by any other name---

these past two weeks i've been helping one of my students write an essay on helen keller. i've been really inspired as well. both of us have been inspired. writing on and off the essay topic, inspired by the persistence, the strength and the courage of helen keller and the details that surround us, those that we walk past and never notice, and the ones we stop and think about with respect to helen.

we were taking notice of the small details around us -- sight -- sound -- words spoken -- songs -- laughter -- rain -- conversation -- shadows -- with new eyes we saw the sounds and heard the words. the other day at the cafe where we meet i told her just to take a few minutes, look around, and see what was there. next thing i knew, i tried to talk to her and she held up her hand, mumbling something to indicate that i shouldn't bother her. she was very busy scribbling something down. "oooh you're gonna loooove this" she squealed with delight as she was writing. in about three minutes, the 11-year-old girl who came to work with me in september and told me proudly "i hate writing" had written this poem:

What Helen Should Have

the sun on a rainy day,

people in the café,

a look in a good book,

the way the cloud sway,

that’s what i see today. 

then we were on the phone this afternoon finishing up her essay that's due tomorrow and we --sidetracked momentarily-- were discussing the performance of the school play willy wonka and the chocolate factory that she was in last night. she started counting for me, the number of roses she received after the performance,"i got a lot of red ones... and some pink... and-- "

i heard her telling me the colors of the roses, yet underneath, my mind wondered as it was already composing this next bit that i've now finished writing below......




the roses as helen knew, as i hold them in mind.

they were never yellow, never red, nor pink, purple, white or speckled. they were r-o-s-e-s spelled in hand. they were never admired from afar, or on the kitchen table, never seen from the window. they were touched, learned from fingertips and palms, yet as far as i can see...

the smell was as sweet, perhaps sweeter, but more dangerous to the touch-- causing pain without warning, a disguise, enticed, by the pleasing scent above the stem... nature's silent way, to illustrate for helen, to warn, that nothing sweet can be held, can touch without moments of unexpected pain t-h-o-r-n soft petals at fingertips release with the breath of dusk into helen's trusting palm p-e-t-a-l. under her bare feet on the grass, the rose petals tickle helen with secrets as they fall one-by-one but she doesn't notice as the petals fall from her rose, from her fingers to the ground and touch her feet and the toes that hide in between blades of grass, never knowing a color of greenest green, or yellow petals at her feet.

the fragrant petals just fallen in the air faint perfume lingers in her nose, in her fingers that believe they will once again reach out and grasp-- and bring light to her face. she reaches once more, not knowing that what was once there will never be, has fallen at her feet, and thus believing and trusting--  the prick on her finger from the thorn of what remains from the beauty of what was once, of what was just-- of what was lost-- aches, unexpected blood unseen, and sudden movement away from uncertainty, the blood-stained finger and her hand brushes past the bush where red roses grow and the scent turns her head familiar, new, and knowing now, and trying once more. reaching higher this time with experience, for if one reaches higher, with more caution, perhaps the soft scented object of desire will come into hand, gently reaching with certainty-- seen or unseen-- pain will be avoided, not forever, but in this moment.

and not knowing the richness of the iridescent crimson glimpse of that red r-o-s-e she gently caresses in her palm, she knows. bringing her nose, her eyes, her lips, to the open petals that welcome her; and no one hears her laughter, but her laughter, and roses, fragrant vibrations fill the air, and roses are experienced, not seen, their colors are touched, embraced, fallen and held, never peach or violet, crimson or yellow. delicate p-e-t-a-l-s blush with fragrance. laughter paints the roses colors vivid as your presence, feel them bloom in season-- in turn-- in pain-- in palm-- in faith-- unseen lessons love tangible in essence unexpected detail the r-o-s-e as sweet, by any other name---




chantal--raquel--helen

but... by the time- and we-

rush by they and you : same 
never the-- too late-FLASH- : 
-moments are when we--


[haiku cut out from a longer poem i wrote last night, will put the whole thing here shortly....]
x c

 flickr

of course!

"the course of true love... " shakespeare

senior year in college i wrote an essay on shakespeare's use of apostrophes in the title of his play Love's Labour's Lost. the topic and resulting paper were the mixed result of a late night, not having read the play for a long time, a blank page and a looming essay due in the morning, and a fine-tuned ability to write interesting content on obscure topics while somehow in the process discovering meaning and importance in the details of such randomly selected subjects. I do believe that that was what i really learned from being an english major, and it has served me extremely well and in fact enhanced my perspective, understanding and appreciation of the word (ha! typo... i meant to write.. world) ever since. oh and we spent the rest of class the next day discussing the issue i raised of the apostrophe in the title. so perhaps in due course, avoiding one way of looking at things can haphazardly bring about an understanding of something else that's usually avoided (and in this case, i'm directly referring to the tripped over and forgotten, the use and misuse, of apostrophes, haha. but i'm serious...)

but all i meant to write here, was that, staring into nothing across the mess surrounding me just now, my eyes focused in on that very title, the words facing vertically down on the book cover binding: Love's Labour's Lost. and i got it i mean literally through osmosis it momentarily settled my nerves and came over me. and i got it. by shakespeare i got it. i could write that essay again with an entirely different meaning. those apostrophes say it all. they did back in college and yesterday and then again, today, it hit me, and it meant everything, and in the ink-stained hands of time, the touch of shakespeare's pen scribbled on the to do list sitting on my desk in front of me, reminding me that it's all happened before, this is the experience, the process, and in the tradition of his timeless words, the course--

Love's Labour is at times, overlooked; Lost. at other times, it is again found. and at times like this, it is somehow all at once lost, found, running and smooth.






"the course of true love never did run smooth--" shakespeare. of course.

x c

shadows in the distance-- light

we're always meant for goodbye, again.
#sixwords




my poetry blog :: chandeliers on the floor
jerry yoon :: image

flashlight :: flash fiction :: sparks fly

i'm so invigorated by the concept and implications of the 'flash fiction' buzz. though i mostly write 'flash non-fiction' or 'flash reality fiction' or 'flash haiku' the notion surrounding this movement-of-sorts has me excited-- exhilarated-- like the h&m the zara of writing, and i'll take one in every color. now. right now.

.

.

i've been participating in flash fiction via my blogs and especially twitter, and on my down days it's the only thing that lifts me up. i will write more about this later, but for the moment it's keeping me on my toes, with the instant ability to generate inspiration and ideas, create, share and have rapid feedback from generous and talented writers-- i think i've finally found my place.

.

this is just a flash-fiction news flash, i will fill in what i left out in a later post-- right now i've gotta run-- {well gotta get ready in a flash, then run}

.

cok optum-- x c

lovely images :: carla coulson

.

friday

andrew crane paints. he even does art on concrete..
with words and numbers and immense creativity.
i'm excited to check his site every day.
and.. he's a really nice guy.
go! look at his work!!! now!!! x c

it was the silence

can't remember what language

we spoke said it all




{& in response to eni & anyone else who was wondering, unless otherwise cited the haiku, poems, words etc.. on here are my own; in my words and i appreciate - more than you'll ever know - sharing them with all of you}

still thinking about italy!!

alla luna

O graziosa luna, io mi rammento
Che, or volge l'anno, sovra questo colle
Io venia pien d'angoscia a rimirarti:
E tu pendevi allor su quella selva
Siccome or fai, che tutta la rischiari.
Ma nebuloso e tremulo dal pianto
Che mi sorgea sul ciglio, alle mie luci
Il tuo volto apparia, che travagliosa
Era mia vita: ed è, nè cangia stile,
O mia diletta luna. E pur mi giova
La ricordanza, e il noverar l'etate
Del mio dolore. Oh come grato occorre
Nel tempo giovanil, quando ancor lungo
La speme e breve ha la memoria il corso,
Il rimembrar delle passate cose,
Ancor che triste, e che l'affanno duri!

to the moon

Now that the year has come full circle,
I remember climbing this hill, heartbroken,
To gaze up at the graceful sight of you,
And how you hung then above those woods
As you do tonight, bathing them in brightness.
But at that time your face seemed nothing
But a cloudy shimmering through my tears,
So wretched was the life I led: and lead still ...
Nothing changes, moon of my delight. Yet
I find pleasure in recollection, in calling back
My season of grief: when one is young,
And hope is a long road, memory
A short one, how welcome then
The remembrance of things past - no matter
How sad, and the heart still grieving.

g i a c o m o l e o p a r d i

translated by eamon grennan

old words ring new

I didn’t intend on disappearing for so long, but seems I got swept away for a while. Spent the first day of the year with two good friends, even better conversation, bookstores and coffee...if that’s any indication for the new year, I just might keep turning the pages after all.


***

I’ve been reading old Arabic poetry with the Algerian, it’s really good stuff, the kind that rings as true today as it did when the words were first written around the year 800, ever relevant no matter where we find ourselves in this moment and the next. This one in particular I find an interesting thought for the new year...

Let not your tongue mention the shame of another
For you yourself are covered in shame and all men have tongues.
If your eye falls upon the sins of your brother
Shield them and say: 'O my eye! All men have eyes!'
لسانك لا تذكر به عورة امرئ *** فكلّـك عورات وللناس ألسـن
وعينك إن أبدت إليك معايباً *** فدعها وقل : يا عين للناس أعينُ

i m a m a s h – s h a f i ' i


more to come......
bonne année 2009 ♥ c

a saucy moment

So I woke up, glanced at my daily list of blogs I enjoy and my eyes fell on this: "Ne pas savoir à quelle sauce on va être mangé" on Chocolat & Zuccini, the latest in Clotilde’s series on edible idiomatic expressions in the French language. I clicked on it immediately as I knew that this was an expression for me at this very minute in my little, uncertain life, and I thought it was an amusing way to look at my situation, a new and perhaps even delicious perspective.

For those of you that up to this point have no idea what those words means, Clotilde explains it’s “Literally translated as, ‘not knowing what sauce one is going to be eaten with,’ it means that one's prospects are uncertain, not very good, and entirely outside of one's control.”

Let’s just say that in my current situation in life, I simply don’t even know what sauce I’m going to be eaten with. Right now my sauce is definitely a sweet and sour one, or sweet and salty one, and I’m wondering if things will get sweeter, or spicier...((or richer ;))) or perhaps at this point I might be struggling to have any sauce at all!!

She also says it can be used in less drastic situations ((than my life, ha, kidding)) like a first time going to the acupuncturist as she uses in this example, "C'était la première fois que j'allais chez l'acupuncteur, alors je ne savais pas à quelle sauce j'allais être mangé." And I really do find it relevant to our present circumstances, don’t you? Very pertinent.

So I read that and smiled to myself ((before even having my coffee)), because let’s face it, I’m not even sure what recipe to choose these days to begin to make that sauce, or where my spoon is, or if there’s gonna be any bread to dip in the sauce....so I really appreciated this tasteful way of stating what is already an obvious uncertainty at this point in my life, and in many of our lives I’d imagine... donc, merci Clotilde.

"’Je me demande à quelle sauce je vais être mangé’
(I wonder what sauce I'm going to be eaten with).”

Hope it's a good one. Maybe I'll know after I have my coffee.......

A plus tard x c


((Photo by Angie Cao, found it on Tea For Joy’s Typewriter Tuesday))

merci, takk, grazie, shukran, danke, obrigado, hvala, gracias, tack, çok tesekkür ederim, kiitos.......

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving......so many memories from makeshift Thanksgivings past in Paris.......... will write more later.

Ok, I will write more later, but while I’m on the subject (and while I delay getting in the shower and getting a start to my day) I can’t help but relive these infamous Thanksgivings and laugh, because the ‘Thanksgivings’ often involved alcohol and cold cuts. We did have real live Turkeys running around (ie my amazing Turkish friends haha canim!), as well as a smattering of languages (Sssanksgiving), crazy pictures, countless questions “what do you do on Sssanksgiving other than eat??” ((Uuh..chai pas..)), and more noise into the early hours of the morning than all of my former Thanksgivings put together...

I look at pictures, and it seemed so simple then, sharing a meal with friends. But the complexity of it hits me only now, I suppose I’m still digesting all of it, the lifelong connections we were forming over meals and conversation when we all stepped from our separate lives in our own countries, into tiny apartments in old buildings on small streets in Paris; where the warmth and friendship that we found inside was real enough to hold on to even as we walked away, that we were able to take with us on trains and planes, across oceans and deserts, that we shared in languages of our own while learning those of others.

And all in all, what I remember most today is a feeling of friendship and the buzzing of music, languages and laughter, of excitement and just being together. We were so incredibly lucky to have those cold cuts in each other’s company, literally from all corners of the earth, Turkey (wouldn’t be Thanksgiving without it), Norway, Brazil, Ireland, Bosnia, Jamaica, Sweden, Austria, Colombia, England, India, Germany, Egypt, France (ya we let a few select frenchies in!), Italy, Mexico, Morocco, Canada, Finland (oh ya, and just a few, well-behaved Americans, lol)... stuffed like a turkey into 40-meters-squared apartments filled with warmth and laughter.

I would give anything to have a real Thanksgiving like that again. I'd even settle for a Sssanksgiving. Now we’ve all gone in a million different directions, but we can’t seem to forget one another.. and every Thanksgiving, I think of all of you, and I miss you and I smile at the pictures and memories (and yes laugh at stupid things I may have done..) and am sincerely thankful for all of you who touched my life, and continue to do so......and here’s to another Thanksgiving together again, one day soon........
Merci, takk, grazie, shukran, danke, obrigado, hvala, gracias, tack, çok tesekkür ederim, kiitos..

thanks guys x c

Songs of the past become present

Often, for me, music can document a certain moment in my life, take me to a place, rekindle a feeling, envelop me in a season or an entire period of my life.

I was sitting in my favorite café the other day (not the below-mentioned one on rue du Commerce, but my favorite family-owned café back here in California) and a Björk song was playing. When I came home I started playing all of my Björk songs over and over, and moments of my life that I hadn’t thought of for years came back to me in a matter of seconds.

Back seven years, to the student Foyer on blvd. St Michel, summer in Paris, sometime in my first two weeks after moving there, listening to Björk non-stop in our room, dark wooden furniture and a nice big window; past and present blur in the words of the songs that meant something to me in those days, and do, once again, slowly overwhelm and reminded me. Words that described for me the first step I’d take on the cobblestone streets of this new life. Speaking new words, feeling different passions, different fears, my heart beating to a foreign rhythm. She sings to me the preliminary touch of sentiment for the boy I’d never forget, a chance meeting at a corner café my second night in Paris that changed my life, (the very one who became my touchstone, my dwelling, for the next seven years of my life) the words speak to me now of fortune beyond currency and understanding beyond language, of possibility and fate, and of the pain that comes with loss and the steps (both forward and back) that follow, and the people who carried you through...and sang you another song, and helped you find your voice, to sing once more, as you never thought you would.

“It’s not up to you, oh it never really was...”

I hear myself struggling to get a sentence out in French, or to have a conversation on the phone, and worse, the bright turquoise Alcatel cell phone we all had, about the size of my shoe, and the vocab lessons we got from the voice on the mobicarte recharge recording, words I distinctly remember repeating after the voice over and over like disponible, valable and aucun, we’d actually try to repeat the phrases she said on the recording, “vous avez 70 F (soit 10,67 EURO) de crédit disponible.” I’d listen to Björk during métro rides to my classes, across the Seine, past the Eiffel Tower, sprinting for the RER B, and arriving inevitably late to class in the Foyer at St Michel. It’s a Paris that made me nostalgic for Paris, even the following 4 years I was still living there, because in these first few months, it was new, fresh, romantic, the Paris that opened my eyes and swept me away; it was only the beginning... and yes, a few Björk songs brought all of this back to me, and more.

“Unthinkable surprises, about to happen...but what they are...”

There was a definite Björk period in my life, started in senior year of university (University of California at Santa Barbara) I can literally see myself studying for finals with Amy listening over and over to a Björk CD on my Discman (remember those Discman things? I left mine in Paris with a boy who actually appreciated it for his long métro rides to boulot and foot...)

Yes the Björk period traveled with me into Paris, along with my friend Amy (or mon amie Amie as they understood her name in France), and we followed Björk all over Paris, trying to get into private, sold-out concerts, running to FNAC the day Vespertine came out, even though we already had a bootleg copy, just to have the European release, listening to it on my laptop while we studied (studying again, but this time in my chambre de bonne in Paris), standing in line with hundreds of others at the FNAC Champs Élysées very early on a cold morning to get two coveted tickets, and just minutes before approaching the ticket counter learning a new French vocab word...complet.

I did get a picture of the back of Björk walking up the stairs entering the small gothic chapel La Sainte-Chapelle for her intimate concert, and finally, on the day of her sold-out concert at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées, in the posh neighborhood of avenue Montaigne, we bought two tickets, au noir, for an obscene amount of francs (I still to this day, have not done the conversion) and later that night, had the most amazing view worth every centime, front-row balcony, close to the stage, perfection.

Björk songs carried me through the first six months of my new life in Paris, but were somehow lost en route to and from late night/early morning dancing and socializing and music on the radio, when watching the sun rise on the Champs Elysées became a common occurrence and not just the place where we’d waited in line one cold morning for Björk tickets.

“I wake up and the day feels, broken..I tilt my hat, I’m trying to get an angle”

As far as I’m concerned hearing songs from another time is almost as good as a photo album, in terms of bringing back images. But then again, as I sit here with my photo album now on my lap, I realize that in my mind, my outfits look slightly better than they really, as captured forever on film, did at the time.

“Coincidence makes sense, only with you...”

Yes, I hear the songs that meant something to me then, and somehow always will, that sang to me of a world I’d yet to know, and words I sing now, in the same language sounding distant, and familiar, that remind me of what is possible, and will with certainty, mean something different to me, once more, when I sing them again, tomorrow.

“If you leave it alone, it might just happen...anyway.”

Bonjour mademoiselle

Many of the most memorable parts of my first year in Paris (2001) were spent on rue du Commerce in the 15th. When I saw the above photo from Carla Coulson’s new book Paris Tango, I immediately felt as if I was walking past my corner café on rue du Commerce, 22 years old and loving every moment (yes, the honeymoon phase, with my rose colored glasses I couldn’t see the future struggles and frustrations intermingled with the bread, cheese and views of the Eiffel Tower...still blind to the bureaucratic intricacies that are as French as champagne... mais non, those stories were for a later date).

Nearly every day we’d meet in the café, where my dear friend K and I had befriended the French waiters. We only understood (in our broken French) the name of one of them, Pascal. Pascal called me la princesse and was amused by the fact that I was always smiling (or at least, I think that’s what he said...my French wasn’t so good, but I smiled my way through it..apparemment). They’d wave at us as they scurried about with their trays of drinks, and from across the street they’d call out "bonjour mademoiselles" as we passed the café on the way to the métro.

On the eve of our devastating departure from Paris (I did, in fact, move back to the very same corner of Paris eight months later) we made chocolate chip cookies for the waiters (my secret weapon in Paris -- my cookies á l’américaine) and sat with them to have a final drink in our café. When I did move back the following year, the wait staff had changed, but I still heard the echoes of Pascal and the other friendly waiter and found myself looking over across the street, always expecting to see one of them rushing out the door with a tray and a charming wink and a nod, bonjour mademoiselle.

So an american & an algerian walk into an asian bagel shop..

Today the Algerian and I went to a bagel shop, (one thing I can hold over all my friends in Paris..easy access to bagels, though I’m not even in the habit of eating them anymore..) and straight after four hours of reading ESL (English as a second language)-approved books and practicing vocab with me, he asked the young Asian girl behind the counter, “what’s in that egg sandwich?”

“Egg, cheese, and chai” she responded.

Rather surprised, he asked, “chai? like, tea?”

She smiled all-knowingly shaking her head, “noooooo, chai..chai..it’s like onion” then she giggled about his mistake and smiled at me, as if we shared a secret.

“Oh,” I paused, “chive.”

“Ya” she giggled again and said it slowly, still trying to teach him this new word, “ch-ai, it’s onion. Some people say scallion.”

He looked at me still confused and said, “j’ai compris chai.”

“Ya, moi aussi,” I smiled, non-verbally reassuring him that I’d heard what he’d heard.

“It’s chive, chi-vuh” I couldn’t help but smile, saying it to him slowly and perhaps mocking her previously exaggerated repetition of “chai” for him.

“Chi-vvvvve. It’s fine” I said shaking my head to him “just get it, it’s good.”

Still very confident in her knowledge of onions, she began to prepare his egg, cheese and chai bagel.

“This is a ‘salami’ situation,” I told him, and we both laughed at the ever-present, often oblivious contention between foreign egos competing in accented English.

He worked in a café two years ago just after moving to the States. The owner of the café was a Korean woman -- I’m still not sure how they managed to communicate.

One day, she asked him to make her a cappuccino “and put it in a salami.”

I never even witnessed this, I’ve just relived it ever since, with countless reenactments done on my behalf.

And he tells it: “and I asked her, a salami? and she tells me, ‘a cappuccino in a salami, yes’ so I stare at her, I know what this is, salami, but I didn’t know how it goes with cappuccino, so she gets very mad that I don’t understand, and walks over and grabbed a mug holding it in my face like, I can’t believe you don’t know this, ‘a salami’ she showed it to me like I’m stupid, ‘sa-la-mi’ and I was like, oh, you mean, ceramic?”

“And she still looks at me like I’m crazy, like finally you understand English, ‘yes that’s what I told you, a salami.’”


...Just a hunch, but I’m thinking my recent decision to tutor in English and writing (to all students, btw, not just the international crowd) was a clever one. I’m sensing some English courses and tutoring sessions are needed (though, perhaps not admittedly so!) somewhere out there in, as our governor Arnold so proudly refers to his state, Cal-eeifor-neei-a.

But anyway, stories like this just make me laugh, and reminisce, as I’ve been the brunt of them countless times through my linguistic struggles in France, dealing with inadequate r’s.... But, whether you prefer cappuccino or chai, these words and moments keeps life interesting...and keep us chuckling in every language.