You should never believe a poet. They make stuff up. They create worlds of words and twine. They always lie. Do they? Is a poem made of personal experience distilled into its essence that transcends the individual origins and speaks to millions? Is a poem a lesson in verbal pyrotechnics, exploding with fireworks of erudition, allusion and sophistication? Is a poem just a page from an intimate journal left to be read and pondered long after the thinker and the pen are gone? The pen could outlive the thinker - we see the golden pens in museums. Would the computer do it, too? If the technology shifts as fast as it does, what could we put in our museums along with the clothes and plates and pillows of dead poets? Maybe their Kindles, laptops and smart phones that they use to read their work, scrolling down the screen with miraculously agile thumbs while holding the tiny device up in the air and squinting, because the font is too small in the feeble light on the stage...
Maybe nothing. Maybe there will not be any museums built for poets living today. Too many poets lived and died and clamored for fame already. There's no more space for museums, no space for new words to be added to the universe of language that surrounds us, that makes us who we are, fully human. Does it? Is language, fit for naming things and limiting them with a label, the answer? The only answer? Too many questions just give you a headache.
Mister Cogito wrote Zbigniew Herbert, taking his cue from the famous saying Cogito ergo sum... In her intensely intelligent essay, Oriana Ivy wrote an ode to non-thinking as a key to bliss. I followed another lead - into doubt (Dubito ergo sum , instead of Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum as Rene Descartes's dictum is sometimes rendered), but I will save it for another day. Could the poets say: Scribo, ergo sum? - "I write, therefore I am?" Sounds unusually boring. How about: Lego, ergo sum... or Recito, ergo sum... (I read, recite...) This does not work either. Amo, ergo sum - now, that's something altogether lovely, but we cannot be mono-thematic, can we.
I started public readings at Poets on Site various events around Pasadena and decided to start the summer with a reprint of one poem first heard in Torrance in the summer of 2008, the first reading that surprised me by the hushed attention of the audience. Everyone was silent, listening to my voice. An eerie feeling, even for a former college professor, used to inspiring silence in the classroom. The difference was that the poets were listening to my own words, not regurgitated thoughts of others. I start from this poem to welcome back our founder and leader, Kathabela Wilson and her wonderful musician-mathematician husband. They just returned from a long tour of China. The picture, by Milford Zornes is depicted in the lower left corner of the photograph. Susan Rogers, who later took my portrait above and called it "Maja Starlet" is standing and reading behind me.Point San Vincente
~ inspired by a painting by Milford Zornes
Wincenty, my Orthodox great grandpa,
was a cipher I'll never unravel
except that the name bore a whiff
of old-fashioned stiffness.
Prim and proper, St. Vincent
was the patron of lovers in Poland
before the wave of Valentine's red hearts
swept aside such quaint traditions.
In France, old beggars crowded
to St. Vincent de Paul, the giver of bread
to the hungry, love to the afflicted.
In California, one young Vince was proud
of his middle name, shared with the saint.
A lone lantern shines in Vincent's name
onto deep ocean waters from the cliff
of last hope for those who lost
their most cherished treasure –
their life, drowned in the foam
of temptations, slowly strangled
by the fecund seaweed of desire.
Dangers lurk beneath the surface,
tentacled monsters wait
to pull weary swimmers under the waves.
Lasciate omni speranza say the gates
to Dante's Inferno. In the ocean,
Symbolophorus barnardi, the lanternfish
lures its victims with a false light
shining in the murky depths. The golden
sands announce the safety of shore. There is hope.
The light keeps calling: "Come to me,
come to Point San Vincente, come home."
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This occasional poem brings together various Vincents from my life in a free play of associations, centered on the image of the light shining over the ocean. Since the inspiration was the painting of Point San Vincente, I skipped the obvious reference to paintings by Vincent van Gogh. Three years later, on the way to work, I saw horses wondering around their enclosure and the image wrote itself into a poem of sorts. Still fresh and unfinished (too wordy), it brings together disparate thoughts and images in another play of associations.
Summer Blues
The bay colt learns
how to shake his tail
properly from left to right
looking at his mom’s smooth bronze coat,
swift movements. Three-times his size,
she does not mind the attention.
They trot around the enclosure
in locked step, their manes waving.
“You look like a tomato” –
my son notices my skin
burned by the first rays of summer.
“Sunscreen, Mom, it’s called sunscreen”
– scolds the girl, as cautious
as ever.
I wish I lived in Spain
danced the flamenco every night,
an outpouring of passion
distilled into gestures.
I wish I had a horse ranch
in Nevada – a big Stetson hat
and cowboy boots to shield me
from rattlesnakes, made of their skin.
I was a ballerina,
played in an orchestra,
baked Canadian muffins
I hated, with bran and molasses.
Choral singing, knitting
and embroidery - two perfect napkins
still await the half-finished
tablecloth with Art Nouveau flowers
entwined along the edges
in purple and gold.
Shape-shifting, I move
from place to place, life to life,
like a petal carried by the gale
above the ocean.
The colt will grow into a horse.
The children will find their paths
to make and follow. I’ll keep dancing
my solitary flamenco – black, twirling skirts,
fluid gestures cutting the air
that shimmers with the strumming of guitars.
Throaty voices tear the hearts
with nostalgia
for life that could not be.
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The heartbreaking beauty of flamenco used to be spontaneous, but is so strictly choreographed these days, there's no room for invention. The flamenco "I" would have danced - in my poem - does not, could not, exist. In contrast, it is very pleasant to write about things that are.
Solid, physical, gold-plated, able to withstand the assault of time.
Things outlive us. The pianist's suit laughs in its glass case,
in a museum room filled with things that make the absence, the loss of the owner even more vivid. His body already turned into dust.
The solidity of a Japanese screen calls for a celebration in a "mock-haiku" sequence. The golden glow is made to last, it is created to fix a moment into perpetuity, transform the afternoon minute into timelessness.
Six Variations on a Screen
Rich golden sunset
blooms with intensity
ignored by the birds
Camellia blossoms
with innocence unnoticed
In the dazzle of sunlight
Pine branches shine
stars in the gold sky
happily oblivious
The rocks sigh, resting
aged by mineral stardom
tired into existence
The mossy slope spreads
between glistening stones
sleepy with contentment
Green grass awakens
the veil lifts before you enter
serene gold kingdom
This poem also came from an inspiration by Kathabela, who organized a Japanese-themed Poets on Site reading at the Pacific Asia Museum in 2010. The golden beauty of the screen fills the room with tranquility. No wonder, billionaires spend such fortunes on collecting artwork! Could someone spare a fortune for collecting words?
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Credits:
Portrait by Susan Rogers (2009, Pasadena)
Photo from Poets on Site reading at APC Gallery in Torrance by Kathabela Wilson(2008)
Photo of a matilla poppy by Maja Trochimczyk (2011)
Photo from Poets on Site reading at Pacific Asia Museum, Pasadena by Kathabela Wilson (2010)
"Point San Vincente" was first published in a chapbook edited by Kathabela Wilson for Poets on Site (2008) - Three Generations: Milford Zornes, Bill Anderson and Ron Liebbrecht
"Six Variations on a Screen" was first published in a chapbook edited by Kathabela Wilson for Poets on Site (2010) - Gifts to the Japanese Collection at the Pacific Asia Museum
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COMMENTS FROM FACEBOOK
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Kathabela Wilson wrote:
"So, so sweet and beautiful Maja, you know how I love your poetry and love our collaborations. That is the most beautiful welcome I can imagine. And this is such amazing timing as we begin a NEW adventure together as Poets on Site for the Pacific Asia Museum's 40th anniversary exhibition, 2011! I love your tapestry of words here, and hear them ring. As some of the countries of Pacific Asia still resonate with immediacy in my mind I am up late weaving words too. You would have loved to see me writing in the dark on the way to Yellow Mountain, the words tumble over one another for 20 pages...in my journal for the trip... I know I can decipher them but there is something so amazing about the wildness of that first writing... maybe tomorrow I will untangle them and let them sing... our words will turn to gold... words on white like sunset coloring clouds, and seeping into the dark pen of night..."
Toti O’Brian wrote:
"Marvelous good morning I got, with these thoughts, poems and images of beauty. Thank you Maja! The words of poets are just like dreams, as you well demonstrate all the time: not only true, but quintessentially true. Yes, the story has been told already an uncountable number of times, but, as papa stork says to mama stork (they're are two amazing philosophers, after all) in Hans Christian's tale... . we will say it again, and again, and again. Trust the stork."
Lois P. Jones wrote:
"Awash and awakened in this golden outpouring Maja, weaving the thread of wonder between memory and imagination. Your rich history, mingled with the ecstatic bounty of nature makes for such a pleasure ride. How fortunate for those who know you that the scholar turned to poetry. When poetry calls to us...it is like the siren we cannot resist, no matter how we might try :)"
Rina Rose wrote:
"Maja, every word of prose and poetry is beautiful and magical. If I haven't thought so before, I think so now that you are one of my favorite poets. You are still a teacher, at whose feet so many (or at least this one) poet(s) would love to sit and learn. And I do learn from your words here."
Scott Kaestner wrote:
Wonderfully elegant per usual Maja, may you continue to dance with your muse and make music with language and I shall sing along to praise your poesy...
Oriana Ivy wrote:
"A lovely post. Marvelous opening photo. I am also taken with “nostalgia for what never was, could not be” – one of the main themes of my poems.
Yes, it takes a intelligence to argue against thinking – or introverted overthinking, to be exact. Interesting that the “think less” portion of this post is getting the most attention. I am certainly aware that some situations require us to think more. But productive thinking is “task-oriented thinking.” By “think less” I meant introverted overthinking that in my case invariably led to the conclusion: “I am a failure.” Maybe the word “thinking” should not be even applied to this phenomenon. It’s an automatic delusional train of thought that is not to be confused with functional thinking or the creative process.
I am also thinking of Dante’s warning against the misuse of the intellect. To Dante, misuse of reason was the source of all sin. But what truly haunts me is Jack Gilbert’s dementia. He used to be brilliant, and his best poems are indeed very good. His earlier photos showed a craggy, gloomy face, all sharp features and no smile. His recent ones show him with a roundish, cherubic face, and a happy smile at last. I am tempted to say he (involuntarily, to be sure) traded intelligence for bliss (in some cases, dementia disables mostly the left hemisphere, leaving the victim cheerful and sweet and childlike, delighted by the smallest things). Would I ever trade my intelligence for this kind of bliss? Never.
For all this brave talk about bliss, I put intelligence first. Nothing comes ahead of intelligence. If I had a choice between more intelligence or more bliss, I’d take more intelligence, in spite of the biblical warning that “in much wisdom is much grief, and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow” (Eccl 1:18). Intelligence can be either a source of deep pleasure – when I read a challenging book, for instance, one that makes me think – or a tool of torture when it turns against me, trying to find answer to questions such as “What is the greatest mistake I made in my life?”
It’s thanks to my intelligence that I know there can be no reliable answer. I also know that it doesn’t matter what the mistake was, since the process of healing remains the same: I have to forgive myself, acknowledge the huge role of circumstances I couldn't control, and move on (what Milosz called “escaping forward into work”). It’s thanks to my intelligence that I decided not to be depressed, and defined my “no-think zones” – my former portals to depression, which I could enter at will as a refuge against the hardship of engaging with the world. It’s thanks to my intelligence that I can read, re-read, and analyze – and write. I’d still choose to be intelligent rather than happy, assuming such a choice existed. But since the proper use of intelligence – going into a subject in depth, for instance, or “gazing at the world” – gives me great pleasure, it’s not an either/or. My new ideal is “intelligent AND happy.”
There is the kind of bliss which gives the brain a rest from thinking, or else the thinking is effortless: the surprising discovery and insight, the right ending for a poem. For me, these are watery phenomena that occur while I am in the shower. But there is also intellectual bliss, the bliss of making a huge, dedicated effort – the bliss of studying and learning, the bliss of writing a complex piece of prose (I typed “peace,” since writing prose is so beautifully peaceful in contrast to writing poetry, which easily slides into the hell of obsession). Of course I enjoy and welcome the watery bliss of non-thinking. But I am not giving up the bliss of complex thinking, of using my conscious mind to the utmost."
John Guzlowski wrote:
“In a world increasingly given to stark images of chaos and collapse, forgotten mothers and orphaned houses, it's important to celebrate the occasional moments of transient beauty that still somehow occur."
Oriana Ivy answered:
"I agree about the need to celebrate moments of beauty, but I wonder if the chaos and collapse are anything new. Possibly the Victorians' flight into the kind of sentimental beauty that we now reject was their reaction to the "dark satanic mills." Or think about the horrors of the Middle Ages -- yet some of medieval art is the most transcendent ever produced by humanity."
John Guzlowski responded:
"I'm sure people have always felt something of the chaos and collapse, but really when I think about how much violence there is now and how much violence there was in the last century, I feel that maybe there is more chaos and collapse."
Oriana Ivy ended the discussion:
"No question that the 20th century will be known as the age of mass annihilation, but what makes me slightly optimistic is the spread of education, the rising life expectancy, the economic surge in countries such as India and China, more communication, and much else. The progress is painfully slow, with backslides, but we are progressing. That's not to say we'll ever run out of pain, or that the beauty of nature can cease to inspire us to praise. Gee, maybe my optimism has something to do with my knee shots? And knowing that in the worst-case scenario, I won't be subject to the kind of crude knee replacement that was the only option 20 years ago? It is one of the ironies of my life that I, a poet, take comfort not in art (well, occasionally), but I am thrilled by leaps in science, technology and medicine. The genius of humanity, the collective psyche, does not fail to awe me -- in spite of religious wars and other monstrosities."
"To return to the gift of Maja's post, what comes to my mind is this statement by Joseph Campbell: "We cannot cure the world of sorrows, but we can choose to live in joy." My last blog post tries to say the same thing, and discusses various unexpected means achieving to more joy, e.g. limit choice (who knew?). "We must risk delight" -- Jack Gilbert"
Susan Dobay wrote:
"To my understanding those poets who lead us toward to higher awareness through imagination are giving us more TRUTH than those who giving facts and materialistic reality. Maja's poetry gives me beauty and food for my soul. The make up stuff could be closer to truth than the fact based lies."
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