no words

{No credit, unfortunately}

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{this is my favorite. I want to be the girl with the pretty blue umbrella.}

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{Credit Here}

the problem with poetry

Camping was lovely. I wished on a shooting star at 2:30 in the morning as I laid awake. :) And I saw this terrific piece of graffiti on a huge boulder:

It must have taken someone a long time to carve this into solid rock. That's a lot of luv.

On a completely different note, I'm thinking of submitting some poetry to a contest the library's holding. It isn't really blog-worthy material, except that it's made me think about the problem with liking poetry. My conclusion is this: The problem with liking poetry is that no one else likes it except other poets. Being a poet isn't like being a musician, because no one dislikes all music. But if you tell people you write poetry, they say, "Oh, I hate poetry," not realizing that they've just shaken the foundations of your dreams. Or else they're nice enough, but they don't get it. So you feel kind of dumb because you like the way that what the poet didn't say means just as much as what he did, or the way the words skitter across the page and paint pictures in your mind, and when you say the opening words out loud you really understand how the poem is supposed to feel - and when no one else understands, it feels as though maybe there's something a little dumb about it, after all.

Not that this has ever happened to me. ;)

But anyway, that's my rambling on poetry. And I'm going to submit something! This is a big deal, because I never show anyone what I write. So be excited for me. :)

later days

"Granted, fate and tragedy, aimless and just-missing-by-a-hair are part of human experience, but they are not all, and I'm not sure they are a major part, even in the lives of men who know no Designer or design. For me, I have seen a Keener Force yet, the force of Ultimate Good working through seeming ill. Not that there is rosiness, ever; there is genuine ill, struggle, dark-handed, unreasoning fate, mistakes, 'if-onlys' and all the Hardyisms you can muster. But in them I am beginning to discover a Plan greater than any could imagine. "

-Jim Elliot, 1951

Oh, October!

How I love you! You are beautiful! October is most certainly making up for the letdown of September. The leaves haven't turned yet, but the sky is the perfect smooth blue oval that it only can be in the Fall. The air is crisp, like the apples we picked Saturday.  sixty. five. degrees. Perfection. :)
 I went for a walk today in the woods near our house today, and saw four deer bound away into the trees. Something about Autumn seems to make nature feel so much closer. The sky is a little lower; the trees make themselves conspicuous. I'm going camping tomorrow, because there couldn't be a more ideal time. 

She lit a burner on the stove and offered me a pipe

"I thought you'd never say hello," she said

"You look like the silent type."

Then she opened up a book of poems

And handed it to me

Written by an Italian poet

From the thirteenth century

And every one of them words rang true

And glowed like a burning coal

Pouring off of every page

Like it was written in my soul from me to you

Tangled up in Blue

So now I'm going back again

I got to get her somehow

All the people we used to know

They're an illusion to me now

Some are mathematicians

Some are carpenter's wives

Don't know how it all got started

I don't know what they're doing with their lives

But me I'm still on the road

Heading for another joint

We always did feel the same

We just saw it from a different point of view

Tangled up in Blue

~Bob Dylan,  Tangled up in Blue

Hopefully I'll have some adventures to relate when I get back from the Great Family Wilderness Excursion :) Until then, happy, happy, happy autumn! 

Love is not a victory march

I've been reading Edna St. Vincent Millay lately. Despite her scandalous private life, her poetry is brilliant.

The Concert

No, I will go alone.
I will come back when it's over.
Yes, of course I love you.
No, it will not be long.
Why may you not come with me? --
You are too much my lover.
You would put yourself
Between me and song.

If I go alone,
Quiet and suavely clothed,
My body will die in its chair,
And over my head a flame,
A mind that is twice my own,
Will mark with icy mirth
The wide advance and retreat
Of armies without a country,
Storming a nameless gate,
Hurling terrible javelins down
From the shouting walls of a singing town
Where no women wait!
Armies clean of love and hate,
Marching lines of pitiless sound
Climbing hills to the sun and hurling
Golden spears to the ground!
Up the lines a silver runner
Bearing a banner whereon is scored
The mild and steel of a bloodless wound
Healed at length by the sword!

You and I have nothing to do with music.
We may not make of music a filigree frame,
Within which you and I,
Tenderly glad we came,
Sit smiling, hand in hand.

Come now, be content.
I will come back to you, I swear I will;
And you will know me still.
I shall be only a little taller
Than when I went.


First Fig

My candle burns at both ends;

It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends --
It gives a lovely light!

There are more, of course. But these two are the most memorable, for me. This one's excellent too. :)

The first day of Fall was last week. It was 96 degrees. It's about time for this extended summer to die, I think. I'm ready to break out the jean jacket, but the weather isn't cooperating. Oh, well. Autumn can't be long now. Right?

I'm really feeling this song right now. And this version is gorgeous and perfect.

Stay tuned for a hilarious series of observations about my new town; also featuring some deep philosophical ideas, reflections on various adventures, and some geeky artsy stuff as well. :)

Fall and Fog

Somehow, while I was getting lost in the back roads of my brand-new town and meeting neighbors and talking to strangers, September slipped in and was halfway gone before I realized it was here. I love September. It's the last hurrah of summer, but it's promising Fall.

Courtesy here. This is how I picture September, in my head. Gray, and a little melancholy. This is Big Sur, California, one of my favorite places. Fall there isn't colorful, but it's gloomy and chilly and mysterious.

Nothing much more to say now, except that football season has started! Go Broncos! :)

FOG

THE fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

-Carl Sandburg

poetry-music

I absolutely love this.

(courtesy of the amazing Natalie Lloyd, and also of Una Bella Vita)

Lately I've been writing poetry. There's not a lot else to do when your life is packed up in suitcases and cardboard boxes. But this song is perfect for poetry. (I'm trying to figure out how to play it on my violin, which is a lot of fun. Now I just need to find a pianist...) Jon Schmidt is so incredibly talented! I love the arrangement of piano and cello, and the two songs sound wonderful together. Oh sorry, am I gushing? :)

Our moving date is in two days. It feels like a door is slamming shut behind me as I leave, but I suppose this closure is better than the ragged loose ends moving sometimes leaves behind. Having moved so many times in my life, I'm good at cutting those ties and starting fresh. I think the difficult part this time will be trying NOT to sever the roots I've put down. But it will be okay.

~Jeremiah 29:11!

goodbyes on a one way street

I'm currently in love with the song Four Chords by The Classic Crime. (I also like their song The Happy Nihilist. Very fun to sing along with :)

I was much too young to think of danger

I was curious and innocent and brave

Even if I die tomorrow I'll be glad my life was filled with songs

Even if I die tomorrow these four chords will keep me living on

I've been saying goodbye to people this week. It's a strange, difficult thing, saying goodbye to the people and places you love. All these memories come back that you hadn't realized you'd forgotten, and you realize you'll miss most the things you took for granted. Gah, this is hard. I wonder if people realize how much I'm going to miss them. :)

But I'm trying to be adventurous about the door God's shoving me through. Life is a one-way street, and looking back doesn't get you very far when you can only move forward.

I'll be away from the internet for a couple of weeks. This doesn't seem like a very good time to take a blogging break, after only three posts, but it can't be helped. So I'll be living life, having adventures, which I'll record later. :) [Tangent: isn't "blog" an awful word? Say it out loud. b l o g. Isn't it ugly? I may need to find a substitute word. I'll work on it.]

Later days :)