Ask about coffee,
but explore champagne.
Linger at cool marble angels—
live time,
but breath the secrets of ghosts.
Wake and be dazzled.
Look! The stars smile.
Embed from Getty Images
Once again, the Oracle knows.
Tag Archives: Coffee
Shadows Cast
Monday Morning Musings:
“Everything that we see is a shadow cast by that which we do not see.”
–Fortune Cookie Wisdom
Moon music whispers
a lust for life—and light
in the darkness.
Ask—does the sky ache above
seeing death below?
There, like the shadow
that lies black beneath the rose.
***
The power of her voice in song–
now only her shadow sings–
caught on video and audio, sing along–
to “A Natural Woman,” it brings—
memories of a president’s tears,
as now a nation fears
the future filled with tweeting jeers.
He and they try to destroy the press
but those of us who cherish thought
protest. We need the freedom to express
ourselves without duress.
Though the shadow ones know—some are bought—
some are complacent, some complicit–
elicit the illicit.
We sit outside, it’s still summer hot
though autumn hovers in the shadows
and we begin to think ahead, no, perhaps not—
there’s still time to sip wine, dip our toes
into pools or walk a sandy beach
and reach. . .
for love. Seek time with friends
fight the shadows, that lurk around us
and yes, we can’t know how it ends
hate is around, and it’s been ever thus.
It’s a fine line we walk
but we must talk
about the hate we see, it’s been freed
no longer do they lurk in the dark
the white-robed shadows proclaim their creed
of white supremacy–they bark
and parade in the open to dog whistles from above
and we must spark the light, the dove–
she flies somewhere high, beyond this rainy sky
where we walk through puddles on cobblestones
the air scented with summer flowers, and all the whys
float through the air, and do we care about the bones
that lie beneath us
the souls that flit above us
in the shadowed world, we cannot see
we shine a light, where is the door,
where is the key?
In the before,
we look for the after
and the in-between
is still to be seen.
There is no moral, this is no fable
but disaster can come suddenly, coffee spilled
across the table.
A recap of my week. Aretha Franklin died, the nation’s press fought back against 45’s attacks, we drank wine, and we saw the movie BlackkKlansman. Trailer here.
A Break in the Rain
Monday Morning Musings:
It seems to rain from moon to sun
rain over and over, never done
and then a break, till it thunders
again and again.
I feel lethargic and dull
and it’s hard to mull
over this or that—
the people who insist the world is flat,
or guns don’t kill, people do,
except there are more dead kids shot through,
and it seems we will never cease
with hate and violence, the human disease.
But in the midst of death we see the love—
yes, pomp and circumstance, uniforms and gloves,
the fascinators, and the meters-long train
(and the sun-filled day with no hint of rain).
It’s storybook fantasy, mixed with Stand By Me,
gospel choir amid the history and pageantry,
but these two appear so much in love,
and if it helps, gets us thinking of
better things, well, I can take a break
in the coverage of hate, it’s not a mistake
to celebrate love, or a wedding day—
a bit of color amidst the world’s gloomy grey.
Still–spring insists on being seen
and here, the world is turning green,
though I don winter clothes because it’s turned cold
and we go through rain, to visit
friends of old.
We eat Chinese food, laugh, talk over the meal
how we can’t understand the hypocrisy of those who feel
the man in the White House is okay
when they were upset at bare arms and a tan suit,
birthers and ape images, just try to dispute
there’s no racism there,
some very fine people on both sides–but I’d beware.
The next day, the clouds break and the temperatures soar,
everyone wants to get out of doors,
I see a hawk atop a weathervane,
Hawk atop a weathervane at Carpenter’s Hall, Philadelphia
perhaps she’s trying to ascertain
the state of this territory, her domain,
which no doubt is full of tasty things
grown and born in rain and light of spring.
We walk city streets, where life beats
A flirty car
in harmony and patterns, under the blue sky
and birds sing and fly,
and there is so much green and flowers in bloom
filling the air with their perfume,
May in Old City Philadelphia
and it is a relief from gloom and rain,
though I know people are in pain
and children are dead, and women are raped
and the world is shaped
by guns, disease, and violence
and we must break the silence—
but for today, just let me feel the sun and say
nothing but “see the hawk there”
and smell the roses over there.
We see a movie about motherhood and coping
with a newborn and others and life,
sometimes mom’s need an extra wife
or helping hands and people to truly see
beyond the façade, the hyperbole
of motherhood’s joys to the cries and sleepless nights
the clutter and exhaustion—along with the delights.
We drink coffee, walk and talk some more
then it’s home to feed the cats, take care of chores.
At Customs Coffee House, Philadelphia
In the night, my mind wanders and roams
far from home
(Macbeth has murdered sleep)
But in my dreams, I hear the chirps and cheeps,
As the mockingbird sings through the night
and we are fine, it’s all right,
the dawn comes with bird 
choir and radiant light.
We saw the movie Tully, which we both thought was excellent, but I don’t want to give anything away. I’ve seen it described as a comedy. At least not in the modern sense.
I’m reading Jo Nesbrø’s take on Macbeth, set in a Glasgow-like city in the 1970s.
Sorry about the weird formatting and gaps. WP gremlins are still hanging about.
Dollhouses and Doors
Monday Morning Musings:
“We do on stage things that supposed to happen off. Which is a kind of integrity, if you look on every exit as being an entrance somewhere else.”
–Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
“The Heart
has many Doors.”
–Emily Dickinson
Full poem here.
“our home has been nothing but a playroom. I have been your doll-wife, just as at home I was father’s doll-child; and her the children have been my dolls.”
–Henrik Ibsen, A Doll’s House
The heart I’m told has four chambers,
but every chamber must have a door
and so,
blood flows,
love comes, it goes,
the doors of the heart beat open, then close. . .
We go to the theater,
drink coffee before closed doors–
they soon open,
A Doll’s House, Arden Theatre, Philadelphia
taking us to a nineteenth-century
that seems contemporary–
how shocking the play must have been then,
it’s hints of sexuality, as well as the dissolution of a marriage.
We are caught up in others’ lives,
the doorbell rings,
people enter and exit,
the audience gasps at Torvald’s remarks,
feels Nora’s awakening
pauses, then exhales
with “the door slam heard round the world.”
We applaud, then exit, too,
down the stairs
and out into the cold.
Winter folds its icy heart around the city.
We walk and talk
past the ghosts of Christ Church
through another door
to drink more coffee.
I think of doll houses and dolls. . .
Our daughters used to play with dolls and doll houses,
tip-tapping the small figures round tiny chairs and tables
and in and out of rooms
without real doors to open or shut–
but who’s to say it wasn’t real,
a man-doll named John,
a piece of a wooden chair named Pumpernickel,
(we never knew why)
the mini American Girl dolls
they were all real,
weren’t they? At least for a time?
A door opened, unfastened hearts and minds,
as I remember . . .
a doll has no heart,
except for that which is given by love,
or perhaps they create their own hearts
and perhaps they make ours grow
as they enter our lives and exit,
leaving the door ajar for others find their way in.
We open doors,
we close doors
sometimes we perch upon them
never noticing how precarious it can be,
life, opening and closing–
sometimes we carry our hearts right through a doorway,
and keep on going.
I’m told that people can die from broken hearts,
like Debbie Reynolds after Carrie Fisher died,
the heart no longer beats,
the four chambers, silent.
The doors of the heart open and close—
until they open and close no more—
Exits and entrances.
Another dollhouse.
Another doll.
There was also this.
For those outside of the U.S., yesterday was Super Bowl Sunday. My local team, the Philadelphia Eagles won. It was a big deal, and even family members and friends who are not particular sports fans were excited. I made my husband goodies to eat, and sat with him for about half an hour, but I then went upstairs to watch other shows and read.
Dreams, Again (Again)
Monday Morning Musings:
“We are like the dreamer who dreams and then lives inside the dream.”
. . .Who is the dreamer?”
—Twin Peaks, Season 3, Episode 14, From Gordon Cole’s dream
In my dream, I was me, but different
and you were someone else, but you,
together, we were other beings, ourselves, but not–
or were we?
If we lived in that dream world
would we long for a more stable world
where we were people,
bound by time,
not creatures of space,
carried on the slipstream of light waves
We drink wine
talk about the past
think about the future,
the musicians sing
Rocket Man and Major Tom floating in his tin can
his dreams, our dreams
blowing spindrift from space
landing, covering our minds
We celebrate a friend’s retirement
(from teaching, not the world)
his mother says to me she’s happy he’s retiring now
he can still enjoy it
they can travel
live a dream.
we talk with friends we haven’t seen in a while
past, present, and future–
tenses merging together–
remember when I saw you last,
here, but then
(this was the future)
marriages, births, and death–
dreams born and died
or perhaps still floating
drifting from the stars
in tin cans
on waves
We go to a movie
two strangers meet–
a woman who feels she must care for her mother
a man who feels stuck waiting for his father to recover or die
they discuss architecture
and the film lingers on the jewels of Columbus, Indiana
framing the characters in doorways and through windows
it is a movie in which marginalia assumes importance,
just as those asides are often important in lives,
the chance encounters,
the remarks remembered,
the dreams dreamed,
and set aside
we discuss the movie over coffee,
Customs Coffee House, Philadelphia
walk through the streets
and down to the river,
where people walk, living dreams,
where people once arrived,
full of hope
or full of fear,
tired masses,
spices and slaves,
a new land.
We watch movies,
and when we become involved,
we are the dreamers
experiencing their world
true of books, too,
once I dreamt
(a vivid dream)
I was the character in the book I was reading
I rode a horse
in northern England, centuries ago,
I spoke like I lived there,
it was so real
I was sure I had been there,
perhaps I was.
I had a dream I was me, but different
and you were someone else, but you,
a woman and a man
walk over a bridge
it happens over and over again
different timelines
variations on the theme of life
until they meet,
destiny,
they share a bottle of wine
the bottle and label are green
like her eyes
(like my eyes)
other beings, ourselves, but not–
or were they?
perhaps, we are inside the dream
we are the dreamers
we are the dream
© Merril D. Smith, 2017
We saw the movie, Columbus. Trailer here. The more I think about it, the more I like it. Definitely not an action movie. It’s a quiet poem of a movie.
Ghosts From Whistling Space
Monday Morning Musings:
From whistling space
dust swirls and burns
glowing
singing
lighting the universe
reaching shores,
then, like tides
sweeping back to the sea
tumbling again and again
in a wave
a new formation
a new song
a new life born
an old life lived
connected
eternal
We go to the movies
a ghost in a white sheet
views his life
rooted to a place, a home,
a place always there and not
time moves differently for him
and for us, in watching him watching
beautiful, sad, but perhaps hopeful, too
(open to interpretation)
there is much for us to discuss
over coffee, of course,
Pondering
More Pondering
Fortunately, we are not hipsters
and as we walk through a city
filled with old and new
A Path to the Past in Summer Bloom
observing how the seasons alters its look
summer flowers making everything bright and beautiful
the city changes over time
here was once a creek
that grew filthy with waste
a sewer
covered now by grass and trees
bucolic space in urban expanse
expansive thoughts arose here, too
made a nation
Maybe someone should write a musical about him.
bodies buried now
yet ghosts still walk among us
paths that bend in time
we hear their voices whistling in the wind
in the space around us
feel their ideas
(legacies)
ebb and flow
the things they left behind
We take my mom on an outing
away from city ghosts
though they linger in memory,
she talks of her parents
her mother sewed piecework for a time
during the Great Depression
her father was upset that his wife went to work
But she worked in their store, didn’t she?
Yes, but that was different, she says and laughs
her brother, my baby brother, I miss him, she says
he was an active child
always falling out of things—the carriage, his crib–
he fell out of my mom’s bed once
she was supposed to be watching him
he bumped his head on the radiator,
she never told her mom
but, I guess it didn’t hurt him
he lived a good life,
though it ended before my mom’s
and now we share the memory of him,
a ghost living in our hearts
We sit drinking wine, overlooking the vineyard
it’s a beautiful day
we watch families
children playing with a beach ball on the grass
hawks flying overhead
we sit discussing the past and the future
our conversation ebbs and flows
thoughts linger, pause—
and float up into space
We eat Pakistani food at my daughter and son-in-law’s house
their dog chases creatures, real and imaginary
birds whistle and sing,
echoing us,
or do we echo them?
We sit with greenery all around us
then eat cupcakes that look like flowers
My daughter’s beautiful and delicious creation.
(summertime)
I wonder about the people who used to live in this house
and what was it before them–
Field? Farm?
And before that?
Did native Americans walk here
in migrations that followed the seasons
circling round, year after year
ghosts walking among us
watching us
rooted to this spot
waiting for something or someone
waiting for a sign,
a message,
a whistle perhaps
a thought that has floated up
swept up in time
and brought back down again
lighting the universe
We saw the movie A Ghost Story. Trailer here. I think it’s a movie that people will either love or hate. It’s a definite Merril movie, but my husband loved it, too.
We drank coffee at Customs Coffee House at 2nd and Chestnut, Philadelphia,
went to Sharrott Winery
And ate Pakistani food from Mera Khana Restaurant I could eat those vegetable samosas every day!
Sunday Morning Tanka
And after coffee
in a perfume cloud haunting
words explore the joy
like a magic voice, almost
sacred, never away long
The Oracle gave me a Sunday morning tanka. I think it describes my creative process perfectly.
Wake and Embrace, Happy Anniversary
Wake and embrace—
linger for a universe of morning
perfumed with coffee and color.
Picture this,
(my window, see?)
breathe the peace surrounding you and me,
flowering cool green
on velvet words almost to eternity
Today is our 39th wedding anniversary! I’m glad the Oracle came through with something nice, even if she sometimes messes up the spelling.
Yesterday morning we had thunderstorms with tornado warnings, but then the sun came out. Sometimes nature gives you a metaphor. Some of you know I’m past deadline on a manuscript for an encyclopedia, and that I’m now researching and writing a second chapter because a contributor did not come through with something I could use. It’s been quite a storm, but I’m embracing blue skies and velvet words today. 🙂
Coffee and Home
Monday Morning Musings:
“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”
–J.R.R. Tolkien
“Coffee is a lot more than just a drink; it’s something happening. Not as in hip, but like an event, a place to be, but not like a location, but like somewhere within yourself. It gives you time, but not actual hours or minutes, but a chance to be, like be yourself, and have a second cup.”
–Gertrude Stein, Selected Writings
This universe must be home
(has always been home)
I wake warm and comfortable
drink coffee
(always coffee)
live mornings of caramel joy
remember a voice
a smile
cats
celebrate a secret sky waking
I wake to the smell of coffee
a childhood memory,
an adult reality,
a scent wafting through time
am image, too, coffee cups and morning newspapers
spread across the kitchen table
(now joined by laptops and phones),
the table in my young childhood home
lived in the kitchen-dining-den space—
my mother hated it—the space, not the table–
and when I was teen, she, no longer with my father,
bought a house with a separate dining room,
a large, center-hall house with five bedrooms
that became too much for her to keep up with
but it was the house by which my siblings and I later measured all other houses.
In that dining room, my boyfriend, now husband, learned about Sunday brunches
with lox, blocks of cream cheese, bagels, herring, boiled new potatoes, and crusty rye bread–
and on the little enclosed porch we’d sit before a fire late on Saturday nights and drink coffee and consume the treats, fried and sweet, from Dunkin Donuts, wiping sugar from our faces with paper napkins and kisses.
Food and friendship, more valuable than gold,
I eat Vietnamese food with a friend
we laugh and talk
she tells me (I had forgotten) that she dislikes tomatoes
then is surprised to find them in her stir fry,
we laugh and talk
I slurp vermicelli noodles with extra hot sauce
and we sit, chatting and catching up,
her mother’s house, her childhood home, sold
she is pleased that the new owners seem like good people
another family for the house
to imbue it with new dreams,
the old ones will fade from the walls
like night shadows gradually erased by the dawn
We don’t order coffee
though we laugh and talk for two hours,
the restaurant owners, mother and daughter, probably eager for us to go,
but we’re enchanted by the little girl, daughter of one, granddaughter of the other,
eighteen months old
she blows kisses and says good-bye.
A few days later, my husband and I go to a first communion party
the daughter of a daughter of long-time friends
we sat with them every Friday night in their first house
a TGIF Sabbath meal each week of dollar hoagies and beer
we were there when our friend went into labor with the daughter whose daughter
we’re celebrating at this party
where I sit and talk the entire time with another friend, my twin
though her skin is darker, her hair shorter,
we’re twins of the heart
we wear our matching bracelets
talk about another friend who could not be there
but who is linked to us
New Year’s Eve, 2016 We are linked, heading into 2017.
and catch up on news, share photos, her sons, my daughters,
it’s a miserable day, cold and raining, more like March than May
but warmed by friendship
After that, my husband and I travel to my daughter’s house
bringing wine for her and her husband,
we laugh about all the wine we’ve ordered
delivered to our door all in one day in three large boxes
so that the UPS man thinks we’re having a party
we eat Pakistani food with them at a nearby restaurant,
the genial owner recommends dishes,
“We have new items”, he says,
“try the spring rolls, vegetarian.”
They are different from Chinese spring rolls,
delicious, though not as good as the vegetable samosas,
our favorites,
my daughter and I share the platter,
everything is delicious, eggplant, vegetable korma, naan, the goat our husbands have
(I suppose)
“Always a pleasure to see you,” the owner says as we leave,
and we assure him that it’s always a pleasure to visit his restaurant,
and it is, even on a cold and rainy night.
In the morning, a package of chocolate covered strawberries arrives,
a special Sunday delivery,
from my other daughter and her wife,
a thoughtful present,
a scrumptious treat for Mother’s Day
even first thing in the morning.
Later I will talk to her on the phone,
hear about her trip to national parks in Utah
(while they still exist)
learn about her surprising facility for rock climbing
and allergy to Los Vegas
I miss seeing her, but it is good to hear her voice
from across the miles
We have lunch at my sister’s house
where we take my mother for Mother’s Day
Before lunch H. had made a grand entrance,
“Hi, I have to pee and sprints through the living room.”
We later talk about the house she and her husband have fixed up to sell.
It was their first home, bought with an inheritance from my father,
her voice breaks a bit as she describes painting over the clouds in her first baby’s room.
The sun is out, and we sit for the garden for a bit
though it gets windy
My family is goofy and wonderful
I love them
I’ve baked a flourless chocolate cake
because there must be chocolate
and my sister buys, rather than brews, coffee
from Dunkin’ Donuts to have with it,
which makes me think again of those long-ago days
I think of all the mothers and daughters
the houses we’ve lived in
the coffee we’ve consumed
and despite all that is wrong in the world
I’m happy to wake in the morning to my coffee, newspapers, and cats,
to my husband saying, “Can I pour you another cup?”
The joys,
transitory like the flowers that have recently bloomed
but no less beautiful for that
timeless in our memories
the sky has cleared in the morning,
there is a half-moon hanging crookedly in the sky humming a song of hope
I go inside and pour a cup of coffee
a cat settles on my lap
this universe must be home
especially if there is coffee
–and love
Dolls, Ghosts, and Memories
Monday Morning Musings:
“Remember thee!
Ay, thou poor ghost, whiles memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe.”
–William Shakespeare, Hamlet
“but with ribbons
it was spinning Fates conjured,
bewitched by the doll mistress
who knew her dreams.
Whose intention they must spin.”
–Luanne Castle, “For the Doll Mistress”
from Doll God (Aldrich Press, 2015)
The play began,
the first floor of a bed and breakfast,
Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, late November,
every surface is covered with knickknacks,
including American Girl doll Samantha,
and it turns out that Jenny, a guest there,
had a Samantha doll,
who she believed was always angry at her,
maybe is still angry at her,
now that she’s packed away in the basement of Jenny’s parents’ home,
(though Jenny cut out pieces of the cardboard box so the doll could see)
And the innkeeper asks Jenny and her boyfriend,
who are facing problems in their relationship,
she asks them each separately,
if they’ve ever felt that they were watched
as though something watched over them.
(I think of how I don’t like people to watch me
when I sleep. How I’ve been awakened by a gaze.)
The bed and breakfast might be haunted,
(this is Gettysburg, after all)
the Jackson room is sometimes “unreliable,”
(perhaps, so are we all)
Mertis, the innkeeper, mentions
the building was a hospital for Union soldiers,
amputated limbs were tossed out of the windows.
Jenny later meets Genevieve, Mertis’s, blind friend,
Genevieve might be crazy,
she thought she was possessed by the spirit of her ex-husband John,
and John, is also the name of Jenny’s former lover,
(we all know someone named John)
who also has a hold on her,
Genevieve hears rustling sounds that no one else hears—
is it us, the audience?
Mertis admits she’s a bit of a mind reader.
Is she also a witch,
a doll mistress, arranging the scenes for Jenny and Elias?
Mertis winds the clock at the end of each scene,
she closes the curtains at the end of each act, and opens them again.
She lights her “angel chimes,” near the end of the play,
flames cause the angel figures to fly,
there is a final sort of “ah-ha” moment,
did Mertis help bring it about?
Did she know their dreams,
the intentions they must spin?
There is much to ponder in this play,
filled with as many details as the B&B’s room,
It is long, punctuated with silences,
but it does not seem long to me.
We sit, drinking coffee,
and discuss it.
Caffeinated
Customs House Coffee is–of course– across the street from the Customs House Building
The next day, I look for my daughters’ American Girls dolls,
I see Molly and Felicity high up on a shelf
(one of each daughter’s dolls)
Molly and Felicity with Frieda
but no Samantha or Josefina,
I wonder if they are in the attic
then I wonder if they are angry.
Should I find them a new home,
foster parents to take them in?
I think of my son-in-law
who was saved by a couple who took him in,
who became his new parents,
moving behind the scenes,
directing them, providing props,
to make certain he was cared for
before he knew his dreams.
Was it fated,
fated he’d meet his love in a play?
We talk about dolls at my younger daughter’s house.
(ghosts and memories)
She remembers–
she didn’t want to send her Molly doll off to be repaired
fearing her doll might be replaced,
another Molly,
so she kept her Molly,
and cared gently for her fractured arm,
holding it on with a rubber band,
battlefield medicine.
My son-in-law enters the room,
makes an innocent remark,
daughter and I burst into laughter,
laughter that bring tears,
and simultaneously,
sitting across from one another,
we wipe our eyes,
mirror figures,
mother and daughter.
My mother tells us,
when she was a little girl,
sick with diphtheria,
(a ghost disease),
she dropped her doll,
“they” took it away,
wouldn’t let her have it in the hospital,
and she cried for her doll,
and she cried for her parents,
who also were not allowed in her sick room,
when she was finally home,
there was another doll for her,
It wasn’t the same doll,
but. . .she shrugs.
Did your mother make clothes for your dolls?
(She sewed beautifully, I tell my daughter.)
Yes, until my brother was born when I was six.
He was a handful.
He baby brother, now gone,
gone before her.
Ghosts and memories.
I have not been good about reviewing the books my friends have written. But with a play in which a doll was a key plot point, and a discussion of dolls, I thought of my doll-loving blogger friend. Poet Luanne Castle’s writes about many different topics on her blog— including family, history, travel, and cats.
Her book of poetry, Doll God is the 2015 winner of the New Mexico-Arizona Book Award. The poems are thoughtful, thought-provoking, lyrical, and sometimes enigmatic. Do check it out!
We saw John by Annie Baker at the Arden Theater in Philadelphia.
Yesterday and today: Merril's historical musings 