BACK IN A JIF

Photo by S. Auberle

Except for the point,

the still point,

there would be no dance,

and there is only the dance."

- T. S. Eliot

Off the blogwaves for ten days...

See you in October...

- mimi

EQUINOX

Photo by S. Auberle

aspen leaves

in morning light

giving birth

to yellow

-mimi

DEERNESS

Photo by S. Auberle

"Last evening, when the moon was rising, saw the warm, burning soft red of a doe in the field. It was still light enough, so I got the field glasses and watched her. Presently, a stag came out, then I saw a second doe, then, briefly, another stag. They were not afraid. Looked at me from time to time. I watched their beautiful running, grazing. Everything, every movement, was completely lovely, but there is a kind of gaucheness about them sometimes that makes them even lovelier. The thing that struck me most: one sees, looking at them directly in movement, just what the cave painters saw--something I've never seen in a photograph. It is an awe-inspiring thing--the Mantu or "spirit" shown in the running of the deer, the "deerness" that sums up everything and is saved and marvelous."

- Thomas Merton

Daily Meditations from His Journals

BORN AGAIN

Photo by S. Auberle

"Poets are born old;

with the passing of the years

we make ourselves into children."

- Humberto Ak'Abal

BE WHO YOU ARE

Seattle Public Library - S. Auberle

"Be who you are

and say what you feel,

because those who mind

don't matter

and those who matter

don't mind."

The above quote comes to you courtesy of Dr. Seuss and Emily Rose, a fine Chicago poet and acquaintance. She may be reached at her website:

http://www.myspace.com/emilyroseks

HARVEST

Digital Photo-Painting by S. Auberle

spring's sweet blossoms gone

all that was promised fulfilled

cherish what remains

-mimi

RAINY DAY ON I-40

Photo by S. Auberle

Home again, and now:

"Until something transcendent turns up

I splash in my poetry puddle

and try to keep God amused."

- James Broughton

YET AGAIN

Photo by S. Auberle

As my man Willie Nelson says, On the Road Again...

Heading back to the Southwest---in Abilene, Kansas tonight.

Four states today--Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska and Kansas, the Sunflower state.

Astonished, as always, by beauty:

the great fields of sunflowers,

the golden light of autumn shining on horses

and pumpkins and old, abandoned homesteads,

the road, always the open road...

"For man's half dream;

man, you might say,

is nature dreaming..."

- Robinson Jeffers

DRAGONFLY DAYS

Photo by S. Auberle

DRAGONFLY DAYS

I love these glittery-winged days

of early autumn,

the bejeweled dragonflies

that sometimes grace my hand.

I love the lake's ripening scent

of marsh reeds and mud

the egrets--and the kingfisher

twirling over the lake.

I could worship, I think,

this stern god carved long ago

in the dead tree snag

and if he might speak

I would wish him to say:

do not come to this place

unless

you are prepared

to do nothing

but breathe...

- mimi

TWO THINGS

Photo by S. Auberle

Two things to make you crazy:

1) Summer's over...

2) This, from a book I'm reading:

"The following sentence is false."

"The preceding sentence is true."

- Godel, Escher, Bach:

an Eternal Golden Braid

-Douglas R. Hofstadter

EPITAPH

Photo by S. Auberle

EPITAPH FOR LUCIANO

Annie, my ninety-two year old friend,

calls today to tell me she is sad:

Pavarotti died, she says,

I heard him sing, once, at the Lyric

and nearly collapsed...

What better epitaph

could one hope for--we--who write

and paint, dance, make music,

grapple with our small creations

in the shadow of giants like him?

The pure notes of Nessum Dorma

float out my back door

as I water a fledgling rowan tree

struggling to hold on in this dry season.

No more dazzling berries

adorn the great parent tree,

another of its limbs has died this year.

It hurts to think of taking it down

but I would leave the massive trunk

standing, rooted among stones,

so as not to forget--ever--its grace,

its abundant giving,

the towering, gentle strength.

- mimi

POETRY IN MOTION

Photo by S. Auberle

So often I'm asked what is poetry? How do you define it? This may be the best definition I've come across so far:

"...poetry is somebody standing up, so to speak, and saying, with as little concealment as possible, what it is for him or her to be on earth at this moment."

-Galway Kinnell

SEPTEMBER MORNING

Photo by S. Auberle

September morning

autumn on the wing...so soon

all this golden light

-mimi