October 12, 2008

Today

Today the last outdoor lunch
Under the broad leaf maple –
green-gold leaves littering our deck.
No one stops them.

Today we dug the last of the potatoes,
Pulled the shivering tomato plants
And rescued the pimento shaped
red orange beauties – tonight’s dinner.

The tomatillos we never planted
they just crashed the party
welcome guests but very late
green striped suits with parchment jackets.

Today we walked
the Cedar River Trail
and smiling dogs
with black lips.

The river runs clear
now green, now gold.
puffballs – the river’s fall companion
white delicacy in the grass.

We walk until
it really is too cold.
The cedar fire warms our home
With fragrance and with heat.

Dinner is soft acorn squash,
creamy yellow in a hard green shell
heaped with puff balls,
the pointy red tomatoes on the side.

The cedar fire is banked
Tonight will be first frost.
The black lipped dogs smile,
turn tightly, then sleep.

You start viewing at the top with the Star People and meditate on the mandalas clockwise. Prismacolor.

October 12, 2008

Today

Today the last outdoor lunch
Under the broad leaf maple –
green-gold leaves littering our deck.
No one stops them.

Today we dug the last of the potatoes,
pulled the shivering tomato plants
and rescued the pimento shaped
red orange beauties – tonight’s dinner.

The tomatillos we never planted
they crashed the party
welcome guests but very late arriving with
green striped suits and parchment jackets.

Today we walked
the Cedar River Trail
and smiling dogs
with black lips.

The Cedar River runs clear
now green, now gold.
Puffballs – the river’s fall companion
white delicacy in the grass.

We walk until
it really is too cold.
Inside the cedar fire warms our home
with fragrance and with heat.

Dinner is soft acorn squash,
creamy yellow in a hard green shell
heaped with puff balls,
the pointy red tomatoes on the side.

The cedar fire is banked
Tonight will be first frost.
The black lipped dogs smile,
turn tightly, then sleep.

We could call this, The Day Kendall Found A Magical Pool at the very top of a razor ridge. She was walking carefully, placing her feet and looking down. The rock face on one side, a mountain face dropping, dropping on the other. A tiny pool in a crevice at the side of a mountain goat trail. She spotted what I am reasonably sure few adults would have the eyesight to see – crystals scattered like diamonds under a foot of water, in the deep shadow of the undercut cliff face. “Grandma, grandma, come here! Look at this!” The almost 11 year old hand opened to show me pure white dazzling crystals, the size of almonds. I doubt she could have been more excited if they were diamonds rather than quartz crystals.

So there we were, rock hounding on the edge of the world. The Cascades spread out in a 360 degree panorama, one range in etched relief with jagged black mountains glazed with the first white snow. The guy with the rock hammer pulled out sample after sample – chunks of volcanic rock embedded with swaths of crystals. The man thought about how exciting it would be to take them to the next rock club meeting. The little girl, how thrilling to show her geologist father and the best ever new specimen to add to her rock collection. I can relate. I think of another time, another curly headed dark haired little girl with a passion for rocks. It must be the DNA.

When I Was a Child

When I was a child
The early autumn moon rose like a Silver Fox
Over the distant black cliffs
Of the Columbia Plateau.
Down in our Wenatchee Valley
So many apples fell to the ground:
Winesaps and Winter Bananas,
Red and Golden Delicious,
Jonathans and MacIntosh–
Every May blossom
A handful of late summer crunch
Juice from every petal,
Every grain of pollen to the hive.
Up on the Plateau
The unresisting wheat
Broke like surf behind
The combine’s simpler blade.

Silver Fox, you
Who run backwards through time, tell me
Of this year’s fruit,
The bushel yield of grain.
What have you learned
From that old river of myth and blood,
Apples and wheat,
River of snowmelt and memory?

–Sandy Jensen
10-08-08

This awkward hybrid animal lumbers forward on flippers, has a beakful of fire and is loaded with people,stories, masks, dances, songs and all the unformed future of the school year to come.

Mandala for My Novel
The school year crowds forward and my creative projects have to take a back seat. Here are the elements of my novel whirling inside its own soulmap.

And here is a poem written in the form called an apostrophe in which the poet addresses something or someone directly in poetry. In this case, I am addressing my inner creative aspect, also known as the Secret Partner, or the Wonderful One Within, or the Muse in most ancient times.

To Be Worthy

Muse of all Muses, my musing Dzonoqua,
Sleepy giantess, you stand like a cedar
In the cedar shadows, swaying
In your endless dream.
I cavort inside the fire’s light,
Cut capers, pass my hat:
Money for the monkey.

Sometimes you flare awake,
And I see your sunken eye pits
Whirl with stars, suns,
The slow cold spiral of distant galaxies.
I have seen you turn away and run,
Remembering your rich lodge
Hung with furs and fossils,
Basement caves and crystals,
The lost bears in the hot mist
Rising at the far end
Of your home meadow.

And I have followed you there,
Although there were times you captured me with a gesture
Beckoning me near,
My cautious approach,
Fire warmth dimming on my backside,
Then your thick, black fingers
Like beaver’s leathery paws
Closing on my shoulders,
Lifting me like a recalcitrant child,
Popping me in your burden basket with a smack
Of your bright red lips.
Jostled, scraped, bleeding,
I have been muted by your distances,
Unlocked finally, tumbled
Foolishly down among your riches,
One more toy on the floor.
I have seen the chief’s wealth you guard.
You have dressed me in my miniature
Button blanket set the cedar bark wreath
Upon my unruly curls: You have fed me
Wilderness in a stew of venison and drums.

Dzonoqua, you have tried to teach me that song
As the crying wild geese passed over and I have stood
And sung after them, understanding for a stanza
My place in the family of all who tell the story, wear the mask,
Dance the song.
Dzonquah, giantess, my captor and keeper:
Twist my wire arms and let them hold
Your necklace of shining pitch.

–Sandy Jensen

The Wraith From the Gray Mist brings an armful of good things- hope, peace, joy, eroticism, playfulness to encourage people on planet earth. I just spent the last few days at a plein air paint out on Whidbey Island, WA. A gorgeous place, perfect weather and a fun event. Whidbey is near Seattle but very far away- it seems 50 years back in time. In spite of idylic circumstances – in my gut I was aware of the massive changes in our country and around the world. Banks collapsing, extensive loss of life due to war and weather; an overall undercurrent of fear and unease worldwide.

The perfect Indian summer sun could not keep away the grayness in my belly, not just for myself – I was fine, but even without seeing the news I knew that I was near the site of a recent shooting where six people died. I was also near the location of the death of a family member, just last week.

My daughter was born on Whidbey Island, and her birth was a win for Life. Her grandfather came over from Norway and was born on a boat just off the coast of Whidbey Island. I have deep history there. The armful of happiness and joy delivered by the wraith from the gray mist is most welcome. She can visit anytime.

Because of my ongoing love affair with eastern Oregon, I have many sketches of Mt. Bachelor so I am pretty familiar with the mountain. This color sketch took awhile. I worked away on it, head down, well into the early trance state of flow that happens when art is going well.

I looked up to see a solid dark shadow. a distinct band across the mountain. I looked at the sky and only the lightest wispy clouds appeared- certainly nothing to create a heavy solid shadow form. I watched without blinking for at least 40 seconds. The dark line remained long enough me to quickly add it to my sketch, then the shadow slowly dissolved and was completely gone. I cannot explain it.

Dark Angel is a new ally and I had to inquire if he/she was friend or foe. She assured me that she is friend and she is waving a colorful cape, trying to get my attention. I quizzed her with automatic writing, trying to get some idea of what she wants. She advised me to start paying more attention to my allies and asking them for advice and support more often. She does have something to say, but not yet. Her answer was: stay tuned and pay attention to Life. It is always hinting, giving me clues.

I am glad she is on my side!

Lately I am reading Haruki Murakami’s work and the most current is After Dark. I cannot explain why this odd scribble drawing emerged as a skateboarder from that story. The novel does not introduce this character, so obviously I am making it up on my own. He seems to belong in the disturbing, strange atmosphere of darkness and detail created by Murakami. I was referring to work like After Dark and the Wind Up Bird Chronicle as Japanese Magical Realism. But they refer to fiction as weird as this as Slipstream. It is not sci-fi, it is not magical realism, it is slipstream, broadly defined as the fiction of strangeness.