The Important Things

Posted on September 5, 2022 by merrildsmith

Monday Morning Musings:

The Important Things

“But the important thing about the sky is that it is always there.”
Margaret Wise Brown, The Important Book

Under a Van Gogh dawn–

in quiet pockets, that many never see,
deer and turkeys frolic,
have picnics on the beach

^{Turkeys on the Delaware River Beach, West Deptford, NJ}

they are there–
as egret clouds spread their wings
across a river of blue jay blue,
even if unseen

the sunflowers grow and
the honey flows
as light that begins to fade,
but is captured in a golden stream

and apples into it dipped.
Red and gold replace the green
and hawk-chased squirrels taunt and scream
and gather nuts for future dreams,

these are all important things.

Now, we walk–
a moment fixed in time
the past captured in hearts and minds
not knowing what will be, but lives intertwined

despite shadows before us and behind.

^{Tall Pines State Preserve}

All can be lost in a flash of heron’s wing–
but feathers are strong,
even when tossed
and the phoenix rises again from ash,

these are things swept but kept—
the traces of stars, dinosaurs to birds’ song.

Last year on Labor Day we celebrated Rosh Hashanah. With the Covid numbers high, we didn’t gather with family, but we had visited a sunflower festival and had the traditional foods. We also went to a winery last Labor Day weekend, as we did this year—except proceeds last year went to help the people and businesses affected by the tornado that had roared through a few days before. This week we live-streamed a Loudon Wainwright III concert from the City Winery in NYC. (We actually watched the replay the next night.) We saw my sister-niece and her husband live at our house, which was so wonderful that I forgot to take photos, and we went to William Heritage Winery on Saturday. On Sunday morning, we walked at Tall Pines State Preserve, which was full of late summer wildflowers.

Summer Stories

Posted on July 18, 2022 by merrildsmith

Monday Morning Musings:

^{Early morning in July at Red Bank Battlefield}

Summer Stories

1.
Today, the clouds seem unnecessary,
like a rhetorical flourish
they ask questions we’re not meant to answer
about the future, the tense of what might be,
not what is.

2.
I’m frightened by the rabid, purple beast,
the stuff of nightmares—
all in my brain, perhaps,
yet he seems to be whipping the world bloody–
he has no regrets.

3.
The geese, deer, and rabbits feast now
on clover. There are flowers everywhere,
nature is not tightfisted in summer,
but balanced, the growth comes,
so, also the shedding—feathers, fur, leaves, virus.

^{Geese, turkeys, deer, and flowers at Red Bank Battlefield and around the neighborhood}

It might be unsuitable,
but I’ll join you—let’s be festive,
order some wine,
in the shade of the sycamore trees,
we’ll pretend to be offbeat artists.

^{On the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia}

5.
Here the water overflows,
but there is a bridge, a thread
that carries us to the rest of the story
bathed in orange sunlight,
we cross.

I used the random words Jane generated yesterday for my musings today. I’m not certain if these stanzas are all different enough to be a cadralor, but I’ll call it one anyway. This week we walked at Tall Pines on what was a beautiful early summer morning before it got too hot.

^{Tall Pines}

On Saturday, we went to Philadelphia Museum of Art. Since we’re members and can go anytime, we don’t feel like we have to see everything on each visit. Masking was optional, so we left when it began to get more crowded. We did see some fascinating exhibits though. The Elegy of Grief was very moving, the Waiting for Tear Gas (covering protests from around the world at different periods of time) was powerful, and as you might suspect, I love Picture in a Picture. I will write more about that idea another time.

^{Swann Fountain and Philadelphia Museum of Art}

We found a place on the Parkway to eat lunch outdoors (photos in gallery above).

Merril’s Movie Club: In my quest to bring you movies you’ve never heard of, 😏 this week we watched a movie that was a lot of fun, Beyond the Infinite Two Minutes,:

“Café owner Kato discovers that his PC monitor shows what will happen two minutes in the future. Another screen downstairs in his café shows the past of two minutes ago. His friends decide to place the two mysterious devices opposite each other, which creates a loop to see into the future. Naturally, chaos ensues. BEYOND THE INFINITE TWO MINUTES is a delightfully light hearted flick shot in one take about five innocent heartwarming friends who discover the art of time traveling!”

It’s only a bit over an hour. It’s a low-budget movie shot on cell phone cameras (watch the credits at the end). It’s available on Amazon and other platforms.

Frost-Flowers and Spring

Posted on February 14, 2022 by merrildsmith

Monday Morning Musings:

Crystalline, they catch
and scatter light, frost-flowers
on reflected branches, the real
and perceived now conjoined
in stark evanescent beauty

as over-wintered sun
returns, we rejoice to walk
in not-yet-warm, but warmer
light. A tangerine sky,
fades, lemonade gleams from blue sky.

enough to banish
February gloom—too soon–
the white fox clouds and moonless sky,
and so, winter resumes
her sharp blanket laid on the ground—

but still, the birdcalls
begin, no morning choir
summoning the sun, yet bits
of song, the wrens duet
amid jay squawks and crow chatter

high on budding trees,
green tendrils emerge to test
and taste the air, not yet, but
soon, I hear them whisper,
the doves not mourning, woo–love comes

through an unlocked gate.

We had some warm almost-spring days this past week. On Saturday, we took a walk in Tall Pines State Preserve without having to bundle up in winter coats. Then yesterday it snowed, and today it was only 18 F when I woke up. So much for spring. But the days are getting longer, and trees are starting to bud, and the spring bulbs are starting to shoot up their first leaves, at least in the parts of the ground that get a lot of light.

February is birthday month here, both my now grown children had birthdays last week; my mother-in-law and my husband’s birthday are this week. I may have and will do some baking. Today is also Valentine’s Day. When our kids were young, we used to have Valentine-Birthday parties, where they made Valentine cards and crafts.

Merril’s Movie Club: We watched Definition Please (Netflix), an enjoyable movie about a former spelling bee champion and her relationship with her brother and family. It deals with some mental health issues. Not a wow movie, but good, with a strong, touching performance by Sunjata Day, who also wrote, directed, and produced the movie. We also watched Flee (rental from Amazon Prime, also on Hulu, and in theaters). I’m not normally a fan of animated films, but this was excellent. It’s mostly animated, but with some film clips, too—it’s a documentary, a memoir of a man who fled Afghanistan as a young teen, and who is pursuing a career in Denmark. He gradually reveals some painful secrets about his life to the friend who his interviewing him. Highly recommend this one; I really would like to watch it again.

We also started watching Inventing Anna (Netflix), which I’m enjoying so far. I’ve liked Julia Garner in everything I’ve seen her in, though she looks and sounds different here. This Shonda Rhymes show is based on the true story of Anna Delvy, aka Anna Sorokin.

I just remembered this photo of Ricky as a Valentine Kitten.

Circling, Caught, and Bound

Posted on November 15, 2021 by merrildsmith

Monday Morning Musings:

“There are names for what binds us:
strong forces, weak forces.
Look around, you can see them:”
–Jane Hirshfield, “For What Binds Us”

The stars are sleeping beyond the grey
our sun yawning without thought of dawning—
our pale blue dot revolves and spins, and we,

held fast by what we cannot see, bound to
that spin, and to each other

circling like restless dogs, seeking a trace
of affinity

within the infinity of time
and space, magic, grace,
the universe surrounds us

with light. We pass through rays,
scatter spectrums with our beating hearts
then take

a souvenir, hold that light within
carved, like initials on a tree,
a memory of what was, a star–

its dust drifting through our veins
and soaring on soft wings
from sky to earth to tree

^{Robins at Red Bank Battlefield ©️Merril D. Smith, 2021}

caught in the sea of eternity,
lost, found, cherished, bound.

I couldn’t decide what to write about today, so I gave myself a challenge to use the words passing (or a form of the word) and souvenir from the two excellent movies we saw this week, along with some inspiration from Jane Hirshfield.
Passing (Netflix) is a new movie based on the 1929 novel by Nella Lasen. Tessa Thompson and Ruth Negga give terrific performances as the two main characters. The women were childhood friends who meet again by chance in a New York hotel where both are “passing” as white—Thompson’s character Irene temporarily, and Negga’s character Clare who is living as a white woman married to a bigoted White man. John openly declares his hatred for Black people in front of both women. Clare’s reemergence upsets Irene’s carefully composed life and dreams.

The Souvenir is a 2019 movie, starring Honor Swinton Byrne as Julie, a young well-to-do film student who becomes involved with an older man (Tom Burke) who manipulates her, pulling her into a toxic relationship. Early on, he gives her a print of the 1778 painting The Souvenir by Jean-Honore Fragonard, which they also see in a gallery. The painting is based on a scene from Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s book, Julie, a 1761 best-seller. (I didn’t know this when I saw the movie.) Julie’s mother in the movie is played by her real-life mother, Tilda Swinton. So, this is the second thing I’ve watched recently with a mother and daughter playing a mother and daughter. The other was Maid. The movie is the director, Joanna Hogg’s, semi-autobiographical story .
The Souvenir: Part II was recently released.

During the week on a spring-like day we sat outside at Heritage Winery.

Saturday morning, we took a walk at Tall Pines State Preserve. It was a golf course turned into a preserve. The sun was going in and out, but it was beautiful with autumn colors at their peak. After we got home it got cloudy, rainy, and windy. We didn’t see any coyotes or other wildlife other than birds.