Watermark

Song to a Coastal Hunter

Trap a white ermine.  Scatter salt
on the snow.  Its tongue will freeze fast. 
Use its pelt for your pillow. 

Draw a deer to its death to blanket
your bed.  Put salt-licks in the forest. 
Wait with your bow. 

Catch a wild songbird.  Sprinkle salt
on its tail.  Cage the bird in your bedroom
to sing you to sleep. 

Hold fast to a woman.  Taste the salt
on her skin.  Leave your sea scent behind
when you go.

 

Carnival of the Cats #45

Featuring the work of
Margaret Krakowiak
[Take your time; it's a long story]

whom I tried to contact for permission
but her email and other site are deceased
so I hope she will forgive me

Welcome to this edition of the fashionable, famous, Carnival of the Cats, a collection of the fluffy, the fantastic, and the fabulous!

Chocolate Cats; Lucky Cats; Cats Cats Cats

The Web has been generous to us this week, offering lots of kitties:

hello kitty,
originally uploaded by qB.

               Edible Kitties

 

Grouchtastic,
originally uploaded by zalgon.

      
         Softie Kitty

Poems, Poetry, Poetics, Cats

My regular readers will know that I rarely talk about my poems, or poetics --  I just post the poems and move on. Last night, in my usual waiting- for- sleep place, I began to prepare a post about The Ledge, and my surprise at its reception; I woke this morning to find that an anonymous and (I think) deliberately illiterate troll had found that very poem (and that spammers had found my GMail address.) So, lots to talk about. But first things first:

• the basement tapes is a new audio blog, an open-mic space for poets, set up by ray sweatman. I've posted one poem there, and will be posting more; if you would like to participate (and please do!) email ray. Go have a listen.

Now, about The Ledge:

Snapshot 26 January 02005

mid-night
in last week's storm
hundreds of ducks

crowded
the curve of ice
along the river

low muttering
a whisper
of wings in water

The Ledge| Audio

Arthur, when he reviewed Watermark, said that his one complaint was too few audio posts.

I keep forgetting.

So here is an audio post of the poem below, with a couple of edits. Doing an audio is a reminder of the importance of reading your work out loud; weaknesses the eye misses are clear to the ear.

[Note: you must have flash enabled to use this feature.]

The Ledge

We sat talking in a cafe in Juneau,
Alaska. The windows were dark with rain,
black sky in the middle of the afternoon.
You told me a story:  a woman

stumbles and falls into an abyss. She
hangs, desperately clinging to a tree
rooted in the cliffside. God!  she cries,
Help me!      I'll help you, God says,

Let go. You smiled and finished your beer.
We left together. Later, we fell apart,
as friends will do; months I wouldn't hear
from you. You left out the part

about the ledge, the ledge she couldn't see,
carpeted with shrubs, just below her feet.

Circle of Labyrinths

Today
Sunday, January 23, 02005

Join us in a
        Worldwide Circle of Labyrinths        
        to commemorate the victims and
        the survivors of the 2004 Tsunami

Photo Gallery

Online Interactive Labyrinth
Make Your Own
Open Spaces| Sacred Places

via Etherealgirl

Do Blog Posts Reflect the Mood of the Writer? You Decide.

Disreputable cats:

      

Weird cats:

      

Dead, but angelic, cat:

All photos linked to original -- thanks lonita, MonkeyFilter, and Look At This.  Entertain yourselves with visits to this week's Carnival of the Dogs and Friday Ark.  Here is the current Carnival of the Cats, but be warned -- this presenter specializes in offensive humor. It is funny, and it is offensive - not for children this time. This Sunday's Carnival will be at Music and Cats, and next Sunday will be here at Watermark.   

May the sun shine on you this weekend!

Create

Rollo May, The Courage to Create

. . . the creative act arises out of the struggle of human beings with and against that which limits them.

. . . transcending can occur only to those who accept the fact of their limitation . . .

Form is not a mere lopping off of meaning that you don't have room to put in your poem; it is an aid to finding new meaning, a stimulus to condensing, to discovering on a more universal dimension the essence you wish to express.

As imagination gives vitality to form, form keeps imagination from driving us into psychosis. This is the ultimate necessity of limits.

Artists are the ones who have the capacity to see original visions . . . We can surely tolerate their special dependencies and harmless idiosyncracies. For we will be better prepared for the future if we can listen seriously to them.