On Clear Skies, Summer Sounds, and the Secret Weight of Words

once upon a time

pink trees flowered under the azure 

of deep, clear expanse

It is almost the end of July, a strange summer of chemtrails, clear skies, heat waves, and wildfires... In recent weeks, I was delighted to again see beautiful blue, clear skies above my head, after months and months of criss-crossing chemtrails.  It was a "Victory of Light" in the hidden war above our heads, a short respite from the chaotic graffiti in the sky. I call these failed artwork "graffiti" -gang signs marking territory where gang enforces its rules - in my photo albums, documenting the shifting patterns, and colors of my California sky. That's how I noticed them, by taking pictures of no-longer azure skies...

no, no, I do not

allow these strange graffiti
to taint my sky

the white haze -

iridescent like fish-scales

in polluted ocean

how deep is the blue?

only the sunrays will know

after piercing the sky

The summer sounds... I was raised with the clacking of the storks and the noise of their wings. Both sets of my grandparents in their villages in different parts of Poland had stork nests on their property: one on the barn roof (a wheel off an old wagon, on which storks piled up branches), and one on the top of a pine that had been struck by lightning and had a bent branch up there... I remember coming out at 6 a.m., sleepy and disoriented after being woken up by the wild ruckus up the tree not far from my window. The wooden porch was sunny and warm, and the world was waking up to yet another day of peaceful summer.

Ambika Talwar, a poet-friend, commented: "This is eternal and true wherever you may be. Claim it! Hold it in your heart. Speak of it. Say it out loud. Awaken someone who needs this now. Sing it so the birds listen to you. Be your dancing self."

Photo from Poland Forever group on Facebook.

The  storks used to follow my uncle in the meadow, about two steps behind, when he was cutting down the grass with the scythe. This is one of my favorite images of Poland, not a photo since I did not have a camera yet: the two storks following my uncle and picking up frogs and what not to eat for breakfast... Peace, and communion with nature, that's what it was (except for the frogs).

Another delightful sound of my childhood was the noise of the bees, and I liked it even though I once had 21 stings in my head and was very sick with their venom.  Maybe, by now, I'm related to the bees... In my California garden the crape myrtle tree is flowering with beautiful purple blossoms that attract hundreds of bees, busily collecting the nectar and making the most heavenly sound I remember from my Polish childhood. When I went for summer vacations to my Grandma's house in the "colony" of Bielewicze (not even a village, but a scattering of houses in the fields by the forest, on the eastern Kresy of Poland), I admired the intensity and patterns of the buzzing of bees in the majestic linden tree in the middle of the courtyard. In Polish, this tree is called "Lipa" - hence the month of "Lipiec" when it flowers. In English: July. Here, under the azure and turquoise cupola of California's skies, there are no linden trees, but the bees sing their songs quite as happily: busy, busy, busy, bzzz, bzzz, bzzz...

The bees go to sleep in the evening. Their familiar and beloved sounds are replaced by another guest from the past, or a couple of guests: crickets that have moved inside the house, sit behind the bookshelf and play, play, play - to their heart's desire.  The Polish village tradition of having a cricket behind the chimney stemmed from the habit of these sonorous critters to seek shelter from cold autumn and winter days in the warmth of village house kitchens: hence the saying, "to be comfy as a cricket behind a chimney," or "swierszcz za kominem."

Here, in the middle of California summer, it is very hot outside, perhaps too hot, so maybe the bookshelf, right by my empty and cold fireplace, provides a shaded and safe shelter from the heat? No matter what reason, I love listening to these critters. They rub their legs to make this lively noise, they do work very hard. Imagine if I had to rub my legs to speak at such a speed! Amazing! What onomatopoeia should reflect the chirping of the crickets? chir-chir-chir is too slow, szuru-buru is too low, so let's leave this translation aside and enjoy.

Chinese scholars used to catch crickets, put them in little cages and make them sing by poking them with a stick. I saw a whole assortment of such cricket cages at the Pacific Asia Museum and was quite offended at the presumptuous human "jailers" who should have set their crickets free, to have them come and play at will, as guests, not prisoners.

A Cricket Sings

The intricate opening

carved into patterns

of ancient elegance

lets feeble light

into the ornate cage

the smooth brown cask

is a luxurious coffin

for insect freedom

How sad for the cricket!

Tickled to sing,

it awakens in a box

held by sweaty hands

of an imperial scribe

who listens to the memory

of distant farmlands

in his own gilded cage -

a tiny room hidden by

the splendor of ancient

palace walls

How sad for the cricket!

(c) 2009 by Maja Trochimczyk

I'm sure that the songs of the captive crickets was not as happy as the one that I'm listening to right now. Alas, I cannot record it, as my house is filled with another, somewhat louder noise, that of the old. fridge. While I tried to come closer to record my evening music, the result was silence: the cricket realized it was not alone and stopped its night-time serenade altogether.  Thus, I learned that "the presence of the observer changes the phenomenon being observed" - a variation on the Heisenberg Principle, heard in my living room, on a summer evening! And my friend tells me that, had I been able to record the cricket and slow down the recording I would have heard singing, just like human voices: http://truthseekerdaily.com/2013/11/someone-recorded-crickets-then-slowed-down-the-track-and-it-sounds-like-humans-singing/.

As physicists have told us, the Uncertainty Principle, a characteristics of all waves, states that you can either know where something is, or how fast it is going, but not both at the same time. In other words: "the more precisely the position of some particle is determined, the less precisely its momentum can be known, and vice versa."  This explains the position of my keys, sunglasses, and stick-drives in my reality, since I do not know where they are at the precise moment of leaving my house, they must be accelerating with intense momentum to reach the speed of light and disappear forever on the other side, in the universe of left socks, assorted pens, hairpins, sunglasses, keys and umbrellas. There must be such a universe, given the hundreds of items that disappear without trace each year.

Seriously speaking, we do have to be serious when speaking: words have weight. So few among us understand the power and potency of words in creating realities. Millions of people have read "The Secret" where this idea is popularized, yet they sought another "get rich quick" scheme and overlooked a fundamental principle of human reality. Words create Worlds. Is it said in the Gospel of John:

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not..."

Manuscript in the Badische Landesbibliothek, Karlsruhe, Germany, 1220.  Cod. Bruchsal 1, Bl. 1v 

That's a pretty important statement about  the true significance of words, filled, as they are, with the Divine creative power. Words create human reality.  We live in the Universe we made of words. Poets do, philosophers, scientists, scholars, politicians, business people, do, parents and children do - we all define our realities in words. Spoken aloud, words can become enchantments or curses: "I hate you, go away" breaks the heart of a child, and may lead to a life-time of trauma. "I love you, you are beautiful" brings an instant flowering of gladness.

On the website of Dr. Masaru Emoto (1943-2014) we read: "We all learn valuable life lessons at our own pace, but there is one basic truth we all learn early.  Positive, compassionate words comfort and heal; negative words and insults hurt. Until recently, we knew this only because we could feel it.  Now we can actually see it.  Thanks to the experimental work of Dr. Masaru Emoto, we can look to water, and its frozen crystals, to confirm the healing power of beautiful music, positive thinking, uplifting speech, and prayer."

"By exposing water to a particular word or piece of music, freezing it, and photographing the ice crystals formed, Dr. Emoto has shown that from beautiful words and music, come beautiful crystals, and from mean-spirited, negative words, come malformed and misshapen crystals. What is the significance?  It becomes clear when we remember that the adult human body is approximately 70% water and infant bodies are about 90% water.  We can be hurt emotionally and, as the water can be changed, for the worse physically, by negativity. However, we are always closer to beauty when surrounded by positive thoughts, words, intentions and ultimately those vibrations."

Dr. Emoto’s theories are articulated in his books: The Hidden Messages in Water, The True Power of Water, and The Secret Life of Water.  Some of his experiments involved writing or saying "I love you" and "I hate you" to various samples of water, with the effect showing the creative, organizing power of love and the destructive, chaotic nature of hate. In other experiments he compared crystals formed in frozen samples from pure stream water  and from microwaved water. Just looking at them makes you want to throw out your microwave... It just is not right.

In any case, believe it or not, water, or not water, the healing power of self-talk, affirmation of one's own value, beauty, goodness, and happiness is well established. But then, what about all these curses, uttered at random, casually? So many "F-bombs" dropped on the waters within the listeners and the speakers alike... What is the damage? We do not know for sure yet, except that "grating" effect, that feeling of being "taken down" a notch, somehow diminished.  I was cursed out by someone not long ago in a phone message I saved, thinking it would be a good start of a book, and not realizing that words could be used with such venom. But then, I thought - why bother? If I transcribe and publish those curses, I'll add to their hidden power, I'll make them go out to the world and do the work that they were designed for: to destroy, to diminish...

Instead, I decided to write an entirely different book, of "Poems and incantations" leading the readers Into Light, with its 30 poems and 12 prayers... I wrote them for myself, but also to share. Enjoy!

Crown Jewels

I am an onyx of grounding
I am amber of attraction
I am a topaz of resilience

I am a rose quartz of affection
I am a turquoise of expression
I am an amethyst of insight

I am a sapphire of faith
I am an emerald of hope
I am a ruby of love

I am a crystal of clarity
I am a pearl of understanding
I am a diamond of light

This book is now available in the following formats:

Paperback (trade, 6 by 9  inches), ISBN 978 0 9963981 8 3
http://www.lulu.com/shop/maja-trochimczyk/into-light-poems-and-incantations/paperback/product-22829841.html

Pocketbook (4.22 by 6.88 inches), No ISBN, available on lulu.com
http://www.lulu.com/shop/http://www.lulu.com/shop/maja-trochimczyk/into-light-poems-and-incantations/paperback/product-22810285.html

and E-Book in ePub format,ISBN 978 0 9963981 9 0
http://www.lulu.com/shop/http://www.lulu.com/shop/maja-trochimczyk/into-light-poems-and-incantations/ebook/product-22830071.html