AFTER THE QUAKE

AFTER THE QUAKE


Galloping off after sunsets
like the errant earth
seeking a friend to play with,
I shiver & shake.
wanting to know if its true or false
this quaking inside—
Now we are immobile like the earth.
It takes the shifting of tectonic plates
to move us out of old patterns.
Destruction before growth
becomes evident
after the fact.



1/20/94 Santa Rosa

ON WRITING

True, in reclaiming the poetic word

we need to look no farther

than our own gaping maws.

The jaguar lost his spots in the darkness of sleep,

killer whales danced with the tuxedo of death,

and penguins, first cousins to nuns

and the stripes of the zebra,

imprisoned in the crosswalks of disorderly conduct.

Beneath my pen, small dark blossoms

begin to bloom on the blank page.

1/20/94

NAMES OF POETRY MAGAZINES

I NEVER GOT AROUND TO:

IN: VOICE

RE: VISION

PARA; GRAPH

META:  4

NO THINKING ALOUD

OVERTURE: COLLAGE NOCTURNES

                                    from Elemental Portraits: Nocturnes for Two Pianos,

                                    composed by Kirk Whipple

The beginning and the end of night—

from sunset to sunrise—

is a concentration of songlines to whet the palate:

jazz notes defining the quality of the forest,

a velvet refugee dressed in marimba patterns,

escaped blue notes outside the key.

Not technical études, but the theater

of neon rain in concentric ripples.

Where does night's vagary begin and end?

We seek the piano score for modern landscapes,

not a dreamy ideal of romantic music.

As if out of oscuridad, a sacred text

finds the first phrases of the moon.

The vibration of human existence resonates

in the music walking us out of ourselves,

the thighbones reminding us

of the steps taken: syllables of the air.

The melody lingers deep inside

long after the overture of the dream ends.

The nocturnal eye of the nightingale

waits for further instructions

from the coda:

                        an endless stranger

                        inside the depths of night.

THE SUN DREAMS IN THICK ROPES

THE SUN DREAMS IN THICK ROPES

In the false warmth of mid-winter

the firebox hisses & snaps—wet bay logs singing

to the ever-present odor of woodsmoke and soot-covered walls.

Last rainstorm the roof leaked,

the ceiling lamp became a bowl of blue light

beautiful as the sky, but colder

like the jewels I found in sleep.

I want to open the front door,

last night’s dream unleashed the lions,

the door won’t close.

With her back to the stove, she sits, reading the paper,

her white hair in random waves.

We have no words for the solitude of morning

or the repetitive spoon against the coffee mug.

The sink purps, an isolated drop of water catches

the room reflected upside-down.

I am groveling on the floor—

acute angles of wall and ceiling never squared.

I think of my mother off in the city;

how I love her so much it hurts

it takes me longer to recognize

my grandmother’s love,

the endurance of woodsmoke,

and childhood to carry me

through this morning

to where the unnamed father

is also a part of the equation of loss.

It takes me 40 years to recognize

that in the layering of years,

unbidden tears need an outlet

like water seeking its own level.

Precious water lost

during the drought years can never be replaced.

Ordinary loss prepares us for what is ordinary.

What sustains us is memory, something more profound

than the weight of time to hold us down,

the repetition of days carries us

into the uncertain present.

The regret, remorse—hard edges of words

cut us to the quick like a stubbed toe,

the pain made larger than life

because of the incipient cold

holding us back this winter morning.

1/16/94   Bishop Ranch, Healdsburg

I think these were from a CPITS AC retreat not Elderhostel

IS IT TRUE OR FALSE

IS IT TRUE OR FALSE

I believed stories that the world was flat,

that it ended at the fence line, 

though I could see beyond it.

It is clearly an illusion, something to do with faith

and the shifting boundaries of the adult world.

She forgot yesterday’s milk

and it expanded, little paper lids perched caps

on the frozen necks of the bottles.

I only needed some sugar and to beat the cats to the cream.

The milkbox made a perfect stool to observe the known world,

the western hills ringed in fog—

milk separating the mystery from the field.

It’s true that dragons lived beyond the known world.

That the snake across the road was as big as a tree limb.

That the pale ghosts of fallen trees in the arroyo

were seen to move at dusk from the corners of the eye.

That no one believed in my ghosts who writhed at dusk;

I speculated they were bodies asleep in the leaf mold—

True or false: fiery centipedes glowed like phosphor on rotten logs,

and stung me in my sleep. That I really was an abandoned child.

Once ants really ran up my pants and I left them, screaming.

Once I thought gopher mounds were powdered chocolate,

my mother’s glass tubes of oil paints in the closet, vanilla ice cream.

I was afraid of the veins in chicken legs at Sunday dinners.

Is it true I didn’t understand the meaning of loss or beauty

and otherwise abstract notions until after the fact?

Maybe I dropped out of kindergarten because of the snake.

The chain across the road kept out the known world.

Was it true that living beyond the county-maintained road

meant we were invisible, untouchable in our poverty?

I remember the wealth of red earth and bay trees against summer sky.

Any car coming this far meant visitors, a break in routine,

A car weaving its way up the valley might be my mother.

Or another false alarm. The word “father” was a vacancy with no name.

Is it true or false that the shrapnel of memory is invisible or sharp

as the unspoken words that continue to survive us?

Or that in the darkness beneath my bed they waited

all these years to grab my ankles after all?

1/16/94  Bishop’s Ranch, Healdsburg 

I think this was from an Elderhostel class I taught there

AT THE READY

AT THE READY

                                    —for William Stafford, (     - 1993)

Poetry will always be a wild animal. . .

that won’t yield to ordinary learning.

I tell students to let their minds lean

forward and fill in the missing words

to reclaim the self, the poetic soul

lost in Dante’s inferno.

Descend into writing to reclaim the poetic word.

We need no longer discern

between the dreaming and the waking.

Words will unveil the self to the self.

Reality bends itself toward sleep

to emerge as the wingtips of doved hands.

If we are lazy we will never find the way—

The muse only comes to those

who are holding the pen at the ready

for small dark blossoms to bloom on the page.

1/14/94             Bodega Bay

AFTER-SCHOOL /GATE ART CLASSES at the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts

AFTER-SCHOOL /GATE ART CLASSES SAMPLE IDEAS: choose from 4 to15+ sessions

Collage, Painting & Drawing** with Scissors & Pencils:   4 to 8 sessions  With ordinary objects we will explore the medium of drawing, using contour line to enhance our awareness of shapes and edges and train the eye to really see. We will then"draw" with scissors, colored paper, and magazines to create "paintings" built in layers which are both surreal and abstract. Matisse and Magritte will be our models. We will color our own paper with tempra or poster paints, and later make paintings of our collages. We may also explore drawing with colored pencils and oil pastels. If there’s time, we will also experiment with monoprints using poster paint. 

MATERIALS: Colored paper, 80# white suifite drawing paper (18x24”), scissors, gluestix or white glue, soft-lead, colored, and stabilo pencils, water-based and permanent marking pens, oil pastels, poster paints, flat brushes, magazines. **Each art form listed above can be expanded into a full length worhshop.

 *PAINTING—Watercolor & Words:   4 to 8 sessions  Watercolor and the written word will be used to make paintings & graphics that incorporate both poetry & art by reuniting words with drawing, to create self-portraits, posters, & broadsides—visual statements! Students will learn wet and dry techniques, and to mix colors. 

MATERIALS: Crayola 07W, or Prang mixing watercolor sets, brushes, morilla board, 80# white sulfite drawing paper, poster paints and flat brushes, scissors, glue, soft-lead, colored and stabilo pencils, water-based and permanent marking pens, oil pastels, crayons. (Silk painting classes also offered).

 *Masks & Staffs—Making the Mask Speak:   4 to 8 sessions Make several masks from many different mediums—from plaster bandages and paper plates to plastic milk bottles—and then give them character and poetic voice. Learn how native peoples from around the world share this most ancient and modern art form. 

MATERIALS: Tagboard, plastic bottles, sand, cardboard (paper plates, cups, etc.), 80# white sulfite drawing paper, poster paints and flat brushes, sandpaper, plaster, scissors, Elmer’s glue, hot glue guns and refills, pencils, felt, feathers, beads, yarn, goodies to decorate masks. (Please note the added expense: it costs approx. $2.50 to $5 per child to make plaster masks, depending upon the additions.) Students will need to bring decorative goodies, plastic bottles, egg cartons, and special piece of wood for staff. 

ALTERNATE: (1) If there’s time, we’ll explore plastic bottle and found object masks too. Or if school can’t afford bandages, this is a cheaper alternative. (2) Masks & Papier Mache animals. Using glue, aluminum foil, acrylics, masking tape & paper, we’ll sculpt/shape/paint large animals based on Oaxacan folk art.

 *Calligraphy—from Petroglyphs to Parchment:   6+ sessions  Learn the art of beautiful lettering using the Italic alphabet. Trace the origins of our alphabet from petroglyphs to parchment. Invent an alphabet, learn cuneiform, create broadsides and note cards, or just improve your handwriting! MATERIALS: Calligraphy pens, inks, clay, wide-lined binder paper, specialty papers.

*Making & Illustrating One-of-a-Kind Small Books:   4 to 6 sessions  Learn how to make elegant pop-up, accordion, & saddle-stitched books from paper scraps. Become your own publisher & author by combining calligraphy, poetry & art to create rare books. If there’s time, we can marble paper, or make our own paper, (blenders & window screens needed). 

MATERIALS: Tagboard, colored paper, endpaper strips, specialty papers, Elmer’s or Prang clear green glue, scissors, exacto knives, drawing, marking, and calligraphy pens, watercolors, brushes.

Kraft Paper & Wood Sculptures—dwellings:    4 to 6 sessions    Using wood and found objects we will work three-dimensionally. With twigs and paper bags we will make sculptural dwellings. MATERIALS Lots of hot glue guns, wood scraps, twigs, twine, bags, Elmer’s glue, starch. (An alternative idea is to create robots using found objects—styrofoam, L’eggs eggs, spools, etc., or to mix this with a clay component.)

Clay Slab Building & Masks:    4 to 6 sessions   We will explore historical and physical aspects of clay using time-tested building techniques. Students will learn how to build three-dimensional slab sculptures, pinch pots, clay masks, tiles, etc. Ancient techniques include burnishing, staining, texturing & scraffito. 

MATERIALS: Clay, tools, stains, glazes, firing. School will need to fire clay, or Creative Ceramics can fire pieces (added cost). (Not available at this time).

Making the Mural:   8 to 15 sessions A group project where students will learn the mural process from start to finish. A mural is the synthesis of a group vision— a vertical history in images—its origins date back to the first cave paintings. We will turn ideas into a thematic visual statement that goes beyond the image to record a story. 

MATERIALS: Butcher paper, drawing paper, acrylic or poster paints and flat brushes, sponges, masking tape, pencils, water containers, 4x8’ plywood panels* coated with three layers of white latex paint, shellac/sealant.

              

 * These classes can be tailored to incorporate a poetry component as well.

SOME NOTES:  School should supply available materials e.g., colored paper, drawing paper, butcher paper, tempra poster paints, flat brushes, Prang green glue, or Elmer’s glue, hot glue & glue guns, glitter, scissors, crayons, kindergarten pencils, colored marking pens, masking tape, colored tagboard for mounting and for portfolios, storage space for art, supplies and portfolios, (4x8’ plywood panels* perhaps a parent could donate them?) etc. 

Below, I’ve included some general prices for supplies FYI. Feel free to pick and choose which classes to do, as some will be more expensive than others. I’ve listed supplies in order of importance. I need to know how many students, total, to estimate final costs—pens, pastel sets, etc. (a basic rule of thumb is about $2 -5 per child for the 2-dimensional arts). I will need an art (av) cart to wheel supplies to and from storage; flat tables, sinks, paper towels. 

Poster paints are about $30.

         Magenta, turquoise, cobalt blue, yellow, black, white, (& red, optional) and flat brushes

I need to research acrylics/housepaint for murals & papier mache animals.

Colored paper—I will need the full complement of sizes and colors,  & may need to purchase

         more than what you already have. It could be $10 or $40.

I prefer to have 3 large gluestix on hand, or Yes Glue, $9, but can use your glue (no paste glue; it’s awful).

I have #12 and Chinese round brushes and the mixing watercolor sets ($7.50 per)

         the watercolor refill pans will cost $15 to 20 per class. (Turquoise Magenta 2 Yellows Blue Black)

I will need at least one package of Morilla board watercolor paper (50 sheets) about $52.

I can also use 80# white sulfite drawing paper, $35 a ream, for some watercolor.

Good pencils and black chisel-point felt drawing pens are approx. .60 to 1.10 ea.

         I can use kindergarten pencils, but need the felt tip pens.

Calligraphy pens cost $1.40 ea. It’s nice to have a set of colored pens for further experimentation. Wide-line smooth white binder paper! Butcher paper for demonstration.

Oil pastels are $3.50 - 4.50 per student (but 2 can share a set—the cheap sets have no purple!)

Plaster bandage masks are expensive—$55+, but it’s such a fun class.

Hot glue guns & fillers $12 - $20.  Sculpture & mask classes take gobs of hot glue.

Clay $60 - 100 + firing costs

Some of these supplies I already have on hand; but will need to be reimbursed.

Suggestions for classes—as a basis I recommend beginning with:

•     Collage and/or watercolor classes, (these core classes can be easily expanded or shortened (no less than 4 sessions ea.), and augmented with 1 or 2 other classes. In these core classes, I will cover various art terms and techniques which will enhance the other classes. If there’s interest, I also like to work with a thematic structure—it could be based on heritage, environment, science, etc.

•     Calligraphy and small books* go well together. (I can include a little poetry here too.)

•     The length of the mural class depends on the skills of the students. I will need some flexibility here.

•     We will need to discuss various options with the three-dimensional classes—masks, and especially small books*, & sculpture—are labor intensive; an enormous amount of prep—pre & post-class time goes into them (much longer than the classes themselves); it would be best to choose only one of these.

•     By the same token, clay is also very labor intensive (back-breaking). Storage is always a problem, and if school doesn’t have a kiln, it’s not feasable, unless we focus on process only. There is something called Sculptee—but it’s expensive. I’ll have to research it. (Not available at this time).

Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions. You may call me up to 11 p.m. If possible, I would like to meet with you at your earliest convenience, before classes begin, to see the school, supplies, space, etc. I look forward to meeting you and, of course, working with your students! 

FATHER HAIKU

RETIREMENT

the day after his birthday, heartsore—

in the wrinkled sheets, death found him

sleeping in the cloistered darkness of the morgue

weeks later, the electric blanket incubated

a rusted carpet of kleenex blooms

BREAKING THE CORONER’S SEAL

beneath the stained mattress

one blank bullet in the gun—

a drowned halo of light in the waterglass

A DECADE  SINCE I SAW HIM

the embalmer gets his mouth all wrong—

with a red rose on the white satin pillow

I say goodbye to the parent of my Akhmatova nose

TO THE FATHER I NEVER KNEW:

the word rests uneasily on my lips—

suddenly jealous of the young man 

who said, He was like a father to me

FAMILY PLOT

where the dead outnumber the living

our shadows circle the casket clockwise

shards of sunlight & whispering feet

LAST DAY OF THE YEAR

after the funeral

I dream of crawling over pictographs

in the desert to find some rest

THICKER THAN WATER

I dream my father’s candle is out—

the slim, musty book he hands back to me

to prove his blood          and mine

My aunt said: He's trying to pleas you.

 DUTIFUL DAUGHTER

welfare child, never saw him much

his precious money went to a stranger

my final inheritance—other than my life

12/31/93

LAST RIDE (for my cousin Richard Reilly)

LAST RIDE

             In dreams begins responsibility

                —WB Yeats

             for my cousin Richard Reilly

             Dec. 21, 1954 - June 5, 1977

      He loved death more than me

      and so slipped back

      into the bosom of the sea.

The cold rain of memory

cresting each wave of thought—

the half-life of yesterday

approaches the gardens of sleep

takes root, finds the fertile fields

of imagination lonely

for the dream’s embrace.

     They took my new red tricycle

     For his leg, they said; the steel brace,

     a strange, uneasy piston.

I had no reason to face the dawn,

my prince of tides returned to the sea.

My legs ached as I crossed the floor

and though I cried, no fins appeared.

Reality bent itself toward sleep—

     beneath the streetlights’ sodium glare

     patient and unyielding, dark cars

     waiting for the motorcycle’s drone—

Small mermaid, I carried the burden

of that night home to the dream’s final sea.

12/9/93

Poetry Unites the World by Dr. Andrei Bantaş

from
THE REVIEW OF FOREIGN REVIEWS, ROMANIA LITERATURA
5-21 Dec. 1993,
POETRY UNITES THE WORLD
by Dr. Andrei Bantaş

BUCHAREST—From the Pacific Coast, California, there comes to us a cultural surprise and exceptional reading: a poetry magazine—or rather a tabloid review, like our weeklies. It is not a mere publication meant to convey to readers the latest production of American poets (as many other poetry reviews do) but an entirely uncommon one: a sort of Secolul XX (the 20th century) of the Romanians, yet devoted to poetry alone, in order to spread publications which the public has few opportunities to know.

The first issue of Uniting the World Through Poetry (UWP) is devoted to Soviet Poetry Since Glasnost, a 24-page tabloid, with a similar format to our Romania Literatura, is full of translations from Arabov, Slepynin, Lubenski, Soloviov, Kulle and many others—verses written in the last six or seven years.

With the decoration of the journals—or perhaps it’s pop-art—with press clippings, photos, collages, and vignettes, an entire page is devoted to a poem of Oleg Slepynin’s, printed in the shape of a cross, with the title buried in the center: SYNCHRONIC.

Some general data, with a short excursion into history, and with substantial topicalization, are offered in the essay entitled, “A Poet in Russia is more than a Poet” by the Ukrainian poet of Armenian descent, Oleg Atbashian (who, with UWP editor, Maureen Hurley, did most of the translations).

The general presentation of the themes and aims of the review is made by the two UWP editors, Herman Berlandt and Maureen Hurley. Berlandt is chairman of the National Poetry Association, and editor of Poetry: USA, a quarterly, and after more than 30 lectures on this very theme of uniting the world through poetry, he decided to publish these international anthologies with Maureen Hurley (an educator, graphic designer, photographer, and writer, with poems translated into Spanish and Russian.

She is an initiator of an international conference of writers for the 30th anniversary of California Poets in the Schools (CPITS), tenatively scheduled in San Francisco, in October 1994. An earlier CPITS conference, (the 25th) was joined by more than 150 poets from the U.S. and Mexico.)

The second issue of the review is entitled Mother Earth, with the same internationalist motto as the subtitle “Let the voice of the poet be heard throughout the world”. These 24 pages bring together (in translation, or in the English original) the voices of poets from Bulgaria, China, Poland, Hungary, Holland, Macedonia, India, Pakistan, Italy, Israel, Greece, Great Britain, Argentina, Japan, Korea, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Estonia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Serbia, Croatia, Russia, and—surprise—Romania: Geo Dumitrescu (translated by the late Dan Dutescu with post-translation by Maureen Hurley) and Ana Blandiana (translated by Andrea Deletant and Brenda Walker, as well as by Andrei Bantaş, also with Maureen Hurley). They are accompanied by fine engravings by Victor Brauner and a Romanian stamp.

In the third issue—devoted to East European poetry, Romanian poetry (including Valeriu Matei of Moldova) is represented in over three pages by the same Geo Dumitrescu and Ana Blandiana as well as Nichita Stanescu, Maria Banus, Nina Cassian, Daniela Crasnaru, Carolina Ilica, and Mircea Dinescu.

The translators are the same, with the addition of poet Fleur Adcock, the version being reproduced mainly from Silent Voices: an Anthology of Contemporary Romanian Women Poets, published by Brenda Walker and Andrea Deletant in Britain about 5 years ago (when they also published Mircea Dinescu’s Exile on a Peppercorn—their persons and books were proscribed in Romania—but well-received in Bulgaria!)

Highly valuing these new tokens of appreciation offered by foreign publishers and translators of Romanian poetry (I happen to know of the financial efforts made by these two English women and the editors of UWP), I am taking the liberty of asking two rhetorical questions: What are we doing for ourselves and for our poets, for our literature, as a whole?

Suppose I rounded off my anthology of 20th century poets (Like Diamonds in Coal, Asleep, Minerva Publishers, 1985) with poems formerly banned by censorship as well as with those of Romanian poets abroad, who would publish it? (today, tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. . . .?





Note Bene: Dr. Andrei Bantaş, with whom I had the pleasure of corresponding, in order to collect Eastern European Poetry, was the compiler of the Romanian dictionary, an eminent translator and a Professor of English Literature at the University of Bucharest, Romania. I had no idea of his fame as I embarked blindly on this translating adventure. Those Romanian stamps we used in the collages were Andrei's. —Maureen Hurley

Book Party with Marsha Connell, Maureen Hurley, This Body is to Ask at Copperfield's Annex

National Poetry Week poster November, 1993

 I have photos of most of these poets.

Center of the Universe Cafe reading with Maureen Hurley and Herman Berlandt

Copperfields student book party This Body is to Ask

POSTCARDS FROM THE ROAD, REDUX

POSTCARDS FROM THE ROAD, REDUX

Dear Jim,

Wending our way cross-country with laptops, sleeping bags,

evening dresses, broken hearts, hiking boots, Celia & I

managed to find the North Rim in the dark without a map.

Woke to your cowboy coffee, colon-blo, boiled french roast

that threatened to make off with the pot at Jacob Lake

which we never did find. Lake was a man, not a body of water.

Soon as we crossed the Utah border, Lord, how we suffered

from Mormon exposure, twisting our vowels (not bowels).

She insisted the sign at Dry Beaver Creek read

“Keep poets on leash/ or face fine.” We haven’t written a thing,

but could use a two-bit shower & a shave.

Dear Sharon,

We drive along the Virgin River, the towns of Virgin,

and Laverkin by the Cowboy Buttes in Beaver County—

& wonder, what was on those Mormon’s minds.

Celia calls me Mo-reen, says we’re in ’Merika now

but is confused by my speaking in tongues:

the ungulates crossing the road are cantaloupes. 

Oh give me a home…

Can you spell dicks-lexia, bulls and girls?

We’re born again, baptized in the Virgin River

(don’t know as to whether or not it actually took),

I say she baptized us in the wrong place: the difference

between dyslexia and dailysex is merely a perceptual matter.

Where does the the random mind stop and the prairie begin?

Dear Bruce,

Crossing the Sandia Mountains

I kain’t believe how much “Jesus saves” ’round here—

Or how on our 1993 White Trash Tour,

which officially began at the Cadillac Ranch

(a line of caddies planted nose first—car henge)

in Amarillo, Texas, folks take three syllables

(or all day, whatever comes first) to say fish and truck.

The trucks here are God’s personal rollin’ billboards

& the overpasses tell us poor watermelons to believe. 

God is dog; evil is live. Shone’s is one-up from Stuckey’s.

We’ve been on the road too long; Denny’s is beginning to seem like home.

We’re road worriers sinnin’ in the heart of the cholesterol belt,

getting good mileage on bad vowels and day-old puns.

Dear God,

El Reno, the epicenter of radio revival land is a shakin’ & a rollin’

but the cockroaches in the motel bathroom don’t seem very saved.

However, I do believe they will inherit the earth, by and bye.

Blanketed by kudzu vines, black-eyed susans suffer death by bed tax.

We’re humid beans descending into the syntax of the vegetable kingdom.

Like true love, and the blues, maps are abstract unless you’ve been there.

You’d like Hot Springs, home of Bill Clinton haircuts & the Sin Tax.

I bet the Mormons took to that idea. Say, God, who's your best friend?

Lightning storm—we pilgrims cross Old Muddy, enter Memphis,

& truly we have let Tennessee into our hearts, for at the gates

of Graceland, the chosen have come to testify the miracles.

St. Elvis is still King, and anything is possible—this poem, or even love.

9/23/93  Graceland