“No one can trust for us.”–Sue Halpern, “Migrations of Solitude”
“Trust one who has proved it.”–Virgil
“To be trusted is a greater compliment than to be loved.”–George MacDonald, The Marquis of Lossie, 1877
“Those who trust us, educate us.”–George Eliot, Daniel Deronda
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The exchange and sharing of the best gifts of self–the very best of the best–cannot occur without trust. Trust is basic or core to any successful relationship.
“The fullness of life is in the hazards of life.”–Edith Hamilton, The Great Age of Greek Literature
“Everything is sweetened by risk.”–Alexander Smith, “The Fear of Dying”
“Only those who dare, truly live.”–Ruth P. Freedman
“If you risk nothing, then you risk everything.”–Geena Davis
“It is only by risking our persons from one hour to another that we live at all.”–William James, The Will to Believe and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy, 1897
“What you risk reveals what you value.”–Jeanette Winterson, “Written on the Body”
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In my experience, nothing great or fantastic–including success, self-actualization, and transcendence–happens without risk.
“Happiness can only exist in acceptance.”–George Orwell
“Flow with whatever may happen and let your mind be free. Stay centered by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate.”–Chuang-Tzu
“Whatever is–is best.”–Ella Wheeler Wilcox, “Whatever Is–Is Best”
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Despite our basic beliefs and values, there is much we cannot, finally, control. In acceptance, there is far less anxiety, needless pain, and suffering. We ultimately need to accept our own limits and limitations as well as those of others. We also need to accept whatever we are given in good faith by others.
we get lucky. And mysteriously, we are freed through the gifts of self by another–a special, remarkable person. And so it is we–our deeper selves–and our own gifts of self are magically freed, and life and love begin anew. Yes, sometimes–quite rarely–we are that lucky.
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“And by came an angel who had a bright key,
And she open’d the coffins and set them all free”
–adapted from Blake
Many years ago, three score and one, to be exact. End of summer. My grandmother’s house on Sherbrook St. Being sent outside to play in the backyard so the adults could set up a surprise birthday party for me. I wandered out the gate, as I had been wont to do, and discovered a small boy, my age, playing down the lane. He had a large, well-used metal toy dump truck of old. We ended up playing together immediately, having a great free time, putting dirt in and out of the truck, managing to dirty our clothes in the process, of course.
Something signalled it was time to go, likely my grandmother’s voice calling my name. I began to walk back, but he wanted to follow me with his truck. Every time I looked back, he was still behind me, carrying the truck, and we eventually entered the back door of the house.
Inside was noisy with unfamiliar kids (I had never seen before) in party clothes, a cake on the table, the usual birthday decorations–balloons and the like. There was visible, palpable awkwardness as my grandmother questioned who this other boy was, my new friend. She commented on his grubbiness–same as mine, I thought. It didn’t bother me. I was happy he was there, too, for the party. But it was pointed out that he needed a gift to attend the party, and so he handed me his truck. I suddenly had its hugeness on my lap, amazed and overwhelmed by what seemed like the best possible gift in the world.
Then my grandmother curtly told him that the truck was old, dirty, and not suitable or good enough for admission to the event. The ragamuffin child was abruptly, and ignominiously escorted out, taking his truck with him. I truly did not want to see him go or be treated in that inexplicably harsh way. I believe I cried as the party tried to resume and all the other presents–much less impressive than his–were offered as new and better gifts of compensation.
My first remembered birthday. The boy I met down the lane. The one who wasn’t good enough to come to my party.
The first remembered gift of self. Torn away from me. The truck which made my three-year-old heart momentarily leap up with joy. My “Rosebud”. And my first lesson about social class. Katherine Mansfield’s “The Doll’s House”, Winnipeg ’50s. A little boy who wasn’t good enough to play with me, to be my friend, and who freely gave me his favorite toy of all. His most precious gift of self.
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Today I wonder if he is still alive and if he, too, remembers this moment. How the rest of his day and life went. Whether he remembers the fun we had, and the boy he once befriended and gifted. And what gifts of self he himself may have later gone on to receive.
“When you don’t read, you don’t write.”--Helen Barolini, The Dream Book
The simple relationship of input to output, or ‘You don’t get something out, if you don’t put something in.’ It’s certainly easier to write if one has been ‘feeding oneself’ with ideas, images, subject matter background, and the views and approaches of other writers.
The fact is we learn from others and what they have done, said, and written before us. I’m sure you can recall, for instance–with little effort–your favorite poems and poets of childhood, school, university, or leisure reading . Reading others–especially the good and great writers–allows us to have contact with and become familiar with the sounds, images, ideas, styles, and sensibilities of those who have written before us. In other words, we read to learn and we read to learn to write.
What we, in turn, manifest in our own creative writing are often echoes, refinements, and nuances based on our choice of authors and readings. Most often, this is reflected in subject matter, diction, technique, and style choices.
If you look back at the great poets, they themselves frequently cite writers and works who influenced them. John Keats read Chapman’s Homer, then wrote a famous sonnet about his reading experience. T. S. Eliot poured much of his reading into his masterpiece The Waste Land as shown in its numerous allusions and satirical references to previous writers and their works.
So, who or what do you read that influences your writing? Emily Dickinson? e.e. cummings? Margaret Atwood? Quirky newspaper stories? Magazine articles about issues? Song lyrics? Online writing blogs? The possibilities are endless. What we read uniquely leaves its various influential, tell-tale marks and echoes in our writing inevitably.
“No poet, no artist of any art has his complete meaning alone. His significance, his appreciation is the appreciation of his relation to [other] poets and artists.”--T.S. Eliot, The Sacred Wood
(In memory of Dean)
“Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight”
“…who see with blinding sight/Blind eyes could blaze like meteors”
–lines from “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night”
The light switch turned on again suddenly so unexpectedly. To suddenly have everything available once again: feelings of physical wellness, energy, focus, confidence, clear-headedness, fullness, completeness, epiphanies about a wide range of topics, ease of expression, ‘strange’ topics to write about, empathy with landscapes-animals-birds-as well as people, subconscious free expression, and absolutely no anxiety about anything. The feeling of total freedom–physical, mental, emotional, imaginative, spiritual, and very soul-full. A comfortable happy plateau and height I recognize, that I have been to a number of times before, and never thought to re-experience again…
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(from a new, longer inner piece)
And by came an angel who had a bright key,
And he open’d the coffins and set them all free;
Then down a green plain leaping, laughing, they run,
And wash in a river, and shine in the sun.
–from “The Chimney Sweeper”, Songs of Innocence
“Strange things doth meet, strange Glory they see.”--Thomas Traherne, “The Salutation”
We are changed by what we behold.
Nothing fake about these
limestone giants of Mingan.
The rocky topiary, a granite Rorschach.
Easter Island sentinels
under a starry blue sky.
A hand reaching up
like some mad “Birth of Adam”.
The camel lying on the beach.
An overhang boulder
awaiting the Coyote.
The stone man leaning
over a giant’s hand and foot.
A big-butt figure walking into trees.
The talking head on high.
An old woman’s shoe
with mounted egg beside.
The reptile head leaning
out to sea.
Egyptian heads that
look shoreward.
Eroded muppet faces
protruding from a forest.
No, you will not feel alone here,
only small.
A primitive gallery of
sky, rock, and water.
Pure sculpture in process.
A test of your own largeness.
‘Any questions?’ asks Mingan,
its masses and indirect carvings.
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Sculptural sensibility.
Shape and, yes, touch.
The dream of permanence
and eternity that teased Moore–
his maquettes and primitive plasters,
or maybe as he rubbed liniment
on his mother’s broad back–
the lineaments that followed.
Nature and the human body.
Moore: He related to
the sculptural Earth,
its folk and creatures.
“Truth to material”–
an invitation to touch.
His direct carvings of mystery.
The seated, standing,
reclining figures.
The rolling bronze shapes
and marble torsos.
The 3D women–
a tactility of outline.
Moore: Sheep grazing
by his “Sheep piece”.
The A.G.O. tourists leaning
on his outdoor Mingan.
Eternity and process.
The galleries of awe.
Mingan and Moore.
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Mingan–the Mingan Archipelago in Quebec
Moore–Henry Moore, England’s greatest sculptor, as great as Rodin
Coyote–yes, the Roadrunner’s nemesis
“Birth of Adam”–Michelangelo’s famous work about (divine) creation
A.G.O.–Art Gallery of Ontario
This poem had its genesis back in the ’80s when I first saw the Moore sculpture at the A.G.O. in T.O. I remember walking about in a daze around the sculptures, occasionally forgetting myself and touching some. If you Google “Images” for Henry Moore sheep, you’ll see some of the pieces I refer to in the poem. Moore had an organic sensibility, like Frank Lloyd Wright, and his outdoor work blends in with country and city (outside the A.G.O., for instance). So what he’s about is shape, texture, and the invitation to touch. He also created grand marvellous female shapes and forms that have a remarkable sensuousness. (BTW/ I have absolutely no doubt that the liniment episode led to the lineament creations.)
Now Moore never likely saw the Mingan Archipelago, but two weeks ago, when I saw the Frame channel’s feature on that place, I immediately thought of him and his work. That primitiveness of the seating, standing, and reclining figures.
The poem is obviously about art and Nature–the processes of direct (man-made; i.e., Moore) and indirect (i.e., Nature). Both artist and Nature carve. Both have left beautiful works that have an air of permanence or Eternity about them, though process is still at work (erosion and time in both cases). They both tease us “out of thought/As does eternity” which takes us back to Keats’ urn and the ‘problems’ of the urn and nightingale poems. The beautiful shapes of Nature and art that stimulate our imaginations and life processes.
Behind all of this, of course, is the mystery that eludes us (‘”Any questions?” asks Mingan’). Something sublime, something sublime, something great. For me, Mingan and Moore illuminate our fascination and, sometimes, obsession with shape and touch–something running very deep, centrally, and common to human experience, Nature, and art.
In the end, Mingan and Moore are the same, but, simultaneously different or parallel. They are beautiful ‘apples and oranges’, rich creations and expressions–if you will–of something very large, great, and profoundly mysterious–“The galleries of awe”.
