It will always be three days of rain at the Golden Dolphin Motel in Brigantine, New Jersey. I think they played cards, or perhaps a board game. Perhaps Scrabble, although I would have remembered that because of my love of words.
My mother's pack of Viceroys, perhaps by then cozily tucked in its Robin's egg blue vinyl holder with the tiny kangaroo pouch on one side for her lighter, purred at her elbow with her cocktail, sweating on a lazy square of paper towel. The ashtrays were marbeled plastic cups the color of dog's droppings—never the wonderful tartan sand bags of an earlier period, which my mother conscripted into duty when the ball bearings in her car ashtray shot out at her one day, as if the dashboard were spitting them. Her lucklessness with spray cans and folding chairs and cars was the greatest source of her story-telling, and she collected and curated each episode, embellishing it in the retelling with genuine good humor and a kind of grace that made her—even as the butt of the joke—seem more attractive.
May 27, 2012
April 16, 2012
First Hot Day
The dogs cling to the kitchen floor, their forearms and chins flattened down, like a spinning carnival ride. Indoors, nature fails the animals, and their useless instincts send them under chairs and low tables, airless and dusty. Only the paunchy bees are happy, loitering in the air around the wooden gate, friendly as drunks. The ceaseless fan, the windows opened all the way, make the dining room feel like public space: a classroom, a Sunday School picnic pavilion, a limestone cave with a plate rail.
Summer is too early. The rainy, gothic days of April never came, yet May is weeks away. We who are older remember weather that never happened. The world never did go right—my mother in 1967 opening the trailer door as she cooked Christmas dinner. The Easter snow storms and chilly July swimming of my childhood—the selfishness and perversity of dead people who were, at one time, 40. The atmosphere will always be wild, and young. But we will remember a more seasonal time, as our instincts mislead us.
Summer is too early. The rainy, gothic days of April never came, yet May is weeks away. We who are older remember weather that never happened. The world never did go right—my mother in 1967 opening the trailer door as she cooked Christmas dinner. The Easter snow storms and chilly July swimming of my childhood—the selfishness and perversity of dead people who were, at one time, 40. The atmosphere will always be wild, and young. But we will remember a more seasonal time, as our instincts mislead us.
March 27, 2012
Liquor Store Walk
Liquor store walk! A big letter "C": two blocks over, eight blocks up, and two over again.
Today I reached across a chain-link fence and pulled a newly-opened wisteria to my face. No smell. Later, balanced on a slender branch that seemed to have no source, a single fist of lilac punched through the underbrush of a neglected yard. The encounter was like a sudden meeting between old friends, as I stooped to inhale the distillation, cupping the blossom in both my hands as my mother did my face.
Advancing up the street, past the little front lawns like vernal bath mats, the boxy side porches with their out of season chairs huddled together for warmth, everything in its right place but more sharp-edged in the cooler, fresher air of this last March week, my body unfolded in the walk like a swimmer's legs and arms open to caress the sea.
Warming up, my muscles slowly reclaimed my wounded mind, subsumed it—lovingly, as a mother puts a bowl of soup down in front of a young son—restored order among the sensations, a hierarchy of personal survival. A temporary end to pain.
A cheerful walk.
Today I reached across a chain-link fence and pulled a newly-opened wisteria to my face. No smell. Later, balanced on a slender branch that seemed to have no source, a single fist of lilac punched through the underbrush of a neglected yard. The encounter was like a sudden meeting between old friends, as I stooped to inhale the distillation, cupping the blossom in both my hands as my mother did my face.
Advancing up the street, past the little front lawns like vernal bath mats, the boxy side porches with their out of season chairs huddled together for warmth, everything in its right place but more sharp-edged in the cooler, fresher air of this last March week, my body unfolded in the walk like a swimmer's legs and arms open to caress the sea.
Warming up, my muscles slowly reclaimed my wounded mind, subsumed it—lovingly, as a mother puts a bowl of soup down in front of a young son—restored order among the sensations, a hierarchy of personal survival. A temporary end to pain.
A cheerful walk.
February 18, 2012
Pym on a Saturday Morning
Pym is in the yard, in the bright February sun, looking up to the porch with a gentle rebuke for the wasted booty—all the hydrangea branches and the peanut shells that failed to compost—he must enjoy alone. He sits like a sparkling pin affixed with a jaunty angle on a gown of moss and raw umber. His effect is to heighten, to focus.
His is the worst kind of loneliness: pleasure that is not shared. He returns again and again to the ground, always finding something to lift with his mouth and toss into the air. Even Franklin naps inside a trapezoid of sunlight on the kitchen floor. We all ignore his bliss.
His is the worst kind of loneliness: pleasure that is not shared. He returns again and again to the ground, always finding something to lift with his mouth and toss into the air. Even Franklin naps inside a trapezoid of sunlight on the kitchen floor. We all ignore his bliss.
February 3, 2012
Windex Etude
My mother had to have the radio on.
It popped out of her luggage before the Sea Breeze, when we traveled.
She entered any room as a surgeon or a teacher might have, her hands always busy pinching and shaping the space, modeling the clay into a stylish bust—a perfect room. Music and ashtrays. Milk glass candy dishes and plastic flowers. Side tables and throw pillows.
She progressed across the floor picking up dirt, bent like the Negroes in old plantation photographs. I remember her in white cotton pullovers, the sleeves jacked tightly up her forearms—the better to accommodate scouring the bathroom sink.
Her slippers, always parked beneath her silvery velour swivel chair, napped the weekday afternoons away like a pair of cats. The placement of her cigarette pack and lighter had an enviable formality—a neat, happy decision: a couplet.
She wipes the phone receiver, flips the calendar, and disappears into memory.
Quietly, I rotate a philodendron's face toward the sun.
It popped out of her luggage before the Sea Breeze, when we traveled.
She entered any room as a surgeon or a teacher might have, her hands always busy pinching and shaping the space, modeling the clay into a stylish bust—a perfect room. Music and ashtrays. Milk glass candy dishes and plastic flowers. Side tables and throw pillows.
She progressed across the floor picking up dirt, bent like the Negroes in old plantation photographs. I remember her in white cotton pullovers, the sleeves jacked tightly up her forearms—the better to accommodate scouring the bathroom sink.
Her slippers, always parked beneath her silvery velour swivel chair, napped the weekday afternoons away like a pair of cats. The placement of her cigarette pack and lighter had an enviable formality—a neat, happy decision: a couplet.
She wipes the phone receiver, flips the calendar, and disappears into memory.
Quietly, I rotate a philodendron's face toward the sun.
October 17, 2011
The Box Collector
An artist is someone who is constantly searching for containers in which to put ideas and observations.
I myself have an obsession with clean, empty cardboard boxes. It never occurred to me until tonight this connection to my drive for an organizational principle. One works from the outside inward. Where there is a structure, the words (or images) flow into it. Most often, finding the empty vessel is the hardest part of creativity.
But the creative urge itself remains a mystery. It is more than psychology, but often soiled with it. It is more than observation, but dependent on it. It has long been unresolved whether great works of art transcend the personality. Like a candy bar left to melt on a sunny window ledge, I tend to believe talent cannot be extricated from the person with whom it is involved.
I do not believe very many artists have been consistently good, and I do believe some wonderful things come out from humble places.
No package is ever completely tidy.
I myself have an obsession with clean, empty cardboard boxes. It never occurred to me until tonight this connection to my drive for an organizational principle. One works from the outside inward. Where there is a structure, the words (or images) flow into it. Most often, finding the empty vessel is the hardest part of creativity.
But the creative urge itself remains a mystery. It is more than psychology, but often soiled with it. It is more than observation, but dependent on it. It has long been unresolved whether great works of art transcend the personality. Like a candy bar left to melt on a sunny window ledge, I tend to believe talent cannot be extricated from the person with whom it is involved.
I do not believe very many artists have been consistently good, and I do believe some wonderful things come out from humble places.
No package is ever completely tidy.
October 12, 2011
Full Moon
We carry such a brave weight each day, like a lead vest. The other night I saw the full moon from my garden, and I just collapsed into tears. So many loved ones lost, so much sadness. And the tranquil, stately light of the moon shining down on my living shoulders, bathing the hydrangea and the stones of the walkway. So beautiful and sad.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)