beach song

To discover a poet

ON THE PIER
by Brenda Hillman

I'd like to walk out on ignorance like this,

long and brown like the ignorance of myself,

see water shimmer and jump,

see the birds find something they could accept.

I would be voicelessly condemned, a bad

sailor walking the plank, hearing the boards

cry out like the boards of an old desk,

slightly gaping, wet with a collection of mornings.

And the end of the pier, at the end of this ignorance,

I'd celebrate, The sea, like many wine glasses

tipped, "Here's to you--you know nothing at all!"

And birds crashing--white gloves, in applause!

Lately I have been hearing the long stretched out call of unclaimed experience; to act, to be a little bit braver, to be a lot braver.  There is so much fear in art. The water is so cold, that first dip, the feeling that rushes into the clammy solace you find in hiding.  Where if you stay, you might be okay, you might see a little sunlight darting onto the wall from the shimmering water where you ought to be, you might just smile at the view with the consolation of tomorrow. And an amount of time will pass, an hour or a year or even many years,  when the poet in you, the lover in you must suddenly rise and do what it needs to do, to come alive and to create, to love the way you are meant to love.

I could be content reading Mary Oliver poems for the rest of my life, but even she would say that one who would write poetry, must also read poetry, and a lot of it. This morning I discovered the poet Brenda Hillman on everyskinnytree, a blog whose author is a poet herself, and a lover of children. The post included her poem A Dwelling, which speaks so pointedly to the poet, to that place of trembling.

on bonding with tools

My earliest memory of working with tools was going into my Grandpa's workspace when I was a little girl and playing with several of his vice grips.  I just loved putting a scrap of wood between the metal teeth and turning the handle until the wood was held tight, always amazed that the wood would not drop!  My brother and I must have looked like some kind of elves, picking up tools we had no idea what to do with and pretending we were master artisans, even if we were just hammering two blocks of wood together. Something about that space filled me with so much awe, it was part of a strange and wonderful new world we had found ourselves in that I only recall at the time as being warm. I knew so little of the violence that my mother had escaped to bring us there, how brave she had been, what shelter she had found for us all. Lately I have been missing my Grandpa so much, his suspenders, his working boots, the thousands of memories I have of him working with his hands, whether he was building a barn or a fence or crafting a wooden marble maze. This here tire swing is the result of a typical rainy afternoon. He never made us go away when we hovered nearby with so many questions, but would give us something to do. And in the house which he built he incorporated features which I am convinced were purely for children, like a laundry shoot from the upstairs bathroom, perfect for throwing down strips of toilet paper, and the opening in the wall right by the doorway where Grandpa would place firewood,  which opened on the other side into the living room right next to the fire. Of course it was really meant to be a spy hole.  My favorite hiding space was a rounded curve between two stairwells, where I would lean as I parked my keester on the cold granite rock floor, and poke the legs of my Uncle who would readily oblige with horrible shock. My grandmother I'm sure either laughed or rolled her eyes when she found who knows how many mysterious pieces of TP in the laundry basket down in the basement, but she never scolded us. These days my Grandpa's health does not allow him to spend as much time being as "active" as he likes to call it, though one day lying on the couch is about as much torture as he allows himself to handle.  As for me, I would just like to gather my own set of tools without heading down some dreaded and impersonal mass production aisle.  This here video featuring the Liberty Tool store in Maine gives me some motivation.  Mr. "Skip" Brack is the kind of proprietor I wish I could meet, so far away from my Grandpa's advice.


There's No Place Like Here: Liberty Tool from Etsy on Vimeo.