July 13: "Breathless," Sid, Calumet

Billy Collins contemplates his death . . .

Breathless

by: Billy Collins

Some like the mountains, some like the seashore,

Jean-Paul Belmondo says

to the camera in the opening scene.

Some like to sleep face up,

some like to sleep on their stomachs,

I am thinking here in bed--

some take the shape of murder victims

flat on their backs all night,

others float face down on the dark waters.

There there are those like me

who prefer to sleep on their sides,

knees brought up to the chest,

head resting on a crooked arm

and a soft fist touching the chin,

which is the way I would like to be buried,

curled up in a coffin

in a fresh pair of cotton pajamas,

a down pillow under my weighty head.

After a lifetime of watchfulness

and nervous vigilance,

I will be more than ready for sleep,

so never mind the dark suit,

the ridiculous tie

and the pale limp hands crossed on the chest.

Lower me down in my slumber,

tucked into myself

like the oldest fetus on earth,

and while cows look over the stone wall

of the cemetery, let me rest here

in my earthy little bedroom,

my lashes glazed with ice,

the roots of trees inching nearer,

and no dreams to frighten me anymore.

This admission may or may not shock you:  I think about death.  A lot.  In the last nine or so years, death has been a frequent visitor in my life.  I should know death's first name, but I don't.  So I will assign death a name:  Sid.

I've been close to Sid a few times in my life, due to my diabetes.  When I have an extremely low blood sugar, I experience a kind of slowing down, as if the world is a motion picture going by one slow frame at a time, so that I can study each one in intimate detail.  It's not frightening or traumatic.  It's also not comforting or warm.  Sid doesn't come as the Grim Reaper, but Sid also doesn't come as a long lost relative.

It's been a long day of rehearsing and performing in Calumet.  Spent the morning writing and rewriting scripts and sketches.  The afternoon, practicing and rewriting some more.  The evening, acting and singing and reciting poetry.  It was stressful, but I was surrounded by people I care about deeply.  

Now, I'm Sid-tired.  I just had the rest of my meatball sub for dinner and watched an episode of Portrait Artist of the Year.  Once I'm done typing this blog post, I will be going to bed.  (Isn't sleep just practice for when Sid comes calling?)

I guess I would be remiss if I didn't mention that Sid tried to take out Donald Trump tonight, but failed.  (Among other things, this blog is also a way of recording notable historical events and my reactions to them.)  Everyone knows I'm not a fan of Trump.  However, I'm not sure if somebody killing the former Insurrectionist and Chief is the best way to dispel the MAGA brand of insanity that has plagued the United States since before the plague of COVID.  (By the way, Sid did take Richard Simmons and Dr. Ruth in the last couple days.  He's been busy.)

I don't have any profound piece of wisdom to pass on tonight, about Sid or politics or poetry.  I'm tired, and I have a long day of travel tomorrow.

Saint Marty just hopes Sid takes the rest of the weekend off.  

June 21: "The Exception," Visual Art, "Poetry Versus Watercolor"

Billy Collins works on a poem . . . 

The Exception

by: Billy Collins

Whoever said

there's a poem

lurking in the darkness

of every pencil

was not thinking of this one.

I rarely write with pencils.  Anybody paging through my journal will note that I write with fountain pens almost exclusively.  I like the way the ink flows so easily, how dark it sits on the page.  One of my best friends, who is a Methodist pastor, turned me on to fountain pens.  (He also turned me on to Moleskine journals, but that obsession is the topic for another post.)

Not many people know that I also dabble in visual arts.  Mostly pencil and ink sketches.  In no way am I a gifted artist.  I'm passable.  That's about it.  And I can go for months without doodling or sketching.  So it's not a passion.  It's simply something that quiets my mind and, at times, heart.

On the flipside, I have to write every day.  I don't feel complete if I go an entire 24 hours without committing words to page (or screen).  That's one of the reasons I have a blog--it keeps my writing muscles in shape.  I will never introduce myself to a stranger as an artist.  However, I have no problem identifying myself as a poet.

Recently, because I've been watching two British television programs focused on art (Portrait Artist of the Year and Landscape Artist of the Year), I've been feeling the urge to pick up my pen and colored pencils again.  I do get a lot of pleasure creating visual images.  My thoughts settle when I'm sketching, and I experience a sense of peace.  (I don't experience this state when I'm working on a poem.  My mind remains fully engaged when I write.)

I do have lots of really good art supplies to draw with.  Think of me as a person who owns all kinds of fancy fly fishing gear but is, at best, a mediocre fly fisher.  Anyway, I have a tin of colored pencils that came with a paintbrush.  So, I use these pencils to create the illusion of watercolors.  I sketch and then use the brush and some water to wash the image.  I love the effect, but it wrecks the hell out of my journal, warping pages and smudging/smearing/obscuring words I've written (with my fountain pen, of course).

Today, I decided to use this watercolor sketching technique to draw a jellyfish.  It was going well until I introduced the brush and water.  Suddenly, everything started dissolving before my eyes--image and words and lines.  I ended up with an adequate jellyfish and a black puddle that used to be a poem.

From now own, Saint Marty is sticking with words to capture jellyfish.

Poetry Versus Watercolor

by: Martin Achatz

Paint bled all over

my journal pages--

pink, purple, blue

pooled like a beached

jellyfish, washing away

a poem I'd written.  Maybe

those lost words will drift

across the Atlantic

to the shores of Galway

where a beachcomber

will find them, take them

home, polish them 

into a limerick.

May 30: "Avoidance," Introvert Day, "Expressionism"

Billy Collins tries not to be seen . . . 

Avoidance

by: Billy Collins

When I saw him

walking toward me in the city,

I stopped and looked in the window

of a store that had closed.

Turned out, it was only 

someone who looked like him,

but all the way home, I wondered

where in the world he could possibly be.

I understand what Collins is doing in this poem.  There are times when I simply do not have the energy for human interaction.  I call them my introvert days.  (Believe it or not, I am an introvert.  While I can and do socialize with large groups of people, I am usually drained to silence by such interactions.  I have to hibernate for a while afterward.)

I had an introvert day today.  Pretty much, I holed up in my office at the library and worked on my computer for about nine or ten hours, with a few breaks to chat with good friends who stopped by.  I needed to recharge my peopling battery.  Now, I'm sitting in my dark living room, typing this post, enjoying the silence.  

One of my recent guilty pleasures is watching a British show called Portrait Artist of the Year at night.  Basically, every episode consists of nine amateur and/or professional artists who paint famous peoples' portraits for four hours.  After they are done painting, three judges tear their work apart and choose a winner.  I watch this show alone because my wife thinks it's as dull as . . . well, watching paint dry, and my son is gaming online with his friends.  So it's another way for me simply to be still and enjoy myself.

DIGRESSION:  In a lot of ways, I think painting and writing poetry are very similar.  It's all about creating or arresting moments in time.  Artists do it with paints and pencils and pastels.  Poets do it with words.  Perhaps that's why I enjoy this show so much--I get to witness the creation of something artistically beautiful.  And I've been a amateur art enthusiast most of my life, Andrew Wyeth, Claude Monet, and Vincent van Gogh being my three favorite painters.

Hopefully, by tomorrow, Saint Marty will be ready to rejoin humanity.  Until then, it's British painters and darkness.

Expressionism

by: Martin Achatz

My uncle never sold

any of his landscapes,

gave them away as

birthday and wedding gifts

instead.  As far as I know,

he also never shaved off

his ear to give my aunt

on their anniversary.