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Thursday, December 31, 2015

Naomi Shihab Nye: "Adios"

















It is a good word, rolling off the tongue;
no matter what language you were born with
use it. Learn where it begins,
the small alphabet of departure,
how long it takes to think of it,
then say it, then be heard.

Marry it. More than any golden ring,
it shines, it shines.
Wear it on every finger
till your hands dance,
touching everything easily,
letting everything, easily, go.

Strap it to your back like wings.
Or a kite-tail. The stream of air behind a jet.
If you are known for anything,
let it be the way you rise out of sight
when your work is finished.

Think of things that linger: leaves,
cartons and napkins, the damp smell of mold.

Think of things that disappear.

Think of what you love best,
what brings tears into your eyes.

Something that said adios to you
before you knew what it meant
or how long it was for.

Explain little, the word explains itself.
Later perhaps. Lessons following lessons,
like silence following sound.


 
"Trying to Name What Doesn't Change" by Naomi Shihab Nye. Text as published in Words Under the Words: Selected Poems (Far Corner Books, 1995).  

Art credit: "Sir bird flies into the sunset" in Darwin, Australia, photograph by kevin kelly. 

Curator's note: After a three-year run, this project will conclude tomorrow with a special post. If you haven't already, I'd really appreciate your taking my brief survey regarding a possible anthology of mindfulness poetry.

  

Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #10


Happy news for Beth Markow of Brunswick, Maine (USA). She has been randomly selected as the final recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. Her gift will be The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry. She says she "loves Wendell Berry's work!", so it's another happy match!

"For the last eighteen years," Beth writes, "I have had the privilege of working for one of our community hospitals, taking care of my neighbors and their families. I have held newborns through the night while their moms rested and held the hands of remarkable men and women, honored to be present as they and their families said goodbye for now."

Beth goes on to say, "When I'm open I see poetry all around me, from an ant climbing a single blade of grass to the way the early morning sun shines though the dew on the trees. Poetry grounds me. Poetry captures life and everything about life and in so few words! I know some of this may sound a little corny but this is who I am at my best."

Not corny at all, Beth. Heartfelt! Enjoy your reading of Berry's poetry!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Kjell Walfridsson: "Restricted Living"

















I have lived restricted
for so many years
the days they vanish
the years disappear
One day I feel
from the ocean a breeze
It warms my inside
and melts my ice
There are doors forgotten
that lead somewhere
though I never dared
believe they existed


Jag har varit trångbodd
i så många år
dagar försvinner
åren de går
En dag jag känner
från havet en bris
Den värmer mitt inre
och smälter min is
Det finns glömda dörrar
som leder någonstans
fast jag aldrig vågat
tro att de fanns




"Restricted Living" by Kjell Walfridsson. Text as published by Pietisten: A Herald of Awakening and Spiritual Edification (Winter 1999). Translated from the original Swedish by Tommy Carlson.

Art credit: "Dancing in the ocean breeze," photograph by Heather Piazza (digitally altered by curator).

Curator's note: This project will conclude with a special post on January 1. If you haven't already, please take my brief survey before then regarding a possible anthology of mindfulness poetry.

Tuesday, December 29, 2015

John O'Donohue: "For Grief"
























When you lose someone you love,
Your life becomes strange,
The ground beneath you gets fragile,
Your thoughts make your eyes unsure;
And some dead echo drags your voice down
Where words have no confidence.

Your heart has grown heavy with loss;
And though this loss has wounded others too,
No one knows what has been taken from you
When the silence of absence deepens.

Flickers of guilt kindle regret
For all that was left unsaid or undone.

There are days when you wake up happy;
Again inside the fullness of life,
Until the moment breaks
And you are thrown back
Onto the black tide of loss.

Days when you have your heart back,
You are able to function well
Until in the middle of work or encounter,
Suddenly with no warning,
You are ambushed by grief.

It becomes hard to trust yourself.
All you can depend on now is that
Sorrow will remain faithful to itself.
More than you, it knows its way
And will find the right time
To pull and pull the rope of grief
Until that coiled hill of tears
Has reduced to its last drop.

Gradually, you will learn acquaintance
With the invisible form of your departed;
And, when the work of grief is done,
The wound of loss will heal
And you will have learned
To wean your eyes
From that gap in the air
And be able to enter the hearth
In your soul where your loved one
Has awaited your return
All the time.




"For Grief" by John O'Donohue. Text as published in To Bless the Space Between Us: A Book of Blessings (Doubleday, 2008).

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer whose name in the lower-left corner is too small to decipher.

Curator's note: A few days left to gift me with your feedback! Please take this brief survey regarding a possible anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Monday, December 28, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #9


Happy news for Lauri Warren of Chapel Hill, North Carolina (USA). She has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. Her gift will be A Thousand Mornings by Mary Oliver, whom, it turns out, she "adores."

Enjoy your reading of Oliver's poetry, Lauri!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


David Wagoner: "The Lessons of Water"



































The best way to conduct oneself may be observed in the behavior of water. —Tao te ching

When given a place to wait, it fills that place
By taking the shape of what contains it,
Its upper surface poised and level,
Absorbing, accepting what it can as lightly
Or heavily as it does itself. If pressed
Down, it will offer back in all directions
Everything it was given. If chilled, it will shatter
Daylight and whiten to stars, will harden and sharpen
And turn unforseeably dazzling. Neglected,
It will disappear, being transformed and lifted
Into thin air. Or thrown away, it will gather
With other water, which is all one water,
And rise and fall, regather and go on rising
And falling the more quickly its path descends
And the more slowly as it wears that path away,
To be left awhile, to stir for the moon, to wait
For the wind to begin again.



"The Lessons of Water" by David Wagoner. Text as posted on The Paris Review (12/31/2013). 

Art credit: Untitled image of penguins on an Antarctic iceberg, taken by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: I'm so grateful to all of you who have taken my survey. Everybody's feedback matters. Please provide yours before the project ends on January 1.


Sunday, December 27, 2015

Teddy Macker: "A Poem for My Daughter"






















It seems we have made pain
some kind of mistake,
like having it
is somehow wrong.

Don’t let them fool you—
pain is a part of things.

But remember, dear Ellie,
the compost down in the field:
if the rank and dank and dark
are handled well, not merely discarded,
but turned and known and honored,
they one day come to beds of rich earth
home even to the most delicate rose.





God comes to you disguised as your life.
Blessings often arrive as trouble.

In French, the word blesser means to wound
and relates to the Old English bletsian

to sprinkle with blood.

And in Sanskrit there is a phrase,
a phrase to carry with you
wherever you go:

sarvam annam:

everything is food.

Every last thing.





The Navajo people,
it is said,
intentionally wove
(intentionally!)

obvious flaws into their sacred quilts …

Why?

It is there, they say,
in the “mistake,”
in the imperfection,

through which the Great Spirit moves.





Life is easy, yes.
And life is hard.
Life is simple, yes.
And life is complex.
We are tough, yes. But we are also fragile.
Everything’s eternally perfect
but help out if you can.





Work on becoming a native of mind, a native of heart.
No thought, no feeling, could ever be “bad.”

It’s just another creature
in the bestiary of Buddha,
the bestiary of Christ.

Knowing this,
knowing this down to the marrow,
could save you, dear one,
much needless strife.

Remember that wild and strange animals
paused to drink at the pond
of the Buddha’s mind
even after he saw
the morning star.





No matter what you do, no matter what happens,
it is impossible to leave the path.

Let me say that one more time:
No matter what you do, no matter what happens,
it is impossible to leave the path.





Believe it or not, dear Ellie,
some folks carefully imagine
hideous gods tearing at flesh,
clawing at faces,
eating human hearts,
and drinking cups of blood …

Why?

To shake hands with the Whole Catastrophe,
to cultivate the Noble Idiot Yes.

According to their tradition,
there are 84,000 “skillful means,"
84,000 tactics of wakefulness,
84,000 ways to become spaciously alive,
84,000 ways to be at home in your life and in this world.

And many of those skillful means are like this one:

enlightenment through endarkment.





Life appears to be fundamentally ambiguous.

Wily, everycolored, unpindownable.

For evidence of this, spend time with trees.

Over and over they say,

There is no final word.

And big decisions—
decisions concerning
relationships, concerning children,
concerning death—
are rarely made cleanly.

In general, be wary—
even if just a little—
of talk of purity,
of goodness,
of light.





To love everything, not just parts …
To love all of yourself, not just certain traits …
To rest in not knowing …

To carry the cross
and to lay your burden down …

To savor the medicine blue of moon,
the fierce sugar of tangerine …

To be a Christ unto others,
a Christ unto one’s self …

To laugh …

To be shameless, wild, and silly …

To know—fully, headlong,
without compunction—the ordinary magic
of our beautiful human bodies …


these seem worthwhile pursuits, life-long tasks.





By way of valediction, dear Ellie,
I pass along some words
from our many gracious teachers:

Eden is.

The imperfect is our paradise.

All is grace.



"A Poem for My Daughter" by Teddy Macker. Text as published in This World (White Cloud Press, 2015). © Teddy Macker. Reprinted by permission of the poet.

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: Another long poem for you to savor into the new year and beyond. Only six days left until the conclusion of A Year of Being Here. Please be sure to complete my survey regarding a possible anthology of mindfulness poetry.

 

Saturday, December 26, 2015

Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi: Untitled
["The clear bead at the center changes everything"]




















The clear bead at the center changes everything.
There are no edges to my loving now.

You've heard it said there's a window
that opens from one mind to another,

but if there's no wall, there's no need
for fitting the window, or the latch.



Untitled ["The clear bead at the center changes everything"] by Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi. Text as published in Rumi: The Book of Love (HarperCollins, 2003), translated from the original Persian by Coleman Barks.

Art credit: "The marble door that leads to nowhere," photograph taken in Naxos, Greece, by the unnamed blogger at legless birds. 

Curator's note: Only seven days left until the New Year and the conclusion of A Year of Being Here. Please be sure to complete my survey regarding a possible anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #8


Happy news for T.L. of Minnesota (USA), who says he doesn't think he has ever won anything until now! He has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. His gift will be A Year with Rilke: Daily Readings (Anita Barrows, editor).

T.L. says, "I love to read the wisdom found in mindfulness poetry as my life's journey begins to head toward the far edge of middle age....."

Enjoy your reading of Rilke, T.L.!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Friday, December 25, 2015

Rolf Jacobsen: "Just Delicate Needles—"


 
















It's so delicate, the light.
And there's so little of it. The dark
is huge.
Just delicate needles, the light,
in an endless night.
And it has such a long way to go
through such desolate space.

So let's be gentle with it.
Cherish it.
So it will come again in the morning.
We hope.



"Just Delicate Needles—" by Rolf Jacobsen. Text as published in The Roads Have Come to an End Now: Selected and Last Poems of Rolf Jacobsen, translated by Robert Bly, Roger Greenwald and Robert Hedin (Copper Canyon Press, 2001). This poem translated from the original Norwegian (found on page 138 of this online source) by Robert Hedin.

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer.



Thursday, December 24, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #7


Happy news for Kay Aitch of Sebastopol, California (USA)! She has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. Her gift will be Selected Poems (Barbara Crooker).

Kay describes herself as "a voracious reader and scrabble player, sometime poet and baker." She says that the mindfulness poetry presented by A Year of Being Here has often provided "beauty, strength and solace."

Enjoy your reading of Crooker's poetry, Kay!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Tom Hennen: "Looking for the Differences"


 














I am struck by the otherness of things rather than their sameness.
The way a tiny pile of snow perches in the crook of a branch in the
tall pine, away by itself, high enough not to be noticed by people, 
out of reach of stray dogs. It leans against the scaly pine bark, busy
at some existence that does not need me.

It is the differences of objects that I love, that lift me toward the rest
of the universe, that amaze me. That each thing on earth has its own
soul, its own life, that each tree, each clod is filled with the mud of
its own star. I watch where I step and see that the fallen leaf, old
broken grass, an icy stone are placed in exactly the right spot on the
earth, carefully, royalty in their own country.




"Looking for the Differences" by Tom Hennen from Darkness Sticks to Everything: Collected and New Poems (Copper Canyon Press, 2013).

Art credit: "Icy stone," photograph by Gungyoel.

Curator's note: Take a breather from holiday bustle. Read a poem you love. Then take my two-minute survey to will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry. A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1.


Wednesday, December 23, 2015

Esther Cohen: "Can I Call You Back?"

















Last night as always
I called Bruce
although
he is the best telephone
person I know
he nearly
always says
Can I Call You Back
because he is Doing Something.
Last night he was
cutting up zucchini
and I asked him,
I always ask him
why he can’t talk to me
at the same time as he
cuts up his zucchini but
he can’t. He just can’t.
Later, he calls
back to explain What Happened
the Last Few Days
(nothing and everything)
Mike the painter
has landlord problems
red flying squirrel
still eating Bruce’s grapes
and I listen, thinking
how words
are the musical
notes I love.



"Can I Call You Back?" by Esther Cohen. Reblogged from On Being (12/09/2015), where it was posted as part of Postcards for Hanukkah, a sequence of eight photo-poems by Cohen and photographer Matthew Septimus.

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: I know you're busy, but I'd be grateful if you took my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Tuesday, December 22, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #6


Happy news for Jane Spickett of Arlington, Massachusetts (USA)! She has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. Her gift will be Red Suitcase (Naomi Shihab Nye).

Jane is a certified spiritual director, artist, organizer, and photographer. "All of these are ways I share that the sacred is immanent in ourselves and our lives," she says. "I read (and write poetry) because it restores me and is yet another reminder  that I am part of something so much bigger than myself."

Enjoy your reading of Nye's poetry, Jane!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Barbara Crooker: "Solstice"



















These are dark times. Rumors of war
rise like smoke in the east. Drought
widens its misery. In the west, glittering towers
collapse in a pillar of ash and dust. Peace,
a small white bird, flies off in the clouds.

And this is the shortest day of the year.
Still, in almost every window,
a single candle burns,
there are tiny white lights
on evergreens and pines,
and the darkness is not complete.



"Solstice" by  Barbara Crooker. Text as posted on Kingdom Poets (12/15/2014). © Barbara Crooker. Reprinted by permission of the poet. 

Art credit: "Christmas," photograph by soulkissfaerie.

Curator's note: Please take my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Monday, December 21, 2015

Wendell Berry: "2007, VI"
["It is hard to have hope"]






















It is hard to have hope. It is harder as you grow old,
for hope must not depend on feeling good
and there is the dream of loneliness at absolute midnight.
You also have withdrawn belief in the present reality
of the future, which surely will surprise us,
and hope is harder when it cannot come by prediction
any more than by wishing. But stop dithering.
The young ask the old to hope. What will you tell them?
Tell them at least what you say to yourself.

Because we have not made our lives to fit
our places, the forests are ruined, the fields eroded,
the streams polluted, the mountains overturned. Hope
then to belong to your place by your own knowledge
of what it is that no other place is, and by
your caring for it as you care for no other place, this
place that you belong to though it is not yours,
for it was from the beginning and will be to the end.

Belong to your place by knowledge of the others who are
your neighbors in it: the old man, sick and poor,
who comes like a heron to fish in the creek,
and the fish in the creek, and the heron who manlike
fishes for the fish in the creek, and the birds who sing
in the trees in the silence of the fisherman
and the heron, and the trees that keep the land
they stand upon as we too must keep it, or die.

This knowledge cannot be taken from you by power
or by wealth. It will stop your ears to the powerful
when they ask for your faith, and to the wealthy
when they ask for your land and your work.
Answer with knowledge of the others who are here
and how to be here with them. By this knowledge
make the sense you need to make. By it stand
in the dignity of good sense, whatever may follow.

Speak to your fellow humans as your place
has taught you to speak, as it has spoken to you.
Speak its dialect as your old compatriots spoke it
before they had heard a radio. Speak
publicly what cannot be taught or learned in public.

Listen privately, silently to the voices that rise up
from the pages of books and from your own heart.
Be still and listen to the voices that belong
to the streambanks and the trees and the open fields.
There are songs and sayings that belong to this place,
by which it speaks for itself and no other.

Found your hope, then, on the ground under your feet.
Your hope of Heaven, let it rest on the ground
underfoot. Be it lighted by the light that falls
freely upon it after the darkness of the nights
and the darkness of our ignorance and madness.
Let it be lighted also by the light that is within you,
which is the light of imagination. By it you see
the likeness of people in other places to yourself
in your place. It lights invariably the need for care
toward other people, other creatures, in other places
as you would ask them for care toward your place and you.

No place at last is better than the world. The world
is no better than its places. Its places at last
are no better than their people while their people
continue in them. When the people make
dark the light within them, the world darkens.



"2007, VI" ["It is hard to have hope"] by Wendell Berry. Text as published in This Day: New & Collected Sabbath Poems (Counterpoint, 2013). 

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: It's a long post, but I couldn't excerpt it. I believe every word.



Sunday, December 20, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #5


Happy news for Christopher Bellonci of Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts (USA)! He has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. His gift will be The Book of the World: A Contemporary Scripture (Phyllis Cole-Dai, editor).

Christopher is a child psychiatrist at Tufts Medical Center. He also teaches mindfulness at the Tufts University Medical School as well as in his consultations to public schools in the Boston area. He appreciates being able to incorporate poetry into his own mindfulness journey and into his teaching of mindfulness to others.

He writes, "I read one of the poems [from A Year of Being Here] recently in a consultation that I found had relevance to the youth we were discussing during our meeting. The medical students have also enjoyed the poetry as a path into their mindfulness practices."

Enjoy your reading of The Book of the World, Christopher!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Marlene Cookshaw: "Over the Shoulder"
























Guilt is a bag someone has carried
up the hill from the pub.  A brown bag
the size of a good catch, or
darkish, and bigger than that:
duffel over the shoulder.

Guilt is a pool with ladders
rising in every direction.
We climb and fall back and climb again.
Who can make the connection between
what snaps underfoot and what drenches us?

We are not taught how to do nothing.
We’re dragged from our busy infancy
and distracted for years till our
balloon of competence shreds.
There are secrets you know,

there is what happens when
what you haven’t imagined occurs.
Pain or its absence. Wind
bares the back of a sparrow’s head
underneath its buffer of down.

I believe in birds, the smallness of them,
their potential for flight, the way
they acknowledge this, even so

nodding and feeding in front of us.



"Over the Shoulder" by Marlene Cookshaw. Text as published in Double Somersaults (Brick Books, 1999).

Art credit: "Black-capped chickadees," image by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: Please take my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Saturday, December 19, 2015

Ron C. Moss: Selection of Haiga


Today we have a selection of haiga (illustrated haiku) submitted by Ron C. Moss, an award-winning visual artist and poet from Tasmania, Australia.

Ron has been published in numerous journals and anthologies including Haiku in English: The First Hundred Years (W. W. Norton & Company, 2013) and Where the River Goes: The Nature Tradition in English-Language Haiku (Snapshot Press, 2013). Among his many current activities, he is an Artisan at The Awakened Eye. As A Year of Being Here draws to a close, he suggests that our readers might be interested in following that site. Learn more here.






 




























Friday, December 18, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #4


Happy news for H.J. of Norfolk, Virginia (USA)! She has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. Her gift will be Ask Me: 100 Essential Poems (William Stafford).

H.J. describes herself as a photographer "intent on looking at the familiar and seeing the universal." The practice of reading poetry on a regular basis, she says, "sharpens my mind's eye to be alert for imagery in the everyday. Poetry, like music, acts as an ever-broadening sphere for my work. Some of the poets like Billy Collins and Naomi Shihab-Nye are reminders to laugh at myself. Poets like Loren Eisley, Rumi and Wendell Berry are always reminders to stay actively engaged with our chaotic world because it is my home."

Enjoy your reading of Stafford's poetry, H.J.!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Emily Dickinson: "#875"
["I stepped from Plank to Plank"]





















I stepped from Plank to Plank
A slow and cautious way
The Stars about my Head I felt
About my Feet the Sea.

I knew not but the next
Would be my final inch—
This gave me that precarious Gait
Some call Experience.



"#875" ["I stepped from Plank to Plank"] by Emily Dickinson. This poem is in the public domain.

Art credit: "Hussaini Hanging Bridge, Pakistan," across the Hunza River in the village of Hussaini in northern Pakistan, photograph by Jonathan Blair/Corbis. Caption: "Massive gaps between the planks, a wild side-to-side swing: there are reasons this is considered one of the world’s most harrowing suspension bridges. While rickety cable and wood bridges are common in this area, crossing this bridge over the rapidly flowing Hunza River is particularly frightening, as the tattered remains of the previous bridge hang by threads next to the one currently in use."

Curator's note: Please take my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Thursday, December 17, 2015

Frederick Smock: "Moon"


















The day lengthens,
the old earth tips its hat
to the moon.

The changeful moon
goes through many phases,
even in a single night,

though it is the same
moon as ever, we know this.
We are the changes.



"Moon" by Frederick Smock. Text as published in The Bounteous World: Poems (Broadstone Books, 2013). Reprinted by permission of the poet.

Art credit: Untitled photograph by Suppakij1017/Shutterstock.

Curator's note: Please take my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.



Wednesday, December 16, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #3


Happy news for Kevin F. of Seattle, Washington (USA)! He has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. His gift will be A Year with Hafiz: Daily Contemplations (Daniel Ladinsky).

Kevin volunteers with the Seattle Jung Society and with Depth Psychology Alliance. An actor, scholar, teacher and learner, he "enjoys poetry because of its ability to bring me to the heart and soul of a matter quickly, often with breathtaking poignancy and beauty, or with an immediacy which can inspire deeply-felt pain or joy. If a poem resonates with me, it does so in the service of greater deepening, expansion, and connection."

Enjoy your reading of Ladinsky's interpretations of Hafiz, Kevin!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Amy Uyematsu: "Tea"


 














for Thich Nhat Hanh


How many years of suffering
revealed in hands like his
small and deliberate as a child's

The way he raises them
from his lap, grasps the teacup
with sure, unhurried ease

Yet full of anticipation
for what he will taste in each sip
he drinks as if it's his first time

Lifts the cup to his mouth,
a man who's been practicing all his life,
each time tasting something new.



"Tea" by Amy Uyematsu. Text as published in Stone Bow Prayer (Copper Canyon Press, 2005).

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: Please take my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.



Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Tom Montag:
"Winter Afternoon, Early December"




The grey lid has been
lifted off the day.

Sun spills everywhere—
on snow, on house, on

me at the window.
No wind in the willow,

no birds in bare branches,
no sadness in the absence.

Only the shine, instead,
the spin and dalliance

of every amazing
particular thing

in the long, the lovely
the almost perfect light.




"Winter Afternoon, Early December" by Tom Montag. Text as published in In This Place: Selected Poems 1982-2013 (Tom Montag, 2014). Reprinted by permission of the poet.

Art credit: Untitled image by unknown photographer.

Curator's note: Please take my two-minute survey before A Year of Being Here concludes on January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.


Monday, December 14, 2015

Curator's Note: Giveaway Winner #2


Happy news for Sharon Barr of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (USA)! She has been randomly selected as a recipient in our End-of-Project Giveaway. Her gift will be Women in Praise of the Sacred: 43 Centuries of Spiritual Poetry by Women (Jane Hirshfield, editor).

Sharon received word of her selection after leading "a Shabbat yoga and mindfulness retreat" at her synagogue. Why does she like to read poetry? "Because there are poets who can crystallize in a few words, feelings and experiences, observations and meaning that the rest of us struggle to articulate.  There are poets who literally have saved my life during difficult times. So many wonderful poets, but the ones who have spoken to me in various points of my life that jump to mind:  Jack Gilbert, Yehuda Amichai, Sharon Olds, Emily Dickinson, Rainer Maria Rilke, Kim Addonizio, Pablo Neruda, Naomi Shihab-Nye…. I could go on and on."

Enjoy your reading of Hirshfield's anthology, Marcia!

Deep peace,
Phyllis


Mary Oliver: "Clam"
















Each one is a small life, but sometimes long, if its
place in the universe is not found out. Like us, they
have a heart and a stomach; they know hunger, and
probably a little satisfaction too. Do not mock them
for their gentleness, they have a muscle that loves
being alive. They pull away from the light. They pull
down. They hold themselves together. They refuse to
open.

But sometimes they lose their place and are tumbled
shoreward in a storm. Then they pant, they fill
with sand, they have no choice but must open the
smallest crack. Then the fire of the world touches
them. Perhaps, on such days, they too begin the
terrible effort of thinking, of wondering who, and
what, and why. If they can bury themselves again in
the sand they will. If not, they are sure to perish,
though not quickly. They also have resources beyond
the flesh; they also try very hard not to die.



"Clam" by Mary Oliver. Text as published in What Do We Know: Poems and Prose Poems (Da Capo Press, 2002).

Art credit: "Winter Clam Scene," photograph taken on 1/08/2013 by Roger Golub. Caption: "Ice crystals on Butter Clams."

Curator's note: Have you given me the gift of your wisdom yet? Please take my two-minute survey before January 1. It will help me (and any potential publishers) decide upon an anthology of mindfulness poetry.



Sunday, December 13, 2015

Dobby Gibson:
"Upon Discovering My Entire Solution
to the Attainment of Immortality
Erased From the Blackboard
Except the Word `Save'"








































If you have seen the snow
somewhere slowly fall
on a bicycle,
then you understand
all beauty will be lost
and how even that loss
can be beautiful.
And if you have looked
at a winter garden
and seen not a winter garden
but a meditation on shape,
then you know why
this season is not
known for its words,
the cold too much
about the slowing of matter,
not enough about the making of it.
So you are blessed
to forget this way:
a jump rope in the ice melt,
a mitten that has lost its hand,
a sun that shines
as if it doesn’t mean it.
And if in another season
you see a beautiful woman
use her bare hands
to smooth wrinkles
from her expensive dress
for the sake of dignity,
but in so doing trace
the outlines of her thighs,
then you will remember
surprise assumes a space
that has first been forgotten,
especially here, where we
rarely speak of it,
where we walk out onto the roofs
of frozen lakes
simply because we’re stunned
we really can.



"Upon Discovering My Entire Solution to the Attainment of Immortality Erased from the Blackboard Except the Word `Save'" by Dobby Gibson. Text as published in Polar (Alice James Books, 2005), available for purchase here.

Art credit: Untitled photograph by Emmanuel Coupe-Kalomiris. Caption: "This image was taken in wintertime in an arid area of the Canadian Rockies. Temperatures were below 30 degrees Celsius, yet because there was no snow fall the surface of the lake was uncovered allowing me to see and capture the bubbles (gas release from lake bed) that were trapped in the frozen waters."

Curator's note: Please take two minutes for this survey to help me decide whether or not to create an anthology of mindfulness poetry. The survey will be up until January 1, 2016, when A Year of Being Here concludes after a wonderful three-year run.