Patterns: Lowell & Emerson

Dramatic Patterns at the Venetian, Las Vegas
My approach to writing and organizing these blog posts is precisely what I always wanted to do with literature. More than scholarly analysis or research ~ going back to my first highschool notebooks, scrapbooks, personal poetry collections, reading lists, and posters ~ I was always most interested in drawing all the loose threads together, weaving some kind of comprehensible pattern, and saying to everyone, "See! Doesn't that make life more meaningful? Doesn't everything make more sense now?" Certainly to me it does." As Amy Lowell says: "Christ, what are patterns for?"

Patterns

I walk down the garden paths,
And all the daffodils
Are blowing, and the bright blue squills.
I walk down the patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden paths.

My dress is richly figured,
And the train
Makes a pink and silver stain
On the gravel, and the thrift
Of the borders.
Just a plate of current fashion,
Tripping by in high-heeled, ribboned shoes.
Not a softness anywhere about me,
Only whalebone and brocade.
And I sink on a seat in the shade
Of a lime tree. For my passion
Wars against the stiff brocade.
The daffodils and squills
Flutter in the breeze
As they please.
And I weep;
For the lime-tree is in blossom
And one small flower has dropped upon my bosom.

And the plashing of waterdrops
In the marble fountain
Comes down the garden-paths.
The dripping never stops.
Underneath my stiffened gown
Is the softness of a woman bathing in a marble basin,
A basin in the midst of hedges grown
So thick, she cannot see her lover hiding,
But she guesses he is near,
And the sliding of the water
Seems the stroking of a dear
Hand upon her.
What is Summer in a fine brocaded gown!
I should like to see it lying in a heap upon the ground.
All the pink and silver crumpled up on the ground.

I would be the pink and silver as I ran along the paths,
And he would stumble after,
Bewildered by my laughter.
I should see the sun flashing from his sword-hilt and the buckles on his shoes.
I would choose
To lead him in a maze along the patterned paths,
A bright and laughing maze for my heavy-booted lover,
Till he caught me in the shade,
And the buttons of his waistcoat bruised my body as he clasped me,
Aching, melting, unafraid.
With the shadows of the leaves and the sundrops,
And the plopping of the waterdrops,
All about us in the open afternoon --
I am very like to swoon
With the weight of this brocade,
For the sun sifts through the shade.

Underneath the fallen blossom
In my bosom,
Is a letter I have hid.
It was brought to me this morning by a rider from the Duke.
"Madam, we regret to inform you that Lord Hartwell
Died in action Thursday se'nnight."
As I read it in the white, morning sunlight,
The letters squirmed like snakes.
"Any answer, Madam," said my footman.
"No," I told him.
"See that the messenger takes some refreshment.
No, no answer."
And I walked into the garden,
Up and down the patterned paths,
In my stiff, correct brocade.
The blue and yellow flowers stood up proudly in the sun,
Each one.
I stood upright too,
Held rigid to the pattern
By the stiffness of my gown.
Up and down I walked,
Up and down.

In a month he would have been my husband.
In a month, here, underneath this lime,
We would have broke the pattern;
He for me, and I for him,
He as Colonel, I as Lady,
On this shady seat.
He had a whim
That sunlight carried blessing.
And I answered, "It shall be as you have said."
Now he is dead.

In Summer and in Winter I shall walk
Up and down
The patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
The squills and daffodils
Will give place to pillared roses, and to asters, and to snow.
I shall go
Up and down,
In my gown.
Gorgeously arrayed,
Boned and stayed.
And the softness of my body will be guarded from embrace
By each button, hook, and lace.
For the man who should loose me is dead,
Fighting with the Duke in Flanders,
In a pattern called a war.
Christ! What are patterns for?

by American poet Amy Lowell (1874 - 1925)
Pulitzer Prize, 1926 (awarded posthumously)

from Men, Women and Ghosts
for more of Lowell's poetry, see also
A Dome of Many - Coloured Glass

***************************

Mystically Patterned Ceiling Lamp at the Palazzo, Las Vegas
In the essay "Experience," Ralph Waldo Emerson writes from a personal sense of apparent fragmentation, a sensation which leads most people to question the patterns life is offering them. "Experience" opens with a question -- and an answer: "Where do we find ourselves? In a series of which we do not know the extremes, and believe it has none. We wake and find ourselves on a stair; there are stairs below us, which we seem to have ascended; there are stairs above us, many a one, which go upward and out of sight." (141). Stairs, or a hallway, or a balcony, or a promenade -- stretching ahead and behind.

Emerson questions the uncertainty of our limited perspective. However, his goal in "Experience" is not to search for or explain the extremes of this series but to suggest methods by which we may find ultimate value in the inconsistencies and frustrations of daily experience. He assures the reader that the certainty we seek is not to be found by imposing order on what seems incoherent, and he offers insight into the possibility that an order beyond our immediate comprehension already exists and is in operation despite the haphazard wreck we may feel our life, at times, reduced to.

If we would grasp the meaning and the pattern of our experiences and see them as other than fragmented and incoherent, we must be willing to wait: "The years teach much which the days never know" (153). We must, Emerson advises, draw conclusions not in the morning but in the evening. We must readjust our perception. Emerson's focus in "Experience" is not the poet of specialized vision but the view of the horizon available to all human beings who take the time to understand the ramifications of their experiences. One thing we can gain by grasping the pattern of our own experience is an understanding of the experience of others.

for more on Emerson, see additional posts:
Always Have the Blues a Little
Portal to the Divine
Fond of Books and Watchful
Burning Bush
Ontogeny Recapitulates Phylogeny
Patterns: Lowell & Emerson
The Primrose Post
An Experience Old House
One Hundred Years From Now
Ben's Birthday: The World Is His
Excellent Images
Dream For Your Life
A Screen of Purest Sky
Through A Glass Brightly

And on The Fortnightly:
Through a Glass Brightly
Emmanuel, God With Us
Opal: In Love With The World
Melancholy and / or Properly Tormented
O Ya - Ya of Little Faith

And on Kitti's Book List:
Suggestions for Sam
A Couple of Domestic Goddesses

Up Again, Old Heart!

~ Happy First Day of Spring! ~

Late Vernal Equinox Sunrise
through the southern magnolia in my front yard

A Series of Blessings
for a Day of New Beginnings

Back in grad school days, I had each of the following
passages written out on an index card and taped up
inside my library carrel for focus and inspiration:
Emerson: "We dress our garden, eat our dinners, discuss the household with our wives, and these things make no impression, are forgotten next week; but in the solitude to which every man is always returning, he has a sanity and revelations, which in his passage into new worlds he will carry with him. Never mind the ridicule, never mind the defeat: up again, old heart! — it seems to say, — there is victory yet for all justice; and the true romance which the world exists to realize, will be the transformation of genius into practical power." *

Coleridge: "The Imagination, then, I consider either as primary, or secondary. The primary Imagination I hold to be the living Power and prime Agent of all human Perception, and as a repetition in the finite mind of the eternal act of creation in the infinite I AM."

Juvenal: "Whatever woman do -- their longing, their fears, their angers, their pleasures, their delights,their comings and goings -- these form the medley of my little book."

Wordsworth: "Imagination, which, in truth, Is but another name for absolute power."

~ Half light ~ half dark ~

P.S.
Southern Magnolia / Winter Solstice

P.P.S.
* A get well wish from Ralph Waldo Emerson,
also from the essay "Experience":
"Life itself is a bubble and a skepticism, and a sleep within a sleep. Grant it, and as much more as they will,--but thou, God's darling! heed thy private dream: thou wilt not be missed in the scorning and skepticism: there are enough of them: stay there in thy closet, and toil, until the rest are agreed what to do about it. Thy sickness, they say, and thy puny habit, require that thou do this or avoid that, but know that thy life is a flitting state, a tent for a night, and do thou, sick or well, finish that stint. Thou art sick, but shalt not be worse, and the universe, which holds thee dear, shall be the better."
More excellent
advice from Emerson:
QK ~ FN ~ KL

Excellent Images

Haiku [if you ask me!]
‎"Things more excellent than every image,"
says Iamblichus,
"are expressed through images."

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 82)
American Transcendentalist
from his essay "The Poet"

This passage from Emerson sprang immediately to mind when I first viewed a series of paintings by my friend and mentor Leonard Orr (in fact, the line from Emerson is something I learned in one of his classes years ago). I am rarely one to suffer writer's block; in my case it's usually the opposite, same as when I'm talking: how can we get her to stop!

However, when I feel the need for some creative focus, I like to make a little game of scrolling through Len's artwork and assigning one - word descriptions to each picture that catches my eye. As I look at each successive creation, my mind races to figure out what it might mean, what it makes me think of. Other viewers have responded to the various paintings by commenting in the form of brief pleasing poems: Click here to see and read.

Last month on facebook, Len mentioned his summer task of reorganizing his paintings: "In preparation for my daughter's visit, I restacked all of the paintings in my apartment to make them take the least amount of floor space (the walls are already covered with paintings). It occurred to me I should start painting over some of these before I use new canvases or else I will have to become a hunger artist, barely able to fit through my rooms and halls."

"Pentimento!" I replied. And Len responded, "Exactly! I have always been drawn to the palimpsest, the liminal, and multilayered."

Inspired by this intriguing list of words, I decided to look through Len's paintings in search of just the right one to illustrate each concept. You may choose differently, but here are my choices:

liminal (from the Latin limen, meaning threshold; relating to a sensory threshold, barely perceptible, an intermediate state, phase, or condition):

multilayered (self - explanatory!):
pentimento (from the Italian pentirsi, meaning to repent; traces of previous work in a painting, indicating an artist's change of plan during the creation process):

palimpsest (from the Greek meaning scraped clean; a page from which the text has been scraped off and written over). This one was easy, as I have already described a couple of Len's painting as such, when I was writing last autumn about the beauty and mystery of ginkgo tree:
Additional paintings by Leonard Orr,
seen previously on this blog:

Golden Paintings by Leonard Orr

End of Summer Sounds

Earth Laughs In Flowers

HAPPY EARTH DAY!
"Earth laughs in flowers . . ."

Such an unusual poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson
and so perfect for Earth Day.
Perhaps you've always thought, as I have,
that Earth is laughing with us; but, no!
According to Emerson, Earth is laughing at us!
Read on . . .

HAMATREYA

Bulkeley, Hunt, Willard, Hosmer, Meriam, Flint,
Possessed the land which rendered to their toil
Hay, corn, roots, hemp, flax, apples, wool, and wood.
Each of these landlords walked amidst his farm,
Saying, “’Tis mine, my children’s and my name’s.
How sweet the west wind sounds in my own trees!
How graceful climb those shadows on my hill!
I fancy these pure waters and the flags
Know me, as does my dog: we sympathize;
And, I affirm, my actions smack of the soil.”

Where are these men? Asleep beneath their grounds:
And strangers, fond as they, their furrows plough.
Earth laughs in flowers, to see her boastful boys
Earth-proud, proud of the earth which is not theirs;
Who steer the plough, but cannot steer their feet
Clear of the grave.
They added ridge to valley, brook to pond,
And sighed for all that bounded their domain;
“This suits me for a pasture; that’s my park;
We must have clay, lime, gravel, granite-ledge,
And misty lowland, where to go for peat.
The land is well, —lies fairly to the south.
’Tis good, when you have crossed the sea and back,
To find the sitfast acres where you left them.”

Ah! the hot owner sees not Death, who adds
Him to his land, a lump of mould the more.
Hear what the Earth say:—

EARTH-SONG
“Mine and yours;
Mine, not yours.
Earth endures;
Stars abide—
Shine down in the old sea;
Old are the shores;
But where are old men?
I who have seen much,
Such have I never seen.

“The lawyer’s deed
Ran sure,
In tail,
To them and to their heirs
Who shall succeed,
Without fail,
Forevermore.

“Here is the land,
Shaggy with wood,
With its old valley,
Mound and flood.
But the heritors?—
Fled like the flood's foam.
The lawyer and the laws,
And the kingdom,
Clean swept herefrom.

“They called me theirs,
Who so controlled me;
Yet every one
Wished to stay, and is gone,
How am I theirs,
If they cannot hold me,
But I hold them?”

When I heard the Earth-song
I was no longer brave;
My avarice cooled

Like lust in the chill of the grave.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)
American essayist, poet, transcendentalist

*******************

Previous Earth Day Posts
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
****

Previous Daffodil Posts

A Screen of Purest Sky

"People forget that it is the eye which makes the horizon."

You will not remember . . . (Formby Beach, Merseyside, England)
Life is a series of surprises, and would not be worth taking or keeping, if it were not. God delights to isolate us every day, and hide from us the past and the future. We would look about us, but with grand politeness God draws down an impenetrable screen of purest sky, and another behind us of purest sky. "You will not remember," God seems to say, "and you will not expect."

from the essay "Experience"
by Ralph Waldo Emerson (May 25, 1803 – April 27, 1882)
American Transcendentalist, essayist, philosopher and poet

You will not expect . . .(Tulum, On The Mayan Riviera)

FOR MORE ON RALPH WALDO EMERSON
READ THE LATEST POST ON MY FORTNIGHTLY BLOG:

"Through a Glass Brightly"

THE FORTNIGHTLY KITTI CARRIKER
(A fortnightly [every 14th & 28th] literary blog of
connection & coincidence; custom & ceremony)

Through A Glass Brightly

"A very very very fine house . . .


Such a cozy room,


the windows are illuminated


by the evening sunshine through them,


fiery gems for you . . ."


~ Graham Nash

In a section sadly omitted from the final version of his novel, Gustave Flaubert pictures Madame Bovary standing before the colored windows at Vaubyessard. She looks out at the countryside through variously colored window panes in a passage strangely reminiscent of Emerson's colored beads and lenses. Moving as from dream to dream, Emma Bovary looks at the illusion offered by each pane.

Through the blue pane, all seems sad; through the yellow pane everything grows smaller, lighter, and warmer; through the green pane everything she sees appears leaden and frozen. She remains longest in front of the red glass, looking at a landscape that frightens her, until she averts her eyes to the ordinary daylight of a transparent pane.

FOR MORE ABOUT
MADAME BOVARY AND RALPH WALDO EMERSON
READ TODAY'S NEW POST
ON
THE FORTNIGHTLY KITTI CARRIKER: A LITERARY BLOG
OF CONNECTION & COINCIDENCE; CUSTOM & CEREMONY
www.kitticarriker.blogspot.com

Stained Glass Design in Fireman's Hall Museum, Philadelphia

[Above: Custom - made front door, Society Hill, Philadelpha]

Last Day of January Resolution

"Write on your heart that
Today is the Best Day"

I've had this stained glass suncatcher for many years,
a present from my mom, when I was in graduate school.

A month ago, my friend Rebecca Sprigg posted:
"Emerson is on my mind tonight.
Happy New Year friends!"

Thanks to Becky for sharing the following
words of wisdom on New Year's Eve:

“Write it on your heart
that every day is the best day in the year.
He is rich who owns the day, and no one owns the day
who allows it to be invaded with fret and anxiety.

Finish every day and be done with it.
You have done what you could.
Some blunders and absurdities, no doubt crept in.
Forget them as soon as you can, tomorrow is a new day;
begin it well and serenely, with too high a spirit
to be cumbered with your old nonsense.

This new day is too dear,
with its hopes and invitations,
to waste a moment on the yesterdays.”

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)

Earlier posts: QK ~ FN ~ KL
Enough excellent transcendental advice
to get you through the entire year!

Presidents Not Kings

Wish I knew the artist . . . ?
Compare to Currier & Ives
"Star Spangled Banner"

See also:
The White House in 1800 &
Oklahoma: Votes for Women in 1918

Boston Hymn

[Read in Music Hall, January 1, 1863]

The word of the Lord by night
To the watching Pilgrims came,
As they sat by the seaside,
And filled their hearts with flame.

God said, I am tired of kings,
I suffer them no more;
Up to my ear the morning brings
The outrage of the poor.

Think ye I made this ball
A field of havoc and war,
Where tyrants great and tyrants small
Might harry the weak and poor?

My angel — his name is Freedom —
Choose him to be your king;
He shall cut pathways east and west,
And fend you with his wing.

Lo! I uncover the land
Which I hid of old time in the West,
As the sculptor uncovers the statue
When he has wrought his best;

I show Columbia, of the rocks
Which dip their foot in the seas,
And soar to the air-borne flocks
Of clouds, and the boreal fleece.

I will divide my goods;
Call in the wretch and slave:
None shall rule but the humble,
And none but Toil shall have.

I will have never a noble,
No lineage counted great;
Fishers and choppers and ploughmen
Shall constitute a state.

Go, cut down trees in the forest,
And trim the straightest boughs;
Cut down trees in the forest,
And build me a wooden house.

Call the people together,
The young men and the sires,
The digger in the harvest field,
Hireling, and him that hires;

And here in a pine state-house
They shall choose men to rule
In every needful faculty,
In church, and state, and school.

Lo, now! if these poor men
Can govern the land and sea,
And make just laws below the sun,
As planets faithful be.

And ye shall succor men;
'T'is nobleness to serve;
Help them who cannot help again:
Beware from right to swerve.

I break your bonds and masterships,
And I unchain the slave:
Free be his heart and hand henceforth
As wind and wandering wave.

I cause from every creature
His proper good to flow:
As much as he is and doeth,
So much he shall bestow.

But, laying hands on another
To coin his labor and sweat,
He goes in pawn to his victim
For eternal years in debt.

To-day unbind the captive,
So only are ye unbound;
Lift up a people from the dust,
Trump of their rescue, sound!

Pay ransom to the owner,
And fill the bag to the brim.
Who is the owner? The slave is owner,
And ever was. Pay him.

North! give him beauty for rags,
And honor, South! for his shame;
Nevada! coin thy golden crags
With Freedom's image and name.

Up! and the dusky race
That sat in darkness long,—
Be swift their feet as antelopes,
And as behemoth strong.

Come, East and West and North,
By races, as snow-flakes,
And carry my purpose forth,
Which neither halts nor shakes.

My will fulfilled shall be,
For, in daylight or in dark,
My thunderbolt has eyes to see
His way home to the mark.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 – 1882)

More excellent
advice from Emerson:
QK ~ FN ~ KL

And for Presidents Day
2010 ~ Fridge Magnets
2011 ~ Pew #41
2016 ~ Taught to Love Lincoln
2018 ~ Duty to Posterity
2024 ~ Mindfully Mismatched Socks
2026 ~ Presidents Not Kings

Exactly Enough Time

Guardian Angels for the New Year

Advice for the New Year

from Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803 - 1882)
American poet, essayist, lecturer, philosopher,
abolitionist and transcendentalist:

""Dearest scholar,
Stick to thy foolish task,
add a line every hour,
and between whiles add a line."

*******************

from Mário de Andrade (1893 – 1945)
Brazilian poet, novelist, musicologist,
art historian and critic, and photographer:

I counted my years and realized that I have less time to live ahead of me, than I have lived so far.

I feel like the children who won a pack of candies: at first, they ate them with pleasure, but when they realized that there was little left, they began to taste them even more intensely.

I have no time for endless meetings where the statutes, rules, procedures and internal regulations are discussed, knowing that nothing will be done.

I no longer have the patience to endure absurd people who, despite their chronological age, have not grown up.

My time is too short: I want the essence; my spirit is in a hurry. I do not have much candy in the package anymore.

I want to live next to humane, realistic people who know how to laugh at their mistakes, who are not inflated by their own triumphs, and who take responsibility for their actions. In this way, human dignity is defended and we live in truth and honesty, the essentials that make life worth living.

I want to surround myself with people who know how to touch hearts, people who have learned the gentle touch of the soul.

Yes, I'm in a hurry. I'm rushing to live with the intensity that only maturity can give.

I do not intend to waste any of the remaining sweets. I am sure they will be delicious, much more than those eaten so far.

My goal is to reach the end satisfied and at peace with my loved ones and my conscience.

We have two lives; the second begins when you realize you only have one.

*******************

from StoryPeople
by Brian Andreas (b 1956)
American writer, artist, publisher and speaker

Slob Sisters

All Caught Up In The Kitchen:
Homegrown eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes from my husband's garden;
apples from Michigan; citrus fruit from Florida;
Christmas cards up year round!
Pam Young and Peggy Jones are two earnest comediennes, who half-seriously, half-jokingly call themselves "The Slob Sisters."

Their books include:

SIDETRACKED HOME EXECUTIVES
GET YOUR ACT TOGETHER
THE SIDETRACKED SISTERS CATCH-UP ON THE KITCHEN
THE PHONY GOURMET

Slob Sisters or Domestic Goddesses? You decide. These gals really are sisters and they really are the greatest! I love their books and their humor and their advice on life & happiness. Their message covers so much much more than keeping the house running smoothly, though it must be said, they are good at that too!

Pam and Peggy's books help you work your way around and through and out of any number of stupid, fretful, forgetful-making things, freeing up your mind and your time for worthier pursuits. And they know how do it not only with file cards, charts and recipes, but also with references to Shakespeare, Emerson, and William James.

To read more about the Slob Sisters, check out my latest reading list update:
"A Couple of Domestic Goddesses"
on KITTI'S BOOK LIST
at www.kittislist.blogspot.com

Readings for Lent, Easter, and Women's History Month

Handey, Hemingway, Huxley, Emerson,
Steve Jobs, Maya Angelou, Henri Nouwen,
Duo Dickinson, Michael Lipsey,
Nadia Bolz-Weber, and more,
reminding us each in their own ways:
Memento Mori
@The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker

Rembrandt, Stacey Zisook Robinson,
E. M. Forster, Ella Wheeler Wilcox,
depicting the steadfast
Esther of a Thousand Ideas
@The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker

Janeen Koconis, Lydia W. Gaitirira
and many young writers from Kenya, striving
To Create a Space for Women's Creativity
@Kitti's Book List

Burning Bush

First Snow Flakes, 11 November 2013

"Earth's crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God . . . "

from the poem "Aurora Lee"
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning

"So the poet's habit of living should be set
on a key so low and plain,
that the common influences should delight . . . "

from the essay "The Poet"
Ralph Waldo Emerson

***************

I also like the way that in this photograph
the entire heavens are afire with God!

Photo of Dickinson's House by Stan Lichens
In honor of Emily Dickinson's birthday:
Born this day in 1830
[died May 15, 1886]

I posted a few days early this week on
The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker
A fortnightly [every 14th & 28th]
literary blog of connection & coincidence; custom & ceremony

Hope you will enjoy my essay
"Hopefully"

Always Have the Blues a Little

Haiku by Basho
Gravestone at Cedar Grove Cemetery
University of Notre Dame
It seems that no matter the century or decade, whether you're young or old, whether it's a "Melancholy Moon" or a "Melancholy Baby," from cradle to grave, in order to be a properly tormented human being . . .

"You've got to win a little, lose a little,
always have the blues a little. . . . "

******************

A Chain of MELANCHOLY Connections
the following quotations & more on my current post

~~ Melancholy and / or Properly Tormented ~~

@ The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker:
A Fortnightly [every 14th & 28th] Literary Blog of
Connection & Coincidence; Custom & Ceremony

******************

What, after all, is a writer's life without a dose of despair?
from Dear Committee Members (p 68)
by Julie Schumacher

“The world is a hellish place, and bad writing
is destroying the quality of our suffering.”
Tom Waits

“I drank to drown my sorrows,
but the damned things learned how to swim.”
Frida Kahlo

Put on your red shoes and dance the blues
David Bowie

Holly Golightly: You know those days
when you get the mean reds?
Paul: The mean reds. You mean like the blues?
Holly: No. The blues are because you're getting fat, and maybe it's been raining too long. You're just sad, that's all. The mean reds are horrible. Suddenly you're afraid, and you don't know what you're afraid of.
Do you ever get that feeling?

from the screenplay ~ Breakfast at Tiffany's
based on the novel by Truman Capote

After thirty, a man wakes up sad every morning,
excepting perhaps five or six, until the day of his death.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

I never wake without finding life a more
insignificant thing than it was the day before.
Jonathan Swift

"Life is only on Earth. And not for long."
from the psycho - science - fiction movie Melancholia

Primrose Path

"If any of us knew what we were doing, or where we are going, then when we think we best know! We do not know today whether we are busy or idle. In times we thought ourselves indolent, we have afterward discovered that much was accomplished and much was begun in us. All our days are so unprofitable while they pass, that 'tis wonderful where or when we every got anything of this which we call wisdom, poetry, virtue. We never got it on any dated calendar day. . . . Our life looks trivial, and we shun to record it . . . So much of our time is preparation, so much is routine, and so much retrospect, that the pith of our genius contracts itself to a very few hours. . . . The years teach much which the days never know. . . . We must be very suspicious of the deceptions of the element of time. It takes a good deal of time to eat or to sleep, or to earn a hundred dollars, and a very little time to entertain a hope and an insight which becomes the light of our life."

Ralph Waldo Emerson
American Essayist, 1803 - 1882
from the essay "Experience"

Similarly:
"The imagination doesn't crop annually like a reliable fruit tree.
The writer has to gather whatever's there: sometimes too much,
sometimes too little, sometimes nothing at all (115)"

Julian Barnes
British Novelist (b. 1946)
from the novel Flaubert's Parrot
P.S.
Supermoon
Unfortunately, it was so cloudy
that we could see only
the bottom half of the moonrise.

Later that night ~ still hazy.

Solitude & Venus

“It is easy in the world to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great ones are they who in the midst of the crowd keep with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.”
~Ralph Waldo Emerson

". . . in my solitude I have woven for myself a silken web or chrysalis, and, nymph-like, shall ere long burst forth a more perfect creature, fitted for a higher society."
~Henry David Thoreau

More from the Haan Museum Sculpture Garden

Dream For Your Life

Deer in Our Backyard
Photo taken by Ben McCartney, June 2007
"A gentle rain makes the grass many shades greener. So our prospects brighten on the influx of better thoughts. We should be blessed if we lived in the present always, and took advantage of every accident that befell us, like the grass which confesses the influence of the slightest dew that falls on it; and did not spend our time in atoning for the neglect of past opportunities, which we call doing our duty. We loiter in winter while it is already spring."

~Henry David Thoreau


"Be not the slave of your own past -- plunge into the sublime seas, dive deep, and swim far, so you shall come back with self-respect, with new power, with an advanced experience, that shall explain and overlook the old."

~Ralph Waldo Emerson


"We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience."

~George Washington


"You did then what you knew how to do,
and when you knew better, you did better."

~Maya Angelou


"Is willing to accept that she creates her own reality except for some of the parts where she can't help but wonder what the hell she was thinking."

~Brian Andreas


And finally this, from one of my wisest friends, who pulled all the above passages together for me:

"Yes, looking back can be a trap, for me anyway. I like the Serenity Prayer--because "accept the things I cannot change" includes the entire past, through and including five minutes ago. That doesn't leave me off the hook for "changing the things I can." But it saves wear and tear on my nerves and heart to forgive myself for all my decisions, and to remember that given the emotional and other data I had at the time, I made what seemed like the best decision I could, at the consciousness level I had achieved to that point. That's what it is to be human--no crystal ball.

"Having said that, I think it is the ongoing challenge to listen to the "still small voice." That is my spirituality. I don't equate the voice with God. It's more like my own unique and local feeling of happiness and aliveness, in any scenario where I am one of the key players. What will I wish I had done, when the immediate pressures bearing on the situation are no longer there? Is it too much to ask, to be allowed to be true to myself? Something like that."

And to conclude ~
A couple of my favorite songs
sung by Judy Collins
on her CD Trust Your Heart

"Trust Your Heart"
The heart will teach us all we need to learn
We have dreams, we hold them to the light like diamonds . . .
Some we keep to light the dark nights on our journey . . .
The heart can see beyond our prayers
Beyond our fondest schemes . . . Trust your heart.
[emphasis added]


"The Life You Dream"
There's a time that comes once every morning
When you choose the kind of day you will have
It comes in with the sun and you know you've begun
To live the life you dream
You can light all your candles to the dawn
And surrender yourself to the sunrise
You can make it wrong you can make it right
You can live the life you dream.

Lyrics & music for both by Judy Collins
[also on Kitti's List: book blog on "Inner Quiet"]

The picture at top is better, but this one, with the corner of the garage included, gives a better idea of the proximity. Ben took a few at first through the window, so the deer wouldn't be startled. But those shots turned out so hazy, and the deer continued to remain so calm that Ben took the chance of going right outside. As you can see, the deer were only too happy to pose quietly for him!

Ontogeny Recapitulates Phylogeny*

Pumpkins Grown by Gerry in our Garden!

" . . . every pumpkin in the field,
goes through every point of pumpkin history."

Ralph Waldo Emerson
from the essay
"Nominalist and Realist"

I like the way that this one has re-situated itself amongst the oregano!

*Theory of Recapitulation

Gems Forever

"1962 - Boise"
That's my mom's handwriting, perhaps
when she bought the album for my dad.

For more jewel - themed poems and stories
and jewelry box anecdotes
see my recent posts

For July 28th
All that Glitters

For July 14th
Where is Fancy Bred

For June 28th
Choose Dearests, Choose

For June 14th
Diamond Studs Are Forever

For May 28th
Heirloom Jewelry

May14th
Re: Jewel, Rainbow, Splendor

@The Fortnightly Kitti Carriker
A literary blog of connection & coincidence;
custom & ceremony

~ A TREASURE TROVE OF EARLIER POSTS ~
~ family heirlooms, childhood treasures, vintage favorites ~

Jewel Tones
Jewel Rainbow Splendor

Emerald Eye
Emeralds and More

Lucky Talismans
Rovilla Pendant

Jane Austen & Charlotte Bronte
Literary Earrings

Ralph Waldo Emerson:
". . . like a string of beads . . ."

An Ersatz for Happiness
Do You Think It Is? & Philly Eagles
Ring Without End
Kiss Me & Open Hand

Lost & Found
Another Lost & Found Story

Christmas
Interstellar Treasure Box
Shiny Little Star

Dreams Like Diamonds & Journey On

"The Jeweled Books in the Shelves"

Portal to the Divine

"I want to touch water and wood,
other’s hands--everything alive,
so steeped in summer sunshine
and the glory of rebirth."

~ Sister Celine Carrigan, O.S.B. ~

From the Wilds of News Mexico ~ Photo by Joni Menard
My dear friend Joni (since junior high days) shared this perfect photograph and the following kind and inspiring comment in response to my recent tribute to my dear departed friend Celine (since grad school days):

"So when you posted this, Curt and I were on our way to the wilds of New Mexico. I carried Celine's poem, your thoughts, the story with me as we hiked around this beautiful place. I never knew her, but all of this was so strongly on my heart and in my head. I am so grateful Kit. All the gifts. Miss Bell [our favorite 8th grade English teacher; if only we could find her on facebook!], you, and your drawing me in to poetry as a portal to the Divine. You have lost too many dear dear friends to cancer. I look forward to meeting Celine. I really do. Thank you for this. I hiked like I wanted to live. Really live. Like this is the moment to really live.

"My hiking mantra was "I want to touch water and wood" it was so wonderful. It changed everything. I touched them and they touched me. Again so grateful."

A couple of facebook friends referred to this as
Joni's Sound of Music photo.
I was also thinking "Salutation to the Sun"
or maybe Ralph Waldo Emerson!
Let me also take this opportunity to say Happy Birthday to Joni [and her twin brother Terry] who each and every single day lives out the true meaning of worship and adore -- not to mention adorable! Thanks, dear Joni for locating the beauty in every hour and passing that knowledge on to the rest of us who might miss it otherwise. You are a blessing! Best Friends For Life!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

To the read the posts referred to by Joni,
including the rest of Celine's poem,
please click on the following posts:

August 29th ~ All Roots and Reasons

September 14th ~ Ever the Best of Friends

An Experienced Old House

"I want a house that has got over all its troubles;
I don't want to spend the rest of my life bringing
up a young and inexperienced house."
~~ Jerome K. Jerome ~~
English Humorist, 1859 - 1927

"Build a fine house; and now you have a master,
and a task for life: to furnish, watch, show it,
and keep it in repair the rest of your life."

~~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~~
American Essayist, 1803 - 1882

A strip of old wall paper -- a hundred years old? --
that Gerry discovered at the top of our stair case.

Detail

Just one more thing to love about our house!

Another find: wallpaper behind wallpaper
in our second Philadelphia renovation, 2001
(still there behind the drywall)