Roped in

"...it is too easy to get lost in abstraction,
as if smoke, and dream, and quantum ersatz-states
are our proper environment..."

From "Stomackes" by Albert Goldbarth


***

Back to making more fruitcakes today (how could I have run out of butter?) and the regular chores and stuff.

No more wandering for pixels until next weekend -- I need to keep an edge on that appetite.

Master lock

"A lock of hair from a famous seventeenth-century poet.
The disintegrating bible wishing it was another book."

From "Adult" by Ray Gonzalez

Hill Country enso

"... It’s not that the angle
of reflection equals the angle of incidence,
but there’s exultation, pleasure, distress, death, love. ..."

From "Streamers" by Arthur Sze

***

And how to translate a few hours spent wandering here, picking up some goodness to take home after sitting elbow-to-elbow with happy, red-cheeked strangers at a shrine to smoked and honored meat?

No real way to do so, except to share a little of what I saw: above, and to come.

Thanksgiving

"...Leon Battista Alberti says,
Some lights are from stars, some from the sun
And moon, and other lights are from fires.
The light from the stars makes the shadow equal to the body. ..."

From "A Short History of the Shadow" by Charles Wright

***

Hey, all y'all! I'm back, sort of!
Happy Thanksgiving for those who are celebrating.
I have a lot to be thankful for, including you.

Here's what I've been doing:
* Too much work-work -- multiple conferences with significant time commitments and more work after.
* In all my spare time, school-work -- I'm now saturated with Nicholas Hilliard and the circle of poets around Sir Philip Sidney; I am in the finishing/polishing stages on the big paper, and made what I think is a pretty interesting case. However, others will be the judge of that.
* Lining up the next independent study -- am hopeful it will be on art historiography (try to say that three times fast!)

Had to give up Italian lessons for now. Just not enough time to study as much as I'd need amid plumbing mishaps, a random virus or two, and the Press of Commerce.

And so, finally, happily, I got out with my camera today. Snagged eight images and then the !@#$%! battery ran down, and my spare was devoid of juice. I took it as metaphor: Nature's way of telling me to go home, nap some more, and get teased by the hubbie for not checking my gear before I went.

More to come...

Was here

"...fold
and turn the paper,
guiding the scissors with care..."

From "Four and a Half Dancing Men" by Anne Stevenson

Slow posting again

The Excuses for No New Pix:

1. The Business Trip -- Two and one-half full days in San Mateo; productive, but not of art.
2. The Plumbing Excitement -- Just before The Business Trip, my bare feet told me our carpeting was wet. Fortunately, the good new plumbers we found helped quickly, but still.
3. The Press of Commerce -- Work work work work work.
4. The Academic Path -- Writing, researching and getting prepped for presentations at TEMA and Kalamazoo (woo-hoo!!!)
5. The Italian lessons -- troppo studio.
6. And so, no time out for wandering.

Ajar

"...The late afternoon tugs
At a gold thread you can hear fraying
When you close your eyes..."

From "Angels Grieving over the Dead Christ" by Gjertrud Schnackenberg


***

Random bits: First, still getting energy back post-surgery, but recovery has been fine and on track, as are my Italian lessons. Last, thanks for stopping by.

Burn ban

"...those hitchhikers,
burning by the side of the road,
burning
like the berries of the beautiful mountain ash..."

From "The Hitchhikers" by Diane Wakoski

Vault

"...And at the still center
of summer it starts; cowboys ride out out
of another life, old cars get up
from the dead and dance
like cripples hired out for a tent meeting. ..."

From "The Delta Parade" by Susan Stewart

Frostie

"...All night I wander alone, searching in vain for the irretrievable.

In the night I will drink from a cup of ashes and yellow paint. ..."

From "Nights on Planet Earth" by Campbell McGrath

***

First full week back at the office (whew), and now need to get caught up on schoolwork. Oh yes, also reaching out for Italian tutoring, among other bits of trouble-making.

If I'm not too punk tomorrow, will wander some with a camera in hand. (Yay! Fresh pixels!)

Worn ol' sun

"All our stones like as much sun as possible.
Along their joints run both solar access and decline
In equal splendor..."

From "Forecast" by Josephine Miles

Behind the shed

"...The opera of. Hummingbirds. MOVE,
an optimum crow and spider sparkle newly. ..."

From "Many Colored Squares" by Philip Whalen

***

Move? A little slow and difficult post-surgery, but we do what we can. Hope all y'all like the free stuff I found.

Dreams with bees

"...The last memory I have
Is of a flower that cannot be touched,

Through the bloom of which, all day,
Fly crazed, missing bees. ..."

From "Flower Herding on Mount Monadnock" by Galway Kinnell

***

I have had at least two recent dreams with bees in them.
I'm going in for some surgery Tuesday, and will come back and post as soon as I can. Stay well and happy, and thanks for stopping by!

Flower ladder

"...Nor do I like the mathematicians who tell me
I cannot say, 'The zinnias are counting on their
fingers'..."

From "My Dog Practices Geometry" by Cathryn Essinger

Mid-summer

"...isn’t it so
we’re merely vessels given in grace, in mystery,
just a little while, our fleet streaked moments?..."

From "Rivers into Seas" by Lynda Hull

Support

"...Somewhere in Oceania they added mermaid elves."

From "Finnish Opera" by Barbara Guest

Bardo

Artwork by Max Gimblett
Australia by Moonlight, 2004
22 x 30"
Pencil, acrylic polymer, Swiss gold leaf / Arches watercolor paper

***

Resorted to someone else's creative energy since I am flat out of fresh pix and running on fumes.

In this in-between-seeing-and-catching time, here's what's on my preoccupied mind:
Hubbie's post-surgical recovery.
The subject of my Fall schoolwork.
Tattoos, and tattoos that aren't tattoos.
Work work, and being behind thereof.
Hopefully visiting a New York friend who has a song by these guys for a ring-tone.
My upcoming surgery.

If all is well at Chez Witzel today, I may go wander tomorrow. Meanwhile, we're all going back down for naps.

P.S.: A shout-out to those krazy kids who've posted Birthday Greetings on my seldom-seen Facebook Wall. You all made me smile!

Framing

"...its shell as rusty
as a camp dish,
as fragile as a pagoda
on a stone..."

From "Letter Written on a Ferry While Crossing Long Island Sound" by Anne Sexton

***

Back from the biz trip, and foo -- caught a summer cold. Lost my voice during Day Two of the trade show (or rather, gained a weirdly squeaky croak.) Still feeling punk, although drinking ginger tea and petting the cats helps.

I'm glad you stopped by, but don't get too close -- I might sneeze, and I'd hate for you to catch what I have.

Here and there

"...The map in the shopping center has an X
signed 'you are here.' A dream is like that. ..."

From "A Happy Childhood" by William Matthews


***

It hasn't rained, but I did have a splendid Saturday involving a long-time friend, some ancho-blackberry jam, and BBQ at this place.

Too much for my friend and I to talk about, to stand under the white-hot sky and look for things my camera would like to snack on. (Sometimes things are for the looking and not the catching.)

Another business trip this week and more family health matters to wrangle, but there's jam in the fridge reminding me of happy things.

Ice cream later

"...The fourth child wonders: What makes poems poems?
The fifth one asks: Which of them is your favorite?
The sixth one asks me: Is there ice cream later?
The seventh child asks: Is a poem dreaming?..."

From "Reading to the Children" by Herbert Morris