December 31

Die Sprache…ist wirklich eine kleine Welt in Zeichen und Tönen. Wie der Mensch sie beherrscht, so möchte er gern die große Welt beherrschen, und sich frei darin ausdrücken können. Und eben in dieser Freude, das, was außer der Welt ist, in ihr zu offenbaren, das tun zu können, was eigentlich der ursprüngliche Trieb unsers Daseins ist, liegt der Ursprung der Poesie.

                                                                  --Novalis, Heinrich von Ofterdingen

Christmas Eve

Here is the poem that I was planning to post last Christmas:

December 24th

Across the street, at the tortilla factory,

throughout the morning people leave

with sacks of tamales and nixtamal.

This is the parade of December 24th,

and announces the day with steps

to the seashore of the litany, to chile grinding.

On this day, in another time,

the inns were already filling up,

like hotels and holiday beach resorts.

(This year Christmas falls on a weekend.)

All day, hands will be preparing tamales,

like foot travelers preparing their meal around a fire,

one day away from the world’s destination.

La Virgen de Guadalupe

Mirror and rose,

dark mother and maiden,

stairway and pinnacle,

pray for us.

Your radiance remains

forever before us.

You open the door

to the garden of delight.

Nelly Sachs

Today is the birthday of Nelly Sachs, who brought beauty and transcendence out of unspeakable pain.  All of the wounds she received: her experience of the Holocaust and the terrible mark it left on her, an obsessive fear and anguish that nearly cost her her mind; and the years of solitude and incomprehension that she lived through, along with the continuing loss of friends and loved ones to tragedy—in the end, all of it could only elevate the ultimate meaning and triumph of her art.  In her poetry there is so much indistinctness and depth that her words sometimes seem like the surface of a shadowy well—that both hides, and hints at, a whole cosmos of relations and revelations.  I can think of no other poet who has such laser precision, such rightness in language; she never hits a false note, never loses control.

     Great poet of the tragic century, your voice is absolutely inimitable, but its message is universal, and I am gratefully sealed with its radiance.

Alles beginnt mit der Sehnsucht,

immer ist im Herzen Raum für mehr,

für Schöneres, für Größeres.

—Nelly Sachs

29th Anniversary of the Murder of Anti-Nuclear Activist Norman Mayer

The Ballad of Norman Mayer

Now listen my friends and I’ll tell you a tale

Of a man they called Mayer and one I’ll call friend.

He dared to cry “Life” in the City of Death:

It was there that he met with an untimely end.

Oh, oh, the City of Death,

They build bombs to kill millions but buildings they’ll save,

If you mean to kill millions you’ll be president,

If you’re sane you’re a terrorist down to your grave.

They called him a terrorist, John Brown the same,

All because they stood up and wouldn’t back down.

“Slaves made us rich and the Bomb keeps us safe,”

But they used as a curse the names Mayer and Brown.

Oh, oh, the City of Death,

They have bombs to kill millions but buildings they’ll save.

Police at your door and more endless war,

If you’re sane you’re a terrorist down to your grave.

To Love Is to Step Outside of Fear

To love is to step outside of fear.  So often, fear of “the other” holds us back, fear of being “on the hook” if we open ourselves to others, fear of all of the harsh demands of love: the obligation to care, to forgive, to hope, to believe.  We’re all so afraid of each other!  Fear is death to love.  To meet the obligations of family, community, and society with love is the only way forward.  What we need is a radical carrying of each other’s burdens; relationships based on mutual respect; openness, self-sacrifice, a true sobornost, to use the beautiful Russian Orthodox expression.  Someone has recently contacted me privately and told me respectfully that he finds certain things I have written here “inappropriate.”  He went on to say that he feared that my “weird” opinions might “influence” him, since he had great appreciation for, and agreement with, many of the things I have said.  He also made it clear that he would prefer I answer him “publicly.”

     This is the only answer I can give.  I got mixed up in this whole blogging thing when a trusted writing colleague suggested that I create a place where editors and others could find links to my work.  It was not something I was totally comfortable with, but I certainly enjoyed reading the musings of a few other bloggers and didn’t see much harm in it.  It became a place to express certain feelings, ideas, memories, opinions, and a place to honor people and dates important to me.  Anyone who knows me will not be surprised that there is controversial material here, but it is offered with the best of intentions.  I do not pretend to be a teacher, or an authority of any kind.  Again, those who know me can assure you how absurd a role that would be for me, how completely unsuited I am for it by temperament, lack of education, shyness, etc.  What I have written here is given freely, but no one is under the obligation to accept it.  This is not the type of venue that is conducive to dialogue (deep dialogue, although I do appreciate the occasional comment), and perhaps that is part of the problem.  But even if this is not a forum for adequate dialogue, don’t be afraid of or upset by my words.  I’m really quite harmless, and more than willing to accept that not everything I say deserves equal weight.  Even when dialogue of words is lacking, there can be a cor ad cor loquitur, a dialogue of hearts.   In the end, I truly believe that there is always more that unites than divides us; more in all of us to love than to fear.