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And Words Are All I Have
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Because here’s the truth: There’s nothing to fix. No rules to follow.
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Nothing to recover from. I’m already perfect just as I am. Right here. Right now.
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Random Musings...
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One thing I detest is snobbery about types of information. Example: Why is knowing, by heart, chemistry’s Periodic Table of Elements somehow more commendable than knowing the names of every one of Love Boat’s 250 episodes?
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And they got me through many a solitary Saturday night. Don't judge.
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I’ve always collected fragments of knowledge, which somebody coined factoids... seemingly useless little nuggets of info that turn out to be great conversation fodder. Or just to keep all to yourself.
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Here are a few (so called) insignificant facts you can now call your own.
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I think they make life a little more interesting.
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· Scotland has 421 words for “snow.” Among them: sneesl (to start raining or snowing);
feefle (to swirl); flinkdrinkin (a light snow).
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· Armadillo shells are bulletproof. Completely and utterly bullet proof.
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· Firefighters use wetting agents to make water wetter. These chemicals reduce the surface tension of plain water so it’s easier to spread and soak into objects, which is why it’s known as “wet water.
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· For the light show of fireflies we can thank the oxidation of luciferin —from the Latin lucifer, light-bearer, a generic term for the light-emitting compound found in organisms that generate bioluminescence. Say that five times...
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· When Carl Sagan was asked about evolution versus intelligent design...to paraphrase his response; the likelihood of evolution randomly creating mankind is equal to the likelihood of a tornado hitting a junkyard and creating a fully functioning 747. Put that under your pipe, creationists.
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This just makes me smile: Jane Hirshfield’s The Promise.
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Stay, I said to the spider,
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embarrassed for me and itself.
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soon starting to tremble.
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of riverine valley meadows,
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of limestone and sandstone.
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with a changing expression, in silence.
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Stay, I said to my loves.
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American poet Tony Hoagland. For me, his talent knows no bounds. He died recently and when I revisit his poems - which is often - each one proves a master class in exactly how it should be done.
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When the medication she was taking
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caused tiny vessels in her face to break,
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leaving faint but permanent blue stitches in her cheeks,
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my sister said she knew she would
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never be beautiful again.
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of watching her reflection in the mirror,
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sucking in her stomach and standing straight,
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she said it was a relief,
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but I could see her pause inside that moment
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as the knowledge spread across her face
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with a fine distress, sucking
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the peach out of her lips,
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making her cute nose seem, for the first time,
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I’m probably the only one in the whole world
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who actually remembers the year in high school
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spending recess on the breezeway by the physics lab,
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tossing her hair and laughing that canary trill
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while some football player named Johnny
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with a pained expression in his eyes
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wrapped his thick finger over and over again
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in the bedspring of one of those pale curls.
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Or how she spent the next decade of her life
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auditioning a series of tall men,
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looking for just one with the kind
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of attention span she could count on.
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Then one day her time of prettiness
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and all those other beautiful women
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in the magazines and on the streets
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just kept on being beautiful
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walking in that kind of elegant, disinterested trance
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in which you sense they always seem to have one hand
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touching the secret place
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that keeps their beauty safe,
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inhaling and exhaling the perfume of it—
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It was spring. Season when the young
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buttercups and daisies climb up on the
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mulched bodies of their forebears
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to wave their flags in the parade.
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My sister just stood still for thirty seconds,
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amazed by what was happening,
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then shrugged and tossed her shaggy head
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as if she was throwing something out,
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something she had carried a long ways,
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but had no use for anymore,
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now that it had no use for her.
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That, too, was beautiful.
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I believe in the power of the imagination to remake the world, to release the truth within us, to hold back the night, to transcend death, to charm motorways, to ingratiate ourselves with birds, to enlist the confidences of madmen.
British writer J.G. Ballard was born 83 years ago today in the foreign controlled sector of Shanghai. He lived there throughout the Second Sino-Japanese War and into
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World War II—his popular novel, Empire of the Sun, made into a brilliant film,
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was based on his childhood years.
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Until next time... I am off to charm motorways...
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this image is a grain of sand magnified.
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Recent Post
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For all of the girls and the women who trusted too much... those found and never found, the lost ones, the lonely ones, whose stories go untold, their heartache entombed alongside them. Last Text from Gabby Petito No service here, but at least I’m free from the cage bars of my body; remember what I’d blogged in observation of …
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Book Sales
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The Music of Leaving, my collection of poetry, is available to order.
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Order directly online — for both Canada and U.S. orders — from Amazon, Brunswick and Demeter.
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