A Poetry Review of Two Travelers

Destination Zero, Sam Hamill

(photo by seattlebloggers)

 I read Sam Hamill’s “Destination Zero” from under a sun hat, but I would always forget that. I would slip away from my front lawn to walk along a grey coast, face stinging with September salt. I noted the “curtsies” of African Violets, the cries of newborn chicks in a musky barn, and the “choir of stars” above valleys and mountains. Before reading his poetry, I had never fully articulated my experience of living in the Northwest. Hamill captures its throbbing beauty, stormy diversity, and tender loneliness with the skill of a painter. In other words, he puts watercolor to what was once inarticulate and paper-white.

Like a painter, Hamill begins with a foundation color. His poem, “A Lover’s Quarrel,” becomes the significant base for which the rest of the book can be read. This poem introduces his relationship with nature, which is a complex character of its own.

Throughout the poem, Hamill examines everything that the wind touches: the evergreens, “half-garbled songs of finches,” moon, “swollen skies,” and himself. He longs to feel completely at home in nature but finds himself grasping. While he is intrinsically connected to the wind, he cannot hold it. The wind becomes a greater metaphor for his aching for unity and permanence, for home: “I’d kiss a fish/ and love a stone/ and marry the winter rain/ if I could persuade this battered earth/ to let me make it home.”

Perhaps Hamill longs to transcend and solidify nature’s fleeting beauty. Its transient quality makes him feel like an outsider. I suppose this aching for beauty is something that drives many poets and artists, as Keats once said, “A thing of beauty is a joy for ever/ Its loveliness increases; it will never/ Pass into nothingness; but still will keep.”

If this is true, then how does this influence our understanding of the title, “Destination Zero”? What is his destination, exactly? Can it be reached? These are questions he may keep you asking too.

And speaking of destinations, if you’re curious about where he resides in the Northwest, Sam Hamill co-founded Copper Canyon Press in Port Townsend.

Froth Poems, Jaroslaw Mikolajewski

Can the empty spaces on a poem’s page be just as captivating as its words?

Yes. A resounding yes for “Froth Poems,” a translation of works by Polish poet, Jaroslaw Mikolajewski. Each carefully selected word pierces and fills its page with haunting and beautiful images. Mikolajewski style can be mirrored after his poem, “rome 3:37 a.m.,” in which he writes:“rome is silent and I think so is the rest/ of the world… the silence is so perfect that if you sighed/or coughed/rome would be full of you in a moment.”  The empty spaces in his writing are a part of the magic. Like the silence in Rome, his words need room to quiver, breathe, expand, overflow.

Mikolajewski is a traveler. He walks between the worlds of his inner and outer conversations, airports, countries, dreams, and generations. Some poems like “Froth” left me tingling from their ghastly darkness, while others beckoned me into the intimacy of his treasured  relationships. In describing his wife’s spine, Mikolajewski writes: “And when my wife is pregnant/ her spine is a bough/ breaking under the weight of apples…” Her spine becomes a scarf, a zipper in a suitcase, a viper, and even a steel rope: “On nights of human love/ it is the steel rope / rustling in the wind, at the highest voltage.” Ordinary objects such as these become vessels for intimate and surprising metaphor.

And this traveler does not lock his metaphors tightly inside a suitcase between poems. The last line on every page ends in white space. Mikolajewski never uses a period, and his poems often begin in lower case, as if mid-sentence. This all contributes to the feeling of motion and expansion, as if “Froth” is really circular, global, all poems blending into each other.

Although translation is essential for English readers, its essence is not lost. Rather, I felt as if I were traveling alongside Jaroslaw Mikolajewski through his worlds.

 (photo above by http://www.hektoeninternational.org/Intercepted-letters.html)

Stars

 

(photo from http://infinite-paradox.tumblr.com/post/29838214255)

On a long drive home when hope was lost, we all started to believe that the only things left in this world break hearts.

…but watching the stars makes you want to believe in God.

Because, looking up, there's something more beautiful than what we have and what we are and what we've done.

…like the stars are still there despite us and will be there despite us. We can hide the stars from ourselves with fake stars and fake skies, but the stars will continue being more beautiful than those things. Continue to be there when we decide to dim our fake stars.

We become blinded sometimes from staring into our lights. And how much more comforting is the sky that belongs to God in that moment.

And if the stars are His, I wish there were more stars.


~Felicia Deng

Words to Anchor

From the names of boats in the Santa Barbara harbor

 * 

Festina lente,

Ocean pearl.

Listo?

Life is short,

Dance smartly.

The Sea Went A Pirating

In honor of the ugliest rock I've ever seen.

The sea went a pirating.

It spit and chewed, it sneezed

a curdled brew, its gum-tongue spewed.

Up the rock hiccuped, its pores

pearled top to boiled hot. 

Cradling its kelpy core, its sails

snag-blistered, it shatter-clattered

to reeling shore.

There, drum-battered,

rum-tum tendrils 

humming, it tasted 

the sun.

It bruise-oozed,

rust-crusted,

and drank its bleached 

cavity jaws wide.

Round, round, it roped

itself, a tide-coddled 

crustacean.

Now, ignore its ghastly

cheeks and blister-speak,

and you'll see it's a leather buckle 

beauty, a tree-ring original,

an unsung carrousel.

For this tether-weathered sailor knows

just how fast the sea-wind blows.

Intersection

Mother under sun hat, over boy.

Look how their reflection bends across the sand water:

moire azure,

sun lit oil,

tugging like kite tails,

and tucking back into its silver hush

like a whisper behind an ear.

Look how sand hems sea

and sea hums sand

into one feather thread.

A Veiling Reveals

2:30 am, UW Med Center. One of the E.R. doctors looks down at me and says, "You are very contagious, and should be getting lots of rest the next couple days."
To which I croak, "What if I'm planning to go to California this Wednesday?" It is early Tuesday morning.
"You probably shouldn't go. Or if you do, take a strong decongestant. And wear a face mask."
Viral pharyngitis, it is called, a fancy throat cold. After my throat had swollen and restricted my breathing, I'd ended up here. My dad, who had picked me up the morning of an early work day, sat nearby. What a guy.

While packing for California the next day, I have no such face mask. I manage to wrap a scarf around my head and mouth, revealing my forehead, eyes and the brim of my nose. Although it somewhat resembles a hijab, a head piece Muslim women often wear, it isn't accurate. Despite this, I feel like I'm pretending to be someone else, but I figure it's better than infecting an airplane of blissful vacationers.

(Here is a link of head piece types for anyone curious. Because I expose some of my hair, I don't truly resemble any:
http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/muslim-headdress/  )

My suitcase grumbles behind me as I walk towards the University Ave, where the airport shuttle bus will come to pick me up. I stand out. And I never usually do (unless I wear my bright yellow pants, which I confess is often. I was also wearing these pants. And although well covered, these pants and my jacket are snug.) I can't clarify how people look at me, but I immediately sense that it is different. Maybe I'm just feeling subconscious! I try to tell myself. I check my watch again. The shuttle bus is late. A man passes me with a look. A watching more than simply looking glance. His eyes focus on me slightly longer, but the rest of his face stays as straight and empty as a sheet of paper.  
Soon after, another man passes me, waving and smiling excitedly. He could be Middle Eastern, and his eyes say, I know you, hello, welcome, and startled, I smile back with mine. His acceptance warms me. It feels nice to feel known, even if it's mistaken, even if it's for only a moment.
Before the shuttle bus arrives, two men call out from a car parked nearby, "Do you need help finding anything?" One also has darker colored skin. I thank them and say I'm alright. I can't say I've  experienced the same helpfulness on this street before.

The shuttle driver eventually asks me, "Where is your home?"
"Oh, I live near campus."
"Where are you from?"
"Oh, that home?" And I say I'm from Bothell, which is only a half hour away. After I long pause, I realize that he is confused. He is trying to understand the scarf without acknowledging the scarf.

While in line at the airport, a little boy in front of me asks, "Why are you wearing that?" followed by, "What languages do you speak?"

Security: the first woman asks me to remove my headpiece to verify my I.D. "I need to see your face. Is that okay?"
The next woman says, "You're wearing a head (slight pause) piece... I'll need to pat that down."

Later, I try to order fries.
"Sprite?" The cashier squints.
"Fries," I squeak again through my cold.

Then I go to Starbucks. Or, at least I think it's Starbucks, but I end up across from the Starbucks. (I am slightly out of it, considering my sickness and medication, not to mention the suddenly limited peripherals of the scarf. Not to mention that it feels about 10 degrees hotter with the scarf.) I hand them a gift card to pay.
"Um...we're not Starbucks."
In which, I suddenly have become, once more, a confused foreigner in my own city.

Foreigner? Yes. I even find myself looking for people who look like me, even though how I look isn't really me. Kind of confusing, right? I remember one of my Indian classmates once said, "What do you do in a foreign country? You look for people like yourself." And for me, being white, Protestant, and from mainstream American culture, I don't often think in this mindset. I don't have to because people like me are often all around me.

In the bathroom, while adjusting such scarf, my eyes leap out at me. My eyebrows too. Until this moment, I had never realized before how expressive eyes really are. Chills rushed through me. Really.

Have you ever seen the famous photo of the woman from Afghanistan?

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2002/04/afghan-girl/original-story-text

I saw her picture maybe ten years ago as a twelve year old. And although knowing nothing else, the memory of her eyes never left me. Move over, Mona Lisa. In front of the mirror now, I think of her.
Covering my face up didn't make me any less vulnerable or readable. That saying about eyes being the window to the soul? Yeah. There's definitely something to that. Eyes might be our vessels for language and emotion. Try wearing a scarf for a day and you'll see what I mean.

If you're wondering, I did eventually make it to California. I half-ripped the scarf from my head. It felt great to breathe fresh air and let the sun warm my cheeks.

Still a foreigner? Maybe.
I called my grandpa later, and he hung up on me. He couldn't recognize my voice or hear me well, and thought I was Chinese. I couldn't stop laughing, and finally called him back.

Maybe this post can prompt some reflection. Do you "stand out"? Have you? And if you're feeling daring, try something. See what it's like to be someone else. I was almost (but not really) Muslim for a day, and although I've enjoyed getting to know some Muslim girls over volleyball, I never knew what it might be like to be in their shoes. Maybe today was a small glimpse into that.

Breakfast love song

(Feeling a little punny. Here goes:)

Be my sunny side up, babe,
Don't scramble my heart with some hard-boiled
Nonsense. I love our love over-easy
Not deviled or fried or poached.
Maybe you woke up on the rooster-side
Of the bed this morning, and I'm a little
Chicken, but I'm hen for some
Happiness, and I bet you chickadee.
So let's flip us over now,
Soft-side, warm-side,
Butter-side.

Almost Famous: How the Fear of Criticism and Pursuit of Fame Influence Your Art

 A terrific article by a local Seattle poet.

http://www.frequency.fm/almost_famous/

(Inventory of a) Once and Still Roman

Almost a year since,
and tonight I’m taking inventory.

I almost smelled the lavender stand

on the way back to our apartment,

the old man who looked fierce

enough to have escaped prison,

who sold the tender, purple silk bags

for 3E each, 2 for 5E.

In Rome, I measured mornings

in street crossings,

the beggar tipping out his hat

on the bridge, the Tiber water

lingering between the quilt-patch

buildings, and the street-line stitches.

In Rome, the poor held
our eyes like steady pools,
so we could see our own
reflection.
Or they bent, head down,
arms cupped, out
like a crucifix

while we watched stiletto
heels striking cobblestone.

Mornings in café freddo, afternoons

in gelato scoops,

(becoming fluent in gelato-speak,
lured into nutella-infatuation.)

Late mornings in sweat,

afternoons in sweat,

showers (feet minimum, cold-med heat,

never hot water),

waking from a siesta in sweat,

evening, walking home, sweat.

Evening, out, ease.

Night: the clatter

of dishes, river of voices,

and bell-chimes of laughter

below our window

as we chased sleep.

Dragging our mattresses
out under the living room AC,
relief.

~

Every city has a birth,

a life,

a death,

I learned.

I measured Rome in years: hundreds,

thousands (as well as any American can).

And days: days passed, days left,

blog days, siesta days, longing for home

moments, hours.

Always a solid eight hours between us—

family, friends,

you,

your morning

or my yesterday.

The way we talked,

words full as a plate of pasta and red wine,

but the slightest—

was it hesitation?

lingered in my mouth,

impossible to trace, as if stained on my fork

before the meal arrived.

It is not the hours that change us

but the places that we grow apart in.

~

Roman time still stretches on today,

even here in Seattle.

Seattle, my home, though sometimes

if one could have a love affair with a city,

I might be tempted

to take Rome in,

undercover,

just for a day.

Rome would smoke his cigar

and tell me about the panino

and bus protests, the heat, and how at night

the Colosseum still fills with its ghosts.

Then Rome would sing

me a song I heard once in a

ristorante, by a man wiping

display windows,

whose deep voice sauntered

for the sake of singing,

or for the afternoon break,

or for living itself.

I practice Rome, still,

by crossing sidewalks illegally

(though it is still best done

with friends, in sandals, in

fear of Vespas).

And sometimes, if given the option,

I’ll take my coffee strong in a

small, porcelain tea cup (mug).

(European size).

~

Every city has

a birth,

a life,

a death.

So goes the saying.

I’ve built my bridges

and pillars via pen—

journals since 1^st grade.

Sometimes, I wonder,

what will happen with them?

Will they become their own Forum?
Will tourists of some kind

sweep in and purge,

pointing with cameras

and sticky fingers,

or will these written memories

be tucked away

like the sacred dead under church

floors, in cemeteries

below

cemetery?

Every city has a birth,

a life,

a death.

Rome teaches this most.

Here, we like our hours

clean and sharpened to the minute.

But

for all our archiving

at the end of the day,

our clock hands

still twist toward Roman dust.

~

Puddles

I’m sapped of wonder today.

A twenty-two year old professional

list maker, who has shaved

down the world into hand held

ambitions: jobs to apply for,

rent to pay, people to see.

My chest is filled with hinges

and buckles, and my mind

needs a serious bubble bath.

Sam, the one year old I nanny

smacks his chubby palm into a mud puddle.

He looks back at me with a brown-eyed grin,

then back at his hand’s wetness,

and lets out a seagull shriek

of delight.

Forget about repopulation.

The older generations would shrivel away

from their urgent ambitions

long before old age,

were it not for children.

Home

Home,

a word we built,

clay in our child hands

destined for glossy oven birth.

Home became

a word that flutters,

a wanderer without anchors,

defiant sails braced for storm thrusts,

stained, and needing to be polished again,

reborn.

But back to home

at the beginning.

*

If my child walls

had a color, they would be

Pueblo red, mud soft, brick strong.

If memory has a color, that’s it.

I once believed in jackal-fears and viper

lighting storms, skeleton grins

and spider nightmares.

But the monsters never came.

Not near my mother’s smell,

her squeaky kiss, the clean sheets.

Not near Dad’s heavy feet upstairs,

his whistle-hum over the coffee

machine, sister’s sparkling eyes

as she flushes my jelly sandals

in the toilet.

These moments

still hum like an old cat on my lap,

worthy of affection.

*

Then I saw how Home

must grow into mosaic,

how Time cracks and breaks it,

how we must mold the

old pieces into soft, fresh clay.

A constant art.

Family vacations through mountain

passes, rain spinning against my window,

listening to our murmurs

whip away in time,

holding our words in my

mind on replay.

Maybe that is why I write.

To hold the pieces long after they’ve

crumbled. To remember

their magic.

*

But sometimes for too long

I consider the cracks:

A song on the radio

reminding me of an old friend.

How I hold you, love,

like water.

Rome, already deteriorating

two times faster

in my mind

since last summer.

Arguments like bee stings,

swollen days after.

Praying for reconciliation.

As a child, burying a mole.

Its soft, dark eyes closed

because it dug too many mansions.

Aching to be in our apartment

in Rome, just for a moment

to feel again the pressing heat,

to see white shirts fluttering

on a neighbor’s clothesline.

*

But when I consider

all this too deeply,

I forget to work in new clay.

While I try to rest in the words

and the anchors of the people I love

my mind still fights to fly

past stars, through deep waters.

I could build so many Babels

if my flesh and bones

didn’t hold me so tightly.

But even Superman must have felt

empty. Alone,

that is the price of flight.

See me with all my cracks,

I’m too old now for child walls.

But always young enough

to warm my hands at the

hearth of the ones I love,

between my snow journeys

for new walls.

That is when I taste it.

*

When I taste this one Home

I have still to enter.

Most days, it seems more

mirage than solid,

an eternal desert crawl away.

But it waits,

confident,

oven-baked to glossy perfection,

Pueblo red, mud soft, brick strong.

The final rebirth.

I taste it sometimes:

Steady, like my feet

anchoring under

sun-filled maple trees.

The sweet ache of

acceptance,

a kiss on a mud-stained

cheek, a tight hug from the

friend who once slipped away

like water.

In these moments

at the well

of human dignity,

the mirage stiffens

into reality.

I ache for this

honey wine completion.

No more cracks, no more new clay,

Just enough.

The Bridge

I still pray for you

on long walks, and at night

sometimes when the world

is small and quiet,

or too big.

I pray your life will be rich

with God’s goodness,

sweet as your favorite

strawberry-rhubarb pie.

I pray that when you meet her,

you will be so happy.

Who knows, maybe

she will even show you

how to dance.

Funny now, how these

prayers are like little

gems of power

building a bridge, one drop

at a time for me to walk

my grief over,

and filling you with strength.

All these unspoken

colors illuminate the hope

that someday hello

will be woven with the fiber

of healed beginnings,

warming your hands

as much as mine.

Since our love crumbled

and drained out, these prayers—

this little, steady candle

remains.

It is enough.

Bookstore

You greet me like a fat tabby cat.

The door jingles and you’re at my side

nuzzling for attention, saying,

come out of the ugly drizzle;

here it is warm.

I wander down your aisles

where books crack and sigh

and open like daisy chain

crowns, each word a petal

in a garland to grace

those willing to listen.

These books smell like pine

trees, muffled walks in the snow,

cinnamon sticks and the first breath

of summer.     

These books have wandered

in pockets, under jackets in rainstorms,

on planes, between friends, lovers,

and enemies, held coffee mugs

and pencil marks, baked under

windowsills, and wrinkled

under tears.

So many journeys in one book,

in one aisle, in one bookstore,

in the world.

Cherry Blossoms (at the University of Washington)

petals flicker down--

thousands of winks

teased by the breeze.

frisbees, chiming

voices, children

in the grass, sneakers

on brick, on snow.

cameras flash

while

these snow faces

land so quietly—

thousands of beautiful deaths.

Moon Fishing

The city lights wink, and cars bob over bridges.

I perch on my boat and cast a line into your rippling

reflection. What would we do, moon, if you visited?

If you popped up with my fishing line, smooth as an

Oreo cookie. It would only be for one night, because

I know you’re busy up there. 

You could be a beautiful balloon bobbing over my

shoulder. We could stroll by all the children waiting

for moon dust magic, the children who sleep on cold

floors and hide in the back of classrooms. 

You could whisper in my ear about what heaven

looks like, if the view is any better from up there.

We could dispel that cheese myth too, I know you

don’t appreciate it. 

Then we could glide by restaurants where lovers

snooze, and light up the dark office corners where

fathers and mothers hide. 

I could pull that flag out of your ribcage. I love

my country, but you don’t belong to anyone. 

We could slow all the young people that hurry, hurry

on, who have forgotten they still live under you.

We could cheer up the elderly who need to look at

something new.

We could warm the hands of the homeless

whose nights are cold and long. 

We could tell this frantic world to hush, hush, hush.

We could do a lot of things, moon.

Seeds

(A new version of Reconcile)

Once, we planted lemon seeds by the sea.

Shoulders brushing, we loosened the fresh soil

in the pale morning light. Inside, the steam

from our cinnamon bread clouded

the window. But we only thought

of the salty air and the seeds,

 so cold and light in our palms.

We didn’t know then how bitterness

could grow to taste so sweet.

For months we still filled our cupboards

with jam jars and painted the sea together,

melting its sunsets into our canvas,

taming its lion waves in our frame.

But at night, locked in your warmth,

I thought of the buds outside, yellowing.

We sliced the first lemons, clean inside

as the sun at its birth. The first bite hurt,

so we covered them in sugar.

That’s when we saw our painting,

turned so still and sepia.

So we let our brushes rust.

Then it came, that storm vomit.

Our lips cracked, our tongues stung

you did, you are, how could you, I hate that you—

and our sea darkened to ashen purple.

 Rain screamed, shutters flew.

Our painting tilted, the jam jars rattled,

the roof unhinged.

The lemon trees stayed.

We stopped to breathe. I studied you,

your frame outlined in the blinking of a lamp.

I used to trace your soul.

You watched me too, me dripping and wheezing.

Your eyes softened.

We knew what to do.

We smashed them under our feet,

slicing and spraying their sour flesh.

Then we tossed them into the sea.