for poets, poetry and those who love to listen. Gone but always, remembered like the taste of Spring asparagus. Like a favorite line of poetry recalled, recited. On the fourth day of National Poetry Month & with gratitude to Nancy Keane.
An address can evoke such a range of emotions. I remember 51 Valley Forge Road, and place it in the middle of my "memoir", particularly as a winding road in the middle of a sparse woods that surrounded a river. Sometimes the river was flowing rapidly, especially after a spring thaw. Sometimes the river was frozen, not always solidly, and we tried to skate on it, unsuccessfully.
Geography so often determines our perspective.
Today I live near enough to spend some mornings with the Pacific Ocean. I walk the shore as much as I can, feeling relief with the expanse of sky and the sea before me--no litter, billboards, cars, or other obstacles to a long view. Just clouds, waves, a few surfers, a dog or two, and birds, many types of birds at rest and in flight.
"All birds in one direction" is a phrase I use to ground myself. It is a visual based on an actual phenomenon I have witnessed at Ocean Beach. What are they doing? Who gives the order to turn west or east? How long do they stay in this formation, and why?
Just seems to me to be a sign of something primal, shared, and predictive. There must be a message in the great shores we could learn if we knew the language.
Primary to understanding the world as we now inhabit it: language. Words are only one frame of reference. Emotional language seems so much more fertile for a poet walking the Mission, seeing old haunts, remembering the glow of one's favorite dive, one's favorite fellow poet.
OCEAN
I walk the beach this morning- a fish the size of my childhood swims up to bite me-- where can I walk the only beach a hungry fish cannot be found?
4400
ReplyDeleteAn address can evoke such a range of emotions. I remember 51 Valley Forge Road, and place it in the middle of my "memoir", particularly as a winding road in the middle of a sparse woods that surrounded a river. Sometimes the river was flowing rapidly, especially after a spring thaw. Sometimes the river was frozen, not always solidly, and we tried to skate on it, unsuccessfully.
Geography so often determines our perspective.
Today I live near enough to spend some mornings with the Pacific Ocean. I walk the shore as much as I can, feeling relief with the expanse of sky and the sea before me--no litter, billboards, cars, or other obstacles to a long view. Just clouds, waves, a few surfers, a dog or two, and birds, many types of birds at rest and in flight.
"All birds in one direction" is a phrase I use to ground myself. It is a visual based on an actual phenomenon I have witnessed at Ocean Beach. What are they doing? Who gives the order to turn west or east? How long do they stay in this formation, and why?
Just seems to me to be a sign of something primal, shared, and predictive. There must be a message in the great shores we could learn if we knew the language.
Primary to understanding the world as we now inhabit it: language. Words are only one frame of reference. Emotional language seems so much more fertile for a poet walking the Mission, seeing old haunts, remembering the glow of one's favorite dive, one's favorite fellow poet.
OCEAN
I walk the beach this morning-
a fish the size of my childhood
swims up to bite me--
where can I walk the only beach
a hungry fish cannot be found?