The secret garden

Flamingo

Flamingo Watching

by Kay Ryan
Wherever the flamingo goes,
she brings a city’s worth
of furbelows. She seems
unnatural by nature—
too vivid and peculiar
a structure to be pretty,
and flexible to the point
of oddity. Perched on
those legs, anything she does
seems like an act. Descending
on her egg or draping her head
along her back, she’s
too exact and sinuous
to convince an audience
she’s serious. The natural elect,
they think, would be less pink,
less able to relax their necks,
less flamboyant in general.
They privately expect that it’s some
poorly jointed bland grey animal
with mitts for hands
whom God protects.

Blossoms

Haiku

scent of plum blossoms
on the misty mountain path
a big rising sun

-- Matsuo Basho

First Fig

My candle burns at both ends;
It will not last the night;
But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends--
It gives a lovely light!

-- Edna St. Vincent Millay

The Swing

The Swing

How do you like to go up in a swing,
Up in the air so blue?
Oh, I do think it the pleasantest thing
Ever a child can do!

Up in the air and over the wall,
Till I can see so wide,
River and trees and cattle and all
Over the countryside--

Till I look down on the garden green,
Down on the roof so brown--
Up in the air I go flying again,
Up in the air and down!

by Robert Louis Stevenson

Fireworks

James Baldwin on Michael Jackson

James Baldwin on Michael Jackson

The Michael Jackson cacophony is fascinating in that it is not about Jackson at all. I hope he has the good sense to know it and the good fortune to snatch his life out of the jaws of a carnivorous success. He will not swiftly be forgiven for having turned so many tables, for he damn sure grabbed the brass ring, and the man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo has nothing on Michael.

All that noise is about America, as the dishonest custodian of black life and wealth; the blacks, especially males, in America; and the burning, buried American guilt; and sex and sexual roles and sexual panic; money, success and despair–to all of which may now be added the bitter need to find a head on which to place the crown of Miss America.

Freaks are called freaks and are treated as they are treated–in the main, abominably–because they are human beings who cause to echo, deep within us, our most profound terrors and desires.

James Baldwin, “Here Be Dragons” (“Freaks and the American Ideal of Manhood”), The Price of the Ticket.

If you believe in the magic of language,
then Elvis really Lives
and Princess Diana foretold I end as car spin.

from Anagrammer by Peter Pereira





Little Mayans, European blondes—
let us follow the route of the thunderbird that
flies before the storm,
Let us toss the ball,
Let us outwit history,
At last, at last, let our game begin,

Eleanor Lerman

Mahalia Jackson

« I sing the LORD'S songs »
(palms once tough to stay alive,
alarm clock on five).

Cinnamon cheeks, Lord,
cornbread smile. SONGS feed your ribs
when you're hungry, chile.

Washboard certainties,
soldierly grace, text and style
in her brimming face.

Your hand on your heart,
her voice in your ear: pilgrim,
rest easy. Sit here.

James A. Emanuel

I want a country

i want a country
let the sky be blue, the bough green, the cornfield yellow
let it be a land of birds and flowers

i want a country
let there be no pain in the head, no yearning in the heart
let there be an end to brothers' quarrels

i want a country
let there be no rich and poor, no you and me
on winter days let everyone have house and home

i want a country
let living be like loving from the heart
if there must be complaint, let it be of death

Cahit Sitki Taranci- translated by Bernard Lewis

The Way of Wisdom

In this vapid, mundane world,
wise men take two courses:
they spend some time with minds
submerged in the fluid elixir of wisdom,
the rest with tender woman
whose breasts and hips enjoy the pleasure
of hiding men's eager hands
in their laps of ample flesh.

Bhartrihari

The Touch Of The Master's Hand

The Touch Of The Master's Hand

'Twas battered and scarred, and the auctioneer
Thought it scarcely worth his while
To waste much time on the old violin,
But held it up with a smile.
"What am I bidden, good folks," he cried,
"Who'll start the bidding for me?"
"A dollar, a dollar. Then two! Only two?
Two dollars, and who'll make it three?"

"Three dollars, once; three dollars, twice;
Going for three..." But no,
From the room, far back, a grey-haired man
Came forward and picked up the bow;
Then wiping the dust from the old violin,
And tightening the loosened strings,
He played a melody pure and sweet,
As a caroling angel sings.

The music ceased, and the auctioneer,
With a voice that was quiet and low,
Said: "What am I bid for the old violin?"
And he held it up with the bow.
"A thousand dollars, and who'll make it two?
Two thousand! And who'll make it three?
Three thousand, once; three thousand, twice,
And going and gone," said he.

The people cheered, but some of them cried,
"We do not quite understand.
What changed its worth?" Swift came the reply:
"The touch of the Master's hand."
And many a man with life out of tune,
And battered and scarred with sin,
Is auctioned cheap to the thoughtless crowd
Much like the old violin.

A "mess of pottage," a glass of wine,
A game -- and he travels on.
He is "going" once, and "going" twice,
He's "going" and almost "gone."
But the Master comes, and the foolish crowd
Never can quite understand
The worth of a soul and the change that is wrought
By the touch of the Master's hand.

-- Myra Brooks Welch

Spanish Dancer

Spanish Dancer

As on all its sides a kitchen-match darts white
flickering tongues before it bursts into flame:
with the audience around her, quickened, hot,
her dance begins to flicker in the dark room.

And all at once it is completely fire.

One upward glance and she ignites her hair
and, whirling faster and faster, fans her dress
into passionate flames, till it becomes a furnace
from which, like startled rattlesnakes, the long
naked arms uncoil, aroused and clicking.

And then: as if the fire were too tight
around her body, she takes and flings it out
haughtily, with an imperious gesture,
and watches: it lies raging on the floor,
still blazing up, and the flames refuse to die -
Till, moving with total confidence and a sweet
exultant smile, she looks up finally
and stamps it out with powerful small feet.

-- Rainer Maria Rilke

Arbole, Arbole

Arbolé, Arbolé . . .
by Federico García Lorca
Translated by William Logan

Tree, tree
dry and green.

The girl with the pretty face
is out picking olives.
The wind, playboy of towers,
grabs her around the waist.
Four riders passed by
on Andalusian ponies,
with blue and green jackets
and big, dark capes.
"Come to Cordoba, muchacha."
The girl won't listen to them.
Three young bullfighters passed,
slender in the waist,
with jackets the color of oranges
and swords of ancient silver.
"Come to Sevilla, muchacha."
The girl won't listen to them.
When the afternoon had turned
dark brown, with scattered light,
a young man passed by, wearing
roses and myrtle of the moon.
"Come to Granada, muchacha."
And the girl won't listen to him.
The girl with the pretty face
keeps on picking olives
with the grey arm of the wind
wrapped around her waist.
Tree, tree
dry and green.

Arbolé, arbolé,
seco y verdí.

La niña del bello rostro
está cogiendo aceituna.
El viento, galán de torres,
la prende por la cintura.
Pasaron cuatro jinetes
sobre jacas andaluzas,
con trajes de azul y verde,
con largas capas oscuras.
"Vente a Córdoba, muchacha."
La niña no los escucha.
Pasaron tres torerillos
delgaditos de cintura,
con trajes color naranja
y espadas de plata antigua.
"Vente a Córdoba, muchacha."
La niña no los escucha.
Cuando la tarde se puso
morada, con lux difusa,
pasó un joven que llevaba
rosas y mirtos de luna.
"Vente a Granada, muchacha."
Y la niña no lo escucha.
La niña del bello rostro
sigue cogiendo aceituna,
con el brazo gris del viento
ceñido por la cintura.
Arbolé, arbolé.
Seco y verdé

Water

Water

If I were called in
To construct a religion
I should make use of water.

Going to church
Would entail a fording
To dry, different clothes;

My litany would employ
Images of sousing,
A furious devout drench,

And I should raise in the east
A glass of water
Where any-angled light
Would congregate endlessly.

-- Philip Larkin.

On Giving

On Giving

There are those who give little of the much which they have - and they
give it for recognition and their hidden desire makes their gifts
unwholesome.

And there are those who have little and give it all.

These are the believers in life and the bounty of life, and their
coffer is never empty.

There are those who give with joy, and that joy is their reward.

And there are those who give with pain, and that pain is their baptism.

And there are those who give and know not pain in giving, nor do they
seek joy, nor give with mindfulness of virtue;

They give as in yonder valley the myrtle breathes its fragrance into space.

Through the hands of such as these God speaks, and from behind their
eyes He smiles upon the earth.

-- Khalil Gibran

A Dream Within A Dream

A Dream Within a Dream

Take this kiss upon the brow!
And, in parting from you now,
Thus much let me avow --
You are not wrong, who deem
That my days have been a dream;
Yet if hope has flown away
In a night, or in a day,
In a vision, or in none,
Is it therefore the less gone?
All that we see or seem
Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar
Of a surf-tormented shore,
And I hold within my hand
Grains of the golden sand --
How few! yet how they creep
Through my fingers to the deep,
While I weep -- while I weep!
O God! can I not grasp
Them with a tighter clasp?
O God! can I not save
One from the pitiless wave?
Is all that we see or seem
But a dream within a dream?.

-- Edgar Allan Poe

Auguries of Innocence

Auguries of Innocence

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.

-- William Blake

Strawberries

There were never strawberries
like the ones we had
that sultry afternoon
sitting on the step
of the open french window
facing each other
your knees held in mine
the blue plates in our laps
the strawberries glistening
in the hot sunlight
we dipped them in sugar
looking at each other
not hurrying the feast
for one to come
the empty plates
laid on the stone together
with the two forks crossed
and I bent towards you
sweet in that air

in my arms
abandoned like a child
from your eager mouth
the taste of strawberries
in my memory
lean back again
let me love you

let the sun beat
on our forgetfulness
one hour of all
the heat intense
and summer lightning
on the Kilpatrick hills

let the storm wash the plates

-- Edwin Morgan

Frankie Manning - Never Stop Swingin'

Watch the entire documentary of Frankie Manning: Never Stop Swinging here on the SundayArts Web site, also to air on May 24th for SundayArts on THIRTEEN.

The documentary features the last major interview of Frankie Manning before his death, as well as precious archival footage of his dancing from the 1930’s to 2009 in New York, Hollywood, Sweden, France, Italy and Singapore. Footage highlights include scenes of Manning’s birthday parties, where he danced with one woman for each year he’d been alive, the legendary dance scene choreographed and headlined by Manning for the film “Hellzapoppin,” and the phenomenal duet with his 76-year-old son, Chazz, himself a professional dancer. Frankie was a born storyteller, with a huge smile and an even bigger laugh.

“Frankie Manning was a man who truly LIVED every moment of his life,” said Julie Cohen, director of the documentary. “Having spent the past two months watching hundreds of hours of footage of him dancing from the 1930’s to the present, I’ve seen the joy he took in every step.”

As a teenager, Manning started dancing in the best venues in Harlem, including the legendary Savoy Ballroom. He became a member of Whitey’s Lindy Hoppers, the energetic, immensely talented group that made the dance a national phenomenon. As a young man, Manning traveled the world, and entertained on stages with Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald and Billie Holiday. The group developed a large international following, even as they fought the racial prejudice that often barred them from sleeping at the hotels where they performed, or eating in the restaurants where their cabaret act brought in big profits.

Frankie’s performances were captured on film in a number of Hollywood movies. His dance sequence in “Hellzapoppin” is still considered the great swing dance number of all time. And it’s not just the oldtimers who enjoy it; the clip has more than million hits on YouTube. Frankie wasn’t just a dancer; he was a choreographer too, although no one called him that at the time. He devised many of the acrobatic “air steps” that made his Lindy Hopping troupe such a huge attraction.

Frankie stopped dancing for a few years to serve in the Pacific in World War II, then picked it up again after he returned home from the war. When the swing dancing craze died down in the 50’s, Frankie got a day job: he worked in the post office for thirty years. Then in the late 80’s when swing came back into fashion, so did Frankie. He was one of the choreographers of the Broadway smash Black and Blue, for which he won a Tony Award. He also did choreography for Spike Lee’s Malcolm X.

Frankie Manning: Never Stop Swinging, is a half hour documentary produced and directed by Julie Cohen, the producer of the hugely popular shows The Jews of New York and New York Goes to War. The program will also feature an interview with Ruthie Rheingold, a 92 year old Jewish woman, who along with her partner Harry Rosenberg made up the only white couple to dance in Whitey’s Lindy Hoppers, and a reunion between Frankie and Ruthie, caught on film.

http://www.thirteen.org/sundayarts/frankie-manning-never-stop-swinging/291

Afternoon on a Hill

Afternoon on a Hill

I will be the gladdest thing
Under the sun!
I will touch a hundred flowers
And not pick one.

I will look at cliffs and clouds
With quiet eyes,
Watch the wind bow down the grass,
And the grass rise.

And when lights begin to show
Up from the town,
I will mark which must be mine,
And then start down.

- Edna St. Vincent Millay

Wild Geese

Wild Geese

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.

Tell me about your despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting -
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

-- Mary Oliver

Homage to My Hips
by Lucille Clifton Read

these hips are big hips.
they need space to move around in.
they don't fit into little petty places.
these hips are free hips.

they don't like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,
they go where they want to go
they do what they want to do.

these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.
i have known them to put a spell
on a man and spin him like a top!

The Red Wheelbarrow

The Red Wheelbarrow

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.

-- William Carlos Williams

Colors passing through us

Colors passing through us

Purple as tulips in May, mauve
into lush velvet, purple
as the stain blackberries leave
on the lips, on the hands,
the purple of ripe grapes
sunlit and warm as flesh.

Every day I will give you a color,
like a new flower in a bud vase
on your desk. Every day
I will paint you, as women
color each other with henna
on hands and on feet.

Red as henna, as cinnamon,
as coals after the fire is banked,
the cardinal in the feeder,
the roses tumbling on the arbor
their weight bending the wood
the red of the syrup I make from petals.

Orange as the perfumed fruit
hanging their globes on the glossy tree,
orange as pumpkins in the field,
orange as butterflyweed and the monarchs
who come to eat it, orange as my
cat running lithe through the high grass.

Yellow as a goat’s wise and wicked eyes,
yellow as a hill of daffodils,
yellow as dandelions by the highway,
yellow as butter and egg yolks,
yellow as a school bus stopping you,
yellow as a slicker in a downpour.

Here is my bouquet, here is a sing
song of all the things you make
me think of, here is oblique
praise for the height and depth
of you and the width too.
Here is my box of new crayons at your feet.

Green as mint jelly, green
as a frog on a lily pad twanging,
the green of cos lettuce upright
about to bolt into opulent towers,
green as Grand Chartreuse in a clear
glass, green as wine bottles.

Blue as cornflowers, delphiniums,
bachelors’ buttons. Blue as Roquefort,
blue as Saga. Blue as still water.
Blue as the eyes of a Siamese cat.
Blue as shadows on new snow, as a spring
azure sipping from a puddle on the blacktop.

Cobalt as the midnight sky
when day has gone without a trace
and we lie in each other’s arms
eyes shut and fingers open
and all the colors of the world
pass through our bodies like strings of fire.

Marge Piercy, “Colors passing through us” from Colors Passing Through Us

Cake Walk into Town

I had the blues, so bad one time
it put my face in a permanent frown
You know I'm feeling so much better,
I could cake walk into town
Honey, I woke up this mornin' feelin' so good,
You know I laid back down again
Throw your big leg over me mama,
I might not fee this good again
My baby, my baby,
I do love the way she walks
And when my woman gets sleepy,
I love the way she baby talks
My work is getting scarce, oh baby,
my work it done got hard,
I spend my whole day stealin' chickens, Honey,
from the rich folks yard
I would love to take a picnic in the country
and stay all day
I wouldn't do nothing but while my blues away
I had the blues so bad one time
it put my face in a permanent frown
You know I'm feelin' so much better
I could cakewalk into town

Taj Mahal

Delight in Disorder

Delight In Disorder

A sweet disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness :
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction :
An erring lace which here and there
Enthrals the crimson stomacher :
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribbons to flow confusedly :
A winning wave (deserving note)
In the tempestuous petticoat :
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie
I see a wild civility :
Do more bewitch me than when art
Is too precise in every part.

-- Robert Herrick

The Oriole

Poems, Series 2 by Emily Dickinson

III. Nature
XIII. The Oriole.

One of the ones that Midas touched,
Who failed to touch us all,
Was that confiding prodigal,
The blissful oriole.

So drunk, he disavows it
With badinage divine;
So dazzling, we mistake him
For an alighting mine.

A pleader, a dissembler,
An epicure, a thief, --
Betimes an oratorio,
An ecstasy in chief;

The Jesuit of orchards,
He cheats as he enchants
Of an entire attar
For his decamping wants.

The splendor of a Burmah,
The meteor of birds,
Departing like a pageant
Of ballads and of bards.

I never thought that Jason sought
For any golden fleece;
But then I am a rural man,
With thoughts that make for peace.

But if there were a Jason,
Tradition suffer me
Behold his lost emolument
Upon the apple-tree.

Frankie and Dawn

Frankie Is Savoy

Frankie is Savoy
Savoy

Behold!
Frankie is Savoy. The bond
Of silence is upon him.
Old
And deep with memories, of slights and scorn,
And trampled on, yet all untamed;
All aged now, yet unbowed, --
The master of the young dance's prime,
Whose rhythms still laugh at Time,
And lifts to heaven the joy of movement,
Rests satisfied upon his fame.

Who shall say:
I taught swing to fly;
And fought abroad to preserve a freedom
I did not have at home,
Give it all up for family and community,
Then returned to teach the world to swing?

Yea, voices mutter about idle comparisons;
Singing of fast feet and celluloid fame,
New-born and known but yesterday.

--"Rhythm in Exile", Eshu Obatala

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