The Tuesday Platform - Windmill in the Garden

The Garden

Carpe Diem #688 WINDMILL

My lovely wife is leading the charge to simplify and get rid of old, unneeded stuff. Tucked away somewhere she found a program from an event we went to in November, 2005, that I had forgotten about.  We were invited by our neighbors and didn't know what it was going to be until we got there.  Turns out, it was a variety show put on by special needs people, with assistance from a couple of very prominent Detroit area professional musicians.

At this late date, my recollections of that evening are quite vague.  But I was deeply moved at the time.  Most of the performers were autistic, though there may have been some with other difficulties as well.

Stuck in the program was something I wrote when we got home.  It's actually more of a song than a poem.  One of the acts was called HEART TO HEART, and I might have been specifically reacting to that.  I have the tune in my head, standard A-A-B-A song form, but no simple way to share it with you.  Feel free to sing it your own way.


RIGHT HERE IN MY HEART

Don't tell me what you think I can't do;
Sing me a song, teach me something new.
Show me the way to make a new start -
I have it all right here in my heart.

Don't tell me that my way is wrong
If it's not your way of singing this song,
We both have ways of playing our part,
If we have it right in our heart.

It's true, I'm different from you,
Or maybe you're just different from me.
But we're the same in our hearts -
Together now, what could we be?

If I'm racing now from pole to pole
Flying to fast to find the goal;
Let's bring it back to music and art -
I have it all right here in my heart.

~~::~~

Accompanying haiku, freshly composed for Carpe Diem

Image found here

in my mind and heart

all of these thoughts and feelings

windmill in a storm

Carpe Diem's Freestyle #3

Today, a haiku/senryu distilled from a poem I wrote several years ago, and posted on my other blog in 2009.   Rereading it today brought tears to my eyes.

~~::~~

The date stamp on the file for this poem is August, 2000, so I suppose that's when I wrote it. It is the narrative of a real incident, just as it happened. My wife and I were driving around one day, rather aimlessly, and went into a park. There was a lake, and we took our shoes off, and waded along the shore line. It wasn't crowded, but there were quite a few people there, in the water, and along the beach.

I am not a religious person, but this was a deeply moving event. Here is how it happened.


SAVING TIME

Such a simple thing, to lift a child.
Hands grasp her sides, a second pair of ribs
Beneath plump arms, and swing her high:
Inconsequential weight on angel's wings.

Farther down the beach a gathering:
Mexican Pentecostal Church of God
All clad in white and black, their Sunday best,
With angel voices raised in Spanish hymns.

That little girl, no taller than my knee
Has not yet mastered walking on dry land.
In childish guile she flees her family's eyes
Makes her way to water's edge, and in.

Senor Juan Baptiste strides chest-deep
Into the lake. The others, arms raised high,
Invoke God's power as he grasps behind the neck,
Supports each penitent beneath the waves.

When no one else was looking at this girl
I saw her falter, fall, then float face down.
Two splashing steps, hands on her ribs,
I raise her out and draw her to my chest.

We could have driven past this lake today,
Or lazed another minute on the shore,
Or turned our wading walk the other way,
Instead, I found myself above this child.

Juan Baptiste mouths a Spanish prayer,
Lifts his new-found brother from the lake,
As I lift and hold this child close to me,
Saved, as by the very hand of God.

~~::~~

what strange twist of fate
brought me to the lake that day
to save a small child

~~::~~

Carpe Diem's Freestyle #3

Carpe Diem #239, curiosity

~ 1 ~

my ignorant quest

like jon snow i know nothing

that is why i blog

~ 2 ~

old man even now

after all these years wonders

about life and love

~ 3 ~

moose and goose are not

curious like the cat - and

they are still alive

~ 4 ~

spider's curious

only about one thing

next fly's arrival

~ 5 ~

envious is green

passionate is purple

curious is yellow

~::~

Carpe Diem #239

Carpe Diem Special #40, Kikusha-Ni's 'in the teabowl'

Inspirational Haiku, by Kikusha-Ni

tenmoku ni koharu no kumo no ugoki kana

in the teabowl
this motion of the clouds
of 'Little Spring'

Plus, I am delighted by Kristjaan's effort

in the rain puddle
the beauty of moving clouds
beneath my feet

I am taking this prompt as an invitation to pause and reflect, not just on nature, but on myself.  I see many people find comfort in religion.  But I am an agnostic and a secular humanist, and have rejected religion as a key to either understanding or enlightenment.  So I do not see haiku as the fulfillment of any religious ideal.  Rather, to me, it is a minimalist intellectual exercise attempting to capture in words some small but meaningful aspect of life or nature.  I appreciate the discipline imposed by the limits of the form, and see that as part of the challenge.

Often, I fail in my attempts to write real haiku - or even senryu - and opt instead for some small bit of structured cleverness.  Such is my ego.  And thus my scattershot responses to the prompts, and reliance on animal props. Sometimes they oonch up the challenge, but they also provide focal points. 

I am in awe of nature, humbled by the universe, and actually do have a spiritual side - though I cannot claim to understand it. Thus my humility. I am a part of the universe, and might even be connected to all things in it.

But it remains beyond my comprehension. 

~ 1 ~

am i a haijin

or just a glib old man

playing with words

~ 2 ~

i please myself

with little word images

are they something more

~ 3 ~

virtual image

on the surface of my tea

universe reversed

~ 4 ~

reflect on nature

emulate the moose and goose

living ego-free

~ 5 ~

moving clouds

seen in dew on spider's web

do not move her

~~\|/~~

Carpe Diem Special #40