event happens, or a series of events occur, and we consider whether to go forward or to remain right where we are.  (Sometimes one doesn't have a choice.  One of Stoykova's poems describes a ladybug whose feet are stuck in tar:  "You will not come out whole," she warns, "even if you flap your wings/ very, very fast.") But wholeness, like happiness, is a matter of perception.  In immersing herself in "the air around the butterfly," Stoykova has let it gently lead her to the air beyond the air--enabling her to transform this experience into poetry.

This all seems to relate back to her poem "Sus-Toss", that existential malaise that manifests in a gnawing sense of the loss of connection--between what was left behind, and what has taken its place.  One attempts to live  both "here" and "there", simultaneously, so to speak.  Choosing not to go back doesn't mean  the longing for certain continuities will disappear.  Because this is an abiding interest--the pull between the there and the here, the then and the now--and its effect on those involved (as a phenomenon, rife with fascinating examples), it perhaps held special significance for me, and yet it bespeaks of a certain universality.  

Sometimes, in reading poetry, one hastens to be carried farther, beyond the words, and sometimes one simply prefers to remain still, content to rest with the words on the page and savor the moment.  Such was my reaction to Katerina Stoykova's collection of poems, on a twofold level: first, seeing the words themselves, as words; and second, following their collective story.  

Ms. Stoykova has, in effect, I think, caught the air around the butterfly, became a part of it, and these poems are the result.  In the final poem, an unnamed interviewer asks an apple why it wants to become a pinecone.  Well, for one, it's tired of being "sweet, and round, and rosy" and of having humans "look at it and salivate".  There is more to me than that, it seems to be hinting.  To become a pinecone, it plans to "elongate" and "develop scales," among other things, and finally, to "fall far, far, far from the tree."  Where this became a "story" for me, was in its unspoken echo back to a previous poem suggesting the same theme, i.e., breaking with the past (stretching out, unfolding, "elongating"), bracing oneself for the future, yet not wanting to lose the self in the process. But like the ladybug stuck in the tar, extracting oneself from a place of being stuck, or from one's roots, is never easy.  In the poem "Tree", Stoykova describes the stem of the tree as being the thickest around its hollow, that "if you lay it sideways/ it will look like/ a boa constrictor/ digesting an elephant."  The tree, anchored in the earth by its roots, its stem likened to a boa constrictor that can swallow one whole (i.e., suffocate, bring death)--one understandably would want to get "far, far, far away"  from such a stranglehold.

Perhaps the poet  intended no such correlation, between the desire of the apple to transform itself, break free, and fall "far, far, far away" from the tree to which it was attached, and the reference to the thickest part of the tree as resembling a boa constrictor, a possible harbinger of death. The idea of death of self, though, is also implied in the poem "Loss" where the poet describes, in so many words, what happens when you attempt to be who you are not:

if a butterfly tries to be an ant
if an ant tries to be a butterfly
the world loses an ant
the world loses a butterfly

The apple wanting to be a pinecone plans to "develop scales", while the speaker in the poem "A Dream", glues fish scales to his/her body. (The scales on a pinecone and the scales on a fish function as a  protection, the way a soldier's armor protects him from being killed.)  When asked by a passerby "Why in the world are you doing this?", the narrator in "A Dream" replies, "I open and close/ open and close/ open and close/ my mouth."  In the dream, he/she is without a voice, tries to speak but can only mimic the motion, like a fish out of water, gasping for life.  Likewise, the apple, if  it becomes a pinecone, would open and close its scales, but it, too, would have no real voice.  It would only "dry up and turn brown."  But then along came that butterfly, the one with the intoxicating air around it; the poet somehow "caught its air", and the rest is history.  The poet's voice comes out, loud and clear, in these poems, pairing words from the land from which she came to words in her new language, reconnecting, completing the circle, so to speak, reuniting the there and the here, the then and the now.

An interesting book of poems. I look forward to its sequel, to learn more about what happens when the journey has ended, or if already ended, what garlands of insights have been collected, what new worlds of words she has discovered.

About the poet:

Katerina Stoykova emigrated from Bulgaria to the United States at the age of 24 and worked as an engineer at IBM and Lexmark.  She holds an MFA in poetry from Spalding University in Louisville, Kentucky and serves as Deputy Editor in Chief of the English language edition of the online magazine Public Republic. She also hosts "Accents", a radio show for literature, art and culture, in Lexington, Kentucky.  Her website can be found here.

Letting Go

like

snow sailing

o'er sea of cedars

no compass needed

dive!

Arty Foodies, Take a Bow

Pomegranate Yogourt

Add 2-3 tablespoons of freshly squeezed pomegranate juice

to about 5 whopping tablespoons of plain yogourt.

Swirl together and sprinkle fresh seeds on top.
It will turn pink and taste yummy.

*Optional:  Toss in a few walnuts and/or a bit of granola.

Red Cabbage Frog

Cabbage Smiley with
Carrot Vision

Heart of Cabbage
pulsing purple

Rumbles from the Earth

Rock crushes scissors
Scissors cut paper
Paper covers rock

a children's game
and then it came

Rock crushes bones
Bones break, here take
blanket,
blanket covers dead
pulled from under rock

Nowhere to go
nothing to eat
night falls
they thirst.
Please ...
water.

Quake crushes Haiti
Papers cover crisis
they amputated her leg
without anesthesia

rock in my stomach
cry in my throat
too little too late
for some

Three days now

S.O.S.

__________

Regarding the earthquake that hit Haiti on January 12, 2010:

Photos here and here.

How to Help:

Send donations to:
Doctors Without Borders
Medecins sans frontieres
International Committee of the Red Cross in Haiti
Stand with Haiti

Writers Rally for Liu Xiaobo

Fifteen days ago, on December 23, 2009, Chinese writer Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years in prison and 2 years' deprivation of political rights for writing some sentences the Chinese authorities felt "incited subversion of state power."   This country seems particularly sensitive to criticism, however factually based.  Its response was to silence, and imprison, the writer.

A week ago, on New Year's Eve, while most of us were enjoying holiday festivities, preparing the family dinner or getting ready for a New Year's Eve party, a small group of writers came together and stood in the falling snow on the steps outside the New York City Public Library, to read the seven sentences for which the writer Liu Xiaobo was sent to prison, and to call for his release.    Some things haven't changed all that much going into the New Year, it seems.  Liu Xiaobo joins 45 other writers now imprisoned in China for, well .... writing.

My New Year's resolution for 2010--which I've already broken, by the way--concerned chocolate and ice cream, among other things.  As of today I am making a new one, one that I'm far more likely to keep, and that is to begin more frequently adding my small voice to the others speaking out for writers like Liu Xiaobo.

What's one more little squawk from an obscure Internet blog? Molly Ivins, may she rest in peace, said we need people "in the streets, banging pots and pans"--like they did in Argentina in 2001--to bring about change.)  At Christmas time people gather on the sidewalk or on neighbors' doorsteps to sing carols--why not writers assembling on non-holidays, in public places, to read out the words of other writers who are no longer able to write? Why not ordinary bloggers occasionally jumping in to voice their support from the sidelines?  You never know who might be listening.

Never underestimate the power of the spoken or written word on a casual reader or passerby--those few words can sometimes change a person's life.  Nearly two decades ago, a  woman doctor whose resume I typed, happened to mention, as she was leaving, that she had just recently adopted a "prisoner of conscience".  "What's that?" I asked.  Her random remark led me to seek out more information about these 'thought prisoners'--and I ended up working with Amnesty International for the next eleven years, where I was privileged to meet former men and women who'd survived years of unbelievably harsh and degrading, dehumanizing treatment--people who had been shackled in prisons, starved, force fed or physically broken in workcamps, put into asylums and drugged, or sent away into exile, merely for expressing their views.  That one little offhand remark by a stranger took me on a path of no return, so to speak.  It compelled me to become less complacent, to not just observe and note, then turn away, but to actually want to join in and try to do something. Life, though, as it always does, intervenes and sometimes I lapse, as my attention is drawn elsewhere--until I'm reminded again--as I was when I saw the above video.

On an official level, governments are still rounding up and punishing people for what they think, what they say, how they say it.  (This occurs on the more personal level, too, albeit less severely, but damaging all the same. People still continue to attack, marginalize, isolate and punish others because of differences in politics, religion or strongly held opinions. While a state can deprive someone of his liberty, one's own family, friends, peers, or even employer can retaliate by withholding support, terminating the friendship, chastising, or firing someone, all because one's beliefs or lifestyle or choices in life embarrass, annoy or clash with their own.  Small intolerances or state-sanctioned repression--some subtle, others blatant--still playing out on the world stage in the never-ending war between the "Usses" and the "Thems".  Evolution, it appears, has yet to occur on this front.

Liu Xiaobo was sentenced to 11 years' confinement for writing 224 Chinese characters--for basically saying, for example, that he believes in democracy, and advocating that China discontinue its one-party rule.  The Chinese constitution states that its citizens have freedom of speech and of the press. In practice, however, if you try exercising this freedom, you risk being surveilled, harrassed and searched, arrested and imprisoned. He was also a political activist. The powers that be would prefer that he had stayed silent.

They may have silenced Liu Xiaobo temporarily--but not his words.  Other writers are seeing to it that his situation is made known and that his words don't disappear.  (You can see one of his poems posted today over on Salamander Cove ("Daybreak" under entry #20100107), and a few more on the PEN American Center website, where you can hear them read aloud by writers Paul Auster, Edward Albee, Don DeLillo, and E. L. Doctorow.)

Liu Xiaobo, in his own words:



A little nudge, to remind myself to not slip into such complacency again, to notch my awareness level up a tad or two:

Speaking for the Silenced

Small squeak today by a few,
giant roar tomorrow by the many ...
a little group of writers, standing
in the cold
snow falling, wind blowing words drifting
out
unchaining chains
breaking the
silence

erase one voice, another takes
its place
then another ...
and another

and another
________

*Update:  February 1, 2010:  Liu Xiaobo has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.[1]

2 Favorite People & My Wish for 2010

James Taylor and Yo-Yo Ma, with Edgar Meyer & Mark O'Connor, playing a classic Stephen Foster tune on their 2000 recording "Appalachian Journey", performed live.

Floe

Floe

flowing

like

Time

's frozen memories,

fragmented and released,

breaking free

to drift

in unchartered waters.

In Spring, not a trace

of the

melting of years.

Only the river remembers,

its waters containing

the record of its own

passage

the slow, steady hardening,
the separating of itself
from itself

flowing alongside itself

merging into

itself

like

Time.

___________________
 *First poem of 2010 by Annie Wyndham.  Photo taken last year, with my older camera, during a walk along the St. Lawrence River at the foot of the Sanctuary in Cap-de-la-Madeleine, QC.  

Year's End

Goodbye old year--Hello, new one. I wish I could say something profound or interesting, something other than a cliche, on this, the last day of 2009.  How grateful I am to still be alive, for family and friends and another year to look forward to.  For all the interesting things I've learned and fellow writers I've met, albeit not in person.  Other bloggers, like William Michaelian over at Recently Banned Literature, does it so, so much better!

And, wouldn't you know it, my friend down in the States, the one who gave me the "Write 10 short stories by Christmas" assignment, reminded me this morning that I hadn't made my deadline, and that I should try, before midnight tonight, to crank one out one more, so as not to have left such a dismal record of compliance. And so I did, being "under the gun" so to speak; I just sat down and ... wrote.

What to write about, on such short notice, at the end of the year, when a dozen yet-to-do tasks loom waiting? The state of the world today, our awful economy, gratitude for what one still has ... love in small gestures?? None or All of the above?

At least I can say I spent some minutes of the last morning of the old year ... writing. (Not that that gets me off the hook for my 'assignment'). But I plan to stop procrastinating in the new year. Honest.

So here is my little story. Some of it is semi-autobiographical (the smuggling episode). Some of it is recently factual (the state of my toast this morning). Some of it is based on memories or random observations of human behavior. Most of it, though, is purely imaginary. I call it:

BURNT TOAST

There are, they say, no coincidences in life. An event you might think is accidental is not really accidental. Fate determines where you’re eventually going to end up and though you may try to maneuver things toward a different outcome, circumstances arise, randomly and completely out of your control that put you back on the path to your destiny.

Who IS this mysterious “they” that seem to know what we do not? What if your destiny is, oh  ...  sameness?  How, in heaven's name, do you climb out of everlasting sameness?

Such were the dark thoughts that gathered like a heavy cloud in Dennis’s head this morning, the last day before the beginning of yet another new year.

“So what resolutions did you make for New Year’s?” his wife asked, scraping the burnt toast with a butter knife, sending blackened flecks of toasted ash cascading into the sink.

Dennis was tired of burnt toast every morning for breakfast. He’d fixed the damn toaster eight times and still couldn’t get it to work right. If you pointed the knob to “Light”, the bread came out the same way it went in, slightly tanned but still too soft.  If you selected “Medium”, the toast burnt to a charcoal-black crisp. If you selected "Dark"--well, they never did, after it first started malfunctioning.  If "Medium" could practically incinerate a slice of bread, what might "Dark" do?  He could not even imagine.

“My resolution for the new year,” Dennis replied, “is to buy a new toaster.”

“You know we can’t afford that, honey,” said his wife.

She had to go and remind him, again, how poor they were. Some people replaced their toaster every year, not out of necessity, but simply because they grew tired of its style, or color, or wanted one with more sophisticated and unnecessary gagetry. My fate, thought Dennis, is to have to endure burnt toast for the rest of my natural life.

“No, really,” said his wife. “What are your New Year’s resolutions?”

That, of course, was a trick question on her part. Dennis knew that his wife knew that he broke every resolution made at the beginning of every year, well before the first week had even ended. It was like a game with her, he chuckled.   It’s as if a little alarm goes off in her head at that exact time every year, alerting her: “Hey look, it’s that time of year again. Let’s remind Dennis how little things have changed, how after almost 45 years of couplehood we seem to have gone right back to where we started,still in the same boring little house in the same depressing neighborhood, still eating burnt toast and unable to afford even the smallest of new appliances.” 

It was, of course, not that way at all. Dennis's wife thought no such thing. They certainly could afford to buy a decent toaster.  They were even given one as a gift--twice--by their grown children, but Dennis's wife, unbeknownst to them,  gave them away.  Her reasoning was that they already had a toaster, while their next-door neighbor, and a newly married niece, at the time had none.  Dennis just got defensive from time to time, about his inability to move mountains, which is what it would take to change their economic situation so that buying a new toaster, or a new anything, wouldn't create such a perceived dent in their finances.  Dennis's wife was what they called, a "penny pincher"  Even if they had had the money, she would have balked at spending it.

In the beginning, when they'd first married, he found this quality admirable.  He knew no other woman who-- say if her washing machine broke down and couldn't be fixed or replaced for another month or so--would willingly, and even cheerfully, wash every single item by hand, including the bedding and braided carpets.  But Dennis's wife did, and thought nothing of it. He was impressed, at first.  Then it just got ... tiresome.  If she'd only work less and stop trying to do everything herself, she'd have more time for, well ....him.   

Dennis filled his cup with the dark, steaming coffee, grabbed the plate with the toast, and shuffled off to his chair in the living room to read the paper. Another day, another year, what’s the difference.

His wife, who knew his routines by heart, settled back into her own. She put aside the scraped and now buttered toast, turned on the faucet and rinsed the sink, poured herself some tea, and headed for her favorite chair to resume her knitting. Another day, another year, another wrinkle, another few gray hairs, another age spot on her arthritic hands. She examined the little baby sweater she was knitting for their grandchild, smiling with pride at her expert craftsmanship.  It cost her only a few dollars for the yarn and she had all the time in the world.  Were she so inclined she could have sold it for more than $50 to the Baby Boutique in town, who would have sold it for even more, that's how fine a garment she could make.  But the thought never occurred to her; this was a product of love and her entire heart went into each and  every careful stitch.

“Hey,” called Dennis from the living room, making her lose her train of thought.

“Hey what?” she called back.

“Wanna go take in a movie today?”

“You know we can’t afford the movies,” she reminded him. Dennis’s wife tried to remember when was the last time they had gone to see a movie. She remembered that their daughter, who lived in the city, called movies “films”.

The neighbor across the way was shoveling snow out of his driveway. Sounds of metal scraping against frozen asphalt, a familiar sound that took her back to her childhood, her father scraping snow from the concrete porch, the same sound … scrrrraaape… scrrrraaape … scrrrraaape. She smiled at the memory.

“So,” said Dennis. “You wanna go or not?”

“We have exactly $12 in the cookie jar,” she reminded him.. “And that’s to go for a new toaster, remember?”

“Oh what the hell,” said Dennis, rising from his chair and folding his newspaper. “Why the heck not? Do us good, to see a flick once every coupla years.”  Dennis's wife never heard him call movies "flicks" before.

Another year coming and more likely than not, they would still be eating burnt toast every morning. Dennis was sure of it.  How he managed to convince his wife to go see a movie, he couldn't remember.  But a funny thing happened on the way to the movie theater that afternoon. As they crossed the street, just before they got to the other side, Dennis’s wife spied a shiny object sticking out of a trash can on the upcoming sidewalk. It had a cord dangling from it. She let go of Dennis’s arm and went over to investigate. It seemed to be intact—no rust or dents or noticeable damage. She looked at Dennis. Dennis looked back and shrugged his shoulders, as if to say, “Well?”

Without saying a word, Dennis’s wife lifted it out of the trashcan and began stuffing the shiny object into her coat (because it would not fit into her  purse) and they proceeded into the theater to buy their tickets for the matinee. When they got inside, the usher, noticing the uneven bulge under her unbuttoned coat, wondered if she might be trying to smuggle a giant bag of home-popped popcorn into the theatre, to avoid buying it at the concession stand, whose prices, in his opinion, were outrageous. He decided to just let it go--his good deed for the year.

The next morning Dennis and his wife slept in, it being New Year’s Day, and when they got up, Dennis’s wife cleaned up the shiny toaster they’d found in the trash, put it on the counter and plugged it in, and placed two pieces of bread inside it.  It was missing a knob so one couldn’t predict the Light/Medium/Dark outcome. They both stood there, in their bathrobes, coffee and tea in hand, in front of the toaster, and waited.

“What if it explodes?” Dennis’s wife suddenly asked, thinking no person in their right mind would ever throw out a good, working toaster. It was thrown into the trash because it didn’t work. What was she thinking, to bring it home with them last night?   Theirs was still perfectly fine.  She imagined an enormous bang and a cloud of black smoke filling her small kitchen, the walls catching on fire, the cubboards melting, all their possessions … gone.

But the toaster didn’t explode. It just emitted a low, mechanical “mmmmmmmmmmmmmm”. “It’s humming,” said Dennis. That means it’s working!

It wasn’t a hum exactly, more like a cat purring.  Dennis’s wife came closer and bent over the toaster and peered inside.  Warm air was coming out of it and the coils were slowly turning red.   She became hopeful. In less than a minute a small, soft "clink” was heard and the two pieces of toast popped into view. Dennis grinned. His wife clapped her hands.

But when they pulled out the toast, they discovered why the toaster had been so readily abandoned. Each piece of toast had a lightly toasted half and a completely burnt half. How very bizarre. They tried it several more times with different types of bread, they turned the toaster upside down and shook it, they even cut the bread into half-pieces, but no matter what they did,  it always came out that two halves would be lightly toasted and the other two halves completely burnt.

Dennis sighed. His wife laughed.

Now, nothing seemed to have changed for these two people. Although Dennis tinkered with the toaster and tried to fix it, the results were still the same.   Sameness prevailed.  And so they made do, just as they had  always done, just as they planned to always do, for however long remained to them upon this earth.

One thing, however, had changed. Dennis began looking forward to his toast in the morning. He, of course, chose the lightly toasted halves of the two slices that came out of the toaster. His wife took the burnt halves and stood over the sink, as she had always done, scraping the blackened flecks into the sink.   Then she'd spread a thick slab of butter on the now well-crusted but still perfectly edible toast, add a dab of orange marmalade, take a sip of tea, and head for her reading chair. Neither her toast nor her routine had significantly changed.  It was, after all, her little ritual, the scrape, scrape, scraping of the toast every morning. And she did not like altering her routines, however weird other people might think them to be.  But she liked going to the movies that time with Dennis.  That was fun.  Perhaps they might do it again.

The $12 in the cookie jar soon climbed to $25, then $50, then $75—more than enough to buy a new, quality toaster, one that would make perfect toast, every time. And in due course, one was purchased, and the old, humming former shiny reject found in the trash can, which had nevertheless served them well for so many months, found a new life--or at least its parts did--at the recycle center.

Another year rolled around, and to all intents and purposes, nothing had really changed. Or had it? Was it this couple’s fate to be forever stuck in their sameness and inability to rise to a higher level of happiness? They didn’t seem to be unhappy—except about the burnt toast, and that was only Dennis, and that situation, as we have seen, eventually resolved itself.

Did Dennis view himself as stuck in sameness?  This thought had once briefly crossed his mind. Their increasing lack of money, brought on by retirement, a reduced income, and an unstable economy, bothered him. But everyone he knew was in the same boat. They had a roof over their heads, they had enough to eat, and the neighborhood, though sometimes boringly predictable, was full of memories and--familiar. Their daughter visited often, they would soon welcome another new grandchild. Dennis had his routine. His wife had hers.  He was okay with things.  The "same", he reflected,  could be both frightening and welcomed.

His wife concurred—or would have, had he asked her. Each of them greeted each new year hoping some things would stay  the same, that there would be no new catastrophes, no new unwelcome surprises, nothing approaching that they could not handle. But they looked forward to some changes. They planned to re-do the kitchen at some point; Dennis's wife talked about their maybe taking a little trip somewhere.


“So," that little voice that picks apart your newly written prose to probe its worth, suddenly whispers in my mind before the ink is even dry.  "And the moral of the story is ....?"

There is no moral to the story.  It’s just a story.
About a man,
and his wife
and their toaster.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL. And I emphasize the word Happy. :)