Slain by the Word?

When you step outside at this time of year, particularly at night, you can't help but notice the scented air.  I notice this every night while letting my cats out and back in.  Lilacs, and all kinds of other fragrant blooms, are in season.  The words "Come to the window, sweet is the night air" keep going through my mind.  It is a line from an old poem called "Dover Beach" by Matthew Arnold.  Many other lines in this poem "slayed" me when I was only a young woman in high school. 

What do I mean by "slayed"?  I mean "hit me in the gut" and captured so much that resonated with me.  As a teenager I read and wrote a lot of poetry.  The stuff I wrote was mostly just the navel-gazing drivel of a painfully shy and geeky teenage girl expressing her angst.  I even dreamed of being a writer, but instead I became a secretary as it was more practical.  I entered and graduated from university as a mature student.

Do you have a favorite line of poetry that hits you like a ton of bricks?  Have you ever had these words inspire a quilt?

Here's a piece of mine, made in 2006, that was inspired by the words "heartbeat of the earth", which came to me from an aboriginal radio station.  Hit me in the gut actually.  So I started sketching, and a quilt called "Heartbeat of the Earth was born:

Heartbeat of the Earth, 2006

There have been other times when a piece has been named with a title or snippet of poetry.  An example is "Vagabond Song" below.  The name is from Bliss Carman's poem A Vagabond Song, which has also been one of my favorites since high school.  It starts with the line, "There is something in the autumn that is native to my blood."  I knew one day I had to make a quilt that expressed this poem, and one day while photographing in Vermont I was stopped in my tracks (literally "slayed") by the most amazing and gnarled red-leafed tree.  It inspired my quilt, which was already named before it was made.

Vagabond Song, 2010

In some cases, a title or snippet of poetry is chosen after the quilt is made.  An example of this is "Kissing Joy" below.  Poppies are so brief and ephemeral that coming upon one is literally like "kissing joy", as described in William Blake's very short poem Eternity:

He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sun rise.      

Kissing Joy, 2009

What brings this topic to mind today?  Well it just so happens that a few days ago I read an article in the Globe and Mail about the serious and funny aspects of travelling with cats.  The writer quoted a line from Farley Mowat's book "The Dog That Wouldn't Be", describing Farley's feelings after the dog's death.  

The pact of timelessness between the two of us was ended,

and I went from him into the darkening tunnel of the years.

Are the words "pact of timelessness" not brilliant?  Hit me like a ton of bricks!  Slayed me in fact.  Will it inspire a quilt?  We shall see ...

Speaking of words slaying us, but not necessarily in a good way, a few weeks ago I had a student in my free-motion machine quilting class that claims she was told by another teacher that she is hopeless at free-motion.  Guess what?  Her free-motion machine quilting looks just like mine did when I began!  I would say there is lots of hope for her.  So we also need to remember how easy we can slay others and their creative spirits with our words. 

 

Kissing Joy

This morning when I looked out the window I was delighted to see that the poppies are blooming. A couple of years ago I finally captured some great photos of them in a way that inspired a quilt called Kissing Joy. The name was inspired by William Blakes verse,

He who binds Himself to Joy
does the Winged Life destroy...
But he who kisses Joy as it flies
Lives in Eternity s Sunrise...

Given the delicate and brief life of a poppy, it seems to me that encountering one, and even capturing a great photo, is a moment when you get to kiss joy.

For the photo below, I set my camera to Macro and placed it right up against the poppy.

Of course on my walk in the garden this morning, three cats accompanied me. Here is Mudgie McMenace doing what he does best!

Johnnie, my retired studio assistant (now that he is blind) ventured into the garden too. He finds his way around by sound now, earning him the name Sonic Johnnie.

Kissabelle was too busy eating grass to raise her head for a photo.

The Summer Day

I know it isn't officially summer yet, but here in Ottawa it is a perfect summer day IMHO! Days like this always make me think of Mary Oliver's poem "The Summer Day". At one time I used to have an inventory of poetry that has inspired me on my website. My website started to become too confusing and cluttered so I removed it. Mary Oliver's poems really speak to me because of her love and appreciation of nature. Here is her poem ... asking you in her last line what you plan to do with your "one wild and precious life"?

The Summer Day
Mary Oliver

Who made the world?
Who made the swan, and the black bear?
Who made the grasshopper?
This grasshopper, I mean-
the one who has flung herself out of the grass,
the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,
who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down-
who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.
Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.
Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.
I don't know exactly what a prayer is.
I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down
into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,
how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,
which is what I have been doing all day.
Tell me, what else should I have done?
Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?
Tell me, what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life?