October 15: "This Little Piggy Went to Market," Snow, Mysteries

I woke this morning to snow coming down in my neck of the woods.  That's right.  S. N. O. W.  

It didn't last long or stick to the ground.  Yet, driving to work, my headlight beams were confused with a sleety not-quite-rain.  Of course, I know it's coming.  I've lived in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan almost my entire life.  I can remember only one Halloween that didn't require boots and a winter jacket.

Yet, I was still unprepared for this little taste of winter.  If I were younger, I would have been excited.  Since I'm not younger, I used some very colorful language this morning, and it wasn't a nursery rhyme. 

Billy Collins takes on Mother Goose . . . 

This Little Piggy Went to Market

by: Billy Collins

is the usual thing to say when you begin
pulling on the toes of a small child,
and I have never had a problem with that.
I could easily picture the piggy with his basket
and his trotters kicking up the dust on an imaginary road.

What always stopped me in my tracks was
the middle toe--this little piggy ate roast beef.
I mean I enjoy a roast beef sandwich
with lettuce and tomato and a dollop of horseradish,
but I cannot see a pig ordering that in a delicatessen.

I am probably being too literal-minded here--
I am even wondering why it's called "horseradish."
I should just go along with the beautiful nonsense
of the nursery, float downstream on its waters.
After all, Little Jack Horner speaks to me deeply.

I don't want to be the one to ruin the children's party
by asking unnecessary questions about Puss in Boots
or, again, the implications of a pig eating beef.
By the way, I am completely down with going
"Wee wee wee" all the way home,
having done that many times and knowing exactly how it feels.

Some things just don't make sense.  Billy Collins has issues with "This Little Piggy."  He doesn't understand the third little piggy eating roast beef.  I've always thought the poem is about pigs being fattened up for slaughter.  Maybe it is.  I don't know.  

But not understanding something doesn't preclude you from enjoying it.  I don't understand how a combustion engine works, but I still drive a car.  I don't totally get the ending of 2001:  A Space Odyssey, but I still teach the movie.  I don't understand Trump supporters, but . . . Okay, there's nothing to enjoy about Trump supporters.

I went for a walk with my wife when I got home this evening.  It was cold--the kind of cold where you can taste winter in the air.  An almost full moon was in the sky, and the trees on my street were every shade of orange and yellow.  I can't say we went "Wee wee wee" all the way home, but we did watch the sun set and stars begin to wink on one-by-one.

I didn't study physics in college.  Or astronomy.  But I still love auroras and meteor showers and comets and eclipses.  Walking hand-in-hand with my wife down the street, with the moon rising above us, is a wonderful mystery of love and gravity and attraction.  Two bodies drawn into each other's orbits.

Oh, and Saint Marty thinks the moon was pretty cool, too.

May 19: "Mysteries, Yes," Astonishment, Agonal Breathing

Mary Oliver prefers mystery . . . 

Mysteries, Yes

by:  Mary Oliver

Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous

     to be understood.

How grass can be nourishing in the

     mouths of the lambs.

How rivers and stones are forever

     in allegiance with gravity

          while we ourselves dream of rising.

How two hands touch and the bonds will

     never be broken.

How people come, from delight or the

     scars of damage,

to the comfort of a poem.

Let me keep my distance, always, from those

     who think they have the answers.

Let me keep company always with those who say

     "Look!" and laugh in astonishment

     and bow their heads.

This poem is all about choosing astonishment over answers.  Oliver distrusts people who have the kind of self assurance that leaves no room for mystery.  Think about the first time someone told you that Santa wasn't real.  It may have been your mother or father, but, more likely, it was a friend/classmate/peer who was trying to make you feel childish and stupid.  Who was trying to assert some power over you.

People who have all the answers bore me at the very least and piss me off  in the extreme.  Don't give me the science of light and refractions and atmospheres if I comment on the brilliant blue of the sky.  Tell me that you can see your father's eyes looking down on you from above.  If I'm sitting in a hospital room with my dying sister, I'm not interested in the biology of agonal breathing.  I want to hold her hand and tell her that mom and dad are waiting for her.

Mystery is more comforting.  Mystery helps us live with the unanswerable and frightening.  I think that's why I ended up becoming a poet instead of a computer programmer.  You may be surprised to know that I have undergraduate minors in math and computer science.  Four credits away from a BA in computer science.  I took classes in abstract algebra and calculus, artificial intelligence and computer graphic design.  I could write a line of code with the best of 'em.

However, I finally realized--after about four years of classes and a nervous breakdown (literally)--that I didn't need to know all the answers.  I preferred to be dumbfounded on a midnight beach by Lake Superior under a curtain of auroras than reading about electrically charged particles entering the Earth's thermosphere at very high speeds.  Mystery over the mundane.  Poetry over Pascal.

I have never regretted this decision.  To this day, I prefer moments of breathless wonder versus news about Marjorie Taylor Greene's latest display of stupidity and bigotry.  That's doesn't mean I live in ignorance.  That means my life is made richer when grace enters into the equation.

Poetry does that for me.  Reading poetry.  Writing poetry.  Listening to poetry.  Grace and grace and grace.  For other people, it's music or visual art or theater or novels that do the trick.  Some people even find grace in mathematics.  Here's the thing, though, whatever the source of grace:  it isn't about answering questions.  Grace is about being human in the rubble of the world.

Saint Marty doesn't have all the answers, and he's okay with that, as long as there's a poem by Sharon Olds or Mary Oliver close by.

April 6: Love and Joy, Psalm 29, Curse of Change

Well, I changed the poem from yesterday.  If you read my post yesterday, "Psalm 28" is now different.  Haiku is not a form I've worked with very much.  I understand compression and simplicity.  However, haiku is also about sound and rhythm.  All those things are supposed to congeal into this one moment of breathlessness.  I love haiku.  Admire haiku.  I'm just not very confident in my ability to compose haiku.  Of course, you're going to have to be the judge.

Tonight, my wife is working the afternoon shift at her new job for the first time.  She was hired to work afternoons, so it's something to which we're going to have to adjust.  It really complicates evenings.  For example, tonight, we had to hire a babysitter so that I could go to choir and band practice at church.  My wife works until 11:30 p.m. or so.  We're not even sure at the moment that this new job is even worth it.  We're definitely having to pay out a lot more money in daycare.  Now don't get me wrong.  I'm not some kind of male pig who wants his wife to stay barefoot and pregnant, cooking the cow I bring home at night.  That's not me.  It's just a matter of the job paying for itself and some of our bills, as well.  The jury is still out.  It's what I call the curse of change.  Change happens, and sometimes it works out.  Often times it doesn't, in my experience.

Today's psalm continues down the path I started yesterday.  Psalm 28 was based on the Mysteries of Joy from the Catholic rosary.  Psalm 29 is based on the Mysteries of Light.  The Mysteries of Light deal with the life of Christ.  They are:
1)  The Baptism of Our Lord by John the Baptist
2)  The First Miracle of Jesus at the Wedding of Cana
3)  The Proclamation of the Kingdom of Heaven
4)  The Transfiguration
5)  The Institution of the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist
I chose to make all of the haiku based on these mysteries into love poems.  I think they hold together well.  There's just something about connecting light and love and joy that really works for me.  I'm enjoying this test of my poetic abilities.  It's making me stretch and think a little more.

Tomorrow's mysteries are the Mysteries of Sorrow.  Obviously, there will be a drastic change in mood from the previous poems.

Speaking of moods, in my Good Books class today, I found myself talking about hope.  We've just finished reading The Road, and the question I posed to my students was about the conclusion of the novel.  I asked them if they thought the ending was ultimately hopeful or hopeless.  This question led into a discussion of hope in the abstract.  I told them that we all live for hope.  College students go to class in the hope of passing.  They go to college in the hope of getting a degree.  They get a degree in the hope of getting a job.  They get a job in the hope of making some money.  They make some money in the hope of having a nice life.  You get the idea.  Each and every day of a person's life is an exercise in hope.  I left class in a really good mood.

Saint Marty is full of hope today, and he hopes everyone has some joy and love in their lives tonight.

Psalm 29:  Mysteries of Light

1.  Baptism
She bathes
With cherry blossom soap
Pure, white milk

2.  First Miracle
I eat strawberries
Their tender flesh, their seeds
Wedding night

3.  Proclamation
Neruda at dusk
Whispers in his wife's ear
Holy sin

4.  Transfiguration
Kiss her fingers
Feel her breath
Transforming touch

5.  Eucharist
Her body
Given up for me
Sweet, sweet sacrifice

Mystery of Love