{"id":20542,"date":"2018-08-31T10:07:42","date_gmt":"2018-08-31T14:07:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=20542"},"modified":"2018-08-31T10:07:42","modified_gmt":"2018-08-31T14:07:42","slug":"spirit-from-material","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2018\/08\/spirit-from-material\/","title":{"rendered":"Spirit from Material"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Image:<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: “Spirits in the Material World, Plate 3,” by Thomas Hawk; found on Flickr<\/a>, and used here under a Creative Commons license (thank you!). As has happened before, with other photographers, I find now that I’ve used Hawk’s work to illustrate earlier<\/a> posts<\/a> as well as this one. I don’t know how to conduct a search (of almost 1,500 posts) to find all such favorites, but I wish I did!]<\/em><\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n

The Discovery Of Daily Experience<\/strong><\/p>\n

It is a whisper. You turn somewhere,
\nhall, street, some great event: the stars
\nor the lights hold; your next step waits you
\nand the firm world waits—but
\nthere is a whisper. You always live so,
\na being that receives, or partly receives, or
\nfails to receive each moment’s touch.<\/p>\n

You see the people around you—the honors
\nthey bear—a crutch, a cane, eye patch,
\nor the subtler ones, that fixed look, a turn
\naside, or even the brave bearing: all declare
\nour kind, who serve on the human front and earn
\nwhatever disguise will take them home. (I saw
\nFrank last week with his crutch de guerre<\/em>.)<\/p>\n

When the world is like this—and it is—
\nwhispers, honors or penalties disguised—no wonder
\nart thrives like a pulse wherever civilized people,
\nor any people, live long enough in a place to
\nbuild, and remember, and anticipate; for we are
\nsuch beings as interact elaborately with what
\nsurrounds us. The limited actual world we successively
\novercome by fictions and by the mind’s inventions
\nthat cannot be quite arbitrary (and hence do reflect
\nthe actual), but can escape the actual (and hence
\nmay become art).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(William Stafford [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Be pleased yet once again to come down and breathe a soul into the newly formed, fragile film of matter with which this day the world is to be freshly clothed.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Pierre Teilhard de Chardin [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

People of the South Wind<\/strong><\/p>\n

1<\/em><\/p>\n

One day Sun found a new canyon.
\nIt hid for miles and ran far away,
\nthen it went under a mountain. Now Sun
\ngoes over but knows it is there. And that
\nis why Sun shines—it is always looking.
\nBe like the sun.<\/p>\n

2<\/em><\/p>\n

Your breath has a little shape—
\nyou can see it cold days. Well,
\nevery day it is like that, even in summer.
\nWell, your breath goes, a whole
\narmy of little shapes. They are living
\nin the woods now and are your friends.
\nWhen you die—well, you go with
\nyour last breath and find the others.<\/p>\n

3<\/em><\/p>\n

Sometimes if a man is evil his breath
\nruns away and hides from him. When he
\ndies his last breath cannot find the other,
\nand he never comes together again—
\nthose little breaths, you know, in the autumn
\nthey scurry the bushes before the snow.
\nThey never come back.<\/p>\n

4<\/em><\/p>\n

You know where the main river runs—well, for
\nfive days below is No One, and out in the desert
\non each side his children live.
\nThey have their tents that echo dust
\nand give a call when you knock for acquaintance:
\n“No One, No One, No One.”<\/p>\n

When you cross that land the sandbars
\nhave his name in little tracks
\nthe mice inscribe under the bushes,
\nand on pools you read his wide, bland
\nreply to all that you ask. You wake
\nfrom dreams and hear the end of things:
\n“No One, No One, No One.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(William Stafford [ibid.<\/em>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

Solitary reading is luxurious, especially in summer, and solitude in cities is my favorite kind. In Paris, you can look up from your book and see Proust mirrored in the street life, the architecture, the people walking by. Nothing makes you wiser or sadder than reading Proust, John Ashbery has said—his words are so often still relevant, necessary, illuminating, true. One morning toward the end of summer, for example, after everyone I knew had left the city and I sat reading at the same caf\u00e9 at which I’d met friends the night before, half-expecting them to appear again, I reached the final page of Swann’s Way<\/em> and came upon this:<\/p>\n

“The reality I had known no longer existed. That Mme. Swann did not arrive exactly the same at the same moment was enough to make the Avenue different. The places we have known do not belong solely to the world of space in which we situate them for our greater convenience. They were only a thin slice among contiguous impressions which formed our life at that time; the memory of a certain image is but regret for a certain moment; and houses, roads, avenues are as fleeting, alas, as the years.”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

(Deborah Landau [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

Engraving: World-Tree with an Empty Beehive on One Branch<\/strong><\/p>\n

A too beautiful view rejects the mind.
\nIt is like a person with a garrulous mouth but no ears.<\/p>\n

When Basho finished his months of walking,
\nhe took off his used-up sandals,
\nlet them fall.<\/p>\n

One turned into the scent of withered chrysanthemum,
\nthe other walked out of the story.<\/p>\n

It’s only after you notice an ache that you know it must always have been there.
\nAs an actor is there, before he steps in from the wing.<\/p>\n

Another of Basho’s haiku:
\na long-weathered skull, through whose eyes grow tall, blowing grasses.<\/p>\n

They look now into a photograph,
\na scraped field in France, September 1916:
\nmen bending, smoking, gleaning the harrowed rucksacks for letters.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Jane Hirshfield [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “Spirits in the Material World, Plate 3,” by Thomas Hawk; found on Flickr, and used here under a Creative Commons license (thank you!). As has happened before, with other photographers, I find now that I’ve used Hawk’s work to illustrate earlier posts as well as this one. I don’t know how to conduct a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"William Stafford, Deborah Landau, et al., on extracting things intangible from the substance of the real world: 'Spirit from Material'","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[247,1393,250,5,251,4159],"tags":[270,1345,4792,4793,4794,4795,4796],"class_list":{"0":"post-20542","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ruminations","7":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","8":"category-art","9":"category-06_writing","10":"category-poetry-writing_cat","11":"category-essays","12":"tag-jane-hirshfield","13":"tag-william-stafford","14":"tag-pierre-teilhard-de-chardin","15":"tag-deborah-landau","16":"tag-spirit","17":"tag-material","18":"tag-implicit-transubstantiation","19":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-5lk","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20542"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20542\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20550,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20542\/revisions\/20550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}