Thursday, January 28, 2016

Bubble-up and ripple


I can't image Pantone assigning one color to water, can you?

So much depends on water.  Cooking, for instance.  So much is inspired by water.
Calligraphy, for sure.

Tea water bubbles up; writing ripples.  Life is sweet & richly wet.

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Instances of portals:




windows
doors
doorsteps
paper
lists of all kinds
hands

of course,
the ear

&
recipes
&
dreams
each
ripeness
spoken

Tuesday, January 26, 2016

Wonder-apped

This should be a word.  Those apps that startle, surprise, make us smile.  Do something we can't. Even though we can create wonder by stirring soup, writing a poem, walking down the street, talking to a friend.  Or even taking a bath with goo-gobs of bubbles.

For instance, this wonder-apped:


What is it?  A shower cap made luminous by the app, Circular.

Monday, January 25, 2016

Typerwriters have long memories

Homage, 1974, modified typewriter by Leopoldo Maier, Hess Winery Gallery
So do gifts.

My first memory of a typewriter.  It was red and flameless.  A Tom Thumb.  A gift from my mother's sister.  One of the most extraordinary gifts I received.  Others, include pencils engraved with my name.  Be aware of the gifts you give; the gifts you receive.

Recently, I was given a wooden spoon.   A treasure.  Treasures can be practical.

How are typewriters and spoons similiar?  They both are vehicles to stir, whether words or soup. Please sit down, a meal has been prepared for you.


Sunday, January 24, 2016

Windows share two properties

Eyes

& roots

Eyes out
into the world.
Eyes into an interior.
And the same goes with roots.

Now think of root vegetables and meals which beg to be taken outside.
What does a window really see?
Do roots recognize flowers?  A plate its salad?  Paper anticipate a poem?
Go look out your favorite window.  Can you see how questions feed hunger?

Saturday, January 23, 2016

Real is rooted in place

San Francisco is getting what is needs -- rain.  Rain again predicted today but right now, sun with assertive clouds.  This is the real in this place.  In NYC, my former real place, there's different perspective, a different feel.  No ambiguity.  Winter storm:  strident snow.  So I'm sending assertive yellow to my friends back East and through the country.  Not that I'm damning snow.

Each bloom is an egg yolk.
Each bloom, a haiku.



Friday, January 22, 2016

Oranges are a winter's blessing

Farmer's markets are fewer and leaner this time of year.  Neverthless, let's celebrate the orange -- it's color, taste, its jaunty spirit.


 Orange Salad Conversing with a Black Bird

sliced:
cara cara oranges
black and green olives
red onion

black pepper
red sorrel leaves
a drizzle of olive oil

And the poem is on the wings.

P.S.  The cara cara is related to Pantone 152.

Mourning

What is the color of mourning?  Right now persimmons.  Because they adhere to the laws of seasonality.  Seasonality promotes hope:  the Fuyu will return.  Below is my typical salad:  sliced Fuyu, tri-color quinoa, steamed snow peas, olive oil, ginger, black pepper.  Sometimes almonds, sometimes not.



And here, hope's view of the salad:

 Fuyu salad through the Circular app

Meanwhile, persimmons find their way into poems -- easily.  And speaking of poems:  what is the color of today's morning?

Thursday, January 21, 2016

Translating a leaf

You walk down the familiar street and see a few familiar leaves.
So far, all is normal.  But what if, this is what you saw:


























And when you manipulate the above "normal" in the Circular app, this is what you see:



Is it a surprise that the translation of color is personal?
Is it a surprise that the translation of taste is personal?
Is it a surprise that the translation of words is personal?

Now, consider translating surprise into mystery. Mystery into surprise.
No surprise that color inspires hunger.  And hunger, often the poem.

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Where does color end

and shape begin?  The question folds into itself (as all questions do). Who shapes who:  color or shape?  Shape or color?  Or are they in cahoots.  Cahoots, another word for collaboration?

With writing is it the pen or the paper which brings shape and color to words?  And always, let's return to food.  Here squash and a slab of slate collaboraing with color.  Or the other way around?


And, yes, the collaboration with the app, Circular. 



Tuesday, January 19, 2016

Goddess of Paper

Well I'm not sure whether Pantone would agree that the bird is purely 108. That's beside the point.

What is the point? Much like a egg yolk. Unboundless joy. The mouth tasting a perfect soft-boiled egg.

Pure magic & joy as paper accepts one word, then the next. Perhaps, a haiku will take flight.

And who cares there's not much sun today. Rain is glorious. Doesn't paper love the rain of ink?

Thanks, Anika O. for my gift.

Monday, January 18, 2016

Color

Color takes light & eyes & imagination.
Imagination, the great namer.

And would you believe that my home state of New Jersey plays a key role in this color-naming.  So let's name the place:  Carlstadt, NJ.  Founding in the early '60s, Pantone created a color-standard language for fashion, cosmetic and medical communities.  Pantone grew into an color-standards empire also servicing design, ad agencies and the printing communities.  Institutes, too.  To come full circle (geographically-speaking), Chronicle Books, San Francisco, published the box-set "Pantone:  100 Postcards." A source-book for 2016 poetrybites.   Thanks, Pantone.  Thanks, Chronicle Books.

By the way, who says there's isn't inspiration in a box?

So to begin the year, here's color and "color-apped".  Locally-sourced:  Stern Grove.




So above, so below.  
The "real" Stern Grove tree above; below the image "apped" with Circular.  Pehaps, an eye into water?  


Let's return to imagination for a second.  This I know to be true -- food & poetry are inspired by the imagination's naming of color.