Proverbial Hell

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I remember talking my grandmother ‘s poor ear off.  Her typical responses to my endless questions were proverbs. I didn’t understand the complexity of a proverb until I was much older. They appear, on the surface, to be gems of wisdom which have been passed down through the ages.  I don’t know how many times I have nodded my head and accepted without further discussion. I still remember the day someone pointed out to the that most proverbs have an exact opposite. I felt foolish because it seemed so obvious to me. Why didn’t I note the contradictions?  Do you catch yourself responding to a younger person with a proverb?

Look before you leap.
He who hesitates is lost.

Opposites attract.
Birds of a feather flock together.

Hitch your wagon to a star.
Don’t bite off more that you can chew.

Many hands make light work.
Too many cooks spoil the broth.

Don’t judge a book by its cover.
Clothes make the man.

The squeaking wheel gets the grease.
Silence is golden.

Clothes make the man.
You cannot judge a book by its cover.

If at first, you don’t succeed, try, try again.
Don’t beat your head against a stone wall.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.
Out of sight, out of mind.

Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.
Don’t cross the bridge until you come to it.

Two heads are better than one.
Paddle your own canoe.

Haste makes waste.
Time waits for no man.

You’re never too old to learn.
You can’t teach an old dog new tricks.

A word to the wise is sufficient.
Talk is cheap.

It’s better to be safe than sorry.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.
Beware of Greeks bearing gifts.

Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.
Nice guys finish last.

All Good things come to those who wait.

Strike while the iron is hot.

Cold hands

Warm Heart

Confession is good for the heart

Let sleeping dogs lie

Many hands make light work.

Too many cooks spoil the broth.

What I wouldn’t give to hear your voice again Gramma…. Irene Tenney Poupart.

If you know some other proverbs, please feel free to share.

Motivational Quotes

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“Make up your mind that no matter what comes your way, no matter how difficult, no matter how unfair, you will do more than simply survive. You will thrive in spite of it.” —Joel Osteen

“Difficulties are meant to rouse, not discourage. The human spirit is to grow strong by conflict.” —William Ellery Channing

“Sometimes you don’t realize your own strength until you come face to face with your greatest weakness.” —Susan Gale

Still immersed withW.S. Merwin

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To the insects 

Elders

We have been here so short a time

and we pretend that we have invented memory 

We have forgotten what it is like to be you

who do not remember us. 

We remember imagining that what survived us

would be like us

and would remember the world as it appears to us

but it will be your eyes that fill with light

we kill you again and again

and we turn inutile you

eating the forests 

eating the earth and water 

dang dying of them

departing from ourselves

leaving you the morning 

          in its antiquity.
~The Rain In The Trees Poems by W.S.Merwin 1988

I’ve read three of his poetry books this weekend. I find it fascinating to see how his work has evolved 

Quote

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“For every poet, it is always morning in the world. History a forgotten, insomniac night; History and elemental awe are always our early beginning because the fate of poetry is to fall in love with the world, in spite of History.” ~Derek Walcott

Walcott passed on March 7th, 2017 at his home in St. Lucia. His metaphorical poetry captured the physical beauty of the Caribbean while never forgetting the complexities of his existence in a two culture world. Walcott was a mixed race poet living on a British-ruled island.

“Where shall I turn, divided to the vein? I who have cursed …

I who have cursed …

The drunken officer of British rule, how choose

Between this Africa and the English tongue I love?

Betray them both, or give back what they give?”

The Season of Phantasmal Peace
BY DEREK WALCOTT
Then all the nations of birds lifted together
the huge net of the shadows of this earth
in multitudinous dialects, twittering tongues,
stitching and crossing it. They lifted up
the shadows of long pines down trackless slopes,
the shadows of glass-faced towers down evening streets,
the shadow of a frail plant on a city sill—
the net rising soundless as night, the birds’ cries soundless, until
there was no longer dusk, or season, decline, or weather,
only this passage of phantasmal light
that not the narrowest shadow dared to sever.
And men could not see, looking up, what the wild geese drew,
what the ospreys trailed behind them in silvery ropes
that flashed in the icy sunlight; they could not hear
battalions of starlings waging peaceful cries,
bearing the net higher, covering this world
like the vines of an orchard, or a mother drawing
the trembling gauze over the trembling eyes
of a child fluttering to sleep;
                                                     it was the light
that you will see at evening on the side of a hill
in yellow October, and no one hearing knew
what change had brought into the raven’s cawing,
the killdeer’s screech, the ember-circling chough
such an immense, soundless, and high concern
for the fields and cities where the birds belong,
except it was their seasonal passing, Love,
made seasonless, or, from the high privilege of their birth,
something brighter than pity for the wingless ones
below them who shared dark holes in windows and in houses,
and higher they lifted the net with soundless voices
above all change, betrayals of falling suns,
and this season lasted one moment, like the pause
between dusk and darkness, between fury and peace,
but, for such as our earth is now, it lasted long.
Derek Walcott, “The Season of Phantasmal Peace” from Collected Poems: 1948-1984. Copyright © 1987 by Derek Walcott.  Reprinted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux.

Tribute to Uncle Howard

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I wish I had known you better, there always seemed to be something going on and now it’s too late. As I sit here thinking about what I should have said to you all my muse wants is poetry.

For The Anniversary Of My Death –  by William Stanley Merwin

Every year without knowing it I have passed the day
When the last fires will wave to me
And the silence will set out
Tireless traveller
Like the beam of a lightless star

Then I will no longer
Find myself in life as in a strange garment
Surprised at the earth
And the love of one woman
And the shamelessness of men
As today writing after three days of rain
Hearing the wren sing and the falling cease
And bowing not knowing to what

******************************************
Looking East at Night

Death
White hand
The moths fly at in the darkness

I took you for the moon rising

Whose light then
do you reflect

As though it came out of the roots of things
This harvest pallor in which

I have no shadow but myself

— W.S. Merwin, from The Lice, 1967

******************************************
Utterance

Sitting over words
very late I have heard a kind of whispered sighing
not far
like a night wind in pines or like the sea in the dark
the echo of everything that has ever
been spoken
still spinning its one syllable
between the earth and silence

— W.S. Merwin

Godspeed Uncle Howard
He was born on January 30, 1936, in East Calais, VT, the son of Jonas and Doris (Dalton)Parsons. He died on Sunday, March 5, 2017, at his home, with his wife by his side at the age of 81.

 

Photograph

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I saw a picture on Marilyn Armstong’s WordPress that I really liked in black and white. Typically, people do not favor landscapes in black and white but I am one of the oddities. I genuinely love black and white photography. I decided to blog today on another passion of mine that gives me creative license to be different.

  • “In photography, there is a reality so subtle that it becomes more real than reality.”
    — Alfred Stieglitz

DSC_0195

This is a picture I took of a seagull when we were visiting  Cape May, New Jersey. It has only been cropped and watermarked in the above picture. I love watching them swoop in the breeze over the ocean.

DSC_0195 (2)

This is the same picture with it sharpened and brightened.

DSC_0195 (3)

This is the same picture in black and white without any sharpening or added filtering.

DSC_0195 (4)

This is the final image with denim filtering over the black and white picture. This is my favorite take on the picture because of the way the filter allows the black and white to maintain intensity while adding just a minute coloring to the sky in the backdrop.Photo

Photography to me is like creating a poem. One poet may choose one word and another a different word leaving everything else the same but the poem will have a different feel to the reader.

  • “There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.”
    — Ansel Adams
  • “When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.”— Ansel Adams
  • “You don’t take a photograph. You ask quietly to borrow it.”
    — Unknown
  • “To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting an ordinary place… I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.”
    — Elliott Erwitt
  • “When I photograph, what I’m really doing is seeking answers to things.”
    — Wynn Bullock

I know for me when my muse is being resistant I grab my camera and open my mind to different surroundings and when I look at them through the focus of a lens my muse engages.

Thank you Marilyn for the inspiration. I hope you check out her landscapes and let me know which you love best.

A PHOTO A WEEK CHALLENGE – COMPARING THREE

Self-Promotion

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irish dance shoesI was looking in my port on Writing.com when I saw this poem, it’s one of my favorite poems I’ve written. I looked to see if I had shared it here on WordPress and discovered it among my early posts when I had one follower so I decided to share it again since I do have a larger following of poetry lovers.

It is done in couplets with a rhyming pattern on the end.

Love of an Irish Lass

He bowed his head in silence,
allowing his rattled breath to slow.

Closing his eyes, he could feel
the lively Celtic music flow.

He was swept away to days past,
Where her feet moved to and fro.

Oh wee lass, dance for me, I long to
see those ye’s rosy cheeks aglow.

Take me back to those days
Of hornpipes and tapping heel and toe.

Show me again those green Irish eyes
when you paused and bowed ever so low.

He lowered his head in silence again
cherishing his memories of long ago.

The lovely Irish ballad faded quietly away
and with it the old man’s final deathblow.©

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

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flag2I love seeing all the witty Irish proverbs appear:

  • May you have the hindsight to know where you’ve been, the foresight to know where you are going, and the insight to know when you have gone too far.
  • A good laugh and a long sleep are the two best cures.
  • If it’s drowning your after, don’t torment yourself with shallow water.
  • May you get all your wishes but one, so that you’ll always have something to strive for.
  • ‘Here’s to women’s kisses, and to whiskey, amber clear. Not as sweet as a woman’s kiss, but a darn sight more sincere!”  ( My grandpa used to say this a lot especially when grandma and him were at odds.)
  • May the hinges of your friendship never grow rusty.
  • What butter and whiskey won’t cure, there is no cure for. 🙂
  • Where ever you go, and what ever you do, may the luck  of Irish be with you.

A Blessing: Yol Bolsun

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May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields and,
Until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

scatterednotebooks's avatarScattered Notebooks

May there be a road
May your path always be clear
May your journey never fail
May your trail not disappear

May there be a road
May your burdens all be light

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Author Connection 7

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There is strength in numbers. Individually we are one drop but together we are an oceanI’m fascinated with creating poetry whether it be from a quote or an excerpt from another poet that inspired me or simply a blank page compelling me to write. If you think about it are our pages blank. We have ghosts of other poems, songs, catchphrases, even those silly tv jingles cast shadows on our blank page.

Do you remember that famous T.S. Eliot quote “Immature poets imitate; mature poets steal; bad poets deface what they take, and good poets make it into something better, or at least something different.”

I love making something from something else. Think of it as recycling creativity into a different creativity. Poetry, crafts, cooking, photography and other hobbies or passions it’s something as artists we share in common by deriving pleasure from old things to new things or vice versa.

A boiled corn beef dinner with potatoes, carrots, cabbage and onions for St. Patrick’s Day dinner. Hash on Saturday with diced beets added. Healthy eating. 🙂

Yards of fabric cut up and pieced back together a quilt. That same quilt invites the best cuddles ever on a cold evening.  I’ve got two different ones in progress, I love learning new patterns.

Where does inspiration take you?