Lovely haiga - photos or art with haikus - sent in by members of Southern California Haiku Study Group were presented on Zoom on Sunday, January 2,2022 in a presentation hosted by Debbie P Kolodji. It was a delight and a meeting of friends, some from Southern California, Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego County, others from Northern California and the East Coast. Debbie brought us all together, created a delightful PowerPoint presentation of haiga riches, and led us through the reading. At the end, she collected ideas for more meetings in person...I'm inviting poets to Big Tujunga Wash in May and June for a walk amongst the towering white Yucca Whipplei flowers, a delight for us tiny Liliputs in the valley of giants...
So much good poetry, but I only have photos of my own... I looked up what kind of Chinese Year are we going to have and saw Black Water Tiger - so I looked for a stripy photo to match, and found one from Redondo Beach, taken during the Christmas walk with kids and grandkids, some of them, anyway....
Then, I thought I should celebrate the fruitfulness and abundance of the coming year, so our focus is positive and full of trust in the great future we are expecting and will see happening. I just ate my very last pomegranate I saved for the new year. I kept it on the tree until January 1, and took the photo in mid-December when the gold leaves were still on the tree...
The pomegranate was rich, almost amaranth in shade, dark burgundy wine hue, or .... pomegranate, bursting with tart sweetness on my tongue.... I wrote many pomegranate poems, the most recent one will be published in California Quarterly 48 no. 1, so here's The Aril from the past:
The Aril
“Aril” is the word for me.
Not “arid” – as in the desert of wasted years, hours.
Not “arduous” – as in working so hard every day
to make ends meet. These ends, they never meet, anyway.
Just aril. As in my garden at noon. As in ruby-bright
pomegranate shining in full sunlight. A jewel bowl of arils
I pick from exploded fruit to freeze for winter. A handful
of overripe arils that taste rejuvenating, like fine wine.
Tartly-sweet juice stains my fingers burgundy-red –
or should I say, aril-red?
Oh, the delight of untold riches!
You watch me blissfully chew the seeds
and say in disbelief: “You eat them whole? Really?
When I was a boy, my brother told me that
trees would grow out of my ears if I swallowed
pomegranate seeds – huge trees would grow
and grow and grow and grow…”
We laugh at the vision of these arid, forgotten years.
It was an arduous journey that took us through
the wilderness to this vivid moment of sharing
this magic, life-giving nectar of arils,
ruby-red arils.
(c) Maja Trochimczyk, 2021
Last week, as I was driving through our astounding mountains with Ian, my youngest son visiting from Texas, I wrote a poem about what surprised me the most - the river of gold leaves, ash, cottonwood, poplar - at the bottom of the canyon, meandering between steep hillsides - walls of cracking rocks, charcoal-dark from the rain, and sparse dried out bushes... We were driving too fast to take any photos, I'd have to climb half way up the slopes to catch a good view, anyway...
Here's a photo with Ian from the "Black Water Tiger" beach portrayed above.
Here's my older son's family with my youngest granddaughter, one of them, Aurelia
And here's my second youngest granddaughter, Juniper with her parents, her uncle and grandma.
Andherewe are in Costa Mesa Oso Park, with brand new Snoopy...
This morning, a haiku summarizing that experience, the contrast of lovely, flowing gold and charcoal crumbling into nothingness appeared out of nowhere. Then, I went for a walk to find some gold leaves - there were quite a few, from liquid amber, mulberry, poplar, cottonwood, ash, and some other trees that I do not know the names of... Here's the end result - extra leaves as the background. I actually found all hues of yellow, orange and red, or should I say Napes, Chrome and Imperial Yellows, Gold, Gamboge, Saffron, Amber, Minium, and Ginger, Vermilion, Scarlet, Hematite, Dragon's blood, all the way to Tyrian purple, Archil, russet, Sepia, and Umber... I know the names of these colors now, because I got a new book for Christmas, The Secret Lives of Color by Kassia St. Clair. So vivid, so brilliant!
May your year of Water Tiger be vivid and brilliant -
Since the stream dried out, yucca is no longer blooming, and I cannot wade in ankle-deep water, I stopped going for walks in the Wash. How many times can you walk down the same path and not get bored? I got restless in front of my laptop one lovely, sunny afternoon when the sky was perfect sapphire or lapis-lazuli, so brilliant and the sun just became golden, painting the hills into hues of amber and linden honey.
A surprise was waiting for me among pungent bushes of sage and manzanita - some yucca stalks, dried and lifeless were perfectly golden in the setting sun. So a poem came back home with me from that peaceful walk.
Fall Yucca
Golden stems shine like beams of sunset
piercing the purple valley that sinks
into darkness under a soap-bubble sky.
The stems lean sideways, imperceptibly falling
- these are our leaning towers of Yucca in the desert
valley that I make my home. I breathe deeply, delighted
by the omnipresent sheen and sparkle of sonorous
cicadas that rush to surround me with their scintillating
songs of summer, before rains silence them into sleep.
Long, narrow yucca leaves gather at the stems
like supersonic star-beams meeting at one point
on the horizon, blurred by velocity of a Star Wars flight.
They burst out at dusk with a silvery glow
of moonlight - then detach from their drying stems
to crumble into the thick charcoal of the earth.
The yucca's white lily flowers have long turned into
bunches of seed-pods - waiting to fall and germinate
into spikes of sharp leaves that poke from the rocky soil
with a promise and a certainty of survival –
the next year's yucca. Shadows reveal sparks
of icy stars above me – I walk home, content.
My rock heart that I wrote a ballad about and kept placing on a little indent in a larger rock is gone, so I found another rock heart and placed it right there. This place I call the Rock Heart Valley, so it has to have its heart! Nearby someone put together a tall cairn of rocks, so I took a photo of it.
I'm not the only one here interested in rock art. someone else put together a spiral to walk into and outside. I did that and got dizzy from turning inwards at smaller and smaller angles, until the whole valley was rotating around me, standing transfixed under the sapphire sky.
The nights are cool these days, winter chill comes out right after sunset, though it still feels like summer in direct sunlight. Roses like it and after slumbering through the hottest months of the year, July through September, they finally started blooming again. I have several new, fragrant varieties to join the pink French Perfume that had as many as 30 roses simultaneously. The smaller bushes have one or two, but so pretty in their rainbow colors and delicate, intoxicating scents. Sometimes I stand in front of the rose bush and take 10-20-30 breaths of the rose perfume - aromatherapy done live! Here's a new poem about the two-color rose, cream inside, blush pink outside, called the Double Delight.
Double Delight
Gentle as dawn, clearing
the sky of midnight nightmares
my November rose smiles to herself
rearranging the bluh and pink crinoline
of petals folded into a heart –
her secret within
She tells me to laugh
and laugh again, overflowing
with childish joy, champaign bubbling
in a crystal – while the air around me –
is heavy with cries of panic, anguish, hate.
“What of the news?” you say,
“Who lived, who died, who suffered?”
I’m silent, exploring the inner landscapes
that only music knows – the infinity
of cellos, violins, and the lover’s gaze
locked in the key of brightness.
I'm grateful for my Double Delight, I'm grateful for my pomegranates, here filled with thank-yous in so many languages. Gratitude is the virtue of blessings.
Is there anything better in life than holding a child in your arms? Your child, your grandchild? I am blessed to have witness a miracle recently, a miracle that changed my existential status. From now on, I'm a Grandma, Babcia.
These words seem rather abstract at the moment, as I think of my own Grandmas/Babcias and how ancient they seemed to me, when I was a child spending summer vacation in their village homes, eating strawberries and cherries in their gardens and orchards... No matter, age is not important. The new life of the new person just entering the world and opening his eyes to see the universe - this is what is important.
To welcome my Grandson, Adam Marcin (born in September), I spent the last month before travelling to Poland for this monumental occasion writing a long poem, entitled "I Give You the World" and illustrated with all sorts of photos - of family life and things I love to take pictures of, leaves, petals, clouds... There is a lot of personal material in that book, so I'm not going to make it publicly available. In fact, it has been printed in ten numbered copies and that's it.
But some fragments of the poem can be pulled out to become independent pieces, and shared with readers. So here they are. I Give You the World. A Poem for Adam 1. I saw you with eyes closed smiling
waves, shadows changing direction— where are you?
Adam, the first man I give you the whole Earth to name
2. I give you my world with veins of gold slicing through the drab clay of hours, drops of amber hidden in sand, bright turquoise among slabs of granite, and pure diamonds in charcoal. 3. I give you the strong scent of the Electron rose with its hue of vermilion flames. Here’s the gift of wings of the butterfly shining yellow on a pink hibiscus and the busy buzzing of bees in the crape myrtle tree, overshadowing my Sun-Land patio. Can I also give you the ancient linden tree, all awash with the bees gathering nectar in my Grandma’s yard in Bielewicze— the sweet noise of honey and July? Careful, don’t catch any bees! They die as they sting you. Better save them from drowning in the pool, bees are precious they give us honey and fruit, lots of fruit.
4. I give you rocks in the riverbed, white, grey, and veined with pink — so you step on the solid foundation and grow up with both feet on the ground strong and stronger each day. I give you water laughing in the stream, so your laughter spills over the waves of air, lightly, in silvery droplets.
I give you the hummingbird’s feathers ruby–red and emerald green — their feisty owner suspended in mid-air on invisible wings, drinking nectar from a butterfly-shaped flower of bougainvillea in the intense shade of magenta. 5. I think you will love my gifts of the pink grapefruit and juicy oranges fresh off the tree. This one is funny! It wears sunglasses made of shadows. It is good to laugh at shadows… And look! Is this a flower or a bird in paradise?
6. I give you the patience of a lizard, sunning itself on my pathway, and catching flies — no, I do not give you the gift of catching flies,or maybe… it could be useful! Well, let’s stay with the hard-working habit of waiting for the right moment—Yes, do everything at the right time— do everything right. You may like the intense hue of the California poppy a wildflower of the hills. As orange as laughter, with delicate green leaves of the spring, it comes back year after year, without rain, after fires. Like this poppy, never give up! 7. I am sure you will like the taste of red cherries right off the tree in Jelonki, in my childhood garden later demolished to build a street for those tall apartment blocks that are as ugly as machines to live in—but cherries, ah, cherries, with juice flowing down your fingers and your chin— I give you all the riches of the clear, crisp air in the fall, when gingko, maple, and poplar leaves are yellow and crunchy under your feet, when the last peaches are getting wrinkly and too sweet on empty branches in the orchard.
8. I give you the heady scent of needles on the Christmas tree, a Douglas fir covered in handmade ornaments, hidden behind a mountain of gifts in crinkly wrapping paper green, red, gold, and navy — next to a row of stockings waiting for chocolate on the mantel. Please, accept the fragrance of resin melting in the hot sun, flowing in large drops down the branches of my juniper and cypress — and down the trunks of pines that lined the sandy road to your Great Grandpa’s family house in Bielewicze, where storks welcomed sunrise, ferns unfolded and stretched in forest shadows, and silence rang like crystal bells at noon. This is the time for trees to dream of sleep and for birds to map out long flights along mountain ranges, above green waves of forests, white-crested waves of the ocean, soaring on waves of air. 9. I give you the chirping of the cricket behind my chimney — their summer song, the kind my Grandma heard in the freezing, snowy winter in Trzebieszów— I wish you always have a cricket behind your chimney— let it sing, if it wants to sing! 10. I give you the majesty of sequoias, tall and ancient with heads in the sky, roots stretching down inter-connected. Solid, immobile, above and beyond it all. Theirs is the gift of nobility, strength and resilience. They do not die in forest fires — just get singed and grow new branches — that’s what I give you today.
11. When you grow a bit bigger I’ll give you wings to fly in planes, across oceans to distant cities — London, Paris, Rome, Barcelona and the City of Angels, and to the white coral sand under coconut palms on Pacific islands, and to the waterfalls and volcanoes of Hawaii—Come on! Grow! Let’s go! We’ll enter magnificent cathedrals and listen to angelic voices and heavenly sawing machines of Johann Sebastian Bach.
We’ll climb the world’s most famous tower To look down at the rooftops and streets, Eating ice-cream, and almonds, and crepes.
We’ll admire crystal mirrors of rococo palaces with the thrills and trills of coloratura sopranos and the Magic Flute by Mozart. We’ll waltz in the rain with Chopin and rest under weeping willows of his Mazovian plains. We’ll visit the willows reflected in Claude Monet’s ponds, full of clouds and water lilies. We’ll spend the dawn and the dusk in his garden.
At noon we’ll stand in the rainbow of stained glass windows on stone menagerie carved into the floor of Sainte Chapelle. We’ll travel through the primary colors and black lines of Mondrian to the upside down world of Magritte, where dawn and dusk are the same. I wonder if you’d share my admiration for the smiles of Gothic Madonnas with blue-winged angels in gold-relief heavens, nodding to the swinging rhythms of Brazilian samba and classical jazz, the luxury of mellow voices. Ella and Frank forever.
12. I give you the rush of understanding, the “aha” moment when you get it and things fall into place where they should have been from the start. Stuffed into this junk heap of ideas is a gift of making cosmos from chaos in the pristine, strong light of your mind. And don’t forget the white kernel of fresh walnut after you peel off its yellow wrinkly skin. All the bitter flavor is gone, only sweetness remains — just like in life, when lived right. So yes, I do give you the true gift of living right, capturing each moment and dissecting it into what to keep and what to discard.
13. My gift is unique and hidden. You’ll find it inside you, when your bare feet touch the new grass and your eyes follow shifting clouds in the blue-grey Polish sky. This is the gift of seeing and knowing what is true, how grass grows, how clouds become scarves for the hills, sneezing in winter. How to be present to changing sunlight on the mountain slopes with patches of shadow moving through distant canyons and meadows.This is my gift.
14. Of things I have not touched with my feet or the palms of my hands I share with you Norwegian fjords and Alaskan glaciers, the glistening black-and-white skin of my totem orcas, the whale-song and dolphins. Play a tune on the teeth of a plastic comb, immersed in water and a dolphin will come to investigate this new language of clicks — and will spit water on you if he does not like what you have to say— maybe a dolphin’s insult? They are smarter than humans, you know. So, instead of playing, set them free. Yes, please, do. 15. So, my dear first-born grand-son son of my first-born son, I give you the colors, scents, and flavors of fall, winter, spring and summer. Know that what becomes old dies out, letting flowers blossom and turn into the delicious golden fruit of experience and memory. Well, I never thought of memory as a jar of pickled pears with cinnamon sticks and cloves ready for a winter feast. Apparently, that’s what it is. Thus, I give you some pickled pears of your Grandma,great-Grandma and other, greater grand-Grandmas, with family recipes and stories to keep.
16. I give you the bells of sailboat tack ringing against the mast on your boat in the harbor, waiting for another adventure on gently undulating grey waves of a lake. That’s for a summer day. For winter nights, I give you ten billion suns in each of ten billion galaxies as your playground. You will find your way from sun to sun.
17. I give you the shape of hand-written letters, the spirals of sunflower seeds, and a snail shell, the cycle of seasons, the living breath of our planet, the fractal veins on a rose petal and on tributaries to a river you will see from the orbit through electronic eyes of machines.
I give you the multitude of seeds in a pomegranate, each seated in its own ruby-red juicy pod, squished into the tightest space. This is how tight knowledge will be packed into the neurons and cells of your brain,so you can squeeze its sweetness into words of supreme wisdom.
18. I give you the gift of my language, many languages, really — Two for certain, maybe three, four, five, or six I could have spoken if I tried harder, made more time. So now you can do it —learn more skills, get more knowledge, expertise, beauty. Let’s not forget beauty, the true meaning of life—see the snowflake star crystals melting on your glove? That’s what it means being like the lilies of the field that are clothed in glory and stretch their heads to the sun, breathing in the morning dew, absorbing the golden essence of life with each leaf, root, and petal. So, there.
19. I wish you the murmur of waterfalls and the silver resonance of Tibetan chimes, slowly swirling through the evening air with the smoke of frankiscense. I wish you the halo of light-filled sound and the brightest fragrance to keep you enveloped in a shield of light, your armor against the dark. I wish, I wish, I wish for you the most precious gift of them all —the great river of light and the luminescence of golden white love. 20. I give you all the beautiful and good things I can find. What you do with my gifts is yours only— store them in the treasure chest of your allotted time to do this and that, and this much, and just enough. May every step lead you to greater understanding and compassion for all living beings,to greater wisdom, higher awareness, and more intense connection with all others— plants, animals, people. May your song echo widely across the Universe. May you learn to sail and swim, and climb mountains, and write sonnets, or paint, or plant. May each day be full of hours flowing by, like the feathers of a peacock—in delight and bliss.
21. I give you the invisible secret of the universe — cords of light tying it all together, sand, stars and waves, tree roots and clouds. The warm softness of the nose of a puppy or a baby kitten—would you like dogs or cats? And a myriad of happy eyes, looking at you with the warmth of affection — all one, all one, all one. 22. I give you the gift of compassion, the hazel light shining inside. Close your eyes —you will see it in silence —you will hear it in your heart’s gentle whisper of love, nothing else, only love.
23. So, I wish you the gift of un-feathered flight, the treasures of night sky, diamonds scattered on the water by sunlight as you swim in the lake. The pearls of what, exactly? You go figure out your pearls, get together your plan for your life and own it. Don’t forget where you came from and why — to link, connect, span the globe and shine, yes, just to shine. May the beautiful luster of your un-excelled essence be known to all. See, I just read the story of Buddha and I’m writing like one, already – with millions of suns, dazzling star crowns, constant bliss, serenity, supreme joy, and the lotus of wisdom dissolving into clear light.
24. If you are an artist at heart, make a living, be grateful for your gifts,and give back in kind.
If you are an engineer, invent things to help people,or animals, or plants, or to heal the water and air.
Make them happy, hear their song — that’s what we want most of all, to be happy, to love, to be loved. When you choose, choose wisely and follow your heart, always follow your heart.
Since boys love machines, I thought I'd add to this tribute to the newborn a humorous short story that's a life lesson in old computer language. I find it amusing and accurate - this is what we all have to do:
Install LOVE on the HUMAN Computer
by Author Unknown
Customer: I really need some help. After much consideration, I've decided to install LOVE. Can you guide me through the process? Tech Support: Yes, I can help you. Are you ready to proceed?
Customer: Well, I'm not very technical, but I think I'm ready to install it now. What do I do? Tech Support: The first step is to open your HEART. Have you located your HEART? Customer: Yes, I have, but there are several other programs running right now. Is it okay to install while they are running? Tech Support: What programs are running?
Customer: Let's see... I have PAST-HURT.EXE, LOW-ESTEEM.EXE, GRUDGE.EXE, and RESENTMENT.EXE running now.
Tech Support: No problem. LOVE will gradually erase PAST-HURT.EXE from your current operating system. It may remain in your permanent memory, but it will no longer disrupt other programs. LOVE will eventually overwrite LOW-ESTEEM.EXE with a module of its own called HIGH-ESTEEM.EXE. However, you have to completely turn off GRUDGE.EXE and RESENTMENT.EXE. Those programs prevent LOVE from being properly installed. Can you turn those off?
Customer: I don't know how to turn them off. Can you tell me how? Tech Support: My pleasure. Go to your Start menu and invoke FORGIVENESS.EXE. Do this as many times as necessary until it's erased the programs you don't want.
Customer: Okay, now LOVE has started installing itself automatically. Is that normal? Tech Support: Yes. You should receive a message that says it will stay installed for the life of your HEART. Do you see that message?
Customer: Yes, I do. Is it completely installed? Tech Support: Yes, but remember that you have only the base program. You need to begin connecting to other HEARTs in order to get the upgrades.
Customer: Oops. I have an error message already. What should I do? Tech Support: What does the message say?
Customer: It says, "ERROR 412-PROGRAM NOT RUN ON INTERNAL COMPONENTS." What does that mean? Tech Support: Don't worry, that's a common problem. It means that the LOVE program is set up to run on external HEARTs but has not yet been run on your HEART. It is one of those complicated programming things, but in non-technical terms it means you have to "LOVE" your own machine before it can "LOVE" others.
Customer: So what should I do? Tech Support: Can you pull down the directory called "SELF-ACCEPTANCE"?
Customer: Yes, I have it.
Tech Support: Excellent. You're getting good at this. Now, click on the following files and then copy them to the "MYHEART" directory: FORGIVE-SELF.DOC, REALIZE-WORTH.TXT, and ACKNOWLEDGE-LIMITATIONS.DOC. The system will overwrite any conflicting files and begin patching any faulty programming. Also, you need to delete SELF-CRITICISM.EXE from all directories, and then empty your recycle bin afterwards to make sure it is completely gone and never comes back.
Customer: Got it. Hey! My HEART is filling up with new files. SMILE.MP3 is playing on my monitor right now and it shows that PEACE.EXE, and CONTENTMENT.EXE are copying themselves all over my HEART. Is this normal?
Tech Support: Sometimes. For others it takes a while, but eventually everything gets downloaded at the proper time. So, LOVE is installed and running. You should be able to handle it from here. Ah, one more thing.
Customer: Yes?
Tech Support: LOVE is freeware. Be sure to give it and its various modules to everybody you meet. They will in turn share it with other people and they will return some similarly cool modules back to you. Customer: I will! Thanks for your help!
Self-portrait with Leonardo at the Louvre, November 23, 2015.
And they said, aren't you afraid to go? To Paris? Now? After the explosions? Bloodied bodies in the streets? For Thanksgiving? This is how we show we are not afraid, we will not let them win, whoever they are, these men with guns, tall, strong-muscled men without love, with guns, always more guns. But I sought something else, something to be thankful for. The Louvre was there, waiting.
Oh, how we long
for the tender arms of mother -
safe touch of azure
And there is more, that other half smile of John the Baptist. Leonardo's mysterious twin.
look at the clouds
don't get distracted by things below
he says, pointing at the sky
Today, I'm thankful for paintings. Leonardo in black and blue made my day. And so did that flustered angel, excitedly bomb-diving the Blessed Virgin with the good news, hers and ours, the real Good News: Peace be with you. God lives in your heart. Look how surprised she is, how unprepared. Aren't we all? To know that there is only love, only One Love that links us, sentient beings, from the bee to the bison, from dolphin to the duck, with the cruel, violent humans hiding somewhere in-between? When will we feel that all human beings are part of us; that all trees grow our roots, all skylarks sing our songs?
Yes, I did see long guns in Paris. Groups of four or five soldiers in camouflage fatigues, walking along the umbrella lines waiting to get inside the Notre Dame Cathedral. Why did we stand for over an hour in the cold?
umbrellas blossom
on the cathedral square
without gunshots
Maybe to hear the bells ringing at noon, and, again at one o'clock.
a new hour -
cathedral bells are ringing
under clouded skies
The Cathedral waves of song bounce off the cobblestones spill on the rooftops stay still, watch shadows fle the bronze majesty of bells morning brightness rises in the rhythm of the ocean, caressing ancient mounds of cooled off lava at the edge of the dying world inside the rib-cage of a cathedral we learn to breathe in the beached whale of a building the city’s beating heart
(C) Maja Trochimczyk, October 19, 2013
Yes, I'm thankful for the cathedral. For the artisans who made its rosettes and stained glass windows,
I also thank the carpenters who built the walls of the Auberge des Deux Ponts near the Bibliotheque Polonaise on Ille de France, just around the corner from the Notre Dame. What a perfect, simple, elegant, place. With ten tables for two, and a harmony of sights and tastes.
I count my blessings when I walk around in the rain. It is such a pleasure to take in the sights, the sounds. The wind and the wings of seagulls gathering above an old lady who came to feed the swans on the shore of the Seine. The whole aviary showed up, uninvited, and started their pithy battles for the crumbs. I'm touched by the sight of the swans, and the one, oversized ugly duckling swimming nearby.
Yes, I'm grateful for the bread, the lady, and the swans. The violinist and artist Wanda Sobieska made hand-drawn illustrations for a new version of the Ugly Duckling, composed by Ken Woods and recorded by his ensemble. It took them two years to write a ten-minute tale. Was this time well spent? Of course.
grey feathers fly
the gang pecks and screeches
poor ugly duckling
But that turmoil was before the swan was aware who he really was: the majestic, glorious bird, of grace and beauty. A case of mistaken identity. Don't we all suffer from it sometimes? At all times? Do we know what are we here for? The contours of our lives outlined by heartbeats? The invisible links of affection? Shortcuts through time into the ever present, ever brilliant now? Are we thankful?
What are we thankful for?
Today, I'm grateful for music. My travel to Paris is for a reunion of scholars, connected by an unlikely subject of a pianist-composer long gone, Maria Szymanowska died in 1831, why are we still talking about her? What is there in the life, in the music of this lovely, elegant lady, the Court Pianist to the Tsarina, that could possibly matter to us today? Aren't we thankful for when we listen to Szymanowska's Romances sung by Elisabeth Zapolska and played by Bart van Oort on an antique Aloysius Graff fortepiano from 1820s? One of seven such instruments in the world... It has five pedals, can sound muted, distant, or jangling, percussive, or resonant and boisterous. Who knew so many colors could hide in a box of precious wood and metal? Hats off to those who made and restored this ancient beauty... Hats off to Elisabeth whose enthusiasm and warmth inspired so many...
Bart van Oort and Elizabeth Zapolska perform Maria Szymanowska. November 24, 2015.
Today, I'm grateful for libraries. We would not know who we are, where we came from, who was here before us, what they thought, what they did, what they left for us to find, if not for the nameless armies of librarians, archivists, custodians of our past, and ushers of the future. The Czartoryski family of aristocrats in Poland, and their Home Library of letters and notes that helps us understand the emotions felt by lonely mothers two hundred years ago. The countless, nameless servants of truth, who made sure that these paper gifts survived until today (and are now in Krakow). The Great Emigration exiles in Paris that started the Bibliotheque Polonaise in 1830s, among them the son of Adam Mickiewicz, grandson of Maria Szymanowska, who kept Grandma's papers, jewels and even her satin slippers....
Maja Trochimczyk with Eva Davos-Talma and Prof. Irena Poniatowska, iFrancja.fr.
And let me thank the librarians: Ewa Rutkowska who guards the Mickiewicz manuscripts and Magdalena Glodek who oversees the rare prints and books. Thanks to them I could make my small discoveries, making order out of chaos. I identified a romance by a forgotten woman, Franciszka Kochanowska, found her death date and her family, and doubled the size of her known oeuvre, from one to two songs!!! Hurray!!! The first notice of this rare find was given at the 3e Maria Szymanowska Colloque held at the Polish Academy of Sciences in Paris, with Prof. Irena Poniatowska, my mentor, in attendance.
A page from Maria Szymanowska's Album, Manuscript No. 970,
Bibliotheque Polonaise, Paris.
Soo, I'm grateful for books. The ones written and lovingly preserved, and the ones I'm going to write and publish. One of my favorite books of all times is a set of illuminations of Dante's Divine Commedy by Giovanni di Paolo, way better than the 19th century dark imagery of weird angels and demons. Giovanni paints huge golden suns, the dazzling brilliance of Primum Mobile with real gold.
A revelation and a delight. Coupled with my favorite pomegranates from my tree: a treat for this Thanksgiving!
A Revelation After Il Paradiso
We live in the third sphere
of lovers, in the Earth’s long shadow
Our love waxes and wanes
like the Moon, or Venus rising up
before dawn, the star of the morning
We oscillate from darkness to brilliance,
float from fear into sunlight
to rest on a golden afternoon
in the innocent warmth of affection
among newly planted roses
Imperial, Electric, Compassion
Double Delight and Simplicity roses
in our garden where we trim dried, twisted
branches of old oleanders to make room
for orange blossoms and more pomegranate
always more pomegranate
never enough pomegranate
Dark red translucent juice stains our fingers
Tart juice bursts with flavor
in our mouths, ready for kisses
always ready for more kisses
softest, childlike, strongest, tasting
like the wine we never tasted, the dream
we never even hoped to dream about
escaping the long shadow
of the Earth on a golden afternoon
lovers in the Garden of Love
afternoon in the Third Sphere of Venus
golden, golden, sparkling golden
afternoon on another planet
(c) Maja Trochimczyk, October 2015
Finally, and always, I'm thankful for those who love me, my children, my family, my friends.
Maja, Marcin, Agnieszka, Ian, Anna, May 3, 2015
Among them, there is the talented poet and visionary mystic of deep insights, Ambika Talwar who posted a beautiful note on Facebook... Yes, this is what FB is good for:
Thanksgiving Post from Ambika Talwar Hello Everyone ~ I am here in ND remembering and counting my blessings, my lessons, the gifts from many of you through rough and gentle times. For this I am most grateful. I am remembering my ability to serve and those willing to receive. For this I am most grateful. I am remembering the diverse possibilities arising for our futures that so many of you have shared and I long to learn more ways by which our potential may be realised. For this I am most grateful. I am remembering how utterly alone one can be in this vast world and how someone remembers or shows up to remind you we are not. For this I am grateful. I am remembering my many homes while I sit here in my parents' living room making sense of all our ways and vagrancies, whose lessons are not always easy. For this I must be grateful for those above and those actions unmentioned. And mostly, I am remembering the life of my beloved father and his many sensitivities, sensibilities, and wisdoms - his delighting ways, his challenging ways, his capacities to know and to understand and to love despite our profound differences. To remember and to cherish all this is my deepest privilege now, knowing that this is what will carry me forth wherever I am to now step and claim as mine. I am grateful for my kith and kin, my friends, my most delightful nieces and nephews, the birds and bees, horses.. all sentient beings, all life. I pray I find my new way and am fulfilled in ways not imagined before. And I wish this for each of you, for all of you. With all my love ~ Ambika Talwar
Lois P. Jones, Maja Trochimczyk and Ambika Talwar, Photo by Susan Rogers.
Santa Monica's Rapp Saloon, October 2015
Isn't it a beautiful greeting? From the mind and the heart?
