Thaw

So much glittering ice this winter. The stairs, the brick walk, and the steep driveway are all treacherous runways leading to slapstick crash landings. Especially in the dark. Today: thaw at last. Just saying February sounds warmer. (Parallel mood thaw?)

Here are several selected lines plucked (not in order, sorry -- just wanted that first one first) from Polish poet Wislawa Szymborska's poem "Under a Certain Little Star," translated by Magnus J. Krynski and Robert A. Maguire:

Pardon me, hounded hope, for laughing now and again.

Let happiness be not angry that I take it as my own.

I apologize to time for the muchness of the world / overlooked per second.

I apologize to the cut-down trees for the table's four legs.

I apologize to the big questions for small answers.

This piece appeared in The Poetry of Our World: An International Anthology of Contemporary Poetry, edited by Jeffery Paine with Kwame Anthony Appiah, Sven Birkerts, Joseph Brodsky, Carolyn Forche, and Helen Vendley. (Harper Collins Publishers, 2000)

The photos were taken yesterday, right here inside my own personal ice. Thanks to Thea for the miniature creatures. They make me laugh.

The Miniaturist

Sitting here finishing my Chicken Marsala, I just remembered that I had a poem, "The Miniaturist," that would be so fitting to post on this cold and blustery November night. Then I realized that I also had new photos that I took at a strange little doll museum in Vermont. Synthesis.

THE MINIATURIST

Here, in his cellar workshop,
a human sneeze could topple a world.
He confines his vision to the rooms
of the red and blue dollhouse.
Within a cone of golden light,
his hands are steady,
everything perfectly focused.
He balances a poppy seed bead of glue
on the tip of a toothpick,
attaches fringe to a rug
sewn from a scrap of his robe.
For his silent family,
he snips the hair from his head,
paints their eyes and smiling lips
with a single-bristle brush.

At dusk he lights the tiny lamps
and dreams himself inside.
Admit it, you're in there, too --
feet propped on the tapestry footstool,
hands clasped behind your neck.
An Afghan the size of a stamp
cozily rests across your lap.
You've turned your back to the missing wall,
to November's early darkness.
A bulb is ablaze
in the miniature fireplace,
its orange glow mistakable for warmth.

-- Christine Boyka Kluge
From Teaching Bones to Fly (2003)
Bitter Oleander Press

The poem was first published in Tar River Poetry, then in Teaching Bones to Fly. The photograph was taken 11/6/08. For more on things miniature, see the June 30th post entitled "The Poetics of Space," complete with a photo of a dollhouse doll. To enlarge the photos, just click on the images.

The Stardress and the Fiery Head

As a child reading Grimm’s Fairy Tales, an unsettling feeling of both enchantment and horror would possess me. Elements of impossible beauty and thrillingly happy endings alternated with pure evil and terrifying examples of revenge and torture. Rereading some of these classic stories as an adult, I have the same lurching physical reactions: teeth and stomach clenched at the description of monstrous creatures, then the wild sigh of satisfaction at the escape of a victim or the wedding of a perfectly, magically matched couple.

Who wouldn’t love it when a poor, beautiful stepdaughter, given cruel, impossible tasks by her evil stepmother -- such as emptying a pond using a spoon with holes in it -- is visited by a benevolent old woman who not only empties the pond for her, but builds her a magic castle? In “The True Bride,” the young woman even got to wear a “stardress which sparkled at every step she took.” And that ending! “The horses hurried away to the magic castle as if the wind had been harnessed to the carriage. The illuminated windows already shone in the distance. When they drove past the lime tree, countless glow-worms were swarming about it. It shook its branches, and sent forth their fragrance. On the long steps flowers were blooming, and the rooms echoed with the song of strange birds….” I can quietly drift right into that harmonious scene, even now. I’m there among the blossoms, birdsong, and flickering phosphorescence.

By contrast, what a harsh lesson for the child reading “The Old Witch,” where a little girl, one “who was very obstinate and willful,” (uh-oh) took off on an adventure, against her parents’ wishes, to visit the old woman with “many marvelous things in her house.” You knew something incredibly ugly was about to take place. The silly girl admitted to the woman that she had peeped through the window and saw not a woman, but “a creature with a fiery head.” And yet she stayed. The witch said she had “long waited” for the girl, and “now you shall give me light.” She turned the girl into a block of wood, threw it into the fire, then sat on the hearth, warming herself. She said, “Ah, now for once it burns brightly!” Creepy. See what happens when you don’t obey?

In “The White Snake,” a king had incredible wisdom, “as if knowledge of hidden things was brought to him in the air.” Actually, he was getting it from a secret covered dish he received after every dinner, once he was alone. After a while, the curious servant who brought the king this dish finally stole a look inside, only to discover – of course! – a white snake. (I know.) The servant “could not resist the desire to taste it, and so he cut off a small piece and put it in his mouth.” Okay, that’s going a bit too far. Even if he could then hear “the sparrows talking together” about everything they’ve seen in the world. He now had the “power to understand the speech of animals.” From that point on, the tale goes wild, filled with ravens, an ant-king, and an apple from the tree of life.

Some of the stories were surreal, seemingly just odd lists of bizarre happenings. For instance, in “The Ditmarsch Tale of Wonders,” the narrator saw “two roasted fowls flying” with “their breasts turned to Heaven and their backs to Hell.” “An anvil and a mill-stone swam across the Rhine prettily, slowly and gently.” And, naturally, “in that country the flies are as big as the goats are here.” You had to love the sense of play, the carnival mirror worlds of experimentation.

When my children were small, I used to make up stories to tell them, evolving tales of fantasy created on the spot. I remember being surprised – and secretly thrilled – when my older daughter began to state her unvarying request for the type of story she wanted told: “Make it sad or bad or mean.” Still a toddler, she knew what elements guaranteed interest. (No, no, I didn’t tell them Grimm-like tales of violence and gore.)

Looking at Grimm’s Fairy Tales as an adult, I’m surprised by how frightening and grotesque some of the stories are. (It’s like the shock of watching the old Disney film version of “Snow White” with your children. That witch!) Maybe I was somewhat traumatized by Grimm’s Fairy Tales in my childhood, but the works were unforgettable; they widened my imagination. I certainly gathered vivid images and a love for the magical, for wild fantasy. It was scary and wonderful reading. Even just the story titles in the collection had such strange, dark allure: “The Devil’s Sooty Brother,” “The Devil’s Three Gold Hairs,” “The Glass Coffin,” “The Three Snake-Leaves,” “The Flail from Heaven,” “The Poor Boy in the Grave,” and “The Spirit in the Bottle.” What child could resist? What adult can resist? Just lift the lid of that secret, gleaming, covered dish….

The photograph was taken in my living room on 7/6/08. The mask was a gift from my younger brother.

The Poetics of Space

By a forgotten, meandering path through the Web, I arrived at a quote from The Poetics of Space, by Gaston Bachelard, the French philosopher. It’s strange that I no longer remember this specific passage, because I was electrified by his words. I immediately ordered a copy of the book, which has proved to be a thrilling and enlightening read. I haven’t been reading this book in sequence. Instead, I open it at random, read a page or two, then shut the book and blink in awe. I need to replay the language, the observations and brilliant insights. I am slowly letting the words quench a thirst I didn’t know I had. I seem to siphon such large, rich drafts with my small sips. Bachelard’s wisdom expands inside my mind, flooding the recesses with something effervescent. I can feel my brain, buoyant, shifting to rebalance. Then I reopen the book, almost holding my breath in anticipation of sampling more revelatory lines. I can tell that I’m almost done with the book, because it’s almost entirely filled with Post-Its.

Some of the chapter titles will give you an idea of Bachelard’s creative style of thinking: “Intimate Immensity,” “Miniature,” “House and Universe,” “The Dialectics of Outside and Inside,” and “The Phenomenology of Roundness.” I was immediately absorbed by “Miniature,” since I love all things minuscule. (In my family, we share a hereditary condition my aunt refers to as tinyitis.) In my own poetry and hybrid writing, I can find myself entering the smallest possible worlds, sometimes shrinking to observe my surroundings. To me, details open expansive worlds. They are beautiful in themselves, but that pointed focus, that scratching at the surface, provides a door into a deeper, wider place. Just like the door of the poem opens elsewhere.

In discovering Bachelard, I was quite taken by reading essays that could describe my personal writing experiences, my observations about poetry. (He values poetry so highly that it seems to validate my calling.) He says “…the minuscule, a narrow gate, opens up an entire world. The details of a thing can be the sign of a new world, which like all worlds, contains the attributes of greatness.” “Miniature is one of the refuges of greatness.” He states that the “man with the magnifying glass – quite simply – bars the every-day world. He is a fresh eye before a new object. The botanist’s magnifying glass is youth recaptured. It gives him back the enlarging gaze of a child.” (Do you remember Horton Hears a Who, by Dr. Seuss? Long ago I loved that children’s book, where a whole other complex world existed on a speck of dust.)

Today I was again wandering about in the “Miniature” chapter, when I came across Bachelard’s discussion of a “prose-poem” by Andre Pieyre de Mandiargues, “The egg in the landscape.” (That title.) The excerpt from this piece felt wildly familiar to me. It describes looking through a flaw in a window, “one of these kernels that are like cysts in the glass, at times transparent little knucklebones, but more often, befogged or very vaguely translucent, and so long in shape that they make you think of the pupils of a cat’s eyes.” The “introduction of the nucleus into the landscape sufficed to make it look limp…Walls, rocks, tree-trunks, metal constructions, lost all rigidity in the area surrounding the mobile nucleus.” “The outside world in its entirety, is transformed into a milieu as malleable as could be desired, by the presence of this single, hard, piercing object, this veritable philosophical ovum which the slightest twitch of my face sets moving all through space.”

Bachelard adds to this: “every universe is concentrated in a nucleus, a spore, a dynamized center. And this center is powerful, because it is an imagined center.” “…we see the center that imagines; then we can read the landscape in the glass nucleus. We no longer look at it while looking through it. This nucleizing nucleus is a world in itself. The miniature deploys to the dimensions of a universe. Once more, large is contained in small.”

This struck me, not just because it’s a truth I also feel, but because I’ve recently been taking pictures using wavy, bubbled glass to create distorted worlds, hopefully creating an atmosphere of disorientation and surprise, and finding a little magic by peering in through those “glass nuclei.” I also like to imagine the dolls/people, looking back out, observing both their own world and the larger “real” world through those clear but warping lenses. Creating these miniature scenes, experimenting with light and reflections and atmosphere, are wonderful forms of play and discovery. It seems I always end up taking a picture of something different than what I first imagined. Led by the original inspiration, I let the idea evolve, taking its own mysterious course. (Additional meandering.) In turn, the photograph ends up telling me a new story, opening other doors, inviting poetry inside. This afternoon, energized again by reading Bachelard and the excerpts from de Mandiargues, I got out my camera and took some more photos using glass. The above picture is one of the results of the same continuing experiment.

Gaston Bachelard (1884-1962) inhabited a different era, lived in a different country, and wrote in a different language. Even so, I feel a kinship bridging time and translation.

The Poetics of Space was originally published in French in 1958 by Presses Universitaires de France. The Orion Press, Inc. published the English version, translated by Maria Jolas, in 1964. Beacon Press published it in 1969, then added a foreword by John R. Stilgoe in 1994.

The above photo was taken this afternoon, 6/30/08. Click on image to enlarge. I posted two earlier watery-glass-world photos on the blog on May 7th and June 3rd, parts of which were later used on Mental Contagion, along with a few prose poems from Stirring the Mirror. You can view the previous blog posts by clicking on "Older Posts" at the bottom of the page and scrolling back in time.

Turquoise Galaxy

I received an e-mail from John Glick of Plum Tree Pottery following the post about the "Glorious Cabinet of Perfect Order and Beauty." (Two of his fantastic ceramic vessels are proudly displayed in said cabinet.) He attached photos of an exciting new project he is working on. His accompanying note resonates with my own perspective concerning the creation of art:

"I will include one full view and several amazing little universes that seem to be rich in visual color poetry and possibly a grace that comes only in the unguarded moments we have when playfulness has a tag game with good luck and experience."

I'd agree. That is the joy and surprise and discovery all artists savor.

Thrillingly, John told me he was going to mail me a "bit," a sample from this new work. Imagine the fun of receiving a small package containing a beautiful tile alive with swirls and clouds and gorgeous splotches. Something both earthy and celestial -- a turquoise galaxy unreeling over a field of rich brown. I took its picture; a partial portrait glows above. I have never met John, have only admired his art. What generosity of spirit. I will reciprocate with something poetic.

John suggested using a loupe for viewing the details in the glaze. I am obsessed with all things miniature, so can only imagine what tiny worlds might blossom when magnified. Also, picture using the loupe to view fiddlehead ferns, fabric, the angel wing begonia leaves....

Here's where John suggested finding an inexpensive loupe: Calumet Photographic.

(To see "The Glorious Cabinet..." post, scroll down to the 5/2/08 entry. For parallel comments on the "grace" of creative expression, on art and writing, see the 10/22/07 "Space Doll" post. Just click on "Older Posts" at the bottom of this page and scroll back in time.)

Click on photo to enlarge.