presence
Morning Trip (81)
“I am dust particles in sunlight.
I am the round sun.
To the bits of dust I say, Stay.
To the sun, Keep moving.
I am morning mist,
and the breathing of evening.
I am wind in the top of a grove,
and surf on the cliff.
Mast, rudder, helmsman, and keel,
I am also the coral reef they founder on.
I am a tree with a trained parrot in its branches.
Silence, thought, and voice.
The musical air coming through a flute,
a spark of a stone, a flickering
in metal. Both candle,
and the moth crazy around it.
Rose, and the nightingale
lost in the fragrance.
I am all orders of being, the circling galaxy,
the evolutionary intelligence, the lift,
and the falling away. What is,
and what isn’t. You who know
Jelaluddin, You the one
in all, say who
I am. Say I
am You.”
–Rumi
Morning Trip (61)
“ 62. [Autumn]1
The yellow forest lies beneath the sun
Quiet, although it suffereth decay
The brooklet to the Ocean-deep does run
With gentle lapse and silent(2) melts away,
The clouds upon the evening sky are bright
But wasting mingle in the glorious light.
So, may my soul in life’s declining hours
Like the still forest never once complain:
And flow unmurmuring, adown its course
Like yonder brooklet to the Eternal Main;
And as the clouds upon the sunset sky
Be mingled with the radiance on high.
–Thomas Cole
1. untitled manuscript,
2. silent/softly”
(My own note. This same poem, punctuated differently, carries a date of 1842. The date is gleened from sequence in his writing books. There is no indication how far apart autumn 1 and autumn 2 are in work nor in writing, by the editor, Marshall B. Tymn.)
One Shoot Sunday and Noticing–Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley
Good Morning! It’s One Shoot Sunday again! The following is quoted to attribute the photographer and the site that supports and encourages The Poetry Challenge of One Shoot Sunday.
“Sunday Photography Interview: Rob Hanson & Poetry Challenge (Part 1)
Rob Hanson is a photographer dedicated to the art of HDR. This North Carolina photographer has moved through a number of mediums over the years, but always with a strong desire to make his images and his work as perfect as possible. Constantly on the lookout for new techniques and technologies to explore, he doesn’t shy away from the uniqueness of the world—he expresses it in his colorful work. Find out more in the first of this two-part interview…
One Shoot Sunday Challenge Time!
"Purple Phase"--by Rob Hanson
Noticing
Smooth sheets caressing naked calves and feet
The soft grunted intake of air
Upon bumping a familiar round belly
A sigh and change of position
To spoon one back into sleep
Hands on breast and thigh
Soft sleep warmed lips brushing fur
Smiling
Relaxing into
Familiarity
Significant non-quickening
Careful languishing sighs
Sheer curtains move
As always they move
In winter
From blowing heat.
A door creaks open
Something wanders in
Stares intently,
Observer of a chrysalis
Eyes rub
Feet flex
Toes wriggle
Sheets move
Feet hit the floor
Born again
Noticing
–by elisabeth connelley
When I am here–Purple Profundity: Poetry by Elisabeth Connelley
When I am here
what part of me do you love
do you fantasize about
without knowing
me
understanding you
smiling at
who
you can paint
yourself
when you feel
near
me
myself
who are you
do you ask
do you dream
illusions and puffy things
you wake up
you think me gone
eye
was never here
missing the view
of the image
in the mirror
smoke
wisps of air
curling away
–by elisabeth connelley
Morning Trip (5)
Sometimes I try to justify the falling rain
Then I try to rectify; change what can never be changed.
That’s not to say that change won’t surely rearrange
it all
and I know that there’s no way to say just how
it’s all about to change
but somehow I feel the pain when things don’t go
my way
That’s when I try to justify, justify the
falling rain
–Geoffrey Haun
Native Trees by W.S. Merwin
Native Trees
by W. S. Merwin
Neither my father nor my mother knew
the names of the trees
where I was born
what is that
I asked and my
father and mother did not
hear they did not look where I pointed
surfaces of furniture held
the attention of their fingers
and across the room they could watch
walls they had forgotten
where there were no questions
no voices and no shade
Were there trees
where they were children
where I had not been
I asked
were there trees in those places
where my father and my mother were born
and in that time did
my father and my mother see them
and when they said yes it meant
they did not remember
What were they I asked what were they
but both my father and my mother
said they never knew
W. S. Merwin, “Native Trees” from The Rain in the Trees (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988). Copyright © 1988 by W. S. Merwin. Reprinted with the permission of The Wylie Agency, Inc.
Elisa's Spot 