{ Theodore Roethke: Journey into the Interior. }

Journey into the Interior
by Theodore Roethke

In the long journey out of the self,
There are many detours, washed-out interrupted raw places
Where the shale slides dangerously
And the back wheels hang almost over the edge
At the sudden veering, the moment of turning.
Better to hug close, wary of rubble and falling stones.
The arroyo cracking the road, the wind-bitten buttes, the canyons,
Creeks swollen in midsummer from the flash-flood roaring into the narrow valley.
Reeds beaten flat by wind and rain,
Grey from the long winter, burnt at the base in late summer.
-- Or the path narrowing,
Winding upward toward the stream with its sharp stones,
The upland of alder and birchtrees,
Through the swamp alive with quicksand,
The way blocked at last by a fallen fir-tree,
The thickets darkening,
The ravines ugly.

 

{ I know how it feels to be your age. }

No recs today because The Dad wants me to stand in the shop this afternoon. Normally I resent being asked to do this, but for whatever reason, I don't mind this holiday. Hopefully the afternoon shift isn't DEATHLY but I'm beginning to think it's always like that in the shop now, which is a little scary. Trade is disappearing.

--

I think The Family is gathering at one of my uncle's houses for the long weekend, but we won't be going. (Read: shop.) I also think that my maternal uncle is visiting tomorrow. Tomorrow marks the end of my first week of Easter break which means pretty soon I need to read Tortilla Curtain, email my classmates re: Paradise Lost, prep my On the Road essay, and do some serious work on my dissertation. Some time this break I also have to go shopping with my mum's side of the family (ugh - to the shopping more than the company, but still; this never goes well) and get myself measured up for a handful of sari blouses. This wedding malarkey is getting to be more than a little irritating (and I haven't even been to any of the pre-festivities that have been held so far, let alone the ones that have yet to come).

--

The Long Blondes have a new album out on 7th April; it's called Couples. Having only discovered them in the last year, I am full of hypothetical yayarms. Once and Never Again remains one of my favourite songs of 2007, and Heaven Help the New Girl comes a close second.

--

Lost continues to scare the crap out of me. Huzz.

--

edit: OH THANDIE. Way to get on the Fug Boat.

{ Han-Shan: Words from Cold Mountain. }

Words from Cold Mountain
by Han-Shan, trans. by A. S. Kline

   25.
Bright water shimmers like crystal,
Translucent to the furthest depth.
Mind is free of every thought
Unmoved by the myriad things.
Since it can never be stirred
It will always stay like this.
Knowing, this way, you can see,
There is no within, no without.

 

{ landed in a very common crisis. }

The afternoon shift was indeed deathly but was made amusing by two things: firstly, the ever-changing weather forecast (thereby fuelling nearly every conversation I had this afternoon, and yet still managing to provide variety) and secondly, the Good Friday rush for Easter eggs and hot cross buns.

At one point hail was bouncing merrily down the street. Oy.

--

Numpty that I am, I left the house at 1340 with only my keys. I was all, pfft, why be burdened by the weight of materialism? Who needs a handbag? Who needs a mobile phone? BE FREE, MEISHA, BE FREE OF YOUR EARTHLY TIES.

Of course, being free of earthly ties meant that I was also free of a staple of British outdoor clothing, namely: MY BROLLY. I'm such a moron.

So I spent an hour at my aunt's waiting for the sky to clear a little. I played with Baby Cousin, ate a slice of home-made Victoria sponge, and watched as my aunt prepped some seriously delicious-looking roast potatoes. When I left it was dry, but my aunt made me take her coat. Good thing too because being free of earthly ties is synonymous with being shit cold.

--

A friend of mine just sent me an Easter email. She— look, you know you get those adverts where someone is talking and then half-through someone dubs over them in a blatantly other voice? The email is just like that. Except my friend was dubbed by Metatron, the Voice of God on earth. (If Alan Rickman had delivered the email, I'd have had a significantly different opinion on the matter.)

I appreciate the sentiment, but I also feel like... she knows that I don't believe. If I were heartless I'd email back all, "Hi! Happy Easter! You misspelt 'judgement'! Love, M!" but I'm not that sort of bitch any more, and she's well-meaning at the least.

--

Have another poem. This one is earthly in a crass way that I think is marvellous.

The Cinnamon Peeler
by Michael Ondaatje

If I were a cinnamon peeler
I would ride your bed
And leave the yellow bark dust
On your pillow.

Your breasts and shoulders would reek
You could never walk through markets
without the profession of my fingers
floating over you. The blind would
stumble certain of whom they approached
though you might bathe
under rain gutters, monsoon.

Here on the upper thigh
at this smooth pasture
neighbour to you hair
or the crease
that cuts your back. This ankle.
You will be known among strangers
as the cinnamon peeler's wife.

I could hardly glance at you
before marriage
never touch you
--your keen nosed mother, your rough brothers.
I buried my hands
in saffron, disguised them
over smoking tar,
helped the honey gatherers...

When we swam once
I touched you in the water
and our bodies remained free,
you could hold me and be blind of smell.
you climbed the bank and said

this is how you touch other women
the grass cutter's wife, the lime burner's daughter.
And you searched your arms
for the missing perfume

and knew

what good is it
to be the lime burner's daughter
left with no trace
as if not spoken to in the act of love
as if wounded without the pleasure of a scar.

You touched
your belly to my hands
in the dry air and said
I am the cinnamon
Peeler's wife. Smell me.

as if wounded without the pleasure of a scar. Permanence of touch (touch that is fleeting, momentary) is perverse in a lot of ways. Scarring, biting, bruising, marking: branding. Laying claim. And yet this is beautiful - cinnamon and saffron, and a very rich world of existence.