Memories: Bullish By Night

Old sculpture:
30-40 minute exercise with model?
Years ago, so I am not sure.
Sculpture mix--and overglazed, but I like how that came out.

My stubborn side, you know?

Moon Snails

Photos taken at Drakes Estero.

Reprise: Moon Goddess

Mask: Moon Goddess.
Sculpture mix;
stormy blue and celadon/green over transparent brown glazing.

I miss the studio.

Robert Graves' "Apple Island"

APPLE ISLAND

Though cruel seas like mountains fill the bay,
Wrecking quayside huts,
Salting our vineyards with tall showers of spray;

And though the moon shines dangerously clear,
Fixed in another cycle
Than the sun’s progress round the felloe’d year;

And though I may not hope to dwell apart
With you on Apple Island
Unless my beat be docile to the dart —

Why should I fear your element, the sea,
Or the full moon, your mirror,
Or the halved Apple from your holy tree?

— Robert Graves

They Told Me The Moon Was Made Of Green Cheese

The Drowned Man: Mask and the moon.

Can you see the moon?  Follow the arrow to the right of the mask's "ear" . . . .

Poetry in Motion: McKay, Teasdale, and Wroth

THE TROPICS IN NEW YORK

 Bananas ripe and green, and ginger root
     Cocoa in pods and alligator pears,
And tangerines and mangoes and grape fruit,
     Fit for the highest prize at parish fairs,

Sat in the window, bringing memories
     of fruit-trees laden by low-singing rills,
And dewy dawns, and mystical skies
     In benediction over nun-like hills.

My eyes grow dim, and I could no more gaze;
     A wave of longing through my body swept,
And, hungry for the old, familiar ways
     I turned aside and bowed my head and wept.

--Claude McKay



NIGHT SONG AT AMALFI

I asked the heaven of stars
     What I should give my love --
It answered me with silence,
     Silence above.

I asked the darkened sea
     Down where the fishers go --
It answered me with silence,
     Silence below.

Oh, I could give him weeping,
     Or I could give him song --
But how can I give silence,
     My whole life long? 

--Sara Teasdale



From PAMPHILIA TO AMPHILANTHUS


When night's black mantle could most darkness prove, 
     And sleep, death's image, did my senses hire 
     From knowledge of myself, then thoughts did move 
     Swifter than those most swiftness need require.
In sleep, a chariot drawn by wing'd desire, 
     I saw, where sate bright Venus, Queen of love, 
     And at her feet her son, still adding fire 
     To burning hearts, which she did hold above.
But one heart flaming more than all the rest, 
     The goddess held, and put it to my breast. 
     "Dear Son, now shoot," she said, "thus must we win."
He her obeyed, and martyr'd my poor heart. 
     I, waking, hoped as dreams it would depart; 
     Yet since, O me, a lover have I been.


--Mary Wroth

Wet Clay: Moon-Man

Berberick: Hunting, Hunted

Still, even in those unlighted times when I'd shut my eyes tightly to the skald leygr, I remembered the teachings of my old friend, of Stane Saewulf's son.  One of the things he taught me was this:

"Men and Dwarfs, we are all riddles," he said.  "We are puzzles to our friends, puzzles to ourselves.  Who finds joy in riddling, pleasure in the patient stalking of the hidden truth, that man knows how to live."

But what do you think happens, my Sif, when truth becomes the hunter, man becomes the hunted?  To me, it seems that the man stalked by a truth becomes a brother to the wolf-haunted moon.

--Nancy Varian Berberick, from Shadow of the Seventh Moon

Berberick's narrator is Garroc, dwarf, soldier and skald.  Berberick's tale is a historical fantasy set in 7th-century Britain, amidst the wars of Saxons and Britains and Welsh, a tale paying tribute to Old English poetry and poets.  Garroc is one of the last generation of dwarfs, a race now cursed with infertility and thereby extinction for attempting to steal the goddess Idun's apples of immortality.  In the passage above, Garroc's reflections have a more personal flavor, a more specific context, and yet the lines on riddling, on hunting and being hunted, ring true in this life, for life in general.  

One can know too too much.  Or, to put it another way, the man (or dwarf) hunted by a truth may need to flee, may need to stand, and who outside that pursuit can truly judge?   Or, whatever the judgment, the passage speaks both to the joy of the hunt and to the desperation, the haunting, of being hunted by a truth.  Garroc is haunted by a pack of truths in the tale, until . . . .  

I'll repeat my favorite portion of the passage: "Who finds joy in riddling, pleasure in the patient stalking of the hidden truth, that man knows how to live."  

And woman, too.  

Berberick's adopting the older style of pronoun use to match the older times, the older English, in which she has set her tale.  Sif, Garroc's human foster-daughter, is a respected character, Garroc's confidant and our narrative conduit.

Moya Cannon: "Tending" and "Hunter's Moon"

I think if you even merely browse this blog that my appreciation for the poetry of Moya Cannon is very strong.  Here are two more that I wish to share:


TENDING

When a wood fire burns down and falls apart
the fire in each log dies quickly
unless burnt ends are tilted together --
a moment's touch, recognition;
gold and blue flame
wraps the singing wood.

--Moya Cannon


HUNTER'S MOON

There are perhaps no accidents,
no coincidences.
When we stumble against people, books, rare moments
          out of time,
these are illuminations --
like the hunter's moon that sails tonight in its high clouds,
casting light into our black harbour,
where four black turf boats
tug at their ropes,
hunger for the islands.

--Moya Cannon

Postcard: A Desktop View

Office art, tools, toys, and memory bottles and jars.

You've heard of comfort food; here, I offer comfort clutter.

Can you spot the red devil-duck?

Oh, and that bit of string is left over from the English 1B final exam in which tying and properly labeling a knot from Proulx's "The Shipping News" earned extra credit. Closed book, of course.

The Man In The Moon

An ornament I made some years back: two views.

As a boy, I was sure of two things: the moon was made of cheese, and I could see the Man in the Moon easily. Other people didn't seem to see the same figure that I did, and their persistent blindness or obstinate refusal to look again, more closely, frustrated me.

Later, I let all that go. The first moon walk was magic, but not the kind that meant the most to me.

I can still see that Man, you know.

The Moon-Goddess, Horned

Fall 2009: sculpture mix, glazed with multiple layers of transparent brown, stormy blue, and celadon. I feel pretty good; I was aiming at these effects, but she's far more lovely than I anticipated. The Moon Goddess, Horned: believe it, believe her.